#well abuse implied but we know what sally did

[violetren]

Controversial opinion but, Gabe's level of crappy was well adapted actually.

I think the fact that the maintenance guy felt the need to apologise to Percy because Percy had to go into the house with a freshly annoyed Gabe, and the fact that Percy "my mother is more important than the gods" Jackson was surprised that Gabe has been answering her phone implying that its a breach of privacy and not a thing Sally would normally allow if is she knew, and just a few other things in general do work well as subtext that Gabe can be a lot worse than we got to see of him so its weird for me seeing everyone be like "idk man its probably gonna feel bad when the medusa him like the books, he's just kind sucky."

Like it's a live action disney show made for CHILDREN, there are a lot of things they are never going to get away with showing. Like showy domestic abuse. Violence only flies if its fantastical or if it is in small doses by people in the same peer group, like kids fighting kids, adults fighting adults. There isn't as much wiggle room as in say animation where its easily stylised to be less confronting, or in text where its all theatre of the mind.

Just because a lot of the original fans of the series are adults now doesn't mean the show was made for us, and would go in on those darker themes. It was made because its popular children's franchise that has the potential to get a whole new generation of viewers, they aren't gonna get by today's ethical standards for a children's show by making Show!Gabe more overtly like Percy's descriptions Book!Gabe.

Also do you know what actions we get from like the dozen or so lines we get of Book!Gabe at the start of the story when you strip away Percy's internal monologue about how awful he is? We get an entitled man child who sits on his ass playing poker for most of the scene and cares more about having cash to gamble than Percy or Sally's happiness. A loser who is placated into leaving the scene and becoming irrelevant by being offered food he likes.

So no, we didn't see him asking for Percy's change from the cab fare but we also didn't see Percy get a cab. And no, he didn't make some shitty comment about the money for the trip coming out of Sally's clothes money, but we did get him answering Sally's phone without permission and telling Percy he better take his shoes off in the car implying that Gabe sees his boundaries and belongings as sacred whereas theirs aren't. Gabe was only ever just kind of a pathetic jerk who had to prompt his so called friend twice for the guy to get in on jeering at Percy so honestly it makes sense that a modern version would only play online because he wouldn't have the charisma or attitude to get an in person table.

Book!Gabe only seemed more hardcore because we had Percy's internal monologue adding layers that couldn't have been put into adaptation without adding an extra 10mins of run time or using a voice over technique that wouldn't mesh with the rest of how they have constructed the show and would have come off as cheap. And arguably even with the internal monologue the only reason his death still feels justifiable as an adult is because we've been steeping Percy's (aka the heroic audience surrogate protag that our young minds all latched onto) satisfaction at his death in nostalgia for almost two decades.

So yeah, he seemed pathetic and kinda manageable in the beginning, but the reason abusers can be so prolific is that a lot of the time they do look pathetic, or manageable, or if you're especially unlucky they can even seem charming, and attentive, right up until they aren't.

For the adults and older kids that know the character that means we know what he is under that pathetic facade, for those that don't some red flags were dropped, and for the kids he's just vaguely a jerk compared to Sainted Mother Sally Jackson and that might be enough of a hand wave when they have much cooler fantasy shit and other characters their age to be more busy sympathising with.

Obviously we don't know how things will play out, maybe because they "scaled him back" they'll drop the medusa statue approach. Maybe we'll get flashbacks or conversations about Percy growing up that will show Gabe's more sinister side to justify it happening anyways. Maybe we'll see nothing but when Percy and Sally will arrive home and Gabe will blow up at them for having to sit through the big game alone and without his sandwich completely ignoring that they were missing for over a week beyond how it inconvenience him, and make it a moment of self defence. Maybe it will be played for cheap laughs or a cheaper girl-power™ moment.

My point is for what the show is and who its aimed at, Gabe was an acceptable level of crappy, and its too soon to make a judgement call on whether he deserves his book death since we don't know if they'll have scaled that back to match his new incarnation. It was funny and felt kinda like justice in the books, but it wasn't a major plot point, it was just a loose end being tied up. They could end the season evoking much of the same emotion just by kicking him out of the apartment with nothing but his wrecked car and a sandwich that doesn't even have peppers in it.

#chirping wren #pjo #gabe ugliano #disney percy jackson

[takaraphoenix]

PJO Episode 1 Thoughts

Spoilers ahead, huh.

Positive things first:

I love that Percy draws, and draws pretty well (for a 12 year old). I don't remember him being an artist in the book series? But the idea of him coping with his strange monster visions by drawing them is a nice addition.

Sally is a treasure, the actress brings such a motherly warmth to the role.

I loved Sally sitting in the rain with that expression on her face, you could feel the yearning for Poseidon. Never really got the "still hung up on Poseidon"-vibes in the books, but I still loved that moment for how well it was conveyed.

I do think that Grover is perfectly cast. That kid embodies the anxious and nervous energy I want from my Grover.

For very obvious personal reasons, I will be cherishing and including the fact that Percy plays Mythomagic from hereon out.

And, on that same note, I wonder what's up with the di Angelo name-drop. Maria is dead, her kids are in a magic casino, so is this just completely unrelated to our di Angelos and a bit of a wink wink nudge nudge, or is this actually going to pay off once we get to the di Angelos...?

I did love the "Why is there half a goat in your pants?" line and enjoyed the whole "getting to camp/expositioning" scene. It had the needed dramatic gravity. And Sally making Grover swear an oath. I liked how it was all played, enacted and written, it bodes well for the dramatic moments in the future.

Also the credits are stunning. The art, the designs. Honestly made me feel a lot of disappointment that we didn't get a cartoon adaptation of PJO, because I do still think that would have been a more fitting medium for this.

Now here's the things that bothered me:

Considering that this was episode one, titled "I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher", the vaporizing was... not very central to be quite frank? She jumps him in broad daylight, one stab later she's gone. A little bit of a chase, more of a confrontation, to make this seem a bit more significant, would have been nice.

Also damn, the gaslighting of a 12 year old hits way harder when it's live action and with actual kids, than when it's written in a book.

My biggest problem so far: I hate, hate, hate what they've done with Gabe. I hate it. They neutered him so hard.

It's been a couple years since I read the first book, but I remember how utterly uncomfortable Gabe made me. I know this man abused Sally, and it was always implied also Percy.

But this man? Is... just a pathetic loser. He lets Percy completely walk all over him, he gets pushed around by Sally. I remember the "I'm borrowing your car"-scene from the book, because it was a tense scene, because it didn't feel like a given, but this...? This was just... pathetic. That's the only word I have for it.

The character of Gabe Ugliano is so formative to Percy pre-series, and the way they changed him to make him look silly and non-threatening is... frustrating.

I honestly had no idea who got cast for Chiron, that one somehow went fully past me. I think the actor is... a little old. He has the warmth that Chiron needs, but with his 76 years he brings it more in a grandpa way than in a mentor way. Chiron should have been in his 50s, if pushing it in his 60s.

And while I did like the dramatic weight of the parting scene, I also do think that... Sally's sacrifice is... less heavy than in the books? Like, they stand there and yap for minutes, while they could have just gone ahead and been safe at camp in that time, and then Sally dies and Percy and Grover still just stand there and watch instead of going to the safety of camp. It felt very avoidable...

#PJOTV #PJOTV Spoilers #PJOverse #Phoe Watching PJO #S01E01 - I Accidentally Vaporize My Pre-Algebra Teacher

[equalseleventhirds]

thinking so hard abt the characterization of lily in 'letter from juniper' and her diary that anna finds, vs the characterization of her in what she did to thomas, vs the characterization of her in the flower shop au where she seems to still be alive but either participated in or did not stop mabel being kicked out of the family, and 'my last name is martin *snooty french accent* martin, if you listen to my mother' and what that means for a girl who 'looks a bit like an aztec statue' to have a mother like that

mabel real mabel didn't rly know her mother much, but we have......... clues.

#mabelblogging #perhaps once she was young and innocent and made the mistake of sacrificing love for love #but CERTAINLY by the time she meets thomas she is selfish and cruel #was it because she knew she would die on the hill? or was there something else? #something she learned from her mother; something she learned by being a white woman in the world #(we know sally was an 'old white bitch' we know mabel's indigenous mexican ancestry is from her father #it's possible lily was mixed but.... clues. 'martin'. etc.) #letter from juniper makes me FERAL but considering who lily became as an adult #are we glad she did not leave with juniper? are we glad juniper left her faithless love to die? #(or would juniper have been just as bad? or would going with juniper have changed her? #'you have to leave it all behind and i can keep you safe' #would the king stop his punishment for broken promises if she would only leave it all behind? #her mother the house her place in the world? i wonder i wonder) #(it's abt ur parents and who they once were vs who they are to you etc etc. sometimes.) #dysfunctional family cw #abuse mention #well abuse implied but we know what sally did

[percabeth4life]

What’s ridiculous is I see people saying that Annabeth just misinterpreted things based off what we see in TTC, and that Mrs. Chase was right to keep her separate from everyone else. The logic is that since she cannot see divine things, she’d have no reason to believe Annabeth and that the monsters would only be after Annabeth, not the others, so it’s like quarantining a child with chicken pox to keep the others safe, but if she can’t see the webs, she wouldn’t see the monsters either and wouldn’t have a reason to think the boys are in danger, so that argument is useless. Also, Annabeth was 7, a literal child; when her stepmother married her father, she implicitly agreed to raise Annabeth with him, and even if she couldn’t see the webs, she should’ve comforted her stepdaughter from the nightmares, it’s the responsibility of the parent to calm their child down and tell them that they shouldn’t be afraid as the parent will protect them. Mrs. Chase didn’t do this, and didn’t even believe Annabeth about the nightmares, saying she was seeking attention (she’s 7, and misses her dad. Maybe Mrs. Chase should’ve stepped as a parent, like the title of stepparent implies). Also, maybe she changed by the time TTC rolled around, but abusers pretend otherwise in front of others, and both Thalia and Percy would know this, since they both had abusive parental figures in Gabe and Beryl, so it’s wildly OOC that both of them would be totally chill with the Chases. Thalia and Percy would be the first people to remind Annabeth that if she wants this, they support her, but if anything happens, she can call them immediately; Sally would let Annabeth stay with them (even if Percabeth didn’t happen, anyone who thinks Sally wouldn’t love Annabeth, her son’s best friend along with Grover, like a daughter didn’t read the same books I did) and Artemis would let Annabeth chill with the Hunt long enough for her to go to camp or find someone to stay with for the school year, if Annabeth doesn’t want to be a Hunter. Thalia and Percy would be civil while asking for help, they need help badly and the fate of their world depends on them being able to free Artemis along with Annabeth, but neither would actually trust them or like them. Also, WTF was up with Frederick melting her weapons as an experiment; it worked out well enough, but he could’ve damaged the metal irreparably and Annabeth would’ve been screwed. Like, Annabeth left those weapons in case she came back and needed them, and he melted them down, meaning Annabeth could’ve come in lethal danger seeking a weapon, and would’ve had no weapon to defend herself. He potentially risked his daughter’s life and safety on a science experiment.

I hate people excusing Annabeth's abuse, it was a real genuine thing that was bad enough to make her run away, not once but twice (maybe three times if you count SOM). So like- her family is not at all okay.

#pjo #percy jackson #life answers #annabeth chase #anon asks #tw abuse #anti frederick chase

[littlenahsstuff]

Sally Mckenna x Reader

A/n, geez this took me forever to actually get out. Not reread so I'm sorry but hope you still like it. Also I don't know how to do the friggan read more thing so... sorry again.

WARNINGS: implied death, implied abuse, sally being possessive, unhealthy relationships, sexual reference. Uhhh yeah plz read at ur own risk.

It's a wonder to many how Sally ended up with a girl like you. Sally was a wrecked soul made of ash and fire and the gasoline lighting it and tears and pained laughs. You were a hopeful wanderer made of soft kisses and poems and snowflakes and pretty fragile flower petals and innocence. Or maybe sweetness. Even though, you were a rabbit and Sally, a fox. Possessive and cunning over her prey.

You met when you went to the Cortez to get away from your past, from the people who hurt you, from her. Truth was you were terrified of anyone and everyone and... well she said she could protect you. You believed her too.

***<>***<>***<>***

"Hey babydoll, why ya crying without a drink in your hand? After all, your at the bar and clearly because you don't want to be alone in your room," she spoke husky and blunt. You were awfully shy and you spooked easily.

"Oh I just, I'm not usually one to drink. It makes you do things," you whispered, still not meeting the ladies face. Your twiddling thumbs were looking awfully nice to you right now.

The truth was she was right, you didn't want to be alone. Not after the year of being alone with her. Though, the alcohol only served to remind you of her more, it was the only place you could go with people who you don't know. With people.

"Aw, that's okay. But c'mon I'll keep you some company, only if you let me buy you at least a little liquid courage. We can't have you being this shy with me the whole night," she ended her bargain with a deep chuckle. It was startling how quickly you agreed to her.

So making your decision you let out an okay and decided you should know what this person looks like at least.

Upon your scan of her you figured out 5 important things. 1. This woman was crying earlier and you knew because her eyeliner smudged and dripped in tracks. 2. She was wild. This was given by her frizzy blonde hair that looked as dead as her, yet so alive. 3. She had an odd sense of fashion that complimented her too perfectly. Her leopard print coat and older dress told you this one. 4. She holds more emotion in her brown eyes than in anyone else as a whole that you've ever seen. The fact that even with the immense amount of depth in them, you could still see a twinkle in the depth of them, shocked you. 5. She was and still is the most beautiful person you've ever seen and she's trouble.

"Okay, sure. Thanks," you exhaled. And thus you two were forever in each other's debts. For you both were never alone after that day.

***<>***<>***<>***

"Hey sweets," you called out into room 64, "I brought you something!" You always felt bad for leaving her so you ended up getting her things that reminded you of her. This time it was a new guitar. Sure it was a little expensive but you didn't mind, you practically lived at the Cortez now and for almost free.

You, of course, know that Sally is a ghost and that she can never roam farther than a few steps out of the Cortez. It breaks your heart that you can't take her with you to explore the world you couldn't before but you just have to. Your ex never let you, so having a job and getting to actually do things was something you thought you would never be able to again. Yet here you are.

One problem, Sally doesn't like it either. It doesn't matter how many gifts you give, she just wants you. Her approaches aren't nearly as rough as your ex when she wants you to stay and she would never be too harsh with you. Or so you believe.

Sally had been plotting this night forever, she was gonna ask you to die tonight and stay with her forever. She needed you here. She needed you to stop leaving her.

Of course you were her precious angel and she understood that you loved exploring, but she could never shake the sense that you were too eager and would get yourself hurt or worse, killed. Then she would be alone forever again. She couldn't be alone and she had to make sure you stayed with her. So even if you didn't know better and wanted to still go out despite the danger, she had precautions in place to keep you safe.

So, this night had to be special and romantic. She had made your favorite meal, despite not being a master chef. She had set up a romantic scene in your room and it. Was. Perfect.

How could you say no after this?

"Hi babydoll. I made you dinner, your favorite Y/N," she appeared next to you. You made a slight jump, but collected yourself when you saw it.

"It's gorgeous," you gasped. Your eyes marveled at the candlelight, neat placement of the silverware, and your absolute fav dish on the table.

"The best for my babydoll," Sally smirked, kissing you on the cheek. You twiddle with your thumbs again.

"I'm sorry," you suddenly spoke, eyes downcast. Fear shot through your spine and your thoughts raced. Did I forget something important?!

"Hey, Y/N, look at me. I know that look what's wrong?" Sally's tone was soft and she added some comforting rubbing on your back to ease you.

"I- Did I forget something? I know your birthday's not today or our anniversary or-did we make plans? I can't remember. I'm so sorry, I promise I can do better," You said meekly and decidedly.

"Oh," Sally's heart broke. She hated when you got like this. So stiff and afraid if herself and all because of her. "Babydoll, I just wanted to do something special for you. Dont worry everything's gonna be just fine."

"Well..." you paused, relief had worked itself through you, "Thank you so much, this is so lovely. I love you so much Sally. I um, got you this," you handed her the new guitar.

It was light weighted and had a darker wood, practically perfect to Sally. At least... that was until she gazed upon the not so delicate etching in the side. Sally & Y/n 4ever. A message not long forgotten to her. You meant it too.

You made a deal that when you were ready, you would kill yourself to be with her at the Cortez. Till death do we not part, you had joked. It would be a day when you would at least be no younger than 30, you were 24 now.

So today was not that day. Or rather tonight.

But it didn't make the phrase any less emotional for Sally. Despite the agreement. So with shaky hands she reached out for the instrument.

"I love it baby," she whispered from her messily painted lips. Her fingers brushed across each copper string. They plucked one by one at it, each ringing out with the vibration. It was out of tune but surely nothing she couldn't fix. You must have gotten it at a pawn shop. Usually ones elsewhere come pretuned.

Relief flooded over you as you saw the smirk snake upon the ghost's lips. She did like it, good.

"Well as much as I would like to play this baby. I think you might be a little hungry, it is 10. Can't have my meal without her having hers first Y/n." Sally smirked at the way your cheeks went aflame.

"Okay," you whispered, looking at the table and sitting down. The ghost followed suit.

With a click, warmth was made from Sally's cig lighter.

Candlelight brightened the both of yours faces, adding a yellowish tint. This tint was especially viable upon Sally's pale face and the shadows stood in stark contrast, formed from her chiseled cheekbones.

They could cut you.

Knowing that Sally is impatient at times and was highly receptive to others actions and expressions, told you that briskly, you should tuck in. Boy did you tuck in.

The first bite was pure bliss. Enough so that a moan was let out and you craved more from the first touch to a tastebud.

Sally watched as pleased as can be. You liked her food, it was praise that came from your reaction and because of that she's happy.

The second bite happened after of course and this one tasted oddly different. Not bad, but as if it was bitter.

Then Sally ate, she chewed with a hum. Of course eating wasn't necessary, but anybody except some anorexics can appreciate the taste.

She then sputtered a giggle, "Too much parsley, oops." It explained it, it's why it was so bitter.

Then silence as food was enjoyed. The atmosphere was tense with a question wafting through.

Fortunately, Sally exudes so much emotion in that slim frame of hers that you didn't have to wait long to be asked it.

"Will you stay with me?" She asks. Oh dear. Again? Is this why she made me this?

"Of course, I would never leave you for someone else." It's stated firmly but calmly. She needed nothing else.

"No, I mean stay with me, forever... as a ghost babydoll. Tonight?" She clarifies with hesitation. Breathing gets harder a bit, not too terribly but enough to feel as if something's stuck in you esophagus.

"I, but I thought you wanted me to experience stuff?" You croaked. You wanted to cry, because you thought there was more time.

"You have, but I think that now you know life without that much pain, you can stay here. It's not a safe world out there, just like it was with them. I wanted to have you see that. You just haven't," she explains. You think.

If this is what she really wants...

"And besides we can live together. It's not like there isn't anything here. I always moan and groan about it but I could be stuck somewhere worse and with you here it would be p-"

"O-okay," you decide. You sound like a mouse and the tears have only been growing.

Sally stops, not expecting that. She thought you would have said no. She made a grave mistake.

"Really?" She asks dumfoundedly.

You nod slow and with a slight twitch as a sob wrecks you silently. "Yes, but only the way I want. I want to be killed by myself. It's my decision. It's my death. I don't want anybody taking it away, not even you Sally."

Sally really messed up now.

"Oh god." You mistake her statement as happiness that she doesn't know how to deal with. So you take it as agreement to your terms.

Thus you move upward out of your seat to hug her and that niggle in your throat itches, getting worse. The headache brewing ever since eating is tenfold what it was. Bile is a sickly fiend approaching up way your throat.

Pain seeps through your innards to your mind. Pain wracked your bones and breaks your heart. Pain.

The table you gripped was no longer there, causing clenching on nothing but wind while you tumbled down onto the floor, your foot snagging on the chair leg as well.

"Oh Babydoll no," Sally wails, making sure you can't see her, but can feel her presence and hear her voice. She's ashamed and you realized she did this.

That wasn't parsley that tasted bitter.

She's smarter than she looks but blind as well. You would die for her at this hotel and she couldn't see it.

So she had to make sure you would regardless.

You layed there with sorrow and betrayal. She took the one thing you never got, freedom of choice. It was never about protecting you that you held onto. It was that she would honor you. What they didn't do.

She broke fine china, already so fragile and yet handled with improper care still despite it's value.

The etching on the guitar served to mock.

Sally & Y/n 4ever

#sarah paulson x reader #sally mckenna #sally mckenna x reader

[byorder-fanfic]

A Ghost Walked Through the Door

Summary: Anna Gray has been looking for her brother for a very long time.

Word count: 2637

Warnings: Mention of foster care and children taken from parents, swearing, implies abuse from Church (nothing explicit) and implies homelessness/ rough childhood.

Author’s Note: In the show, Anna’s age is all over the place so I’ve decided that she is a year older than Michael (born in 1902) because I really like the older sister dynamic. Hope you enjoy xx

Anna stood outside the wooden gate, staring into the typical country garden: green grass (that surely would've been vivid in any other season but the grey winter) that stretched as far as she could see, and slap bang in the middle of it all was the little brick cottage. The fire was lit. Perhaps he was there, the person she had been searching for as long as she escaped the boat. Perhaps this was it- the day she found herself. Her shaking hands did not reach to open up the gate. Not yet. The rusted old car of Jack Low's had clunked its way down the dirt road many minutes ago, leaving behind a trail of smoke and her. She was lucky she had found someone to drive all the way to the front gate, and Jack was quite kinder than she'd expected when she saw the white-haired bloke. It was because of the fur lining her throat and wrists, the newly gained winter's coat showing off a majesty of wealth she did not have. If Jack had noticed the thick chunk of mud clinging to the bottom of her leather boots, or had he clued on to her makeup less face behind her slick bob and fringe, or even saw the dimness of the plastic beads as she rolled them between her calloused fingers, he hadn't asked. Thankfully. Maybe Michael would- he'd probably be impressed with her finery, especially if the farm life was all he knew, and then he'd probably be a bit disappointed with how she acquired each luxurious item.  Finally, her hand (pale and shaking with more than nerves- why hadn't she taken Alberta's gloves that she'd had her eye on?) pried open the gate with a creak, as she walked into the garden. The sound of her quickening breath thrummed in her ears as she kept on going, heels clacking and tangling in the field. She made it to the door. Laughter boomed inside- could it be Michael's? Eagerness overcame her as she rapped on the door, politeness replaced with loud booming knocks that scraped her already bruised knuckles. The voices quieted, a quick "I'll get it!" from a woman. Michael's foster mother, perhaps, would she let Anna see him? The weight of a knife in her pocket proved that hypothetical pointless. Heels tapped closer. And closer. And- the door swung open, Anna's heart nearly burst. She was a portly woman, a warm smile on her face as she observed the girl with evident surprise. "Hello there, can I help you?" She asked kindly, hand still on the door frame. "Yes, please." Her eyes flickered behind her, where photos lined the walls, but she couldn't make out the one face she needed. "Are you Mrs James?" She nodded, yes she was. Another breath fell from her, a smile curling on her lips. The nun hadn't lied, then. "I'm looking for Mich- Henry, I mean. Henry Johnson. Your son, I believe." The other name still seemed so wrong on her tongue. Mrs Johnson's face fell, sadness and suspicion souring the woman's once kind expression. "It's Michael Gray now," she spat out. "Those Shelby bastards took him back to Birmingham with them." Anna breathed in deeply- her entire family was reconciled, all but her. Surely, if they found Michael, that meant they knew about the documents. Fuck. "When was this?" Her voice was meek. Maybe she could stop any real damage before it was done, stop Michael and her mother from mourning a girl still alive. "Two years ago," she said in a solemn voice, her eyes growing glassy. "Why?" "I'm Anna Gray," she stuck out her hand. Mrs Johnson hesitantly accepted it, eyes wide again in shock. "I'm looking for my brother." "Don't." She shook her head. "Those Shelbys are the devils, dragging my boy," she paused, "my Henry, into their Peaky Blinders nonsense. Your Michael...he isn't that boy any more." "He's my brother," she said, trying not to feel too offended at the disgust directed at her cousins. "He's all I have." "Very well," Mrs Johnson conceded, although obviously still disapproving from the look in her eyes. Motherly, Anna would call it, if she even remembered what having a mother was like. "They live in Watery Lane, Small Heath. Everyone there knows them, so just ask for directions." "Thank you!" Without entirely thinking it through, Anna pulled the older woman into a quick hug, pulling away when she felt her tense. "And thank you for looking after my brother all these years. It's good to know he had a good woman taking care of him." She couldn't call Mrs Johnson a mother, although she knew from the grief in her tone and photographs still hung up, that she was exactly that. But her mother was still alive- her loyalty was to Elizabeth Gray, first and foremost, even if she felt pity for this woman here. Just as Mrs Johnson had said, directions to the Shelby's betting shop (now Shelby Company Limited, she was impressed to hear) were easy to come by. Although she was getting odd looks from the men in uniform caps and coats, who were obviously comparing her clothes with that of most Small Heath citizens. Her years of searching were finally over and yet she couldn't find herself to knock on the bloody door. Or even walk down the bloody street. She loitered around the Church, not daring to go in, but not straying from its sight. The rosary in her pocket was wrapped loosely around her battered fist, as she uttered a silent prayer. The nuns and priests from the orphanage had jaded her to all things Christian, but this was a gift from Peggy. The good Catholic girl that took one look at the girl on the streets and decided to befriend her. Well, friend wasn't exactly the right word. She felt a burst of courage at the feeling of the wooden beads now, the crucifix hanging on the end of it no longer bringing vomit up her throat. "Oi, you there!" She jumped at the accent. It wasn't Brummie, sounding closer to Isabela's voice: another girl that friend wasn't the right word for. She looked at the boy, who was lighter skinned that Isabela, and wore the same cap and coat of many men in Small Heath. However, he himself couldn't have been older than Anna. "You coming in, or am I allowed to lock up?" "I'm just leaving," she said. Her voice wasn't from Burmingham either, immediately making the other boys eyebrow to shoot up in suspicion. She didn't really have an accent, just a blend of all the places she'd been and all the people she'd ran from. Despite her statement, her shoes stayed firmly on the path. Michael and mum were just a walk away, and she was stuck outside the Church as the boy faffed with the keys.  "So," he came up behind her, tilting his head. "Just leaving anytime soon, or...?" He had a smirk on his face and a teasing glint in his eyes, that immediately took in her appearance with curiosity, stopping at the rosary. "Just getting courage," she held up the beads before putting them back in her pocket, tapping over it to make sure it was safely in. "Whatdya need courage for?" He asked as he lit up a cigarette, standing stationary besides her. "Need to get to the Shelby betting shop," she shrugged her shoulders, hoping that'd get Church boy to stop asking. She hadn't missed the almost fearful nature her family was spoken in. But not Michael, of course- her Michael wasn't a Shelby. "Oh, really?" The boy put the smoking cigarette in the corner of his smirk. "Cause I'm just going there." She groaned internally, knowing this meant she actually had to go. "Alright," she snapped. "Could you show me the way?" "Course," he held out his elbow like he was a gentleman. Anna didn't stop her self from rolling her eyes as she took it, with only a little smile. "I'm Isaiah Jesus, by the way." "I'm Sally." Only the nuns ever called her that, in an attempt to pacify the girl screaming for her mother. Everyone else called her Anna, and Sallyanna if she was in trouble. "No last name?" "You'll find that out soon enough." For someone who seemed so talkative, Isaiah sure knew when to shut up. "Alright, Ms No Last Name," Isaiah teased as he held open the door, gesturing for her to go inside. "Here we are: Shelby Company Limited's very own betting shop." She was slow as she walked in, head turning to the pale pink wallpaper and the floral sofa. A cross hung up on the wall, alongside a number of Biblical quotes. There was a double set of doors, painted green, that were thrown open. Inside, a crowd of men and woman sat as numbers were called out, typewriters clicking and Peaky Blinders smoking. Isaiah walked past the frozen Anna, welcoming into the shop with cheers of greetings. "Hey there Isaiah!" One boy yelled. He was round faced and freckled, taller than everyone else and skinny as Anna was behind her thick coat. "Who's that you got with you?" "Sally here wanted to come to the betting shop." Isaiah gave a shrug, revealing that was all he knew, as he sat on his desk. Three men looked up from the table: one looked a lot like the skinny boy that had noticed her, but older. Not Michael. The other was broad shouldered and intimidating, with a moustache. Not Michael. The third man had hair as dark as Anna's, with the bluest eyes. But Michael had brown hair, and hazel eyes.  "And why do you want to be here?" The blue eyes man questioned, voice cold. She recognised the three vaguely, mind scanning for facts she once knew as well as the sky was blue. "Tommy?" She asked, eyes squinting, then she pointed to the other two. "And you must be Arthur and John, then." She didn't heed the curious glances as she stepped further in, head turning around to the people staring at her. "Finn, I'm gonna guess, although I never really knew you." The freckled boy had a shocked look on his face, as he turned to Isaiah in a "who the fuck is this" kind of look. "So, where's Michael?" Her voice was stern as she looked around again for the brown hair she only barely remembered.  "And why the fuck do ya wanna know that?" John, Anna thinks, stood up, arms folded as he watched her scan the room. "I've been looking for him for fourteen bloody years," she cocked her head, seeing a light flicker in the blue eyes of her cousin. "Now tell me where the fuck Michael is." Suddenly, a door opened, two sets of shoes walking through as they muttered to one another.  "Mum, there's abso-fucking-loutely no way I'm gonna do that," a voice said as he walked into the betting shop. The round face she remembered had sharpened out, his skin tanned (probably from the farm) in ways she knew her pale skin would've had she gotten onto that boat. His mousy brown hair was tidily gelled up, a smart suit on his broad build. He didn't walk in it like he stole it, she noticed proudly. His hazel eyes widened as he looked at her. The woman at his side was frozen too, watching the betting shop's sudden pause. "Who is this?" The woman snapped, dark eyes falling on Anna. She had the same dark hair, although hers was longer and in curls, and their eyes were just the same. No one could answer for her, and she seemed too absorbed in the two figures in front of her to bother with formalities.  "Anna," Michael's voice was barely a whisper, but is shattered everyone. Next to him, Polly trembled, pale skin suddenly whitening as she started to draw the same comparisons to the baby she had held what felt like a life time ago. "Hiya Mikey," Anna said in the same soft voice she'd use when they were little. She opened up her arms. "You too old to hug your big sister or what?" In a second, her brother fell into her, arms wrapped so tightly around her torso that she thought she was going to suffocate. If the fur on her coat was itching his face, he didn't seem to mind as he pressed his face against her neck, tears spilling from both of them. "I missed you so fucking much," she croaked into his ear, not daring to look up to her mother's broken face, or her cousin's undoubtedly confused faces. "I thought you were dead." Michael sobbed a little, pulling her closer as if to check she was real and not just the ghost Polly used to have nightmares about. "They said you were dead, gone to fucking Australia so I couldn't even see you." "I didn't even get on the boat, Mike. Couldn't leave. Not with you in England." They finally broke away, as Anna allowed her rough hands to wipe away the tears on her little brother's face (not so little anymore) and giving the biggest smile she'd ever worn for the longest time. "Been looking for you for years, been from orphanage to orphanage trying to find Michael Gray. Turns out that wasn't even your fucking name." "You were looking for me?" Michael's voice was an echo, sadder and on the verge of more tears spilling. "Course. Wanted to find you so we could come back home together." She took a dramatic turn of her head, grinning. "Although you didn't seem to share that sentiment, huh?" He tried to chuckle a little, shyly wiping off tears and snot with the sleeve of his probably expensive suit. "Went all the way to the fucking countryside only to be told that I had to go all the way back to Small Heath. Honestly, couldn't have waited a few years for me?" Her teasing tone was second nature, a whisper of the what was. "Bus fare wasn't cheap, you know?" Not that she used the bus. Or paid, with her own money at least. Still, it got another smile on his face as he hugged her again, letting her breathe this time. "Anna?"  The broken voice was enough to get Michael to back away, falling by his sister's side to allow Polly a proper view of the much longed for daughter. "No, it can't be, I thought- they said...but...you were alive this whole time?" She barely whispered, shaking the dark locks of curls with her head. She took a few strides forward, lifting her hand. Despite the great comfort she felt in the woman's presence, she flinched at the sight of the manicured nails being bared. Ever so gently, Polly placed her hand (too cold for comfort, but Anna had felt colder) against Anna's cheek. Bringing another hand slowly up to pull back the dark fringe that covered her forehead. Like this, she could see her wide eyes that had once looked so big on her bald head, the little pout that would tremble when John took her toys, the curves of her face that were so like Michael's, and her dark eyes that could only be Polly's. "My girl, my Sallyanna." "Mum," Anna smiled as she fell into her embrace, letting the woman hold her like she should've done for the last fifteen years. There was no tears this time, just soft smiles and tight arms clinging to each other like she had done when the coppers came knocking. Only she was grown now, and she wouldn't let them take her from her family ever again.

#Peaky Blinders #peaky blinders fanfiction #peaky blinders fanfic #anna gray #sallyanna gray #anna gray fanfiction #michael gray fanfiction #polly gray #polly gray fanfiction #Isaiah jesus #finn shelby #tommy shelby #john shelby #Arthur shelby #mrs johnson #peaky blinders fluff #michael gray

[couldnt-think-of-a-funny-name]

how would you do a percy jackson adaptaion?

okay, so I know this is a controversial opinion right off the bat: I really don’t think it should be an animated series.

A large part of the appeal of the series is that it’s a fantasy series set very very firmly in reality. Literally, apart from the camps, you could go to every location hit in the books. Riordan mentions specific streets, buildings and landmarks, and that was cool when I first read them. I remember being a kid and waiting for him to set a scene in a place near where I lived! I remember trips to New York and being able to envision an epic war happening in the streets. So I think any adaption needs to be live action just to keep that same feeling alive, while I’m not knocking on animation, I just feel like taking the story out of real life would make it loose a little of the charm. Like, the scene where Manhattan is completely frozen in time? It would be haunting to see that in real life, but I feel like it would be less impactful if it didn’t…you know…look real? The series should be done in a way that makes you truly feel like you could just turn a corner and walk straight into a snake woman going about her day. 

Now: another large part of the appeal of the series is how funny it is, but a lot of that…is Percy’s inner monologue. He doesn’t actually voice most of it, there was even a book where Annabeth described him as being quiet. So, I think the best way to work around this: make it Interview With A Demigod. 

Imagine it’s got an interview with a vampire-esque setup- and this even works because within the riordanverse, the books canonically exist because Percy sat down with a ‘camp scribe’ and had his quests recorded. So, like, this isn’t even entirely out of left field. But just imagine, a college-aged, maybe a little older Percy, I can see it so clearly in my head, he’s wearing a sweatshirt that at first glance looks like it says NYU but a trained eye will see it actually says NRU for a camp jupiter easter egg, he’s sitting in some dinky little diner (maybe it can even be a monster donut or something with a clever greek myth related name) with a guy who’s recording the conversation on some old-ass tape recorder that keeps acting up but they can’t record on a phone because of the whole technology thing. Every now and then it’ll cut back to them to get some great Percy thoughts out there. They open with older Percy saying the ‘look, I didn’t wanna be a halfblood’ and then explaining where he was when the whole mess started. Once he get’s to “was I a troubled kid?” the screen fades from older Percy to 12 year old Percy getting in a fight with Nancy and her gang, and the voice over says the ‘Yeah, you could say that’ part as we see him get threatened by the principal to behave on the field trip. Boom, we’ve got an opening. Lowkey….I’m seeing Jordan Fisher as older Percy, but I’m not 100% married to the idea. 

And before anyone tries to argue that showing an older Percy would spoil he’s not gonna die in last olympian- like, reading the books, we all knew he wasn’t going to die. It was a first person narrative and he was consistently speaking in past tense lmao like we Knew he was gonna make it. We still enjoyed the series. It won’t ruin anything.

I want part of the score of the adaptation to be instrumental versions of songs from the musical, I think that could be a sweet nod to that team. 

They really need to nail camp halfblood. I know that goes without saying, but in order to keep the pacing of the story decent we can’t spend as much time falling in love with it like we got to with the book. The book is like, 24 chapters and the quest starts at chapter 12- for a movie or tv show, that’s just gonna feel like it’s dragging. So, the insanity of the camp needs to smack you in the face right away, and then it needs to endear itself to the viewers quickly after that. Don’t try to ease the viewers (or Percy) into the mythology is real thing, rip it off like a bandaid. He’s on his way to meet Chiron and Mr. D for the first time and even if he’s not comprehending what he’s seeing, there’s nature spirits and harpies all around going about their day. Hestia waves at him and then disappears into the flames. Hecate kids can be seen casting a spell on the porch of the Hermes cabin. The Stolls are seen pranking some Aphrodite kids. He sees someone surely die on the climbing wall but then you hear a faint ‘I’m okay!’. The Apollo kids put a rhyming curse on another cabin. Pure chaos all before he gets the ‘so, gods are real’ speech. And then after that…show how warm Luke is to him at the cabin and at dinner. Show the kids all goofing off at the campfire and really make it clear that they’re children. Show the strawberry fields rolling in the wind and Percy sitting on the beach. The whole couple weeks where he’s searching for powers and learning greek and latin with Annabeth can be a montage. Make it clear how hurt and scared he is when he finds out he needs to leave.

It needs to really get you feeling how Percy’s feeling, every laugh, every tear, every moment of fear or confusion needs to shine clear through. Like…think of Spider-Man Homecoming, the Washington monument scene. All things considered, it’s not the most high-stakes scene we’ve ever seen in that franchise, and when it cuts to the kids in the elevator, they’re worried but not quite freaking out, but that scene feels very high stress to watch because the movie is good at getting the viewers to feel what Peter feels. A Percy Jackson adaptation needs a touch like that, because Percy’s a very emotional kid and that’s what a lot of the scenes hinge on.

Lowkey- I’d love it if the casts of both the previous movies and the musical had cameos or bit parts (the movie cast did Nothing Wrong, it was the rest of that team). It’d be hilarious to see, like, Jake Abel as the owner of the poodle, or Logan Lerman as Older Percy and the reporter’s waiter that keeps trying to get in on the conversation, or Brandon T. Jackson as a satyr who’s still stuck grooving out in the Lotus Hotel and Casino. Kristen Stokes as a nature spirit, Chris as one of the ghosts stuck in the waiting room of DOA Records, just like any of those casts having small parts would be fun and sweet. 

There should be a lot of easter eggs for the bigger riordanverse. Promotions in the background for the new Tristan McLean movie. Gabe’s got a true crime documentary about the missing Grace children playing during his poker game. Mr. D is reading a paper about Rachel Dare’s father’s newest project. At some point while they’re still in New York they pass the Kane family’s mansion or whatever it was called. Annabeth keeps a picture of little her and Magnus on her nightstand. The barest of hints about the Triumvirate. Seeing kids in camp jupiter gear in some background shots, just out of notice of our main characters but implying the camps are going through similar problems (BITCH….if we got a titan’s curse adaptation…and we had a shot of Thalia in the foreground….but in the background we saw a blond boy in purple with a golden sword….well I would simply loose my Goddamn mind).

And show us how easily the mist lets things blend in, too- like, everyone thinks ‘Monster Donuts’ is just a normal chain, it’s just on an average street block, but if Percy looks through the window he can see who’s behind the counter. Show someone swindling some guys in a park and you have to look twice to realize he’s a gegeines. Like…how people are still trying to find all the background ghosts in haunting of hill house. I would LOVE to see a bunch of background monsters and mythical beings just going about their day as much as the mortals are while the gang’s questing. 

The effects need to be fun. The whole story needs to be fun, but one weird thing about the past movies are that like…in their attempt to make it gritty, none of the fantastical things happening on screen actually felt that exciting. We need bright colors and interesting choices, consistently cool action shots, a liveliness that makes you feel like you’re in the center of the action. I have absolutely no doubt Disney easily has enough funds to pull off great effects.

The characters need to be….in character lmao. Annabeth needs to be cocky and bratty with the skill set to justify it. Percy needs to be a sweetheart who pretends to be hardened because that’s what people assume he’s like. Grover needs to have dry humor and a Too Old For This Shit attitude whenever percabeth start bickering. Luke needs to be nice and friendly but in a specific way that you can look back after the betrayal and see he was trying to groom everyone. Sally needs to be loving, protective and strong. Chiron needs to feel defeated and determined at the same time. Mr. D needs to….be Stanley Tucci lmao

Also, I’d love if the adaptation could expand more on things that got brushed along in the books- Percy and Beckendorf’s friendship, Silena and Clarisse’s dynamic, make Nico’s crush on Percy a little more obvious, give Rachel some more development. One thing that haunts me about the books is Sally never found out that Gabe hit Percy. Absolutely they don’t need to make the abuse explicit, but I also personally feel like a lot of Percy’s mindsets throughout the series are somewhat a result of Gabe, and I’d like if that got, you know, acknowledged. Maybe in the scene where he figures out Gabe abuses Sally he could say ‘does he hit you too?’ or something to that effect. They could also go more into detail about Annabeth’s family, give Zoe some more depth….like the possibilities I’m screaming.

Okay this is already long and I’m getting tired but I can so clearly see a great adaptation in my mind….Disney please come through….It’s what we deserve…. 

#percy jackson #disney #rick riordan #pjo #hoo #toa #asks #molly mumbles

[mashounen2003]

Sonic opinions - 2

In large portions of every fandom, it looks like it prevails the idea that you can only take one of two positions: praising the story in every respect, including both the ideas themselves and their execution by the writers, or admitting not to like the story and not to praise any element of it at all. I think my ideas regarding the Archie-Sonic comics and the Sonic franchise in general cannot be pigeonholed into either of these two extremes.

More below the "keep reading" cut.

I loved all the world-building in Archie-Sonic, the elements the comic introduced, their many characters and the potential to tell stories about them; I also really liked much of the art and personal styles of several artists Archie-Sonic has had throughout its history, with very few exceptions (and such exceptions include Ron Lim, of course). That's why, of all the Sonic continuities, I often use the pre-reboot Archie-Sonic comic as the primary source for world-building elements and story ideas.

What really makes me feel bad about that comic, what motivates most of my criticism, is the ideas’ execution by the main writers, as well as aspects that I think are more linked to each writer as a person, the unique way in which each of them has written their stories.

Firstly, Michael Gallagher: the writer for the first few dozen issues of the comic had a terrible sense of humour, and this hurt the comic hugely since those first issues were fundamentally based on that low-quality comedy style. The characterization of the entire cast also suffered greatly from this; in Sally's case, something quite ironic happened too: Gallagher portrayed her as bossy, annoying, temperamental, usually bickering with Sonic, and now that's also how Sally is seen by many fans of the videogames’ continuity (at best). Other than this, not much more could be said about him.

Karl Bollers wrote quite decent stories with some nice comedy, with “Return to Angel Island” being his best work, one of the best stories in the entire comic and perhaps even one of the best in the franchise; but Bollers’s work was "torpedoed" by Ken Penders and then-editor Justin Gabrie, which ruined the stories’ final versions sometimes or led to elements introduced by Bollers being "retconned" and overwritten by whatever Penders smoked and decided to do when taking over. The characterization of Fiona Fox is one of the main examples, with Bollers's Fiona being a quite under-utilized character but with a great potential that would later be wasted by both Penders and Ian Flynn. Another similar case was Sally breaking up with Sonic: Bollers tried to give context to such a drastic decision by Sally and show how she was the one who was suffering the most at that time and also that both she and Sonic were partially right, but Penders and Gabrie didn't let Bollers develop this subplot properly and all we had was a quite infamous scene that unfairly made Sally one of the most hated characters. It’s also known of several plans Bollers had for future stories, and one of them was Antoine being corrupted by the Source of All and turning into a villain; this had the potential to be a good story by subverting the concept of the Source of All and making it an actual threat, but on the other hand, it’d have meant resorting once again to the resource of "this character isn’t doing anything, let's make them evil", something quite disappointing, which later would have disastrous results when Flynn did the same with Fiona a few years later. However, these plans of Bollers were just ideas, and the quality of a story created from them still depends a lot on execution. In the end, I can't say anything about how good or bad Bollers was as a writer, simply because I have no way of knowing what his stories would have been like if he had been given more freedom and had stayed as the writer longer.

There were two writers who influenced Archie-Sonic comics far more than any other writer in its history: Penders and Flynn. The first of them was a retarded pervert with an overly inflated and fragile ego. He became obsessed with the primitive, toxic ideal of "family" North-Americans have. He wrote nonsensical, contradictory stories, having already decided the end down to the last detail long before even thinking about how the story would come to that end (I also made this specific mistake a few times when I was just starting to write fanfiction, I must admit). He increased Fiona's age in order to be able to pair her with the Don Juan that Sonic had become, which also ruined Fiona's characterization forever. The issues 150s -right before being replaced by Flynn- were the worst part of Penders’s run, as Bollers was no longer there to put a stop to his madness in any way, and it was at this time when there was the most egregious case of Penders pouring into the comic his worst perversions and retarded ideas: he hinted at a sex scene in one of the most infamous cases in the history of the entire Sonic franchise, although it wasn’t infamous for the implied sex per se but rather because what happened was technically a rape by deception; to add insult to injury, the writer implicitly blamed the victim some years later when asked about it on Twitter.

I could go on talking about “Ken Perverts”, but I think that's not necessary and would be a waste of time since, as everyone here already knows, he's been the laughingstock of the entire Sonic franchise for years; @ponett even has a whole secondary blog, @thankskenpenders, mainly dedicated to this. On the other hand, there’s still another writer who has also contributed a lot and also made huge mistakes but is not criticized in the least by almost anyone, simply because he was better than Penders.

Ian Flynn usually reduced the characters to slightly oversimplified portrayals, similar to the personalities of the characters in the most recent videogames. Under his pen, Sonic was more sympathetic but his words sometimes sounded too empty and shallow, his apologies for past mistakes didn’t lead to genuine changes on his part, and sometimes he even seemed plain insensitive to all the tragedies happening around him, especially at the Mecha Sally Arc (I nickname Ian Flynn’s Sonic "Plastic Smile" for this). Admittedly, this had already happened several times with previous writers (Penders portraying Sonic as a Don Juan, as I already mentioned), and this is why I think the original Sonic from Sonic SatAM was always better for feeling more "genuine", less "empty", and more heroic and likeable as a result. Perhaps the only ones to escape the oversimplified portrayal have been Shadow and E-123 Omega, whose characterizations in Archie-Sonic were the best in the whole franchise.

Besides, Flynn had strong favouritism for Amy Rose, which only made things worse because this Amy was much more similar to the one in the videogames from Sonic Heroes onwards. Anyway, this also happened with previous writers, like when Amy wished to be younger at the cost of a chance to save Sally's mother and no one ever berated her for it.

Let’s look at the villains. Unlike the typical Eggman from the videogames, with his follies, eccentricities and other absurd aspects, the Robotnik “inherited” by the comic from Sonic SatAM was explicitly a genocidal bastard and crueller while at the same time being sane enough to realize everything he was doing (@robotnik-mun already spoke in detail about this once); however, Flynn tried to combine the two characters into the pre-reboot Archie-Sonic Eggman, and the result created some severe problems with the stories’ tone. Something derived from this was how Sonic let Eggman live and even felt sorry for his fall into madness, in addition to treating him as if they were the Sonic and Eggman from the videogames, Sonic X or Sonic Boom; it’s worth remembering this Eggman technically is a sort of reincarnation of the SatAM Robotnik (his exact nature is quite complicated and includes parallel universes, but yes, he’s supposed to be exactly the same as the SatAM Robotnik, with memories and everything) and this Sonic is supposed to have fought a bloody decade-long guerilla war against him just like his SatAM counterpart.

Scourge was turned into a massive Mary-Sue who achieved easy victories, as subtle as a huge neon sign saying "the bad guys win"; he was also an abusive manipulator towards Fiona Fox, and Flynn was unable to show that properly for fear of making his pet look no longer cool, which makes you wonder how alike Flynn and Penders might actually be in some ways. To clearly understand the horrible damage this has caused: it not only created a generation of young Sonic fans -mostly boys from the USA- who romanticize abuse either consciously or unconsciously, but also there are even women -including scholars, committed feminists and transgender people who are also activists for social justice- who either sympathize with Scourge or think Fiona made a right, wise, rational or informed decision by joining him in the story (I’ll not give names of those women, I’m not really eager to get into heated fallacious discussions about “the true meaning of Feminism”); to top it off, among the writers who started working with Ian Flynn either on IDW-Sonic or the last years of Archie-Sonic, there’s at least one person who got the job of writing official Sonic comics after gaining quite a bit of fame with a fan-comic where they used the pairing of Scourge & Fiona to inspire its readers to feel sorry... for Scourge. And speaking of Fiona specifically: the subplot of her career as a villain was ill-conceived, was built by using as a cornerstone the A-story of Issue #150 (that quite infamous and widely known story written by Penders where Scourge may or may not have raped Bunnie by deception), and was also seemingly "abandoned" as Fiona ended up merely being Scourge's new abuse victim girlfriend and her status as a traitor didn’t even have a significant emotional effect on the Freedom Fighters.

Flynn also followed something like a pattern of taking tropes from famous works and then using them when writing the comic but not actually understanding why those tropes had worked in the first place. Perhaps the prime example of this was Scourge giving Sonic the Joker's "One Bad Day" speech: it almost felt a bit like giving the same speech to the Batman of Batman vs. Superman, as Sonic had already had a whole "bad decade" and was still a hero despite it; also, Sonic's answer to that speech (telling Scourge it only takes a tiny bit of selflessness and decency for him to be a good person) wasn’t that great, not at all compared to the mildly masterful answer Batman had originally given to the Joker in The Killing Joke, and it even made Sonic look more like a bad judge of character.

Lastly, the entire Mecha Sally Arc was poorly planned, had some contradictions with itself and with previous stories, was stretched through dozens of comic issues no matter if that felt forced, and the main events and plot twists throughout the story arc were heavily based on shock-value without giving any substance to this or making it a bit more sense when putting it under scrutiny; meanwhile, Flynn always seemed to have quite a hard time when writing long story arcs, so these long stories looked like he was trying and outright failing to imitate Toriyama (someone quite known for putting together stories ad-lib according to what seemed most convenient at the time).

Despite this, it looks like those Sonic fans who are still interested in material outside of the videogames will keep buying and reading whatever Ian Flynn or one of his colleagues writes, simply because they’re better than Penders... even though it's been 15 years since Penders wrote something official about Sonic. Seriously, we should have gotten over it by now, instead of continuing to compare all material in the franchise with Penders's work, which sets the bar too low for any official content creator. Now that I think about it, Penders's work is to the North-American Sonic canon what Sonic 2006 is to the videogames: people can criticize the latest games all they want, and rightfully so, but if someone even casually mentions Sonic 2006, any Sonic game from 2010 onwards instantly becomes a masterpiece just for being marginally better than Sonic 2006; the same happens between Penders's work on pre-reboot Archie-Sonic and any other North-American Sonic comic written by Flynn after Penders left.

Right now it looks like it's also forbidden to criticize Flynn as a writer at all just because he's much nicer in his personal life and engages with fans more directly through his podcasts, or because Flynn is truly progressive while Penders claimed to be progressive and a feminist and was affiliated with the USA Democrats but his work showed how misogynistic, perverted, retarded, reactionary and downright sick he was. Also, now saying something about Flynn other than total blind admiration for him and his work, even asking for the Freedom Fighters to return in the IDW comics, has become synonymous with agreeing with those assholes who cry "Rally4Sally" or "Udon4Sonic" on Twitter: "nostalgic" fans of SatAM and Penders's work on Archie, in their 40s or 50s, deeply conservative and absurdly paranoid, who claim that those new inclusive cartoons such as Steven Universe or She-Ra "are ruining their childhood", are mad at Flynn just because he hinted Sally and Nicole may be a lesbian couple (and in a rather platonic way, not even romantic in the traditional sense), and try to justify their own warped ideas and fantasies about SatAM by ignoring any “liberal” political messages SatAM may have had at the subtext level.

#sonic fanfiction by mashounen #sonic opinions by mashounen #sonic #sonic the hedgehog #archie sonic #sonic comics #sonic satam #michael gallagher #karl bollers #ken penders #ian flynn

[danasfilmreviews]

“Forrest Gump” (1994) Review

*THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS*

Forrest Gump (Tom Hanks) isn’t the smartest person you’d meet. Raised by his single mother (Sally Field), who showers him with love, encouragement, and words of wisdom such as “Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get”, Forrest learns to navigate through life and persevere through whatever life throws at him. We watch Forrest as he first escapes bullies in grade school, to becoming a star on his school's football team, to then becoming best friends with Bubba (Mykelti Williamson) while serving in the Vietnam War, to then becoming a ping-pong champion and opening a seafood business. Through all this, Forrest never forgot about one of the most important things in life; his love for his childhood sweetheart, Jenny (Robin Wright). 

First off, I think that the way the story is told is very unique. The film is narrated by Forrest, as he sits at a bus stop and explains his life story to strangers sitting there with him. The movie goes back and forth between showing Forrest at the bus stop, and showing Forrest actually in those situations. I thought that this was unique and allows the viewer to understand Forrest and his emotions when he looks back on his life and all that he has been through.

Forrest is definitely a unique character. I thought that Tom Hanks did a great job in the role of Forrest and portrayed him perfectly, from his mannerisms, to his accent and his awkwardness. Something that I thought was very special was Forrest’s relationships with the people he meets throughout his life. We of course know how much Forrest admires and cherishes his mother and Jenny, but beyond that, Forrest becomes attached to Bubba and Lieutenant Dan (Gary Sinise), both of whom he met while serving in the army. By opening up a shrimping business in honour of Bubba and his dream (Bubba Gump Shrimp Company), and sticking with Lt. Dan and watching their slow-blooming friendship unfold, we admire Forrest for his loyalty and kindness, even in times when others don’t show him the same. He also remains to be a strong character, despite the hardships of losing his loved ones one-by-one, including his mother, Bubba, and sadly, Jenny. 

One thing that I liked about this movie was the portrayal of Jenny. Although never explicitly shown or told, it is heavily implied that Jenny was abused by her father. To be honest, at times throughout the movie, I was quite annoyed by Jenny and her actions, as well as how she treated Forrest. However, despite this, by the end of the movie, I learned to appreciate her character, and understood that she could be acting a certain way because of her unfortunate past. 

Finally, I want to talk about the end of the film, as I thought that this was very impactful. Near the end of the film, Jenny unveils to Forrest that they have a son together. They spend every day together, cherishing every second spent together as a family, until Jenny passes away. The final scene in the movie shows Forrest sending his son, Forrest Jr., off on the first day of school. In a sequence similar to that in the beginning of the film (including the same bus driver), viewers get a parallel to Forrest and his childhood. This is a heartwarming scene as we feel that Forrest is prepared to give his son the best life possible, after learning from his own personal experiences. 

I would rate this film a 8.5/10. To be completely honest, I think that this film is very overrated, but I enjoyed watching it very much. There are elements of humour, sadness, and love, and action, which I appreciated in the film, and contributed to creating a well-balanced film in terms of tone and mood. I think this is a pretty well-rounded movie, and also one of those “must-watch” films just because of how much it has been talked about. I would recommend this film to anyone over the age of 16. I think in order to fully understand the story (for example, the implied message that Jenny has been abused in the past), the viewer would have to be a bit older. I also think viewers that are a bit older than a young teen, would be able to appreciate the complexity of the story and the message of the film. Overall, I thought that Forrest Gump was a great movie that many people will enjoy watching, although perhaps it may be a little too praised.  

#forrest gump #film #film review #tom hanks #run forrest run #bubba gump #romance #drama

[seeneverything]

today i decided to replay nick’s dlc! not only to catch back up and remain canon, but to look into his journals and the notes / environment around a little deeper to see if i can discover anything more about him, the game’s story, and the timeline of the game.

i have to say it somewhat surprised me that nick has handwriting that’s legible. i figured it would be similar to sally’s -- very here and there with hardly any grammar, punctuation, and horrendous spelling. yet nick’s journals though brief, are quite linguistic. a pleasant surprise.

but without further ado, my metas are under the cut! a very long read so i hope you enjoy it. i tried my best to divide it into some sort of organization as i could. <3

GENERAL LORE :

ever wondered what an original joy bottle looks like? well, nick has one.

it’s tucked in the far back in his kitchen, behind a light on his shelf. initially i thought it was some random drug and it was more proof of the dlc being pre-game. but if you look closer, the words underneath wellington wells’ emblem say  “EVERY DAY, JOIN THE FUN”  which is a clear indication of what it actually was. and beside the emblem, just to the right, if you really squint, it says  “FLAVOR:”  but it’s hidden and you can’t sneak around to the other side. however, considering how old it is, especially from the wear and tear on the sticker, one could probably imagine it being haworth’s own vanilla.

which intrigues me. i wouldn’t doubt that nick was one of the very first people who got the initial batches. virgil dainty found him when he was still a young poet in his teenage years. meaning he probably snatched him when he was around 16. if we play it out like he was 16 when the train came and took all 13 and under, nick would be around 32 during the base game. but i honestly doubt that since the make believes released more singles than albums, and they released the album around the time of strawberry’s release, as inferred by the cover of the album. so for now and to me, nick is somewhere between mid-late 30s.

speaking of joy though, does anyone remember the whole debate about the type of joy nick was taking in the dlc? it wasn’t any type at all. in fact, it was something sally made herself.

“Vibing my guitar always helps me remember things. Like where I put my Sally Specials.”

Those reds and yellows are just another one of the many street drugs that Sally sells to her clients. Probably something like rainbow and the like, but much, much weaker and not as long-lasting. After all, Nick has to take five at one time to black out. Probably at least three of them to feel any sort of a buzz at all.   ( as a side note, it personally makes me wonder if sally had anything to do with the production phlash. i’d love to see if there were any notes of it anywhere. )

I had a headcanon a while back that the woman using the power cell was using a sex toy. After all, she has a suitcase that’s cleverly hidden under her bed. If Nick believes it’s this, it makes sense that he’s aware of the “fun part of town,” unlike Arthur and Ollie once in the Parade. Yes, he goes there for sex and relief, but also because he makes deals with the owners to sell adult-themed merch. Wouldn’t be surprised if there were dildos, lube, even lingerie like Nick’s threads -- very, very plausible if there are full sex dolls.

With the Sally Specials and the Joy Bottle being so old, it could still be proof that it’s pre-game as well. After all, if Nick is still around Sally ONLY to obtain to drugs from her, then it could be easily inferred. After all, Sally remembers her time with Nick in the past together, not in the present. And that is pre-1964.

A LITTLE MORE ABOUT NICKY :

it’s absolutely no secret that nick hates himself. from the scratches on the mirror that hide his face and spell  “USELESS,”  to the inferred suicidal attempts from downing entire bottles of joy with alcohol. the puke is always so rancid in the sink. but there’s also this, too.

it’s funny how nick tends to keep scratching at his head and his eyes. the persona is who he’s trying to cover up i imagine, considering that there are multiple voicelines in the game that says he never meant to cause any harm. and he never meant to commit all the unpleasantries that come with being a rockstar. one of them being infidelity and adultery, and another being a general asshole to the public. overtime i believed that nick gained celebrity syndrome. which is essentially just being a karen on steroids. nick believes he doesn’t need to pay for anything, and he also has the innate ability to give orders to people. just because, in his mind, he’s the best in the world. the avalon’s manager wants to get back at him once and for all for his bossy attitude. but he’s not the only one who feels that, either.

petunia does as well.

nick’s love-life is an extremely complicated one. aside from the the various forms of substance abuse and exposure to said substances, nick has always had his rockstardom become the center of his universe. see, this is all headcanon but, i personally believe that nick was coddled as a child by his overbearing mother. mama told him the world would love him. and mama told him that the world would never hurt him, and that it would be perfect and easy to get through. but then he saw just how hurtful people could be, and just how much hate the world had to offer. and to him, at that. it was extremely difficult to find love in anything and anyone. especially himself. so finding petunia was very, very reassuring. after all, she did promise him, as nick said during the boss fight, to be the lighthouse on all his rocky shores. indicating that she would be the one to lead him back home, and make him stable. and i’m sure for a while, it did.

canonically, until nick lightbearer overtook norbert pickles. he found so many more people who loved him that way. and thus, he let the life of his own stardom take over everything else. including his love life. even more so when the birds threatened hatred and slander to his name if they couldn’t shag him. and if they didn’t manipulate him, nick was so afraid of losing another fan that he wouldn’t care. it felt good anyway, why not fuck people? he keeps a fan, doesn’t worry about being hated, and keeps the life of love toward him going.

not even thinking about petunia in the process. and instead of showing him that he didn’t need all the fans, instead of showing him that he needed to remain faithful and loyal, she lashed out and belittled him from every other corner. though he did deserve it for encouraging her into polygamy and bigamy and definitely by his demanding attitude(later in the note it mentions how he was a henpicker), she did not help his mental state in any capacity. petunia, the moment she didn’t help him anymore and show him the love he thought she promised him, became nothing more than someone who belittled him. truthfully nick never meant to hurt her, but it’s seen through his celebrity ideology that he truly believes in quantity over quality. a sad shame. nick’s mental state is so fucked he doesn’t even really know what true love is by this point. meaning he could potentially be easily manipulated without realization.

despite all this though, i found this to be especially intriguing:

a little hard to read, but this is during the scene before he fights the fans at the contest. his journal reads:

“They think I’m an IMPERSONATOR? Have I lost the Lightbearer aura? How much lower can I sink?”

this heavily implies that nick sets his own idolism over his chances of being a murderer. meaning that somewhere, deep in the crevasse of his subconscious, nick is so desperate for some true love and still can’t grasp hatred that he is clinging onto his persona for as much love as he can. even if it’s fake. thrice as intriguing when one learns that, during his breakdowns, he always explains how he wants his fans to know who he really is:

“i wonder if i remember how to sound polite,” “things are sure to look up once i’m not soaked in hemoglobin.”

an intelligent, young man who was so wrongly brought up into the world by an attached mother who never taught him what punishment really was. nick has been using his celebrity name as a clutch for so long that he’s having difficulty remembering who he really was, or if he can ever be norbert pickles again. he cannot handle being a celebrity, and he never could because of what his mother taught him and grew him to be. yet somewhere deep down, he knows his true self is there. but what nick doesn’t know how to do is accept the hatred of the world enough, especially to him, in order to ever take norbert pickles out.

it’s a constant mish-mash. he can hardly handle the hatred from being a celebrity, but what he does handle from stardom is what keeps him going with it. a war between nick lightbearer and norbert pickles. but neither side has proper ammo because the battlefield is strife with a lack of vegetation.

nick lightbearer in himself is an irony. he shines so bright for everyone around him but yet truly, the light is most needed for himself.

#; 🎸 | META DRABBLES . #tw: suicide mention #suicide mention tw #( SECOND ATTEMPT HERE WE GO ) #( SODFBJFDSFBNGF ) #( I AM SO PROUD OF ALL THIS!! ) #( it took me a few hours to compile this all together so <3 ) #( i'm v confident in it ) #( no wonder why it's sympathy for the lightbearer gbogfdnsrk )

[takaraphoenix]

Sally Jackson choice safety over stability in terms of how she'd take care of her child. Both her and Percy faced years abuse by the hands of one man. Does this make her a good mother who was in over her head or an unprepared one making an impulsive decision?

You found the one hot take even I haven’t dared say aloud yet, because I think it may just be my most unpopular opinion in this fandom. One thing everyone in this fandom seems to agree on is the “universal truth” that Sally Jackson is the best mother in the history of fictional mothers. So, here’s my hot take:

Sally Jackson is not that perfect mother the fandom pretends she is.

Sally during the series? Presented as a loving and good mother. But to get to that point? Pre-series Sally is not written as a good mom; she’s written as a plot-device with the things the author needs to happen in mind and not the motivation of a good mother who prioritizes her child’s happiness and safety in mind.

And I’ll back that claim up with three ways in which Sally has failed Percy as a mother. Not just once, but repeatedly, for years.

But before we get into that, I’d like to switch what you said first. Sally Jackson chose stability over safety. Sally chose the stability of keeping her child at her side over said child’s safety. She made an inherently selfish decision that was not with her child’s best interest and overall safety in mind.

Now, the first - and most obvious one - is Smelly Gabe.

And before I can elaborate on that, I need to clarify one very important thing here, before anyone goes “don’t blame the victim!” on me: Sally Jackson is not a victim; she’s a fictional character. Fictional characters can be written as victims, but they are not autonomous people who make their own choices; their choices are very deliberately made by their author for them. And I want to look at the choices that went into writing her this way, writing her story this way.

Real abuse victims get stuck in abusive relationships for a variety of reasons and they don’t get out of them for equally various reasons. Most of the time, it’s something like “he was so sweet and kind at first, but by the time he showed his real face, it was too late” (and, as a note to that; Percy describes Gabe as having been nice to them for a total of thirty seconds before showing his real face. Now while that is, of course, and exaggeration, it still goes to say that Gabe was pretty much upfront about what kind of person he was).

I’ve never heard one start with “he was the most disgusting, grossest man I could possibly find”. Sally Jackson chose this man. Not just in the way one picks a partner. She went out there and chose the stinkiest, grossest man.

It was a deliberate choice on Riordan’s part to have Sally choose an abusive relationship over sending her son away for his own safety. And this decision did not keep Percy safe; Percy Jackson was abused in his own home, by a horribly stinking man, for six years of his life. That’s not keeping your child safe.

The choice was not made to keep Percy safe; the choice was made to keep Percy with Sally. It was inherently selfishly motivated; she didn’t want to send him away, she wanted to keep him with her.

Sally loves Percy, she loves him dearly and fiercely, I’m not arguing that. But that love led to her not wanting to let go of him. And sometimes, parenting means making tough choices, sometimes loving someone means you have to make a tough decision.

In this case, the “tough decision” is presented as Sally bravely putting up with six years of abuse at Gabe’s hand. That’s the narrative chosen by the author.

But the actual “tough decision” would have been to send Percy to Camp Half-Blood, where he would have been safe. That’s the tough choice a mother would have had to make to keep her child safe.

That’s the tough choice the parents of most of the year-rounders have made. Mister Beauregard sent his daughter all the way from Paris to New York to give her this safety. The distance alone guaranteeing he wouldn’t see her for years potentially - because flying between New York and Paris is not necessarily easily affordable for everyone. Sally’s option was to send Percy to a camp that’s literally one and a half hours away. She could have still seen him, he could have easily visited her.

But her solution was to mask Percy’s scent by marrying a stinking, gross, abusive man.

Let me just stretch once more: Sally’s choice did not keep Percy safe. Sally’s choice made their home unsafe. It brought the danger and pain into their home. It may have moderately protected Percy from monsters - until The Lightning Thief kicked in - but it did not keep Percy actually safe, because it put him into a different kind of danger and through a different kind of pain.

For six years. And, this is where the “not a real person but a fictional character” thing comes up again, because this isn’t a woman where one choice leads to a date with a man which leads to a relationship which leads to abuse that she doesn’t know how to get out of anymore. She is a fictional character whose journey was set out to end with her being in an abusive relationship.

And we also don’t know why she didn’t get out of it. She’s not a real person, we don’t know if she was so scared of Gabe that she didn’t know how to leave, if her lack of a support system is what led to her not leaving him, or if it was the motivation of not giving up Percy. The real, actual reason is that Riordan wanted to keep her in there and keep Percy out of the loop until he was twelve and The Lightning Thief could happen. Because she was able of getting rid of him as soon as the truth unravelled and Percy met camp.

And I’d like to use the way she did that to drive back home just how bad Gabe was, just how bad the situation Sally and Percy were in for six years, really was.

She murders him. She flat-out murders him. Both, her and Percy, together. This twelve-year old child who we meet and get to know as kind and not... not a murder-child, is ready to kill a man. That’s how badly Gabe abused them; both of these kind people chose murder to get rid of him.

And it’s just something I’ve never gotten over. Riordan really made the decision that his protagonist’s mom would rather get them both into an abusive home than give Percy up to camp. That was his decision; there could have been other ways. One thing that would have made this seem less like a deliberate choice would have, for example, been Sally not knowing about camp.

If she was a desperate mother, who saw no other options? That’d have made the situation different too. But we know Sally knew about camp. She knew there was a place she could send her son where he would be safe from the monsters, but she decided against that, she decided that she wanted to keep him close, at any costs - and the cost was six years of abuse.

I do not think that this decision should be framed as a heroic sacrifice, because the fact that she knew of an actually safe solution and decided against it was inherently selfish. She did not put up with six years of abuse for selfless reasons because there was “no other way”; there was, she knew that, but the author didn’t want her to take that.

Sometimes, the sacrifice is letting go of your child. And, as mentioned before, she wouldn’t have let go of him for good - camp is in the same bloody city as she is living. Literally one and a half hours away from her.

Now on to the other two ways in which I think Sally Jackson failed Percy.

For one, the lies about his father. Now, real people who are left by their partner with a baby, they can pick whatever to tell their kids whenever. But, again, this is a fictional character and the author makes the decision for her. And this, again, was a decision made solely based on the end result; Riordan needed Percy to not be in the know by the time The Lightning Thief came around, even though from a character-perspective, telling Percy the truth earlier would have been the logical and right decision.

If your kid is a demigod who is attracting real actual monsters with his scent alone? Percy started really attracting monsters when he was six years old and for the next six years, Sally didn’t disclose the truth to him; not about monsters, not about his father, not about the fact that Percy may have powers.

Percy attracted so many monsters that it led to Sally getting married to Gabe. That’s how badly he attracted monsters. Which also implies that Percy must have seen monsters. We get to see in The Lightning Thief just how much Percy thinks he’s going crazy with the things he sees. And that’s  been going on for six years too - six years and in those, his scent only got stronger.

This, again, isn’t just one decision she made. This is a decision she made every single day over and over again. The decision not to tell Percy about his father, the powers, the simple reassurance that he’s not going insane, that monsters are real. This was Percy’s reality and it would obviously only become more and more of an issue the older Percy got, but every single day, she chose not to tell him, to let him believe not just a lie but also steadily that he was going crazy.

And it’d have gone a long way if he had just known. Even with Gabe in their life, even if she hadn’t made the choice to send him to camp at age six, it’d have helped him so much to know the truth and be prepared for this life.

Because this wasn’t just an issue of “the guy left me, I don’t want to talk about it with my kid”, this was inherently about, once more, Percy’s safety. Knowing what to watch out for, knowing the thing you should watch out for is actually real, are huge factors in Percy’s safety. Having him as well-prepared as possible.

She knew his father was Poseidon. It’s not even that she had sex with some dude, not knowing who he was. She knew he was Poseidon. She knew what Percy’s parentage was, she must have observed the slow development of Percy’s powers over the years.

But again, she chose to leave him in the dark about it. He could have been well-prepared by age twelve. Read up everything on Poseidon, experimented with potential powers he may have, understanding why the fishes in the aquarium are talking to him and that he is not actually hearing voices, learning.

But that’s not useful for the author; Riordan wants an unprepared Percy who can be used to introduce this world to the reader.

The choice to not tell Percy the truth about his father and about being a demigod was made deliberately and, again, not in Percy’s best interest. And in this case, there really is no other interpretation left aside from “the author needs it to happen this way” - with Gabe, there is the legitimate argument that she may have been at one point just an abused woman stuck in a relationship with no out because we don’t know enough to know what her motivation and situation were exactly - but there is... no benefit at all in lying to Percy about this, no reason for it.

The moment he first started being in actual life-threatening danger because monsters came after him, it became a pressing matter to tell him what monsters are, that they are real and why they are after him and to prepare him for it.

Which brings me to the third instance.

She never prepared him - even just in a mortal manner. Even if we let the first two - the marriage to Gabe and the lies about his father - stand as they are, Sally could have done something very simple to prepare Percy for his life and to help keeping him safe.

Self-defense classes. Judo. Martial arts. Sword-fighting classes. Whatever.

Many parents teach their kids these kind of things from a young age. Parents whose kids aren’t in constant danger of being attacked by monsters. One of your first parental instincts should be to teach your kid to be safe; to protect themselves. Give him the means to fight back.

So, that’s it. That’s the three very vital and important instances in which I think Sally failed Percy as a mother; not just once, but repeatedly, for years.

Instead of sending him to a safe place where he could learn about his heritage and learn control of his powers as well as learning how to fight the monsters after his life, she chose to marry an abusive, smelly man whose scent would mask Percy’s. Probably. Hopefully. But it didn’t really, not all the time. As shown by The Lightning Thief and monsters coming after Percy. And Percy starts to think he’s crazy, because at no point did she tell him about the monsters, and at no point does he really know how to fight for his life, because at no point did she put the means to defend himself into his hands.

No. No, I do not think that those are the decisions a good mother would make. Those are decisions the author made because he knew the starting point of his story and he knew where Percy’s character needed to be for that.

The thing that’s glossed over are the choices Riordan implicitly made Sally make. To get to this point for Percy, at age 12, he had to make Sally repeatedly act against Percy’s best interests and deliberately not tell Percy the truth or teach him way to stay safe. So he masks those choices by putting on a framework that’s meant to make you only look at her suffering and the outcome, not the choices that led to it. That was Riordan’s choice and he framed it in a way that the fandom ate up and celebrates, when... neither Sally, nor Riordan, had do to that. There was another option on the table and, if Riordan had sat down and thought hard, I’m pretty sure there would have been more options.

The bottom line, what Sally’s parenting comes down to in the end, is that she and Percy got stuck with an abusive man for six years, because she didn’t want to send him to an actual safe place, she spent six years essentially gaslighting Percy about the things he hears/sees by not telling him the monsters are actually real and she repeatedly left him in unnecessary danger by not giving him the means to defend himself in any way whatsoever. And those are not signs of good parenting, not in my book.

But it’s just so much easier to ignore all of that and pretend that blue candy and trips to Montauk are the end all be all and that Sally’s fierce love for her son is the most defining trait of parenting. I know that. Most of the time, I’m right there with you - I love fanon!Sally, I love to pretend she’s the best mom ever and never did anything wrong, because I know the decisions are inherently made by Riordan and are a by-product; I know he wants her to be a good mother, I know throughout the series, he writes her as a good and loving mother.

But if I have to be honest and if I look at the whole text, including the implications of their past, canon!Sally isn’t that good of a mother.

#PJOverse #Riordan Critical #this is the one hot take #I always dreaded to make #because I just #that's the one character #I've never seen shit talked about #oh well #let's see what the outcome of this is #Anonymous

[companionjones]

Letters For The Elf

Pairing: Bernard x Reader

Fandom: The Santa Clause

Summary: For most of your life, an elf from the north pole has been responding to your Christmas letters. One might even say that the two of you are friends. Hopefully, nothing will ever mess with that.

Warnings: Gets way too dark for a story based on a Christmas movie, relationship mental/physical abuse, cursing

*******

    Dear Santa,

            I’ve been thinking for a really long time about what I want for Christmas. Maybe some ice skates?

            Something you should really try to do is get Sally new chalk. She’s my next door neighbor. She’s really nice, and she needs new chalk for her sidewalk drawings.

            Thank you!

                                      From,

                                             Y/n L/n

***

    Dear Y/n,

           My name is Bernard. I’m the elf who received your letter. It’s rare we get children asking for gifts for others. You’re a very thoughtful kid. We at the North Pole will do our best to get you your skates and Sally her chalk.

          Merry Christmas!

                                    From Head Elf,

                                            Bernard

*****

    "This is a bad idea. This is a bad idea. This is a bad idea,” Bernard chanted as he climbed into Santa’s sleigh.

    It was a bad idea, but Bernard was desperate. He needed to get to you right away.

*****

    Dear Bernard,

         How are you this year? Everyone at my school keeps talking about how Santa and the North Pole aren’t real, but I know you are.

         For Christmas, I hope Mrs. Jamesson, a woman I met at a nursing home, gets new sewing needles, and maybe more yarn. I know you get annoyed that I don’t ask for things for myself anymore, but I think you know me well enough to guess my present.

         Anyway, I can’t wait to get your letter back. Have a nice Christmas!

                                 Talk to you soon,

                                         Y/n

***

    Dear Y/n,

       I don’t get annoyed! I would just rather you tell me what you want for Christmas instead of just guessing.

       As for the kids at your school not believing in Santa, the magic doesn’t last long in some people. You’re different though. You know how important the magic is.

       I’ll get her the stuff you asked for Mrs. Jamesson. I wish there was a way that she could know you did this for her. As for you, I think I have a few ideas.

                                Sincerely,

                                          Bernard

*****

    The head elf landed the sleigh on your apartment building. He practically leaped out and he rushed down the stairs to your address.

    “Please, please, please, please,” the elf begged, hoping against all hope that he could get to you in time.

*****

    Dear Bernard,

        Look at us, swapping notes almost every week now. I believe the other day was the last snow of the season, which saddens me because it’s one less thing that reminds me of you.

        I think it’s a little crazy that you elves get right back to work on Christmas. Don’t you have a family to be with? Or at least…a significant other?

        Nevermind. I made a friend the other day. His name is Freddy. He’s nice enough. He helps with my Chemistry homework.

                                Thinking of you,

                                          Y/n

***

    Dear Y/n,

        Who’s Freddy? How long have you known him? How are his grades? I looked him up, he’s on the nice list, but people can fall off that at any time, and the list covers variety of behaviors, anyway.

        I’m not with anyone, if you were wondering. You probably weren’t, but just so you know, you know?

        Write back soon. I want to hear more about this Freddy guy. And Y/n, take care of yourself.

                                Not that concerned,

                                             Bernard

*****

    “Freddy! Freddy, stop. Please, stop!” you cried from the other side of the door.

    Bernard started slamming his fist against the door. “Hey! Hey, leave Y/n alone! Y/n! It’s Bernard. I’m here!”

    “Bernard!” you screamed, but it was followed by a thump, presumably your head hitting the ground.

    Freddy questioned angrily, “Who the hell is Bernard?! Get out of here! This is none of your business!”

    “It became my business when you hit them!” Bernard shouted, and began to try and break the door down.

*****

    Dear Bernard,

        I need help. After Freddy and I started dating, he changed. He barely lets me out on my own anymore. I’m getting really scared. The other day, I yelled at him for treating me badly, and he slapped me in the face.

        Sometimes I think about what it would be like if you and I could see each other. Maybe things would be different.

        Please help me. I don’t know if elves can call 911, but I need someone to come save me.

                                Love,

                                          Y/n

*****

    Bernard didn’t write you back. Instead, he hopped into Santa’s sleigh and went to go find you.

    That was how he ended up busting your door down to see Freddy pummeling you. The rules said that no elf should ever do any harm. The only time Bernard ever broke a rule was that day.

    Back at the North Pole, Bernard made up a room for you, but you didn’t want him to leave you alone.

    “Did he do anything other than...” Bernard trailed off, ever-concerned.

    You shook your head, knowing what he was implying, and continued to stare out the window. “It’s beautiful here,” your raspy voice commented.

    Bernard made his way to the window seat you were on and sat down next to you. “Yeah, I love it here,” he agreed, enjoying the same view you were.

    “So, this is what you look like,” you smirked, trying to lighten the mood. “You’re cute.”

    He quietly chuckled, “You’re cute, too.”

    Your smile grew.

    Then, Bernard went serious again. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there.”

    “What do you mean?” you wondered.

    The elf explained, “If I was normal...if I was human...maybe...maybe we could’ve been together, and you wouldn’t have been put in that situation...I would never hurt--”

    You leaned forward and kissed him. The kiss was simple. It only lasted for a few seconds.

    When the two of you separated, Bernard breathed, “I’ve been wanting to do that with you for a long time.”

    “Me too,” giggled, and climbed into his lap.

    There, the two of you kissed again, and you nuzzled farther into him.

    Gently, Bernard whispered a promise, “I’m going to take care of you here. You won’t have to worry about anything ever again.”

*******

Author’s Note: Thank you so much for reading! Fill up that heart and reblog if you liked it. I also would love a comment if you have the time. If you would like to read more, I have more fics over on my page. You should check it out. Also, REQUESTS ARE OPEN. I take requests for one-shots, drabbles, multi-chapters, headcannons and preferences. No smut, please. I write for a variety of fandoms. If you’re wondering if I write for a specific fandom, please ask me. Have a nice day, night, or whatever time it is for you.<3

#christmas #bernard #bernard x reader #bernard head elf #bernard head elf x reader #the santa clause #the santa clause bernard #the santa clause bernard x reader #bernard the santa clause #bernard the santa clause x reader #christmas movies #christmas movie #letters for the elf #companion jones #this was way darker than it needed to be #sorry

[travisphelpsofficial]

Wait what about Steve putting racist and homophobic stuff in the game? I still haven’t had a chance to watch chapter 5 yet :( what happened?

This'll spoil the plot 1000% but it was easier for me to watch after hearing about it first, because I knew what was coming.

TW: racism, homophobia, self-harm, child abuse

Travis' whole story being about how he's violent & homophobic because he's in the closet is a homophobic stereotype from the jump. Most people who make homophobic jokes are just that, homophobes. To imply otherwise makes it harder for gay men to both come out, and critique those who make homophobic comments about us.

Personally, I also feel like the joke Sally made in the bologna incident is very, very out of place ("do you kiss your dad with that tongue?") given that Travis' dad is a) obviously abusive b) known to be homophobic and c) what most cults are known for doing to children. But that's not a common complaint people have.

Travis is never allowed to be happy, as a Brown gay man, he is abused throughout his time in the game. Which is, not okay, at all.

He dies trying to kill his father. Don't get me wrong, I totally understand and wanted his dad to be killed off, but Travis didn't have to die for it to happen.

That 1/3 of the cannon gay characters dead, and one of the few Black/Brown characters dead as well.

Todd's only character traits are that he is a nerd and gay. He does not have any kind of real story to him. He's just the token gay in the main 4.

The trauma p*rn only continues when Steve decides that, Todd, again one of the few pieces of representation in the game, needs to become a demon. (Which,, one could argue has a religiously homophobic tone to it... "oh he's gay let's make him a demon!!")

That's 2/3 gay characters and he doesn't technically die, but he's tortured and only exists to be gay, smart, and become a demon.

Neil, one of the few Black characters, and the last canon gay man is killed. Violently by the cult. His dead, naked, bleeding body is shown during one of the last scenes, for quite a while.

This demonstrates the bury your gays trope and that Black and Brown people truly only exist for Steve Garbage to torture. Extremely distasteful and ignorant.

Neil's only character traits also just so happen to be: Being gay, being kind, and being Todd's boyfriend. Not a well rounded character at all.

The fact that Neil was written to be so calm in the face of death, was also very disturbing. Sal didn't really want to die, Larry only killed himself because he had to, and Todd but up enough of a fight that he didn't get eaten up by a demon, but Neil, one of the 2 Black characters just accepts that he needs to die. All the white characters put up some kind of fight, but Neil, like the kind Black man that he is, just accepts death. Weird!

He kills off Robert, too (in chapter 4) and he's like the only other Black character we see more that once.

This isn't racist or homophobic, but the fact that he makes it so Ash has to try to kill herself in order to bring Sal back, is fucking awful. It comes out of nowhere and is very triggering.

Apparently he said that their high school mascot was a "Native American". I've never seen that, but I've heard people talk about it and obviously that pretty fucking racist.

THEN he decides that he'll add this weird as Native American lore into the fucking story?? And the legend he writes for it so misguided, racist, and ignorant, it sounds like something you'd write in second grade in a southern elementary school. I feel like we probably wrote shit like that at some point, and I still knew was wrong.

There's this fucking girl in a cave and she's got tribal tattoos and is like "my ancestors made these cave paintings" !! What!!

Natives don't have a universal culture. Not all of them did cave paintings. Not all of them believed in certain kinds of deities. Not all of them had tattoos. It's a gross generalization of a hundreds of cultures. It's racist.

He also tried to make it sound like the legend, that his dumbass wrote, was just some crazy Native jibberish. He has the legend written out, and then is like, yeah that's probably fake but they believed it any way.

All of this culminates into giving the cult part of that "oh ancient Native American demons better watch out!!" Trope. Which is, again, racist as fuck.

The end of the game leaves a lot to be desired and just fucking sucks honestly.

The game just ended up being torture p*rn made by a cishet white man, who obviously has a lot of bigoted tendencies lying beneath the surface.

* let me clarify that torture p*rn rarely conveys NSFW attributes and has a purpose of putting certain minority groups into painful/torturous situations and usually gives way to a white savior complex.

In this instance, Ash & Sal, two cishet white individuals "save" the town from a cult run & created by Brown people at the expense of the lives & souls of all of the Black, Brown and/or gay civilians (that we know of), which is a small price to pay, for them.

The fact there was never even the slightest "this game contains sensitive content, proceed with caution and care" at any point also rubs me the wrong way. Like, okay you don't want to spoil the game or lose revenue because very few people would buy a game with such fucked up views in it, but a small warning was more than necessary. Especially so considering this game ended up attracting a fan base filled with individuals that would be directly harmed by the shit.

I could go on, and on, and on about my personal grievances about how the game was written, how little research was obviously done etc., etc. but those are the main problems with it.

#anonymous #discourse?? #sally face spoilers #sally face #tw: violence #tw: death #tw: racism #tw: homophobia #tw: self harm #tw: child abuse #if you see this & wanna add more feel free to do so! #larry johnson #travis phelps #sal fisher #sally fisher #ashley campbell #todd morrison

[mobius-prime]

211. Sonic the Hedgehog #143

The Original Freedom Fighters (Part 2)

Writer: Romy Chacon Pencils: Art Mawhinney Colors: J&A Ray

So it's time to find out just how the original Freedom Fighters were betrayed and lost. The guard at the Lake of Rings catches a ring and then lets Sonic and Hope watch the place for a bit while he delivers it to the castle, and Hope urges Sonic to continue his story, which he agrees to on the condition that afterward she'll let him go off to do his thing. One day when Sally was still young, Stripe was speaking with her and being kind when Peckers, who has the worst name by the way, burst in with some news.

That's right, they found out about the Zone of Silence years before the current Freedom Fighters did. They went into the palace on a mission to rescue the king, or at least to gather more information for a future rescue, but suddenly found themselves trapped within a room, with Scales leering at them from the outside and Robotnik stepping up beside him. Scales had apparently betrayed his teammates because he wanted power and also because it was "totally within his nature" as a snake, but true to form, Robotnik had some treachery of his own to enact, throwing a horrified Scales in with his fellows. Robotnik revealed to them that they were standing in his first room-sized roboticizer, before pulling the lever.

Oof. Uncle Chuck, still roboticized, saw the whole thing and had it recorded in his memory banks for posterity, but those in Knothole never found out what happened until years later when he regained his memory. All they knew was that their heroes had disappeared, and held funerals for them all befitting their status as heroes. The young Sonic was stunned and demoralized, as Stripe in particular had always been kind and encouraging to him, but ultimately the actions of the original Freedom Fighters were what inspired Sonic, Sally, and the others to form their own group and carry on the fight.

Now remember how I said this ties into something I've brought up before? I've talked many times about how the war against Robotnik has essentially been carried on the backs of literal child soldiers, but we've never really discussed why this came to be. Well, here it is. This is why. Remember that Robotnik's takeover came right on the heels of the Great War, with barely a few years at most separating the two wars. From Robotnik's perspective, he couldn't have picked a better time to stage a coup - the kingdom was weakened, and a lot of its best fighters had likely died or had to retire permanently due to injures from the previous war. Not to mention that a lot of people who could have helped in the current war were likely captured and roboticized in the initial fight before they had time to react - Robotnik would have known who posed the greatest threat to his rule and made sure the swatbots targeted them, and in addition, it's implied in the previous issue that Stripe was one of the only veterans who had the sense to run away rather than stand and fight. The original Freedom Fighters were basically all Knothole had left. And when they were lost, Knothole was vulnerable. Hope was in short supply. Hardly anyone had the ability or the mental fortitude to even try to carry on the fight.

And then this little band of orphaned kids rallied around the precocious princess, and took inspiration from those who had fought before them. These kids, most of whom were barely older than eight (and I'm not guessing at that number, it's literally confirmed later on in the comic that Sonic started striking back against Robotnik at the age of eight), banded together with the overconfidence of young children and put themselves in harm's way to save the planet. They grew up so surrounded by war that participating in it was second nature to them, and though each of them were hit with their own unique traumas from the things they'd seen and experienced, they kept up the fight, into their teens and into now. And like I've pointed out before, even now that many of the kingdom's adults are freed and willing to continue the fight for them, they refuse to give it up. Sure, Sally may be preoccupied with being active ruler right now, and maybe Rotor has retired from field duty to work on inventions back home, but everyone is still wholly invested in the fight despite their still-young ages. And that's both inspiring, and utterly tragic - especially considering that most of them aren't even self-aware enough to understand how awful throwing children into a war is. They just don't know anything different.

But anyway, as Sonic's story winds down, Hope thanks him and then rushes off, remembering her homework assignment for history and leaving an exasperated Sonic to guard the pool alone after all. The next day, she has her report all finished, and recites it in front of her class to much praise.

That is a great way to tie everything together, if you ask me. I'm sure it makes Mrs. Stripe and everyone else who personally knew the original Freedom Fighters happy to see the youth of today, even the youth of another species entirely, remember the sacrifice of those heroes.

Mobius 25 Years Later: Father's Day

Writer/Pencils: Ken Penders Colors: Jason Jensen

Are you ready, kids?! This is actually the best installment of this arc, period! It's relevant to the current conflict, it contains important character development, and a satisfying conclusion is reached by the end! I know, I know, I'm shocked as well. But my praise for this chapter is genuine, and you'll see why.

Lara-Su comes downstairs in the morning, wondering where her father is. It's hard to tell if this takes place shortly after her discussion with Knuckles last issue, or if this is the next day entirely or something, but either way, Julie-Su reminds her daughter of what day it is, which - well, I hardly have to tell you, it's right there in the title. It seems that on Father's Day every year, Knuckles visits the grave of Locke in the forest - it's been hinted at here and there that he's dead by the time of this arc, but this is our first clear confirmation of the fact. Knuckles drifts into memories, first of a conversation he'd had with Archimedes many years ago. They'd traveled to the crater in Downunda where Angel Island first lifted off after having spent several weeks together, and prepared to part ways, as Archimedes was planning to move here to Downunda permanently. Knuckles was somewhat baffled by his decision, having deep roots on Angel Island and being unable to relate to wanting to move somewhere else, but Archimedes pointed out that as Athair followed his own path, so must he, and so had Knuckles for that matter.

I think it makes complete sense for a slightly older Knuckles to have decided to end the Guardian tradition, given how much pain it has caused him over the years and how shady the whole operation could be. Archimedes said his goodbyes to Knuckles after telling him how proud he was of him, and Knuckles used his guiding star gem to head back home. Once there, he was shocked to find Lara-Le crying and distraught, and all she could manage to say was that something was wrong with Locke. Wynmacher called a cab and took them both up to the hospital in Echidnaopolis, where the doctors revealed to him that his father was getting weaker by the day and they couldn't figure out what was wrong. After some exploratory surgery, they determined that he'd developed pancreatic cancer and didn't have long left for the world, so a stunned Knuckles and Lara-Le were allowed to enter the room to speak to him once he'd woken up. From here, I'll let the next couple of pages do the talking for me.

I think this is literally the best thing Penders could have possibly written on this subject. I've pointed out how awful Locke has been many times, and one of my biggest criticisms of him was less about the character himself and more about how Penders handled writing him. Locke was based on Penders' own father, with whom he'd had a difficult relationship, and this colored his writing of Locke a bit for the worse. Locke was in many ways abusive, selfish, and distant from his son, and put Knuckles through hell for his own purposes. He was too shortsighted to see how this was affecting his son, and only when reality began to harshly and repeatedly bitchslap him in the face did he even begin to realize how badly he'd messed up. This has always been clear from the outside, but it's also obvious that Penders, naturally, wasn't keen on writing a character based on his own father as a bad guy, and the end result was Locke being portrayed in a bizarrely sympathetic light as he manipulated, spied on, and betrayed the trust of his son without any self-awareness at all. This scene is exactly what we needed in the light of all that - a scene where at the end of everything, Locke truly realized just what he'd done to the two people he loved most in the world, fully owned up and admitted to all his mistakes, and asked for forgiveness. He makes no excuses for his actions, instead laying it all bare and trusting them to judge him fairly on his own deathbed. I've said before that Locke would have been far more fascinating as a well-intentioned but too-extreme antagonist of the story, and ultimately this is exactly the kind of redemption scene I would have imagined for him at the end of said story. I may make fun of and even get angry with Penders from time to time, but I truly think that this is one of the prime examples of where his writing shines. He has great ideas, just often bad execution of said ideas. This is one time where he did it right.

Knuckles finishes reminiscing and comes back to himself in the present, standing in front of his father's grave, and begins to realize that in a way, he's been repeating the same mistakes that his father did with his own daughter. While Locke never gave him the choice not to become a Guardian, he's done the inverse with Lara-Su, never giving her the option of Guardianship at all. He decides that he's going to give her the choice after all, and thanks his father at the grave while Locke's ghost and Aurora watch proudly from the afterlife. And you know what? This is also a great scene! Because I 100% believe that Knuckles, after going through everything that he has, would want to end the tradition of Guardians and never put the island's fate on the shoulders of one person again. Let's face it, he's downright traumatized by some of the things he's seen and been through, and once he had a child of his own he'd want to protect them from going through any of the same things he did. And I fully believe that with that mindset, he could end up stumbling into the same "my way, no highway option" mindset that his own father had, just in reverse. He never realized just how his own hangups were affecting his daughter until he came here to meditate after all her pestering. And what makes this scene so great, ultimately, is that he learns from it. He doesn't continue down the manipulative, restrictive path that his father did, but rather opens up to the thought of listening to what his own daughter wants, and allowing her to make her own choices in life. This issue ends with a tribute to Penders' own father Kenneth, who lived from 1934 to 1982, and I find it a fitting end indeed. After all, for all my criticism, I can hardly condemn a person for wanting to pay loving tribute to their own parent. Good job, Penders - this issue's story was genuinely enjoyable, and I appreciate the work you put into it.

#nala reads archie sonic preboot #archie sonic #archie sonic preboot #sonic the hedgehog #sth 143 #writer: romy chacon #writer: ken penders #pencils: art mawhinney #pencils: ken penders #colors: joshua d ray #colors: aimee r ray #colors: jason jensen

[makerofrunevests]

Decoy

In response to @goblin-overlord‘s request that I write a fic in which Loki used a decoy in Infinity War :)

_______________________________________________________________________

“Your brother is angry,” Mantis said softly, her eyes vast. She took a step closer to where Loki sat near a window of the Guardians’ ship, her fragile antennae drooping. “He is angry that you pretended to die.”

Loki continued watching a comet shoot past them, towards an unlucky distant realm. “Thank you for informing me,” he said.

They were both well aware that Thor had shoved him against control paneling so hard that they had had to delay flight for a day to repair broken buttons and switches.

Mantis sat down beside him on the bench, folding her hands in her lap. Loki thought of rising and leaving, but decided not to. Her quiet analysis was better than listening to Drax bellow and Quill blare slightly aged Midgardian music, and it was far better than watching Thor try to usurp Quill’s leadership.

The god and the empath were silent while the comet became a spark and then vanished. Then the ship tilted and jerked back to being level, making Mantis, whose feet did not touch the floor, almost fall off the bench. Loki automatically steadied her, frowning at the shouts that accompanied and followed the leveling.

“You need to watch where we’re going!” Rocket yelled from the front. “Not watch comets!”

“I was watching!” Quill yelled back, even louder than the raccoon. “Both! I’m a trained driver!”

Loki rolled his eyes. Cacophonous fools. He heard a soft whimper and looked at Mantis, who had pressed her hands over her face. Her sudden distress baffled him, but before he had reacted in any way save opening his mouth to speak, it was gone. Her hands descended to her lap, and she looked up at him with great pity.

He raised an eyebrow.

Mantis blinked. “I feel feelings, when I touch people,” she explained, her voice quiet and fast. “And you have many feelings, feelings of sadness and--and rejection.”

Loki subtly moved farther from her on the bench. “My apologies,” he stated, unapologetically, and frowned at a distant planet. It had not been her fault that she had touched him, but she might have kept his feelings to herself. He had not known she was an empath before now.

Mantis nodded as solemnly as if his tone had been serious. “I would like to know,” she said. “What happened. Because you would not so mourn that your brother is angry, if you had meant to pretend to be dead. How did you stay alive when Thanos broke your neck?”

Her dainty eyebrows rose as she asked the question, and she touched her own neck.

Loki frowned slightly as he looked at her. She was more inquisitive than he deemed a stranger should be; but he appreciated that she presumed him innocent. “By not being the one whose neck he broke.”

“Whose neck did he break?!” Mantis asked, already almost forgetting to breathe.

“A dead warrior’s. The Titan had consecrated himself to halving.” Loki scratched his palm as if it were itchy, although it was not.  “As I dare say you know.”

Mantis nodded. “He turned me into dust,” she said, too cheerfully. “It was interesting!”

Loki nodded, deciding not to react to her description. “He intended to kill Thor. But I thought it likely that if he slew me, he would spare Thor, and I was certain that he would kill me if I attempted to kill him. So I determined to stab him. I all but trod on a corpse as I went to sally forth--and conceived a better plot.”

He paused dramatically because Mantis was a wondrously riveted listener. Both her antennae were glowing with the suspense.

“I possessed a few wisps of the Eternal Flame, and I bestowed them on the dead warrior. He rose and obeyed me. I clad him in an illusion of myself, and sent him forth.”

Loki paused again, undramatically. He had seen all that his illusion had seemed to be seeing, and seen it again in nightmares. “It’s hardly necessary to relate our dialogue in detail. Suffice it to say that I implied to Thor that this was unreal, infuriated the Titan, and re-created the illusion of myself in every instant of the Titan strangling my deceased decoy.”

“So the illusion would not break,” Mantis commented sotto voce, correctly. “Why did you not let it break after the Titan left?”

“Because I could not,” Loki said, truly, and hoped both Mantis and himself could believe that. “The Titan’s high priest was a master of magic, and would not leave a fresh-fallen enemy unwatched.He would have reported my deception, and his master would have returned to ensure both my death and Thor’s.”

Mantis nodded, without skepticism. “Where did you go after it exploded? Thor was the only living person we saw when we came to help.”

“Some bit of the ship struck my head in the explosion, and when I was again conscious, I was flying through a tunnel of light and darkness.”

“I would not like to awake in such a place,” Mantis noted sympathetically. “Where did you land?”

Loki suddenly smiled. “Jotunheim, oddly enough.”

“The realm to which we are taking you.”

He nodded. “An icy realm, of which I happen to be the rightful king. I fell into a deep snowbank, and before I regained my feet was found by half a dozen Jotun hunters, who expected me to be an iron meteorite and were remarkably disappointed. They would have killed me, had I not revealed that I possessed the Casket Of Ancient Winters, which would save their realm, and which only a master of magic can wield. And thus--I am now King of Jotunheim.”

Mantis clapped enthusiastically. “You are good at surviving disasters!”

Loki laughed, both amused and pleased by her applause. “I really can’t dispute that.”

“Why didn’t you tell Thor you were alive? And why were you on Alfheim?”

“I knew not where he was, and I could not leave Jotunheim due to its utter lack of airships. As for why I was on Alfheim, we advanced last month to the point of possessing an airship constructed of native materials, and I was seeking an alliance with the Alves--alone, because Alfheim is too warm for my people. The ship perished when I attempted to leave Alfheim, and so I hired your captain to transport me home.”  

Mantis nodded, and looked at him thoughtfully, head tilted. He let her ponder whatever she was pondering.

“I am Groot! I am Groot!” came faintly from the other end of the ship.

“I’m not ‘grumpy,’” Thor answered the tree, grumpily, and Mantis leapt to her feet.

“I will tell him all of what you told me, and then he will not be angry!” she exclaimed, and darted off before Loki could stop her.

Loki sighed, and rose to find some other part of the ship to be in.  Thor would not be angry with Mantis, but he would think she was unintentionally echoing lies, and would deem it his duty to be furious with his brother for “abusing the trust of the innocent,” or something of the sort.

He could hear Mantis speaking, but her voice was so quiet and she was speaking to enthusiastically that he could not tell what she was saying. As he reached the ladder to the lower deck, he heard Thor’s loud footsteps and looked back to see Mantis holding Thor’s hand and all but dragging him towards Loki. “I have made him not be angry!” she said hopefully.

Thor did not look angry, but he looked as if he was not anything else either. Loki shook his head. If Mantis had sedated Thor, this would be as useless as talking to him while he was asleep. “Thank you, but--”

“You weren’t trying to make me think you dead?” Thor asked, and Loki realized that he was not sedated. He was dumbfounded.

Loki turned to face him, deadpanning, “You’re as brilliant as ever, brother.”

“That was sarcasm,” Mantis commented, to nobody in particular, and then burst into tears.

After a moment Loki realized she was because she was holding Thor’s hand, and his expression softened. He walked towards Thor. “I did imply that I intended a renaissance.”

Thor nodded, gently pulling his hand away from Mantis, who stopped crying straightaway. “I was having a hard time focusing on details,” he said. “With my little brother about to be killed.”

Loki felt a lump rise in his throat. He hadn’t liked for Thor to call him “little brother,” but after a decade of his never calling him that….

Mantis blinked tears out of her eyes and smiled proudly as the brothers hugged. “Reconciliations are full of such happiness!” she whispered.  

#loki #thor #mantis #endgame spoilers

[rachelbethhines]

The Antoine and Bunnie Retrospective - 153

“Duality” A Bold New Moebius II - Sonic the Hedgehog #190

Last time on the Antoine and Bunnie Retrospective, The Anti-Mobius gang invades freedom HQ while the Choaix is away fighting the Dark Egg Legion. 

We get some opening banter between Sonic and Scourge and then the big battle beings.    

Everyone pairs off, Antoine finally getting a crack at fighting Patch and Bunnie still going after Boomer. I’ll come back to the Patch vs Ant stuff in a minute but lets focus on Bunnie for now. 

She’s paired off with Boomer not only because of their similar power sets but also because the contrast in how they view said powers. Bunnie may have accepted herself for who she is, but she still resents the fact that her choice was taken away from her. And she can’t fathom why anyone would give up being what is to her mind “normal”. 

While Boomer’s reasoning is fairly shallow, he’s a bully who gets overlooked by the bigger bads and naturally craves validation same as all bullies do, it’s the seed of an an idea that will grow in future stories concerning Bunnie’s character: questioning the validity of cybernetics both her own and that of others. 

Sadly said stories are a ways off, as this is possibly the most development she gets during the entirety of the Eighth Era.     

During the skirmish Scourge almost gets sent back to his world. Angry at the thought of losing, he threatens his team and we see some hints as to how he came to power. 

I can’t remember if it is outright stated later, but it’s heavily implied here that Scourge actually did gouge Anti-Antoine’s eye out and gave him the moniker of “Patch” as an insult. 

The Suppression Squad now genuinely fear Scourge, unlike before, and follow his orders mainly out self preservation. 

You can’t feel too sorry for Patch though, because he’s also a lying abusive murdering psychopath. While I’m sad that we never saw Bunnie, Ant, and/or Sally thoroughly trounce his ass, it is nice to know that karma did it for them. 

More fighting ensues, more banter, and some more insights into Ali’s and Miles’s motivations occur, and then we reach what is perhaps the most important scene in the whole arc. 

I’ve talked about Antoine’s change in behavior since his capture several times before on this blog. We’ve also seen one or two hints that Bunnie herself has notice this change as well. This, however, is the first and sadly only time where we get an on panel confrontation revolving around it. 

Antoine claims that he only desires to protect Bunnie. That the reason he wishes to fight Patch is not for revenge but in order to keep everyone safe. 

It’s a sweet moment, but is it fully true?

Make no mistake, everyone’s safety comes first when Ant’s concerned. I have no doubt that he genuinely believes that what he does is for the greater good. But killing someone out of fear, even a reasonable fear, is still killing someone, and Antoine never says that he wouldn’t strike Patch down if given the chance. So does he really desire revenge and is using “protection” as a justification for his actions? Or can he no longer see the difference between the two when it concerns his family? 

We’ll never get an answer, but I personally believe that Ant is the only core Freedom Fight who would kill, and possibly already has.  And Patch is probably at the top of his hit list, if he ever went down a darker path. 

Especially when Patch continues to pull shit like this.   

Guys, I can’t. I just can’t. There’s not enough words in my vocabulary to process everything that’s going on in those panels; the angst, the horror, the dread, the relief, the love, the devotion, the squees of a dying fangirl.... It’s too much. 

So I’ll let someone else do it for me! XD 

I found this fanfic a while back that relates Antoine’s point of view during these events. It’s by  VideoGameAddictsLtd and It’s just so good!   

A Second in Eternity

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Read it guys! You won’t regret it. 

So after this bit of drama the battle wages on with neither side gaining any ground. Sally therefore calls for a retreat and Bunnie provides cover for everyone. 

I think this a new power for her. She’s had shields before, yes but not ones that worked like that. She also hasn’t had once since before her upgrade. 

And we think we get our first hint that Bunnie’s powers can have a bit of wear and tear on her body. A plot point for a later arc. Though you  could also infer that Boomer just hit her really, really hard too. Either way,  Ant’s concerned for his wife and it’s uber precious as always. 

This issue technically concludes this “arc” but not the whole story. This would be Flynn’s first foray into multi-part epics that spans across more then one arc. For better or for worse. 

#antoine d'coolette #bunnie d'coolette #bunnie rabbot #sonic the hedgehog #archie sonic #patch d'coolette #scrouge #anti-mobius