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#a.) didn't want to turn himself in

loumands · 1 year

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I feel like many people have a fundamental misconception of what unreliable narrator means. It's simply a narrative vehicle not a character flaw or a sign that the character is a bad person. There are also many different types of unreliable narrators in fiction. Being an unreliable narrator doesn't necessarily mean that the character is 'wrong', it definitely doesn't mean that they're wrong about everything even if some aspects in their story are inaccurate, and only some unreliable narrators actively and consciously lie. Stories that have unreliable narrators also tend to deal with perception and memory and they often don't even have one objective truth, just different versions. It reflects real life where we know human memory is highly unreliable and vague and people can interpret same events very differently

#the way some people (usually lestat fans lol) talk about louis being an unreliable narrator has frustrated me #i still insist louis' unreliableness is mostly subtle (passing quickly over things he doesn't want to think about #presenting things that factually happened in a way he can build a story that makes sense to him #not knowing what lestat is thinking and feeling so interpreting him differently than lestat himself probably would)#rather than he's telling something that didn't really happen or is under armand's mind control or something #like for example i think it's been made very clear all the abuse really happened they're not gonna suddenly pull the rug from under it #if anything i feel lestat is going to turn out to be even worse than louis perceived him when we hear people who are not in love w him lol #keanu.txt

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puppetmaster13u · 5 months

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Prompt 111

Y’all know H2O? Where some people get cursed to turn into merfolk whenever they get water on them? That, but replace water with ectoplasm and merfolk with naga.

No, Bruce has no idea how they managed to get cursed or how he ended up with an armful of baby snake-person creature thing. At least this one isn’t black-hair and blue-eyes so his kids can’t complain at him. And it’s not his fault they all fell into this, this was supposed to be a vacation while Lucious, Alfred, and Gordon kept an eye on things back in Gotham.

On the bright side, his children want to snuggle up for once, which he supposes is nice. And Damian seems pleased about it judging by his rambles about snakes. So there’s that.

#batman au #dcxdp #dpxdc #prompts #naga au #batman #cryptid batfam #This is what happens the One time they go on vacation #“Damian do not drip lazarus water on yourself to get free venom”#“No Jason you can't turn into a giant snake for 'intimidation purposes' do not”#“Duke stop encouraging your brothers”#“Somebody grab the baby *please*”#Danny has no idea what's goin on either #He's a baby #a lil baby halfa who has found himself in this stranger's arms but they're warm and there's other kids who feel content-safe sooo #“Master Bruce that had better not be another child without any prior warning-”#“Alfred I didn't get prior warning either they literally appeared out of nowhere”#I might draw this actually #Do whatever types of snakes you want #but i am picturing #Bruce- Rinkhals #Barbara- Purple-Glossed Snake #Dick- Bluestripe Garter #Cass- Banded Krait #Jason- Blood Python #Steph- Taipan #Tim- Coral Snake #Duke- Eyelash Viper #Damian- Boomslang #Helena- Black Mamba

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lolottes · 6 months

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the soul of the person you are trying to resurrect is not currently available. please to not try your ritual again later!

Superman was dead, the Justice League took advantage of a lull in their shitty situation to try to revive him. But instead of their Superman, someone in their body making their eyes shine lazarus green or Kryptonite green depending on who you ask. the person inside looks at the justice league with judgment and disdain close to contempt and disgust.

The soul of the person you are trying to resurrect is not currently available. please not try your ritual again later!

The GiW managed to capture Phantom in the confusion of the invasion. Danny finds himself tied up not far from Superman's ghost in poor condition. With Superman's ghost blocked by GiW technology, a random Observant has taken the place of Superman's soul and is not happy to be there and does not intend to hide it …or to be useful

#dpxdc #dcxdp #dc x dp #dp x dc #dp x dc crossover #dc x dp crossover #GiW #justice league #superman #ghost superman #danny phantom #observant #for once they didn't do anything wrong #but they don't intend to do anything good either #It's Superman's turn to have dissection trauma #he has no idea of the situation he found himself in #he just wants to get back to his paperwork #the only members of the justice league they know are #deadman because of some sort of misplaced national pride of certain ghosts #Constantine because of the paperwork he generates #and Billy Batson because not knowing who the new champion of magic is would be unprofessional #they also have no respect for the idiotic code names of humans #wonderwoman will have no qualms with the lasso very strong and tight #meanwhile the phantom team must choose between ensuring the protection of amity park or taking advantage of the confusion to attack the GiW #my #my prompts #prompt

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seventh-fantasy · 6 months

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li xiangyi, yin, and femininity

we all know that li xiangyi is a character of fractured identities. and li lianhua is an unreliable narrator to his own story. these make him not the most straightforward character to study. but I've believed in treating li lianhua as a part of li xiangyi, rather than separates. and there must be a common thread that ties all of him together. thus, I offer what I have found to be the most useful lens to use to view him as a cohesive whole, regardless as li xiangyi, li lianhua, or any other identity he may reinvent into: his 阴 yin qualities. (yin of yinyang)

this framework suggested by the drama's text itself has helped clarify to me his strengths, weaknesses, motivations, and struggles. by identifying this constant, too, makes it so much easier talking about what has changed in him.

[to the, hopefully growing, boli lhl hivemind @markiafc @ananeiah]

there are some notes on the concept of yinyang and chinese conceptualisation of gender I have to preface with.

[disclaimer: of course, I'm not even trying to cover a tip of what experts have extensively studied and debated in a depth it deserves. all I'm doing is try to parse the broad, fundamental ideas that are needed to explain my blorbos through my own spotty brain filter. so there bound to be nuances I've overlooked or some degree of my own interpretation. pretentious but needs to be done.]

阴 yin and 阳 yang are concepts characterised by passiveness, darkness, gentleness, femininity etc, and proactivity, light, toughness, masculinity etc respectively. a very key and handy concept to have in mind is their relationship to each other - which I'll not attempt at explaining better than literal scholars have:

Yin and yang exist only in relation to one another internally as the way warmth-coldness only exist relative to one another. Furthermore, when using yin-yang as an organizational schema, achieving balancing harmony is always the goal, not domination nor subordination of one to the other. [x]

while yin and yang can be symbols of femininity and masculinity, it doesn't mean all female are yin and all male are yang. it's certainly not a strict 1-to-1 equation. the concept of gender in chinese context is more social than biological. this suggests room for fluidity, and shaping of identities, often through social rituals as one journeys through life. it also means that there can be femininity in the masculine, and vice versa - in fact, that's only healthy because you need a good balance of the two worlds. no one part is better than the other. if you think of the two components as relative to each other, they are always interacting and affecting each other, rather than being strict and inert binaries. simply put, it needs to be kept in mind that there are greater nuances in applying yin and yang to the definitions of gender, and to avoid at all cost a simplification of this framework into a binary.

sure, the show has implied that lxy's powers and energy are yin-coded. but femininity is only one of the multiple attributes of yin. so how are we extending lxy's yin to femininity specifically? it's in the text that substantiates and qualifies lxy as feminine. dead women being used as proxies to his character. being literally dressed as a woman in order to put himself into their shoes and feel what they've felt. adopting a name that happens to be very, very feminine - 莲花 lianhua (lit. lotus flower) (it must be caveated that chinese names are NOT gendered. but there are just some names that are more feminine than others.) him coming to lead a life revolving around traditionally feminine, domestic things as li lianhua. him having interactions with the women around him like he's in his own element - no pressure and tension at all, unlike with all the other men.

as such, I'm more willing to use yin and femininity interchangeably in discussing lxy (while it's not necessarily applicable to every point that will be mentioned albeit there being some degree of implied association). and it's for the sake of elucidating what I feel is an intention or very plausible reading of the canon text in parsing feminine experiences in lxy's character. and thus, his queerness.

one last note is that taoism is going be mentioned quite a bit as well because of how much it as a philosophy honours the yin quality. its key tenets include valuing passiveness and inaction as a form of action, and submitting to the nature of things. and we will see how those come up in lxy's life too. (though I'm not gonna attempt to deep dive into it here beyond broad strokes of it.)

a huge part of li xiangyi's yin actually manifests in him being a passive person. this applies not just to li lianhua, but also li xiangyi. I know. ok wait hear me out. the idea of yinyang is after all components that can change and are relational to each other: thus, there were points in li xiangyi's life when he was less passive than other points, but they ultimately don't match up to the degree of aggression displayed by other men around him. so relative to their display of proactivity and aggression, he can be considered as passive. the best example is that of shan gudao proposing to launch an offensive on jinyuan alliance, while lxy - as much as he was arrogant about it - was standing his ground on not taking action in favour of peace.

it has already showed up in his childhood as well. he wasn't a particularly competitive child: 从来都没有谁要和你争 nobody has ever thought of competing with you over anything, he told sgd as he recalled of their times growing up. it was in fact sgd who was desperate to control and override lxy's presence. baby lxy did not hesitate at all over giving up on winning in favour of protecting his only rare few close relationships left in the world (given how hard-earned relationships are when they're non-familial !!!!). as much as I resent the one-dimensional writing of sgd, he has served as a very strong marker to highlight on lxy's yin.

I've harped on it several times before but this is the time I finally get to explain it proper: my own theory is that li xiangyi became an unparalleled swordsmaster because of his yin/feminine quality, not in spite of it. an interesting point that had been out in the open unclaimed until it was brought up in our friend group is that, li xiangyi does not actually fit anybody's conventional image of a 武林盟主 wulin mengzhu (ie. ruler of wulin). it would most likely have been some burly, muscular, ultra-masculine dude. even if they don't look like the demonic monk, it should be someone more like di feisheng. but. it's li xiangyi, the boyish, delicate-looking kid, who came to the top. (no wonder people - mostly men - love or love to bully hate him like weak men hate powerful women??)

"why didn't they cast someone who looks more like a wulin mengzhu (read: traditionally manly)?" no, no that's precisely the point. nobody said wulin mengzhu have to look manly. and also who is to define the manliness required to be in a place of authority? (or in my other meta, we would ask, who is to define anybody gets to have the authority over anyone else at all?)

by taoist ideal, gentleness is the most refined form of strength. li xiangyi has been haunting and distracting me in my chinese calligraphy practices lately because I'm thinking about how this must be the closest to what it felt like lxy becoming the best swordsman in jianghu. (so pretentiously brainrotten of me, I know, BUT IT'S REAL and I'm suffering.) mastering a chinese art is essentially about mastering a delicate balance between force and gentleness; being able to draw force from softness 柔中带刚 and an ability to maintain this balance. a beginner will instinctively hold a brush for the first time with brute, unrefined force. some fairly reputable contemporary calligraphers, according to my teacher, can be seen as being either too soft or too forceful - but are still able to pass off as good enough. it's then, the master of masters who will have the sophistication of a firm yet flexible control of the brush with the appropriate use of gentleness/laxness that produces a harmony of strokes. this idea extends to any other sort of chinese craft or practice including traditional chinese medicine, and I believe, swordsmanship too. I'm taking a fucking leap of faith here to say this because I practise NO sort of (chinese) martial arts, I must caveat. (someone who does may want to say something...) but theoretically that should be how it works.

it is not for no rhyme or reason, or *handwaves* that lxy emerged to the top AND is almost undefeatable. among a competitive, forceful (ie. yang) wulin, li xiangyi stood out with a power and energy defined by yin (ie. gentleness and stability) that led him to create his signature 扬州慢 yangzhouman. it is characterised by 慢 slowness (my calligraphy teacher says to us all the time to take it slow), and also described by dfs as 中正绵长 - which I would best describe by painting a picture of a steady and stable stream. these precisely speak of the essence of a mastery of gentleness as strength to me.

conversely, dfs's way in mastering power is very largely premised on taking action because he literally had no other choice in the environment he grew up in. both of them develop in opposite ways. it was the case of gentleness for lxy clearly because he grew up in a safe, nurturing environment that had allowed him to be slow and steady at his own pace, drawing on his natural gifts.

now top of the wulin world at 17, li xiangyi founds sigu sect. li xiangyi, the boy before becoming menzhu and li xiangyi the leader of sigu sect are not the same.

how then did a (relatively) passive boy like lxy end up founding sigu sect. this lxy is the one who was fostered into competition - though not in an abusive, twisted way. in fact he was raised in a rather taoist way by his shifu: to be honest with yourself and respect your opponent. so he honoured whatever powers he had been bestowed with by nature. he gives into it. even so, at another level, I just have a sense that shifu and shiniang's competitive marital spat had an insidious effect on the boys...though the detrimental effect was more on sgd than lxy. baby lxy feels like a sweet-natured kid who was just in his own zone, you know - some (aka sgd) would say, too much of him even, to have not realised what was wrong at all with his shixiong for years.

that's not all of course. I've always gotten the vibes that his attitude behind forming sigu sect felt more like, this is what all the good men of jianghu do and I will have to do it now especially that I'm the best. it didn't feel particularly personal to me, but rather what would have been expected of him by the social climate of wulin jianghu (eg. lxy saying to 光耀师门 bring honour to his teacher). it's definitely not an expectation from his shifu, who explicitly told him that he was never expected to become a noble figure of any sort, but just to be alive and contented. as concluded by the man himself as li lianhua: "有些人入了江湖是为了立心，而有的人入江湖为的是立命。我却不知道自己真正想要的是什么。some people enter jianghu for the cultivation of the mind, others for a cultivation of a meaningful life. but I never knew what I truly wanted." he was ultimately, unwittingly a passive player in his own story of becoming the great sigu sect leader.

(at this point, as a side note, I do wonder if there were any other similar sects or alliances that function the same as sigu sect that came before it. because I'm damn well sure there must be something, as likely as there must have been generations of wulin legends who came before lxy. but of course, this is not what the story is concerned with at all and I'm ok with that.)

it's crucial to point out that, even despite this being the phase of his yang in the display of taking action and enacting firmness, lxy had still done sigu sect with the sole purpose and manner of upkeeping peace and order (in the way of the pro-universal love, anti-aggression mohist 侠 xia leader of the people). he's still very characterised by yin in my books, especially when vis-à-vis to sgd.

a li xiangyi full of himself and made himself too useful to the people was only bound for a great asteroidal fall, in the concept of 物极必反 - or in taoist lexicon 反者道之动 (ie. anything that has reached its limit will only start developing in the opposite direction). if you think you're above all, you can only go down.

this manifests during the next time he took action - and it was one so forceful that it overpowered even his opponent, dfs who ended up being the passive, receiving party in this case - was in initiating the battle at donghai 10 years ago... and gee oh boy. it didn't end well - for both of them, but even more so for lxy. (dfs was like 'tis but a scratch (shrugs)' as compared to him being ripped off his tendons by jiao liqiao like nezha did to the dragon prince. truth is he had to go into a 10-year healing retreat served by his entourage. :p) ok, I digress.

xiao zijin was quick to attribute sigu sect's fall to lxy's arrogance - in turn setting the stage for lxy's 10 years of self-hatred and the framing of lxy as a villain? irresponsible figure? by jianghu. (god forbid girls do anything! ok for legal reasons, this a joke.) lxy lost his mind in ways I believe he never had in his life there and then upon seeing his shixiong dead. so, you could say he led the jianghu world to ruins out of love (using this term loosely). but it feels inaccurate to say it's due to arrogance. he did not do that out of self-importance or ego, especially when the revenge for sgd was a collective decision made by sigu sect as we know from the flashback. so when llh pinned all fault on himself for being arrogant in the past, it is with caution to take his words because that's the unreliable narrator in him speaking.

anyway, it's precisely li xiangyi that is capable of bouncing back from such a fatal crisis, equipped with his yin and a mastery that gave him the power of flexibility.

it's extremely vital to re-establish that literally the only thing that was keeping li xiangyi alive, physically, as li lianhua is yangzhouman. (monk wuliao literally said that to lxy even though he did facilitate in saving him.) it's the yangzhouman that was drawn from lxy's mastery of yin. without yangzhouman, li xiangyi would not even have the chance to become li lianhua and undergo any needed process of transformation. without li xiangyi, there would have been no yangzhouman. no li xiangyi, no li lianhua, get it?

the point is not to deny the change li xiangyi wants to make and has made. but to acknowledge that change isn't about complete erasure and destruction. something from you survives. something in you had kept you alive to have you come so far, regardless of all the bad bits that you want to denounce of. you've always been worth it.

bringing back the thing about his new name: the distinction must be made that he did not pick it because it was feminine but it just so happened a feminine name had resonated with him. (read: he didn't necessarily identify as a woman but identified with femininity. at least within the parameters of canon text.)

he also made an interesting choice to retain his surname for someone who was desperate to sever ties from his past. hmm. or maybe he wasn't that desperate? when li lianhua says li xiangyi is dead, I believe it meant that li xiangyi the sigumen menzhu is dead rather than li xiangyi as an entirety. li lianhua is a returning to the path lxy could have gone if he did not establish sigu sect, the path that shifu wanted him to take. when he walked to the doors of sigu sect in the aftermath, nothing was actually stopping him from going back (people were still around and alive, instead of all dead people, you know)... except for himself. taking that action would have been too much for him. so he went with the flow of life giving him a chance at rebirth and walked away. there, inaction as a form of action.

zhan yunfei and qiao wanmian have said to li lianhua, oh that doesn't sound like li xiangyi at all. but has it been considered that, maybe it was sigu sect's lxy who wasn't the real lxy? sigu sect lxy was one big performance of the values of masculinity and heteronormativity that llh had came to an awareness of, and eventually struggle with again and resist against in the final year of his life. there had only been some glimpses of his true nature allowed (validated by fang duobing talking about lxy at his altar).

imho, most flashbacks of lxy during that period felt impersonal and more like a template of a hero expected to marry his girl at 18. going through all the motions and steps of a normative life even before he was old enough to grasp and explore his own identity and what it meant in the world. no wonder he denounced so much of what he had done as lxy including liking girls. walking away then also meant a walk away from those duties and expectations. li lianhua is li xiangyi liberated from masculine duties and heteronormative performance.

in doing that, he had the opportunity for the first time in his life to explore what he truly wanted, at least within the parameters of what he could afford to do at that point. he could go on to build a domestic, feminine life within the space of jianghu (as I've established here). it's a kind of feminine lifestyle that doesn't quite exist in mainstream society - being a woman there meant to stay put in a domestic space without much room to move socially. nor did it exist in wulin jianghu because even the women there like shi-guniang and jlq were expected to be masculine, aggressive, competitive. so building a mobile home in the space of jianghu is his way of defining the life he wants and can have. li lianhua is the extension of femininity in li xiangyi - and one that can be free.

it's also worth talking about in my opinion what is one of the most important and a favourite dihua moment: when dfs said to lxy that his greatest weakness was to like being a hero. and a swordsman should be without weaknesses. I'm forever wrapped up in how many layers this can be read in. was he mad at lxy for liking to be a hero or having weaknesses, or both? if the former, it was dfs criticising, based on lxy's public reputation, lxy's oversized illusions about being a hero - a figure of masculinity with an unrealistic sense to uphold noble goals eg. saving the world etc. that is actually perfectly logical coming from dfs, the straightforward, no-nonsense, morally neutral guy with no illusions about heroism (in this case, he feels more like a yin). but at the same time, we should understand that lxy's motivations behind the donghai battle are more personal than noble. if any, it was actually the opposite of noble - it was like he was acting out of the role of a caretaker of his family, and at a cost of the peace and order of jianghu he was set on guarding(!!) dfs also knew that lxy was there just for his shixiong. and so, dfs, who happens to be the epitome of yang, can be read as a symbol of masculinity disapproving of lxy for being sentimental and emotional; for having the "feminine" desires to simply want to defend his family (not saying those are exclusively feminine traits but they have been conventionally associated as feminine). I think both layers of reading are correct and should work together to contribute to the complexity of their characters. (we can see how it contributes to lxy and dfs being the perfect yinyang halves to each other, which I will come back to briefly touch on later.)

for 10 years he lived a life of seclusion and staying-in-his-own-lane a taoist would be proud of. he knew he was dying and has always been ok with dying, as he claimed. but did he want to die? to think of it, it was the opposite. because in those 10 years when he could have 100% just taken action to take his own life, he didn't. in fact, he lived on and took care of himself in the way shifu wanted him to. he had simply preferred letting nature run its course. if bicha didn't take him, he wasn't gonna do anything. but if he died one day very soon, he would be ok with it too. sure, he was maybe banking on a lead to sgd's whereabouts to appear during his last years alive but that clearly wasn't the only thing on his mind for NINE years because he didn't actively go out seeking for that either. this is basically him telling dfs that he would just lie in the sun and wait for the sweet release of death, if dfs were to force him to fight. not even the mortal threat from dfs was enough to move him into action of fighting back or killing himself.

time and again, lxy as llh was dragged into fdb's cases but not only that, he also maintained an impersonal distance with them. it's starkly different from the usual (wuxia) hero archetypes (for eg. fdb) who would be more impassioned and personally invested in the plight of the victims- or unlike most seemingly aloof protagonists who would somehow grow emotionally invested over time. one of the many things I love about llh is that he never tries a second time to persuade people out of their decisions he finds unwise (eg. him just wanting to move on in response to the girls in 女宅 insisting on staying behind with their slave master at first.) he will not interfere in other people's choices made in their own lives. it's not his business. he didn't even want to be there, to be honest.

however as the story progresses, more and more people - especially men, his past, and the leads to the truth came back to demand and taunt him into doing something. they vary from well-meaning people without any harm intended such as fdb intruding upon his private space completely uninvited and qwm wanting him back; to dfs merely seeking him as a mean to an end initially (eg. I only need him to live long enough to have one last fight); and finally, on the other end of the spectrum, outright aggressive and hostile people like sgd and xzj who wanted him to die. under all this pressure, he tried his best to deflect, but he does waver especially when it comes to matters concerning the people he cares about aka his obsession wish of 10 years of looking for sgd's remains that had lied low until fdb entered his life, and then later on taking revenge for his shifu.

looking for sgd became his final bid at taking action. he was operating on a slim chance of getting some emotional closure from finding out his shixiong is dead for real, yes. what a good plan. but objectively unnecessary. or surprise! uhhh...finding out his beloved shixiong is actually alive and would strangle him for one corn chip? AND OH NO IT GOT WORSE- uncovering a devastating truth about his shifu's death that he could have totally gone on with life fine without knowing if he had continued not caring.

but it is sometimes just impossible not to care - it is only human to care. and he is human, not an icon in the image of a hero. so he took a chance, once more, and it killed him in unprecedented ways. it's donghai all over again. things in life don't go as planned. you fuck around and it fucks you back. finding out the truth behind his shifu's death and his family background from the past did nothing for him as li lianhua living in the present.

it's no wonder that this lxy decisively relinquishes the desire to take action in the end. he goes back to letting nature run its course. and this time, stands firmly to it despite everyone begging him otherwise. wangchuan flower could only give him a recovery (or survival?) rate of 30%. there's a 70% chance of failure and even in the 30% he was not sure what he was to become. in comparison, dfs took a 10% chance game of survival in a heartbeat, and it pushed him to new heights. that's how they differ: he thrives by taking risks and action while lxy the other way round. so, something like that has happened before and he wants none of it again.

he leaves lotus tower, only taking his horse and a sack - relinquishing almost every other material belonging he had - and sets off on a journey. before xzj interrupted...where to was he going?? I wonder. we don't know for sure, I think? and are we allowed to know? that makes the scene he had with xzj an understated inflection point in the very last part of his journey. yes, he was already on his way to...maybe die? but not necessarily. you don't have to travel distances with your belongings for that, right? or speak to dfs personally about not wanting to fight? (borrowing one of @ananeiah's takes.) regardless, he was definitely leaving behind jianghu - not only wulin jianghu (he already did that 10 years ago), but also the jianghu space he had carved out in the last 10 years.

what sparked the decision to jump off the cliff in him was dfs's words from the night of their wedding 10th donghai anniversary: 横扫天下容易，断相夷太剑不易 conquering the world is easy, breaking xiangyi sword is not. in the original context, dfs was talking about defeating lxy being harder than conquering the world. but when it came to this scene, it was to lxy about forsaking the very last worldly possessions he had after already giving up on lotus tower and hulijing (including releasing his horse), especially his only connection left to swordsman lxy.

perhaps it had dawned on him that, wanting things at all was bad for him. in the last 10 years, he lived a life of seclusion, wanting very little. but he had still wanted things. there were still things he couldn't let go of that had led him to this state. despite having lived on an identity inspired by a buddhist teaching for 10 years, maybe it was only at this point that he was finally the closest to reaching an understanding of it. (I wish I was knowledgeable enough right now to dive into the possible buddhist reading here but alas. I'll leave it to our resident expert @markiafc)

it doesn't quite matter in the end where he was going after all. what mattered was that he literally went where the water took him and we're not supposed to know where it ends. I'm not seeing this in a bad and pessimistic way though. I think the relief in all this is that he had tried his best to within his abilities. also it's a form of enlightenment in relinquishing a desire, an obsession, a need to take any more action in order to live well. thus his ending felt to me relatively tender, empowering, and kind - albeit bittersweet and heartaching - than other possible kinds of ending, in a story where it was very possible for him to have died under the knives of his opponents or bicha at any moment, outside of his control.

if you've come so far in this post, congratulations! but also a reveal is that... you're not immune to the dihua propaganda threaded throughout this post. :P

as mentioned, other men like sgd and xzj in lxy's life were incredibly hostile to him. their yang nature overwhelmingly powers his yin. but dfs is different. dfs is the yang counterpart that fits perfectly to his yin.

dfs's yang is one that contains yin, that mirrors lxy's balance of yang in yin. it was suggested in text they are yinyang-coded meant to complement each other, given that whenever wangchuan flower's yin vs yang properties were discussed, the two men were always spoken about in the same breath. more importantly, as with the above few analyses of dfs's words playing a big role in shaping of lxy's choices with multiple meanings - as well as their day-to-day interactions - we can see that they constantly play off each other.

dfs's yang energy has been used to help lxy prolong his life (though not saving him entirely), while lxy has used his yin energy to save dfs and subsequently helped him attain his breakthrough. dfs has also helped lxy in his breakthrough of yin but not in the same way as dfs's cultivation of his combative powers, and rather, it's for lxy an understanding of his own path to take in life - a cultivation of the mind (both times 10 years before and after). given how significant dfs is in the shaping of lxy's realisation of the yin path - alike his shifu has, it's no wonder that they were the only two people lxy had imagined in his last sword dance of a farewell to jianghu.

with each of them coming together to form the perfect yin-yang model, they're a harmony of yin and yang representing the cosmos. what I also love is that they didn't start out as a perfect fit, but only towards the end of the story was the harmonisation completed, which makes sense for two components that are always in a flux influencing each other. the fact that they were number 1 and 2 of wulin, and being the only ones capable of understanding each other in a level nobody else could... it all reinforces the cosmic sense of their relationship. they're the halves to a whole, fitting in a specific way nobody else can.

(I mean. technically this is going into the space of extrapolation based on a tangential interpretation of canon text, so do take it with a pinch of salt. but of course this pinch of salt can do wonders for a shipper's feast... :P and this certainly could have been a meta of its own expanding on dfs's side of the analysis, but this is it for now in this context.)

to think of it, li xiangyi has actually died more than that one time that turned him into li lianhua. first was a death of him as a nanyin royalty - I resent having to bring up nanyin like it should hold any weight to the narrative as far as I'm concerned, but the point being that he had a completely different (familial-based) life before that still stands. then he had a rebirth as li xiangyi, disciple and swordsman to his shifu and shiniang, and later died again when li xiangyi the sigu sect leader took over. lxy the sigu sect leader died at sea in the battle 10 years ago and came back as li lianhua. (just like nezha, died after battling at east sea and rebirthed from the lotus) li lianhua then dies by the end of the drama.

there can be a myriad of interpretations as to what exactly happened to him, including the possibility that he's still alive. regardless, we can agree that li lianhua as an identity has ran its course, and he had to evolve again. but into what form?

in the line of thought of yin and femininity, and how his transformation has been in an increasing degree of presentation of femininity - even way back when I was watching the show, I had the idea of him living socially as a woman post-li lianhua. I don't know what he would be realistically doing or what could be practical for him in such an identity. but conceptually it was sensible and compelling to me before diving deeper into the details. (I have more elaboration to do on this that I won't be talking about here publicly but it is in the same strain of idea as this other comparative meta I wrote.)

I think the next possible identity lxy can assume - alive in the material realm or not - is one that will be beyond a material being. a nameless entity. once you've gone through the phases of life - from not knowing to knowing, and perfecting knowledge, then to the surpassing of knowledge - you surpass all worldly existence, and become one with the cosmos.

I end this off with an excerpt from Tao Te Ching's Chapter 41 (I'm not pretending to have read the whole book ok but I couldn't resist including this):

明道若昧，进道若退，夷道若纇 [...] 道隐无名 The bright path seems dim; Going forward seems like retreat; The easy way seems hard [...] The Tao is hidden and without name. (x)

the character translated into "easy" is the same 夷 yi of li xiangyi's name. somehow this seems to encapsulate the journey of his life: one that seems blessed and smooth-sailing but ending up to be rocky and turbulent. but at the end of the day, after all that he had been through, he will become hidden and without name.

#莲花楼 #mysterious lotus casebook #lhl #lhlmeta #my posts #a big win for the inaction fandom. lxy would have been patron saint #this inevitably turned into a 'lhl is a taoist and buddhist story if not a very chinese story' meta hbhjbjhbhjjb #the last thing i do before going to sleep is write this meta. the first thing i do after waking up is write this meta.#i feel so insane writing this. it kept growing like a monster. do you think this is a joke it's like my part-time job now #but it's one of the few times in my life i have confidence in my insanity. so.#crazier thing is. this meta is approaching 6k words yet i still think there must be things i haven't covered.#the last section is so nuts idk how i even wrote it guys i think i was possessed #it's also like the most pretentious way to put that he's dead in this world ok hjbjhbhjbhjbjbh #to be clear iirc the drama didn't say LXY'S POWER/ENERGY IS YIN in the same way it literally said dfs's energy is yang #but it's definitely implied by the explanation of the flower's healing properties for both of them. on top of yangzhouman #also fuck. another reason he didn't choose to save himself was so dfs could have the yang flower which he believed was what dfs wanted #thank u frens mark and ana for indulging my brain in the first time i brought the lxy as woman thing up. for it to have come this far #ofc disclaimer is that a lot of this is my own reading. it doesnt have to be agreed by everyone #i would be very happy though if any part of it resonated with anybody #also a good part of the analysis is based on my memory of the show. though i did revisit parts selectively to verify. sooooo. yeah.

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forgottenarthur · 3 months

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50. Writer's preference - "And what if it is not you?"

The barb stung and Arthur turned away as quickly as if she had struck him.

These walks had become something of a tradition between the Prince and former Princess over the rolling weeks. With the out of doors near unpassable, Arthur's mornings had shifted to a shorter indoor practice before dawn, followed by a brief repast and then a stroll through the Orangery with the Lady Aria. Though they still argued as often as they didn't, there was something free and flowing in these conversations -- a strange sense that no subject was off limits...And that every single one was somehow taboo. It was perhaps true that they had each been raised as royalty, but it seemed their worlds could not have been more different.

Today, the subject had fallen to that all-encompassing theme of his life, the most pressing topic in the empire, and the one least likely ever to be openly addressed: Roderick's line of succession. It was an ache in his gut, this, a hill he had run up all his childhood only to find a sheer rockface confronting him. Now, scrambling for footholds in the brutal cliffside, it was a race to the top against those he loved most -- a climb now far too high to risk the drop. It was success or the death of all meaning. But what was he to do? Throw his siblings from the sides? They too held on by meager fingertips and he could not bear to think of them dashed against the teeth of the unforgiving stone so far below.

Arthur's jaw clenched. He kept her pace, but he no longer looked at her as she spoke; heard her only as if from a great distance. What was there to say? Yet, her last words burned, searing like vinegar in his cuts, and he turned sharply towards her, a rush sounding in his head.

"What? You favor someone else?" he demanded, all effort at bluster or calm stripped away. Surprise seemed to register in his face and, pressing his eyes shut, he shook his head, realizing she meant this only as rhetoric and, with a look of defeat, he sighed; shook his head. "How should I know? It would be the end for me."

He didn't look at her, now, gaze straying upwards towards the gently nodding trees, branches heavy and sagging with fruit. He thought of the tart-sweet of them, tawny and opening with a kind of crack. Fibrous chambers of juice attended the tiny seeds at the center and this, then, was life. Even trees limned their children with sweet cushions against the harsh reality of the world around them. When he laughed, it was a bitter sound.

Sighing, Arthur shook his head. "Aria, I--" but he stopped. He'd not said her name so baldly before and he gestured, helpless, voice trapped within his throat.

Her eyes were dark: not mere chocolate, but something else as if the sea had leaked into them and tossed against stormy shores within her mind. Her face was set, but he could not read it. He searched for something written there, something designed for him to read: he wanted it. He knew the message he wished to read. A very simple message. He wanted to read it again and again, see it roiling within the storm of her eyes. But there was nothing. She was no harbor. She was, perhaps, another deathly drop.

Aria lifted her chin. "Go on."

"I don't know what will happen if my father chooses someone else any more than you do. But I do know I will be a threat to whoever is chosen, simply for having been in the running, and..."

And if it were Edmund who were selected, whom Arthur regarded as the most likely alternative, he would not expect to long outlive his father -- or even his father's choice. Enemies of the House of Calainon had a way of disappearing. Arthur was not altogether certain they even lifted a finger: they were witches, after all. Likely, all they needed do was wish for a thing, and their dark magic did the rest. Edmund might not wish him gone, perhaps...but Amira would not hesitate. He could not help but think that would make for a horrible ending, all the demons of hell rising at her command. His would be a silent end, he had no doubt, yet he knew, too, that if it were by Amira's hand, he would die howling.

If Aria had said something else, Arthur had not heard it. At last, she said: "And what if the Emperor doesn't choose? What happens to us all, then?"

Arthur stopped short, and Aria beside him. "Then it'd be war."

He walked out without another word.

#this was really interesting to write -- he's actually much more clear eyed (when forced to confront it) than id thought he'd be honestly #drabble #challenge #aria stafford #edmund varmont #amira varmont #guinevere varmont #ask #honestly still ruminating abt this like...this response really shocked me??????#i kinda thought he'd be like 'guess id turn to duke or knight errant or smth' or just bluster but he was like 'nah im dead by black magic'#me: you ok arthur?????#arthur: obviously not #roderick varmont #arthur's gonna go hit smth really really really hard btw if you're wondering where he's off to #realizing being a knight isn't ~just abt proving himself (tho its v much that too!!!) its also a coping mechanism #and he's lowkey terrified every single day of his life and now im really sad #i honestly didn't think he was so aware of all that laksjdflkjslf #about #also if you're wondering what he was searching for in her face -- he just wanted to see a lil faith in him #that's all he really wants from anyone #and its all he never gets from anyone #if anyone anyone showed a lil faith in him or a lil love for him -- god forbid -- he'd go to the ends of the earth for them purely for that

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tswwwit · 9 months

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What are some ideas you have floating around that you don't have any plans on writing but like to entertain as a thought?

Many of them, in fact! Though they sort of vanish from my memory if I don't make a record of them, here's a few ones I jotted down when they came to mind.

For a domestic one: Bill thought he'd hate a lot of being married! Even though he loves Dipper, he thought he'd rebel against the chains of domesticity - and in some ways he still does - but one major benefit he's found is not having to be 'on' all the time.

No need to be perfectly performing all the time! No shoving around for social influence, no intimidation, or clever tricks. No commanding attention or taking up the room. Hell, there's surprisingly little upkeep! Bill can undo his tie and pick his nose and bitch about his day to someone who isn't bending over backwards to agree with him on everything. Someone who doesn't give him a weird look and sneer if he, god forbid, actually wants to sit down, read a book, drop the grin for an hour or two.

The concept in question is Bill's very first moment of great surprise. That when he isn't being the most charming, terrifying, and exciting guy in the universe, and just chilling out for like, five minutes, Dipper comes over and snuggles up to him on the couch, or wraps his arms around his shoulders and kisses the top of his head. And when Bill asks 'what was that for?', Dipper shrugs and goes 'eh, just felt like it'. It's both baffling and extremely compelling.

A short where Reincarnated Dip is Definitely Sure he's Not Gay!!! Especially not for this Hot Demon Man who is getting so close and touchy with him with his big smile and horrible wiles. Yep. Just keeping an eye on him to make sure he's not up to something Nefarious ™.

A discussion between Dipper and Bill where Dipper insists that Bill should understand this, or not do that, because, like. Y'know, Bill's a guy! There are guy things! Making Bill stare at Dipper like he's an idiot. He proceeds to informs Dipper how that's stupid for multiple reasons! First, that Bill's Not Human to begin with, his gender can't be put into a little box! And frankly, he never filled out the paperwork for his original one, come to think of it. Sure, he/him's fine, but c'mon, sapling, thinking of the whole shebang like a binary is dumb as hell. Now Dipper has to do some mental readjustment re: his own issues with masculinity/gender.

#answers #None of this is very coherent I just saved this ask for a while and dumped some thoughts in #Though I do have like a whole scene in my head for the gender one #Probably it's Bill cajoling Dipper into wearing a dress for something. Which Dipper obviously rebels against.#Bill's very convincing but Dipper shoots back well. He's never seen *Bill* wear a dress. Thinking he's making a point #But Bill just gets the metaphorical equivalent of a lightbulb over his head. Hey! Good point kid it's been a while #Oh ho!!! I see! Pinching Dipper's cheek - you want us to *match!* Surprised to see any fashion sense outta you #Hold on a sec. Bill will whip up something in a jiffy. A real nice one #Now Dipper's spluttering. He thought it was a good counterargument but Bill didn't even *flinch* at the idea of wearing one himself #But like. C'mon Bill Guys Don't Wear Dresses!! You're a guy you shouldn't-#Bill stares at him like he's an idiot. DIpper shuts up. Dumb move actually now that he's thinking about it #Both because telling Bill he *shouldn't* do something absolutely means he's looking into doing it. If not already in the process #And second. Uh. Oh hell. Dipper remembers. That Bill's only wearing that body. Not human. Triangular so - Wait. Is he *not* a guy?? Uh.#Bill's perfectly fine with his human body and his pronouns. Even with the presumptions that his husband has made over the years #But Dipper having this idea that those mean Bill should STOP doing certain things annoys him a lot #Bill politely - for him anyway - reminds Dipper that he's very much *not* a guy. None of that crap applies!#As Dipper has seen! And hey the ideas Dipper's working with there are outdated even among *humans* what the hell #There's probably a mini-rant that's rather scathing but frankly that's Bill on easy mode for his husband #Dipper's well-intentioned and knows how things go but he struggles with masculinity especially regarding himself #Turns out being bullied and trying so hard to be Socially Acceptable means a lot of issues to unpack #Also re: the Domestic one #Dipper is present with Bill while he chills out for those five minutes. Just watching from across the room #Bill knows he's there. But he's not puffing up trying to be impressive. Not being dismissive. Just accepting. And now Dipper's *fascinated*#It's so rare to see Bill NOT 'on' that he couldn't help it. No big show. No big grin. Almost.... not 'vulnerable' he's terrifying always #But so so relatable. God does Dipper know the feeling of just wanting to find some peace and quiet after a hectic day. But for Bill. That's #Rare and strange and so - Dipper *knows* he's the Only Person who could ever ever see this. Being in Bill's presence for a full ten minutes #Without Bill flipping some internal switch to 'Impress or Intimidate'. This is Dipper's own little secret to watch and absorb and treasure #And. In a way. When Bill's not vibrating with potential energy for parties or violence he's even MORE handsome #He just HAS to kiss him. A little bit. On the cheek or on the top of the head. Maybe curl up next to him where it's warm and touch his ches #Bill spends hours afterward wondering where the hell that came from and WHY. And it'll take him *so much* time to figure it out

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arabian-batboy · 9 months

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Endeavor from BNHA is a prime example of how fandom trying to shield characters from (rightful) hate will only generate more hate toward the said characters.

Because I binge-watched the show before stepping foot in the fandom and even though I began this show hating Endeavor, he was actually starting to grow on me since his plot-line was one of the most interesting parts of the show and at certain points I even thought his “awkward dad” moments were kinda endearing? Then I looked around and saw an army of people who are so damn eager to swiftly forgive Endeavor for everything wrong he has ever done and shield him from any type of criticism, which includes shifting all the blame to his own wife & children and suddenly what little affection I had for this character is gone and now I’m back to hating him again.

Like you do realize that this is a grown middle aged man who has been emotionally and physically abusing his wife (who’s really more of a stay-at-home surrogate) and children for 25 years straight and has only turned a new leaf in-universe for only half a year max? It doesn’t matter how much you like his character, LET PEOPLE GO OFF ON HIM IF THEY WANT TO!!! You trying so hard to victimize him or to victim-blame his family for all his abuse will just make people hate him even more.

#just saw this dumbass dude on Tiktok trying to justify him slapping Rei on ep 17th of the 6th season #by saying he has the right to be mad that she allowed his son to burn himself #I never wanted to to slap someone over fictional characters so bad #first of all Touya's breakdown is 100% that child abuser fault in the first place so what right does he have to be angry at her?#if anything HE should be the one getting slapped #2nd of all how do you know that Rei knew about Touya's burns and didn't do anything about it?#Endeavor said that he was only burning himself in places no one could see under his clothes #3rd of all what about all the times he slapped Rei because she tried to protect 5 year old Shouto from Endeavor's beatings?#you got excuses for that too?#that dude might have been an Endeavor's stan trying to make other ppl like his fav more #but ironically that one minute video turned me from an Endeavor semi-enjoyer to an Endeavor hater #enji todoroki #rei todoroki #touya todoroki

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godsfavoritescientist · 10 months

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Building off of what I wrote in my fic "Sparks," I'm really compelled by the idea of Ford genuinely no longer being interested in sailing around in a boat with Stan by the time they were seniors in high school.

I like the idea of it not being just a symptom of the resentment that had been building between them, nor it being a dream of Ford's that only paled in comparison to west coast tech, but it being a genuine loss of interest on Ford's end. I think it complicates things even further in some really juicy ways.

Like, imagine going through high school slowly losing more and more interest in the dream you've shared with your twin and only friend ever since you were little kids. How do you break it to him? How do you explain it to him without making it sound like a rejection of him? Without it making him hate you?

How do you explain it without it feeling like a spit in the face to all the hard work he's put into a plan that started out as a way of him comforting you by telling you "it doesn't matter what people say about you, you're going to be an adventurer who sails away into the sunset and never has to hear their mockery ever again, and there will be babes and treasure and heroism, and then they'll all see how cool you really are!"

And all through high school you think to yourself, "he's going to move on to more realistic dreams any day now, and then I won't have to say anything about it!" But no matter how many times you mention something else he could do with his life that he seems interested in, or bring up the challenging logistics of traveling around long-term in a boat, he sounds just as committed to the childhood dream as ever, and completely oblivious to how apprehensive you sound.

So resentment grows, little by little. Because that's easier than confronting the soul-crushing levels of guilt that are building up inside of you, every time you don't take an opportunity to tell him you don't want to do the plan anymore. You don't have a single person in your life who modeled how to have difficult conversations for you. As far as you know, having this conversation with Stan would crush him into tiny little pieces and then he would hate you forever, and you can't stand the idea of losing the only friend you've ever had.

So tensions grow. A lack of interest turns into a bitter resentment that, if you were really being honest with yourself, is directed more at yourself than it is at Stan.

And then the falling-out happens, and it seems like you were proven right. Stan hates you now, and he's never going to forgive you for giving up on his dream. But two can play that game, so you try to hate him too. Because if you hate him too, then maybe it won't hurt as much that he never came back. That he never even turned up at school, or by the boat, or in through your bedroom window in the middle of the night. He knows what dad's like, and how he says impulsive exaggerated things when he's angry, and haven't you both dealt with his harsh words countless times before and been able to dust yourselves off and joke about it later? So why isn't he back at home, joking with you about how absurd your dad acted that night, being impossible and belligerent about ruining your dream, but at least now you're even, because you've ruined his dream too.

And now imagine you find out he risked the lives of everyone in existence to bring you back, right after you had accepted your fate was to die killing Bill. It would be terrifying and confusing and infuriating. If he cared so much, why didn't he do something to reconnect with you sooner? Why did he ignore you in favor of trying to make it big without you? Why didn't he take the infinitely safer and simpler action of reaching out to you without you having to track down his address and send a desperate plea for help? You were convinced that he didn't care enough to bother with you unless you had an important enough reason for him to come. But even then, he thought your plans were stupid. He didn't want anything to do with you, not even with the world at stake.

Did he save your life out of guilt? Does he pity you that much? It doesn't add up with what he did in the decade leading up to shoving you into the portal. And the dissonance between the version of him in your head that hates you, and the man who held out his arms to welcome you back to your home dimension, is so strong that you feel like you're being lied to again, like you're back in the depths of gaslighting and manipulation that Bill put you through, even though there's no way that's what Stan is trying to do... right? You can't figure it out, so you run away from it. You don't want to know the answer to whether or not Stan hates you, because you don't know which answer would hurt more, so you try to make him hate you more than ever, because at least then you would know for sure how he feels.

And in the end, after he sacrifices his memories for you, and for the world, things seem clearer. The layers upon layers of confusion and anger and hurt seem to have washed away like drawings in the sand, leaving behind the simple truth: that you two had an argument, and didn't move past it for forty years, and despite everything you put each other through, you both still want to re-connect.

So you sail away in a boat together.

And at first, it's wonderful. It's exactly what you want. It feels like an apology to Stan, and a thank-you for saving the world, and a once-in-a-lifetime chance to heal the rift between you two, and it's good to be back on earth, and you wonder why you ever doubted the dream you two once had.

But then, after the first long journey you spend on the sea together, when you get back home to dry land, Stan is already talking about planning your next adventure out on the open sea. He recaps every adventure you had on the first trip, over and over again, and he wants to chat with you all through the morning and long into the night, and you don't have the words to explain to yourself that you don't have enough social battery for this, and suddenly you're slipping back into the horrifyingly familiar feeling of Stan being overbearing and needing space from him and how could you think that? How could you think that about him after everything he's done for you and everything he's forgiven you for? But the longer this goes on, the more you realize that you still don't want to spend the rest of your life sailing around with Stan. It's great fun in moderation, but the idea of your whole life revolving around Stan and going on adventures with Stan and being in a boat with Stan with no time to be by yourself thinking about your own things and figuring out your own dreams makes your skin crawl with a claustrophobic kind of panic that you still don't know how to put into words forty years after the first time this feeling grabbed you by the throat and ruined your friendship with Stanley.

But the first time this happened, it nearly ruined his life forever. You can't let yourself feel this. You don't feel this. You're happy to spend the rest of your life fulfilling Stan's lifelong dream, and making up for the time you crushed his dream, and sure, maybe he crushed your dream once too, and maybe it would be nice for him to support your dreams like you're now doing for him, but you can't say that. He saved the universe, and it would be horrible and ungrateful and cruel for you to try to voice these feelings, especially when you don't know how to voice your feelings without it making other people feel like you twisted a knife into their gut. So you try to pretend the feeling isn't there.

You go out on a boat with Stan again. You planned out another incredible journey together, and this should be fun, and you should be happy about this, but the unspoken feeling you shoved as far down in yourself as it could possibly go is eating you alive. The worst part? Stan is starting to notice. You have never been good at hiding your emotions. The trick to it has always been to convince yourself you don't feel it at all, and not think about it, and that has always worked like a charm. But whenever the emotion claws its way back up to the forefront of your mind, you can tell Stan knows something is wrong. So you can't even give him the happy ending he deserves. You can't even convince him that you want to be here on the open seas forever with him, like he deserves. And you keep trying and trying to hide it, but Stan keeps asking in roundabout ways, like "You're being awfully quiet, sixer," and "whats that look on your face?" and eventually it comes exploding out of you like a shaken-up soda bottle dropped on its cap.

And then it's like you're back at home in New Jersey again, standing in the living room while dad grabs Stanley by the shirt. It all comes pouring out of you, in the worst possible way, with the worst possible phrasing, like a pandora's box of monstrousness, and Stan tries to fight back against the sting of your words, but you're made out of acid and you're burning through him and you can see it on his face, and there's never any coming back from this, not this time, you'll just have to either jump into the ocean or become a monster forever, so Stan can hate you more easily again, and-

-and at the end of the outburst, you're still on a boat in the middle of nowhere in the ocean with your brother, in dangerous waters, and you have things to do to keep the boat running smoothly.

You can't run away from him. He can't run away from you. You're stuck here for at least a couple more weeks, even if you turned around and sailed back towards shore right away.

And the thing that compels me so much here, despite how unbelievably angsty it all is, is that it sets up a situation wherein the Stans might end up forced to actually address the decades of resentment and confusion and wanting-to-reconnect-throughout-it-all that they thought they could gloss over and heal with enough time spent adventuring together on a boat. They might end up forced to actually address the crux of the issue that drove them apart in the first place: Ford wanting a little more space to feel like his own person, and to feel like he's able to have his own dreams, too.

It wouldn't happen easily, nor right away, but if they were stuck together on a little boat in the middle of nowhere surrounded by magical creatures they have to protect each other from in order to make it back home alive, then after they had one fight where they brought up all the things they silently agreed to never bring up again, it would probably happen many more times, and each time it would leave them both angrier at each other than ever, until eventually something honest slipped through amidst all the saying-anything-except-what-they-mean bickering. And once enough of these honest moments slipped through, then they would have a thread to tug on to start to unravel the gargantuan knot of their decades of unresolved conflicts.

And then, eventually, maybe Stan could learn that he can have a good friendship with his brother without needing to be glued to him at the hip, and Ford needing a certain amount of alone time doesn't mean he dislikes him or wants to abandon him, and Ford could learn that he can be honest and have a meaningful connection with someone without it driving them away and making them hate him.

#succumbed to the stan twins angst visions and wrote 2000 words about this #ford pines #ford meta #this turned into a character analysis that almost reads like a fic #godswriting #<- i need to change my writing tag to this #something bothers me a little bit about the solution to their conflict being 'ford appreciates stan more now so he is now fine with-#-boat adventures with stan'. to me it leaves the initial conflict of 'he doesnt want to do that anymore' unresolved #obviously you could easily argue that ford never stopped wanting to go on boat adventures with stan and he just couldnt justify it to-#-himself when compared to the opportunity at west coast tech. but that has one less layer of conflict #compared to the possibility that he truly was not interested in boat adventures anymore. ESPECIALLY if its a manifestation of him #feeling suffocated by the whole dynamic-twins-duo thing #its normal to start wanting a little bit more space especially at that age. to want to have space to figure out who you are #the healthy thing would have been them talking about it and figuring out a compromise. like 'when ford needs space he can spend a few hours #-alone without stan being worried the whole time that it means ford hates him' and 'we still spend x amount of time working on the boat and #-we still chat on the way to and from school every day and hang out at the beach on weekends'#like of fucking course it was never about hating stan or about wanting to get away from him because of who he is as a person!#he literally just wanted to have a little bit of breathing room to be his own separate person. he just didn't know how to put it into words #I really think the crux of it all was them not knowing how to navigate that balance between independence and identity while staying close #so ford misattributing/reducing that feeling to 'I dont have the exact same dream as stan anymore. why does he still have that dream. oh no #feels like a good way of giving that conflict a tangible aspect to it thats easy for the stans to point at and talk about as a way of-#-alluding to the REAL core of the conflict between them.#and of course the show never says 'they sail around the world for the rest of their lives 24/7' so it's not like it Actually Conflicts with #-my interpretation of the conflict and how it should be resolved. but since its the last thing we see happen between them when theyre given #their happy ending. I feel compelled to say 'hey I know them living in the shack together and traveling in a boat every single year sounds-#-really fun and like a satisfying ending but I think they should have a Little Bit more space from eachother than that. Hanging out almost-#-daily but not literally being in the same house and same boat for the rest of their lives. bc if stan was ok with ford asking for that-#-little bit of space and if ford didnt panic and isolate himself from everyone whenever he needs like one hour of alone time? that would-#-feel like a big piece of the puzzle fitting into place for their conflict resolution and growth as characters. to me #and I think they deserve to have all the tied-up-loose-ends and resolved-conflicts and character-growth in the world.

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epicfirestormer · 1 year

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What's making me kinda go insane about replaying Chapter 2 now, after doing Kai's mini episode, is that it recontextualize the Yabusame sibling's death. Suddenly, it's not just Rio Ranger being cruel and killing off Reko/Alice, just for the hell of it. Now it's a scene about two pairs of siblings, who are forced to separate by forces out of their control. Both dying in their siblings' arms. Suddenly it's a tale about how Sei loves his brother, which in turn made Rio do the exact same thing that killed him to the Yabusames.

What makes me wonder is, does Rio Ranger remember? Does he have Sei's memories? Did he remember his last time as Sei, dying in his brother's arms, and decides that Reko and Alice doesn't deserve that happiness either? Did he know the pain of losing a sibling, that he knows it's the best way to make someone truly suffer? Does he know that seeing your sibling die in front of your eyes and unable to do anything about it is a worse fate than death?

Rio Ranger doesn't feel happiness, but maybe seeing Reko and Alice reunite- in a Death Game, where only one can win- just made him feel sick and be reminded of a time best left forgotten.