#because this is VERY important to my portrayal of him

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

there are a lot of reasons i'm really, really impressed by how well sdmi portrayed the dynamic of an abusive relationship with pericles and ricky, and one of the big ones is how accurately they show what it looks like when abuse starts to escalate.

the extent of that is yet another thing that'll take a longpost of its own to go into, because it spans like.... the entire arc of their relationship in the show. but one thing that stands out to me in particular is their portrayal of the massive red flag that is a partner trotting out bigoted behavior against a group you're in. especially insults, and especially directed right at you.

this show has a LOT of fatphobia, jesus christ does it ever, and there are certainly some fatphobic tropes going on with ricky; but i've always been surprised and impressed by how many of the nastier ones they avoided, especially considering his role in the story and what his arc is about.

he is a major, nuanced character whose trauma is treated with full weight and sincerity. it's implied that his body type changed the way it did due to the trauma he went through when he was younger, and the ensuing mental illness, which is a pretty realistic experience for a lot of people. the things that happen to him are played for full tragedy and horror, when it would have been so, so easy for them to make light of it because Tee Hee Fat Guy and Tee Hee Male Abuse Victims Funnee. despite how his whole thing involves corporate greed, they don't go the route of portraying him as Gluttonous and Hedonistic; if anything he is very obviously not using all that money for even basic physical self-care, and the only time we ever see him eating anything it's when he's drinking wine grape juice with pericles. which, like, there's issues to be unpacked with that too, but jesus christ it's an improvement over what usually happens with characters like him.

he's a fat queer man who isn't degendered or made feminine in a mocking and/or predatory way. (there's nothing wrong with feminine fat queer men and they need more non-shitty rep, please and thank you god, but there is a lot of nastiness in the tropes they're often used for in mainstream media, and one of those tropes is when people consider 'fat queer man' and 'masc' to be oxymorons.) no one ever once calls him ugly; if anything multiple people in his life think he's attractive and desirable, for better or for worse. no one body-shames him. and no one ever mentions his weight.

except pericles.

'The Horrible Herd' and 'The Devouring' are two halves of a whole here, re: escalation of abuse. 'Devouring' is when the abuser goes full mask off and shit hits the fan; 'Horrible Herd' is the wind-up before the punch. HH is when ricky realizes things are getting Bad and he needs to put a stop to this now, and Devouring shows what happens when he tries, because by the point where it's gotten bad enough to give him a wakeup call it's already too late. it's how abusive relationships tend to go, and it's chillingly accurate.

and what's one of the things pericles says during Horrible Herd when that punch is winding up? something no one's ever said before now, including him? 'you pudding-faced dummkopf.'

he body-shames him. he insults his weight, and that's a major turning point. bigotry is something that's often there to some degree from the start, but not always, because some abusers are good at hiding things like that until they're confident they've got you where they want you. the message with ricky and pericles is loud and clear: when this happens, the walls are dripping blood. get out.

(if you can. and be careful when you try.)

when this show is good, it is really, truly good. god damn.

#sdmi #scooby doo: mystery incorporated #ricky owens #professor pericles #pericky #abuse cw #fatphobia cw #domestic violence cw #i am just consistently fucking blown away by what fantastic SA/DV survivor representation ricky is #i have no idea how he ended up where he did; especially with how godfuckingawful their *other* portrayals of IPV are; and just. wow. #he is incredibly important to me and i love him with my whole heart #also; to be very and extremely clear; i do not say he's queer as a headcanon or because he feels like he has Vibes #he is quite literally one of the two most blatantly thread-away-from-textually-explicit queer characters in the show #a show that is famous for *velma and marcie.* that is *saying something.* #and the other most blatantly queer character in the show is pericles #and they are mutually *why the other one is queer-coded* #ricky is a fat canonically bisexual man and he is an abuse survivor whose story is treated with respect and that is just. so much. #and that is why i am insistent that people do not ever ever tag my posts about them with 'not ship' #you don't have to ship them yourself to acknowledge that they're a thing and that matters; and discuss it #but like. don't. do not. do not ever try to cut ricky being canonically queer or a DV survivor off of anything that i post. thanks #SDMItag #dyn: when i die i want you to die too

[a-shadowedvales]

when jane's powers return in season four (and because they were regained by her confronting and accepting her past, rather than being retraumatised with it!) they're stronger than they ever were. when she starts getting a handle back on them, she very quickly comes to realise not only have they affected her, but her mother, too. one of the biggest losses that came about with her losing them was the fact that she could no longer visit terry in the void; while there was no real communication there, it did allow jane to sit with her, and gain a little more connection than she could in the real world. when she first visits the void after their return, it takes her three hours to find terry, something that is both unexpected and incredibly worrying. but when she does, it's something of a miracle. jane's increased strength and control over the void actually wakes terry up from her catatonic state, but only in the void. there's no way to help her mother physically, but she does do so (unbeknownst to her) mentally. terry is reborn in jane's newfound control over the vale of shadows; she becomes the woman she once was, and while her body remains frozen in a "good dream", her mind connected to jane's own allows her some freedom. jane is able to speak to her mother in the void, is able to be held by her, and while it's still unfair and jane cannot stay in there forever, it's something. this only lasts for about eight months, as each visit slowly begins deteriorating terry's physical and mental state, and jane's health begins declining after spending hours upon hours in the void each and every day.

when jane finds out these visits are actually killing her mother on the outside, she deems to stop, but terry expresses the importance of them being able to speak, that she'd prefer to die on the outside, if it meant she could have just a few months with her daughter like this. terry and jane's connection was always so strong, which ultimately led to terry "waking up" in the void, but even jane's newfound strength cannot save her from the harsh realities. each visit nearing the end of those eight months, terry fades more and more, becomes weaker in the void, and her real body eventually gives up. jane's in the void when her mother eventually passes on, and physically feels their connection weaken, like some part of her suddenly becomes lost in the shadows, a part she'll never find again. jane falls into a depressive state for weeks after her mother's death, given she's technically lost her a second time, but soon comes to realise she was lucky to have even shared those eight months together. it was better than nothing at all. there is a proper burial and funeral, (and when jane dies, she's buried next to her mother) which allows jane some sense of closure. she never fully recovers from losing terry, nor from the fact that she never had a proper relationship with her, but she does eventually find some peace with it all.

#study‚ in my dreams it's all real and my heart has so much to reveal. #IF U SAW ME POSTING THIS YESTERDAY. no u didn't. #i wanted to change things again (who is surprised!!) and decided to just rewrite it all rip. #me taking a few weeks off from this blog and then coming back with a brand new terry / jane hc? more likely than u think. #purely self indulgent too i might add! #every day i battle with making my terry portrayal canon to jane's timeline so jane can have her mother in every verse not just #selected ones. #but. her not having her mother is ultimately important to my writing of her and sfjasfjas >:( hate myself for it. #so here be a brand new addition to my timeline that gives jane SOME time with her mother!!! bc i need it for my mental health. #i imagine when terry dies her body turns to smoke in the void. almost like what happened to billy when jane was spying on him. #and he stopped her connection and faded in front of her. #and jane also visited terry a lot in the void because it allowed her to see more memories of her mother. #i hc that she had a real grasp on that before s3 when she looks into billy's memories. #terry (even in her catatonic state) WANTED jane to see what happened to her in hawkins lab. #so she'd want her to see the good stuff too. her childhood. andrew. her grandmother that raised her and becky. #all the good memories! #so when terry dies jane loses all that completely. #which leads to jane grappling with the conflict of whether or not she should have kept visiting terry in the void which eventually led to #her death. #because if she hadn't connected to her. she'd at least be able to look back on all those memories. #jane becomes obsessed within those months and barely speaks to anyone else. #in any free time she has. she's in the void with terry. #her own physical body grows very weak after a little while but she pays no attention to it and even gets into heated arguments with becky. #because becky is jane's carer and needs her safe and healthy. needs to look after her. #but jane is so adamant about the fact that this is her MOTHER and she's finally able to speak to her. #UGH i have so much to say abt this actually i sense a brand new addition to my timeline coming on. #ANYWAY. i'm emotional about them that is all.

[daydreamerdrew]

The Human Target (2021) #7

#oh my gosh I loved this issue #it completely recontextualized all of Guy’s prior actions as he tried to keep Ice and Christopher apart #and changed our understanding of the rest of the series to come as the principle mystery has seemingly been solved #genuinely very excited to follow the rest of the series as it comes out #I also loved what this specific bit added to Christopher’s character #we’ve already seen that it’s very important to him to take his death calmly because of how horrified he was #by the humiliation of his father’s death #which feeds into his desire to be a human target for people and take their deaths for them #and I like this new tidbit where he stopped crying for his father because he realized he sounded like him #when his father realized how screwed he was #and learned to act as though everything was fine #I’ve only known this character for these 7 issues but I’m very compelled by his portrayal #dc #the human target #christopher chance #beatriz da costa #my posts #comic panels

[margindoodles2407]

Lucy. Maximus. Besties.

PLEASE be VERY VERY CAREFUL

#also maximus stop digging yourself into this hole. like my guy would it kill you to not lie #i swear this man is a pathological liar. but i love him though #i think it's very important that he has this very real tangible flaw because i've noticed this trend in media where black characters #are hardly ever portrayed with flaws and as flawed individuals. it's probably in an attempt to avoid racism but it actually ends up #making them less accessible as characters because instead of being relatable people they feel to the audience like these perfect gods #or whatnot. and then in the end it completely backfires because that portrayal of perfection sort of dehumanizes the character anyway #anyway all this to say that i love the complexity of maximus as a guy who i think genuinely wants to be a good guy and do the right thing #but has these serious flaws (i.e. all the lying). and how he decides to overcome these flaws- or rather IF he decides to overcome them- #is really going to be very interesting to follow #fallout

[shizdrone]

realised that as all of my irl friends fear me in tabletop games. even after all of this time, i am still successfully following in shizune's footsteps. next comes getting them into risk. australia will be mine

#blue flavoured ramblings #yeah let's go with that tag name for irl shit #i'd tag shizune's source material but it's all in all an awkward scenario. game still holds a special place for me but it seems people who #still hold onto it tend to be a bit... dodgy. it hasn't even aged that badly despite everything being stacked against it! #the worst it has is that kenji no longer reads as an extreme parody of a certain type of person #and is now just an actually accurate portrayal #which if you view this from a modern lens instantly turns him from a funny comic relief #into an actually creepy and dangerous character. unfortunate! #you'd think the meat and potatoes of the game would be what aged the worst given the game's subject matter and origins but #somehow that's aged really damn well. i haven't revisited it in ages but i did read some retrospectives from relevant professionals around #the 10 year anniversary and there was a lot of serious praise thrown. not perfect by any means with a decent amount of pretty important #slipups but WAY ahead of its time. #(shizune is arguably one of those slipups unfortunately) #sucks because it's a big part of what got me into a lot of my current interests (pre-diagnosis) but it's also dodgy as fuck to say #it was your starting point. hopefully the other work i've done would make it clear i'm a Trustworthy Human Being should anybody dig shit up #anyway #weird to think shizune still holds a place of personal importance to me but it makes sense #character who is unquestionably a bad person but is doing their very best to be a good person in spite of it? #character who struggles with communication and simultaneously sees all the hurt they bring while being just as blind to it? #character who wants to lift others up but can only do so indirectly because direct action merely pushes people down? #YUM YUM EATING IT UP #IT'S A TWISTED MIRROR REFLECTION STARING BACK AT ME BUT YUM YUM #at one point i was heavily into the headcanon that she could have a diagnosis like me because so many of her flaws resonated with me in a #deeply personal way. since let go of that because there are meaningful differences and while shizune's story is a familiar one of #being alone in a room full of people it is a much more deaf-specific one that doesn't match with me perfectly and the same goes for their #personality. she still helped lay down the seeds for me to understand myself given i got into it around a year before i got my diagnosis #so i think no matter what i'm stuck with her in my memory now. the least popular character in a super awkward game to like for my interests #awesome!!!!!! #raindrops and puddles #that's the tag name i'm using for this game btw

[neptune-scythe]

The thing I love and appreciate so much about Kanej is that they are an example of the deeper more nuanced aspects of a relationship that is so often overlooked in modern media.

It's Kaz loving Inej's laugh, it's Inej paying such close attention to Kaz that she can tell when he passed out just from the change in his breathing, it's Kaz emptying his life savings to buy Inej her freedom, it's Inej about to kill all the Dregs just to save Kaz, it's Kaz buying Inej a ship so she can have her dream of hunting slavers even though that means they'll be separated, it's Inej accepting who Kaz is and acknowledging that even if she didn't always agree with his methods that the Barrel needs him just as he is.

It's how well they know each other, that their relationship is based on friendship and mutual understanding, it's the little things like Kaz seeing Inej and feeling like a little boy who believes in magic again.

It's so much more than the typical modern portrayal of love that requires touching or sex to telegraph what two people feel about each other. They never need to hug or kiss or hold hands for us the readers to know how they feel because Leigh put the effort into portraying the beauty and depth of real love that modern media so often doesn't bother to attempt.

Regardless even of the fact that I, and many other aroacespec people, feel represented by Kaz, Inej, and their relationship, their relation and interactions with each other shows the aspects of love and friendship that is so rare in modern medias. And especially for younger generations growing up with TV and books, seeing love portrayed as sex or physical attraction can be very misleading and leave them confused when those things don't give the satisfaction in real life that it is given in media. But Kanej is the balance of that, they are real love, portrayed in the ways that show what real love is.

Young boys and girls and non binaries and every other gender or type of person can read these books or watch the show and see what real love is. They can see they don't have to sell their bodies or give up their boundaries to satisfy another person and that none of that would guarantee being loved, that love is so much more than just physical attraction, that being known and valued for who you are as a person in the current moment is the most important thing.

I want to make this another TedTalk about why I take issue with Kanej being portrayed in fanfics and fanarts as touchy or needing that to show they've healed or that their relationship is valid, but I'll keep this one focused on the positives so I don't get all the aphobes and haters clogging up my notifs ◉⁠‿⁠◉

#grishaverse #six of crows #kaz brekker #inej ghafa #dirtyhands #the bastard of the barrel #the wraith #kanej #kaz x inej #kaz and inej #kaz brekker x inej ghafa #kaz brekker and inej ghafa #kanej thoughts #kanej post

[hotjaneaustenmenpoll]

Semi-Final Two

Propaganda...

Mr Knightley (2009):

Johnny Lee Miller as Knightley is JUST SO. I mean the way he says "if I loved you less I might be able to talk about it more" IS JUUUST. The dance scene. The tentative shy smiles. The fact you can see in his eyes the entire time " I am completely in love with this woman. She'll never love me back BUT I DO NOT CARE I'LL LOVE HER FROM A DISTANCE ANYWAY" IS JUUUUUUST

We need to appreciate Mr Knightley more for both his snark and for those soft eyes just so full of love for Emma

GIF by dearemma

I was just going to send in the actual dance but the little panic he has when Emma says she knows his secret is just soo charming. There was some thread on twitter a few years ago about how a romcom man's most important quality is knowing how to look at a woman and JLM is just the master of it in this Emma

I really feel like the pictures say it all. He stands there, head tilted to one side. He is listening to you. His posture is relaxed. His gaze open, frank, candid. He's not trying at all. He just is.And that's why he is Knightley.

GIF by night-unfurls-its-splendour

Some propaganda, not just for Jonny Lee Miller, but the general interpretation of 09 Knightley. I have some excerpts here from my review of the 09 adaptation:

What I really think is great about the 2009 interpretation of Mr. Knightley is what an easy and comforting presence he is, without being apologetic when he scolds Emma. I think this is communicated especially well by how often we are actually shown Mr. Knightley taking his almost-daily walks to Hartfield, how smoothly he comes and goes, and how happy Emma is every time she sees him coming up the path (usually, just at the perfect moment when she needs something to put her back to rights.)

Here is Emma, feeling lonely after Miss Taylor's wedding. And in the background, walking up to Hartfield--there's Knightley. He's always been there for her, and he always will be.

And also this Mr. Knightley is as understated as ever, but I wanna highlight this outfit and why I love it: This is Knightley’s first appearance in the series and it’s the perfect establishing shot that shows the viewer everything they need to know about Emma and Knightley’s relationship and how it has always been. He sort of materializes, out of focus in the background, but Emma immediately knows he’s there. And to accentuate how much Knightley is part of her home and scenery, his clothes (similar shades of pale tan, white and minty green to the wall behind him) almost camouflage him and make him seem at one with the moulding of her home.

Additionally, Jonny Lee Miller captures Knightley’s playful qualities, and his exasperation is so endearing

GIF by christophernolan

GIF by sashajames

GIF by christophernolan

I can’t be the only one tickled by this Knightley’s frustration with Emma! JLM FTW!

Jonny Lee Miller is mesmerizing in any role he inhabits. It’s 2009 Knightly all the way.

no but can you actually go vote for mr knightley he was FOUNDATIONAL for 16 year old me my favourite portrayal of my favourite austen man cannot fall at this hurdle!!!

He is my ultimate Austen Dream Man, I'm with him until the end. Honestly this adaptation is my very favorite of them all (P&P 1995 is a VERY close second) because it made me fall in love with Emma as a story? Honestly no other adaptation or indeed even my reading of the book made me love it quite as much. My crush on JLM goes back to 1995 and I do think he is one of the better actors of his generation - his range alone is just impeccable. The fact that he can go from Sick Boy to Mr. Knightley to Sherlock to Jordan Chase is really something. Of all the actors I know, his range is the most impressive. But i love how bright and sunny this adaptation is. The colors, it is as vibrant as Emma should be! The Kate Beckinsale Emma is dark and terrifying to me, not at all suitable an adaptation. I like the Paltrow Emma a lot, but it's got the same issue the 2005 P&P has for me -- it's just too short. This is tonally just right, and the casting is lovely, and JLM is just at his dashing best. His face is so expressive, he is so capable of communicating so much without saying a word. His open jealousy of Frank Churchill is delightful to watch. His face when Emma tells him his secret is out at the ball! JLM is maybe the most underrated actor of his generation and I LOVE that he has been multiple Austen heroes. I maintain that in a future adaptation of Pride & Prejudice, an older JLM would make an EXCELLENT Mr. Bennet. He would convey the right amount of grumpy but fond beautifully.

Look. Do people realize JLM hates wearing period clothing AND hates dancing? And yet in Emma he's sashaying around in pink jackets looking amazing and is THAT convincing? That's called BRILLIANT ACTING!!

A tiny bit of Mr Knightley 2009 propaganda but I love that they put in that bit from the book where he looks like he's going to kiss Emma's hand when he's saying goodbye but then he hesitates and doesn't and I just...it's such a tiny detail but conveys so much!

GIF by myforeverworldofmovie

It’s the only Emma adaptation that really hits the romance notes well. Knightley’s crowning moment of awesome really feels like it (when he rescues Harriet from humiliation) and his subsequent dancing with Emma does make you feel a shift in their relations. Love this adaptation. - This Knightley and Emma in particular are equals. They quarrel, not because he’s telling her off, but because they can have an argument because they know each other, trust each other and care about each others opinions, and there is never a sense of domination of one over the other. This adds so much fire to the romance, and it’s so unusual for a romance of that era (or even one written today!!). - Emma is rich, clever and beautiful and as powerful as a woman of her age and situation could be at the time and she married Knightley for no other reason but because he’s her best friend and his company for the rest of her life will enrich her. - He even leaves his house to move in with her!

Captain Wentworth (1995):

Ciaran Hinds has that perfect ruggedness yet friendliness to his face that makes him the perfect charming Wentworth. And all of the longing that he manages to convey in his eyes is so hot.

Wentworth may be angry/resentful with Anne but in general he is charming and the best friend you could ever have. Ciaran gets the pleasant parts of his character and brings them out, while keeping a guarded coolness (protective camouflage) with Anne.

GIF by molinaesque

I dunno if this counts as propaganda or not, but Ciaran Hinds has a face that looks like it was jackhammered out of a shale cliff.

If a line like 'I am half agony...half hope' comes out of a face like that you know that man has a soul for poetry.

I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you by such means as are within my reach. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me not that I am too late, that such precious feelings are gone for ever. I offer myself to you again with a heart even more your own than when you almost broke it, eight years and a half ago. Dare not say that man forgets sooner than woman, that his love has an earlier death. I have loved none but you. Unjust I may have been, weak and resentful I have been, but never inconstant. You alone have brought me to Bath. For you alone, I think and plan. Have you not seen this? Can you fail to have understood my wishes? I had not waited even these ten days, could I have read your feelings, as I think you must have penetrated mine. I can hardly write. I am every instant hearing something which overpowers me. You sink your voice, but I can distinguish the tones of that voice when they would be lost on others. Too good, too excellent creature! You do us justice, indeed. You do believe that there is true attachment and constancy among men. Believe it to be most fervent, most undeviating, in

F. W.

I must go, uncertain of my fate; but I shall return hither, or follow your party, as soon as possible. A word, a look, will be enough to decide whether I enter your father's house this evening or never.  

This is propaganda for the next round because I need my boy to be a finalist! But this letter is all the persuasion I need to know that he is a winner

Ciarán Hinds in this is a whole other level of "a good man" He makes Anne's decision at the end so much more perfect.

#hotjaneaustenmenpoll #semi finals #mr knightley #captain wentworth #emma 2009 #persuasion 1995 #Emma #persuasion #jane austen #ciaran hinds #jonny lee miller

[amerricanartwork]

RW Headcanon: "Pebbsie Privilege"

Here’s a headcanon I’ve had in the works for a while, and now I finally want to share it! It's shorter than some of my others, but I hope you'll still find it amusing!

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

So firstly (and I plan to expand on this more later) I headcanon Five Pebbles is someone who cares a lot about his appearance, though not in a prissy or snooty sense and more in a “likes being the smartest and most sophisticated one in the room” sense. That means, more so than the average person, he generally doesn’t like being teased, ignored, belittled, condescended to, or otherwise disrespected, and very understandably so if you ask me! But it also means there exists a very special ability when it comes to interacting with Five Pebbles that almost no characters have. 

It’s no more than the ability of someone to refer to Five Pebbles as “Pebbsie” while he’s in earshot without getting death-glares from him. Looks to the Moon, who first started using it, affectionately calls this ability “Pebbsie privilege”, and she ends up being one of the only characters who has it (besides Innocence, who in my portrayals eventually gets it too). Though even so, Pebbles originally got rather flustered when she called him that alone, much less in front of others, considering it's definitely a very cutesy nickname. In fact, poor Pebbles really didn’t like being called “Pebbsie” because one of his least favorite ways of being treated is like a child (which includes being thought of as "cute" in any way). This unfortunately happens to him a lot though since he’s part of the newest iterator generation and tends to have lots of uncommon ideas rarely taken seriously by the older models, and this treatment only amplified as he grew more stubborn and arrogant. 

To elaborate on the origin, Moon developed the nickname pretty much on an impulse — quite a rare thing for her to act on actually — of wanting to hearken more to her role as “Big Sis Moon” and show love to her little brother. Soon after she started using it though Pebbles would pull her into private chats and urge her to drop it to save his dignity. Not wanting to hurt her brother in any way, it didn’t take long before she apologized and stopped using it, and basically got her "Pebbsie privilege" revoked. In the current time she secretly still likes calling him that in her mind, but knowing how much he dislikes it she always feels pretty guilty afterwards, despite them being no more than thoughts at that point. While not a major issue in-and-of itself, this situation was actually a small step in worsening a long-time fear Moon has, though that’s a headcanon for another day…

On a (marginally) more positive note however, after Moon’s collapse and the worsening of Five Pebbles’s rot, along with him generally reminiscing about the things he used to have (as part of yet more character headcanons I’ll elaborate on some other time), he actually began to grow fond of the nickname more and more. Yet he also couldn’t also shake the growing heartache the memories brang, as he came to see it as a reminder of his sister’s never-ending love for him and the better times he now regretted taking for granted and trying so hard to escape. While I headcanon he handles it differently in Downpour’s canon, in the worm-off-the-string AU story I’ve got so far, Moon slowly regaining her “Pebbsie privilege” and Pebbles appreciating it and no longer taking it so seriously (though he still forbids its usage in public) could serve as a small, yet sweet indicator of character growth for both of them.

-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Aaaand another RW headcanon done! I wanna mention, though, now that I’ve got more of an idea for the aforementioned AU I really want to start posting more of my headcanons for the Local Group, since the character interactions, histories, and ultimate character growth is perhaps one of the most important elements of that story so far. I’ve spent at least a couple weeks creating almost 40 pages worth of character notes, and while this particular one started out as just a little side-headcanon, I ended up tying it into all of that. Hopefully I can start sharing the main parts of these headcanons soon!

#art #artwork #sketch #drawing #digital #digital art #fanart #rain world #headcanons #rw headcanons #iterator #rw iterator #five pebbles #FP #rw fp #looks to the moon #LttM #rw lttm #quetzalli draws #quetzalli headcanons

[thesiltverses]

Hello! I found the silt verses about three weeks ago and have listened to it several times since. I have a few things to say.

I absolutely adore that episode about the national grid workers. I think it’s my favorite episode of any podcast I’ve ever listened to. My favorite part of that first episode Paige is in is how she justifies not standing up for Vaughn, that cognitive dissonance that you wrote so well. This episode gives me what I wanted from that episode, the workers all banding together to stop the wasteful sacrifice of one of them. The actor who played the foreman did an incredible job as well. I think that having him discuss which of his workers he would sacrifice was such a significant moment, despite how brief it is. It cuts right to the big question that I took away from the podcast which is, “How much is someone willing to sacrifice in order to maintain their comfort?” And the utter disrespect of Glodditch (apologies for the spelling) refusing to cancel even the radio but asking grid workers to kill themselves for 200kw/h! Top tier episode.

I grew up in the south and went to college in Appalachia. I saw the disparity in technology and “advancement” if that makes sense that poverty brings, and the way you set up the world invokes that feeling in me again. You are an amazing world builder and storyteller.

I really enjoyed the cameos - I’m a big fan of malevolent/devisor, Old gods of Appalachia, and all of Jonny sims work, so hearing familiar voices was an absolute delight. Harlan Guthrie as an acolyte of the snuff gods might have been a bit too on the nose with some of the things that man writes, though… /pos

I’m transmasculine, and something that I really appreciate is how you manage to make a trans man do some objectively awful things, but still manage to make him a complex, full character that I was rooting for very frequently. Brother Faulkner is so, so important to me as a character. Paula Vogel has a play called “Indecent,” which is about the true story of a troupe of I believe German Jewish actors between the years of 1910ish and 1940s putting on a show called “God of Vengeance” by Sholem Asch, also a Jewish man. “God of Vengeance” has queer themes and received a lot of criticism from the Jewish community for showing Jewish folks in a “bad” light at a time when there was already so much hatred for Jewish people. Brother Faulkner being as complex and, in my opinion, malicious and cutthroat as he is at a time when trans people face so much bigotry, especially legislatively in the United States, brings this conversation about “God of Vengeance” up again for me. I also love how normalized non-binary people are in this world, without question. “Sibling this or that,” the hunter, adjudicator Shrew - big thanks from me for all of this.

All of this to say, I love this podcast. Can you talk more about the rhetorical gods? Is Babble one? What makes them one if they are, or why aren’t they? I’m fascinated by them. Can you talk more about the propaganda gods too?

Thank you so much for the thoughtful and kind words!

I'll check out Indecent, it sounds really interesting and I'm very glad to hear Faulkner works for you as a character. I think the topic of how to include and write queer characters who are capable of terrible things and thoughts (because, after all, these characters are human beings and not tutelary exemplars), within the context of both a rising movement of transphobia right now and centuries-old scapegoating / pathologising portrayals more generally, is a really knotty but a really important one, and I always want to make sure I'm approaching it with care and due responsibility as well as a sense of humility around the limitations of what, as a cis writer, I can actually achieve.

To that end, I don't want to ever take the audience response for granted, but I'm always really grateful to hear that the portrayal is working for a listener!

Propaganda gods: gods whose prayer-marks or ritual verses are fed directly to the enemy, enforcing destructive or sabotaging changes to reality (so rather than sending a destructive saint or angel to rampage over the foe, you might drop pamphlets or send radio messages to the enemy to 'convert' them).

Rhetorical gods: gods whose followers possess reality-warping powers of language itself (which is why 'rhetorical god' is a polite way of saying 'liar's god'). In other words, the paranoia around them comes partly down to the fact that a disciple like Val may appear to be a limitless shaper of new forms, rather than shaped into a limited form of their own, as a result of their worship.

#carmen maria machado has a fun mini-essay about queer villainous portrayals which I do recommend

[fumifooms]

Laios Touden and autism; admiring the non-human

Do you think people exaggerate when they scream about Laios being autistic? Do you feel like it’s weird that so many people including autistics are so set on Laios, the problematic (but incredible and kind) king TM, being the most autistic that has ever autisticed? Why do we cheer on autistic people wanting to be monsters?? Isn’t that weird?

Well, of course it depends on the way it’s done, it can be done quite offensively, but long story short Kui blew it out of the park. The thing is, autistic people really do like monsters and animals and robots. Nonhuman does not mean subhuman, it just means Other. Feeling a connection with them has been shown to be an extremely common autistic experience for that very reason.

Because some people don’t understand why we autistic Tumblr Laios stans cheer “autism! Autism!” whenever he talks about monsters and feeling alienated to humans so! Here’s a post about how yes even research papers are analyzing the special connection we form with animals. I’m not even joking but Laios Touden & the mass cries of relatability with autistic people he gets and all the love for him could be used as study material and evidence for future papers because the link is that strong. Oh also I think it’s notable that being autistic and undiagnosed vs diagnosed makes a huge difference. In my experience as someone who was undiagnosed up until 18, it’s even more alienating to not know that there’s a reason why you’re different, being gaslit that you’re ‘normal’ and you just need to try harder and get with the program, etc. Personally when getting diagnosed I went through the 5 stages of grief because the thought of having been fundamentally different all your life (a difference which you will never be able to change) and mistreated for it when you weren’t “wrong” all along makes you unload all the anger and sadness and loneliness and sheer trauma you’ve built up over time. Like it’s world shattering.

So! Back to seeing dogs as family. Also I implore you to value experiential evidence when it comes to autism and other neurodivergences because brains are complicated and neurotypicals not being able to understand us well even with scientific research is like, a whole thing even though we’re right there speaking about how we feel and being right every time because the topic is literally us and how we experience the world. 

Disclaimer for this whole post that, of course, no group is a monolith and everyone has different experiences or can diverge from the norm of the group, and that doesn’t diminish the validity of either side! Like, I know autistic people who have trauma with dogs and hate them. But, trends do happen, and in this case... Autism is very “My experiences with humans make me feel dehumanized in a bad and lonely way so instead I’ll dehumanize myself in a good and inspiring way”.

“I was treated like a failed human my entire life and you’re surprised that my response was to become a dog.” -Patricia Taxxon

It’s literally well recorded that autistic people relate to animals more than humans globally. With this post, besides spreading autistic Laios truthism and explaining why the portrayal hits so deep for so many,  I want to show in what way this is a very specific experience and not looking at his character through an autistic lense really misses a lot of why he’s everything that he is. (Tacking allegedly onto here for legal reasons, different interpretations are valid etc etc /gen). This honestly isn’t super long though.

To define an important term, anthropomorphism in the studies and in this post means to attribute human traits to the nonhuman, which not only includes anthro furry designs but also animals irl, inanimate objects, and animated media as opposed to live action, to humanize them and empathize with them.

Paper: https://www.liebertpub.com/doi/10.1089/aut.2019.0027 

“Dogs taught me how to hunt and socialize and work in groups”, Laios having internalized body language... So real so real. I, too, make a great dog impression. And I want to emphase the part that it helps greatly develop a sense of emotions and relationships! For Laios, he didn’t get along with kids his age, it was him, Falin and the dogs against the world. Since it’s a group of dogs too, it taught him group dynamics and social hierarchies (like with Falin being considered as being below the dogs in authority according to the dogs rip), and the importance of group coordination when hunting.

For me, I cannot like, concisely explain just how much animals were important to me developmentally. I also grew up with dogs, but like I vividly remember encounters with like hamsters as well just radically shaping my understanding of boundaries, the importance of giving something space and the way you interact with them and respect their side of it. Unlike humans they don’t really mask how they feel, it’s direct cause-effect reaction and data gathering. There are no words involved, so the focus on having a perfect phrasing and tone is gone, leaving just pure interactions. 

There’s also no reason to mask how you feel either, and you don’t have to feel silly over wanting to form a connection and it showing, what, is the dog gonna laugh at you because you obviously want to make friends with it? Toshiro or Kabru might, but dogs and cats will just tell you to fuck off and leave it there worst case scenario. I often say that I think one reason Marcille is special to Laios and he feels comfortable around her is because she emotes INTENSELY, she gestures, she puts her whole body into it, her facial expressions are pretty exaggerated and her ears even emote too- like with a dog’s ears!

I think there’s def also things to be said about how he gravitated towards Izutsumi at first, all excited, was eager to sleep in the same bed as her, but in the Izutsumi sleep rating chart we see they really just casual and chill so it’s not a Laios talking to Shuro deep into the night situation just a “I like sleeping besides animals” situation and that is enough to hype him up. I love how he pet her in the extra about why Chil let her sleep with him too. He’s just so transparently eager to befriend her, even if in the end they weren’t all that compatible and he accepted that.

There are honestly so many examples I could give for this. Like Grandin the famous cow lady.

More about autism & empathy:

https://www.spectrumnews.org/news/double-empathy-explained/ (Also mentions a study in which groups of autistic, allistic then a mixed group played a game of telephone and both singular groups had similar levels of information retention, but the mixed group was significantly worse. As an autistic person yeah duh, obviously autistic people are different from one another and can have plenty of interpersonal issues, but communicating with other neurodivergent people feels pretty intuitive and straightforward and comfortable. One of the reasons why neurodivergent people tend to naturally gravitate towards each other I suppose.) 

^ Paper: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5932358/  For good, extensive summary of why we relate to animals so much you can go to the “anthromorphizing and asd” section of the paper. This paper extends to our widespread liking of cartoons and robots as well. Ok so this is a whole thing I won’t get into here but this is a big reason why a lot of autistic people are agender leaning as well. Genders and queerness in general is a lot about social constructs, and being queer is being marginal to these, not fitting into boxes or challenging those social norms and conventions. Queerplatonic relationships are a great example of this, where the framework of the relationship is platonic but the intangible nature of what it is exactly is the point, not familial not anything but everything at once too, just adoration, I like to say having pets is a bit like it as well, bc obvi it’s not romantic and often not fully familial, very platonic but also sooo much cuddling and adoration and kissing and whatnot that you wouldn’t typically do with a friend or family member. I’ll talk about qpr and labels another day though.

I got carried away but queerness in Dunmeshi is something I 100% want to make a big post on one day. Experiencing the world with different guidelines and not registering things to have the same boxes, sigh. Personally I also relate to Laios on a gender level, “cis by default because I don’t care all that much but if I were to dig deeper I’m probably otherkin and I want to be socially associated with traits of monsters and animalistic rather than man/woman” sighh hard to be a cryptid in this day and age. I wish we had a term like furry but for monsters, I want to be in the fantasy or folk tale genre ty, like changelings. Goshh changelings... You know, the irl myth where people said their neurodivergent kids were fairies’ children instead of human. Diminished physical sense of self means I see myself as some unknowable black  void aesthetic wise, but like in a way that simultaneously makes me feel seen. Like becoming a monster, losing your sense of self but also somehow just being simplified and seen for what you are, it’s weird to try and explain. This post is more about relating to the nonhuman than about seeing yourself as such, but like connect the dots right, that IS an important point of Laios’ character. It’s because our brains literally work different than allistics which makes us feel as other, but also because of social ostracization and functioning in a different way than society at large, living in the margin of society, being weird and non-conforming.

Meanwhile, animals and social norms... Like ok, showing your neck and rolling on the ground to show that you’re friendly and harmless and play biting might not be proper. But have you considered that it’s also fun and feels very intuitive. Play with a dog in the dog’s way I promise it is so nice and freeing. Play tug of war and growl back when they growl. Hiss at your cat to tell them they do something wrong, engage with them on their level.

Autism made social life hard, but it made animals easy. Do you have anyyy idea how good it feels to mask all day every day and feel constantly misunderstood or like you’re doing a performance but then you can just, drop all of that in the company of animals and they understand you. They understand you. You form an understanding and rapport so easily.

And this whole thing with Laios is so explicit too, with the Winged Lion saying “You’re sick and tired of the human world”. Notice the choice of words. Sick and tired of the human world. Exhausted from the constraints, sick of the mind games. It really isn’t as much about loving monsters as it is about loving the nonhuman. Relating to them because you feel that you can actually understand how they work and think, and feeling like they could understand you back as well. Animals are safe.

Like I could go on about how Laios admiring even just demi-humans like orcs is because they’re socially seen as non-humans more than any true physical thing, that they’re not bound by human society and its rules and live with their own lifestyle. But it would deal myself 1000 points of psychic damage and I am not ready to cry today. It’s idealization 100%, and like, Laios DOES want to be treated as human, to be valued, but it feels like an unreachable thing meanwhile becoming a monster is instant gratification and freedom and a sense that now no one will be able to hurt you in a way that reaches you, never again shall you be defenseless, and then if people dehumanize you then that only strengthens your sense of identity as a monster and UGHH ugh ugh.

And like. This post is a mess at this point but if you want to kinda delve into the more “why” then I recommend this Patricia Taxxon video essay. It starts out on a very different topic, but it’s all about autism and finding comfort in the inhuman. Long story short is othering made us like this also animals are just simpler to intuitively get along with.

So when I post this

I mean it. I really mean it when I say he’s me. I have never felt so seen. So many conflicting emotions all wrapped so concisely yet so intangibly woven into the whole storyline so subtly. 

Not being depicted as a monster of an human being for feeling/having felt that way?? The manga understands you. The world can understand you. Other humans can understand you. You can bond with them. You can. And I think that’s a big part of Dungeon Meshi too- Laios opening up to others about how he really is and his interests, and all the bumps on the way but how it was the only way to truly get to know each other and bond. With the climax being Laios confronting head on his complex with monsters and humans, and his monster-loving side and animalistic side being exactly what saves the whole world, what saves humanity. Because Laios does value his friends, does think humanity has beautiful sides to it, he wants to help it thrive and eat and become more accepting, carving out a kingdom for misfits and demi-humans. At the end of it, transforming into a monster and being free is a daydream fantasy, and the reality of it is that Laios does belong in the world as he is, and does receive and give out love.

If you enjoyed this you’ll probably like some of my other Laios analysis!  Here’s an analysis of his succubus and what it says about his relationships with other humans. And here’s an analysis about his relationship with Shuro from his perspective.

#dungeon meshi #delicious in dungeon #laios touden #character analysis #i guess #dungeon meshi manga spoilers #spoilers #autistic laios touden #asd #autism representation #meta #draft so old it uses the old Tumblr post editor #it would be much better if i could put them side to side rip #i also wanna do an analysis trying to pin down his level of social awareness #i love that the monster story epic saga about misfits and your place in the world on an ecosystem level is just sooo autistic so perfect #this post has a weird structure but hopefully it can showcase some things and make ppl understand and others relate! I know we're out there #hiii therians how we feeling today. Brain chemistry is weird but ours is just wired different not broken #feeling self-conscious bc even with studies this is the equivalent of going 'trust me bro I get it' which usually doesn't go well with us #Humanity is beautiful <3333 Humans are social animals broski love yourself!!!

[fuckyeahisawthat]

thank you so much for that excellent chani post. i've seen some annoying takes on twitter about how not making her totally devoted and subservient to paul makes her 'unlikeable' and i'm like. buddy. i think that speaks more to how you see women. than anything about her. this chani is very dynamic and interesting to me.

i'll be honest and say i've not read the books. this is me speaking from what i've seen of summaries, but i think giving her a real cause to fight for yet also genuinely loving paul gives her an interesting struggle, and also plays into how the portrayal of the fremen (seems to me to be) more diverse and nuanced. as in, the fremen themselves seem to have more of a push-and-pull to them. the clarification of how different fremen believe differently (the south being more fundamentalist) is a very important thing to include in a movie where you can run into the danger of saying that all adherents to a foreign, islam-adjacent (in coding) religion are all fundamentalists. that can (in less nuanced hands) be a pretty irresponsible thing. so showing that there's also more secular/pragmatic/less dogmatic sectors of the culture seems a pretty good counterweight.

so yeah. this is how i processed it as a movie-goer. and having chani represent that aspect (believing in people over prophecy, action over religion) and having stilgar as the humanized face of the southern peoples (showing that yknow, regardless of being fundamenist beliefs, theyre still PEOPLE with the capacity for love, friendship, honor) makes total logical sense. you're not just "telling" us that there's different aspects to fremen culture, you're SHOWING us by showing different characters who represent those aspects, without demonizing either or turning either into a one-note stereotype.

Thank you! I'm not someone who was a long-term fan of the books before the movie came out (I tried reading Dune as a teenager when I was reading a lot of classic sci-fi but found it too boring) but I did read Dune and Dune Messiah after the first movie came out, both because I wanted to know what happened next and because I wanted to have an opinion on how the movies worked as adaptations.

(book and movie spoilers below and also I basically ended up writing a whole essay in response to this)

My single biggest frustration with the book is that after they arrive at Sietch Tabr and Jessica drinks the Water of Life and becomes Reverend Mother...the book up and skips two years of the story and when we next see Paul he's already got Fremen followers who are ready to die for him and he's in an established relationship with Chani. Oh I was SO MAD when I got to this part. I was like FRANK. FRANK!!!! Did you seriously just skip two years of the most interesting part of your own story???

The thing is, even though I know that Frank Herbert's intention was to write a critique of the idea that oppressed people need an enlightened external (white) savior to liberate them...if you don't provide an alternate explanation for what's happening then you end up falling into some Orientalist tropes anyway. And because, in the book, we don't see the process of how your average background fedaykin comes to trust Paul as a military and political leader, there is nothing in the text to counter the idea that the Fremen are a bunch of unquestioning religious fanatics easily swayed to do violence by belief in a prophecy.

My second biggest frustration with the book is that we're given no reason at all why Chani would fall in love with Paul. While she has some memorable scenes, she doesn't have a lot to do as a character in the book, and she's missing from a whole chunk of the end...because she's in the south...because she and Paul have a baby, Leto II, who's then killed off-page when the sardaukar attack the south. (I'm honestly really glad they cut this from the film, because it never seemed to be given the narrative weight it deserved in the book.)

So you can imagine how happy I was when the Villeneuve movies figured out how to address both these frustrations by tying them together. The fedaykin don't just blindly accept Paul because of some prophecy. They come to trust him because he proves himself as a fighter, and because he starts out from a place of genuine solidarity and humility--which it is possible for him to do because he has no structural power over them at that point. And Chani falls in love with him for the same reason, in that heady environment of fighting side by side for a political cause, and maybe for the first time in a while starting to believe that you can win.

I think the Villeneuve movies improve a lot on what's in the book in terms of how the Fremen are portrayed...when we're with the fedaykin and/or Chani and Stilgar. There we see political debates and discussion and the fact that not all the Fremen think the same way. And we also see little humanizing moments of folks just hanging out, celebrating after a victory in battle and just shooting the shit and being friends.

I do wish the movie had extended this to more parts of Fremen society. If there's one thing I could have added, it would be seeing more of daily life in Sietch Tabr. It makes sense that when we're seeing things from Jessica's POV, she is more distant from and suspicious of the Fremen, seeing them as a force to be manipulated, but I wish we had even one or two scenes of people just being people in the sietch. It felt kind of weirdly empty and not particularly lived-in as a place, and I think they could've easily countered this, with scenes from Chani, Stilgar or Paul's POV, and that would have made it hit even harder when the sietch is attacked.

If there were two things I could have added, I wanted more exploration of the people of the south. Why are they more fundamentalist than the Fremen who live in the north? (We get one line about how "nothing can survive [in the south] without faith" but I wanted more than that.) While I think the movie did a fantastic job of humanizing and differentiating the Fremen we see around Paul, when we get to the south it does backslide a little into "undifferentiated mass of fanatics." Surely the people of the south also have some diversity of political views.

I think there are some interesting threads they could have pulled on in terms of how proximity to direct colonial violence shapes people's ideology. Sietch Tabr is one of the closest Fremen communities to Arrakeen, the seat of colonial control. They have probably had to mount some kind of armed resistance for generations just to keep from being wiped out. I can see that producing skepticism of the prophecy ("well I can't sit around waiting for a messiah but I do have this rocket launcher") as well as resentment at the idea of someone swooping in and taking credit for a struggle that you've put your life on the line for, and probably a lot of people you know have died for. There seem to be some generational differences, too, where young people of Chani's generation put less stock in the prophecy, while the true believers are mostly older. I can see faith in the prophecy coming out of despair--when you've been fighting for decades with no change, maybe you draw the conclusion that only an outside power coming to your aid will make a difference. While the people of the south are still under colonial rule, maybe being generally outside the reach of direct Harkonnen violence (the Harkonnens don't even know they're there) makes the concepts of both oppression and liberation feel more abstract and more receptive to being filled in with Bene Gesserit mysticism. It seems absurd to want more from a movie that's nearly three hours long already...but I wanted more of this.

Still, I do think they managed to improve on a lot of things that frustrated me or are simply dated about the book, while keeping the political thriller/war drama/epic tragedy elements that I think are the heart of the story, and in some cases drawing them out more clearly and effectively than the book did. The best kind of book-to-film adaptation imo is one that has a strong point of view in terms of what the story is About, on a large-scale thematic level, and is not afraid to change individual elements of canon in service of telling that story the most effective way possible in a cinematic medium. While there are always things I want more of, I feel like Denis Villeneuve really, really understood the assignment in terms of the overarching themes of the the story and he delivered so fucking well.

#dune #dune spoilers #dune part two #dune part 2 #dune 2021 #dune books #chani kynes #asks answered

[staridust]

★ DO NOT USE/REPOST WITHOUT MY PERMISSION. NO MINORS.

Jack in my Pouring Rain AU vs Jack in my Sunnyverse AU

Gonna ramble a bit here about the two portrayals, there’s a lot more typing space here so I will also be using my posts as a bit of infodump sometimes! ↓

For starters, I really adore Jack as a design and character, there’s not much I wanted to alter about him in the design department, so all changes are subtle!

✦ Starting with Pouring Rain!Jack!

This guy’s probably the closest to how he’s presented in game honestly— still manipulative, still colorful, probably a bit more deranged because his sunshine keeps forgetting shit.

Art wise, I wanted to really keep the colors on him vibrant, but also give him sort of a dim vibe as well. His hair is a bit more reflective of turquoise highlights with a gradient of a muted darker blue at the tips.

I like to imagine Jack uses colorful knives (if he most certainly has to use one). I have colorful knives in my house, it just seemed right as I was doing the dishes one day. He also changed his paints ever so slightly, because stars are very important to him.

He’s also rather glitchy when upset, but not that of a computer glitch when it happens.. more of like… something that’s being rewinded and re-written over numerous times, no?

Or, maybe I have no idea what I’m talking about!

And finally, the colorful paint on him!

Rain!Jack’s original sunshine way back nowhere was actually a graffiti artist, so does Jack know how to paint? It’s not like he would say, but it is a bit easier to play off a mysterious red stain if you’re covered in all the other colors.

——

✦ Ending with Sunnyverse!Jack!

Sunnyverse, is quite frankly a bit of a community like idea. The premise being quite similar to the same notion of Spiderverse, where multiple of the characters can exist and vibe but may look different, while still following a canon of sorts. It’s basically like showing off your characters and AUs in your style!

(Honestly, with a name like that, maybe I should draw Spider-Jack… *Sunrise Spider?*)

This Jack is a divergent of the idea where the fictional world of CloudyTown is real. ← This information also is a slight spin-off of an unofficial AU called “Sunny Time Town” by artist Sauce! I will also be using “Sunnyverse” for the official name of my AU that includes my ocs that switch up the story in a non-yandere manner!

SV!Jack here rocks a bowtie and suspenders with the design paying a full tribute to a sketch I did in March! I’ve seen a few comments relating it to his teaching profession… and now I can’t I see it, haha!

To contrast Rain!Jack, SV!Jack’s hair is a nice pure blue gradient that dips into indigo/purple at the tips!

I added his belt as a tie in both of them (don’t ask why the belt is doing a :3), but now I hear the belt is sentient… that’s a cool idea I seen around, I gotta learn about that!

That’s about all the information I had on this piece though, til next time!

#Sunny Day Jack #Sunny Day Jack AU #SWWSDJ #I just really wanted to draw jack twice #types way too much for a simple infodump #I have a lot of time to develop shit #should probably be sleeping rn #SDJPouringRain #SDJSunnyverse

[writingwithcolor]

Romani character portrayals in fanfiction

Rroma Dick Grayson, batman fanfiction

endoftheworldhere asked:

I wanted to write a fanfiction about what Dick Grayson’s life would have been like if he wasn’t adopted by Batman. It was going to have him dealing with the bad parts of Gotham City and interacting with various criminals and rouges, But I was worried that could come off as stereotypical or racist since he’s been portrayed as at least part Romani and I wanted to include some connections to his heritage as a way he clings his parents after they died so traumatically. Any advice?

The thing about Dick Greyson is that he was retconned into being part Romani, and the writers did so in a very stereotypical way. A lot of Romani people have talked about this, especially on Tumblr, and opinions do vary about how he should be written. Many think it’s best to ignore his “heritage” and just write him as white, while others disagree and think that his heritage is important representation and should be written, but more respectfully.

I honestly don’t know my personal opinion on this, but I will say that there is a huge stereotype about Romani people being criminals. If you do plan to write him as part Romani, make sure to avoid these tropes. Otherwise, I would just nix his Romani heritage.

-Mod Tess

Romani woman, curses and Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Anonymous asked:

I'm struggling a bit with a piece of fan work right now, and I was hoping you could weigh in. In Buffy season two, there's a character named Jenny, who we first meet as a techno-pagan computer science teacher, who helps Buffy and co deal with fighting demons and stuff. Only the thing is, she's Rromani. She's there to make sure a family curse stays on a vampire who killed someone beloved to them a century ago (mostly to protect people from him if Angel/Angelus gets uncursed), which everyone gets mad at her for not telling them when he loses his soul and goes on rampage.  Ordinarily, it's not hard to write her, because until that arc, she's a fun character who happens to be a Rroma woman, and as other characters use magic, that doesn't stand out. But the whole curse thing, and the depiction of her family we're given, (and the way a canon redemption arc for Angelus I can't stand starts with him getting a soul as a punishment for killing a Rroma woman in 1898), and the everyone being mad about deception all just feels like many negative stereotypes.  What would be your thoughts on depicting Jenny, and on what to keep in mind trying to rewrite how she was shown in the show. [Ask redacted for length]

Let me just start out by saying that I am not very familiar with Buffy, so thank you for the context. I think your best bet here would be to drop the curse plot line altogether, as that’s a huge stereotype about Romani people. I think it’s ok to have her do magic, as long as other characters also do, and although I do think the vampire stuff is also a stereotype (a lot of vampire lore is supposedly taken from some Romani folklore, and Romani people are often associated with vampires in pop culture), I think it’s fine given the context of the show.

-Mod Tess

#Romani #Romani women #Romani men #fanfiction #Romani stereotypes #Romani tropes #asks

[bonefall]

I personally like Thunder's prosthetic. Explained it to my friend (who does use a mobility device, a cane and wheelchair, and listens to me rant and infodump about BB) and they agreed, it's important to know that not every person needs what someone wants to give them. It's another example of "bad ableist person does a thing that hurts a disabled person because they are bad and ableist".

Clear Sky got Jagged Peak killed and would have killed Sunlit Frost! He would absolutely force his disabled son to be "normal" and present it like a privilege. "I wouldn't do this for anyone else, it's special, why don't you want to be helped?"

Thunder Storm should toss it in Clear Sky's face. (I would say toss it into the river but we do not pollute waterways in this house)

Thank you for telling me this, and tell your friend I'm thanking them too! If they have anything else to add please forward what they have to say

Since BB!DOTC tackles some of the heaviest topics in the entire series because its canon equivalent is so dark, I think very carefully about what I do here and how I show it. I take feedback on its sensitive aspects very seriously. If I'm understanding the criticism properly, it's that I should avoid stigmatizing prosthetics by making sure Thunder Storm's not the only one with it-- which he's not! And I'll add even more.

I don't want to avoid something only because it's uncomfortable if the topic is important, and my portrayal is respectful. Ableism IS uncomfortable! There are some situations where a prosthetic is not wanted! I think the rejection of this particular one is both a good opportunity to show a type of ableism and ALSO is very fitting for the characters.

In BB!Clear Sky's mind, the villain, he's fixing an old mistake. He can't admit that he got Jagged Peak killed or take REAL accountability for it (though he will, occasionally, apologize insincerely), but deep in his bones, he knows what he did was cruel. He'll never tell anyone this because he doesn't really cognate it himself, but Thunder Storm NEEDS to take his gift.

If Thunder doesn't take it, it blows a hole in his newest story. You see, throwing Jagged Peak out was All That Could Have Been Done back then. It was a Tragedy and he simply Made A Hard Choice. He regrets it very much, But You Have To Understand.

But now? Now? Well, behold. Look at what he's accomplished since the tragic death of his little brother. His cats are well-fed, cared for, and stable enough to make such incredible advancements. If only Jagged Peak had been able to hold on longer, if only he could be here now, I could fix him.

Just like I can (MAKE YOU JUST LIKE ME) fix you.

"Everything I've ever done is for Jagged Peak. For Fluttering Wing. For you." Thunder Sky is SPECIAL, but if he rejects any gift, tries to turn down the "privileges" offered to him, in an instant that becomes ungratefulness and arrogance. He both forces him to be special, and then leverages it against him if it's rejected. "Spoiled brat, doesn't appreciate what I've worked so hard to give him."

It all goes back to him and his own guilt. He can NEVER be wrong. He can't accept his family doesn't have to be "normal" or reflect his own ability. He won't see himself as a bully, let alone a murderer. It was never about his son's comfort or finding out what Thunder Storm wants or needs, it was about his own ego.

...All that said I'm still taking feedback if there's anything else I should keep in mind, or if anyone has a counter point, especially if you also have experience here.

(In the interest of having a link trail for posterity, here's the critique/call for feedback this is in response to)

#ALSO also I will take suggestions on other characters who should have prosthetics #Sunlit makes sense and it will make a really nice character moment later for him to have one built #There's also an amputee in RiverClan few people talk about called Stonestream #I can give him one and bump him up into a bigger character. In BB he is the sibling of Willowshine #BB!DOTC #better bones au #Also just as a side note... I love writing BB!Skystar. My ire for the character comes from his redemption arc so I feel like I get to-- #--write the character I WANTED to see #Same with Bramble in other BB arcs #cw ableism #tw ableism #ableism #They're fascinating in that they always have to see themselves as the victim or the hero #They believe every lie they tell. #If you ever catch them in a contradiction they will still try to find some way to turn it on you and YOUR lack of understanding. #Interestingly both of them are ableist. Sky's is just more obvious because he's LOUDLY bigoted. #But BB!Bramble is *notably* less close to Jay for a very sad and very subtle reason. #Jay just doesn't serve his ego like the others do until much later in his life. #unfortunately most bigotry is like that. #the type you have a hard time calling out because it's a deniable bias. the constant gaslighting of being part of a marginalized group #Maybe I need to address the criticism by adding a character with a prosthetic to THIS arc even earlier #Problem is that like... Thunder's small merc group is already full of disabled characters and their THING is forming in response to ableism #OH maybe I'll put someone in the Forest Cat group which is lead by Slash? #I need to finish that last book and then gather up all the cats for sorting into allegiances

[twopoint99]

Possible spoilers if you haven’t already listened or read the book. Also, spoilers for The Horror of Dracula, 1958 and Bram Stoker’s Dracula, 1992.

One of my favorite things about @re-dracula is seeing the reactions of people whose main exposure to the story is through the many film adaptations. The differences in how the characters relate to one another are way too many to list from film to film. Even aside from the bizarre choices (Lucy as Mina’s sister-in-law - the Horror of Dracula, 1958, or Mina as the reincarnation of Dracula’s lost love - Bram Stoker’s Dracula, 1992) the most important difference between those adaptations and re - dracula is that these are fully rounded characters who clearly care about one another.

Jonathan adores Mina, Mina loves him, and loves Lucy. The suitor squad and Van Helsing genuinely cherish Lucy and it causes everyone palpable pain when they see her slipping away. When the group finally gets together in one place, they all acknowledge and respect the various strengths they each bring, and they hold one another up as needed.

None of the characters seem cast aside, as often happens in film adaptations. Even the 1992 film, which includes all three suitors, doesn’t manage to make them all seem like full personalities. They appear more as aspects of an individual, or as tropes. Lucy herself in the ‘92 movie is the complete opposite of her characterization in the novel. Her behavior in the film is anachronistic at best, and offensive at the least. It is a perfect illustration of the stupid and misogynistic attitude in horror that “wanton” women are punished.

Not only that, but it also completely changes the story and the dreadful implications of it. Lucy isn’t targeted because she’s “done something wrong” (quotes because I don’t believe expressing/exploring one’s sexuality is wrong, no matter what my favorite genre keeps telling me), she is targeted because she is convenient. Dracula wasn’t musing in between leaving his castle and reaching England that by golly, he couldn’t wait to terrorize Lucy Westenra! He saw an opportunity, like any other predator, and he took it.

Of course, we’ve seen that he is very willing to play with his food once he feels in control. He was very pleased to be able to torment Jonathan, yet another character who is often treated poorly in adaptations - in the 1958 version he’s so smug and patronizing toward what appears to be a terrified woman, that I was actively hoping for his death.

In contrast, the novel/Dracula Daily/re-dracula show us a sweet, earnest man, one who is gentle and loving. He, like Lucy, is a convenient victim, and like Lucy, is innocent.

The true horror is that terrible things can happen to anyone, and no amount of wealth, education, or simple good-heartedness, will act as a shield. There are no preventatives, and no one “deserves” the terrible things that happen. The real strength of the story isn’t in deciding which characters(usually women) are worthy of saving, an overly simplistic approach that many film adaptations take, some more subtly than others. The story resonates because in spite of the randomness of the horror, the people involved decide to do something about it.

These people are not always perfect or even heroic. Dr. Seward (who I really enjoy, and who is also often portrayed badly in adaptation) is not a safe person for his patients to be around. He is ableist, arrogant, patronizing, and definitely not handling his own mental health well. He is also loving, practical, loyal, and in many ways exceptionally tender-hearted. All of the cast is achingly good in their portrayals, but Johnny Sims’ interpretation of Seward has been revelatory. The man is flawed, but gosh darnit, he’s absolutely human. His pain is visceral, his awkwardness is utterly relatable, and his attempts to make things make sense is so hard to hear, because we want the awful things to be a puzzle with a logical solution, but we also know that there is no motivation for what is happening, it is all chance.

Mina herself questions why they need worry about Dracula, once he is gone from England. By this time she’s had a horrific experience with the count and understandably wants to be done with the whole thing. Earlier, however, she begins her work of compiling all the information available about Dracula, because she understands that something may need to be done, for the good of all.

She is afraid of losing her husband, she is afraid of what other horrors may wait, but she also is able to put that aside to continue to pursue stopping Dracula, so that there won’t be another victim, and so that Dracula himself might be saved from the horrific reality he’s experienced for so long.

I have been telling people ad nauseum that re-dracula is hands down the best adaptation of the novel I’ve ever encountered. It is because it is treated as a story about people, real people, with real connections to those around them, real flaws and strengths, who grow to share a bond. They swear to stop Dracula, not out of vengeance, as Jonathan can be forgiven for wanting, but out of love for those they have lost and those they may save.

#re: dracula #tiny essay #if you aren’t listening but have any interest please listen #you won’t regret it

[seeker-of-stories19]

One I thing I have personally really appreciated about Bridgerton is seeing Violet interacting with her children in different ways and being portrayed differently in each season. I don’t mean for this to be a super negative post about her just that I think people tend to ignore the real disparities in how parents treat different children and usually when it is brought up it’s minimized to ‘having a favorite.’

But there’s so much depth in Bridgertons portrayal of Violets relationships with her individual children and how much they are affected deeply by society, trauma, her personal feelings etc. Parents are genuinely influenced by these things and it is unfortunately projected differently onto different kids, whether that is because of outside forces or clashing personalities or something else entirely it’s often glossed over or handled poorly in media.

Coming from a loving family doesn’t necessarily say much about what someone went through growing up and often love is only a small part of the equation. Despite Violet loving all her children they have had very different lives and experiences related to her parenting and you can clearly see that with each one of them.

First you have Daphne who is generally taken with the whole idea of being a debutante and the idea of romance which is very relatable to Violets character and their relationship (from what I remember) paints a generally idyllic picture of the family.

Then you have Anthony who is at the other end of the spectrum entirely, he has gone through extreme trauma and been neglected, abandoned, and parentified to an intense degree. We see him struggle with poor self esteem, anxiety, and imposter syndrome as he tries to step up during the worst time of his life. He has to bear the weight of Violets grief as well as his own and raise his siblings and handle the estate meaning that he has had an incredibly different parental relationship with her.

Benedict and Colin both seem to receive some light chastisement and a bit of meddling from Violet about their choices and finding a match but are generally not bothered by it and both seem to be relatively content in their relationships with her which again is very different to what some of the siblings experience.

Eloise also struggles with her relationship with Violet, albeit in a very different way to Anthony and for very different reasons, but it’s coming from a place of not wanting to disappoint Violet while also not wanting to be someone she’s not. I think Violet generally handles this as well as she’s able within the confines of the time period and despite hurting Eloise she seems to be coming from a place of trying to help her find her place within a framework that already exists but still in a way that’s authentic.

Francesca also seems to have a primarily positive relationship with Violet but there is some pain surrounding their differences and how Violet and her siblings fail to understand her or meet her where she is at, leaving her as the outlier of her family and struggling with loneliness because of it.

I don’t think I’ve seen enough with Gregory and Hyacinth to see get a very good idea of those relationships but they seem happy and content, they also haven’t really gone through the trauma of losing a parent the way their siblings have which was a very pivotal moment for the rest of the family. Whereas Violet and Anthony are the only parents they ever really know.

The point of all of this is just that I think this is so important to the storylines and really lends the Bridgerton family a lot of depth that makes them much more realistic together and individually compared to how families usually work. The siblings are different people who all have very different relationships with their mother and are treated in observably different ways, for better or for worse, and from my personal experience this is much more realistic than the average dynamics portrayed on TV.

#bridgerton #bridgerton meta #violet bridgerton #anthony bridgerton #benedict bridgerton #colin bridgerton #daphne bridgerton #eloise bridgerton #francesca bridgerton #gregory bridgerton #hyacinth bridgerton #parenting #parentification #relationship exploration #mother child relationships