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silima · 3 years

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Do you have any tips for small artists?

i have no idea what level of technical skill u have so these are some pretty general tips but here u go! these are also mostly focused on fanart lol cuz that's what i like to make.

number 1 rule of art is that people like art that is interesting!!! it's gotta make them feel something or they will ignore it!! i used to draw so much art that was just like, a character standing there doing nothing. and i would try very hard to have nice lineart and pretty shading and all that good stuff but in the end a character standing there doing nothing is boring. if you have really good technical skills, then some people will still be like "wow pretty art!!" or "so photorealistic! how cool!" but generally speaking it's gonna take soooooo long to actually reach that level of technical skill if every drawing u make looks like this 🧍. if you wanna improve fast, you're much better off experimenting with all sorts of types of art.

so, what do people find interesting? lots of things!

ship art is an easy way to make an "interesting" drawing, b/c people like ships and b/c you've got a character interaction happening there. even if they're just leaning on each other or holding hands or something, there's personality in that. even when i was really shitty at art i always noticed that my ship art got more notes than art of just 1 character.

in general, character interactions always make things more interesting. u certainly don't have to only draw romantic ships--draw some characters who are friends hanging out and having fun, or draw characters who are family hugging each other, or something. or draw people fighting!!! if you're not yet used to drawing characters interacting, it can be a bit of a pain at first, but it opens up so many fun possibilities (and reference photos can always help you!! google images is honestly the best of all resources for that lmao although more specific stuff like adorkastock is great too).

even without character interactions, u can make drawings that try to evoke an emotion of some sort. dark and angsty? lonely? happy and cute? this is one of my favorite drawings ever and i think it's super, super visually interesting and tells a story without the need for more than one character or any sort of words/dialogue, just from the pose and the background and the whole vibe of it. it feels so peaceful and lovely. of course, it makes a difference that this artist clearly has a lot of technical skill, but if this same artist drew a picture of aang looking like 🧍 on a boring white background i would definitely not love this art nearly as much lol.

screenshot redraws are also pretty popular!! personally i would strongly advise that if ur gonna redraw a screenshot, you should be adding something interesting to your version. if you colorpick the exact same colors from the drawing and try to copy the style as closely as possible, it's a little boring, right? why would i want to see the exact same picture twice? one artist who does screenshot redraws really well is viorie (who i think has removed/deactivated a lot of her stuff, thus the repost, sorry):

like this is very clearly an artist that had something of her own to bring to the screenshot she was redrawing!! that's what makes it cool, appealing art, even though it's "just" a redraw.

and of course my absolute favorite thing to make drawings "interesting" is to make comics. comics are the best!! u get to draw a whole story!!! lots of types of comics that you can make, too. a lot of the comics that i've made lately are my own writing and tend to be more serious, but if you're looking for something easy, fun, and simple, try drawing incorrect quotes or make art/comics that are based off of other people's posts, fics, or ideas that you thought were really cool (w/ appropriate credit obviously).

on that note, drawing fanart for other people is especially effective for putting yourself out there because it's often hard to get your foot in the door on social media when you literally have 0 followers and no one is seeing your stuff. you draw something for a popular fic writer or a humor blog, they're happy because they've gotten fanart and they reblog your art, you're happy because now all their followers are seeing ur stuff. lol this sounds so transactional but it's really a lot more fun than it sounds. make art for other ppl! make some friends! join discord servers, join group chats, comment nice things on other peoples' work, & check out fandom events, like big bangs or ship weeks or whatever. it's good stuff.

also, use different social media. it might seem like what tends to be popular in one corner of the internet is gonna be pretty well-received everywhere else but that's not always the case lol. tumblr, for example, usually puts a lot of emphasis on consuming content "from a fandom" rather than consuming content "from an artist"--it's hard to build an individual brand, people just want More Insert Popular Fandom Content and don't really care who it comes from so long as it fits a certain type of art; in my case, atla is a way more popular show than lok, so my atla art gets significantly more attention than my lok art does, despite the fact that i don't make that much of it. on the other hand, on instagram, people really like my lok/red lotus art because that's sort of my "brand" and my atla art tends to get less attention. (this works out for me because i like lok way better and i also have way more followers on instagram than i do here.)

& ofc when you talk about becoming a "popular" artist... i mean, i'm not gonna be the person who tells u "oh you should ONLY be doing this for yourself!! if you're doing it for attention you're doing it all wrong!" because obviously i love attention and i love making art that people like. i would not draw nearly as much if i didn't have fun sharing it! but if you let yourself get too sucked into the idea of making "popular" art, you're gonna feel super drained and fucked up and you eventually will burn out hard (ahaha.............). there's a balance to strike between "i'm making this art because it's fun" and "i'm making this art because i know people will like it." on tumblr, my atla art is way more popular than my lok art, but i don't care abt atla nearly as much as i care abt lok, so i'm never gonna like, make an in-depth comic about the atla main cast the way i have for the red lotus, the lok main cast, and kyoshi. what a waste of time! even when you're looking for advice about how to become a "big" artist, ultimately, you've gotta make the art that's fun for you, and with luck you'll eventually find an audience that also enjoys that type of art.

#ask #anon #art advice

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baya-ni · 3 years

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SHADOW’s Queer Coding

I first started exploring this idea of Sk8′s implicit queer rep (as in stuff other than explicit same sex intimacy) in this post.

I know we like to joke that Hiromi is the Token Straight of the protag gang, but I argue that he’s as much an example of queer rep as any of our main characters, albeit in a less conventional and fanservicey way.

So that’s what this post is gonna be, an analysis of Hiromi/SHADOW as a queer figure, how his character fits the Jekyll/Hyde archetype as a metaphor for queerness and The Closet, the similarities between SHADOW as a skatesona and early drag, and how his character represents a larger problem of exclusion within queer fandom spaces.

The 1886 Gothic novella The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson is the origin of the phrase “Jekyll and Hyde”. What I’m calling the Jekyll/Hyde archetype, refers to the same thing; it refers to duality, to a character who is “outwardly good but sometimes shockingly evil” (as described from the novella’s wiki page).

And the Jekyll/Hyde dynamic has also long been associated with Queerness. The antagonism between Jekyll and Hyde as two sides of the same person resonates with many people as similar to the experience being in the closet, and many many scholars have written about this queer reading of Jekyll and Hyde. Do a quick google search if you don’t believe me.

Hiromi experiences his own Jekyll/Hyde duality through his SHADOW persona, which seems to entirely contradict with Hiromi’s day to day personality.

Whilst Hiromi is sweet, romantic, and generally very cutesy, SHADOW is mean-spirited, sadistic, described as “the anti-hero of the S community.” And though these two personalities seem entirely at odds, SHADOW doesn’t exist in a vacuum, he’s very much a part of Hiromi. In the show, this manifests as SHADOW’s sabotage moves being all flower themed, as Hiromi works in a flower shop, and how he’ll “step out” of character when playing babysitter to the kids.

Below is passage from an essay titled, “The Homoerotic Architectures of Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” which reminds me a lot of Hiromi’s character, such that I think his character arc can be read as an allegory for coming out and self acceptance.

The closet, here, is a space not only for secrecy and repression, but also for becoming; it is the space in which queer identities build themselves up from “disused pieces” and attempt to discover the strength needed for presentation to the world. The closet is both a space of profound fear and profound courage—of potentiality and actualization. (Prologue)

Unlike the kid/teen characters, the show’s adult characters all lead double lives. When they aren’t skating, they have day jobs. Kaoru is a calligrapher, Kojiro is a restaurant owner, Ainosuke is a politician/businessman (but tbh his job is just being some rich dude), and Hiromi works in a flower shop.

But of the adult protagonists (so not Ainosuke), Hiromi compartmentalizes the most.

Kojiro leaves his face totally exposed such that he can be recognized both on and off the skate scene. Kaoru at least covers his face, but his trademark pink hair and constant use of Carla doesn’t make it very hard to connect the dots between him and CHERRY. He’s also always with Kojiro in the evenings, so if you don’t recognize him as CHERRY when he’s on his own, you certainly will when you see him interacting with Kojiro/JOE.

Next to these two, Hiromi seems the more adamant at separating his Work from Play.

Even when he’s been clearly found it, he still tries to deny that he and SHADOW are the same person. Miya even uses this to coerce Hiromi into helping him and the boys:

I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that the separation between Hiromi and SHADOW can be interpreted as a metaphor for being in The Closet. As SHADOW, he leads a secret life, one characterized by an tight-knit underground community with a vibrant night scene, where he behaves in ways typically frowned upon by larger society. He worries about being found out and judged by the people close to him.

But in Ep 4, the walls of his Closet begins to come down, or in this case is literally imposed upon by other members of his community, by its younger members, who don’t feel the same need to hide their passion for skateboarding or lead the same kind of double life.

We then see the line between Hiromi and SHADOW begin to blur.

He becomes less of an antagonist, and instead the audience sees him become a mentor and “mother hen” figure for the younger skaters. Later on in Ep 4, we see him casually interacting with the other protags in full SHADOW mode, not as an “anti-hero” but as a friend. In Ep 6, he acts as a babysitter for the kids, and we see him totally comfortable appearing both in an out of his SHADOW persona throughout their vacation.

And I think that this gradual convergence of Hiromi and SHADOW will culminate in this tournament arc.

There’s something more personal that’s driving SHADOW to do well in this tournament. It’s not just for bragging rights or his pride as a skater, but the results of this tournament is going to have some kind of greater impact on Hiromi’s personal life. Personally, my theory is that Hiromi is using this tournament to prove to himself that he’s worthy enough to ask his manager out on a date.

Hiromi is no longer compartmentalizing, his two lives are overlapping and influencing each other. Recall the essay quote I cited earlier:

The closet... is the space in which queer identities build themselves up from “disused pieces” and attempt to discover the strength needed for presentation to the world... of potentiality and actualization.

This is exactly the case for Hiromi. Through skating, he is piecing together the disparate parts of him such that he can present himself to the world as a more unified and confident being.

And the show presents the very skating community that Hiromi has been working so hard to keep separated from his personal life- Reki, Langa, Miya, Kaoru, and Kojiro- as the catalyst for that becoming.

That, my dear readers, is queer coding if I ever saw it.

But there’s probably gonna be people claiming something along the lines of “But SHADOW can’t be queer rep because he’s Straight!” And I assume that’s because he shows romantic interest in his female manager.

First of all, Bisexuality. Also Ace/aro-spec people. And second of all, SHADOW is Hiromi’s drag persona.

And before anyone can say anything about how Hiromi can’t do drag because he’s straight (assumption) and cis (also an assumption) uhhhh no, fuck you.

Drag didn’t start with RuPaul’s Drag Race, that’s just how it got mainstream. And it’s also how it got so gentrified and transphobic. You heard me. But anyway.

Drag is, and has always been, first and foremost about exaggerated, and oftentimes satirical, gender presentation and performance. It’s about playing with gender norms through artistic dress and theater, not so much to do with sexuality or gender identity.

Literally, what’s the difference here?

SHADOW is a persona of exaggerated masculinity with a punk aesthetic. Regardless of his sexuality or gender identity, Hiromi’s gender performance as SHADOW is drag- that makes him queer representation, change my fucking mind.

Queerness is more than same-sex romance, and by extension, good queer representation is not limited to canonized gay ships. The very word Queer, in it’s ambiguity, is meant to encompass the richly unique experiences of everyone within the LGBTQ+ community.

In my opinion, Queer =/= Gay. I mean, they’re colloquially the same yes and even I use them interchangeably. But for the purpose of this post, they’re not the same, and that’s to argue that Hiromi/SHADOW’s lack of acknowledgement as queer rep illustrates a larger issue of exclusion within fandom.

I mean, this is something we all kinda been knew, but in the case of Sk8 specifically, there are a two main reasons why I think Hiromi is rarely acknowledged as queer rep.

1. He’s not shippable with another male character

Fandom favors mlm ships when it comes to what’s considered good queer rep. And the ultimate mark of good queer rep is explicit acts of romance or intimacy between two male characters. Unlike with any of the other characters in the show, we can’t point to Hiromi and automatically clock him as gay, especially because he expresses romantic interest in a woman.

So by default, he’s less popular, because “Ew Straight People” amirite /s.

2. He’s not attractive

This is really interesting, because like JOE, Hiromi is a beefcake.

But fans don’t thirst over him the same way they do over JOE. Granted, the show really plays up JOE’s muscles in a very strip-teasey way that literally encourages viewers to find him attractive. By contrast, Hiromi is pretty much covered head to toe and he paints his face in theatrical makeup- the point is to look scary, not attractive.

In essence, even though Hiromi engages in “queer behavior” through his SHADOW persona, his queerness isn’t palatable.

But I also think there’s some pretty insidious undercurrents of fetishization going on here, of both Asian people AND gay men. Which is... a whole other thing I really don’t have the capacity to unpack completely.

But basically, Hiromi doesn’t fit into any of the popular BL archetypes so he’s less likely to recognized as Queer. Relatedly, he’s also less often subjected to a fetishistic gaze as other characters. I mean...

So again, fans just don’t find him as appealing. Attractive characters are always more popular than ugly ones.

And I’m sure there are a lot of people who just don’t care for Hiromi’s personality, that’s fine, he does act like an asshole sometimes. But this post is meant to illustrate that queer rep takes multiple forms, and unfortunately I think a lot of media just tends to fall back on stereotypical portrayals of queer people for the sake of broader appeal. And by consequence, the fandom’s idea of what constitutes queer rep narrows to same-sex romance, usually between two cis gay men.

With the release of Ep 9, I know a lot of people queer people are going to find representation in the Kojiro’s whole “unrequited love” thing. But personally, I feel more represented by Hiromi, his journey of self-acceptance and subversive relationship with gender- that’s what resonates with me as a trans person.

And I think it’s important to see that kind of less palatable type of queer representation more acknowledged in fandom, and in Sk8′s fandom especially, because I know the demographics of this fandom lean heavily queer.

But that’s all for now, lemme know what you guys think :)

#if there are typos forgive me i'm tired #i've been sitting on this take for a number of weeks now #i rlly hope i'm big braining rn #and not just like #yelling into a void #i love hiromi #yall Sleeping on my mans #hav u seen his leather clad ass???#bodacious #sk8 #sk8 the infinity #sk8 theory #sk8 meta #sk8 spoilers #sk8 shadow

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bigbrotherlouis · 4 years

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i’m obsessed with joel farabee and morgan frost and you should be too: a primer

hello! welcome! recently i have become infatuated with morgan frost and joel farabee for a lot of reasons but mostly because of that one post that i spent like twenty minutes searching various blogs for that said “people are freaking out about sexualising hockey players, meanwhile joel farabee is one instagram comment away from telling morgan frost he’d suck him dry.” in my head rent free. hit a girl up if you have the post.

anyway! frosty and beezy:

[hard cut to me whispering “oh my god even their nUMBERS are friends” i’m fine.]

this is more like about vibes and less about facts, so you can google if you want to know more about their, like, bios and stats and stuff that’s not 99% rpf or conjecture. this primer is just the things that make me scream. however, that being said, they do play well on a line together and both are very good players.

joel farabee is american, from new york i believe but his dad is from philly, and falls neatly into the category of BORN TO BE A FLYER. longtime fan, hugely excited to play for the team, brings it up all the time.

morgan frost, from ontario canada, was not.

a real, actual tweet. he tweeted this with his WHOLE chest and then joined the flyers like three years later. i adore it. another real actual tweet i adore:

sweet, sweet joel. he misses his buddies :( no doubt including morgan because they are, by all appearances, obsessed with each other. i’m trying not to keep using the word obsessed in this primer but it’s hard because they are. morgan’s a year older, a first round draft pick in 2017 and joel’s a first round pick in 2018, but they didn’t start playing together until 2019, i believe, because joel played for a college team in boston. side note: he also captained team usa and wore a number 28 in honour of claude giroux and i am absolutely not okay about it.

e! mo! tion! al! incidentally, frosty wears danny briere’s number when he plays for the flyers, which. take from that what you will. iykyk. their NUMBERS are FRIENDS. HERITAGE SOULMATES. joel’s been called up to play on the flyers (and did really well in the playoffs!) but we’re still waitin’ for morgan to come along too but the coaching staff hasn’t recognised the raw power of true love yet so.

at this point, you’re probably saying “sasha shut up about their fucking numbers and talk about why they’re obsessed with each other” but good news! i do not need to do that because the official flyers media has done that for me! (x) i’d recommend watching it because it’s a lot packed into a neat 100 seconds, but notable moments include the voice over saying “joel farabee and morgan frost have found that going at it together has its benefits” within the first thirty seconds. that is a real direct quote. i can’t believe it either. there’s also a lot of light homoerotic bonding over playing chel, them sitting across from each other on their beds, the admission of being ROOMMATES (oh my god they were roommates), this shot of them sitting with their mouths wide open on either side of their dad,

and also joel wearing a hat with a canadian maple leaf on it, despite being from the the united states. wonder where he got that from. please watch the video.

when they’re not playing chel or, you know, going at it together, they’re being horny in each other’s instagram comments. there’s honestly.... so many of these that i can include but we’re just gonna go with my favourites.

when i say i think about this comment on a picture of morgan with isaac ratcliffe, a fellow flyers prospect on a daily basis, i mean it. i’ll be just doing my thing, minding my own business, and MORGAN MAKES ME VENMO HIM JUST TO TALK will pop into my head, completely uninvited. king shit for morgan to do and king shit for joel to admit on social media for the world to see, but joel admitting things he maybe shouldn’t is a running theme.

cool. TOTALLY not flirting or anything.

joel. also both their exhibitionist streaks should be explored in fic more i am JUST sayin.

ok but bee you were lookin. like you can chirp but you were lookin, don’t lie.

when ur in love with ur roommate but ur both hockey players so u can only communicate that love via chirping when he’s with the boys :(

what’s it called when you vibe really well with someone and also live with them and also comment on their shirtlessness and also maybe kiss them on the mouth a little? d... da... dating?? can’t be it.

morgan is a little more composed in the comments and mostly just posts inside jokes i cannot comprehend, or compliments. it’s still cute.

this was on a playoffs pic where joel’s wearing #28 love 2 see it love a supportive boyf always

this one was of joel with a fish he caught and i’m sorry but i did not want it on my phone.

but morgan can’t hide his affection for long. (me, in the distance: TWENTY EIGHT TWENTY EIGHT TWENTY EIGHT!!!!!!!)

there’s more comments but they’re boring and this is long, mostly joel chirping morgan for wearing baseball or football stuff. however! they are also on twitter where they keep each other humble after incredible goals, like bros do,

this is DEFINITELY flirting. like, blatant. it’s like that kind of flirting when you’re thirteen and you don’t know what to do with your body so you just kinda steal your crush’s stuff or insult them because all attention is good attention, right??

but when push comes to shove, beezy is always gonna look out for his boy (because they are in love):

some important pictures of them together, for your pleasure:

this is so DUMB and i love it

friends supporting friends!!!

this is them meeting their hockey dads :) so cute :) joel is promising g that he’ll have morgan back by ten yessir he will be respectful of boundaries and curfew. jake is high fiving morgan on getting some. this is facts i just call em like i see em.

and finally!

is this allowed????? is this allowed???? it’s hard to tell but i’m pretty sure that’s joel on his knees for in front of morgan and i just??? how is that allowed???? it’s been five days and this picture has RUINED me. someone write me an essay to have on my desk by morning, stat.

also v unrelated but here is a video of morgan frost reading, proving he’s the smart one in the relationship. that’s not saying much but, hey! at least there’s proof he can read.

obviously different ships capture people in different ways but there’s something about them to me, personally, that is just so captivating. there’s a lot of potential for different fic vibes, and joel in particular always has a really fun voice to read (and also to write). they definitely have chemistry, they’re pitted against each other so there’s a good-natured rivalry going on, CLOTHES SHARING AND HERITAGE SOULMATE NUMBERS, and, like, they just genuinely seem to enjoy each other. someone PLEASE write more fic for them or by god i’ll have to do it myself.

ok that’s everything for now, i believe. they’re in love and don’t care who knows it and i’m obsessed. (however, i’m also obsessed with joel farabee and andrei svechnikov together, for which i have a one-picture argument for here.)

(p.s. anything not linked i screenshotted myself thank youuu for reading have a good day and remember: morgan makes joel vemno him just to talk 😌)

edit: hello. i wrote this on election night as a way to take off the edge of my nerves and it is not as funny or screechy as i wanted it to be so i’m going to add some now.

#this is a mess but idec #joel farabee #morgan frost #flyers #hockey #hockey bros #farabeefrost #frostbee #idk which one #:)#i should be writing #long post #masterpost #primer #i blame meghan and la entirely

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notallthosewho-wanderarelost · 3 years

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Since it’s Tuesday and we get Loki 1x05 tomorrow and then I’m seeing Black Widow the day after, and I guess I’m doing these now, some thoughts on Loki 1x04.

Hopefully this will be a shorter post due to me not knowing wtf is going on. This show is so chaotic and it’s perfect but that makes trying to predict it impossible. How VERY LOKI OF IT.

NOPE, NOPE THIS IS NOT A SHORTER POST, I have no idea what is going on plot wise but this episode gave me a lot of character stuff to talk about apparently.

Alright, let me get the big one out of the way. I’ve already said this in various places, mostly tags, but if I’m gonna make this post it’s gotta be here. I’m uncomfortable with Loki/Sylvie being romantic. Would prefer for Marvel to stay away from selfcest. PLEASE. I’m kind of hoping and wondering if it’s a fakeout for a reveal that Loki has finally learned to love or at least accept himself through his care of and admiration for Sylvie, which would be VERY Agent of Asgard-esque and I can see it being very probable.

I think giving Loki a love interest of any kind was always going to be difficult to pull off, but especially Loki as he is at the point in time when the show finds him- fresh off his attempted takeover of Earth and probably still deeply reeling from the revelation of his adoption and also likely mentally affected by any torture and/or mental manipulation Thanos might have done on him. Loki’s self-loathing is probably still close to an all-time high here and he’s questioning who he even is. I’m not saying that you have to love yourself before you can love someone else- I don’t think that at all; in fact I think loving someone else would probably encourage someone to value themselves more- but Loki as he is here I think would need to work through some of his own issues before he could get involved with anyone else. I think that Loki would need to learn to love himself first, to accept that he’s worthy of love, before he could genuinely fall in love with anyone else. (Remember this, I’ll come back to it.)

I got major sibling vibes from Loki and Sylvie on Lamentis. Like I said last post, they felt like alternate universe twins to me. They’re the same person from different universe, but also very much not the same- I feel like twins is the closest description? I can admittedly be pretty awful at picking up romantic vibes when I’m not expecting them, but I did not get romance vibes at all.

I also feel kind of annoyed that we would never be having this conversation or having this as a canonical ship option if Sylvie hadn’t been female. Loki is now officially canonically bi, (which means Sylvie is too btw) but in comics Loki is both bi and also genderfluid. Lady Loki is just Loki when Loki is identifying as female. So having Loki fall in love with a female version of himself feels both unnecessarily heteronormative and kind of...awkward in terms of 616!Loki’s genderfluidity, to put it lightly. (Note: I am not genderfluid, this is just my opinion, please prioritize actual genderfluid people’s opinions on the subject over mine.)

That said, after I finished the episode I was genuinely confused if they were actually going there and had to go look up interviews to see what the Loki team was saying about it. I found this interview with head writer Michael Waldron, also featuring quotes from director Kate Herron and from Tom Hiddleston. Relevant quotes below:

“That was one of the cruxes of my pitch [for the series], that there was going to be a love story,” head writer Michael Waldron explains to Marvel.com. “We went back and forth for a little bit about, like do we really want to have this guy fall in love with another version of himself? Is that too crazy? But in a series that, to me, is ultimately about self-love, self-reflection, and forgiving yourself, it just felt right that that would be Loki's first real love story.”

Loki reassures her that while they might lose, they don’t die — they survive. He goes on to call Sylvie “amazing” for how she almost took down the TVA on her own, and it’s clear from the look on his face that even though they’ve only been together a short while, Loki’s already come to admire and respect her. As the moon literally crumbles around them, Sylvie places a hand on Loki’s arm, and that’s when it happens: A branch on the Sacred Timeline. These two Lokis are having a moment they were never supposed to have, which as Mobius puts it, is “pure chaos.”

“The look that they share, that moment, [it started as] a blossoming friendship,” continues Waldron. “Then for the first time, they both feel that twinge of, ‘Oh, could this be something more? What is this I'm feeling?’ These are two beings of pure chaos that are the same person falling in love with one another. That's a straight-up and down branch, and exactly the sort of thing that would terrify the TVA.”

...

“Who’s a better match for Loki than himself?” director Kate Herron chimes in. “The whole show is about identity. It's about him, and he is on a very different path, and he is on a different journey. He sees things in Sylvie that he is like, ‘Oh, I've been there. I know what you feel.’ But she's like, ‘Well, I don't feel that way.’ And I think that was the kind of fun thing about it. She is him, but she's not him. They've had such different life experiences. So just from an identity perspective, it was interesting to dig into that.”

“When Loki meets Sylvie, he's inspired solely by curiosity,” reveals Hiddleston. “He wants to talk to her and understand her and try to discern what was similar about their experiences, and what was different. He keeps asking her questions because he wants to see if his experience was also her experience. I think he realizes, and she realizes, that while they're the same, they're not the same.”

Aside from the parts where Michael Waldron says “...have this guy fall in love with another version of himself...” and “the same person falling in with another version of one another,” everything they talk about in this article could be read as Loki and Sylvie caring for each other in a way that’s not necessarily romantic. Waldron even says that the series is specifically about self-love and forgiving yourself.

(Coming back to the thing from earlier about Loki needing to love himself now.) The way I’d read Loki and Sylvie’s relationship, especially from Loki’s side since we know more of his history, is that this is the first time that either of them actually cares about themselves. Because of their trust in and their love for each other, they’re each able to see themselves as a person worthy of love. I think that’s what the Nexus Event was. I think that’s why Loki and Sylvie’s moment of connection destabilized the timeline. Because Loki’s self-loathing is a deep root of his villainy, and the sacred timeline needs Loki to be a villain, two versions of Loki feeling self-worth, at the same time and place, created a HUGE nexus event. Loki even says it himself in the first episode: he doesn’t enjoy hurting people, he does it because (he feels) he has to, in a desperate play for control. He lashes out and hurts people because he thinks it’s the only way for him to have some control over things.

What Loki starts to speak to Sylvie at the end, he says, “This is new for me,” and references the nexus event on Lamentis. We never get to hear what it is that’s new for him. The episode sets it up to make us think that Loki’s about to tell Sylvie that he’s in love with her. But I think (or hope) that he was about to say something more along the lines of how the time he spent getting to know Sylvie on Lamentis helped him learn to care about himself and see his own self worth. That’s certainly a new feeling for him, since Loki seems to have always been an outsider and been looked down upon. And actually saying out loud that he’s starting to gain a sense of self worth would definitely be new for him. Loki knows that he and Sylvie will figure this out because he’s figured out the nexus event on Lamentis- that when they accept themselves and their own self worth, they can do pretty much anything.

I think it’s also worth mentioning that we never actually hear from Loki himself that he’s in love with Sylvie. We only hear it from Mobius, who’s feeling pretty betrayed by Loki and uses the entire concept to write Loki off as a huge narcissist. That way, he won’t feel as bad about Loki betraying him, or about sticking Loki in a time loop jail. Not that Loki would be the type to shout any romantic feelings to the world, especially in this situation, but the way he kept denying it didn’t seem like it was something he had to lie about.

This episode also called Loki a narcissist a lot; I assume to set up the “reveal” of his feelings for Sylvie and explain why he would fall in love with an alternate version of himself. But while Loki is many things and sure has a lot of issues, I do NOT think narcissism is one of them. When the time loops really start to get to him, he says to Sif: “I crave attention, because I’m a narcissist. And I suppose it’s because I’m scared of being alone.” But that second sentence completely contradicts the whole idea of narcissism! According to a quick google, the definition of “narcissist” is “a person who has an excessive interest in or admiration of themselves.” But Loki is the exact opposite. He has such a low opinion of himself that he acts out to get attention, because he’s so used to being overshadowed, overlooked and alone that he’s afraid that if he doesn’t do things for attention then nobody will give him any. He can be arrogant, yes, but even a lot of that stems from well-earned confidence. Loki is very talented magically and is used to being the smartest person in the room. He knows what he’s good at. But he sure isn’t attention-seeking just for its own sake. Any narcissism he’s displayed, he’s done since becoming a “villain” in Thor, and it’s actually been a mask to cover up his massive inferiority complex.

I also think it’s definitely worth mentioning that when Loki calls himself a narcissist, he’s repeating what Mobius said to him earlier. Loki clearly does care about Mobius and his opinion of him and feels bad about how things have fallen out with him. He’s also been through the time loop dozens of times now, and there’s a reason the TVA picked that memory. Because what Sif says to Loki really reflects his deepest fear. He doesn’t want to be alone, but he has such little love for himself that he might very well think he deserves to be. Loki’s emotionally exhausted at that point and just wants things to stop.

Okay. I think that covered most of my character analysis of the episode. I have some theories about Sylvie and the Time Keepers/TVA, etc, but they won’t be anywhere near as long as THAT^ was.

To start at the beginning of the episode: Sylvie’s backstory is SO SAD. I want to hug her. She spent almost her entire life on the run, growing up and living in apocalypses so the TVA wouldn’t catch her again. She didn’t deserve any of that and I’m so upset on her behalf.

Especially because as I said in another post, I think that the reason Sylvie got taken by the TVA was because she was never going to be a villain. Sylvie was kind and wanted to be heroic in the clip we see of her as a child, and she knew she was adopted. She was never going to be the Loki the TVA needed her to be for the Sacred Timeline because nothing would have ever pushed her to do what our Loki did.

The scene with Sylvie and B-15 was so good. Sylvie was kind to B-15, because her natural instinct is to be kind, and I have so many feelings about that. I love Sylvie. And then B-15 coming to the rescue to uncollar Sylvie and Loki and give Sylvie her sword was EPIC. She’s so cool.

Small aside, I got emotional seeing Asgard again in Sylvie’s flashback. I miss Asgard. :(

Also, if a kid can escape the TVA just by biting the agent holding her, the TVA have really got to step up their game. That’s kind of pathetic. Good for Sylvie though, that was very clever of her. The most juvenile yet effective tactic.

The Time Keepers being fake robots was an excellent twist, and one that I kind of saw coming as soon as they didn’t show Ravonna’s conversation with them earlier in the episode. It immediately made me feel like there were no Time Keepers at all. (And I was wondering if the no-robots rule from episode 1 would be plot relevant! I wonder if it has anything to do with the Time Keepers actually being robots?) It was also really clear that Ravonna was lying about what happened to C-20. As of now I think that Ravonna might actually be the real power behind the TVA. Or possibly a designated lieutenant to the real power behind the TVA:

When I was looking up interviews about Loki/Sylvie in this episode, I stumbled across an article about Ravonna’s comic counterpart and started kicking myself so hard for not recognizing her. In comics, Ravonna Renslayer is Kang the Conqueror’s wife. (Now, in my defense, my previous exposure to Ravonna was in Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, in which she spends most of her screentime in a coma.) For anyone who doesn’t know, Kang the Conqueror is a time traveling classic Avengers villain. His whole thing is that he time travels, and wants to take over all of time. So it’s possible that Ravonna runs the TVA to benefit Kang somehow (maybe because Kang needs a certain sequence of events to assure a future victory over the Avengers?) or even does it on his orders. Kang the Conqueror is also set to be in Antman and the Wasp: Quantumania. (Aka Antman 3.)

(I don’t know if it’s relevant, but Kang the Conqueror also happens to be the reason the Young Avengers form. The very first member, Iron Lad aka Nate Richards, is a teenage Kang who meets his future self and decides he doesn’t want to be evil, so he travels back in time to get the help of Kang’s nemeses, the Avengers. However, he lands when the Avengers have disbanded and winds up putting together a team of Avengers-affiliated teenagers instead. The team gets bigger over time and a later version of it notably includes Kid Loki. I’m not going to go off on a Young Avengers tangent here but I LOVE the Young Avengers, please read Young Avengers volume 1 by Allan Heinberg and Jim Cheung and all of its associated tie-ins. It’s fantastic. Unfortunately Kid Loki is only in volume 2, which gets a very solid “no thank you” from me but ymmv. Imo if you want Loki, read Agent of Asgard instead; I keep bringing it up for a reason and that’s because it’s amazing. Kid Loki is also in Journey into Mystery prior to his appearance in Young Avengers, and I haven’t read that yet but it looks very good.)

I’m VERY curious as to what the deal is behind the TVA. This could go a lot of different ways but they all seem exciting.

This show is definitely gearing up for a finale in which the TVA no longer exists or at least no longer decides everyone’s fates, which is exactly what I predicted back in episode 1.

Final thoughts on the episode: I was just wondering after Mobius was pruned if maybe the pruning sticks are actually teleporters of some kind, instead of time tasers, and then we got THAT CREDITS SCENE. I am so confused but also VERY EXCITED. I almost screamed when I saw Kid Loki. MY CHILD. I just had this thought but oh, I would kill for a Thori reference. Best murder dog. Classic Loki’s costume looks so terrible, it’s absolutely on purpose, and I love it.

THIS SHOW HAD BETTER END WITH MOBIUS GETTING A JETSKI. AND BOTH SYLVIE AND LOKI HAPPY.

I’ve been wondering since the show was announced if this show would somehow end with a version of the comics Kid Loki + AoA Loki storyline, where this Loki gets reborn into the main MCU as Kid/Teen Loki so he can join the Young Avengers, and I still don’t know how I feel about that, but with how things are going I can still see it happening.

LET EVERYONE WE LOVE BE HAPPY AT THE END MARVEL.

#long post #loki spoilers #loki 1x04 #loki series #a rare text post appears #loki #sylvie #mobius #tva #ravonna renslayer #kang the conqueror #meta #my stuff

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kinetic-elaboration · 3 years

Text

September 17: 3x07 Day of the Dove

I am incredibly discombobulated today—usual weekend nocturnal shenanigans I guess! Anyway it’s somehow midnight. Gonna try to write up these note on the Classic episode The Day of the Dove in as efficient a manner as possible.

Hmm, a planet with wavy pink Fraggle plants. I like it already.

But where is Spock? Very suspicious.

I really appreciate Kirk giving a little speech to set up the overall question/issue for us. (I know he does this all the time with the Captain’s logs but this is out loud and so… more obviously expository.)

Oh no, it’s our old friends…the Klingons.

I will admit that this ONE TIME, the Klingon is being reasonable. Like, it is reasonable to think that Kirk and the Enterprise attacked his ship, given that his hip WAS attacked, and who else would it be?

Three years of peace between the Klingons and the Federation? That is inclusive of the show so all this tension must technically be “peace” and also implies there was something more like a direct war going on, like, right before Kirk got the captaincy.

Zoolander voice: What is this, a colony of the INVISIBLE?

“We have no devil. But we understand the habits of yours.”

No takers? No takers on the torture? No volunteers to be mercilessly tortured by the Klingons?

Star Trek Beyond could have had Kirk and Chekov bond over being brothers! I mean, to other people.

They’ll kill 100 hostages at the first sign of treachery. He does know there are only 400-some people on the ship right? Maybe you should pace yourself, Kang.

Kirk’s so badass he needs MULTIPLE guns trained on him just to use the phone.

Oh-ho secret message to Spock. Which version of the iPhone will be capable of doing THAT?

The Klingons are “suspended in transit” is an awfully nice way of saying they’re just dematerialized atoms in space. Philosophy major and/or Bones nightmare fuel.

How did Kang not see this coming, by the way? Like, he just says “I’m taking your ship now, me and my 6 men versus your 400-some men, and I’ll do this by simply declaring it to be so. Now let’s beam up to your ship, where I’ll be greatly outnumbered, and there are armed security guards all around me.” Guess he’s been reading The Secret!

WIFE AND SCIENCE OFFICER

Aka the most important part of this whole episode.

Kirk’s face is very ?????? You can have both????

It’s legitimately not even important for her to be the science officer tbqh. Like that is so gratuitous. That’s just in there to drive me insane.

"We're prisoners, somehow, after I demanded to come on the ship, assuming they'd just give it to me without any kind of fight. How DID this happen?”

Federation death camps lol—someone’s been watching Fox News.

I do kind of wonder… is this an actual rumor that goes around the Klingon homeworld or is it something that the alien entity put in her head specifically to make her angrier right now? I mean it really could be either.

I also appreciate this episode for being pretty much the only one to actually attempt to give the Klingons a reason for being as they are. The Romulans… maybe aren’t well-described, but they do have a sort of regalness to them, appropriate for being related to Vulcans, and you can kind of imagine that they are the way they are because they’re Vulcans without the intense self-control. Plus they’re literally only in 2 TOS eps and in the second, the Federation are the aggressors. But the Klingons show up a half-dozen times only to be depicted each time as just like Cartoonishly Bad, aggressive, violent, and selfish for basically no reason. And I mean, some people really are!! But TOS has so much nuance in other places, that it always seemed a little disappointing to me that the Klingons are really just like ‘well we’re just bad and we hate everyone and we really like killing I guess.” At least in this ep there’s a little more added to that: that there is poverty on their world, that they feel aggrieved, that they feel unprotected, that taking and conquering is how they look after themselves…

I think that’s later in the episode though.

He’s detaining them in the LOUNGE lol. With their favorite dishes available to them to eat. Absolutely barbarous conditions.

I can’t believe Chekov is hanging in the elevator with the cool kids. Like, one of these things really isn’t like the others.

Kang is officially sure of himself for someone currently imprisoned in the lounge, that most fearsome of Federation death camps.

Hmm, could the glittery light alien have taken over??

You know what, that's a lot of tasks for Johnson to do all by himself: search the whole ship, fix the engines, and free 400 people.

Sulu would love this: everyone gets a sword!!

“Bridge. I gotta show this to Sulu immediately.”

Klingons have maintained a dueling tradition. That’s interesting. Finally some characterization going on.

Spock is really living up to his logical nature today. Everyone else has gone off the emotional deep end and he’s like “have you considered this completely rational explanation that accounts for the actual, observed facts??”

Whoops Chekov is actually an only child. Scratch that previous Beyond headcanon. (Interesting that his dead brother does really resemble Sam though—killed on a research colony??)

Love that Sulu knows that about him though.

Oh, that’s a pretty schematic picture of the Enterprise. I want that on a t-shirt.

Lol the pan out to the armory, now filled with… swords!!

Do ALL of these men have a fetish for swords? Sulu and fencing, Spock displaying swords in his quarters, and Kirk in his San Francisco apartment, and Scotty salivating over this Scottish blade.

“Klingon units.”

Finally Sulu gets his sword! It’s what he deserves.

Love that the shiny light alien also has a fetish for swords.

Oh no, it’s our old adversary, an alien life force.

What is the alien’s purpose? Um, I’m pretty sure its purpose is to start shit.

“An appropriate choice of terms, Captain.” I don’t even remember what this is referring to but I think it’s pretty clear that Spock is enjoying himself during a crisis again.

Bones, being so dramatic. Were there atrocities? He’s talking about the Klingons as if they were literally hacking off limbs—it’s a few stab wounds here and there, chill.

Oooh, time to behave like military men—strong words. (But I thought it wasn’t the military?? @ S**** P****) (This might not even be my best argument, given the context of this episode, but I’m sticking with it.)

This is like a giant game of capture the flag.

AU that’s just about the Enterprise crew playing capture the flag with the Klingons.

Sulu in the background standing guard with his sword

Damn, turning on Spock with the slurs now!!

Spock was absolutely ready to kill him. Like he would 100% have taken him out with a blow to the head. And he’d been doing such a good job of not feeling the alien’s effects so far! Admittedly, that was a strong provocation though.

Honestly, I really like this scene. It’s uncomfortable and tense and you can really see how the alien is bringing out the worst possible influences of their respective races. And I liked how Spock was definitely full on pre-Reform Vulcan for a minute there. It was a more effective portrayal of what that might have looked like than All Our Yesterdays tbqh.

A result of… stress?

Kirk got himself out of it first. He’s so strong. He knows himself so well, he cannot be outsmarted by any alien.

“We’ve been taught to think in terms other than war.”

“The alien brings out the worst of us—patriotic drumbeating…even race hatred.”

He’s so sad; he can’t imagine thinking like that about Spock :(

Sulu in a Jeffries tube! A man of many talents. It’s okay bb, take credit for turning on the lights.

The alien must have been getting bored. The Klingons must have been doing too well, and the playing field needs to be leveled for maximum shit-stirring.

“Let’s find that alien.” That’s how I ALWAYS feel.

Oh, Kang, you’re so close—“What power supports our battle but thwarts our victory.” So, so close to getting it.

ALIEN DETECTED.

Spock takes his sword, of course.

“Jim.” Obligatory Jim moments hit differently when they’re not so obligatory.

“Jim—stop hitting my protégé. And put that sword down.”

Kirk looks so sad, picking Chekov up to carry him bridal style.

Also in addition to ‘race hatred’ I think we need to add ‘rape-y tendances’ to the bad stuff that the alien is inspiring here.

“A brief surge of racial bigotry. Most distasteful.” Spock winning for understatement of the year.

They're assuming the alien is trying to test out their relative powers but I think it just wants entertainment. I mean, doesn’t it look like a naughty little thing?

Mara’s outfit is… little shorts? Interesting. Usually not my style but she makes it work.

Spock doesn’t even look at Johnson as he falls lol. Another one bites the dust.

“It exists on the hate of others.”

What does this remind me of? Oh, the Vast of Night and the whole “aliens made us do every bad thing ever” conspiracy theory. At least this one makes more sense, in part because it is not quite so overwhelmingly broad!

All hostile attitudes must be eliminated, he says, and there's Mara right behind Kirk giving him a death stare lol.

Kang is so obviously posing. Google Earth, always taking pictures.

Only a few minutes before drifting forever in space becomes inevitable? Good thing Kirk works well under pressure.

“Well… do whatever you can, Scotty. You know the drill.” Doesn’t even bother giving real directions anymore. We’ve been in this scenario before.

“So we drift in space, with only hatred and bloodshed aboard.”

And the 392 people below just get to…live in Enterprise prison, I guess.

Star date: Armageddon. So dramatic!

I’m not even making that up; that’s an actual quote. Can you imagine being an Admiral listening to this?

“Stop the war now.” An actual line, really aired on television.

Spock wants to threaten the wife lol. That's the old pre-Reform Vulcan seeping through. Surak who?

Damn, Kang is cold. “Eh, she gets the concept of being killed in battle.” They’re gonna need marriage counseling after this.

“There is another way. Mutual trust and help.” Yes that’s my hero!!

“No one can guarantee the actions of another.” Can’t remember the context of this entirely anymore, but great line.

The entity is loving this—multi-person choreographed sword fight!!

"Those who hate and fight must stop themselves. otherwise it is not stopped.” Another baller line. Spock has a lot of deep thoughts today. And so does Kirk. And Kang.

Kirk tries to reason with the alien. Nice try.

“Shoo. Shoo, alien. Off the ship, go away.”

Omg that last moment—Kang slapping Kirk’s back way too hard, Spock’s completely ridiculous wide-eyed expression when he does, like some sort of combo of amusement and confusion, and then Sulu just passing on by in the background….

Then the alien just yeets itself into space. And that’s the end!

Always feels weird when there’s no wrap up on the bridge.

Also, what are they going to do with the Klingons? They have no ship. They really did come out of this a lot worse than Kirk and co. No ship, huge casualties—and no one to blame even, but the alien.

I feel like the alien messed up a little in killing so many Klingons. Like, it could have accomplished its purpose, angering the Klingons and turning them on Kirk, by attacking the ship a little less violently—you know they’d react to 5 deaths pretty much the same as 400, and then there would be many more people to fight forever and produce that sweet sweet anger!

Maybe the alien’s powers aren’t strong enough to influence 800 people though. Also it wants equal forces and 800 people wouldn’t fit on the Enterprise, one assumes. So it still makes sense.

That was, of course, an excellent episode. 100% agree with is classic status, even though the main things I remembered going in were the wife + science officer bit, and everyone laughing at the end in a really forced, fake way, in order to make the alien go away.

I thought the Klingons were a lot better/more interesting today than usual. First, I think Kang is a better character, or a better actor maybe, than the others; he has a certain way about him that is… more watchable, more sympathetic. And he’s always saying these really dramatic things that make it seem likely he writes patriotic Klingon war poetry in his off time. Also, including his wife made them seem more… not human obviously, but normal. Not just cardboard cut-out villains. And of course the actual lightly specific motivations I earlier mentioned helped too.

Also, the plotting was very good: it built up slowly but surely over time, so at first the alien’s influence wasn’t that obvious, and then it became more so, and then it became horrifically obvious and extreme. And then you had to re-evaluate earlier moments: was that the alien changing facts in their heads, or a real part of the animosity between humans and Klingons? And it wasn’t always clear, which I appreciated. The tension when the people were at their worst wasn’t overdone, like in that moment with Scotty, Spock, and Kirk—or even in Chekov’s assault on Mara, tbh. The various strategies of the different sides were very entertaining too; there was never a dull moment, and they fit in a lot of straight-up actions and twists into 50 minutes.

The possible threat was truly terrifying, also: stuck in a space ship, forever, unable to die, feeling the worst possible emotions all the time, besieged, angered, despairing, fighting a war that can’t be won, being injured and suffering only to recover and fight again, and it never stops… A perfect nightmare mixture of insanity and violence and pain. And the alien, in encouraging hatred and anger, doesn’t discriminate between sides: they turn on each other just as much as on the Klingons, breeding paranoia and infighting. For eternity.

The episode also felt much more strongly anti-war than I remember tbh. Like it was not subtle. Kirk literally says “stop the war” in so many words. He has a part in his speech where he talks about the possibility of other aliens out there, encouraging other wars. And while I do think “maybe the aliens are making us do it” is a cop out explanation, or would be if it were real, the scenario gave the show a lot of room to say, like, pretty ballsy things: to include “patriotic drum beating” along with “race hatred” in a list of corrupting feelings they were experiencing; to show how the same instincts that lead to warring also lead to sexual assault and the aforementioned ‘race hatred;” to reveal the true horror of an endless war by making the participants unkillable and sticking them in a singular space ship in the middle of nowhere; to imply that the combatants of war gain nothing from it, but outside or third-party entities will pull strings of their own design to profit from the conflict as long as possible; even to make an impassioned plea to camera to stop the endlessness of the conflict. Like I can’t even totally unpack this but it is a lot!

Finally, it was also a great Kirk episode, which of course is my most important factor. He’s smart; he’s strong; he’s so sure of himself and his values that he cannot be manipulated to mindless hatred, he represents the values of the Federation, and the show itself; he treats even his enemies with basic respect and humanity; and ultimately, he saves the day.

Okay I was not efficient in writing this up at all! It is very late!!

#the year 2021 #2021: star trek #2021: fandom thoughts #star trek tos

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twilightofthe · 4 years

Note

So...about that Obitine Anidala rant. Also, you said something about how Sidious and Obi-Wan are foils. I would love it if you elaborate. (Also, I love your blog.)

Awwwww thank you anon! I just be yelling on here!

*wheezes* okie doke! Tho I stress that this won’t exactly be a rant because I adore Obitine and Anidala and rant kinda implies aggression towards them, this is more of just a long-ass ramble because while I love them, I don’t always love the way canon portrays them in the narrative, particularly in relationship to each other, because I often do not feel that what the show is trying to push us to think about them is accurate to how they actually act and come across. Notably, the show attempts to draw comparisons to the two relationships that really don’t exist below surface level similarities. Again, these are my own personal opinions, and in fact, I welcome discussion! I truly do! Please politely debate me on this if you disagree!

(god dammit it got long again, so long I’ll actually put ur Sidious and Obi Wan as foils part in a separate post)

I’ll get to why exactly the show compares the relationships very strangely in a moment, but first we gotta explore the reason why it does this in the first place, which is that the Clone Wars show has decided to make Obi Wan and Anakin narrative foils to one another. Narrative foils, by the literary definition, are two characters that contrast one another. They don’t have to be the protagonist and the antagonist, these characters can be on the same side, basically the thing is that they have “opposite” personalities where if one character is hot, the other is cold, if one character chooses to go right, the other will go left. It’s usually used to show one character’s qualities as more favorable for the situation as opposed to anyone else’s.

TCW does this whenever they possibly can with Anakin and Obi Wan. I get its reasoning behind it. I do. The reasoning is that while Anakin is supposed to be a main character, he makes questionable decisions quite often and for the kiddies watching, those decisions must be seen as Bad even if the hero does it, so they have Obi Wan, the unquestionable good guy, encounter the exact same scenarios Anakin makes his questionable decisions in, and then has Obi Wan make the Right(TM) decision to teach the kids a valuable lesson. They turn Obi Wan into the voice of reason for the entire show, which turns basically almost everything Obi Wan and Anakin do into a constant competition in the narrative in a way the movies do not do (and I’ll get to the movies later). I’m not saying it’s necessarily a bad thing, making them foils, but it’s definitely more of a show-only thing and it does it quite, quite often.

So yeah, TCW likes to compare Obi Wan and Anakin to the point that sometimes they try and use Obi Wan to diminish Anakin’s genuine trauma and struggles by going “well why didn’t you do it like THIS?” and I think that writing parallel plotlines for the purpose of shaming/criticism is kinda ://////, but that’s another rant for another day that again, if y’all wanna hear about, lmk

Anyway, the need to compare them absolutely made its way into their romantic relationships as well, as they acknowledge the similarities in the show, and Filoni and the crew explicitly compare the two relationships in interviews.

Basically my problem with how they try and draw said parallels can be boiled down to one quote by Filoni that a cursory Google search could not find but I know exists so y’all can take my word or not, that went along the lines of “Obi Wan and Satine are like Anakin and Padmé but better because they know how to stay unattached and let each other go. They’re a success story.” I disagreed with this quote so much it inspired me to write a whole-ass fic about it (Mutuals update: yes, it is coming soon, Darth Maul is just himself and therefore an utter pain in the ass to do a POV on and is fighting me like the bitchass he is)

My thesis that I will be arguing today is that while TCW tried to create Obitine as an Anidala parallel, they’re really not similar in the way the writers think they are. Obitine is not a success story to Anidala, they’re a goddamn tragedy too; the real parallel to Anidala is that Obitine also ended in death and tears despite making all the “right” decisions instead of all the “wrong” ones, and that is what is sad about them.

Like, on the surface level? Yeah, the crew-intended parallels are there. A fancy politician and a Jedi get together after the Jedi is assigned as the politician’s bodyguard. The first time they see each other in over a decade the guy’s first words are basically “damn girl you’re still hot”, there is Conflict(TM) and the choice to try and be together or stay yearningly apart because they are Forbidden(TM) to be together, and ultimately a Sith Lord fucks them both over because he’s obsessed with the Jedi and uses Politician Lady to his advantage, finds and exploits a vulnerability of hers, destroys her life’s work, and then lets her die to make Jedi Man sad. The difference is all that one pair said “yeah we aren’t gonna break the rules to be together” and the other said “fuck it yeah we are, let’s do this”

But beneath all of that, they real similarities are different and not at all focused on by the narrative. Obi Wan and Anakin are extremely different people, as are Padmé and Satine, so their relationship dynamics together will not be the same. You want to try and compare Obi Wan and Anakin and then compare Satine and Padmé like the crew attempts to, and you can’t, they have the same job but not nearly the same life. Namely, the funny coincidence is that Obi Wan and Padmé are much more similar in personality, while Anakin and Satine are also much more similar in personality, so the first time they meet again, it’s both Anakin and Satine as the one who’s been pining for over a decade and the one more actively pursuing the relationship, while Obi Wan and Padmé who are more like “uh, hi, wow, you’re hot and this is a Problem because I have a job to do pls don’t look at me like that but also I will Cause Problems On Purpose and flirt with you anyway because I can’t help it”. I get the Corruption TCW ep with Sati and Pads was mostly intended just to help Satine pass the Bechdel test and also show how similar the two leading lady love interests are, but it was a genuinely creative episode that actually ended up showing how much Satine and Padmé compliment each other instead of mirroring each other, much like Obi Wan and Anakin do.

And, onto my next point, despite the character parallels being wrong, the parallels in the relationship are different too. Like I said, the parallel isn’t that Obi Wan and Satine aren’t attached like Anakin and Padmé are. The parallel is that Obitine is actively running from what that attachment means instead of embracing it like Anidala is. The show would argue that since they try to avoid it, that they are able to live without one another, means they aren’t attached like the Jedi define it, but I argue that they definitely still are attached to a degree because they cannot give each other up. They held torches for each other from a timerange of 15 YEARS. Yes I know they spent an entire year together at a young and emotionally volatile point in their lives, but I stand that NO ONE is that hung up on their ex for that long unless there is some serious emotions involved. Anakin was hung up on Padmé for ten years, and that was because Palpatine was constantly bolstering those affections and reminding him of Padmé. Obes and Sati both-- or at least Satine, the show always makes Obi Wan’s feelings for Satine in return much more vague --held on to their feelings for five years longer without the influence of a Sith Lord.

And the thing is, they know it. Obi Wan and Satine are both fully aware that they haven’t been able to shake each other off like they should and that that is a Problem, that’s why they’re both a mite venomous with each other beneath the flirting at first, they’re both extremely frustrated with themselves for not being able to get over this thing they have, and frustrated with the other for being there as an active temptation.

And yet, they still are attached to each other. They try to avoid it, they definitely try, and that’s what makes them different from Anidala, but they are definitely still attached. You can see it in Obi Wan’s actions in Voyage of Temptation when Merrik is threatening to blow the ship, the way he hesitates in attacking him because that would be “striking an unarmed man”. Obi Wan Kenobi does not prefer violence, no, but he has never hesitated to cut a bitch before if it’s for the good of the many. This is the man who stabbed someone with a fork and threatened to eat him just to maintain his cover as a dangerous criminal. This is the guy who had no problem killing Zam Wessel for information to protect Padmé. This is a pragmatist who prefers peaceful solutions, but he does not hesitate if he feels it is a justified offense. But this time, when an entire shipful of people is at risk, Obi Wan hesitates. Because he doesn’t want to upset Satine. Because he’s probably thinking on how she told him that if he had killed the last terrorist they encountered, she wouldn’t speak to him, how she had criticized every time he used violence to escape Death Watch before. He hesitates because he’s putting her happiness, just for a second, over the sake of duty. Do I think that if Anakin hadn’t shown up to save their moral compasses, Obi Wan would have eventually taken out Merrik? Absolutely; hell, I honestly think Satine might have done it.

But the matter was, Merrik could have pressed the kill switch any second of Obi Wan’s hesitation, and Obi Wan knew that, and was hesitating anyway.

I am calling this attachment solely because if the situation was reversed, if this was Anakin and Padmé in this situation, with Anakin not taking out a dangerous criminal because he doesn’t want to upset Padmé (lol ignoring the fact that Pads 1000% would have shot that bitch, and even if she didn’t, Anakin would because he is perfectly fine with hurting his loved ones’ feelings if he feels it’ll keep them safe), god, the narrative would have eaten Anakin alive.

No, I won’t take criticism. I know how the show handles the Anidala dynamic. It would have shown Obi Wan popping up to take out the baddie as him doing the right thing and saving the day, and then Anakin would have been shamed for letting his feelings for his wife get in the way of protecting a shipful of people. THAT would be the Vader foreshadowing, none of this “only a cold-blooded killer” shit, no way would they ever stick that label on Obi Wan.

So yeah, I’m going off of the fact that if that would have been classified as attachment for Anidala-- which, it would, then. it counts for Obitine.

And then Obi Wan and Satine continue to be hung up on each other for the rest of the eps they’re in, Satine saying in words multiple times how much she loves and cares about him and wishes things could be different, and Obi Wan performing it in actions, risking his own neck and political standing to help her even when she’s a fugitive, probably personally putting in to send his own grandpadawan to help her later. Right up to the time when Satine decides that she is going to call Obi Wan when she is deposed. Not the Senate. Not any powerful politician friends. Not even the Jedi Order or the Council as a whole. She calls and addresses her distress call to Obi Wan alone. And Obi Wan, as now revealed to us by TCW S7, defies Council orders and breaks a century old neutrality treaty to try and bust her, a convicted murderer in the eyes of the Republic and Mandalore, out. He didn’t even know Maul had her. Just knew she was in danger and came running to her aid. He risks starting a potential war to come save her. They acted so in love that Vizsla was able to guess from being around them for like five seconds, and was able to tell Maul exactly who he would need to bait Obi Wan.

That is where the attachment comes from. It’s the fact that Obi Wan and Satine tried so, so hard to give each other up and do the right thing, but when it came down to it, they couldn’t lose the other one so they put them first when logically they shouldn’t. And thus, Satine ended up dead.

Now I know most people will argue with me that actually Filoni means that since they didn’t stay together after the year on the run, THAT is what makes them able to give each other up, and also the fact that Obi Wan didn’t go dark side and murder everyone when Satine died.

But I still think that at least the murder front is a fairly low bar to cross, and anyway, that just because they could live without each other didn’t mean they weren’t still attached. Anakin and Padmé were apart for 10 years and then even after that, they were apart almost constantly during the war. Just because they could live apart or even past the other’s death didn’t mean they weren’t attached, as they both still had not let the other go mentally and also broke rules to try and ensure the other would not die, even if the rules said they should let it happen.

So yeah, that’s my big theory. We can’t compare Obitine with Anidala by saying Obitine was a success story, we compare them by acknowledging that both struggled with attachments and letting the other go, but Obitine at least tried to the bitter end to do the right thing while Anidala didn’t really bother, and both ended up with dead women and broken men regardless, and that is the true sad parallel to me.

#ohhhhh my god i really gotta learn how to shut up lol #thanks anon! told ya it was long!#ask #asks #when we were young #star-crossed lovers #our only ho #peace out #one (1) hot mess #queen of my heart #anon

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mc-slowwalker · 3 years

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shipping to australia is a nightmare. anytime I go to do any online shopping I’m instantly stopped by the thought of shipping. hahahahahahaha at least that’d be a funny way to go out tho

yeah true!! every time I’m watching a vod I’ll get so startled cause they always pop up when you’re least expecting them too. I’ve only got my prime sub and I haven’t tested it but I have a feeling that twitch would still give you ads. they seem like the type

so true I’m not paying hundreds of dollars for textbooks I’m barely gonna use for half a year. oof that sucks. if I didn’t google my way through those exams I guarantee I would have failed though😅😅 then one subject that was ungoogleable, I did fail. god now I feel bad about how terrible a student I am

it’s so nice to see dream being on streams and having fun and interacting with other people !! it sucks cause I would absolutely LOVE to see dream on ppsat but I hate the idea of toxic people that would find reasons to shit on them :// like with gartic phone the other day. I felt like so toxic when the twitter updates account tweeted that dream was there cause I knew the “twitter stans” were coming. and I don’t even have a terribly negative view of stans as a whole. and then turns out it was justified and then I felt even worse. the gumi stuff pissed me off too. feeling a bit bad for dream tho. mans can’t even play with his friends without them getting attacked. I clicked on the links in your subtitle/heading/whatever it’s called when I first followed you like 6 or so months ago. was pretty funny

damnnn you’re doing all of those?? that’s tough. I dropped language (french) in yr 10 and decided to never touch maths again after I finished highschool and I loweky like maths too. oh I will 100% be telling people to touch grass that is so funny. I also can’t say anything about the nerd thing cause I just fully had the thought “what if I write an essay on the internet and it’s effect on language development”

Yes!! please tales!! where is it!! my weekly dose of happiness. I remember the last tales stream I watched like it was yesterday😪 I miss the ____ my beloved gifs that would be everywhere everytime a new character was introduced. I may have very little clue about any of the in between/the other side lore but damn were the builds insanely good. I was watching tubbo’s stream too and he said there wasn’t anything to do on the dream smp and like true ig but🥲🥲 he also said he’s been thinking about lore on twitter tho!!! so there is that !! hmm yeah I do wonder what they’re waiting for actually cause it’s been genuinely so long that c!dream’s been in the prison for. I wanna why it’s so important cause cc!dream and cc!sam put a lot of emphasis on it. and I just really really want to see what c!dream will be like out of the prison. for so many reasons

oh nooo ripppp. that’s kinda funny tho. the video was so short that was funny too. sapnap and george 2000iq moment nice. it was a nice vid tho, chill and enjoyable. so much dream content recently I feel like he’s about to drop off the face of the earth or miraculously stream something (highly unlikely but I can hope)

When streamers runs ads you gey a warning! But when vods do it it’s just a hey haha fuck you! You’re 100% right about twitch jeff bezo wouldn’t let any thing go to waste. He’s not the ceo right now but I hate him anyways. I’ve never actually used prime sub because I don’t have amazon prime, but I’ve been gifted subs a couple of times which was neat!

You know I may not be the best student but as someone who has cried a lot because of school I think it’s morally correct to be a bad student Cheat!! You’re paying then money they owe your ass so fucking much!! Abuse their resources stick it to the man. No time in life for guilt especially considering that universities are just corporations anyways they made hide behind the guise of learning but I’m calling them out no way knowledge gotta cost this much

I also love seeing dream stream with his other friends! To badly quote scott smajor, the dream team is made up of anti social sweaty fucks (affectionate). He’s always so awkward at first and ngl? Huge confidence booster /j/j. Logically I understand that twitter update accounts are useful, but I think they should all collectively take a break for a minute. Would it change anything? No. But it would make a lot of people very unhappy. I don’t even know what to do about toxic twitter stans because like, content creators and us can call them out and not at all condone their actions but we can’f actually do anything about it? It’s super frustrating. And I feel like a hypocrite too because if dream does stuff with a cc I hate I bitch about it too I just don’t have as far a reach. Like I for sure threw a whole fit when dream went on to kaceytron’s stream. Actually I tend to get upset when he goes onto streams with people who actively hate him. So I struggle with that because despite feeling like I’m justified in doing that, twitter stans feel justified in their stuff too. You could argue that it’s different because the chance that the ccs will see it is near 0 but it’s still the same behavior isn’t it? For sure not saying twitter stans are right, they piss me off how dare they say shit about gumi, but also I worry that I act similar you know?

I’m glad is was amusing I haven’t gotten any angry anons so I can never tell if the links are working or not

Listen listen it’s less that I chose this and more that they’re requirements. Spanish is a req, but I’ve always really liked spanish? I’ve found with learning languages I have to be interested in the lanrguage’s history/culture. So french makes me mad but spanish makes me feel cozy and I like it! I pick up spanish pretty fast too and I’d like to be actually fluent in it some day. Language as a whole is super interesting. Also the internet has made language even more interesting with widespread similarities and what not

Listen I would agree more with tubbo but instead Imm going to lighheartedly call him a coward who’s afraid of surprise lore! He said he would be there more often if other people logged on more often but I know for a fact other people feel the same and by him not regularly logging on he’s adding to it! I think foolish, ponk, puffy, and bbh have really upped my standards for lore. They log on at least once a week and make their own plot. Like bro if you’re bored start some shit tommy style! Personally I would make enemies with all the beets people. Tubbo has such cool lore I just wish he was willing to be a little more spontaneous. He was tired last night though so I can see his boredom beinf effected by that. I really really enjoyed bear smp those guys were so fucking funny and I will be watching more of them. Need to catch up on hermitcraft too

Who’s to say he can’t drop off the face of the planet and stream? He can multitask. Also hems been big on reddit recently so we’ll see where that leads ajddj

#anon #ask #long post

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morganas-pendragons · 4 years

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Best Carol/Melissa Episodes

So I got bored in Quarantine and I was so moved by Look At The Flowers that I decided to make this list of the best episodes that either feature Carol/Melissa as a lead or she plays a large part in them. I haven’t seen S1-2 since like... 2014 as they’re my least favorite (i know i’m sorry but i did include honorable mentions) but I’m so freaking proud that I couldn’t not make this list. Here we go! Feel free to add to them! ** means they’re my favorite performances of Melissa! I do mention some scenes that are also with Norman/Daryl as he is a LARGE part of who Carol is. If you think it’s ‘’shippy’’ which it might be, don't read it. I worked on this for almost two hours.

season 1

- for real, what woman keeps a grenade on hand? That was it. That was where I started paying attention to her.

- also, the scene where she digs the pickaxe into Ed’s head? I think Daryl and I both fell for her then.

season 2

- the honorable mention!! the barn scene in which carol learns the fate of her daughter. I don’t remember most of s2, but this one I do. I think this might’ve been the first point in the show where I was like, “Hey Google, how to protect someone who isn’t real.’’

season 3

- walk with me: We get to see how Carol has changed during her time on the road after the farm and how much she’s learned. This is also, unfortunately, the last time we see her for a couple episodes until Daryl finds her in the cells below.

- hounded: daryl finds carol. It’s sweet, it’s warm and soft and there’s alot of reunions and alot of mourning over T-Dog and Lori.

season 4

- Carol has become a leader in her own right for this season. She teaches the kids how to defend themselves during the ruse of a story time and takes on Lizzie and Mika as her own after Ryan is bit.

- indifference: After killing Karen and David to stop the spread out a virus, Rick takes it into his own hands to banish Carol. This one hurts too because it’s quite obvious why she did it. She did it to protect herself and the people she loves, but sometimes that’s just not enough.

- the grove: emmy emmy emmy emmy material. Holy crap, I CANNOT stress this enough! This is the make or break episode for Carol as a character. There’s beauty and devastation and anguish all wrapped up into 45 minutes. This should’ve made Melissa well known. This should’ve won her multiple awards, and it didn’t. But we know. We know.

season 5

- sanctuary: this one goes down in history for multiple reasons, and most of us know them. 1.) Caryl reunions galore. Even if you don’t ship it, that moment is so, so sweet. 2.) If it weren’t for Carol, your fave would be dead. That’s literally it.

- consumed: OOF. Really.

- The back half of season 5 after the arrival at Alexandria is hilarious to me. Because these people are so sheltered from the darkness and the cruelty of the outside world that Carol takes on their own persona to blend in with them, to know the naivety of these people and to hide easily among them to get what she needs. This is also how she befriends Sam, who probably reminds her of Sophia which is why she’s so cruel to him.

season 6

- jss**: ‘’Miss Peletier, you are an honest to goodness hero.” No. Freaking. Way. I remember watching this episode and rocking back and forth on my heels in anticipation because up until this point, I think this might’ve been one of the bloodiest moments in the show - and right in the center of it all is Carol - who is now of the mindset that, ‘’hey, we need to kill, we don’t have a choice.’’ and she portrays the internal struggle behind all of this so, so well. The scene with Melissa holding the body on the stairs was what won me over for this episode. It’s very much a merciless 45 minutes.

- no way out: Carol is not a lead in this episode, but Melissa is very heavily influenced between this one and the previous because of her confrontation with Morgan. I remember how angry that made me, having to watch him bodyslam her (a former domestic abuse victim) against the floor. Outside of Carol, this episode is one of my favorites in the show.

- not tomorrow yet/the same boat**: Carol moreso plays a bigger part in the latter as opposed to the former, but these two episodes really showcase two things: Her heart to protect her family (IE: A now pregnant Maggie) and her deteriorating mental state. Outside of The Grove, I think this is one of Melissa’s most powerful performances. it’s also the only female led ep in the show

- east**: I cried the first time I watched this. Carol vs The Saviors, #2. This episode breaks between Morgan and Rick going out to look for her (HENCE ONE OF MY ALL TIME FAVORITE QUOTES ABOUT CAROL: “That woman, she’s a force of nature.) I don’t think I really understood the power behind the eyes in the midst of television until I saw this episode. I can’t find the gif, but I’m sure most of you who’re reading this know what I’m talking about.

- last day on earth**: again this episode shifts between perspectives as TF is trying to get Maggie to Hilltop for her pregnancy complication, but Melissa is stellar here. Carol doesn’t want to love because if she loves, she has to kill, and she attempts to manipulate one of the survivors from the massacre into doing what she can’t: taking her own life. She just wants to go, and Morgan won’t let her. This one is a bit darker, and the episode as a whole is not my favorite, but it’s definitely up there in my favorite performances for Melissa.

season 7

- the well: if there was ever an episode that would show you that Melissa aces comedy, it was this one. This is meant to be an introductory to The Kingdom, but the hilarity behind the way Carol talks to Ezekiel is so entertaining. It’s kind of hard to believe she ends up marrying the man (we’re not going into shipper discourse here, friends) but this one also shows you something through Carol’s eyes: The differences between people and walkers and her desire not to kill. She wants to hide, and she does.

- new best friends: Daryl lies to Carol about what happened in the clearing with Negan. This one is so so heartfelt. It’s deeply intimate. It showcases two people who’d move heaven and earth to ensure the safety of the other, both physical and mental and emotional. Norman and Melissa aced this. I can’t say it more simply then that.

- bury me here**: I love love love love love this episode. The entire thing is a metaphor, but I love it anyway. If I remember right, this is also the one where Morgan tells Carol about Glenn and Abraham. Remember what I said about the power behind a look? This is another instance in which Melissa shows she is the master of this.

- carol spends alot of the time at the kingdom for the rest of the season and i cannot really remember any more memorable performances for this garbage, as they took my fave and reduced her to a side character for this and most of s8.

season 8

- the only performance i will give any credit to in this season is 8x04, which is Some Guy. I barely remember the rest of it. Minus the moment where she finally saves a kid - Henry - instead of losing one. And a heartbreaking moment between her and Morgan that I also barely remember. Case in point, S8 was and still is garbage.

season 9

- 9x01-9x05 all have Carol in them because whenever Angela Kang took over the show, she had the brilliant idea to actually use her lead women as leads. Season 9 feels like an eternity ago and I can’t remember if she took over before or after AL signed off, but my point remains. Between Carol’s loyalty to Ezekiel because of Henry, (who she has now taken as her son), and their marriage, and her short stint as the leader of the Sanctuary as Negan is in confinement, there’s something in Carol here we haven’t seen in years. It’s something akin to peace, or as close as she’s gonna get to it. 9x03 and 9x04 (particularly the conversation b/t Rick and Carol) are my favorite of this cluster for her.

- I almost dropped off after 9x05. I thought that was it, I thought that was gonna be where I ended. Nope. This woman - AK- took this show and made it what it had been and I’ll never be able to thank her enough for it.

- Who Are You Now: I only remember this one because of the scene where Carol and Henry are in the carriage - side note: I really need to go back and rewatch this season again - but one of the things that caught my attention about the after of the bridge was how the relationships b/t parent and child are approached as significant. They’re not the future. The adults are building for the future of the kids. Michonne/Judith, Ezekiel/Henry and Carol/Henry. It’s sweet. Very sweet.

- Stradivarius: this is a very Caryl heavy episode, but we find out something here: Even with being married to Ezekiel, Carol has still gone out to see Daryl where he resides by the same river that took Rick. Henry sees the relationship between him and his mother. It’s as obvious as the nose on your face. This one is just adorable. I love it.

- The Calm Before**: Ow. OW OW OW OW OW. You want more pain? Here you go! Carol faces the dark truth as she crests the hill that holds her worst nightmare: Henry has died. She’s lost another kid. You wanna restrain yourself from breaking through the TV to comfort Carol for the umpteenth time as she breaks? Cool. That’s what you get here.

- The Storm**: Split apart by the death of Henry, Carol and Ezekiel no longer remain married. She gives up that fairytale - one of the happiest she’d ever had - and begins wallowing in her suffering over the loss of her son. Heartbreak and grief do not come easily to her. They never have. Can you imagine being suffocated by things you’ve never talked about? Can you imagine having to live every day with your grief? Well, look here... that’s exactly what Carol does, and you want to know who her guiding force is?

It’s Daryl.

season 10

- I remember when Season 10 aired, I watched the first episode in Kenya and loved it. I’d heard something about how PTSD was a BIG factor in the progression of the story throughout this season, and as someone who wants to go into mental health counseling, I was so intrigued by this that every single episode kept my eyes glued to the TV. Carol is the lead female now besides Michonne, but I’m gonna tell you every single favorite episode of mine anyway.

- Ghosts: Carol makes a mistake and fires at Alpha when they meet her at the border. She wears a mask that’s so composed it’s almost hard to see the heartbreak beneath it, and that’s the point. She’s not considering her life. She’s considering vengeance for the life that was taken. This is a constant circle for her. Alot of people are tired of this arc and I get it, I do. But the difference between this one and the three seasons previous is that we’re meant to get to a resolution now. This episode broke my heart. Especially the last scene in the gym.

- Bonds: Another Caryl heavy episode. I love this one. It’s very lighthearted compared to the rest of the season.

- Open Your Eyes**: This one is utterly terrifying and eerily reminiscent of the one in S2 where Daryl interrogates Randall. Carol, having just brought back a Whisperer from her escapade with Daryl, interrogates him to find out the location of Alpha’s horde without any real consideration for the people around her. She also uses Lydia for her own personal gain, and I’m not gonna lie - Even though this one is one of my favorites because of Avi Nash (WHO WAS SUCH A GOOD ADDITION TO THE SHOW I LOVED HIM AS SIDDIQ) This episode made me so angry because of Carol’s motives.

- The World Before**: And when I said I was angry, this episode turned it all into heartbreak. This one remains one of my favorite of the show and of Carol for one very specific reason: The scene in the woods between her and Daryl.

As someone who has never done grieving well, this scene hit me so. hard. She’s so set on this path of vengeance and blood that she’s neglecting a very real truth that she has never done well: talking about her burdens, talking about the pain and if she does that, if she acknowledges it, then she will hurt.

- Squeeze: I don’t have to talk about this. I just have to show you.

Ow. Please, please let her heal. I’m so tired of seeing her hurt.

- 10x11 and 10x12 don’t really have Carol, and neither does 10x13, but she’s there. We see her a couple of times, we have a conversation or two. Let me get to the penultimate moment. One we’ve waited for years to see and which next week will give us the rest of.

- LOOK AT THE FLOWERS*****: You can be a Carol fan for five minutes or five years and still somehow managed to love her MORE after watching this one. There’s a couple reasons why this one is probably in my top 3 for both Melissa and Carol as a whole.

1. I have waited years to see Negan meet Carol. JDM has made it very clear how he feels about MMB and I knew, I knew, that once this interaction happened I would not be disappointed. I should’ve realized she was the one who let Negan out, but I didn’t. That entire first scene is gold.

2. This entire episode is just.. art. The fact that Carol’s darker side takes the form of the being of her hatred - Alpha - is fitting, and it’s also the first time we’ve really gotten an actual dialogue about multiple things that have formed her character for the last several seasons: The Grove, the loss of Sophia, Ed... It’s heartbreaking to see because she keeps telling herself pushing people away is better, it’s better to be alone because there’s no one to burden, and the darker side of her asks a very simple question: What do you want?

Her answer is clear, at least to her. I want to be alone. But the fact that the darker part of her, the one that keeps calling out on Connie, doesn’t agree. No. There’s something deeper. Something she’s too afraid to acknowledge.

3. That whole final scene. Wow. I’ve watched it like four times because Samantha Morton is just so good as Alpha, as Carol’s dark counterpart, trying to mock and taunt her into doing the one thing she never was able to do herself: Dying. This episode is dark because of this realization. “Look at the flowers’’ is akin to ‘’It’ll all be over soon.” but instead of choosing death, instead of choosing the one thing that would let it be over, she chooses life. She essentially chooses to fight for herself which she has not done in YEARS. The minute she acknowledges that it’s never too late (FOR WHAT?? HM??) the demons disappear. I think that this point into 10x15 will give us two things that every Carol fan is desperate for: Healing for Carol (FINALLY!), and a resolution to this endless arc of suffering.

Also... Why do we think that Daryl is the one who ends up welcoming her home? Why is he the one who opens the gate?

Long story short: I love this character. I love Melissa McBride as she is one of the most down-to-earth, humble and compassionate actresses in Hollywood. It’s a shame she’s not gonna be recognized by The Academy because if ever there was an actor/actress on this show to win, it’d be her.

#Carol Peletier #Melissa McBride #The Walking Dead #TWD #twd spoilers #messing up my own tagging system just to prove my point

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justkindaoverhereobsessing · 4 years

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okay hear me out - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19 and twenty. for the ask thingy, please ma'am

Gonna go ahead and tag @wanna-be-bold here because your ask clearly had some overlap with Sofia’s mega-ask. XD

1. who is the hardest character for you to write? Anyone outside of my normal ships, lol. I’m pretty comfortable with Tiva but you throw Vance (and his toothpick) in there? I’m gonna struggle.

2. who is the easiest character for you to write? Ziva, I think, or an original character I wrote years ago. Characters I really feel like I understand!

3. How do you know if your writing is “in character”? I don’t, lmao. I just write what feels right and then hope for the best!

4. Where do your story ideas come from? YOU SOF. And sometimes other places too, lol. But seriously, a lot of my ideas are sparked from the fics of other writers! I love a good “what if” that stems from a different “what if”.

5. Do you tell the people in your life that you write fics? Lmao. Well you know my mom read WAAO so you really think I keep any secrets after that? Everyone in my life knows what I love and I don’t hesitate to talk their ears off about it all!

6. What has been the hardest fic for you to write? We Are an Ocean, definitely. There’s so much more range to it than anything else I’ve ever written, so I’ve had to figure out how to shift gears from smut to fluff to plot to angst and back again!

7. What fic of yours makes you the most emotional? The Place Where the Light Enters, a very old collab I never finished, lmao. That story saw me through some tough times and we put our characters through some REAL TOUGH times, too! Actually, one of my tattoos relates back to it, lol. “I picked up a pen; I wrote my own deliverance.”

8. What is a scene you wrote that you are most proud of? Gotta be some scene from That We May Forgive, but I’m not sure which one. I just know that’s the fic I’m most proud of!

9. Is there one character that you refuse to write? why? Ehhhhhh not really. But there are definitely characters I don’t enjoy writing. Jenny Shepard, lookin’ at you!

10. When you write fics, how much of canon are you willing to ignore/skip over? Lmao. Depends on the day, my mood, and the fic in question. I love AUs so really I’m willing to throw everything out the window. Suck it, canon writers. You don’t own me.

11. Do you prefer to be cold or hot when you write? COLD COLD COLD COLD COLD. I’m allergic to the cold but I would love to be cold for my whole life, so long as I have a decent supply of quilts and hot tea. I can’t focus when it’s too hot... living in Ghana was a STRUGGLE.

12. What is your ideal writing area? I usually write in bed, laptop in my lap and my back leaning on a pillow propped against the wall. It’s not ideal but I don’t have a desk so it’s become MY “ideal”.

13. How do you come up with your titles? I have zero creativity in my body so I’ll decide on a theme and then google quotes for that theme. For example, for a fic I referenced earlier, the theme was healing. I found the quote “The wound is the place where the Light enters you.” (Rumi) The fic then became titled as a shortened version of that quote, The Place Where the Light Enters.

14. How do you come up with chapter titles? I never title my chapters, lol.

15. At what point in writing a fic, do you decide to quit? I... okay, I can’t truthfully say what I was about to say. I WANTED to say “I don’t quit fics” but I have definitely abandoned a few in my day. (Haven’t done that for years, though.) Unless this question really means when I decide a fic is finished and ready to be published, in which case my answer is that I throw a dart at my nonexistent plotting paper and end the fic wherever it lands. I’m terrible at ending things, lol.

16. How much of your personal life do you put into fics? Oof. Enough to be offended by this question, lmao. I sometimes use events from my personal life to inspire or plot fics, but more often, I explore my own confused emotions by making characters feel similar ones and writing it out.

17. What is the most supportive comment you have gotten? Definitely something from you, @indestinatus, the queen of fic comments (and also the queen of fics, shush). But I’ve gotten some really really nice ones from strangers, too, especially on ff.net.

18. What is the most negative comment you have gotten? Well this is embarrassing to admit. My first ever fic when I was... eh, ten years old? I tried to post it on Mugglenet, the only fanfic site I’ve ever been on that needed fics to be approved. My fic was rejected and the mod who rejected it said my main character was a Mary Sue. I’ve never recovered.

19. How do you handle negative comments? I genuinely don’t get them often, so I’m not sure how to answer. People are usually really really nice.

20. What story that you have written makes you the happiest to re-read? That We May Forgive! I poured my heart and soul into it.

#sofia i love you #my typing hands will never recover from the 17 hours of work they put into answering this ask #but it's fine cause i love #YOU #thank you for asking! <3 #lmao you're just always getting ever-deeper looks into my soul aren't ya

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troped-fanfic-challenge · 4 years

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Who will be on the CHOPPING BLOCK!?

Fifteen fics were written following a Theme of [Angst], including the Tropes [Stranger to Lovers] and [Road Trip AU], and with a Character focus on [Harper McIntyre]! Voting determined the 8 who would continue in this competition…

We had fifteen (15) INCREDIBLE fics this round, but, unfortunately, not everyone can move on to the next round. In this round, eight (8) authors are on the CHOPPING BLOCK! Thank you so much to all the authors who participated, and, to the authors who were Chopped, we hope you’ll consider joining future Chopped events, and we are so happy you decided to be a part of Chopped Madness!

Our reviews for these fics can be found under the cut!

The eight authors who have been Chopped are:

Author 1: @iexasheart : You can bloom again [Harper x Clarke] [Rated T]

Qualifying Round Fic: don’t be who you were

Author 2: @shen-gong-oops - Never Gonna Give You Up [Harper x Raven] [Rated T]

Qualifying Round Fic: The Sixth Bride

Author 3: @justwalkedaway: Take back my life (Prove I'm alright) [Harper x Monty] [Rated T]

Qualifying Round Fic: Where is the path to Wonderland?

Author 4: @mobi-on-a-mission - The Hardest Thing [Harper x Emori] [Rated T]

Qualifying Round Fic: 2199 Nights

Author 5: @kuklash: I Need You (Like I Need a Gaping Head Wound) [Harper x Echo] [Rated T] **graphic depictions of violence, major character death**

Qualifying Round Fic: There's Gonna Be a Party When the Wolf Comes Home

Author 6: @hopskipaway - i wanna shoot the whole day down [Harper x Monty] [Rated T] **major character death**

Qualifying Round Fic: i've got a heart in me (i swear)

Author 7: @vmreed: What the Hell is a Pulmonary Embolism? [Harper & Murphy/Clarke] [Rated T

Qualifying Round Fic: How to Kill a Two-Headed Turkey

Author 8: @pawprinterfanfic

Qualifying Round Fic: Simmer Simmer Simmer

—-

Now that you have been Chopped, all the fics you’ve written in Chopped Madness have been revealed and you can post about your fics! Don’t forget to tag us so we can share!

But don’t be discouraged if you were Chopped this round (or unable to participate)! We’ve created a non-anon collection, where you can submit your fics if you would like to write for other rounds, keep pace with the writing period, etc, in a non-competive way! That’s where you’ll find us!!!! We’d love to read your fics and will gladly share them on our tumblr! The non-anon collection can be found here! To submit your fic to the collection, simply enter ‘chopped_non_anonymous’ as the name of the collection when uploading your fic!!!

Non-Anon AO3 Collection Link: https://archiveofourown.org/collections/Chopped_Non_Anonymous

To all the remaining Chopped Madness Authors, we hope you’re excited for ROUND 2, which starts TONIGHT, 12:00am (EST) March 26th!! Please be sure to check our google doc for theme and trope explanations! Good luck!

@iexasheart Mods’ Review

The concept of this story, with Harper having Nightblood on the Ark and no one knowing or even understanding it, is so cool. It plays such a relevant part to really drive the whole story. Harper and Clarke are such a good ship, they’re a perfect match, like it's shown through the fic, they’re both survivors, they both can push through and make it through anything. This pairing added a nice layer to the story! Harper being kidnapped and held hostage for months was super dark, and very angsty! “She catches bits and pieces of conversations, when she can, and learns that they’re keeping her there just in case she is a Commander. Through her tears, she screams at them that she’s not, that she doesn’t know what this means, but they don’t ever listen.” This was such a good scene, we were genuinely terrified for Harper and so concerned about her. We loved this as a rationale, and that it makes it worse for Harper because she isn’t and doesn’t understand, it was a really nice touch to add an extra layer of angst! We also really loved the catharsis of the moment when Harper finally gets free. Harper getting to express her pure fury and rage was a nice character moment, a chance to let her feel her pain out loud. “She hasn’t moved from that spot, but for the first time in years, Harper takes a deep breath in and feels a fleeting sense of freedom” this quote really captured that moment so well! It was a nice touch to let Harper learn that being a nightblood kept her alive, giving her a chance to see that the thing that caused her so much pain and misery was also what kept her alive, letting her appreciate something unique and special about her! Them digging up Polis together was such a cool scene. It added an extra layer to the scene we saw in canon, and it also gave a little extra mystery (to Harper at least) when Clarke found Lexa’s throne! And the ending, such a nice way to relieve the angst of the story. Them being happy in Eden felt like a natural and easy conclusion to a story where the characters didn’t get much ‘easy’.

@shen-gong-oops Mods’ Review

This fic was ANGSTY. Best friends who were never allowed to hug or touch? Who had to go on a roadtrip in seperate cars just to be able to share an adventure? So good! And Raven being introduced as the surrogate Monty chose was a great way to incorporate the strangers to lovers trope! Also, so cute, that it was so clearly a set up. The fact that they had been planning this trip since they were kids makes the angst hit even harder, the idea that they’ve spent years wanting to get to be normal kids and be together, but they never could. There were a lot of great character moments, but some of our favorites were Raven ironing, and Harper getting to express her anger. Raven ironing felt super in character, a way to maintain order and structure in the chaos, a nice way to show that she likes to be in control of her life, and a nice way to show how much its hurting her that she might not be in control after her accident. Harper getting to express her anger and frustration with the world and its unfairness was very sincere and felt very earned for her character, and it was a nice way to show how Harper was really feeling about the hand she’d been dealt! As soon as you mentioned Raven being an organ donor, we KNEW you were going to have her get hurt, and we were already upset about it, but the scene was so well done. It was angsty and sad, and scary, but by adding that cheesy rom-com joke about Harper having Raven’s heart, you were able to add a little levity and a breath of air to the scene in a way that was super natural and so well timed!

@justwalkedaway Mods’ Review

First off, Monty and Harper feeling like strangers in their own marriage, and coming to realise they loved each other in a different way than they did 10 years ago was such an angsty and super creative way to incorporate the ‘strangers to lovers’ trope! This fic was so angsty, and painful to read! Little things like Monty forgetting their anniversary, and Harper being aware that Monty was attracted to Miller even though they were drifting apart were really great ways to establish where they stood in their relationship! We really enjoyed the ending, with them getting a chance to talk to one another and realise they were on the same page about their feelings, and then letting them start to forge a new path forward. We especially liked the line “They would never have to be strangers again, that their love as friends would help them grow together. Everything was going to be okay.” The paragraph at the end, where you really explained that the connection between them was so good, and allowed for a slight tint of hopefulness for their future while maintaining the angst at a 10!

@mobi-on-a-mission Mods’ Review

This fic used the combination of the character, theme, and tropes so well! Emori x Harper is such a unique pairing, and it definitely works great! The set up of the Mountain Men killing all of Skaikru is really eerie and angsty, it adds a really unsettling air to the fic where you feel like both of them are unsafe at every turn! “I’m an invader too” the idea that Emori is an invader because she was left out to die, and they see her as a stain, an unwelcome piece of their community is so good, this was a really nice character moment! Harper copying Lincoln’s map, and wanting to carry on with their plan to go to the see was a great way to tie canon back in and set up the ‘road trip’ they were going to go on! Emori teaching Harper the same way she taught Murphy was also a really fun addition! Harper waking up screaming from her nightmares to marry an angst plot and a romance plot together, letting them be physically comforting and hold each other through it, this was a really nice detail to incorporate! The story kept you really invested the whole time, and having Harper be kidnapped towards the middle/end of the fic was a really great way to do that. It was an opportunity to add angst and danger, but also a way to show how Emori had grown during their relationship, to not only love Harper, but to put Harper’s safety above her own. “She was always light, so light, so light… She was the sun” this quote is so lovely, and such a nice way to describe Harper!! And that final kiss? “Tears welled in her eyes and smeared against Harper’s skin as they kissed”? So angsty, so good!!

@kuklash Mods’ Review

To start off, 90’s political thriller? Corrupt government officials and spies on the run? Like…someone make this movie for us, but it has to be Chelsey Reist and Tasya Teles as the stars! On to the actual fic though, a kidnapping and being forced to hit the road is a great way to hit all the tropes! Maintaining the kidnapping for a while helped the story feel serious, and made the stakes higher, adding a little fear and letting us know Harper wasn’t going to be safe in the story, which was a great way to add more angst! This fic had a lot of great character moments that really showed who Echo and Harper are in really great ways. “..but she has to stay strong. If she wants to survive she has to be strong”, this line is a great way to show Harper’s characteristics! We loved that Echo was her false name, but Ashe was her real name, and we loved the reveal being a soft moment of peace. It was a nice way to involve a canon element, but in a way that fit the story, because of course a spy on the run wouldn’t give her real name. It was also a nice way to show Echo slowly warming up to Harper! Echo’s death scene was SO well executed, even though we knew they weren’t safe, we were still stunned when she died! And don’t even get us started on the ending, so eerie and creepy and a great way to tie off the story with a slightly ambiguous ending!

@hopskipaway Mods’ Review

The set up for the road trip was great, a nice way to tie the angst directly into that trope, and Harper and Monty never meeting until this point was a great addition. It added the strangers to lovers part, obviously, but there's also a nice amount of angst involved in bonding over the loss of a friend. There were so many nice character beats that really showed Jasper’s bond with all of them, like when Harper knew Monty’s favorite candy just because Jasper had talked about him so much, and how Jasper thought Harper would be cute for Monty. It worked really well to establish how much they all meant to him. We loved the moment of all of them finally arriving at the bar together. It felt very much like a community of strangers who were really joining through loss. We really liked the dynamic of the entire bar scene. “I worked with him.” She wasn’t sure why when someone dies you trade around excuses and explanations of how you knew them, like it was some sort of grief currency.” This line was such a great way to express the uncomfortable feeling that situations like that can have, and it was a nice touch. The delinquents coming together after Jasper’s Death was PAINFUL, and a great way to establish a sort of Found Family dynamic in a way that definitely hit the angst mark! Definitely crying at that last bit. Also, great use of the song Jasper was singing in the Rover being on the Jukebox!!

@vmreed Mods’ Review

Harper’s outsider POV on the Strangers to Lovers Story was such a unique twist on the trope, and the use of a bus crash within the ‘road trip’ was also a really great take on that trope! This fic was a great way to showcase how the tropes we give for Chopped can be used in unexpected ways! This fic had a lot of great character moments too, like Murphy being so obviously grumpy and sullen that Harper knows not to try with the cute Tour Guide move is so good. A nice touch of characterisation that was added in a very natural and interesting way. Harper losing Carl was also a great moment for characterisation! “Carl stopped breathing, and Harper died a little bit too” this was such a sweet touch of angst, and a nice way to show that Harper’s life exists beyond this story, and that she and Carl were friends. We loved the very real action drama of the bus crash, with Harper running back in over and over to save people, the chaos and the fire, the acknowledgement that people actually died. With all those deaths, it sounded like the Road Trip from Hell, but the trio really jumped into action and it was great to see their interactions. The whole scene was an exciting and fun read!

@pawprinter Mods’ Review

The Qualifying Round was so great and your fic was a lot of fun to read! There are so many callbacks to early Bellarke and it was great to see their relationship bounce back on their journey. When Russell warns Bellamy that they can only trust each other...he can only trust Clarke, and then all he does to save her...well, let’s just say this fic gave us all the Bellarke feels!!! The idea of Sanctum beginning anew, and going back to harvest the land, is a very human thing to do on a foreign planet. “The sky glittered with stars, showing constellations he was unfamiliar with. He missed the stars from Earth more than he realized…” This line is so good. Can you imagine looking up and not recognizing any part of the night sky? This is such a cool thing to add, and we loved it! The vines are SO creepy! We loved how creepy and scary you made the Hansel & Gretel fairy tale with the vines scene. It really upped the stakes and had us on the edge of our seats. AND THE ENDING?! Bellamy frantically searching for a cure that likely doesn’t exist, only to stumble upon a mass grave from the cannibal lady in the woods?! INSANE, and SO well executed!

#chopped madness #chopped madness: round 1 #round 1: angst #chopped madness: chopping block #author reveal

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imgoingtocrash · 5 years

Note

So I just read I fell for mantle photographs and LOVE it! And want to take you up on Pepperony fic recs you offered. I’m going to go through your previously written fics and your bookmarked on AO3 but thought I would get a head start by sending you a msg.

Thank you so much for reading my fic! I’ve been ridiculously excited to share what I’ve made this week, so seeing people enjoying so far has been awesome!

Also thanks so much for reading my other fics as well! I was in the Marvel fandom back in 2012-2014, but never ended up writing any fic for it, so it’s been fun to see how the fandom’s changed. (Also, I keep a word document instead of bookmarking things a lot, for whatever reason, so they’re not super accurate. I applaud you for looking, though.)

Onto the fic recs, of which I have many! I’m going to stick to older fics here, but feel free to ask what more recent fics I’ve read, as I have some favorites there too. I’m also going to publish this ask, so that other people that were curious can read some fun Pepperony fic in honor of Pepperony Week.

lake buddies by Quillium - Rated T

A cute little pre-meeting AU, where Pepper and Tony bond over swimming together at different points in their lives as young adults. (They’ve written other good Tony/Pepper ones as well as some good IronDad fics I’ve really enjoyed!)

Drive by roboticonography - Rated M

This fic showcases a super sexy Post-IM2 Friends With Benefits situation that turns into feelings (or always was about feelings?) Anyway, this author is one where essentially anything they write is good. I read their Steve/Peggy fic Flames We Never Lit back in the day, and was ecstatic to find out they’d written great Tony/Pepper stuff too.

Palmer’s Kiss and Mnemosyne’s Lock and Winterlight by VR_Trakowski

This author is one of the best for Tony and Pepper imo, hands down. Almost all of their fic is Pre-IM2, and despite the fact that canon went totally different ways, they have these two perfectly written to how in love they are in current canon as well. Palmer’s Kiss is a perfectly tropey Fake Married!AU, Mnemosyne’s Lock is an expert example of an Amnesia!AU (one of my favorite tropes but sometimes hard to execute), and Winterlight is a sweet Christmas fic where Tony uses the holidays to woo Pepper.

Travels (series) by pukajen - Rated M-E

Tony and Pepper get away after IM1/2/Avengers 2012. While a decent amount of the content is smut, the other half also includes them going out into various cities and learning each other in different stages of their relationship, and it’s super fun.

[More under the cut, to keep the post short.]

love is like a stubborn youth by owlvsdove - Rated T

A story that follows Tony and Pepper from their first meeting to their fifteen year anniversary. They’re both stumbling through who and what they are to each other and it’s great world-building.

Ring of Fire and Stretch Out My Life And Pick The Seams Out by NyxEtoile and OlivesAwl - Both Rated M

In Ring of Fire, Tony and Pepper go on what’s supposed to be a relaxing, sexy post-IM2 vacation. It is that, and it’s also the two of them realizing they work great together when it turns into a survival situation. The more recently written Stretch Out My Life And Pick The Seams Out, is a Post-CW fic that goes into Homecoming fic. Tony comes home from the confrontation in Siberia to Pepper, who he’s also fighting with. To fix things, your boy gets some therapy and makes good on his promises to deal from his trauma, bless.

The Most Adequate Christmas Ever by igrockspock - Rated T

I actually recognized this author from work I’d read in the Veronica Mars fandom, and this Marvel fic is just as good. It shows Tony—used to Big Ass Gestures of Affection—giving Pepper a quiet, loving Christmas.

Almost No One Makes It Out by atrata - Rated T

This AU changed my life??? It’s SUCH an interesting AU that I’m recommending it even though the Tony/Pepper herein is IM1-levels of “teased but not the explicit focus of the story”. It’s a Military AU where instead of being--to quote the author--“richer than god”, Tony uses his intelligence to go into the military, and his relationships with the characters we know and love as well as his origin story change because of it.

Secret Feelings (From Childhood) by emorosadiaz - Rated T

You may have already seen this art and be aware of this fic made for Pepperony Week 2016, but if not, it’s a Friends-From-Childhood!AU Where Tony and Pepper go from best friends forever to dating, and it’s soooo funny and cute and pure.

Nutcracker by cincoflex and VR_Trakowski - Rated T

A Ballet!AU which??? normally might not be my first choice, but it’s very sweet, well written, and wonderfully holiday filled.

Black Market Baby and They Take Apart Their Nightmares by sabinelagrande - Rated E and M

This author has all of the smutty Tony/Pepper you could want, but these pieces in particular are my favorites. I haven’t read a lot of sex worker!AU or seen a lot of “sub/dom dynamic as a way to heal from PTSD” fic before, and these fics made me believe they’re actually really great concepts I’d be interested to see more of.

How Not To Be A Cliche (series) by lettered - Rated E

I’m gonna warn you right now: that rating is there for a reason. This series, within the last fic especially, became smutty in a way that was a little squick-y for me. However, if you can power through, it’s some really great Post-IM2 smut about defining boundaries and getting to know likes and dislikes as a couple. So, yanno. Read at your own risk. (Also, it has the honor of being the first fic that’s ever given me a GOOGLE SPREADSHEET mid-fic that is 100% in context and makes sense. It just wilded me out in my decade+ of reading fic.)

Succession by amonitrate - Rated E + includes a Rape/Non-Con Warning

If you didn’t watch Dollhouse, why I liked this fic might go over your head a bit (though the author does include a basic rundown). For someone like me that really loved that show, seeing it used in this fic HOW it was used was both brilliant and terrifying. They also have some other interesting Iron Man fics, both with and without Tony/Pepper.

Between the Darkness and the Stage by marinarusalka - Rated T

Back when Pepper wearing the Iron Man armor was only a dream many fans surely had, this fic was written, showing Tony being rescued from (another) kidnapping by Pepper. He’s left with some (more) PTSD, and the IronFam works through it together upon his rescue.

All My Killers in the Street by quigonejinn - Rated T

This fic and many more AUs written by this author are kinda twisted, but it’s engaging as hell every time. Like…I don’t want this universe, but I’ll give them that it’s interesting to engage with. This one in particular is where Pepper and Stane are married pre-IM1…and so she isn’t as helpful to Tony as she is in the movie. It’s Tony/Pepper, but it’s kinda one-sided due to the nature of the plot.

Velveteen Rabbit by PutItBriefly - Tony/Pepper - Rated M

IM2 AU where Tony tells Pepper that he’s dying from Palladium poisoning. Tony’s most important take away is that he loves Pepper, and defining their relationship when he’s NOT dying anymore is a whole other story.

I hope that’s enough to keep you reading for a while! I know it took me time to get through them all. (Although, there’s NEVER enough good fic for a ship you love, lbh.) Thanks so much for reading my fic! Keep enjoying Pepperony Week!

#jilycs #asks #pepperony #fic recs

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makeste · 5 years

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BnHA Chapter 227: Basically Just Me Saying “Holy Shit” a Bunch

Previously on BnHA: We went on a semi-enlightening romp into Toga’s past. Basically she was an adorable child who just so happened to have a taste for blood. And whoever’s job is was to explain to her, “hey Toga, I know you like blood, but other people like being alive, so, you know. Let’s explore some other options for you,” they basically dropped the ball there. So after she murdered her hapless Deku-looking classmate in middle school, she went on the run, and we basically know the rest. Back in the present, Toga had just been blown up from the inside out as you may recall, so she spent most of the chapter kind of out of it. At one point Kizuki even started talking about her like she was already dead, reassuring her that she’d become a martyr for the Army’s cause (which, no thanks). But then Toga managed to stumble to her feet and transform into Ochako as she tried to flee. It was revealed that while transformed, she can use the quirk of whoever she’s turned into, and she proceeded to demonstrate this by floating Kizuki (and half her redshirt goons) a hundred feet into the air before dropping her back down to the pavement. Yeah. So I’m pretty sure she’s dead now. Ah well.

Today on BnHA: Toga passes out in a shed after a job well done. We learn that the MLA is recording all of the fighting, most likely for propaganda purposes because as we have previously established they’re a bunch of dicks. Hanabata confirms that Kizuki is dead and gets the Army all fired up. They charge at Tomura, who is really fucking sleep-deprived you guys, and as he stands there blinking at them he has another flashback. Turns out the little girl from the previous flashback was his sister, and back when they were cute lil munchkins and she was still alive (sob), she showed him a picture of Nana and told him that their grandma was a hero. Tomura doesn’t remember this clearly, but he remembers the accompanying emotions, which is enough to get me hyped out of my mind fyi. Back in the present, Tomura disintegrates I’m-gonna-go-with-about-200 Army henchpeople basically instantaneously without even touching some of them, which, oh shit. And then Dabi is all “oh cool I want to do some mass murder too” but before he can let loose, some dude with fucking ice powers shows up to challenge him. I guess this means we’re never going to get Touya VS Shouto, or if we do it’s going to be very repetitive. But it’s not like I’m complaining either way. Here’s hoping the villain flashback trend continues next week because omfg.

(All comments are my unspoiled reactions from my first readthrough of this chapter like an hour ago lol. I did a quick edit for grammar and clarity, but aside from that this is as close to a live liveblog as I’m going to get. It took two-thirds of a year, but these recaps are finally caught up.)

this is so exciting guys. I mean, for me the reading process is basically the same, but the posting process is going to be a new one since I’ll be trying to get this up the same day once I’ve read it! so you can expect many exciting errors and brain farts! prepare for the full brunt of my unpolished rough draft thoughts!

so anyway, here’s Toga

lol so much to analyze here. real quick:

“sleepy.” if that isn’t the most relatable chapter title in the history of time, though

loving the “my villain academia” logo in the background! as far as I’m concerned that’s the official title of this arc

“the conclusion of the battles” y’all I read this and I was like “what?! already!?!” but then I realized they’re talking about volume 23, which features the conclusion of the joint training battle arc. so who knows how many more villain battlin’ chapters we’ve still got ahead. I have a feeling we’re already winding down, though

note how all of the stuffed animals are stabbed. ah this girl

it’s 2214, who the fuck still uses polaroid cameras. that would be like someone in our time using a [googles inventions from 200 years ago] modern suspension bridge. ...wait

anyway you guys maybe I should start reading the actual chapter already if I want any hope of actually getting this posted before fucking midnight though

oh hey, so Toga is dying in a shed you guys. fun

I’m not really thrilled about this! to be honest! I mean for fuck’s sake she’s only 17. she was blown up from the inside out. and although the consequences initially seemed to have possibly been handwaved, it appears that no one can escape BnHA’s realistic injury clause for long! so. yeah

I get why she hid, because it’s not like the others are just gonna drop everything to come help her (although Twice, though...), and there are enemies everywhere so this is probably safer. but it also means that if she passes out here there’s a good chance she’s not going to wake up again! and that is bad! that is very much not good

what she really needs to do is call Ujiko! hitch a ride out of there while you still can! he is a doctor, right? even if it is the questionable mad scientist type! worst case, you end up as a Noumu. actually, wait a sec, maybe we should think this through

and yet the fact that she’s still laughing, though. just. goddammit. I love her so much. I swear to god Toga if you fucking die...!!

so now she’s curling up in the fetal position and thinking “once again I’ve gotten closer to you”

yeah, Deku really does do this every other week. or he did for a little while at least sob

and now we are cutting to ReDestro who for some reason is monologuing about Toga!

oh right, because he had the cameras and shit set up to livestream that shit

okay but is it just me or is he not looking at any cameras. he’s just enjoying the view from his little observation tower same as before. does his quirk allow him to see everywhere at once or what

is it bad that I barely even paid attention to the actual content of his ramblings lol. it’s just the same old same old. blah blah society rejects anyone who’s different, it’s so unfair, blah blah

it’s not a bad point, mind you; it’s just that RD and his army are completely full of shit and acting like they’re so much better even though they’re just a bunch of mur-diddly-urderers. it’s like how PETA acts like they’re champions of animal rights when really they mostly just kill shelter animals, insult Steve Irwin, and claim that milk causes autism. but I digress sob

oh shit I forgot about this dude

here I was thinking there was only the one other miniboss to go before the big bad. silly me. how could I have forgotten that two page spread and our friend here with the Gorillaz mouth and the Beatles haircut

wow are you serious?

Giran sitting there with one skeptical eyebrow raised thinking about how these guys threatened to kill him in order to lure his friends out so that they could, you guessed it, kill them!

and also, way to completely disregard the dozens of other minions who already bit the dust before Kizuki. like, your entire town is basically doomed, guy. but sure let’s cry for the one dead villain who actually had a name though

holy shit you guys

are you telling me that’s why you were recording the whole thing? is that why you invited the League here in the first place?? for the fucking publicity? kill the bad guys and earn the public’s good will? did I miss that part of the planning sesh, or was this objective already painfully obvious and I somehow either missed it or forgot all about it?

either way it’s amazing how these guys become bigger assholes with each progressive chapter

oh now he’s explaining it all on the next page lol. so I guess I didn’t miss the memo, good

okay but first he’s getting real physical with my boy Giran here though

okay first of all, all he did was say “footage...?” like wth was so fucking impolite about that. and second, why do I get the feeling that there’s probably a fair percentage of people who read this chapter and got to this panel and now suddenly ship it sob

I mean, he just got so up close and personal though. all up in his face. this guy has such a weird energy and it’s really creeping me out now ngl

anyway so here we go with the explanations

holy shit you guyssssssssss

when did Giran get so fucking hot?? and is he single?! asking for a friend???!

anyway so now RD is wiping away his crocodile tears and says Giran is lacking in imagination

oh hey

what an interesting segue back to Tomura!

wow, Spinner’s asking how much longer until Big G wakes up, and Compress says one hour and twenty minutes. so that means they’ve already been at it for like an hour and fifteen minutes! minus however much time it took to warp over and then follow Back-Stab n’ Go out to the center of town for the ambush. even if that took a whole half hour they’ve still been fighting for a long time! but I guess they’re more than used to that by this point, thank you so much Ujiko and your six weeks of brutal endurance training

Spinner’s all “no matter how many we defeat, they just keep on coming!” and I know, dude, it’s almost like there’s over one hundred thousand of them or something dfskdj

although to be fair, probably not every last one of them is actually there. can you imagine. it might take a whole nother hour to beat them all

now Hanabata is driving in on the back of an election van. because apparently he just fucked right off in the middle of his fight with the League, and then came back. with a van

so he’s all “EVERYONE I HAVE SOME DEEPLY SADDENING NEWS” and oh my gosh what is it

yeah dude we already been knew. RIP and all that

so the crowd is all distressed and asking what the Supreme Leader said

really?? that’s what they call him?? yeah you guys aren’t evil at all

and Hana quotes, “‘do not let her sacrifice be in vain’“

sorry bruh. but. it’s gonna be in vain. hate to break it to you

right??

GASP

TWICE STOP BEING AWED AT HANABATA’S INFLUENTIAL AURA AND START PAYING ATTENTION TO THE DUDE WHO’S SNEAKING UP BEHIND YOU AND TRYING TO SNATCH YOUR MASK OFF

anyway so in the meantime this is happening

maybe there are 100k of them. seems like there’s a lot. I do like that from this angle it appears that Tomura and the others have holed up in a relatively narrow alley, thus creating a choke point and limiting the number of enemies who can attack them all at once. although this panel does make it look like there’s just a big ol’ wave of bad guys surfing their way towards them though, so it remains to be seen how effective this strategy will actually be lol

eh?

yeah no shit boy you’ve been fighting Daruk from BotW for the last month and a half

anyway so apparently he’s feeling ~weird~ though

I shit you not guys, my sister was hospitalized a couple months back (she’s fine now) because she started hallucinating after a three-day bout of insomnia. shit is no joke. don’t be like Tomura. go to bed and don’t stay up all night fighting villains

-- OH SHIT!?!

ASDFALSDFHLKSDHLFKJHAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

IT’S A LITTLE GIRL!! AND SHE’ S OPENING A SECRET DRAWER!!

SHE’S ALL “IT’S OUR LITTLE SECRET!” OH MY GOD

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

SWEET JESUS MARY JOSEPH!? HORIKOSHI DO YOU FUCKING READ THE THEORY POSTS ON TUMBLR JUST SO YOU CAN IMMEDIATELY SHIT ON THEM TWO DAYS AFTER?? HOW THE FUCK

AND IS NANA’S SON WEARING DEKU SHOES?? OH MY GOD PLEASE

AND THIS MEANS THE LITTLE GIRL IS ACTUALLY TENKO’S SISTER SOBBBBBBBBB NOOOOOOOOOOOOO

BUT ON THE PLUS SIDE THIS MAKES TOMURA MUCH MORE LIKELY TO GO APESHIT ON AFO’S ASS IF HE COMES TO REALIZE THAT AFO INDIRECTLY MURDERED HIS SISTER OH SHIT

BUT SHIT YOU GUYS, SHE’S SO CUTE AND SHE’S FUCKING DEAD NOW SOB THAT’S SO FUCKING HORRIBLE I MEAN IT I’M REALLY UPSET THOUGH

BUT LET’S CONTINUE WITH THE FLASHBACK TO SEE IF HORIKOSHI WANTS TO TOY WITH MY EMOTIONS ANYMORE!!

NANA DIDN’T DO A GOOD ENOUGH JOB ERASING ALL TRACES OF HER CONNECTION TO HER CHILD AND IT EVENTUALLY RESULTED IN HIS DEATH OH SHIT. I’M SERIOUSLY SO UPSET ABOUT THIS??

NOTE HOW BABY TENKO’S FACE IS PURPOSELY BLACKED OUT EVEN THOUGH (A) HIS SISTER’S IS NOT, AND (B) WE SHOULD, IN THEORY, ALREADY KNOW WHAT HE LOOKS LIKE! IT’S BECAUSE HE DOESN’T HAVE THE SCARS OR THE WHITE HAIR YET CUZ AFO HASN’T WIPED HIS MEMORIES. [nods sagely as though I have any sort of proof of this whatsoever and it’s not all just wild speculation and conjecture]

HANAAAAAAAA oh shit I better come up with another nickname for Hanabata then. looks like it’s Back To The Full Name for you mister

!!?!?!?

okay you guys I think this is intentional misdirection. we’re meant to believe that Tenko’s dad was perhaps abusive and that his behavior toward his son ultimately triggered the awakening of his quirk and led to all of the subsequent Horrible Things happening

but I think what it actually is is that Tenko’s dad probably resents Nana for giving him up. and maybe Tenko wanted to know more about her and maybe he got in trouble for it? because now Hana is showing him the picture, and then talking about this mysterious conversation with their dad and saying she’s on Tenko’s side. so that’s my bet

anyway! but this means Tomura might not need as much convincing as I previously speculated! I figured he probably wouldn’t know much, if anything, about his grandma even if he did somehow get his memories back, because he was only four when all that shit went down, and Nana had parted ways with Tomura’s dad years ago. but if he actually did know a bit about her and even possibly felt a connection with her, as this flashback suggests, that could go a long way towards fueling his eventual breakaway from AFO’s side once All Might is able to explain the truth

ahhhhh you guys this is exciting I’m excited. though also still very sad though because wtf seriously

so Tomura’s tiredly thinking that the least his stupid memories could do is show him the whole picture instead of these fragments. “it’s like a broken tape recording or something”

HOLY SHIT

...I have no words. holy shit

anyone else getting flashbacks to the Highway to Hell though? what is it with Tomura and periodically pulling off the most badass stunts in the whole fucking manga. all because he didn’t get his nap dsflkjlk

ReDestro look at this loss of life. are you crying again. no, I can’t imagine that you are. you ass

you guys are probably getting tired of me just going “holy shit” over and over, but

hooooooooooooly shit

guys, if Tomura can dust people without even touching them he might as well just change his name to fucking Thanos and we’d better start praying this kid gets redeemed and soon

so now there’s a panel of Tomura being all drooly, and honestly he looks like he’s about to pass out. not sure if this is intended to be a glam shot or what lol

ohhhhSHIT

YESSSSSSSSSSS DABI. DRACARYS

!LKJDSLFKJLSDKJF!!

OH SHIT YOU GUYS, IT LOOKS LIKE WE’RE ABOUT TO GET ALL A SONG OF ICE AND FIRE UP IN THIS BITCH

who is this weird little black mage. I’ll tell you one thing, he’s the only guy I’ve seen so far who’s actually dressed appropriately for fucking December weather, though, so good on him

will he defeat our boy Touya (spoilers, he won’t)? will Touya have some flashbacks of his own (TOUYA PLEASE), since that seems to be what all the cool kids are doing these days? will I lose my fucking shit all over again next week? stay tuned! but yes I absolutely will, oh jesus this is awesome

#bnha #boku no hero academia #bnha 227 #toga himiko #giran #shigaraki tomura #bnha spoilers #mha spoilers #makeste reads bnha #are there any theories about tenko's sister possibly still being alive?#please you guys I need there to be theories where she lived #justice for the shimura sibs #brb going to pore through the entire manga looking for clues about who she might be if so #she's probably a couple years older than him #but we don't know her quirk #she could be anyone dammit #shimura hana please show yourself please I need this

194 notes · View notes

aproblematicpanda · 4 years

Note

Harry Potter? For the in-depth fandom ask

Hi thank you! ♥ I will use the books for my answers, since I didn’t really like most of the movies. I apologize if I mix up some of the characters, I’ve only read the books in my native language so I will have to google for some of the names in English. :’D

Top 5 favorite characters: Minerva McGonagall, Luna Lovegood, Fred & George Weasley, Neville Longbottom, Ginny Weasley. Other characters you like: The golden trio obviously, Molly, Dobby, Draco Malfoy, ... There are not a lot of characters I dislike. Least favourite characters: Umbridge, for obvious reasons. Otps: Hermione and Ron. Notps: I don’t think I have any? I’m not very invested in shipping when it comes to the HP fandom, I pretty much keep an open mind to everything? Except incest but I’ve never seen anyone ship anything like that, so. Favourite friendships: Harry, Ron and Hermione, obviously, and I also really liked Fren, George and Lee, and Lavender and Parvati. Favourite family: The Weasleys Favourite episodes: / Favourite book: Prisoner of Azkaban is probably my favorite book. Favourite quotes: "If you want to know what a man’s like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals." "I solemnly swear I am up to no good." "But you know, happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light." "Harry witnessed Professor McGonagall walking right past Peeves who was determinedly loosening a crystal chandelier and could have sworn he heard her tell the poltergeist out of the corner of her mouth, 'It unscrews the other way.’" "There is no need to call me ‘sir,’ Professor." And probably more. The books have so many amazing scenes, funny, inspirational, sad, hopeful, ... It was really hard to pick just a few. Best musical moment: / Moment that made you fangirl the hardest: Ehh... I mean, obviously I was rooting for Harry and the ending was a satisfying one, just like every other time Harry beat Voldemort, but the moment that made me fangirl the hardest would probably be Hermione punching Draco in the face. xD When it really disappointed you: The only truly disappointing thing about the book is how House-Elves are treated. Other than that, the only time I’m disappoint is literally every time JK Rowling decides it’s a good idea to open her mouth. Saddest moment: The moment Harry breaks down in Dumbledore’s chambers after Sirius dies gives me chills every. damn. time I reread the book. Most well done character death: Oh god, this is so hard because most of the deaths really hit me hard Favourite guest star: / Favourite cast member: / Character you wish was still alive: Honestly? Probably Hedwig. Maybe Fred. One thing you hope really happens: That JK Rowling’s Twitter account is banned so she doesn’t have a damn platform anymore. Most shocking twist: When did you start reading: I think the first three books were already out when I started to read them. My classmates kept telling me to do it and I was in that annoying phase where I refused to dive into anything that was this massively popular - but I’m glad I eventually caved because if I hadn’t, I wouldn’t have grown up in this fandom and that means I would’ve had an entirely different experience. Now I can still say I grew up with the books and I’m glad I did. Best animal/creature: I’m a gigantic sucker for unicorns and I’m not sorry about it. xD Favourite location: I mean, Hogwarts is amazing, the descriptions of the castle never get old. Trope you wish they would stop using: Ehh... I honestly don’t know? One thing this book does better than others: I love how this show has such an inspired, dedicated, creative fanbase. The amount of HP related art, fanfiction, headcanons, ... out there is mindblowing. I’ve never quite seen that happen in any other fandom and it’s part of why I love this one as much as I do. Like how people can take a character that’s mentioned maybe a couple of times in the books and they create so much content for them to the point where I’ve actively had to stop myself from writing an answer to this questions because the answer isn’t canon, that’s admirable. Funniest moments: Fred and George wrecking havoc on Umbridge and finally leaving the castle after they get caught is without a doubt the funniest scene I can think of. Couple you would like to see: Like I said, I was never really into shipping anyone with anyone. I enjoy quite a lot of fanon ships I see on Tumblr, though. Actor/Actress you want to join the cast: / Favourite outfit: Every outfit I can think of is influenced by the movies so I don’t really have an answer to this. I would’ve loved to see Hermione’s dress to the Yule Ball, though, and the Patil sisters’. Oh, and Fleur’s wedding dress. Favourite item: The Marauder’s map. Do you own anything related to this show: No. What house/team/group/friendship group/family/race etc would you be in: I’m a Slytherin. Most boring plotline: I can’t think of anything. The passage that bores me the most is the one where the Minister of Magic meets the Muggle Prime Minister but that’s not a plotline. I guess everything is just so well thought of, everything that’s in the books in there for a reason and I wouldn’t cut anything out of it. Most laughably bad moment: As much as I dislike JK Rowling, she wrote seven brilliant books. I can’t think of a bad moment. There are plot holes, sure, and things that really fucking bug me, but no laughably bad moments. At least, not any that I can think of right now. The fact that she gave Cho Chang two last names as a name is a bad moment, though - but it’s not laughably. It’s just more proof that JK Rowling is a terrible person. Best flashback/flashfoward if any: The memories Snape shows to Harry, and the ones they both get to see of each other during their Occlumency lessons. Most layered character: I love the character development Ron goes through. Most one dimensional character: Ehh. There were a lot of important characters so it makes sense that not all of them got the layers they deserved. Right now nobody who’s relevant to the plot comes to mind as an answer? Scariest moment: Well, when Harry and Dumbledore came back from finding the fake Horcrux, that had me scared. Not for their lives (because it was obvious that Harry would live and Dumbledore would die) but because it felt like all of Dumbledore’s plans would be ruined so that’d probably be the scariest moment for me? Grossest moment: Ehh... I would probably throw up if I had witnessed Nagini sliding out of Bathilda’s dead body so I’m gonna go with that one, that must’ve been horrifying for Harry, especially because he spares Hermione the details. Best looking male: Well the books name Cedric Diggory as the most attractive one, so... Let’s go with that one then? Best looking female: Fleur and Ginny Who you’re crushing on (if any): I would probably be all over Ginny if I had gone to Hogwarts. Favourite cast moment: / Favourite transportation: A Thestral! Most beautiful scene (scenery/shot wise): I really love the descriptions of Hogwarts. Unanswered question/continuity issue/plot error that bugs you: Oh god, so. many. Off the top of my head, here we go. 1. The carriages that bring the students back to the train station are mentioned specifically at the end of the fourth book and yet Harry can’t see the Thestrals until the beginning of the fifth book. 2. In what world are the Weasleys poor? Hermione specifically mentions in the seventh book that you can increase the quantity of food and Harry gets more wine for Slughorn and Hagrid with a spell in the sixth book, so no wizard or witch would have to spend any money on food, ever. And like with clothes and books and everything, why buy multiple ones? Just buy one and then duplicate it like when Hermione did it with the medallion? 3. Harry randomly remembering the phone number to get into the Ministry of Magic after almost an entire year, having heard them once: please. I started rereading the fifth book like two months ago for the gazillionth time and I already don’t remember them anymore. 4. Supposedly there’s a curse on the position as the DADA professor ever since Voldemort asked for the job, so there’s a new teacher every year, but Professor Quirrel is introduced in a way that makes it seem as if he has been teaching there for quite a while and other students (like Fred and George) treat him as such - seems to me like the curse was only activated with Harry coming to Hogwarts but that’s not what’s canon. 5. Voldemort conveniently waiting for the end of the school year each year to make his move. 6. The school year somehow always starts on a Monday and the Hogwarts express always leaves on September 1 which would mean that September 1 was a Sunday for seven years in a row. 7. Why, WHY, would they use feathers and parchment? What the hell is wrong with pen and paper? Or things like torches, when electricity has been a thing since forever? And the same goes for using owls to send letters, or the memos that are used in the Ministry of Magic: just text or e-mail, dudes. One sloppy ‘this doesn’t work here because there’s too much magic in the air’ just doesn’t cut it for me, especially because Harry does wear a watch, for instance. I probably have more but this is all I can come up with right now. xD Best promo: My childhood best friend bugging me about the books until I finally caved and started to read them. xD At what point did you fall in love with this show/book: Literally the first chapter.

Send me a show/fandom and I’ll answer

#hp #ask

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courage-a-word-of-justice · 4 years

Text

BnHA 84

Ey? So Gentle is basically Luffy, only he can do stuff with air too.

“Tokoyami, it’s in lesson 3.”

Eizouken 10

LOL, you can see a name similar to “Rachel Enyoung Choi” in one of the credit lists. Update: Euyoung Choi is credited on one of the other folders.

“Kanamoney” is catching on, I see.

“Well, dough.” - Sarasoju, where soju is some alcoholic Korean beverage.

The back of the clock reminds me of that Skipper and Skeeto game I used to play.

Did Kanamori get a fringe cut…?

You can see the symbol for Eizouken on the (imaginary…?) warehouse.

Uchitama 9

The video got encoded funny again…

I‘ve heard of AIBOs before. They’re robotic dogs, although with newfangled drones, Google Nests and stuff, they went out of fashion years ago.

Aibou (with kanji) means “partner”, come to think of it...

While everyone else is talking in the foreground, I’m staring at Beh in the background…

Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve seen Kuro and Nora interact all that much.

Natsuki Hanae as Leo, huh?

Uchitama 10

Second-last episode!

Neko (cat) -> Koma -> ari (ant)…isu (chair) -> suika (watermelon) -> tamago (egg, or sometimes it sounds like tabako/tabacco to me) -> ??? -> koi (carp) -> ???? “Kooten” seems to be a nonsense word.

The video got encoded funny again…

…and that’s twice now…

LOL, this is based on Millionaire.

…thrice…

The original quote is (something like), “It is said that heaven does not create one man above or below another man.” (Yukichi Fukuzawa)

The answer was C, obviously.

…4 times.

Bull does his best Thinker impression.

Oh my gosh, they’re bringing that joke back…? (LOL) Update: The portal joke.

“chunk of meat” – Uh…what?

Holy s***! It’s Bull’s dad! Bull time travelled!

Magia Record 8

I like how the anime introduced Gomakashi, then had the proper OP.

Chuo Ward (Chuoku)? In Hypnosis Mic, that’s a sign Ayappe is definitely a girl…but this ain’t HypMic, so no worries!

The greeting is “Kamihama” because it sounds kind of like konbanwa and the host is Mr Hammer because that sounds like the back half of Kamihama, I guess.

Magia Record seems more overt about its lesbian undertones, I see.

I noticed a piano on a poster in the back. Wonder what that means…?

Just reading translations of radio transcripts like this makes me think of the HypMic radio show. I’ve been using that (and all of HypMic, to be honest) to cope in these tough (COVID-19) times, which is why I’m mentioning it a lot.

Mami!

Eizouken 11

So this is how they met, huh? I never knew Kanamori could have such little faith in people, considering how she is now.

ID:INVADED 12

What I don’t get is Hayaseura’s motive…

Uraido…”from behind”? I need kanji to figure this one out…

Whose well is this Bliss background, ayway…?

Momoki and Matsuoka pass a sign saying 大井南 (Minamioi), which is in Shinagawa.

Why does Momoki need drugs…? To subdue Asukai…?

Oh no. Inami is going to have a vendetta after her man was killed!

According to Ramuda, the optimist sees the doughnut, the pessimist sees the hole…I think’s that’s important for that moment.

…Welp, when a hole in the brain doesn’t kill you, a shot to the stomach does.

In this time of COVID-19, I think talking about people coming back to life is inappropriate…

Post-credits segment!

Uchitama 11 (FINAL)

According to Ramuda, the optimist sees the doughnut, the pessimist sees the hole…

“Tullip” (sic).

Oh, so instead of “Tama” it said “tanu___”, so the kids assumed it said “tanuki”.

Ooh, cat meeting. This should match the dog meeting from earlir in the season. Plus Nora’s face on the title card.

The video got encoded funny again…

“I’m busy right now.” – Nora, sleeping – Yup, that’s my mood. In fact, I was woken up by a call this morning…

I still think the Momo x Bull ship is stupid…

Nora can talk to crows…?

BnHA 85

…huh? What’s up with Bibimi?

Oh, in La Brava’s room there’s a graduation album. No one translated that.

Seriously, Deku’s gotten kinda creepy these days…

Tobita = essentially “to fly” + “field”. Makes sense when the Quirk is elasticity.

“It’s dangerous to go alone!” – I want to reply with “Take this!”…LOL.

This bouncing around thing was basically done by Sonic in OPM.

Update: Turns out the kanji for elasticity is read dansei, which is th same rading for the characters for a man (but with characters meaning “male gender” instead and the last kanji being shared betwe the two). That’s why Danjuro is Gentle Criminal.

BnHA 85

I noticed some of the decorations around the school look like heroes we’ve seen – there’s a Midnight one and a Thirteen balloon.

Why is the crowd chanting for YaoMomo…?

It’s in English, huh?

End of credits segment! Keep watching!

“Guys like you who say there are no do-overs in life…”

Hawks! This is the first time I see him outside spoilers!

ID:INVADED 13 (FINAL)

Was gonna finish this the day I got it, but I got access (limited to 1 week)…to Akira, which is a movie I’ve never seen before.

The sharks are a nice touch…(LOL…?)

Welp, John Walker has his hat back now.

Uraido…Hayaseura. Of course, how the heck did I not make the connection?!

The video got encoded funny again…

…wow, after learning a thing or two about CPR, this part actually makes sense to me now…Amazing. (Also, I learnt about comminuted fractures from Double Decker.)

COVID-19 is entering these notes too…because if you cut yourself off from society, you won’t know about pandemics…

Why do I get the feeling Kiki’s gonna kill herself…?

She…almost did it. (Wow, I should try predict things more often.)

That pool…is basically the one from Minority Report!

Wow, that just did an Eva…

Why did they choose such a lively ending song…? Anyways, that wrapped up really well (no pun intended!). See you next time!

Magia Record 9

The tower appars to be modelled more after Tsutenkaku rather than Tokyo Tower.

For some reason, the subbers like to capitalise “Magical Girl”.

One of the speech bubbles in the back says koneko no gorogoro, or “the cat’s laziness”.

“Stand alone!” This is probably some kind of wordplay on the Solitude (Hitoribocchi no Saihate), since “alone” is hitori de.

Interestingly, the word for “delete” here is keshite (literal meaning: “to erase”).

The sign that passes Sana by while she’s on the boat says “Futaba” on it.

The blue letterboxing is an interesting effect.

“Sorpredente” = surprising.

Eizouken 12 (FINAL)

“They have their own business to run.”

I’ll miss this OP song when it’s gone…*sigh*

LOL, the contrast between Asakusa’s imagination and reality is huge and that’s what makes Eizouken so fun.

“I’m here to deliver the promised data,” Kanamori says (which I think is a more literal translation, ut works better).

It’s unfortunate Comiket 98 was cancelled…

Hey, why didn’t Anime vs. Real Life cover Eizouken?! That would’ve been so good!

I noticed one of the viewers had a “No Disc” pop-up of some sort. Also, the moving logo exists now, too (LOL).

I like how 1 of the UFOs hits the windshield.

The arrows really bring your attention to what’s the same in the split screens.

Magia Record 10

The Mifuyu in the previous episodes was either a flashback or a fantasy, right?

Mami is wearing a Wings of Magius badge…!

On the titlecard, there’s what seems to be a radio tower with a small lightning bolt above it.

BnHA 86

Hey, Tsu has a sister..?

Ah,so this is Mirko! I’ve heard of her too!

Is it just me, or does Endeavour hav CGI on him…?

Hawks reminds me of Fubuki from OPM…

Wow, even Endeavour’s trying to be funny…the world really is different now. (This humour has a terrible success rate with me, though.)

There seem to be holes in Hawks’ jackt for his wings.

So basically, Hawks is being the Iori to Endeavour’s Riku (but without too much of the homoerotic overtones that come from being close in age, since Endeavour is 46 – 7 and Hawks is 22), so to speak.

Oh! That punch is based on All Might’s! Same framing and everything!

Hajimari no doesn’t suggest a pronoun, so they must have chosen that based on the manga or the production company or something.

Magia Record 11

Shaft headtilt!

This Witch…apparently it appears early on in the OG series according to This Week in Anime. It does give off that vibe.

…wow, that fight was fast.

The video got encoded funny again…

Why are all the magical girls Naruto running???

Hachibey = Kyubey (where kyu = 9), but for 8.

ACCA OVA

Who’s this-oh, never mind.

I don’t remember the OST being so…cool.

Jumo, where ju = tree I guss.

Nino! Who’s the blonde though? I forget…

Jumo for Jumoku…right. I forgot.

Shinro, literally “path of advancement”. I’ve grown a lot since I last watched ACCA, but I only feel I’ve gotten dumber since then…to be honest.

I like how the flashback is saturated in blue…actually, that reminds me of Given, now that I think of it.

Where’s Grossular? I liked him the best because he’s basically older!Kyosuke Kuga. Update: Spoke too soon.

Now that I’ve learnt keigo between the OG and now, I can understand more of what Mauve says.

Magia Record 12

(no notes, sorry!)

Magia Record 13 (FINAL)

Is it just me, or can I see a feather-like object floating down the screen…? (Or is that static?)

You can see one of the hooded Wings (on Touka’s left) has dark blue hair – roughly Sayaka’s shade.

Ooh, Mami and Sayaka fight! (I’ve never been one for catfights, but this is certainly a match-up I want to see!)

Mami’s fate really sucks, huh? Her head came off in the OG and now she’s a tool for the Magius…

Yachiyo does look a lot like Togo from Yuki Yuna, doesn’t she…?

Anyways, this is all for now. There’s an s2 on the horizon, but COVID-19 means it could be years down the line…see you when s2 arrives.

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