#i think i still have the high school essay-writing format brainworms this feels like a structured essay

[waywardsalt]

I am humbly requesting your thoughts on Linebeck

Oh I have a LOT of thoughts on Linebeck but I'll try to just get some major points down bc it would take me ages to spill all of my thoughts on him.

(plus i do have two general headcanon posts [ 1 2 ] a post abt headcanons about him being autistic [ x ] and a weird post about his coat [ x ] as well as pretty much anything in my linebeck tag with my excessive tagging of some reblogs and my original posts + whatever writing or fanfiction i have done/will do with him included so. bonus reading for headcanon-y stuff or a look at how i portray him)

added a read more bc this is long bc of course it is :) i hope it's in the right spot :)))

Linebeck is... a good fucking character. He's probably my favorite character period, and has been pretty much soon after I got Phantom Hourglass. He feels unique compared to other Zelda characters as a companion character who offers less direct support and is more just of a constant character who changes throughout the course of the story and is... well, a companion, not really a helper. He falls more in line with the types of loz characters who are more rude or antagonistic towards Link, but develops out of that, and also technically counts not only as a boss but a final boss, putting him as the only non-villain character to be a final boss, so uh good for him.

Just within the context of the games he's got a great design and a great theme (which is only heard about two times before the final boss but has a recognizable enough motif for it to be noticed in the final boss theme) and an interesting role in his game and just has one of the best character arcs and one of the most interesting places within the story as a whole. Linebeck's arc is very... natural in how you see his attitude change within both story beats and in his overworld dialogue, but at the same time seems like it stutters when he deals with Ciela's criticism and upholding his own reputation, I think his character arc is very fascinating if you consider the entire context of his character and what he interacts with, since a majority of the characters he directly interacts with seem to deny the idea that he's any more than a useless coward.

The fact that pretty much the rest of the major cast in Phantom Hourglass has basically no faith or respect for Linebeck is so fucking fascinating to me. This guy has to be doing so fucking bad over the course of the game. In relation to Ciela specifically, an idea I've been thinking of and trying to work into some of my Phantom Hourglass oneshots is that having to be around and interact with her so frequently wears Linebeck down pretty badly as the game goes on.

This guy is undeniably mentally ill and that's also something I have a specific fic planned out for but that's probably not going to see the light of day for a while. It's basically five chapters of Oshus being Linebeck's therapist or something each time Link goes to the Temple of the Ocean King.

I particularly enjoy how the game (at least twice) plays with your expecting him to be at the ship all of the time by having him be in a different spot on an island. His dialogue for islands and his overseas dialogue are fun, it gives off a sense that he much prefers exploring and is a bit less guarded overseas. His dialogue during the ghost ship fight is ESPECIALLY fantastic, the specific line of 'I'm fighting right there with you this time, kid!' not only offers some very interesting insight to his attitude towards link and his own role, but kind of also stings when considering the events of the final boss and is also a quote I took a screenshot of while reading the text dump for this game.

Phantom Hourglass is by no means an exceptional game and while the story is fine it's nothing fantastic and even most of the characters are... ok, but Linebeck is without a doubt the best part of this game and I really feel like he's the main reason why people still give this game a chance and despite everything he's easily one of the best characters in the entire series even if his game isn't one of the better ones. He honest to god steals every scene he's in, even if he barely has any dialogue- he's animated with such distinct personality and I love it. He doesn't speak at all until the end of the spirit of courage scene and yet is so fucking distracting with his fruity fucking posing and movements in reaction to what's going on.

I'm also personally a fan of the near-complete lack of backstory we get for him. The most we get is some vague implications but everyone can read the given information in different ways so it's really not much. Phantom Hourglass's general lack of lore is great for me since I can just fill in the blanks however I want. I kinda honestly don't want Nintendo to revisit this game because I don't really want them to add anything new. Just port it or something don't change it.

That's about it for surface-level specific-to-the-games Linebeck talk... on to everything else.

Linebeck is literally the reason why I found out I was autistic. I wrote this loser and realized I was accidentally making him kinda autistic and THEN realized I was also projecting and then decided to look into that. He's fun to write and he always ends up a little out of character and at this point I barely give a damn because this bastard is masking or keeping up a facade or whatever the fuck in most of his scenes anyways. Linebeck's arc feels to me more about him being most honest and open to and about his own emotions and actual personality so honestly writing him a bit out of character doesn't bother me too much.

He's my favorite little guy, and when I plan out Zelda aus he always gets a major role to the point where a lot of the twists to my aus all end up being similar. For a few of them I've had to forcibly alter his role so that I can't include him constantly. He's very interesting for different kinds of aus because he's an interesting character for different concepts and situations. His relationships with characters in Phantom Hourglass lend well to au stuff; specifically with Link, in one au they're adoptive brothers, in one they're something akin to rivals, in one their mutual fixation on each other propels the plot. I've even expanded on interactions and possible dynamics with Bellum in aus (Bellum is honestly fun since he's kind of a blank slate in canon but there's just enough there to build off of but keep it relatively the same original character).

I have a few ocs that used to be au versions of Linebeck that ended up becoming their own thing because the aus in question worked better as original stories.

With Phantom Hourglass-centric ideas, it's a lot of fun to poke around and explore stuff with Linebeck's past, his mental state, the kinds of things he enjoys or hates, pretty much anything the game doesn't elaborate on. With all of that blank space and the fact that I've known about him for a few years now, I've gotten down a whole backstory and deeper details on Linebeck, most of which I'm probably going to end up expressing through writing.

Just a few of the baseline ones are just along the lines of him being gay, autistic, touch-averse, intersex, a cat person, someone who highly values his freedom, half Gerudo, interested in music- some of it can be supported with canon (he really comes off to me like a closeted gay man, and he does have some generally autistic vibes) and some of it is really just for the hell of it (in particular the idea that he’s of Gerudo descent has no backing but is so interesting for story stuff and is generally fun) (I also enjoy ignoring parts of canon. I have not played Spirit Tracks and I do not want to play it so if I don't look at it I can ignore it).

I have a lot of fun fleshing him out in different aus or in scenarios before or after Phantom Hourglass, since there's just enough there to allow for further reasonable exploration, and his being just some normal guy actually helps with that since it forces you to keep things relatively normal and comparable to kinds of things you can experience in your day-to-day. I've more or less figured out a (mostly) full backstory for him, I've decided on a full physical description of how he looks so that I have a baseline if I want to change stuff in an au or just so that I know how I figure he looks as well as have an idea of how some physical traits can lend themselves to other aspects of how I write and portray him (for example, I figure he has long fingers, which goes right with the idea that he enjoys music and is pretty good on a piano, and also that he's good with tasks that might require a bit more finger dexterity as well as generally helping a bit with pick-pocketing or thievery)

I figure that, along with the general idea I have of him valuing his freedom, he's not particularly interested in following rules or laws and hates seeing too many of them put in place, and especially values his own identity even if he doesn't express it as much as he'd like. He likes being able to go wherever he'd like and he likes being able to do what he wants and express himself how he wants and that stuff gets bogged down when he plays into that image of someone he's not that he hides behind and doubles down on in a good bit of Phantom Hourglass.

Linebeck is fun in general he's a good character he's fun for aus he's got enough groundwork to spend ages pouring into possible avenues for his personality and background and whatever potential he could have in different aus or roles. He's surprisingly fun and interesting to use as an antagonist since you can't fall back on easy villain-writing ideas and have to get a bit more creative with it.

I think I struggle to write him in-character but it's backed up a bit by my specific interpretation of him suggesting that a lot of what you see from him is forced or fake. I still think he's a greedy piece of shit, though. He sucks and it's on purpose. I lean into him being rude and cold and a bit quieter overall.

He just... for some fucking reason when I decided to play this game Linebeck struck a chord with me whether or not I realized it at the time so he's just very interesting and entertaining and important to me and it really doesn't help that either Phantom Hourglass as a whole or just Linebeck is my special interest.

Linebeck stands out in comparison to other Zelda characters and has a very unique and fascinating role and arc and is just so fucking good.

He feels like he could be used as an example of how good character writing can save a piece of art (not that ph sucks but like. god damn he elevates it) just because his inclusion makes the story more interesting as you have this selfish asshole tagging along next to your little goody-two-shoes protagonist and fairy friend, and his arc, though not entirely the focus of the story, is another reason to keep progressing. His dialogue is funny and has some really good in-character tips every so often, he adds character to traversal and adds stakes as a character to care about and protect and is just fucking fantastic.

He's a character that can work as comedic relief but at the same time can be taken very seriously and I really enjoy that while he seems to be in the role of comedic relief a lot it never seems much like it's diegetically intentional and it still allows room for him to be taken completely seriously. Him knocking over stone Tetra is funny but there's so much character in that entire string of animations that while it's a fun background gag it also provides even more insight into Linebeck as a character.

Essentially he's my favorite character ever he was probably my gay awakening and I want to steal his gender and I think about him more than I think about my ocs.

#linebeck #asks #whistlingstarlight #loz #legend of zelda #phantom hourglass #salty talks #literally i got ph in the first place bc some old zeldatubers made a good case abt him and i vaguely remembered reading the manga #and now im still playing it bc of him. do it for him. whatever. easily one of the most important fictional characters ive experienced #i tried to make this more.... formal??? cuz you asked so nicely ty for the ask #i tried to just give some kind of idea of my basic ideas? i didnt want to get too specific since you just asked for thoughts #had a couple of instances of imposter syndrome pop up while writing this bc it feels weird to me to call ph or linebeck my special interest #when i dont look at anything beyond the game half of the time so idk. i think abt and can talk abt linebeck in specific for a while ig #i didn't want to go too in depth with anything since the ask was a lil vague and i didnt want to go into massive tangents #i think i still have the high school essay-writing format brainworms this feels like a structured essay #whatever im insane about him but this is really long and i dont know what to focus on #long post #i stg if the fucking 'keep reading' teleports to where it shouldnt be #anyways a few of my linebeck pet peeves are when people treat him as shallow comic relief or ignore his character arc #i have a lot of linebeck pet peeves but those are the basic ones. pls be nice to him #i empathize a lot with linebeck hence the projection i do with him so idk what that says about me but hes got gay autistic swag so whatever #i left out a lot of other stuff bc some of it would maybe require a mature label. im insane abt him but im also gay abt him

[wenightmareyou]

movie post for AR @alien-romantic !! ✨

okay i feel like my movie taste really does come down to what did i see in theaters that made me define my personality around them for the rest of the week, and i usually have Allergic to Watching Old Movies Disease so most of these are p recent! my movie taste is Also defined by what i saw enough on tumblr that eventually i broke down and watched it and it was actually amazing lol

✨favorite horror movies✨

Jennifer’s Body: THEE movie of all time, it literally has anything i could ever want in a movie: excessively campy dialogue, a plot around making a deal with the devil, a town that’s slightly fucked up, extended metaphors about gender violence but in a palatable PG-13 non-graphic format, Megan Fox going feral and eating boys, a homoerotic friendship where they also kinda hate each other but its mostly bc neither of them can deal with their feelings in the world they were brought up in, and a soundtrack that slaps. Seriously i could probably quote this movie word for word at this point, and like technically its horror but its also really funny and theres not really any jumpscares or anything. Im gonna stop talking about this one bc if i keep going i could write a whole essay but its so good (also i wont elaborate but Jennifers Body and Heathers are sisters, spiritually)

Us: hhhhhhhh this is so good, ik Jordan Peele’s only directed two movies so far but he never misses, like this was genuinely terrifying for me but also raises a lot of Questions and made me think about the implications of it for weeks afterward. It’s about this family vacationing in Santa Cruz, CA at the same time that there’s this planned uprising of doppelgängers all around the US (i cant remember if its the world or just the US? But it makes a lot of commentary about the US in particular so im guessing its just the US). I’ve still only seen it once but the aesthetics are so good, its definitely more on the violent side than Get Out was, but its not too bad (like idk if you’ve seen Midsommar but like. its nowhere near as gory as that lol). I swear i didnt have a fear of doppelgängers before this but between this and tma i sure do now

It (chapter 1): this one is so close to my heart omg 🥺 i associate it super strongly with watching it with friends so thats at least half the reason its a favorite. Also i love horror-comedies so much as a genre, mostly bc i scare easily so its nice to have jokes in between to break the tension and this movie’s hilarious

Cabin in the Woods: i cant say what this one’s about without spoiling it but i’ll say it definitely goes under the same category as It for me, in terms of horror-comedy. Its such a fun deconstruction of horror movie tropes and it gets so insane at the end, like when you watch it you can *tell* it was made in 2011 but like in a good way

Also honorable mention to The Love Witch for sending me into a spiral about what truly is the female gaze/if there can be one definition of that/the relationship between love and violence etc etc basically it’s Extremely Gender. Also not v bloody and doesnt have any jumpscares, and its an aesthetic masterpiece omg

✨favorite comfort movies/romcoms✨

Juno: i dont normally have favorite actors but Elliot Page is my emotional support favorite actor, like idk how to explain it but all of his characters just scream comfort character somehow. Juno has the same screenwriter as Jennifer’s Body so it has a really similar sense of humor, but altogether v wholesome plot about a pregnant teenager and her bff, michael cera. Also highly quotable, and i dont think ive ever watched this without crying, like this is one of those movies where im like love is real actually 🥺💕

Easy A: this movieee!!! Oh my god this movie, its so intensely californian and thats def part of why i like it. Also realizing now a major factor in movies i like is how quotable they are bc this is another one i feel like i quote all the time. Plus theres something so fun about baby Emma Stone living her 80s movie protagonist dream AND doing the “you think i’m a villain? I’ll show you a villain!” trope bc thats always fun

All of twilight but especially the first one: i mean idk what to say, i got brainworms when i was 11 and made twilight my whole personality for like 3 years, then grew out of it, then the twilight renaissance happened and im Back on My Bullshit 😂 i also just like having a purpose for me memorizing everything possible about twilight in middle school so like.... if you ever want any fun twilight facts hit me up (this goes to AR but if you’re not AR and reading this too this also applies lmao im down to talk about twilight any time)

And honorable mention to Scott Pilgrim (okay not a romcom but def a comfort movie), to be fair i havent seen this one all the way through in a looong time but i go back to the most iconic parts a lot

also okay theres def more in this category that i like but my brain is turned off now so i cant remember them 😂

✨ and the best category: movies i hate ❤️ ✨

i feel like i tend not to like movies that feel like they’re trying too hard? Like if i watch something and *instantly* know its trying to be Oscar bait, or if its trying to be camp but like,,., pretentious high end camp. Like anything by Wes Anderson is a hard nope for me, also i saw Gravity in theatres on a whim whenever that came out and it just didnt click for me at all. (Also okay The Love Witch kiiiind of checks the boxes for this but its still a fave)

Also okay this movie isnt any of those things but i still dont like it: It Chapter 2! I feel so bad cause It chapter 1 was so good and created this huge hype for the sequel for me, but the plot just went off the fucking rails. Sure we got bill hader being in love with his childhood best friend which spawned the whole Reddie craze on here for awhile..... but that came at the price of naked old ladies being used for shock value and whatever the hell was going on with Pennywise being an alien/god/something??? Like if the book is like this i know i couldn’t get through it, i was laughing my way through the whole movie but like, laughing (derogatory)

I feel like this section just became a reason to dunk on It Ch 2 but honestly the only other sequel i can think of that betrayed me like that was Endgame 😂

Also unrelated but while im still on the topic of movies i dont like/my hot takes: 10 Things I Hate About You was too sexist for me enjoy, i see it hyped on here a lot and im like ??? yall that did not age well 😭 but tbf i still like Mean Girls so we all have our things 😂

#this is for AR but if anyone wants out of context movie opinions here they are lol #also omgg i typed this on my notes app and did not realize how long it got lmao #my post #also wait i forgot heathers under comfort movies but pretend thats there too