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rui-drawsbox · 4 months

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remembering the most memorable mc's (with canon appearences) from the otomes i played

all of them are phone games btw. and looong rambling about the games after the cut!

Mystic messenger has been in my radar since i was in elementary school but i played it for the first time after the spanish traslation came out (2017 i think?) Seven shaped my type in such a specific way that im not really sure why loved him so much (it was the whole "he loves you in every route" stuff). I like a lot the default mc, most of the fandom did and that was enough to won me over

Rosa is top tier protagonist tbh, Tears of Themis has really good story and characters (as far i played, not a lot but i enjoyed it) The reason i'm not that much of a fan is bc the game is expensive asf and not very free to play friendly. You're either lucky or have a big wallet with the gacha

i miss my wife man(Marius)

Ephemeral has to be one of the best free to play otomes i've played tbh (if my memories aren't tricking me, it's been years) Good artwork, good storyline, good characters and as far i remember you can unlock one chapter of the character route per day (mabye two days, idk) and the mc's background has an important role in every route (she's a zombie! she's pretty now but eventually will fall apart, aaaaand her story gets expanded in one of the routes!) ((shes also adorable)) There's also a sequel, if you wanted more of the boys! never finished it but i'd recommend it

Honorable mentions! Huellitas Mágicas is a great game! has a really good cast with well fleshed arcs for all the characters, even the scondary ones! The game shines more for the development of *all* the characters rather than just the protagonist/ml. The main theme is overcoming insecurities! Each love interest has a different way of helping our (very insecure) protagonist and helping different characters with their own struggles :DD

10/10 i recommend this game if you want something cute and can be finished in a few hours, if i remember right. It also has a sequel! with like- 12 new love interests, also never finished it bc i didnt found a guide that worked for me but ñek

A3! is my canon event as a gacha player. Discovered the english/global server, tried it and got bored, left it for a few months, tried it again and fell in love, noticed the game was going to shut down bc low sales -HAHA :(-. This is not a otome btw, this is here bc Izumi has to be one of my favorite protagonists in gacha games ever

last but not least! Obey me! Shall we date? oh dear, what have they done to you :(. The original had intense powercreep to force you to pull cards -multiple times bc that makes them stronger- and even now, the company showed a lot of favoritism to some characters, leaving others to dust bc they don't make the same money. Not to say, they released a new game with the same cast and new main story (ignoring all what happend before). And let me say: THEY LITERALLY WANTED TO KILL THE ORIGINAL GAME.

Nightbringer might be a decent game but i don't trust the devs anymore, i still remember what happend with Asmo's birthday right after the release, and honestly i don't want to sit there watching how they disrespect my favorite characters again and again and again. Loved the characters hated the devs. 5/10 you can play it if you want but i don't recommend spending money on it, it's not worth it, just search #obey me here in tumblr and enjoy the amazing fanworks that i can assure you have a lot more love than the game itself

i miss my wife man (mammon and levi)

#got sting by the nostalgia mosquito #thinking about it i kinda want to play huellitas magicas again #mystic messenger #mysme #tears of themis #rosa tears of themis #ephemeral #its that the right tag?#huellitas magicas #a3 #a3! act! addict! actors!#izumi tachibana #obey me #obey me shall we date #otome game #tot

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gwendaria · 7 days

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Okay, I have to talk about this because it's been bothering me so much. Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga releasing brought up a lot of the Fury Road arguments from years ago... Where a lot of people (see: men) don't understand that outside of maybe the original Mad Max film.... Max Rockatansky is never the main character. He is always That Weird Guy who gets mixed up in some local skirmish, someone else's journey and really just everything that has nothing to do with him... He's the connective tissue through what is, in the mainline series entries, basically anthology.

ANYWAY... All of that MM discourse made me remember how a lot of people (see: men and Johnny Depp stans) thought that Jack Sparrow was the main character of the Pirates of the Caribbean films... Which is also objectively just not fucking true. The worst movies in the franchise, AKA the last two, tried to make Jack the protagonist but the series only ever functioned with him as a wacky supporting character to Will and Elizabeth... Because Elizabeth Swann was the main character of the Pirates of the Caribbean trilogy -- She has the most defined arc aside from Will, but unlike Will, she is brought into the world of Pirates from the outside and sees a full fledged transformation because of Will and Jack, two pirates, change her entire life.

Basically.. I’ll get to my point: Fury Road was always Furiosa’s story so of course the prequel we have out right now makes sense!! But also Elizabeth was the main character in the POTC trilogy -- The most I'll concede on is that you could see her and Will as two halves of the main protagonist -- And it was never fucking Jack Sparrow!! He was the Han Solo of the trio, he’s there to balance things while also adding some humor and scoundrel flavored mischief and tension!!

It’s just annoying when people erase women from narratives that rely on their role and existence.. All to prop up a man. Anyway I wrote all of this to say they should bring Keira Knightley back to POTC!! Fuck Johnny Depp, the people yearn for more Elizabeth Swann.

#potc #pirates of the caribbean #mad max #furiosa #venting and ranting I AM SORRY #cw johnny depp mention #but really his current stans are dumb as fuck and super media illiterate

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favcharacterpoll · 8 months

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ROUND 6 MATCH 3: CECIL VS. C!WILBUR

Cecil Palmer from Welcome to Night Vale faces c!Wilbur from the dsmp. @10piecechickenmcnugget get over here sage

Cecil Propaganda:

"Cecil is not only the Tumblr sexyman, he is the first gay protagonist of a podcast that most of us have ever heard. From the very first episode he was unashamedly queer and no one has ever called him out or given him shit for being gay. He is a gay Jewish fashion disaster who is the mouthpiece for an incredibly bizarre town and plays the whole “this horrifying thing is completely normal”thing so well. If Cecil wasn’t there, I think a lot of people wouldn’t have felt so accepted for just being who they were. Cecil is an inspiration and the queer podcast rep we all deserved as we were growing."

"he’s gay. he’s a dilf. he’s ageless. he has been since there’s was nothing and he’s still here after the world ended. he can summon music. his mother is a oracle his father is a tree. his cat is a man who got cursed and also has wings a stinger and poison??? he thinks a tutu and crocs is formal wear and has talked to god and she said ‘I love you. I’m sorry’. he’s definitely guilty of manslaughter from negligence"

"this is the website Night Vale built!"

c!Wilbur Propaganda:

"Accurate depiction of mental health and spiral, handled delicately and deliberately, every piece of his story was thought and planned and in the end he went home to Utah. Thank you lord."

"Please don’t let the name dream smp effect how you feel about this submission, this character is completely unrelated to dream and I’m pretty sure the person who played him has nothing to do with dream anymore. This man single handedly got me through a horrible patch filled with extreme paranoia by also being extremely paranoid. Genuinely really helped me feel seen and I coped a lot by getting invested in this character. I almost cried when he died :("

"He’s so fucking stupid. I could infodump for hours this man transed my gender. Everything has gone wrong in his life. He’s the definition of a bisexual disaster."

"I didn’t fail 10th grade math bc I was thinking about c!wilbur for him to lose round one"

"I mean look at him!! his Minecraft skin is adorable!!!"

"if you people vote for cwilbur i'll draw him in a bikini."

"A VOTE FOR C!WILBUR IS A VOTE FOR GIRLBOYS EVERYWHERE"

"i should not have underestimated minecraft fans they came together"

"Season 1 changed me. I didn’t know minecraft videos could have good acting, dramatic plots, etc. Wilbur was one of the best there. His plot was so interesting with the L’Manburg and the unfinished symphony arcs. He was funny, dramatic, sad… I fondly remember my dsmp days (though I only saw up to like part of Tommy’s exile)"

#polls #wtnv cecil #cecil gershwin palmer #cecil palmer #wtnv #welcome to night vale #c!wilbur #c wilbur #cwilbur #dsmp wilbur #wilbur soot #dsmp #wilbur dsmp

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lurkingshan · 2 months

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10 Things I Love About Only Boo!

*kicks down the door* I'm a few weeks late but I have arrived and I am here to yell about this fucking adorable show. Have you heard that it's the cutest shit you've ever seen in a fresh new package of all your favorite silly old romance tropes? Besties, this is truly the Sunday Serotonin we need. Here are the top 10 things I love about it:

The main romance is between a confident sunshine protagonist and a kind older boy working through his grief and an artistic block. Mok (Moo) and Kang are such nice boys, two cinnamon rolls too sweet and pure for this world, and I loved them instantly. They have a nice crackly chemistry between them and really solid communication right from the start.

The setting is rural and refreshing. Moo moves to Nakhom Pathom to attend school for a semester because his mom wants him to focus on his studies before she will allow him to pursue a career as an idol. Little did she know she was delivering him to a cute boy who would become the new distraction.

The crushing and flirting starts immediately, and it's mutual. They just like each other, man. Kang is (slightly) older and trying to be responsible about keeping Moo focused on his studies so he's putting up some token resistance, but it's very very token. They both find excuses to keep seeing each other after they meet.

There's a side couple with a long-term pining friends to lovers arc. The way I squealed when they revealed that photo wall. I support you, Payos, you will get your boo. These two also have a lovely, easy chemistry and seem so comfortable around each other. Their characterization also gets a fun twist in the beginning of the story.

The writing is strong and assured. This was written by the same screenwriting team as Cooking Crush, aka the best written original Thai bl of last season. These folks know their way around a smart romcom. They know how to deploy classic tropes so they feel fresh, build authentic character arcs, and make all the beats of the story feel confident. We are in good hands and don't need to worry about any out of left field conflicts or weird plot turns with this one.

A fresh new cast brings a ton of energy. I really love all four of the main actors for this show. They're young and bright and breathing some new life into an old formula. And both pairs have solid chemistry and seem comfortable in their scenes together.

Some of our old favorites are here too. They've made the smart decision to bolster the young main cast by surrounding them with more experienced seniors like our lady Milk, here playing Kang's friend and neighbor who is all up in his crush on Moo. Louis and Book are also going to show up at some point.

The show incorporates music and dancing in such a charming way. Moo is one of those kids who just has to dance, and the show mines a lot of comedy around his efforts to stifle the impulse as his mom ordered. I don't think he'll hold out for long, though, because Payos and Tae are on him to train with them. And of course the music supervisor is having a great time working in some classic GMMTV music gags (yes, Love Score and Too Cute To Handle both make memorable appearances).

It's a high school story brimming with youthful energy without being mired in immaturity. The tone of this show reminds me of My School President in the best way, in that it has all the sweetness and innocence of a high school romance without making the characters so immature and bad at communication that it's annoying to watch. As expected from the CC writers, these characters may be inexperienced but they are going to talk to each other and honesty will prevail every time.

We are only three episodes in and the romance is already well underway. This is the kind of show where we will see the main pair flirt and date and face obstacles together. The swoony moments started immediately and Moo is already throwing around the faen title. We know from the synopsis that the core conflict will come when Moo is forced to choose between his relationship with Kang and his dream of being an idol, and I expect he will be finding a way around that choice. I'll be strapped in for the ride because I already believe in these two.

#only boo #only boo the series #thai bl #10 things #shan recommends #shan shouts into the void

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david-talks-sw · 3 months

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I was watching the Clone Wars featurette about the Holocron arc and Dave talks about the scene where Bane threatens to kill Ahsoka. He says "we're seeing a dark side of Anakin, and in a very clear illustration of why Jedi should not have attachments, we see that attachment get exploited." So clearly at what point in time he understood the whole attachment thing. What happened?

Unlike Karen Traviss, I think Dave Filoni actually understands what "attachment" means, in Star Wars. Apparently, it's the Star Wars theme that he and George spoke the most about.

"The biggest area of the Force and the Jedi [that] George and I have gotten into discussing the whole deal with attachments. And, arguably, that's what Anakin whole life is hinged on, is this - like you've mentioned - he has a lot of attachments to Artoo and how how right or wrong is that? Is it that the Jedi have made themselves dispassionate, that they are actually deceived by the Sith and they fall apart?" - Dave Filoni, Rebel Force Radio, 2012

What I've noticed is that, while understanding the meaning of attachment... Filoni doesn't seem to agree that the Jedi embody the concept of compassion.

He has acknowledged sometimes that "attachment is bad" is the theme of Anakin's story (but question if it's really so bad, unlike Lucas who says it's understandable but bad) but disagrees that the Prequel Jedi represent the obvious counter-theme, "compassion is good."

If you read what Filoni says, he argues that:

The Jedi have lost their way, taken the "rid yourself of attachment" rule and pushed it to an extreme where they've rid themselves of any empathy and thus compassion. They've focused so much on being selfless that they've forgotten how to love.

All except for Qui-Gon, who is the only one that truly knows how to love without getting attached, to love selflessly.

And personally, that strikes me as a coping headcanon, a way of reconciling the theme and feeling the Jedi like Mace, Ki-Adi, even Yoda and Obi-Wan are stoic, unlikable and too different from Luke.

Sure, they're not perfect, but nowhere in the films is the Jedi's stance on love framed as "bad" by the narrative. The narrative agrees with their philosophy, and George echoes it.

In fact, among 772 collected George Lucas quotes, I've never seen him state that theme while adding the asterisk that "of course, the Jedi of the Prequels have forgotten how to be compassionate, except for Qui-Gon who was the true Jedi."

And of course he doesn't do that. Because doesn't that muddy the waters so much?

Supposing Qui-Gon truly is the only character that embodies the concept of "compassion"... doesn't killing him off in the first film confuse a targeted audience of children?

Bearing in mind that the Prequels are about how greed makes people and institutions become the very thing they swear to destroy, and Star Wars as a whole is about being selfless instead of selfish:

In one corner, we have Anakin and the Senate showing what you're not supposed to do.

In the other, you got Padmé, Shmi and the Jedi, showing you what you should do instead.

Simple. I can see a kid getting this (and I did). But according to Filoni, that second point is incorrect. Instead, it's:

In the other, we have... Qui-Gon, who is one of the first film's four protagonists that dies at the end, without openly stating anything about the trilogy's theme. Theoretically, there's the Jedi who state and address the theme, but they don't themselves embody it so they don't count. So really... in this corner we have nobody (?)

That seems overly complex, a whole lotta hoops to jump through. Doesn't make sense. But hey, good luck learning the lesson, kids.

So yeah, Dave Filoni gets what attachment means. He just doesn't think it's as bad as Lucas' films frame it as, and disagrees on the Jedi narratively embodying the concept of compassion.

And I think it's coping. It's connecting non-existent dots, Always Sunny-style, to justify not liking characters that weren't meant to be developed much, due to their calm, collected nature and secondary/tertiary role in the story.

Coping and coming up with headcanons are what any irritated Star Wars fan does when they're confronted with something they're unable to make sense of.

“I care because I passionately believe that important stories ought to make sense.” As well you should—and when a story does not, you apply that passion to finding a way to make it make sense. [...] When a rational and inquisitive mind is confronted by the engaging yet irrational, it often responds in this manner. This process is not usually appreciated by those undergoing it; the most common reaction is a deep irritation. But isn’t that always how pearls are formed?” - Don DeBrandt, Star Wars on Trial, 2006

Unless they choose to make documentaries and click-baity YouTube video where they decide to spew hate and get angry pointlessly. Which I'd argue is still worse.

#Dave Filoni #George Lucas #Jedi Order #attachment

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autumnslance · 4 months

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Normally I'd agree many Final Fantasy games have rather young protagonists. It's because they're usually single-player JRPGs made with the assumption of younger players, and like most Young Adult media, create characters that cater to that, even if it ends up with teens running the world and fighting in wars. And for many players, the first time playing these games is in childhood/adolescence/very young adulthood. So it's YA anime.

Final Fantasy XIV does not fall into that same mold, despite the "Teen" rating for legal and distribution purposes.

The majority of the FF14 cast, including the bulk of the main characters, are between 20 and 40 years old (the Scion Archons, Ishgard Elf Husbands). Many other characters are between 40 and 80 (Ishgard's Counts are all late middle aged to elder dads/grandpas, Gaius is mid 50s, Jehantel and Ran'jit are elderly, all still active). The younger characters (especially with any authority or special position) like the Leveilleur twins, are actually outliers. And the youth of the characters between 16 and 20 years old tends to be plot relevant, where that inexperience and naivety causes problems and drives story (Nanamo's arc at the end of ARR into HW, Alphinaud and the Crystal Braves, Ryne's determination of self in ShB, etc).

Characters have a variety of appearances; some characters in the same age ranges look very different. Varis is only 4 years older than X'rhun but Varis's model shows the stress and disagreeableness of his life a lot more than the RDM trainer's. Cid's in his mid-30s but with the beard looks older--and without it he has a baby face (hair color doesn't matter, cuz they do keep the anime trope of "everyone's got white or silver hair"). Lalafell are designed to be anime-cute halflings so it's hard to tell their adult ages even if they've got facial hair like grandfatherly Papashan. The pad'jal of course look like kids, but the youngest main pad'jal is A-Ruhn in his late teens; all the others are adults stuck in adolescent bodies. E-Sumi is a few hundred years old. Kan-E uses various methods to look older so other leaders and people from outside Gridania will take her seriously as an adult. The padjal introduced in the StB WHM quests is a child, and that's the plot; she's not in charge of anything, or has any particularly advanced-for-her-age skills. She's just a kid having a really rough time.

This inability to determine age by looking and assuming isn't just due to limits of the game engine and character creation options; it reflects real life. I met my work team for the first time in person recently; one person looked older than I know them to be, thanks to months of stress and health issues. While all of them were shocked to remember I'm in my 40s as according to them, I "look much younger". Most people are actually pretty bad at guesstimating ages based on appearance, due to the variety of folks' lives.

Speaking of kid characters, many of the children we interact with, like the Doman Adventurers, are between 12 and 14 and act much younger. Khloe has this going on too, with her age "corrected" to 13 (when previously listed as 10), but she acts way younger to me. Most of the actual child characters are treated like children, and it's not until they get to 14-16 (Honoroit, Leveva) that we start to see them treated like maturing adolescents and having some rsponsibilities, but still young and prone to the kind of choices one expects of less experienced and more emotional youth.

As a MMO, FF14's primary audience is actually adults; teens do play the game, but also age up with it if they keep playing. If a 15 year old began playing with ARR's release, they're in their mid-20s now. Having a primarily adult cast, and treating child characters like children, and adolescents like young people figuring out how young adulthood works, makes sense for this game.

FF14's time bubble is also part of the issue; a developer tool to keep it so they don't have to worry too much about character ages, new models so often, or how long things take in game. Timelines are then intentionally left malleable for the players' benefits, to create our own stories and determine how long things take for our WoLs and their tales. Some folks have their stories pass in real time, some compress it to a year per expac, some expand it out even longer. So the ages the characters have listed in the lorebooks and rarely in game (which is then reflected in online resources), is a starting baseline. Personal headcanons as always should be applied (including changing around some character ages to fit one's own story if necessary).

Also, FF16, made by the same team, has a brief prologue/tutorial section where the main trio is between 10 and 15, guided/trained by adult characters, experience the inciting incident trauma--and then we spend the majority of the game with the main cast in their 20s and 30s. The game also has a mature rating, featuring some sexual situations, lots of violence, and stronger language than other FF games. It's made for adults, and its cast reflects that.

So it is a matter of audience expectations; for a MMO, you're going to have an older and aging player base, and the varied ages of the cast reflect that, as do their varied appearances and experiences as adults. The young characters are treated closer to how their youth should be; still with respect for those in positions like Nanamo, but also prone to errors due to inexperience that drive story. In other FF titles, which were made to be more YA-focused, a teen and young 20s cast were treated much differently. But even in the single-player FF titles, if they are made with adult players in mind, their cast and stories likewise reflect that.

#final fantasy xiv #audience #time bubble #ages #aging #cast #gang's all here #literary analysis #I agree most FF games don't have main casts outside the teens but there's reasons for that #and one can't really fit FF14 into that same mold when the cast is this large and varied #yes this is kinda in response to another post but not putting them on blast

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scintillyyy · 19 days

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the thing is when i say that red robin #1-12 managed to age better than any other reborn title and i'm not even joking is that i know how that sounds funny because 1) i know what out of context panels did to fandom understandings of tim and dick & tim and 2) i know there's a lot of flaws inherent from the time period it was written in in it that gets it a lot of flack.

however. however. ignoring those things, i'm not exaggerating when i say that red robin #1-12 is genuinely almost a marvel in comics storytelling from a *narrative standpoint* in that it truly showcases what the strength of comics as a long-form but at the same time ever changing media *could be*.

because red robin starts at a issue #1--it's a change to the status quo that means you need to quickly introduce the concepts, characters, relationships and their dynamics for new readers to catch up while telling a new story that doesn't actually require knowing the past 80 years of continuity. and despite what fandom says sometimes, red robin is actually fairly competent at that--it lays out a new narrative challenge, quickly reviews how we got to the current narrative challenge, showcases the protagonist overcoming that challenge, & lays a cleanslate groundwork for storytelling beyond it. someone could, in fact, go into it as a first comic & get the gist of things. it does all that fairly well, actually. (yes, even the dick & tim & the resolving of their conflict--the key is actually reading it)

but at the same time, it is an absolute reward if you *have* read the previous 20 years of tim's comics/tim from the start. yost clearly knew a lot about tim & his history--when he was tasked with creating a story arc for tim to transition from robin to red robin he *did his fucking homework*. yost drew from tim's past themes, arcs, relationships & relationship dynamics. he looked at how tim initially transitioned from boy who figured out who batman & robin are to becoming robin. it's not a coincidence that tim's transition from robin -> red robin when read in his relation to his transition from tim -> robin has a lot of similar themes and motifs while *still managing to be a new intepretation of them*. it's not a coincidence that tim in identity crisis i has self hatred from his mother's death that manifests in anger & ultimately tim deciding that he has to do something to save bruce, even if it means he doesn't deserve to be robin and he undergoes a similar arc in red robin with bruce's death. it's not a coincidence that yost was tasked to write an arc where tim comes into his own as a hero as he decides tim needs to travel the world (including paris), the way he's sent away to paris for further training before he can *really* feel like he deserves to be robin like he does in robin i. yost knows that tim sends himself away when he needs to find himself. it's not a coincidence that yost decides to use the league of assassins for a story that flirts with tim having to make compromises like tim dealt with in robin i with lady shiva & king snake. it's not coincidence that he calls back extensively to a lonely place of dying and resurrection of ra's al ghul and prodigal with dick and tim and trust and falling and everything. it's not a coincidence that he has tim blow up the league computers in a way that references tim doing something similar with league computers in legacy. it's not a coincidence you can find parallels to knightfall era dynamics in there. it's not a coincidence that tim almost giving up in the desert can be read in tandem to tim almost giving up on his life in contagion & legacy and fit together very interestingly.

also consider how yost adds in new characters of pru & tam as tim side characters as tim is a character meant to play off others and gives them personality & their own motivations outside of tim like his friends have always historically had along with harkening back to tim as a team up guy who will give anyone a chance. there is so much history yost wove into the very structure of the entire story arc in a way that shows absolute respect for eveything that came before while *still managing to do his own thing*. it is genuinely everything that people want comics to do--carry over important themes and story arcs while still being fresh & not too derivative or just re-telling the same story over and over again. it respects continuity and character history while progressing it. despite its flaws--and it does have them, don't get me wrong--if you look at it from a *comics storytelling* perspective, it manages to achieve what the ideal fusion of respecting the long-form history of comics while creating something that is also a viable, new jumping off point. red robin #1-12 has a lot of respect for *what comics can be capable of as a narrative storytelling medium* and the things you can achieve while respecting both a long, convoluted narrative history & that comics as a medium requires soft resets to make things easier for new fans to jump in to reduce the gatekeeping load.

so when i say red robin #1-12, aged best out of all the reborn comics *this is what i mean*. despite the surface flaws, narratively it achieved so much of what comics with a long history are inherently capable of as a medium. it is a story that is new, yet fits so well with everything that came before it. compare that to morrison's batman and robin, where morrison only cared about how characters could service their grand vision for a story in a way that shows no respect to the past 30 years of dick's storytelling & completely isolated him from the greater universe, because they wanted dick grayson the concept as batman, not dick grayson the character as batman. compare that to how bqm ignored bascially all past steph characterization to turn steph into a 2009 cw "awkward but hot new girl" type protagonist (seriously, she would not be out of place as the protagonist of hellcats. the dynamics of the new girl who just doesn't fit in with the sorority girls of her campus is also not out of place for a cw show like hellcats. the side characters as one dimensional strawmen is peak cw. i would argue red robin didn't treat female characters fantastic, but it did somehow manage to do better than batgirl on this alone lol). red robin #1-12 demonstrates a lot more longevity and solidity as a narrative piece within the greater universe because of all this. imo.

#ik it's trendy to hate red robin but i'm sorry #it is a narrative marvel within the medium & i'm not gonna pretend it's not

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bestworstcase · 1 month

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option 1: tai’s guarding the crown of choice.

pros:

a legitimately important task that recontextualizes his ongoing decision to remain on patch as a personal sacrifice he makes for the greater good.

ozpin would pick the guy named for the god of light to be the gatekeeper of choice, huh.

if any parent in this story is meant to die, it’s him, and narratively this is the most intuitive way to do it.

cons:

realistically, what can tai do to prevent salem / cinder / summer from accessing the vault if they find it? if he’s the gatekeeper, staying on patch alone after everyone else evacuates achieves nothing except, ah, signaling to the enemy that the real vault is under signal academy. bad plan.

it means oz is breaking his promise to be honest and forthcoming, undermining his character growth for the sake of ‘surprising’ the audience with the most obvious answer.

means qrow has either been kept in the dark (see prev point) or he’s also deliberately hiding this information from his nieces after they asked him outright if he knew where tai is; this is so far afield for his character as to border on character assassination, and likewise undermines his positive growth since v7.

honestly makes both yang and ruby seem kind of stupid. they know the crown is hidden somewhere near beacon, that ozpin did something to protect it differently from the others, and that their father hasn’t left patch. ruby was sharp enough to guess that long memory might be a relic hidden in plain sight; yang is just as smart, and she knows tai had “some things” to look after on patch. are we expected to believe that “hey, is dad guarding the relic?” somehow hasn’t occurred to either of them?

tai harbors a whole lot of resentment toward ozpin, and based on qrow kicking him out of ruby’s bedroom to drip-feed her hints on where to go next, he seems to have been on the outer perimeter of the inner circle. why would oz entrust him with the relic’s safety?

glynda—ozpin’s scrupulously loyal second-in-command whose emblem is a crown and whose semblance puts her on par with a maiden—is a far more narratively plausible vault-guardian than tai, and the “sun dragon” makes a damn good red herring.

if he’s guarding the vault, he dies. sorry. but the point of putting the father of 2/4 protagonists in between the two main villains and the thing they want most (choice) is so they can kill him to get it, increasing tension and raising the emotional stakes of negotiating peace. to be clear, rwby is willing to Go There, but i think it’s an unsatisfactory way to close out the rose xiao long family arc.

option 2: survivors trapped under mountain glenn, and tai is taking point.

pros:

a genuinely important, worthwhile thing for him to be doing—even more so than guarding the crown. likely sets up a resolution for him in the vein of “you can be a good huntsman or a good father, and tai picked being a huntsman,” which is an elegant way to balance his contradictions.

gives him meaningful stuff to do in v10; for example, one stealthy huntsman with a bullhead could slip in and out of mountain glenn to get a few dozen people out at a time, and/or run supplies and messages between the kingdoms.

we get to see zwei back in action around mountain glenn :)

introduces a natural segue from playing defense in vacuo to mounting a counteroffensive against beacon as tai’s work clarifies the situation in vale.

easily the most 'heroic' direction for him without contorting the story to arbitrarily lionize tai: he’s a scout preparing the stage for the heroes to take the fight to salem, making him the good counterpart to watts.

cons:

makes no sense to keep it a secret. the emotional beats of B4 can still happen if the girls know this is what tai’s doing: instead of “do you… wonder why he’s not here? i know qrow said he’s on assignment, but what’s more important than here?” yang says “do you… wish he were here? with us? i know qrow said he’s looking for survivors, but how many of them can there really be by now? we need all the help we can get,” and ruby says “maybe we don’t have the full picture” as in maybe dad knows something we don’t and that’s why he hasn’t given up yet. the emotion is the same, and the big "they’re hiding in mountain glenn" reveal is hinted without spoiling.

leaves hanging the narrative thread of what tai has been doing since the fall of beacon, because the “some things” he was dealing with in v4 obviously wasn’t this.

option 3: tai is dead.

pros:

explains the apparent secrecy; qrow knows tai was away “on assignment” (i.e., had taken a huntsman contract that brought him out of the kingdom) at the time salem attacked vale, so he is missing but not yet presumed dead.

might reopen the mystery box of summer’s last mission through the real-deal “left on a mission and never came back” echo.

cons:

raven would know.

it’s a cheap, narratively unsatisfying twist that fails to deliver on the bread crumbs set up in v2-3 (tai starts going on missions again) and v4 (“some things”), and also undermines any serious emotional resolution with regard to yang and ruby’s complex relationships with tai.

option 4: summer’s working with salem, and tai is trying to convince her to come back.

pros:

“some things” being his presumed-dead wife who left him to join the enemy and with whom tai is now having an affair or otherwise hoping to coax back to the heroic side through the power of love whilst also keeping his mouth shut about her being a) still alive and b) a traitor is OBJECTIVELY the funniest answer.

brings forward and interrogates the way tai’s romantic grief informs the choices he makes as a parent: from hiding raven and then refusing to talk about her with yang, to shutting down when he lost summer and letting his five-year-old pick up the pieces, to discovering and then keeping summer’s secrets for the sake of some faint hope that she might finally come back to him.

cogent with the Dead (Absent) Mother / Neglectful Father / Evil Stepmother fairytale paradigm rwby deconstructs with raven, tai, and summer; the father chooses the stepmother over his children.

raises the emotional stakes of the war for summer through direct confrontation with the life she left behind, creating narrative opportunities to develop her character (is she still in love with tai? how does she feel about being his first priority, over their children? does she resent that he has her on this pedestal even now?) and apply pressure to her relationships with salem and cinder (do they know? is summer keeping her communication with him a secret, too? or is he an “asset” she’s using for salem’s benefit?).

consequently, raises the momentum of the narrative toward negotiation with salem; tai still has the coalition’s trust, however strained his personal relationships may be. summer is the obvious ambassador for salem’s side of the war, but she’s also the traitor who needs someone to vouch for her good intentions.

the secrecy needs no explanation: just as summer’s last mission was a summer secret, tai’s "assignment" is a taiyang secret and the girls know everything that oz and qrow do, because all of them have been left in the dark. raven might know, and she has the means to find if she doesn’t, but tai’s whereabouts are entangled with what raven knows about summer, so she can’t explain where tai is or why until she reveals her deep dark secrets about what happened between her and summer that night.

foreshadowing is solid: tai starts to go on "missions" again in v2, after the inner circle becomes aware that salem has infiltrated beacon and just before the breach downtown. when ruby visits summer’s grave in v3, she says "[dad] told me he’s going to be on some mission soon! i think he misses adventuring with you." he’s got to "look after some things" (but he isn’t talking about yang, because he stays home after she leaves). and then with B4 we have ruby echoing what the blacksmith taught her about summer in relation to tai, "maybe we don’t have the full picture?"

juicy

cons:

???

dependent on the unconfirmed theory that summer is working for salem as herself, not some unrecognizable enslaved monster, but i am as confident in that as i was about salem going to vale next and we all know how that turned out :)

taking their mom was not enough salem had to go for the full set APPARENTLY

option 5: secret fifth thing

pros:

???

cons:

???

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magicpotatothoughts · 1 year

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SVSSS | The absolute GENIUS meanings behind the name Shen Yuan 沈垣

Ok so most of us already know the meaning of SY 'cause it's in the appendix of the official translation books but I was today years old when I realised just how much meaning MXTX embedded into this name. *spoilers ahead*

Level 1 Meta

Official translation of the word Yuan垣 means wall. But not just any wall, a wall that surrounds something else. It would be specifically used to describe city wall 城垣 or garden fence 花垣 would use this character. This is incredibly fitting for Shen Yuan because his whole story arc is his battle between his logical conscience for survival and his compassionate gut instinct to protect LBH, in other words, to surround and to shield LBH from harm. But this wall of protection functioned against Bingqiu psychologically because SY kept on making decisions without talking to LBH and decided a lot of things on his own. SVSSS is a novel about achieving that balance, to allow both partners to take agency and face life side by side.

Level 2 Meta

Normally, surnames don't have any meaning. Shen沈 is largely used as a name for things/people buttttttt it can also mean liquid or to pour. Guess what, Luo Binghe 洛冰河 means Luo frozen river. So it could be interpreted that Shen Yuan's entire job in the novel is to make LBH achieve his final crybaby form by getting the frozen river Luo to melt, to "pour".

Also, SY made himself melt as well in a way, his internalized homophobia potential toxic masculinity as well as his need to maintain a cool composure were also things he needed to overcome. We finally see him cry for real in the 3rd book, right after LBH scolds him out of anger and worry. Our protagonist learns to break his own walls down and show emotionally vulnerable parts of himself to LBH.

Level 3 Meta

Chinese characters are made up of radicals, meaning more complicated looking characters are made up of simpler characters (radicals) that give clues to their meaning and pronunciation.

Shen沈 is made up of the radicals:

氵 [ shuǐ ] water 💦

冘 [ yín ] can mean to move on OR doubtful of something/someone

The water radical氵💦 occurs in all three characters in Luo Binghe 洛冰河. This can mean that Shen has influence on Luo Binghe's development and overall life. It also reaffirms their compatibility as as couple. I mean let’s be honest, SQQ cries inwardly and LBH cries outwardly, they are both crybabies.

yín冘 perfect describes the base functionality of SY's character; he has a strong survival instinct but is also extremely doubtful of everyone's intentions, especially LBH's.

Yuan垣 is made up of the radicals:

土 [ tǔ ] soil, earth; items made of earth 🌎

亘 [ gèn ] to extend across (dimension/space), through; from 🚀

I find it so fucking funny that MXTX took the tǔ土 soil radical seriously and literally just had SY zombie-himself out of the dirt after 5 years. But it's also really poetic that it once again goes perfectly with LBH's name; the river and earth go hand-in-hand. no wonder LBH asked for Shizun's hand in marriage. 😳😳😳

gèn亘 perfectly describes SY as a transmigrator, someone who travelled across dimension and space. But also SY is really the ultimate sightseer of SVSSS, casually crossing between the human realm and demon realm while also going on road trips with SQH. It's honestly so fucking mint. But I'm here to point out to you how Xin Mo 心魔 LBH's sword (heart demon) is how LBH travels across dimension/space for the majority of the book.

Ultimately, Yuan垣 highlights the importance of finding a home in the people you love. Bingqiu both enjoy that sightseeing lifestyle but the book constantly has important relationship developments, smexy times and domestic Bingqiu set in the Bamboo House. Ultimately, no matter how far you travel, run or chase, you cannot get away from your problems. You need to extend and make effort in understanding and communicating with your SO 🚀 and work on feeling grounded 🌎 in your relationship together.

MXTX you freaking genius I-

#svsss spoilers #there is another meta coming out about SQQ's name definitely look forward to it #mxtx is a legend and no one can convince me otherwise #svsss #svsss meta #bingqiu #luo binghe #shen qingqiu #shen yuan #scumbag system #scum villian self saving system #ren zha fanpai zijiu xitong #mxtx #mxtx svsss #svsss analysis #danmei #danmei novel #cnovel

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a-sassy-bench · 7 months

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OFMD season 2 disappointment is NOT as simple as "my favorite character died"

don't get me wrong, he absolutely was my favorite character, but i've had lots of favorite characters die. what's different is i've never felt *betrayed* by it before

this show presented itself as a wonderful, queer comedy. we were all excited about the s1 kiss not just because it was a fun cinematic moment where our character's dreams came true, but because it was so surprising and refreshing and *validating* that we weren't queer baited this time around

that kiss drove home that this show really was trying to live up to it's promises and it promised us it was going to be different

so when s2 presented a dynamic and messy and beautiful growth arc in Izzy, it was fair to have an expectation of how that was going to play out in the "gay pirate show" where people talk to seagulls and magically teleport in their dinghies to wherever their true love is

it was fair to have the expectation that all of the queer stories were equally important and would be treated as such

but instead, s2 leaned in to being a rom-com, tropes and all. izzy was reduced to a plot device who had to die to make way for the protagonist couple to live happily ever after

stede's arc was figuring out he was gay, considering other people's perspectives like one time (because izzy told him to, btw), becoming slightly better at being a pirate, then stopping being a pirate

blackbeard's arc was being just crazy enough that he was loveable, losing it completely, then functionally returning to square 1, but happy this time

izzy grappled with an abusive relationship that was core to his identity and a lifetime of pretending he didn't have feelings because feelings are objectively hard and often awful (especially in the life of a pirate)

izzy chose to protect his community over the man he was trauma bonded with even when he knew he would (at minimum) get seriously hurt or (more likely) killed doing it. he re-configured his entire self-concept, made a practically olympic effort to make things right with his ex's new beau, and finally embraced his whole, beautiful queer self

but s2 was just a regular ol' rom-com so the evil gay ex had to die for the 2 cute protagonists to live happily ever after

it was unnecessary. it is valid to be upset that even the gay pirate show buried its gays.

#our flag means death #ofmd #our flag means death s2 #ofmd s2 #our flag means death season 2 #ofmd season two #our flag means death izzy #ofmd izzy #our flag means death izzy hands #ofmd izzy hands #izzy hands #isreal hands #the izcourse #ofmd spoilers #our flag means death spoilers #ofmd critical

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nightswatchdisbandmentera · 3 months

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I have no idea why people think Jon will stop being a POV post-resurrection, or why they think it’s even remotely a good narrative choice. Jon is at the center of the “human heart in conflict with itself” theme that keeps cropping up in these books. A lot of the action in Jon’s story isn’t so much what happens around him but how he internalizes things in his head. He’s always been a very internal character much like Ned and Sansa. So if we lose Jon’s POV, what does it matter that he’s been lied to his whole life and Ned isn’t his real father? What does it matter who his mother was? Who cares about his changing acceptance of magic now that he’ll need to rely on it to survive? Who cares how he views Dany, the only thing to connect him to his father’s family? There’s no point revealing Jon’s parentage or delving into these topics because losing Jon’s POV means losing the thoughts of the ONE person they affect. That is not how you write a narrative guys. And no for the 10000th time, Beric and Cat are NOT good comparisons for Jon. One Beric wasn’t even a POV so I’m not sure why people bring him up in the first place. And two, Catelyn’s arc ended with Robb’s at the Red Wedding. Stoneheart exists but we’re going to see more how her presence affects how other characters move forward: Brienne, Jaime, Arya, etc. Plus Catelyn wasn’t even a central protagonist like Jon is so I don’t understand why she even gets brought up. Beric and LH are there at the baseline to establish that resurrection can be done. Point blank. They’re not a one size fits all such that Jon HAS to be just like them. I’m pretty tired of hammering in this one point over and over again. There’s really no narrative or thematic justification to look at Jon solely through other’s eyes other than “wouldn’t it be cool if?” Istg a lot of people make predictions based on what’s cool (which is debatable) and not what actually makes sense for a character and the themes in their arc. It’s quite frustrating.

#needed to rant ugh #pretty annoying that 80% of the theories surrounding jon post rez are dog 💩#losing him as a pov makes absolutely no narrative sense whatsoever #there are main characters and then there are characters who are at the very heart of the story such that it cannot keep moving without them #jon is the latter type #asoiaf #jon snow #valyrianscrolls

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linkspooky · 9 months

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what are your thoughts on yuji and where do you think he ends up as a character in/after the current arc? i really wish we get more focus on him and his rs with kenjaku after this fight is over cause yuji has felt very underwhelming ever since mahito left him

I think your frustration at the lack of focus on Yuji is understandable anon, but I think Yuji being out of focus is sort of the point. I've always seen Yuji as a "Decoy Protagonist", because he's what the audience would expect the protagonist to be due to all of his typical shonen protagonist traits. Whereas, the real protagonist of the story is Megumi. In the story itself Kenjaku says something along the same lines, that Yuji eating Sukuna's finger was the initiating event of the story, but he's no longer the center of Kenjakiu's schemes. He's more of a trigger than a driver of the plot.

To me this is part of the appeal of Yuji himself. He's a well-intentioned kid who may be a heart of the friend group he's a part of, but he's never given any special treatment by the story. He doesn't have protagonist privilegeTM so-to-speak.

Usually the main character of the story because they're the central focus are given a lot of leeway to make mistakes. It's their story, the story is focused around their growth and development so it makes sense the world and character sin the story are going to center around them to an extent. They have plot armor because of course they do, there's no story without the main character. If they're losing a fight they'll get a convenient power up in time. If they're cornered one of their allies will show up to save them.

By doing away with a lot of the convenience that happens to a lot of main characters in Shonen manga, Yuji becomes a very atypical main character.

The story does not treat Yuji any different from the rest of its characters. Especially during and after Shibuya where Jujutsu Kaisen shifts to more of an ensemble piece than just following Yuji's story and development into a sorcerer.

Mahito lampshades this very fact in Shibuya. That Yuji up until this point viewed himself as the protagonist of a typical shonen jump exorcism manga. He assumes that things will work out because he's the good guy, here fighting evil curses and good always triumphs over evil or whatever the line is. However, Mahito points out that they're just members of opposite factions fighting in the streets of Shibuya. Mahito wants to usher in an age of curses and Yuji wants to kill curses for the sake of humans. Considering curses don't really follow human morality and rules it's not a good vs. evil conflict, it's ust both of them fighting for which side is going to dominate.

"You came to Shibuya with half-assed determination, didn't ya!? How naive, you stupid brat! This is war! Not a battle to fix what's wrong! But a clash of truths you and your fragile justice! You are me, Yuji Itdaori! I kill without a second thought... just like how you save people without a second thought! The instincts of a curse... against the so called dignity obtained by human reason! It's a battle to determine who will be left standing in 100 years!"

One of the biggest mistakes Yuji makes in Shibuya, letting Sukuna take control of his body leading to the massacre of thousands of people is I think a great example of the way the story treats Yuji differently. There are a lot of protaognists who have demon sides that occasionally go berserk. Often giving them a mid-fight power up when their own skill isn't enough to beat the enemy.

Naruto has the nine-tailed fox. Ichigo has Zangetsu his inner hollow / zanpakuto who occasionally tries to usurp control of his body and fight for him. In both cases however, there usually isn't any real consequences for the protagonist losing control. The worst time Naruto rampaged with the nine tails against Pain the village was already destroyed. When Ichigo loses control in the fight against Ulquiorra, he stabs Uryu but the wound heals and no one holds it against him.

Compare this to Itadori who has the deaths of thousands of people on his conscience because of his inability to control Sukuna and is then made an enemy of Jujutsu Society.

Yuji never benefits from plot conveience, in fact assuming things are going to go his way because the world will follow storybook logic is exactly what leads Yuji to making some major mistakes. There's always hard hitting conesequences to Yuji's actions because he's not special, he's just one character among many who are all fighting to survive in this world.

The one thing that gave him a claim to be the main character, being Sukuna's vessel even gets taken away from him. The whole premise of the story is that Yuji is supposed to consume all twenty of sukuna's fingers and then be executed in order to permanently seal him away.

Only for us to learn that the one thing we thought made Yuji special wasn't unique to Yuji. Megumi also had the potential to be a vessel to Sukuna. Sukuna never planned on staying in Yuji's body from almost the start of the manga he was hatching a long scheme to leave Yuji's body and take Megumi's instead.

The quest given to him by Gojo and Megumi. The thing that only he was capable of doing is gone and Yuji is left with nothing.

So what is Yuji's role in the story then, if he's not a main character? A friend of mine pointed this out recently and it helped me understand a lot about Yuji's character: he's sort of a mirror. The story describes Mahito who's set up as Yuji's foil this way as well.

Yuji is for the most part a normal kid (except for the part where he's a science fair project made by Kenjaku) who doesn't have any strong idea motivating him. Which is why it's very easy for him to adopt the motivations of the people surrounding him instead. He starts out repeating his grandfather's words of helping people. The more he interacts with people, the more his motivations become like theirs as well.

He starts out with the vague goal of helping people. When he is given the role of eating Sukuna's fingers he jumps at the chance because it gives him something that he can only do. Even if he dies at the end of his quest he'll die satisfied and on his own terms because he went out helping people. He realizes how poorly thought out his motivation is when confronting Megumi and starts admiring Megumi instead.

When he fails to stop Junpei's death, which is really failing at his goal to save people from "unnatural deaths" as Junpei is twisted into a horrid form by Mahito, Yuji becomes obsessed with killing Mahito instead. In a way he's reflecting Mahito here because violent mahito with no regards for life at all brings out the killer in Yuji. He almost shifts again away from just helping save people from unnatural deaths to becoming someone strong enough to exterminate Mahito.

Towards the end of shibuya, Yuji finally seems to reflect on the emptiness of his own goal. As someone devoid of a purpose he instead just takes whatever purpose someone else around him offers him. Once again playing his role as a mirror, Yuji himself as a character offers nothing but he is someone who reflects and contrasts the people around him.

Yuji doesn't need a purpose for himself, but by being a cog he's still a part of the grander scheme of things. Yuji himself says that he's insignificant but honestly I think it's the same symptom of before Yuji wanting to have a place in the world and a task given to him, but not wanting to contemplate what his own motivations are or what he wants. He wants these things to be given to him instead because he's a mirror, he reflects other people he doesn't not reflect upon himself.

Even thinking of himself as a cog fails because the one role he was given to play, to eat the rest of the fingers and die as Sukuna is now given to someone else because he no longer contains Sukuna in his body. I think Yuji's arc will continue however when he chooses to act selfishly for the first time.

By that I mean he can adopt Megumi's philosophy of "choosing to save people selfishly." Yuji is right now the only person interested in actually saving Megumi from Sukuna's possession and finding some way to do so, while everyone else sees him as a target to be defeated. Which is understandable because by utilitarian logic "the needs of the many outweight the needs of the few, or the needs of the one."

The choice to deliberately try to save Megumi and prioritize his life over the lives of thousands of people that might be killed if they don't put down Sukuna permanently and pioritize that is a selfish one.

However, there's already foreshadowing for Yuji making that choice. There's also a circular storytelling sort of logic to it. The story begins by Megumi making the selfish choice to spare Yuji's life even though he's dangerous to others because of Sukuna inside of him. Therefore Yuji making the same choice to save Megumi even though the less risky thing to do is just kill both Megumi and Sukuna together is Megumi's choice from the beginning of the series coming full circle.

It's also an answer to the question Megumi posed to him in their first contronation. "What if the person you save goes on to kill someone else?" Yuji acknowledging that possibility and going on to save Megumi anyway has a lot of weight to it.

The covers of the key animation books released so far also seem to foreshadow the ending fights of the series. We're already in the middle of a Gojo and Megumi confrontation which is the cover of Key Animation Vol. 2.

Considering both Yuji's own nature as a mirror and the way the story itself started with Yuji eating Sukuna's finger I think it makes far more sense for Yuji's last battle to be against Sukuna. Especially since Sukuna now considers Yuji as someone far beneath him even abandoning him as a vessel. The best battle for a character to function as a mirror is to fight their mirror image, and he already did the same with Mahito which was Yuji's most significant fight so far.

As for Kenjaku, we may get some revelations about Yuji's creation but honestly I don't think there's going to be any confrontation between the two of them. There's far more setup for a final confrontation between Kenjaku and Yuta. Number one, Kenjaku is in Yuta's body and that's always been Yuta's rival.

When Kenaku appears and seals Gojo he states he's not worried about Yuta because he doesn't have the potential to surpass Gojo.

Yuta also states his direct goal is to kill Kenjaku by himself so Gojo won't have to kill his best friend a second time.

That's pretty direct foreshadowing in favor of Yuta, and also I think fits with the theme of Yuji not really being the main character of the piece. Kenjaku is pretty much the main villain and the orchestrator behind the plot so him being taken out by another character pushes Yuji away from the center of things. Kenjaku himself even says that he's washed his hands of Yuji, Yuji's no longer the center of his schemes he's moved onto other things.

#jjk meta #yuji itadori #kenjaku #yuta okkotsu #ryomen sukuna

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khihi · 4 months

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i'm not gonna be able to put my thoughts on this into the kind of wording they deserve because my brain is burned to a crisp at the moment, but now we've got all the chapters i'm sort of piecing together a narrative...

the story starts with kris, whose photos are very tender and exposing – they seem to be about him learning to being comfortable in himself, letting himself be soft and let out his emotions in a healthy way (the shower that washes away the black and white to reveal the gold).

there's comfort and relief in the solitude of his photos – it feels like he's embracing a fresh start for himself – the first new chapter. his nudity isn't for show as much as it is in the others' chapters; it feels more like an innocent "naked as you were born" kind of situation.

then you get bojan, who is the opposite of kris; instead of water, we have fire as the main element, and also a lot more focus on props and costume to tell the story of this guy who finds himself being close to burnout so much. but also perhaps to hide and protect himself.

unlike kris, we're seeing someone who finds little relief or healing in the loneliness of his images; in fact, he never really feels alone in most of his images — he stares down the lens with such intensity it's making it clear to us that he's up there in the spotlight surrounded by an audience. unlike kris, any of his nudity's all for show.

then chapters four and five; jan and nace both expressing a turmoil of emotions in their own shoots – nace's internal stress and strain being put on show, paired with jan's determination to keep the messiness of his own emotions in the dark as much as he can – they're both uncomfortable with themsleves in some way on their own...

but then they come together, and there's happiness and love and support. they look at the audience, but there's no fear or worry there like there is in bojan's shoots; just a silent determination that they're there to protect and care for each other.

then, finally, we've got jure's pictures. which are clearly meant to be sexy as fuck. i think it's interesting how the story began with kris being comfortable and unbothered by any potential onlookers while half naked, then progressed to bojan putting on an uncomfortable show of his half-naked body for any spectators, then on to jan and nace not really showing off much of their bodies at all, and now the story concludes with jure very much putting on a show for the audience but feeling totally comfortable in doing so. he's lounging around in most of the photos – hell, he's got the goddamn baby boo socks on, he seems very comfortable, even playful about letting us look.

so the arc – one of the arcs, at least – i'm reading into this story is finding a healthy balance between showing yourself off - giving the intimate parts of yourself away, if you like - and hiding yourself away from all the discomfort too many eyes on you leads to. it's being confident and comfortable in yourself enough to have fun in revealing enough of yourself without letting it burn you out.

at the end of a good story, the protagonist is usually changed to the point of no return. there's no going back to the innocent, relaxed state that we began with in kris' photos, not after having gone through bojan and jan and nace's photos. but we can find a happy ending within jure's photos, even if changed.

the relief and comfort found in jan and nace's photos together leads us very nicely to the reason behind this happy ending, i think; they feel safest and most supported when together. and that goes, i think, for all of them. while jure might be on his own here, he's surrounded by images of his bandmates. he can be comfortable and confident in himself because he's got his friends behind him. art intertwined.

#joker out #jure maček #kris guštin #bojan cvjetićanin #nace jordan #jan peteh #disclaimer im almost certain damon and or the boys didnt have this in mind when making these images #but art is subjective and you can extrapolate whatever the hell you want from it and this is what im extrapolating so. there.#also this is way longer than i thought it was going to be when i started typing #not rereading or double checking this i'm just gonna post it #it is what it is even if it doesnt make much sense

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chaifootsteps · 1 month

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I’m kinda devastated by the “cockblocktavia” thing, she’s the only female character who really feels like a lead, the closest to a real girl, even if her only waking thought is her dad just like Loonas is boys in general and Millie’s is her husband. Octavia just felt, different, more real.

I’m also a huge fan of Barret Wilbert Weed so I was so excited for her to have more focus and sing with that incredible voice of hers. I thought lots of people would see Via shine and be on her side, creating an actual dilemma in the show that’s been well foreshadowed. But now it’s like Brandon completely overshadowed it, and sabotaged the emotional impact of her story arc and performance for the sake of his character and his musical debut (which is going to sound bad, I’m sorry, but it is) What a selfish prick. What the fuck is Via even getting “in the way” of?? Stolas actually loves her, not obsesses. They have an actual bond. What irritates me too is “stolitz” is nothing but a marketing tool. Only garbage shows have to rely on a dramatic gay ship for views and money, and even this show is better than that.

Also how pathetic is it that the so called protagonist only has a musical debut now in season 2, and even then he has to share it with another character who has sang three times to date. That is the craziest case of creators pet I’ve ever seen. Why isn’t Blitzøs daughter having a big emotional moment? Why can’t we see his family breakdown in real time? Everything is about stolas’ shitty family while Blitzøs is the one that’s actually interesting. And sad. Tight-knit families formed under harsh environments have strong touching bonds, nobles don’t give a rats ass about each other, but Viv hates the poor, so she would never understand that.

Agreed, agreed completely.

I hate that I actually had some hope that maybe, this show wasn't actually going in the direction the Octavia leaks made it seem, that they weren't actually going to villainize this sad, troubled girl in favor of her dad. But it looks like that's exactly what we're getting, and it's surreal and disgusting.

#Anonymous #viv stuff #helluva boss critical #actual blog post

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inbarfink · 9 months

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I already talked about, like, the Obvious Symbolism of Simon reaching his lowest point literally dressed like the Ice King and then gradually gets back to his old outfit as he starts climbing out of his depressive spiral, at least somewhat.

But it’s also really interesting, maybe even more interesting, how Fionna’s outfit has been gradually shifting and changing with basically every adventure.

My first thought was that it really shows Fionna coming into her own as a character. The more she grows and also the more character development she gets - the more the audience learns to see her as more than just Girl Finn - the more her outfit moves away from just being a slightly girlier version of Finn’s classic look and into being its own thing.

Because Fionna is her own character.

But my second thought was more about the first time Fionna’s classic outfit got an update in this series.

This wouldn’t really relate to my first reading, since it just kinda makes her outfit closer to Finn. But it does relate to the most important Theme that her character arc revolves around - Fantasy versus Reality.

Fionna starts out the story interacting with the idea of magical adventure and heroism via the lens of fantasy. She compares everything to video games and just thinks about everything in terms of it being cool and fun and she literally tries to chase down a person from her dreams.

And her mindset was probably only reinforced by discovering she was literally created to be the Main Character in God’s little fantasy universe literally created out of self-indulgence for his silly little stories.

And because of that, she starts out the story with a huge Protagonist-Centered-Morality blind spot where she can’t recognize when she and Cake are in the wrong

And she rushes into action and violence just thinking it’s ‘cool’

And, like, in general acting without thinking of the consequences.

And at basically every step of this adventure, these kinda actions clashed against the reality of her situation. And it all started when she pointed out to her own creator that the outfit he designed for her is cute - but extremely unrealistic for an adventurer like herself

And from there we move to Fionna experiencing more and more of the harsh consequences of assuming everything should fit into her fantasies of heroes and villains

And that she should punch first and ask questions later

And in general that it’s always better to trust her guts over her head.

And with every one of her experiences, the bright and adorable outfit that is a reminder of her origin as God’s Most Self-Indulgent OC gets tweaked in more way - turning it into something that looks a lot more, for the lack of a better word, gritty. And also turning it further and further away from the outfit of her own literal fantasies.

And all of these horrible traumatic experiences and the general dangers of the magical and very different world she’s in have all weathered down Fionna’s original optimism and eagerness and brashness that originally defined her and turned her terribly overprotective and scared instead. And it really reminds of how Simon’s own trauma weathered him down.

Turning him from a kind man with a passion for adventure and the fantastical and a powerful parental instinct to a miserable jerk who aches for mundanity and made a little girl cry

Until he got to his very lowest point.

So I’m guessing next up for Fionna is getting to see her regain some of her old identity that the Trauma has been tearing away at - getting back some of that cheerfulness and brash attitude and adventurous spirit. Because while it has put herself and her teammates and others in serious troubles - it’s also been a huge help at other times (especially as she's a good counterbalance to Simon ‘slow but dependable’ Petrikov)

She needs to find the balance, learning the lessons from her multiverse adventure without losing all the things that made her Fionna Campbell in the first place.

And I wonder if this development is gonna be paralleled with a return of some of the more ‘classic’ elements of her look - or if her outfit is instead going to diverge farther?

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