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olivsie · 1 month

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Something I like about epic the musical is that it Gives it's changes to the original text an actual Purpose

( The first couple paragraphs are basically a rant regarding retellings. If you only want to hear about epic Skip to paragraph 4)

1. I am a bit annoyed by the lack of. Understanding as to why RETELLINGS aren't the most historicaly accurate things in the world. Sorry to break this to you, but that's both just how they work and I would guess how they reach success. Ancient Greece is a much different culture than our own, And most of us would be terrified to actually live back then. When you are Trying to create content That is based on ancient Greece And you want it to be successful/ At least reach a wide, and notably, MODERN audience. You're likely going to have to take some creative liberty And change a few things. Don't get me wrong, YOU DO NOT HAVE TO LIKE RETELLINGS KNOWING THAT FACT ( Me personally, I'm not the biggest fan of Miller's novels Even though I do like epic) BUT IT IS SOMETHING TO BE AWARE OF. And because of that I don't think I would ever expect a retelling to be perfectly accurate And I don't. I had interest in mythology LONG before epic the musical But I didn't actually read the Odyssey until getting into epic. I did not expect it To be just like the musical, I knew Odysseus was going to be much more of an asshole, along with other characters. The odyssey and epic are different pieces of media to me And I am not less of a mythology nerd for liking epic ( Though I will admit that sometimes I take tiny little fun facts of mythology And like to think of them in the context of epic, but that's just for fun.)

2. The Only time being a fan of retellings is wrong as if you genuinely believe they are perfectly accurate And refuse to listen to anything else ( Which has definitely happened, And mythology nerds have the right to be annoyed at that)

3. Some people only like to consume real mythology media, Others like both real mythology and retellings, Others only like to engage with retellings (I would hope they have the self-awareness to know It's not real mythology, From what I've seen some do and some don't, Unfortunately)

4. Ok. now on to what the title of this long ass rant says

I like that epic the musical Retells the story, Not only to both cater to modern audience But Also with its OWN purpose of man versus monster.

Obviously, this is not the point of the original text. Mythos Odysseus does not give a single fuck About the stuff that epic odysseus does. I don't know why the creator Decided to rewrite it this way, (If he's ever said why let me know) But I would assume he wanted to make something about the oddessy And this was simply a very creative way to Translate that for modern audience.

I like this because, yes, holy damn. It does have changes from the original text. But it's not JUST changing it. It's changing it with a purpose

It feels reminiscent of some kind of Dramatic play. the way that epic characterizes.

Polites' kind nature is Representative of the Concept of being merciful Represented in his lines such as " This life is amazing when you greet it with open arms" /"There is so much guilt inside your heart, So why not replace it?"

While in contrast you have eurylochus with more ruthlessness and cautious nature, this is Found in some of his lines such as "You rely on wit, and people die on it" /"we don't know what's ahead" / "I say we strike first. We don't have time to waste so lets raid the place-" /"Let's just cut our losses, You and I and let's run"

And then you have Odysseus, the man/monster. The first act of this Musical is his internal struggle With what He should be On that scale. And the other characters Represent this struggle in the song monster

" Is the cyclops struck with gilt when he kills, is he up in the middle of the night? Or does he end my men to avenge his friend and then Sleep knowing he has done him right?

When the witch turns men to pigs to protect her nymphs, is she going insane? Or did she learn to be colder when she got older and now she saves them the pain?

When a God comes down and makes a Fleet drown Is he scared that he's doing something wrong? Or does he keep us in check So we must respect him and now no one dares to piss him off"

He then Applies this to himself

" Does a soldier use a wooden horse to kill sleeping trojans cause he is vile? Or does he throw away his remorse and save more lives with guile?"

And this marks his turning point of deciding that Ruthlessness It's ultimately worth it if it means Getting home, as aeolus says "The end Always justifies the means"

It's in my opinion, a very creative way to go about retelling a myth. Is it accurate? Absolutely not. For example, circe (From what we know) is not protecting When she turns men into pigs, For all we know, she could just do it because Shits and giggles.

Her character and most others in epic is changed from the original. But it's not ONLY changing for the sake of apeling to the modern Western audience and being successful like Many other retellings. It is also and mainly changing for the sake of influencing the plot that Jorge Rivera herrans crafted For the sake of Retelling epic. It is creative and I enjoy it despite knowing it's not accurate.

#epic the musical #odysseus #the oddyssey #tagamemnon #the iliad #greek mythology #again you do not need to like epic the musical or any other retellings #you are allowed to only like greek mythology itself #as a history enjoyer i understand the frustration and think its COMPLETELY valid to be annoyed when someone uwu's a figure #hell i would be annoyed if someone did that to the EPIC THE MUSICAL version of odysseus #he's still an asshole he's still a killer and a liar in epic just a lot more guilty about it then he would be in the oddessy #if all retelling fans had self awareness that its just a retelling and didn't “soft boi” either myth or retelling #i think we'd all be much happier

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justmenoworries · 16 days

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Alright, original anon is back. Sorry for the delay, and for the wall of words I'm sending your way, lol. I'm going to split it in two, with the second part being my thoughts on Smith-Bravern as a character.

When it comes to the overall arc, this is the crux of things for me: there is no version of this show where Smith is not Bravern. It's the central conceit of the entire story, and every decision about how it was structured and framed was made with it in mind. If it wasn't literally the original idea that led to everything else, it was at the very least an extremely early decision in the writing process.

They wanted to tell a story about a human guy being transformed into his ideal robot hero through the power of love in order to be piloted by his most important person, who is another man. That's a specific concept, and it's not one that's any more common than human/robot romance. It's its own fantasy with its own appeal, and I'm glad that story was able to be told.

Wishing Smith wasn't Bravern isn't suggesting a way to make the show Bravern better, it's saying "I wanted a different show that isn't Bravern at all." Which is fine! That kind of disappointment is one of the most powerful drivers of innovation in popular art. I would be overjoyed if a few years from now we get a sudden burst of gay super robot media responding to Bravern. I just don't believe what Bravern did was inherently shallower or less interesting than that hypothetical other show, or that they were in any way taking the easy way out.

And, well… A show with a similar opening to Bravern where he was never a human is unfortunately not guaranteed to talk about any of the deeper subjects you mentioned in your post, like working through internalized homophobia. It could just as easily never take the relationship further, playing it off as a joke about the robot not knowing what sex is.

(I admit that part of your post made me raise an eyebrow, both because I think the story we actually got was very much about internalized homophobia– for Smith– and because I don't think Isami's discomfort was ever really framed that way? He was struggling because a bunch of confusing, traumatizing stuff happened to him in quick succession, and he didn't have a choice in any of it. Whatever feelings he had about his attraction to men only became obviously relevant to his relationship with Bravern after Smith died, imo.)

I get what you're saying and I politely disagree.

Personally I always saw Bravern as sort of a deconstruction-reconstruction of the Super Robot genre by using the Real Robot genre's often pessimistic and nihilistic approach to mecha as a contrast to the embodiment of robot hero shows that is Bravern.

It would be easy to paint Bravern as a naive idiot whose ideals about heroism and understanding the people you're fighting get crushed by the harsh realities of war. But the show doesn't do that. Bravern's heroism is flashy and not in the least bit grounded. It doesn't fit and it irritates the military and (at the beginning) Isami that Bravern seems to treat this conflict like a stage show. But that's not what Bravern is doing. He's being overly hammy and larger than life to give the people around them someone to look to for hope. And it works. It's Bravern with his impractical flaming swords who defeats soldats and death drives. It's thanks to Bravern that the heroes are able to communicate with and in the end gain an ally in Superbia.

Bravern is for all intends and purposes a war machine like the death drives, but he isn't motivated by a selfish desire to die. He's motivated by a selfless desire to protect life and especially the life of the one he loves. His love for Isami is literally what makes him stronger. And Isami accepting him is what saves them both. Yes, Bravern still messes up, both in battle and when it comes to his relationship with Isami. But it's made clear that hurting Isami in any way is the last thing Bravern would want.

But why?

That's the driving question for most of the show before The Twist.

Why isn't Bravern like the Deathdrives? Why does he want to protect Earth? Why does he love Isami?

We could've had all sorts of interesting answers to that.

What we got was... eh, he's just a guy who became a robot.

Okay.

Also, I have to add: the way that the show never makes it explicitly clear whether Bravern's feelings for Isami were really Smith romantically loving another man or just Knuth being an overly horny weirdo and influencing Bravern's behavior annoyed me. It's very telling that the deathdrive that would become Bravern/Smith is the only female deathdrive of the bunch with an established Yandere personality. It gives the writers a very easy out that isn't "a guy loves another guy romantically".

#bang bravern spoilers

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smallfrenchstudyblr · 2 months

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an acquaintance of mine, who i met through a mutual friend, casually admitted that he used chatGPT to help with his master's thesis (in the humanities); and when i curtly said "i don't think that's good" he was like, "oh it was just to give me some ideas and to help me write the introduction and conclusion.. and besides since i'm not going to write a PhD it was completely unnecessary anyway for me to be forced to write a thesis anyway"

i'm not going to report him or anything but it legitimately is so upsetting to me that someone with this kind of attitude now works as a high school teacher

Oof, that is rough, and on top of the substantive issue, there is something really tactless about one person admitting to you with a lot of chill that they cheated, when you yourself put in the work. It lacks some decency imo. It is indeed very upsetting, and I am sorry that you met someone with this little consideration for (your) academic work.

Obviously the first point is not valid: "to get some ideas" is literally the absolute worst use of ChatGPT or any AI ever, I stand by this and will die on that hill. "to write the introduction and conclusion": the most charitable interpretation would be "to help me rephrase stuff", but I am going to guess he meant "to tell me what to put in the introduction and conclusion", which is also bad. Introduction and conclusion are not summaries of the content, nor are they vapid fluff. There is proper content to put in both of them. If your intro/conclusion ends up feeling like a rehash or an empty shell, folks, you're doing it wrong. It's ok, we've all been there, but it needs to be changed.

As for the "I won't do a PhD anyway"... Something in me balks at that, but I have to sit down and consider if it's internalized elitism or not. I think it depends why you do a Masters, and from my experience it varies from country to country. In France, people go have a Masters because Undergrads are shorter, and you often are not competitive on the job market with a just an Undergrad. The vast majority indeed don't want to do any research, and therefore are not required to - you often can do an internship instead. But even in countries where Masters are more of a choice, an option rather than something that you naturally have to do, obviously not everyone will go into research. Still, the point of going one step above the undergrad is that it should then truly mean something. The masters is not a 5th year of undergrad, I think it is acceptable to require of MSc Graduates a different, wider skillset than from Undergrad Graduates. And part of that skillset is the ability to conduct an independent, small research project. The MSc theses expectations are not even close to a PhD thesis expectations anyway, I would argue they are barely the same exercise (in France, they do not even have the same name). The goal is not to show that you can be a good researcher, it's to show that you can develop originally ideas, think critically of the current state of knowledge, knows how to write convincingly about a complex topic, and have implicit understanding of epistemology, whether you realize it or not (aka you know how to know things, or you know at least one way to know things and understand the world).

These are all transferable skills, and your friend should sit down with a PhD researcher, to understand how little there actually is to do with a classic MSc thesis (or a mémoire as well it in French) and an actual PhD thesis.

#I am not necessariy 100% convinced that msc SHOULD HAVE TO write a thesis #I like the internship formula #but baby boy if you enrolled in an MSc knowing you would have to write a thesis to graduate #then don't go all pikachu meme when you are actually asked to write it #ask me things

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lordelmelloi2 · 5 months

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Hi it’s lexi… 6 and 17

oh my god you guys its Lexitypemoon. Lexi Typemoon you will Always be famous oh my god. Lexi typemoon is in my inbox you guys (HI LEXI 🐛)

#6. Who usually likes to cook most of the food? Or do they always take turns with eachother in that part?

Since Rosesona taught Waver how to do more things in cooking, they take more turns. Waver's already been pretty competent about it, but now they're doing more international cuisines and experimenting around. As for who has more energy to do it: this is variable. Both of them are tired all the time so while they Ideally try to do a new dish every 2 weeks they often fall back on the kind of easy-to-make stuff that isn't difficult to work with. Although slowly they're adapting to that too by doing more meal prep together... Usually Rose suggests a new recipe to try and comes up with the list of ingredients they need to hunt down.

#17. Do they always hold hands with eachother everywhere they go?

buauwuawauauuhuh 🙈 How nice that would be. But no. Well -- in London for a bit, no. It's a little precarious for a while because in the part of their story where they go back to Waver's original dimension, to London in 2004, they can't really show PDA because of Waver's status as a Clock Tower Lord.

However after a while Rose has no choice but to reveal he more-or-less works for Zelretch and is another Magician of the 2nd Magic. (It's not even that he necessarily Works or is Employed by him, it's almost like doing favors sometimes, since Zelretch's "canonizing" ability means he can do less investigative work than Rose can, who doesn't have such an ability attached to his Magic). This throws the Clock Tower into an absolute uproar, but also gives the El-Melloi family a lot of leeway as to what they can and can't do because that's essentially like having a nuclear bomb on their side since Rose's dedication to the family is made very clear during that event. So after that, because Waver no longer fears for his life or his loved one's lives as badly, they can show a little more PDA -- holding hands in public, even kissing, after a while. It's no longer a secret that the two of them are together.

(Doesn't mean they don't still face some precarious situations, but it means they're less scared, which is the key).

In Chaldea, ... not really, either, but it's not like they have to, because their connection is something they don't really need to constantly physical about. When they're on a date or something or intentionally spending time together, they will be. You know. When it's an appropriate time to be affectionate with each other, they will be. Waver and Rose are kind of that boring adult couple in a way. They can't really afford to be all over each other, and given that there's kids around they take care of, they won't be doing that anyways because it's just not appropriate. But they want to be good role models so they'll still every so often show ways they love each other. Constantly hand-holding no matter where they go -- just not realistically feasible. In Rose's words, "I need both of my hands to perform magecraft with so I can make sure we aren't going to fucking die."

#mastersona #lord el melloi ii #waver velvet #rosesona #waverose #Lexi type moon you will always be famous #Hi everyone look its my mentee *pointing at Lexi* my awesome and cool mentee #LEXI YOU SHOULD POST XANDRA STUFF TO TUMBLR.#TUMBLR MASTERSONA NEEDS XANDRA. IT NEEDS HER. IT NEEDS IT

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elysiuminfra · 1 year

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hi anon i love you. thank you for thisi question (i just woke up) you have no idea how excited i am to talk about this. had to make a post since it didnt wanna publish ur ask :( in the ideal world AMPHIMAL (all capitals for silly) is a 14 episode 2D animated tv show (heavily inspired by gennedy tartakovsky's work - particularly with samurai jack and primal, as well as mike mignola's work on hellboy) (AND SERGIO PABLOS!!) (wait edit: AND the old animated batman movies) HOWEVER. i have had many many thoughts about its ACTUAL format as a webcomic. i think it works best in this format cause the internal dialogue is important and you'd lose that in a show (i have many many thoughts about how media format influences tone/overall storytelling) particularly i'd like to execute it as a webcomic set with unconventional format - im very inspired by indie comics such as quinn - a horror webcomic made by moby, tumblr linked here, an artist who's work ive followed for a while and who's work first piqued my interest in breaking "traditional" webcomic format. yugo limbo and mike mignola (there he is again!) are also huge inspirations. (and another webcomic im too embarrassed to say) im in love with the idea of using the website itself as a backdrop for your visuals - it would be a mix of script, prose, intermingling with cinema-like stills as visuals - this is because traditional comics are difficult for me, i THINK in camera angles and shot layouts, not necessarily comic panels. i also plan on having annotations throughout the story, for secrets and descriptions of certain era-specific objects as fun optional facts - although when i actually put it all together on a website, this feature could be toggled. ideally it would be non-intrusive - think the note system from pentiment. the biggest inspirations i draw for AMPHIMAL though is Hellboy full stop in terms of palettes, visuals, and style. i plan on further solidifying and developing the "look" of amphimal as i do more research on victorian cultural and architecture motifs (they don't even know about the henry jekyll architecture associations) and also because i am the world's most unnecessarily detail-oriented person. my current work reflects moreso how i plan on amphimal looking when its published, with stark shadows, black shapes taking forefront, limited and striking palettes with heavy emphasis on color, shape, and object motifs. i am putting an unnecessary and frankly embarrassing amount of thought into literally every single detail (AND striving for semi-historical accuracy) (which is extremely difficult due to the lack of primary sources / bias in papers and the lack of accounts of certain aspects of victorian life, such as lgbt history and london’s underbelly of the era. particularly because many primary accounts are rife with racism, bigotry and inaccuracies - and they don’t paint a complete picture, so much of what i show WILL be speculation and not historically accurate) as for SCRIPT? behind the scenes its pretty rough - i have my charts and notes, but they're all pretty disorganized and i don't think i could share them without 1. spoiling a LOT of stuff (it doesnt differ from the original plot in any way, it just has far, far more depth into the characters - and some stuff i want to keep a secret!) 2. exposing just how deranged my note-taking skills are. amphimal currently exists only in pages and charts and key visuals i've made for myself that i MUST compile in a clean format for personal use (and sharing among those who can take peeks behind the scenes) as for key points oh boy. my favorite chapter and the one i'm most excited to write is utterson's search and first meeting with hyde. second favorite is utterson's scenes involving lanyon's death (he does die in amphimal, that i'm not changing - i thought about it at first but scrapped it) these moments show off utterson's character at key points OUTSIDE of jekyll (an absolute necessity!) - and he is, by far, my favorite protagonist out of all my projects. and i love him your honor ANYWAY ummm i dont really have much else to write other than thank u for sending this question!!! artistic format / experimentation is one of my favorite things to talk about. as for WHEN amphimal is gonna be a thing, it'll be in the future when i'm in a better living situation (and when the full amphimal theory bible is compiled - i'm obsessed with consistency between scenes and background motifs, so this will work as a reference for me once the project gets started however this will and is currently taking a LOT of research) ETA? later. possibly next year if i'm not too busy adjusting to the city im moving to. dont know yet but it'll happen. i'll make amphimal before i die promise because if i dont my spirit will never sleep peacefully

#answers #amphimal #sorry you activated my special interest (MEDIA FORMAT)#as well as victorian architecture. also had to edit cause grammar mistakes that *I* could not let slide

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the-hero-of-light-and-shado-blog · 7 months

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Vauge AC6 x Worm crossover coalescing in my brain, feel free to steal anything from it you like but it's not terribly original. Suicide/body horror warning.

So like. Ok. Taylor, somehow acquires Coral (running idea is that a tinker with a device the grabs random items from potential futures grabs a vital of Coral, ends deems it useless to anyone but Blasto and chucks it in... idk, the woods? Before getting got by the 9 when they came the guitar time because Manequin be mankillin.)

Taylor acquired mystery Vial, superhero fantasy ensues so she keeps holding off it with the hope that it might be like those old superhero comics from before Capes. Where random ass Chemical(tm) grants powers. The Emma shit happens, and instead of triggering, over new years break she Drinks it, justifying to herself that she wants to test the theory. (She doesn't, she knows damn well better, just wants to die.)

The Coral, in a dose that would OD even Rummy is DEFINITELY going to kill her, before Danny finds her and gets her to the hospital. Docs are trying their best, but can't do much more than make her die slower till Panacea gets there. She recognizes Coral is organic but to her surprise her power just goes "idk it's some kinda entry being but also organic. I can't work with this!"

She's freaked out, but also refuses to let this girl die because then she's not a Hero and therefore not a good person. So she starts allowing Taylors biology in a desperate bid to save her, effectively just doing enough to keep it from killing her ah giving places for the Coral to exist. The Coral obliges and Panacea eases up thinking she's saved her (probably feeling the first dose of endorphins in years as her power applauds her actually using it creatively, if less destructive than it wanted.)

Taylor now stable has her body subtly altered by the Coral that's there, now that it won't instakill her, basically making Taylor a Gen 1 augmented human. She wakes up, contexts to the Coral network very crudely, and gets like, inundated with memories, thoughts, and this from myriad people because fuck you Coral can communicate faster than light, abs FTL is time travel. Therefore it can communicate with the past and future. Most notably she gets a lot of Cinder Carla (onown doser, honestly a lot of her wngineers and techs too)shoved in her brain, so all sorts of designs from RaD are just floating around without all the technical knowhow to use them maximally.

Taylor, thinking this if just, how tinkers work, thinks she is a tinker (she isn't, it's run of the mill superscience not clarketech/paracausal madness, totally mass,prpducable and comprehensible by basic humies.) On top of this her immune system has basically been replaced by Coral since it can kill basically any bacteria, so her body is a breeding ground for the stuff that she uses to Kickstart Coral tech.

Something something, Administrative AI she makes named Cueball. (In universe she used the stock unity ball as his avatar and never changed it. Out of universe DESTROY... NINE-BALL.) Something something Squealer makes the world's worst AC, something something Coral is unpredictable because it exists in some sort of atemporal state, so the Entities can only predict what it can do after they've seen an example, allowing her to actually make her mechs and do this shit unordered. Something something, using Cueball to sell hyperefficient internal combustion engines to suffering countries at very reasonable rates, and working at a computer store to steal broken electronics. (It's circuit city, they beat out best buy HARD on bet cause it makes me laugh.)

#wormblr #armored core #NINE-BALL #Cueball makes a mech that can only be used by an AI with 2 coral generators in it #one that kicks on after the other is drained to allow infinite flight #Saint is screaming #taylor can't disti guish her own body from her mech #referring to it as though it were hey body when she's in it #and her physical self as her 'meat'

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the-stray-pup · 2 years

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detransition/misgendering play is a kink that some trans people are into. you can compare it to stuff like cnc, where survivors are reenacting their trauma but with full control over it. it's coping. none of them (<1%) actually want to detrans or think ftms are confused etc. it's fantasy. it's kink.

Since I went on a tangent. Tldr: if you support this shit fucking unfollow me I do not give one single fuck. This is the one and only fucking time I will be addressing this shit on my blog and I am done. So you can try to explain to me all the fuck you want but I will not be responding to that fucking shit and it will be fucking deleted/reported/blocked/etc.

Tw for vulgar language, s/h, suicide, etc. literally just don’t even read the rest of this shit if you have any triggers

Shut the actual fuck up. Literally. Shut. The. Fuck. Up. “It’s kink” no it’s literally fucking disgusting. Those trans people who are into detransition/misgendering have massive internalized shit that they need to work on. You aren’t going to sit here and compare that fucking “kink” to cnc. Cnc does not invalidate your literal fucking identity. If someone were to fucking misgender/want to detransition me wanna know what I’d fucking do? Literally want to slit my wrists and fucking die. You can say I’m kink shaming all you want and I will not give a fucking shit. I’ve already lost one follower probably from that dumbass fucking post but I. Do. Not. Fucking. Care. I’m literally on the thinnest fucking string right now and don’t. Fucking. Care. There’s a difference from being rough and pretending to say no and then literally fucking misgendering someone despite it being “consensual” and there is nothing that you will say that will fucking make me think otherwise. CNC is also a kink that has the potential to be harmful. HOWEVER detransition/misgendering is literally fucking harmful because you’re invalidating someone where as the other one is as you stated recreation. Sure there may be recreation of trauma in that fucking kink but it is more. Fucking. Trauma. Because you’re getting misgendered and whereas a society we have all already been desensitized to rape as something that is normal, so many fucking people are transphobic and will fucking think this was about trans people and for people to get off to that shit is literally fucking disgusting. Genuinely. I don’t know what it was about my original post on this topic that made you think there was a way you could explain this to me that I would be understanding of it. People who have CNC and other related kinks are taking back their SEXUALITY by controlling how they have SEX because they were FORCED to have fucking sex you fucking idiot so of course that’s gonna be the fucking coping mechanism for that shit because most are subconsciously fucking desensitizing themselves to that shit if it happens again/to help with the past experience. If some fucking nasty ass cishet fucking man we’re to be getting off while misgendering/feminizing/detransition oh me I would literally blow my fucking brains out. If people said “I ask (this person) to misgender me, etc in a nonsexual way so it doesn’t affect me as much when others do it” then MAYBE I would understand it. But people are literally nutting to this shit and I just won’t fucking have it because it does not make any fucking logical sense to be getting off to that shit unless you have some massive fucking issues that you need therapy for or because you’re fucking transphobic.

#asks #anon #not talking about this ever fucking again #so literally get the fuck off of my fucking blog #also tw for everything else mentioned on the thing up there so don’t read the tags either if any of what is mentioned is triggering to you #this is literally going to fucking make me relapse a g a i n #i just shekfndjm #WHAT THE FUCK #Updates will be getting made to my fucking pinned post because fuck this shit #and fuck every single one of you #do not fucking care #‘why would you cut yourself over this? 🙄’#BECAUSE I ALREADY HAVE HAD FUCKING ENOUGH THE PAST FEW FUCKING DAYS OKAY #I’m so fucking sick and tired of living #i literally do not fucking care #i hope I fucking get something from this old fucking razor and fucking die

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highdefinitions · 2 years

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66 (ddd)

72 / 73

okay now im done i swear

41. who's your favorite character you've ever written? probably quinn. i love her. she's so badass. who's yours?

47. is there a trope that you've written before but are now sick of? nah i don't think so. if i'm writing a trope, i'm probably going to eat it up every single time. i mean, who could ever get sick of enemies to lovers???

48. who is your favorite character to write for? has his changed since you've started writing for that fandom? i think i really really enjoying writing for josh. i seem to have a knack for always originally thinking the plot of a fic should be for him. side character wise, i also really really enjoy writing him. he's fun. sam is also super fun to write as a side character to me for some reason.

66. what's a fun fact about the dead don't die? it's actually the first fic i have published on here that i did a lot of prewriting for. usually, i sort of just write it and send it off (like shoebox? yeah, i was writing those chapters RIGHT BEFORE i was posting them). i guess that's not very fun, huh? i don't know, it's hard with this one because there hasn't been a lot that went one way and i changed last minute. maybe i guess the most fun thing about it is that i came up with the idea for the cure being in the key while i was driving home to finish up writing that chapter

72. what's your favorite writing compliment you've gotten? all of them. really. this is true. even though i'm HORRIBLE at taking compliments, it makes my heart go a little funny every time i read what someone has to say about something i've written. it's a lot of the reason that i continue to write and post

73. what do you tend to get complimented on the most about your writing? i would guess my ability to balance angst into a love story maybe?? i'm really horrible at taking compliments, but i think a lot of compliments i do receive are about how well i can write angst (i hated saying that oh wow i don't want to praise myself ever again)

75. is there a particular fic that readers gravitated towards that you didn't expect? the dead don't die actually. tumblr is pretty notorious for having self inserts, and i'd seen some people protesting ocs which made me nervous for it. i also hadn't seen a lot of aus being written beside lazarus and the lost boys, so i was also very nervous about putting out an au when i didn't really seem to see a lot of other people doing it. i sort of just said fuck it and see what happens and i'm glad i did because it has become something that so so many people have come to love

76. how do you deal with writing pressure, whether internal or external? i really just try not to pressure myself with it if i'm being honest. i know that's really difficult and i even struggle with it sometimes but the world will not end if i miss a day that i'm supposed to post on. i can't rush it, or else, it won't be good, and i want it to be good. now, sometimes, i do get into my head of 'well, this chapter sucks. it's worse than all the ones before it. i suck.' which is annoying but usually i just have to take a break, do something else, shut the computer off for the night, and then the next day it's not so bad.

i am also very thankful that you guys are super understanding with me when i miss a day or am late posting <3

77. why do you enjoy writing fanfiction? i've always really really liked writing. when i was younger, i had always wanted to write a book so i would work on some stuff here and there. i started writing fanfiction because in a way it was a little bit easier than creating a whole story from scratch. i already had characters, so all they needed were relationships and a storyline. then i sort of fell in love with the way that i could connect with people i suppose. i made friends on apps and had people telling me i should write more so i just did. also, writing about my favorite people is really cool too

#percy's asks #ask game

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tarobytez · 3 years

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disability in the Six Of Crows Duology; an analysis of Kaz Brekker, Wylan Van Eck, and the fandom’s treatment of them.

****Note: I originally wrote this for a tiktok series, which im still going to do, but i wanted to post here as well bc tumblr is major contributor to what im going to talk about

CW: ableism, filicide, abuse

In the Six of Crows duology, Leigh Bardugo delicately subverts and melds harmful disability tropes into her narrative, unpacking them in a way that I, as a disabled person, found immensely refreshing and…. just brilliant.

But what did you all do with that? Well, you fucked it up. Instead of critically looking at the characters, y’all just chose to be ableist.

For the next few videos paragraphs im going to unpack disability theory (largely the stuff surrounding media, for obvious reasons) and how it relates to Six Of Crows and the characterization of Kaz Brekker and Wylan Van Eck, then how, despite their brilliant writing, y’all completely overlooked the actual text and continuously revert them to ableist cariactures.

Disclaimer: 1. Shocker - i am disabled. I have also extensively researched disability theory and am very active in the disabled community. Basically, I know my shit. 2. im going to be mad in these videos this analysis. Because the way y’all have been acting has been going on for a long ass time and im fuckin sick of it. I don’t give a shit about non-disabled feelings, die mad

Firstly, I’m going to discuss Kaz, his play on the stereotypical “mean cripple” trope and how Bardugo subverts it, his cane, and disabled rage. Then, I am going to discuss Wylan, the “inspiration porn” stereotype, caregivers / parents, and the social model of disability. Finally, I will then explain the problems in the fandom from my perspective as a disabled person, largely when it comes to wylan, bc yall cant leave that boy tf alone.

Kaz Brekker

Think of a character who uses a cane (obviously not Kaz). Now, are they evil, dubiously moral, or just an asshole in general? Because nearly example I can think of is: whether it be Lots’O from Toy Story, Lucius Malfoy, or even Scrooge and Mr.Gold from Once Upon A Time all have canes (the last two even having their canes appear less and less as they become better people)

The mean/evil cripple trope is far more common than you would think. Villains with different bodies are confined to the role of “evil”. To quote TV Tropes, who I think did a brilliant job on explaining it “The first is rooted in eugenics-based ideas linking disability or other physical deformities with a "natural" predisposition towards madness, criminality, vice, etc. The Rule of Symbolism is often at work here, since a "crippled" body can be used to represent a "crippled" soul — and indeed, a disabled villain is usually put in contrast to a morally upright and physically "perfect" hero. Whether consciously on the part of the writer or not, this can reinforce cultural ideas of disability making a person inherently inferior or negative, much in the same way the Sissy Villain or Depraved Homosexual trope associate sexual and gender nonconformity with evil. ”

Our introduction to Kaz affirms this notion of him being bad or morally bankrupt, with “Kaz Brekker didn’t need a reason”, etc. This mythologized version of himself, the “bastard of the barrel” actively fed into this misconception. But, as we the audience are privy to his inner thoughts, know that he is just a teenager like every other Crow. He is complex, his disability isn’t this tragic backstory, he just fell off a roof. It’s not his main motivation, nor does he curse revenge for making him a cripple - it is just another part of who he is.

His cane (though the shows version fills me with rage but-) is an extension of Kaz - he fights with it, but it has a purpose. Another common thing in media is for canes to be simply accessories, but while Kaz’ cane is fashionable, it has purpose.

The quote “There was no part of him that was not broken, that had not healed wrong and there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken.” is so fucking powerful. Kaz does not want nor need a cure - its said in Crooked Kingdom that his leg could most likely be healed, but he chooses not to. Abled-bodied people tend to dismiss this thought as Kaz being stubborn but it shows a reality of acceptance of his disability that is just, so refreshing.

In chapter 22 of SOC, we see disabled rage done right - when he is called a cripple by the Fjerdan inmate, Kaz is pissed - the important detail being that he is pissed at the Fjerdan, at society for ableism, not blaming it on being disabled or wishing he could be normal. He takes action, dislocating the asshole’s shoulder and proving to him, and to a lesser extent, himself, that he is just as capable as anyone else, not in spite of, but because he is disabled. And that is the point of Kaz, harking back to the line that “there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken”.

I cried on numerous occasions while reading the SOC duology, but the parts I highlighted in this section especially so. I, as many other disabled people do, have had a long and tumultuous relationship with our disability/es, and for many still struggle. But Kaz Brekker gave me an empowered disabled character who accepts themselves, and that means the world to me.

Keeping that in mind, I hope you can understand why it hurts so much to disabled people when you either erase Kaz’s disability (whether through cosplay or fanfiction), or portray him as a “broken boy uwu”, especially implying that he would want a cure. That flies in the face of canon and is inherently fucking ableist. (if u think im mad wait until the next section)

Next, we have Wylan.

Oh fucking boy.

I love Wylan so fucking much, and y’all just do not seem to understand his character? Like at all? Since this is disability-centric, I’m not going to discuss how the intersection of his queerness also contributes to these issues, but trust me when I say it’s a contributing factor to what i'm going to say.

Wylan, motherfucking Van Eck. If you ableist pricks don’t take ur fucking hands off him right now im going to fight you. I see Wylan as a subversion another, and in my opinion more insidious stereotype pf disabled people - inspiration porn.

Cara Liebowitz in a 2015 article on the blog The Body Is Not An Apology explains in greater detail how inspiration porn is impactful in real life, but media is a major contributing factor to this reality. The technical definition is “the portrayal of people with disabilities as inspirational solely or in part on the basis of their disability” - but that does not cover it fully.

Inspiration porn does lasting damage on the disabled community as it implies that disability is a negative that you need to “overcome” or “triumph” instead of something one can feel proud of. It exploits disabled people for the development of non-disabled people, and in media often the white male protagonist. Framing disability as inherently negative perpetuates ideals of eugenics and cures - see Autism $peaks’ “I Am Autism” ad. Inspiration porn is also incredibly patronizing as it implies that we cannot take care of ourselves, or do things like non-disabled people do. Because i stg some of you tend to think that we just sit around all day wishing we weren’t disabled.

Another important theory ideal that is necessary when thinking about Wylan is the experience of feeling like a burden simply for needing help or accommodations. This is especially true when it comes to familial relationships, and internalized ableism.

The rhetoric that Wylan’s father drilled into his head, that he is “defective”, “a mistake”, and “needs to be corrected”, that he (Jan) was “cursed with a moron for a child” is a long held belief that disabled people hear relentlessly. And while many see Van Eck’s attempted murder of Wylan as “preposturous” and overall something that you would never think happens today - filicide (a parent murdering their child) is more common than you would like to believe. Without even mentioning the countless and often unreported deaths of disabled people due to lack of / insufficient / neglectful medical care, in a study on children who died from the result of household abuse, 40 of 42 of them (95%) were diagnosed with disabilities. Van Eck is not some caricature of ableist ideals - he is a real reflection on how many people and family members view disability.

Circling back to how Wylan unpacks the inspiration porn trope - he is 3 dimensional, he is not only used to develop the other characters, he is just *chefs kiss* Leigh, imo, put so much love and care into the creation of Wylan and his story and character growth that is representative of a larger feeling in the disabled community.

That being said, what you non-disabled motherfuckers have done to him.

The “haha Wylan can’t read” jokes aren’t and were not funny. Y’all literally boiled down everything Wylan is to him being dyslexic. And it’s like,,,, the only thing you can say about him. You ignore every other part of him other than his disability, and then mock him for it. There’s so much you can say about Wylan - simping for Jesper, being band kid and playing the fuckin flute, literally anything else. But no, you just chose to mock his disability, excellent fucking job!

Next up on “ableds stfu” - infantilization! y’all are so fucking condescending to Wylan, and treat him like a fucking toddler. And while partly it is due to his sexuality i think a larger portion is him being disabled. Its in the same vein of people who think that Wylan and Jesper are romantically one sided, and that Jesper only kind of liked Wylan, despite the canon evidence of him loving Wylan just as much. You all view him as a “smol bean”, who needs protecting, and care, when Wylan is the opposite of that. He is a fucking demolitions expert who suggested waking up sleeping men to kill them - what about that says “uwu”. You are treating Wylan as a burden to Jesper and the other Crows when he is an immensely valuable, fully autonomous disabled person - you all just view him as damaged.

And before I get a comment saying that “uhhh Wylan isn’t real why do you care” while Wylan may not be real, how you all view him and treat him has real fucking impacts and informs how you treat people like me. If someone called me an “uwu baby boy” they’d get a fist square in the fucking jaw. Fiction informs how we perceive the world and y’all are making it super fucking clear how you see disabled people.

Finally, I wanted to talk about how the social model of disability is portrayed through Wylan. For those who are unaware, the social model of disability contrasts the medical model, that views the disability itself as the problem, that needs to be cured, whereas the social model essentially boils down to creating an accommodating society, where disability acceptance and pride is the goal. And we see this with Wylan - he is able to manage his father’s estate, with Jesper’s assistance to help him read documents. And this is not out of pity or charity, but an act of love. It is not portrayed as this almighty act for Jesper to play saviour, just a given, which is incredibly important to show, especially for someone who has been abused by family for his disability like Wylan, that he is accepted.

Yet, I still see people hold up Jesper on a pedestal for “putting up with” Wylan, as if loving a disabled person deserves a fucking pat on the back. It’s genuinely exhausting trying to engage with a work I love so much with a fandom that thinks so little of me and my community. It fucking shows.

Overall, Leigh Bardugo as a disabled person wrote two incredibly meticulous and empowered disabled characters, and due to either lack of reading comprehension, ableism, or a quirky mix of both, the fandom has ignored canon and the experiences of disabled people for…. shits and giggles i guess. And yes, there are issues with the Grishaverse and disability representation - while I haven’t finished them yet so I do not have an opinion on it, people have been discussing issues in the KOS duology with ableist ideals. This mini series was no way indicative of the entire disabled experience, nor does it represent my entire view on the representation as a whole. These things need to be met critically in our community, and talked about with disabled voices at the forefront. For example, the limited perspective we get of Wylan and Kaz being both white men, does not account for a large portion of the disabled community and the intersection of multiple identities.

All-in-all, Critique media, but do not forget to also critique fandom spaces. Alternatively, just shut the fuck up :)

happy fucking disability pride month, ig

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queerpiracy · 2 years

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Ed Teach, Izzy hands, and the inter-generational trauma of it all

Ed’s character is such an excellent look at the societal role of manhood and what it takes to break out of that mold. Men are told to be brutal, be efficient, and then stuff everything else down until the day they die. Connection? Emotion? Softness? Never.

We all agree this is Bad! However, I’ve been marinating on the idea that, when we get down to it, our prejudices may suffocate us but they also keep us safe. It’s a twisted safety that perpetuates terrible trauma and stifles the human spirit, but it also provides material security in a society that is poised to grind you up and kill you young if you show signs of Otherness.

This brings me to Israel Hands. Izzy has kept Ed safe in the context of pirating society. He has maintained Ed’s image as the most feared and brilliant pirate in the history of the world. In fact, Izzy-as-toxic-masculinity has been so successful that everyone throws themselves out of Ed’s path to avoid him! The infamous Blackbeard just has to hold out his hand and people will give him whatever he wants. And, Ed’s life is so empty and meaningless he’s going mad.

David Jenkins tweeted “A lot of what we’re taught about being a man is wrong”. Ed’s character arc is about choosing to (and learning how to) leave behind the toxic pirate culture of Izzy (who is traumatized, misguided, acting out of fear and self-loathing (and love)) and embrace the expressiveness, softness, and Otherness of Stede Bonnet.

But--and I love that OFMD very clearly shows this--it’s not a simple choice. In many ways, choosing softness paints a target on your back (and gets you tied to a rowboat and stoned). Izzy/society knows this, which is why he tries to “save” Edward from Stede (i.e. force him back into the box of What A Real Man Does) again and again. And the fucked thing is that I kind of see where Izzy is coming from. I mean, and we’re shown again and again that he is the antagonist and we the audience shouldn’t want him around, and I am onboard with this. But we’re also shown that when you trade in the power of fear and obedience for the much more vulnerable state of connectedness, you can not only lose the social capital provided by toxic masculinity but also open yourself up to the terrible hurt of rejection.

Here’s my original thought that launched this meta and a bit of a left turn, sorry, but whatever you’re not my advisor: why does Izzy move me? I think it’s because he represents not only the dangers and suffocation of societally prescribed masculinity, he also represents the people in our lives who pass on generational trauma because that is the only way they learned how to love us. I see so many of my family members in Izzy Hands. I see family members who, out of their hard-earned fear, tried to teach me how to protect myself from the world and only ended up teaching me to hate myself and shut myself away. I also see a bit of myself in him. My own fear response, my own internalized homophobia. We’re in it, folks. We gaze into the darkness and it gazes back with hazel eyes and a raspy “fuck”.

Ed needs to find himself, still, because remember he went back to Izzy, called on Izzy to bring him tea, and ultimately violently subsumed himself in the role that Izzy demanded of him. He can’t un-love Stede Bonnet, though. I predict that part of Ed’s character arc will be him accepting that he has to choose between Izzy and Stede, because right now he keeps trying to balance the two (when Izzy lost the duel and was preparing to row away, Ed yells something like, “You shouldn’t have dueled him, Izzy! We could have worked this out!” Yeah, no. Intolerance and fear can’t coexist with curiousity and openness).

This isn’t to say I think Ed needs to kill Izzy. Since Israel Hands’.... everything.... is an allegory for trauma and toxic masculinity, I think one of the most powerful things the narrative could do is allow Izzy to live. Because, at the end of the day, we overcome our toxic and limiting beliefs not by cutting them out of our bodies like a tumor (it doesn’t work like that, sadly) but by recognizing them for the trauma response they are. By holding them gently but firmly. By separating ourselves from them. By thanking them for trying to protect us in the only way they knew how, and firmly moving away from them in a search for new ways of doing things.

Though if Izzy refuses to separate and continues fighting to keep Ed in the role of The Kraken, he may need to take a long walk off a short pier. y'know. Healthy boundaries and all.

#love a good 'quick post' that moves me from my phone to my laptop and takes 1.5 hours to write #izzy ofmd #ed ofmd #ofmd meta #izzy hands get therapy

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mayihavethisdanse · 3 years

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“What is this, the Dark Ages?”

Or, Arthurian themes and allusions in the Brotherhood of Steel mythos as seen in Fallout 4. (But that’s a lot of words.)

Yep. We're doing this.

First, some obligatory caveats: there is no single Arthurian canon, just 1500 years of assorted fanfic based on the whims of whoever was writing at the time. For this extremely highbrow Tumblr meta, I have ignored most of it and drawn on my favorites. Also Wikipedia.

Also, I am not an expert in Arthurian literature (or Fallout lore, come to that), and I preemptively beg the pardon of anyone who is.

Finally, in no way am I claiming that all these parallels and thematic echoes are deliberate or even significant. In fact, I'd break it down into:

Clearly deliberate allusions, whether in or out of universe;

Probably coincidence, but could be someone deliberately capitalizing on a coincidental similarity;

Almost certainly coincidence, but fun to speculate about; annnnd

Blatant Monty Python references. (Because of course there are.)

I'll start with the big one.

Arthur Maxson, boy king and unifier

(source)

So across all the retellings and variations of King Arthur’s life story, there are a few consistent elements, particularly in his early life and rise to power. Some of these threads are echoed in the Fallout universe, specifically (and unsurprisingly) in the person of Arthur Maxson.

Both the legendary King Arthur and Arthur Maxson were born with a claim to power lying in their ancestry, both were fostered away from their families, and both proved themselves in combat at a young age.

King Arthur united the warring kingdoms of Britain into a single entity, making them stronger against outsiders and receiving general admiration and acclaim. Arthur Maxson united the divided factions of the BoS after the events of Fallout 3 and is held in similarly high regard by his men.

The name Prydwen is a reference to the ship of the original King Arthur. Presumably, Arthur Maxson (or someone in the BoS who anticipated his promotion) christened the airship in a deliberate homage to the Arthurian myth.

King Arthur is associated with his legendary sword. I think it’s notable that Maxson’s legend is associated with a bladed weapon, too. ("He killed a DEATHCLAW with a COMBAT KNIFE!”)

Probably coincidence, but fun: the historical emperor Magnus Maximus, who pops up a lot in early Arthurian legend, was known in Welsh as... Macsen. (⌐■_■)

Round Table, but make it dieselpunk

(Continued under the cut.)

Moving away from obvious allusions and into some looser parallels:

Like the Round Table, the Brotherhood is an exclusive knightly order with its leader being the one able to open it up to his chosen few.

Like the Round Table, the BoS sees itself as defending human civilization against forces of chaos. (I’ll touch on their tech-hoarding tendencies when I get to the Grail stuff.) This idea of civilization in the face of chaos goes back to the BoS’s founding, even though the level of isolationism we see in most of the Fallout franchise is not exactly what founder Roger Maxson had in mind: “Notably, Maxson's ultimate intention was to establish the Brotherhood as an organization that works closely with people outside of the Brotherhood, as guardians of civilizations, not its gatekeepers.” (source) In a lot of ways, Arthur Maxson represents a return to his ancestor’s original ideals.

Renegade knights? Internal politics? Traitors within? We gotchu.

In both the medieval legends and in all chapters of the BoS we’ve seen, there’s a big focus on bloodlines (ew). Ironically, it’s probably Arthur Maxson’s unquestionable ancestry that allows him to be more progressive than either of his East Coast predecessors when it comes to boosting Brotherhood numbers by recruitment (even though you can still see a clear division between “born Brotherhood” and recruited soldiers, but that’s a topic for another day). Maxson sees himself as an Elder who "cares for the people"—however misguided and patronizing that attitude might be—and whatever else you might say about the guy, you can't say he doesn't believe he has a duty. Which brings us to…

Know Your Enemy: Danse as Gawain

Before I start this section, an acknowledgement of authorial bias:

Gawain, as portrayed in the Middle English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, is my very favorite of King Arthur’s knights. (Other stories aren't always as flattering, but like I said at the outset: I'm sticking to the ones I like.)

That poem is my very favorite piece of medieval Arthurian literature. In this section, I'll refer to the modern English translation by Simon Armitage.

...that’s it, I have no other biases to disclose.

What? 👀

(Art: Clive Hicks-Jenkins)

All right. So in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, you’ve got this himbo loyal knight of Arthur’s who finds himself caught up in... you know what, let me just paste in the Wikipedia summary. (The Toast, RIP, also did a pretty entertaining and more-or-less accurate recap.)

It describes how Sir Gawain, a knight of King Arthur's Round Table, accepts a challenge from a mysterious "Green Knight" who dares any knight to strike him with his axe if he will take a return blow in a year and a day. Gawain accepts and beheads him with his blow, at which the Green Knight stands up, picks up his head and reminds Gawain of the appointed time. In his struggles to keep his bargain, Gawain demonstrates chivalry and loyalty until his honour is called into question by a test involving the lord and the lady of the castle where he is a guest.

Don’t worry too much about the plot details, though; for this post, I’m more interested in the thematic parallels. The Green Knight story is full of contrasts: order vs. chaos, civilization vs. wilderness, mortal man vs. Other... but let’s start with Gawain himself.

Some stuff to know about Gawain:

He was "as good as the purest gold, devoid of vices but virtuous and loyal". Gawain took his principles more seriously even than the rest of Arthur’s knights, not out of pride but out of humility: "I would rather drop dead than default from duty," he says.

He’s faithful and honorable and never even tempted to betray an oath, even when offered every variety of seduction and riches, except for a single moment of weakness in a desperate desire not to be executed for random shit by powerful forces for reasons he doesn't understand.

Even though he doesn’t really understand why he needs to die, he sticks to his oath. Gawain's one weakness is a moment of desperate, private, human desire for survival. He'll submit to the headsman’s axe if he has to, but he'd still rather live.

Above all, Gawain is the ideal of a human man: he might be the bravest and loyal man there is, but he’s still fundamentally human.

You can probably see where I'm going with this.

A few more fun facts about Gawain that resonate with Paladin Danse’s story:

He’s got a bunch of really shitty brothers. (No comment.)

Gawain (SPOILERS!) doesn't actually end up beheaded, but he does willingly kneel for his execution and gets a cut on the throat as a reminder of his sin. And, uh, Danse can also get his throat cut! It doesn’t end as nicely but it’s, you know, a thing that can happen.

Gawain might be a really good guy, and he tries really hard to be one, but in the end he’s nothing more than that: there’s nothing supernatural about him, he has no special powers beyond his own principles and devotion. He’s just a dude doing his Best.

Wait, why not Danselot?

Oh, that guy? Here’s the thing.

Lancelot personifies the continental ideals of courtly love that became popular in the High Middle Ages. Central to his story is the prioritization of personal relationships and romantic feelings in a way that you don’t really see in Gawain's, at least in the Green Knight tale. (Later stories hook Gawain up with an extremely delightful lady, but even that is a different flavor of romance than Lancelot's and has more to do with Gawain honoring his word and his egalitarian treatment of women (hell yeah). In the poem, Gawain is impressed by Bertilak's wife but resists her temptation; in fact, the biggest risk is not that he'll yield to her advances but that he'll be discourteous to her, i.e., violate his principles and cause dishonor to his king and his host.)

Lancelot is driven by passions over principles in a way that Gawain never really is (at least in the stories I’m talking about; later writers have committed character assassination to various degrees). Yes, you could argue that both Gawain and Lancelot betray their oaths, but Lancelot’s betrayal is never, um, blind. He knows what he’s doing and makes a deliberate choice to prioritize his love for the queen over his love for the king. It doesn’t make him a bad guy—he too is an ideal knight with one fatal flaw—but his character isn’t as comparable to Paladin Danse.

Yeah, Gawain is (in most stories) a prince and a kinsman of Arthur’s, but he’s ultimately a native boy who doesn’t break the mold of a Knight of the Round Table. Likewise, Danse is portrayed as competent and valuable to the BoS, but not exceptional or breaking the mold of what a BoS soldier should be: he simply represents the ideal. Meanwhile, Lancelot is a foreign prince who was marked from childhood as special and fancy, and his storyline goes alllll over the place. (Much like this post.)

For example, Lancelot goes to absolutely absurd extremes to prove his devotion for no other reason than to prove it. (“I’ll do any useless humiliating thing you want. I’ll betray every oath except the one I made to you. That’s what love is!”) Gawain would never. Danse would never.

Ultimately, Gawain's tests are of his character and not of his love. And like Gawain, Danse’s devotion is to service and his principles, not to another person—even Arthur Maxson.

All that said, there are some similarities: both are beloved by Arthur, both are held up as the ideal of what a knight should be. And even if their fatal flaws are different, both make the point that no matter how good and brave and loyal they might be, no human being can be perfect.

(Except Galahad. Who is, as a result, very boring.)

I’ll conclude this section with a quote from someone else’s take on the Greek Knight poem:

I like Gawain. He’s not perfect, but he’s trying his best which is all any of us can do. He’s not like the other knights in the Arthurian legends who occasionally ‘accidentally’ kill women on their little adventures and then feel hard done by when they have to deal with the consequences of that. Gawain holds himself to a high standard – higher, it seems, than Arthur and his knights hold him to considering how hard they laugh when Gawain tells them how bad he feels about the whole thing.

I think Gawain is very relatable in this story. We all want to be better than we actually are.

And that, more than anything else, is Danse.

The Grail myth

What’s that? Lost relics of power? Better send some large armed men after ‘em!

The parallels to the BoS’s tech-hoarding ways are obvious enough that the games themselves lampshade them (albeit by way of Monty Python). But it also ties into the larger themes of “purity” versus “corruption” and the BoS’s self-image as a bastion between civilization and chaos. (See Maxson's line in response to the Sole Survivor’s quip about the Dark Ages: “Judging from the state of the world, it wouldn't be a stretch to say we're living in that era again.”)

But the ultimate futility of the Grail mission is also worthy of note. The BoS might want the power of prewar tech on their side, but they’re no more to be trusted with it than any other group of human beings. No matter how they try, the “corruption” of humanity can’t be overcome as long as they’re striving to harness power for their own ends. You can only achieve power by surrendering control of it.

The death of Arthur

The nature of gameplay being what it is, it's not guaranteed that the Arthur figure will be fatally betrayed, bringing Camelot down with him—but it's not unlikely, either.

Awkward.

Some final spitballing:

Outside the Brotherhood, there are some fun parallels of the Arthur myth with the rest of Fallout 4. Betrayal by one’s own son, for example.

The key difference between the BoS and the legendary Round Table: King Arthur’s knights, for all their flaws and human weaknesses, are usually presented as unambiguous Good Guys. The BoS is... a little more ambiguous...

...but damn if they don’t think they're the good guys.

A-ad victoriam, fellas!

#fallout #fallout 4 #brotherhood of steel #arthur maxson #paladin danse #sir gawain and the green knight #sir gawain #gawain #knights of the round table #king arthur #elder maxson #fallout 3 #fallout lore #maxson #roger maxson #look mom I did a meta

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gunterfan1992 · 3 years

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Interview with Fan Artist loycos!

(Art by loycos)

So a few months ago, I was absent-mindedly scrolling on Tumblr (or was it Twitter?) when I came across something: an Adventure Time fan comic by an artist named loycos. As a person embedded in fan spaces, I find fanart like this all the time, but this time, there was something special about the art I was seeing. It was so... show-accurate!

I don’t mean that necessarily in regard to the art style (although it does feel right at home in the Land of Ooo, while still being its own thing with its own flourishes), but rather in relation to the characterization; the way loycos wrote the characters was spot on. She nailed PB and Marceline’s dynamic as former lovers who deep-down miss one another. She nailed Finn’s naive heroism and his one-sided crush on PB. She nailed Jake’s goofball energy. It was perfect.

In the past, I’ve only interviewed people affiliated with the show’s production, but I thought I’d mix things up a bit and reach out to some fan artists that I think are fantastic. As such, I’m delighted to share with you an interview I had with loycos, who answered my questions about her art, her history with Adventure Time, and where her work is headed!

What is your 'artistic origin' story?

[It’s] kind of a corny answer, but I've been drawing since I remember myself. My earliest drawing memories are drawing Clifford (the big red dog) fanart when I was around 5 y/o. I was always more of a "fangirl" artist, [and] I would draw characters from my favorite franchises to illustrate my headcanons and daydream scenarios I'd put them in. That hadn't changed one bit since. I had since gone on to study animation and illustration in official institutions which forced me to design characters and worlds of my own, but when I draw for myself it's always back to fanart (or studies). I don't have any OCs.

Are there particular artists or styles that you were inspired by and/or like to emulate or allude to?

I'd joke that my artstyle is just a mesh of all the franchises I've drawn fanart for over the years, but honestly, is it even a joke? I think you can easily recognize I had a Disney Phase like every other teenager (I didn't have an anime phase though! I know, I'm an anomaly) and [Steven Universe] definitely left it's fat mark on my style too. Out of [Steven Universe]'s storyboarding crew (which I followed very closely over the years) I especially love Raven Molisee and Jeff Liu for their wacky expressions and proportions, and of course Rebecca Sugar for their fluid and carefree lines. When it comes to art in general, I tend to prefer stylized, colorful and brushy styles over realistic or gothic ones, So people like Hue Teo and Patri Balanovsky pop to my mind (and my artstation feed, seriously look them up).

How do you approach your projects; what is your general art process?

It really depends on the type of project I'm doing, though, my [Adventure Time] comics were all pretty similar in their conception: I write down all of my ideas in my notes so I won't forget them. Then I either roughly sketch out the entire comic as fast as I can, or I write a script (if the concept is specifically very dialog heavy) and then sketch it roughly. Then I do the lineart and color, nothing too complicated. The one thing I think is worth noting in my long comic process is that I draw all of my panels on the same document- that way it's easier for me to make sure the characters stay on model and that my panel layout remains fresh. So basically, the way you read the comics on tumblr, as a long scroll, is the format I work on.

How did you come to find Adventure Time? What made you join the fandom?

Adventure Time is one of those shows you just know about, so I don't remember how I first found out about the show. However, I do remember when I started shipping Bubbline—after the episode “Broke His Crown” aired. I somehow ended up in their Tumblr tag and was blown away by the (by 2016's standards) blatant representation. Despite my obsession with them at the time, I never actually watched any episode that didn't feature the girls' relationship. I only started fully watching the show recently. But I did consume a lot of fan content, which I think helped me shape my own headcanons and such. After my initial interest in 2016 I put Bubbline back on the back burner and kept on my [Steven Universe] ramage, until last year's “Obsidian,” which brought me back fully on board the Bubbline decks around 2 weeks before it aired, so I was in maximum hype mode when I watched the special. It did not disappoint [and it] really reminded me of why I loved these characters and their relationship to begin with. I started drawing my own art for the ship shortly after, when I felt like the hype around the special died down and there wasn't much to keep me sustained anymore. I make what I want to see ;)

As for joining the fandom, I don't know if I can be considered a member, seeing how inactive I am most of the time and my very limited list of [Adventure Time] mutuals. I am extremely flattered that my stuff caught ATimers attention in a positive way.

You've done some amazing Bubblegum and Marceline stuff. What draws you to their dynamic?

I'm gay.

OK, seriously now. I have a soft spot for extremely feminine, dainty characters that are very reserved, so PB immediately marked herself as an obvious fav, and the road to shipping her with Marceline (who is such an obvious candidate and a multilayered, fascinating character herself) was a short one. I know calling PB dainty is far from a true statement, but that's what she appeared like on the surface and that's what caught my attention. Another thing is that I love relationships between immortal beings, I think it always adds another layer of complexity to any relationship, especially a romantic one. The whole "getting older without appearing like you've aged" and "watching everyone you love die around you while you stay the same" can surely make 2 beings bond, right? It always felt like PB and Marcy get each other in a way no one else can, they are very different on the surface but share fundamental internal similarities. Oh, and the fact that they're EXES? The romantic tension and the longing? The familiarity and banter they had in every scene they shared?This hit the jackpot on literally every relationship trope that I love. I'd much rather watch a "getting back together" than a "falling in love for the first time" story.

All of this and the fact that they [are] gay. It's really that simple sometimes.

In broad strokes, what is next for you as an artist and/or as a fan?

I have a few [Adventure Time] comics ideas\scripts on the back burner and one that is in the making. I think I'll dabble into some Nintendo fanart cause I've been playing a lot of Smash Bros and [Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild] lately.

I’m so excited to see what comes next! Either way, a huge thanks to loycos for chattin’ with me! If you’d like to check out more of her art, visit her Tumblr and her Twitter page!

#adventure time #atimers #adventuretime #bubbline #princess bubblegum #marceline #marceline the vampire queen #pb #marcy #loycos #fanart #fan art #interview #fandom

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bigskydreaming · 2 years

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So I got an ask wondering about what my usual depiction of Lilith is based on in Titans stuff, and how much of it draws on the books and from where, versus just kinda making a lesser known character be what I want. Which is an extremely valid ask, make no mistake.

But now I’m deep diving into her earliest appearances again, because her initial depiction is 100% what every single thing I love about this epic drama queen is based on, and why I will defend that interpretation of her to the absolute death, THE DEATH SAYS I.....and I’m just.....kermiting all over again at what an absolute GEM they had with Lilith Clay right off the bat. Only to literally just water down her character more and more each time they brought her back after time spent in comics Limbo.

To the point where it really doesn’t shock me that my take on Lilith comes out of left field for a lot of people who have only read Lilith starting in the 90s onward. Because I feel like past a certain point new writers literally just looked at this red-headed psychic and said “This is a Jean Grey” but also their knowledge of Jean Grey was solely limited to the 90′s X-Men Animated cartoon where all the show usually gave Jean to work with was lots of scenes shouting “Scoooooott” and dramatically fainting a lot.

But original recipe Lilith just has so much FLAVOR. Like this is the girl who after years of seeing the Teen Titans exist as like, just the same five teens known as the respective sidekicks to five of the world’s most famous heroes and never showing a hint they wanted to expand beyond that...she literally just decided “yeah I’m gonna go join up with the Titans when nobody even asked because I wanna and also I’m a go-getter, so, look out world, here comes the sixth Titan” - and that’s pretty much exactly what happened then.

She kinda just....auditions herself when all the original Titans are looking at each other like wait did we pass out flyers for a recruitment drive, did anyone else know we were looking to expand? And Lilith’s just like shhh, I sensed your need, now stop talking and listen raptly, I’m monologuing. And also voguing. I have so many skillsets, how do I do it.

And then this absolute ICON of a diva like, vogues in their direction, jazz fingers wagging for emphasis as she dramatically INTONES on one of the pages of her debut issue, which introduced her in media res and then flashed back to how the Titans first encountered her:

“TITANS! A man is going to DIE tonight, unless you stop it, and if you do not, his death will be ON YOUR HANDS!”

Like, case in point number one: This is not a woman who believes in doing anything by half measure, or who’s afraid to make her presence felt. Classic Lilith never stepped softly a day in her life, and she sure as hell didn’t when deciding on how best to petition famous superheroes for a shot at joining their extremely exclusive club.

Now admittedly, because Lilith was rarely a focal viewpoint character in her earliest appearances, in large part because she wasn’t a known quantity like the other iconic teen heroes but also because a huge part of her initial concept was the constant air of mystery she was shrouded in, with the others always wondering about how much she knew and could be trusted....this means that we didn’t get a ton of internal monologue from Lilith or a look into her actual motivations or thoughts about the various events unfolding. So full disclosure, basing my interpretation on mostly just her earliest appearances requires some coloring in and filling in the blanks for a lot of her very-open-to-interpretation early actions, and I acknowledge there’s room for them to be interpreted in other ways than how I view them. But again, I don’t think my take just comes out of nowhere; its earned by how the narrative wrote her.

Because see, one of the biggest unknowns with Lilith’s character and a lot of her actions, is its a proven quantity that she’s a psychic whose powers include precognition....but just how DETAILED her visions are, and how MUCH foreknowledge she has, is very up in the air for the most part.

So one of the earliest criticisms paid of new Titan Lilith, both out of universe and by her new teammates, was if she knew exactly how the man in issue #25 of the original Teen Titans was going to die, and what the Titans had to do with it and thus how to prevent it....why was she as vague as she was, when the only reason she gave for her ambiguity was she wanted to impress upon the Titans how valuable her skillset was and that they needed her.

This in turn colored a lot of their early wariness of her, and why several were less than enthusiastic about welcoming her with open arms, thus meaning right out the gate she was perceived as something of an outlier to the 05 and didn’t get grandfathered into their group dynamic as having the same kind of closeness with them that the 05 are all famous for having with each other. Wally in particular had trouble trusting her or her motivations, because so much of his character is “I think science is neat, and if you don’t, you’re probably a witch, gee whiz” and precognition is not exactly a powerset that goes hand in hand with reliable and verifiable. Oh Wally. Go eat a Snickers.

But the point is, it could be argued that Lilith didn’t do her introduction to her future teammates any favors by being withholding right off the bat rather than give them everything they needed to save the man in her visions. Ironic for a psychic. Course, that’s also what informs a lot of my take on early Lilith and why I love her so much....because my personal belief is that Lilith just didn’t KNOW all that much from her vision, and was kinda bringing it to the Teen Titans as a hail mary type of thing that maybe they could do enough with what little she had that it saved the man in her dreams. BUT at the same time, I ALSO view a key component of things being that like.....Lilith was intentionally vague about NOT having a clear picture of events, in order to leverage her powers and information into what she was after, aka membership as a Titan.

And this is where other details about early Lilith are critical: specifically, that she was an orphan and foster child who was bounced around from one home to the next due to people being wary of the strange child who always seemed to know things she shouldn’t, and whose attempts to endear herself to people and make herself invaluable to them and thus less likely to be sent away, like, constantly backfired on her and became the reason they DID send her away. People didn’t like that young Lilith Clay had inexplicable knowledge of things they usually didn’t WANT anyone else to know, and the fact that she really just wanted to help, not actually use the insights she had to hurt people....tended to get lost in the shuffle.

So Lilith, though not fully spelled out as such, was from a very early point presented as someone who was used to her powers working AGAINST her, at cross purposes from what she actually wanted to do with them. By the time we met her in the comics, her primary motivation aside from her wishes to make something of herself and her power, was to try and find out where she came from, who her parents were, etc. This had eventually led her to the employ of Mr. Jupiter, an eccentric DC billionaire whose history had given him various connections to the hero community, and she somehow got herself hired as his personal assistant in return for his help in vouching for her to the Titans when she ultimately engineers an encounter with them.

(Ironically, later retcons would reveal that Mr. Jupiter was in fact her biological father and though this was part of what had led Lilith to him over the course of her search for her origins, he neglected to share this info - which he was well aware of - during her hiring interview. Guess Lil comes by her inscrutability and penchant for Literally Why Tho dramatics honestly. I’m just saying!)

The point to all of this being that even without her earliest issues detailing her thought process explicitly, the clues are all there to interpret her as someone who was used to people assuming the worst of her and her intentions, and who thus had to try and make the most of what she DID know from her visions, while anticipating that the people she tried to give this info weren’t likely to just take her word for it or assume she didn’t have ulterior motive.

So an expedient solution for Lilith, it seemed, was just to play into peoples’ expectations and PRESENT them with a motive right up front, something that was plausible enough to explain her approach as well as her ‘refusal’ to be fully forthcoming with her intel. Though that refusal was mostly just due to her not HAVING any further intel but still wanting to be viewed as worth keeping around despite what she feared would be seen as having limited effectiveness.

All of which then led, IMO, to Lilith’s decision to approach the Titans with a dire prophecy that they would be integral to the demise of an innocent man....but providing very little detail beyond that. And she played this off as intentionally being vague so that the Titans would appreciate how useful she could be to their heroics and agree to work with her on future endeavors in return for her full insights....rather than her risk that they’d turn her away and write her off as just being some weird fangirl who made a couple of lucky guesses. EVEN THOUGH, Lilith ALSO understood - and seemingly accepted as the cost of doing business - that this very same approach would likely keep her at arm’s length from them for the foreseeable future, because it would come across to them as callous and unheroic....assuming as they did that she COULD have provided them with more intel and just chose not to in service of her own agenda.

But again - Lilith’s only real agenda, in retrospect....was an honest and sincere desire to help save people, to be a hero. And I find that dichotomy, that carefully scripted approach on her part, to be FASCINATING, full of so much rich character potential. The idea of this hero whose entire approach to heroics and the other heroes she’d become teammates with, like, in her own mind REQUIRED her to be mercenary and to FAKE an air of aloofness and mystery as though she didn’t care all that much about the fates she foresaw or individual human lives, when in fact CARING VERY DAMN MUCH was the entire BASIS of her drive to be a hero and a Titan in the first place....that’s so much more compelling to me than Generic Bland Exposition Mouthpiece that later runs of Titans tended to treat her as.

Now, equally important to my view of Lilith, Drama Queen Most High and Proud Of It....is HOW Lilith first got the Titans’ attention so that she could make her approach and utter her dire prophecy.

She did this by intercepting the Titans when they were all relaxing in a club - and basically just commandeering their attention. It was a music club, with dancers... one of whom was Lilith, introduced by the club’s em-cee, directing all eyes on her and which Lil then capitalized on to dance right up the Titans’ table, where the 05 were all chilling out of costume, and led to this exchange:

Lilith: I’ve been waiting for you! I knew you’d come here tonight!

Donna: How could you know that? WE didn’t know we’d make this scene until a few minutes ago.

The narration, in 60s style LULZ fashion: From cool lips, carved of gleaming jade - a scorching thunderbolt!

Lilith: I want to be a Teen Titan!

Dick: Huh? A Teen Titan? Why ask us?

Donna: All that dancing’s got you flaky, gal. (LOL afhsifhalkfhal I can’t even)

Roy: Right! Asking us about being a Titan makes no sense (paraphrasing because I gotta, this dialogue is just too much)

Lilith: Don’t put me down, kids! Who else should I ask about being a Titan, than the Titans themselves? *proceeds to call each of them out by their codename, pointing at each of them in turn*

Like....so to recap, Lilith figured out via her precognition where the Titans would be that night, and rather than just bump into them and introduce herself, she engineered her entrance to be as attention-grabbing as possible. LOL. Cuz Lilith didn’t actually work as a dancer, who just so happened to dance at the club the Titans would end up at the night she had a vision to share intel on. She literally GOT herself a spot as a dancer that night specifically in order to make the approach she did. As I’ve said in multiple Lilith posts, making a totally over the top wtf initial impression is kinda like her signature move, as of her earliest appearances. She deliberately scripts encounters on more than one occasion to leave people off balance and make herself as memorable or larger than life as possible....in order to counterbalance the times she knows that she’ll have less than underwhelming info to offer up when people DO quiz her on what her powers show her and expect she knows more than she actually does.

Its all carefully managed expectations and intermingling smoke and mirrors with genuine truth and psychic foresight, so that even once on the team, Lilith can kinda build herself a reputation as intentionally vague and unknowable, even to her own teammates, and thus somewhat temper peoples’ reactions to her both giving more info than they expect or less, depending on which she happens to have at the time. She deliberately makes herself as unpredictable and inexplicable as possible so they KNOW she’s legit and has actual psychic powers, but also ‘know’ or at least believe she has a habit of keeping her knowledge largely to herself for reasons she declines to share. All because again, she doesn’t trust them to still see her as deserving a spot on the team if she discloses just how unpredictable her powers can be, and thinks her chances of being a hero and a Titan are better if they just all continue to think of her as cold and intentionally keeping pivotal details to herself for mercenary reasons she truly believes are more plausible to them, and something they’re more willing to put up with in a teammate - than a psychic teammate whose powers are less reliable than she’d like them to be.

There’s an inherent tragedy to a lot of Lilith’s earliest character work - like for instance when they meet future teammate Mal Duncan, Lilith sees him sneak out in order to take on a mission solo at night when everyone’s asleep. Only for the other Titans to assume upon discovering him gone the next day that she knew well in advance what he was going to do because of a vision, and think she didn’t warn anyone because she’s too callous to care what happens to Mal. When the truth was just that she didn’t realize at the time she saw him what he was going to do, and only ran with the other Titans’ assumption she had a vision about him because they’d been getting frustrated with her lack of helpful visions all issue and so she thought it was better that they believed she DID have a vision about him than admit she just hadn’t had anything useful to share in days.

Like, I joke about Lilith’s DRAMA and her various ways of drawing attention and capitalizing on it, but the truth is early Lilith is also heart-breakingly insecure about her self-worth and her place on the team and as a hero. In time, she eventually does become close with the other early Titans and open up to them and become a trusted confidante in turn, but it did TAKE time, and she never fully lost the mannerisms and behavior traits that were born of assuming people wouldn’t take her seriously or at face value. At least, not until later appearances where all those aspects of her character just disappeared in an instant with zero acknowledgment of ever being part of her prior characterization. Not because writers had organically grown her past all of that but more likely IMO because they just saw her as a generic psychic info-dumper they depicted as blandly inoffensive and trying not to make waves or stand out....even though that’s one hundred percent just NOT Lil, a character who once upon a time LIVED to stand out and shouted for peoples’ attention in as dramatic a fashion as possible, because she desperately wanted to be seen and heard and valued, to be able to say Lilith Was Here and not be forgotten.

Lilith’s initial character concept was an anti-Cassandra of Troy, a psychic of limited means who was determined not to let that stand in her way as she made the most of what gifts she did have in her pursuit of being a hero and helping people, and who so absolutely refused to accept being disbelieved or ignored that she willingly sacrificed her hopes and desires of being liked and a friend to the very heroes she looked up to and said I’d rather you all think I was the coldest bitch north of Antarctica than risk you doubting me on the occasions when I DO have crucial information I can’t afford anyone secondguess.

But later writers were like we’ve literally never heard of that character, here, have some wallpaper instead. They sanded off all her carefully and deliberately roughened edges to make her as nondescript as possible, because it never occurred to them that this largely forgotten psychic plot device of eras past might have been more than just a plot device, and ironically MOST characterized by her refusal to JUST be a plot device advancing other heroes’ narratives while she stood on the sidelines.

So much for the teenager who blackmailed her way onto several missions by refusing to divulge anything she foresaw ahead of time and insisted that they’d need her there alongside them, whether she’d truly seen that or not. Toodles to the telepath who upon first emergence of her telepathy, panicked because she couldn’t decide if she’d rather share her new power with her teammates and be recognized for it or if it would just give them more reason to distrust her, knowing that she could now hear their thoughts. “We don’t even know her” to the girl who absolutely one hundred percent WOULD deliberately cause offense just to make sure you never forgot about the time you encountered Lilith Clay and she handed you your ass....only to ultimately be replaced by this meek, mild-mannered superhero support staff member who never had a negative thing to say about anyone because her only appearances in stories was to enable everyone else’s plots with no thought to giving her one of her own.

*sighs gustily*

I have just. So very many thoughts on the erosion of the Prickly With Intent and Damned Proud Of It Lilith of yesteryear, into the character we’ve had over the last thirty years (when writers deign to remember a character with that name even exists at all). She was so much BIGGER than peoples’ assumptions about her or about what a character with her archetype and powerset SHOULD be like. Lilith of once upon a time was an often self-sabotaging mess with a heart of gold who absolutely would cut off her nose to spite her face while doubling down and shouting “I totally meant to do that" - preferring to fall on her sword as being literally too dumb to live than live with the shame of people thinking it only happened cuz her powers were on the fritz and she’d been, gasp, fallible. Her priorities were her own and she’d do as she damn well pleased in pursuit of them, and she wasn’t here to apologize for being who she was and how she went about being that person.

She was a complicated contradiction of a desperate yearning to belong and a conviction that there was no point in shooting for an end-goal she didn’t believe she’d be able to recognize even if she ever were to find it. She was a girl whose very powers demanded faith that she wasn’t sure even she had herself, and who then grew up to be a woman whose belief in her own friends’ and teammates’ best natures or futures was steadfast specifically BECAUSE she never forgot how much they all believed in her once she finally started to let down her walls and gave them a glimpse of the more vulnerable, genuine self she kept hidden behind them.

And none of that even TOUCHES on the total wtf-mess of various storylines she had, like when it was believed the Greek Titaness of the Sun was her mother. Or the COMPLETELY forgotten about and overlooked aspect of her character and powers where she only first started wearing a cloak and hood because she’d developed a power to unconsciously alter how people looking at her saw her, with her face taking on the appearance of those she used her telepathy on. So it was like when deep-diving into the mind of a friend or enemy, her telepathy wasn’t like that of an intruder just spying on someone’s most private thoughts, but rather it functioned as though her telepathy let her BECOME that person, comingling with the mind she was delving through to such a degree that where that mind ended and she began started to blur, and who they were began being reflected in who she was as well, with even her face visibly changing to look more like them than herself.

And Lil started to wear a hood after this power development in part to make other people more comfortable, as this was said to be very unnerving for people to witness...but with it at least partially being implied that her hiding her face had as much to do with Lil’s own fears about this side of her powers and what they suggested, as she struggled to find a balance between the good she could do with her telepathy and her fears of losing herself to them and the minds she traipsed through. Like the irony of her insecurities and lack of a sense of self or belonging as an orphaned girl leading into her lifelong drive to be a hero and help and save people and attempts to define herself through that only for that very drive and use of her powers to someday threaten to take her too far and cost her every real sense of self as who she is was in danger of becoming lost or subsumed in one of the minds she foraged through?

THERE WAS SO MUCH MORE TO LILITH WHERE DID IT ALL GO, I WOULD LIKE IT BACK PLEASE AND THANK YOU.

In conclusion, there is my somewhat haphazard and rambling tale of where does my take on Lilith come from and why do I interpret and depict her character the way I do, with a side helping of Gazes longingly into the void of comics past and yet to come, beseeching said void all like Would the Real Lilith Clay, Please Stand Up, Please Stand Up.

Thank you for your time. This has been a post. The end.

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kitsu-katsu · 3 years

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Why c!Wilbur blowing stuff up for shits and giggles as a child makes no sense for his character (and why that would reflect a lot more badly on c!Phil anyways if that were the case):

Warning: c!Phil critical ahead, if you don't like that, skip this post

Now, to those of you that decide to read this: Strap in folks! We've got a lot of ground to cover this from and a ton of quotes ahead!

1) Wilbur’s a pacifist through and through. He always preached words over weapons, only fought when attacked first, wanted to ignore a war until it went away, considered giving up his nation many times, etc. A few examples of quotes to show this thinking:

“Basically, we have such a lower opportunity here that we probably just need to accept the conditions of surrender, just so we can save any more bloodshed, any more destruction on our land. They’ve entrapped our land, they’ve set up bombs on our land, they’ve destroyed all our homes. To stop any more bloodshed, I feel I would be a bad general if I didn’t look for conditions of surrender.” - (Wilbur’s The Revolution is Coming: 30:32, 2nd Aug)

“Tommy, we need you alive. Tommy, this isn’t worth it. Tommy, your life is worth more than the revolution.” - (Wilbur’s The Revolution is Coming: 34:57:, 2nd Aug)

“What has made you do everything you’ve done up to this point?” (Quackity)

“That’s a- That’s a big question. Um. I guess it’s just protection for my people. I mean, I- I- I just want to see them thrive, and I want to see them safe.” (Alivebur)

- (Quackity’s Killing My Enemies: 1:03:02, 12th Apr)

“Look, do you know how long and how much blood was shed to get L’Manberg to the point it was at? You know what would happen if we manage to get L’Manberg back again? More blood would be shed, and we would be the illegitimate rulers of a nation.” - (Wilbur’s video Am I the Villain?: 18:52)

“We don’t win wars with battles and with armour. We win wars with our words, Tommy. We’re starting a revolution, not a war.” - (Wilbur’s The Wall: 4:54, 29th July)

“I’m not a fighter, I’m a writer.” - (Wilbur’s The Wall: 1:48:31, 29th July)

“Fighting is not necessary right now, Tommy.” - (Wilbur’s the election results: 43:42, 22nd Sep)

“Tommy, control yourself. Tommy, control yourself, it’s not worth it. Tommy, do not take your shot! He disrespected me, yes! But we’ve talked about this, Tommy…!” - (Wilbur’s techno and wilbur make cave better: 59:36, 23rd Sep)

2) The reason his thoughts about blowing it all up in Pogtopia even hit as hard, the reason all his allies were so shocked about him going through with it IS his pacifism first mindset (which has only been put second when he’s been attacked first and put in the defensive or in the case of his speech to Quackity after the political debate he genuinely thought, by the previous failure of his philosophy and the war trauma spurred on mainly by the FCR and Eret’s betrayal, that the only way to truly win respect and make a change in the world was through fighting and killing, which he was convinced of but was ultimately always too soft to actually go through with (note how he doesn’t kill anyone in the L’manburg explosion and how in the times during Pogtopia in which he declared he wanted people dead, he got second thoughts, regrets, retracted his statement or protected people with his actions):

“If you want to really help people, you’re gonna need power, Quackity. You can make a movement, you can make a resistance, right, you can go out and you can come back, and they’ll give you a ticker tape parade. They’ll cheer for you in the streets, but you will change nothing.” - (Quackity’s Killing My Enemies: 1:05:42, 12th Apr)

“If you have a revolution, everyone will hate you, you will sacrifice everything, and you will lose everything you’ve ever had, but you’ll come back and everything will be changed.” - (Quackity’s Killing My Enemies: 1:05:59, 12th Apr)

“And power isn’t gaining from diplomacy, and bureaucracy, and giant courthouses suspended in the sky, blah blah blah. It’s gained from swords, Quackity. It’s gained from blades, it’s gained from steel, iron.” - (Quackity’s Killing My Enemies: 1:06:19, 12th Apr)

“We blow up the entire fucking place to kingdom come. I want no survivors. God help whoever’s caught in the fucking crossfire.” - (Wilbur’s video, Am I The Villain?: 17:52)

“And, I know you’re scared, Tommy, I understand you’re scared. And it’s scary, it’s scary, Tommy, but do you know what? You know what? In a time like this, when a man has nothing to lose, do you know what that means? It means we can do what we want. We have a man on our side who literally rigged our nation with TNT. We can do the same to them. We can rig this festival with TNT. We can kill them all, Tommy. ” - (Wilbur’s who are you go away: 1:15:52, 8th Oct)

“Anyone caught in the crossfire is caught in the crossfire. That’s how it goes, you know? - (Wilbur’s who are you go away: 1:41:22, 8th Oct)

“Chat, do I wanna- Chat, do I wanna, do I wanna do it? I’m having second thoughts about the TNT. Chat, I’m having second thoughts about the TNT. Do I wanna kill these people? Seeing that they’re my friends.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 34:09, 16th Oct)

“Tommy, I’m getting second thoughts. These are my friends, I don’t- Do I- I don’t know if I wanna [inaudible].” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 36:17, 16th Oct)

“Just, if you’re gonna kill anyone else, kill me. Don’t kill anyone else here.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 1:10:53, 16th Oct)

“You sounded like you were gonna murder another person. You sounded like you were gonna go for Niki.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 1:12:34, 16th Oct)

“Oh, yes, sorry, Niki, you missed that part. I was gonna blow up Manberg, I was gonna completely destroy it in a huge fireball. Look, Niki, come to Pogtopia, you’re safer here. You’re not gonna be hurt by anyone.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 1:17:59, 16th Oct)

“No you two can escape, I’ll be the… I’ll- I’ll- I’ll be… I’ll be trapped in here…” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 27:27, 17th Oct)

“I don’t, I don’t, I don’t want to kill you two. I don’t want you two to die.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 28:53, 17th Oct)

3) He was inspired by Dream blowing up L’manburg first with Eret’s betrayal during the first revolution. He knew Dream wanted L’manburg out of the picture and had tried it before. It’s why he knew to immediately ask him for TNT, because either way, Dream would benefit from both side’s mutually assured destruction:

“Here’s the plan, right, Dream. Dream is on our side, Dream has TNT, Dream has everything, right. I say we talk to Dream, and we ask him very nicely, very kindly, ‘Dream, give us all the TNT you have’. ” - (Wilbur’s who are you go away: 1:12:22, 8th Oct)

“Remember, how he rigged L’Manberg, like ages ago, during the War? And then he detonated the TNT and destroyed the entire thing? We do that again, everyone, we blow up the entire fucking place to kingdom come.” - (Wilbur’s who are you go away: 1:12:36, 8th Oct)

“The only reason that Dream is working with us, is because of the fact that we are the enemies of his enemies! That’s it! That’s all that joins this!” - (Wilbur’s who are you go away: 1:14:35, 8th Oct)

“Dream, let me be your vassal. Dream, I understand you have a lot of TNT, a lot of the ol’ trinitrotoluene in your possession, don’t you? You do! Dream, I want to be your vassal, I want to set this up, I want to rig the city.” - (Wilbur’s who are you go away: 1:33:27, 8th Oct)

4) Wilbur hesitated a LOT with the detonation, wanted to be stopped, told people his plan in detail and was overall in a deep internal conflict about the whole thing (and didn’t blow it up once to not kill Tommy and Quackity too, this is also the moment in which his suicidal tendencies are the most clear in his lines before the 16th). Ultimately he decided to do it because he was suicidal and deeply suffering from mental health issues, believed himself to be the root of all bad in the server and by extension, L’manburg was too, and by that point his original view for L’manburg had been so twisted by Schlatt anyway that in his POV it’d only be used to hurt more people anyway:

“I- Look, rigging L’Manberg is not gonna help us get it back, I’m aware of that. But sometimes in order to feel comfortable and safe you have to be ready to give up the things that you’re worried you might lose. And in this case, I think I might lose it already.” - (Wilbur’s who are you go away: 1:17:57, 8th Oct)

“I know there’s a lot of people, Tommy! … I’m not telling you where the button is, man. … Tommy, it’s over that hill, it’s over that hill, right there!” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 28:30, 16th Oct)

“Tommy, I’m getting second thoughts. These are my friends, I don’t- Do I- I don’t know if I wanna [inaudible].” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 36:17, 16th Oct)

“But this is the opportunity- this is the opportunity. If I don’t blow it up now, when am I gonna blow it up?! When am I gonna blow it up, Tommy? But when do- when do we do-” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 36:30, 16th Oct)

“If I don’t do it now, what happens if this is the only chance I get. Everyone’s in this close situation, I can do some proper damage. Look, this isn’t a- He needs a consequence for his actions, Schlatt does, he can’t just keep being handsome and powerful and strong all the time. He needs, he needs to be put down a peg.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 37:07, 16th Oct)

“I can still call off this whole detonating at the end of the speech, dude. I can call it off.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 38:24, 16th Oct)

“Should I show you where the TNT’s laced? ‘Cause in a, in a last ditch effort, we may need to destroy it by hand, okay? So, under the chair, where Schlatt sits, there’s about twenty pieces, right? And then going under, under the main area here, following this red line, there is TNT all the way, and then it jut- and then it- … It darts up here, and over to the dance floor, but it doesn’t touch the water.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 38:29, 16th Oct)

“I have to light it, I’ve got to light it, I’ve got to light it.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 1:08:17, 16th Oct)

“Yesterday I had the perfect opportunity to blow everything up and finally end it, you know. I had the perfect opportunity to finally blow up everything and end it and just completely save everyone, right, from the tyranny of Schlatt and the tyranny of the existence of Manberg and L’Manberg, right.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 25:17, 17th Oct)

“Explain it to me! Give me a reason! Give me a reason!” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 26:50, 17th Oct)

“Who else is it gonna hurt?! It’s gonna hurt Schlatt, Manberg, and-” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 26:55, 17th Oct)

“Why did I bring- I should have just done it. I’m such a fucking showman. I should have just done it.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 27:18, 17th Oct)

“No you two can escape, I’ll be the… I’ll- I’ll- I’ll be… I’ll be trapped in here…” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 27:27, 17th Oct)

“I just- I just want to f… I just wanna end it, I wanna end it. I wanna press that button, man.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 28:08, 17th Oct)

“I don’t, I don’t, I don’t want to kill you two. I don’t want you two to die.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 28:53, 17th Oct)

“Ohh, fuck you! Fuck you, man! Why do you make it so hard?! I should have just- I’m such a fucking showman.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 29:29, 17th Oct)

“Tommy, we’ve tried my ideas. I’m willing to listen to you. I’m gonna follow you, Tommy. Whatever you think is gonna be the best way of taking down Schlatt, we’ll do it. We’ve tried my ideas.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 32:01, 17th Oct)

“My L’Manberg. My L’Manberg. As long- As long as I know the button is here… as long as I know. As long as I know the button is here. It’s just not today. I just need to know that it’s there for a fall-back. I need to know it’s there.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 33:46, 17th Oct)

“I’ve been hasty. But the fact that I know it’s there, and I can just stroke my right mouse button, that’s all I need. As long as I know it’s there.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 34:27, 17th Oct)

“You’ve convinced me, I don’t wanna go straight to Plan B, if Plan A fails.” - (Wilbur’s Speedy Stream Festival What festival: 39:02, 17th Oct)

“Look, Tommy, at the end of the day, if this doesn’t go well, I’m gonna blow the place to smithereens. The place will be gone, I’m gonna detonate it and blow it to smithereens, right, if this doesn’t go well. But it will go well…! … ‘Cause it’s literally- there’s no one on Schlatt’s side.” - (Wilbur’s smithereens: 21:00, 16th Nov)

“But none of them have the same anticipatory love of what they’re doing, unlike us. Everyone on our side is fighting for something we’ve loved, and had for ages, right. That’s why we’re gonna win, and that’s why you shouldn’t be afraid. And yes, the whole place is rigged.” - (Wilbur’s smithereens: 21:38, 16th Nov)

“I could, I really could, that’s the thing. That’s the bit that I like. It’s the bit that makes me smile the most is the fact that I definitely could.” - (Wilbur’s smithereens: 26:28, 16th Nov)

“Chekhov’s Gun. Chekhov’s Gun. I’ll be honest with you, chat, I’ve been wondering this whole time if it still works. I’ve been thinking to myself does it still- ‘Cause I fixed it up for today.” - (Wilbur’s smithereens: 1:11:36, 16th Nov)

“Phil, I’m always so close to pressing this button, Phil! I have been here, like seven or eight times I have been here… Seven or eight times” - (Wilbur’s smithereens: 1:14:56, 16th Nov)

“Phil, I’ve been here here so many times.” - (Wilbur’s smithereens: 1:15:13, 16th Nov)

“I don’t even know if it works anymore, Phil. I don’t even know if the button works. I could, I could… press it, and it might-” (Wilbur’s smithereens: 1:15:29, 16th Nov)

5) The one time anything about Wilbur using TNT while young (and here the age isn't as clearly implied as in Phil's thing, this could very well be more of teen Wilbur than kid Wilbur) is mentioned in the actual text is this one maybe-canon-maybe-not-so-canon-anymore line:

“Tommy, have you heard of TNT duplication? The flying machines that dup TNT? Phil taught me about them. He taught me about them- I’m sure he wouldn’t have taught me them if he knew what I was gonna do with them. But, he did teach me about them. … They were very useful, in this.” - (Wilbur’s The Festival: 11:30, 16th Oct)

Now let’s pretend that headcanon makes any sense and that yeah, Wilbur totally just enjoyed building shit to detonate and said tendency encouraged in childhood just up and carried into adulthood and manifested as him internally going “I must blow up this thing I made because that’s what I do” and let’s pretend that he didn’t have a big ass internal conflict about it.

Ok, so Phil said that Wilbur blew stuff up when little, so he’d have connected it to the button room. Now think for a moment: How does that reflect on Phil as a parent? Let’s forget about everything else for this one moment (and believe me, I’ve got no shortage of stuff to critique c!Phil on in regards to his relation with c!Wilbur) and just focus on this one action. A man freely lets his son use TNT to blow up some random stuff presumably made out of toys. Just a little kid playing with TNT, yup, that’s his boy. And it was to such a degree that the same man just went “Oh yeah! It’s totally the blowing shit up thing!” in a fraction of a second after seeing the button… And then yeah, saw all of the hesitation, the breakdown, the struggle, the wishes to die and impaled him with a sword, but we can go deeper into those aspects in another post

Then Phil tried to make it better by saying to chat that all kids just break stuff apart, more implying that little Wilbur wasn’t actually using explosives which… makes the whole thing even dumber, ngl, because at that point c!Phil is just saying “Oh yeah, he knocked over his lego houses when he was four, so when I saw that button I immediately went ‘Oh, of course! He rigged the place! What an obvious connection!’”. You see what I’m getting at?

TLDR: It doesn’t fit with canon and even if we shove it in with its implications, then c!Phil is just an idiot, whether it be from letting his kid freely play with TNT to such a degree that he deduces where his most drastic measure resulting from trauma and breakdowns is going just by seeing the button OR whether it be from him connecting dots where there are none if he tries to save his skin as a father and just say “Oh yeah, no, who didn’t knock over stuff as a kid, what do you mean?” not realizing that… exactly… who didn’t…. so it wouldn’t connect with the button room at all

#dsmp #dream smp #c!phil critical #c!phil negativity #c!wilbur #c!wilbur analysis #wilbur dsmp #wilbur #wilbur soot #pogtopia #l'manburg #Can you sense my saltiness? I hope you can #Did Phil play with explosives as a kid too or was Doomsday just his way of feeling young?#Was he just feeling young and quirky so he decided to go destroy some livelihoods with the bestie?#c!Phil (derogatory)#man wait until I make yet another c!Phil is a bad father and was horrible to everything left of Wil's legacy post #I'm about to destroy a rp old man /hj #I hope you can see how this makes zero sense too #like from so many angles #and the retracting that didn't go all the way is just ???#And this all trickles in from the Dreaded Letters Retcon Stream (derogatory)#Like really if it weren't for those retcons back then this wouldn't have happened #Because then Phil wouldn't need some complicated backstory reason for knowing what the button did #If he had gotten at least SOME info about stuff going awry from Wilbur's letters #And hoooo boy do I have some words to say about the letters stream #Which I have said in posts but I might just remake some #tw suicide #tw suicide mention #tw suicide ideation

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pegasister60 · 3 years

Text

I want to make an Alien!Purpled but like an Among Us Imposter type.

Purpled’s chatting with a crewmate on Skeld while faking a download in Communications with a stolen spare tablet.

Crewmate talks about how she used to be a mercenary in another star system before she joined a research crew as protection and actually got invested in their work. Ever since she’s traveled with them.

Purpled is just trying to make conversation and asks what a mercenary is. She explains it’s a person who’s hired to do some shady jobs. Mostly they’re paid to kill people though.

And Purpled just yeets his tablet across the room and it smashes against the wall.

“You mean people are getting paid for this???”

“Purpled, what-“

Purpled twists his helmet with a click and lifts it a bit so his tongue can pierce her helmet and eye.

She’s dead before he even leaves the room.

Purpled was going to take this slow, but it seems like he’s got plans to make. He’s sure his partner won’t mind the change of pace.

Before long, the two Imposters have had a feast and the Skeld has changed its course to dock at a busy space port. They part ways as perfect strangers.

It takes all of ten minutes for Purpled to find a suitable vessel to hijack, a one person saucer, and take care of its pilot.

He makes his way to the place where some of his last crew’s members had been from originally.

Hypixel.

He lays low until he can make a new face from scratch. During that time he earns some coins to afford his Hypixel Housing space (where he parked the stolen saucer) by playing Skywars.

By the time he’d changed his face, a Skywars-like game with odd respawn mechanics opened up to the public, and he decided to use it to make a name for himself. Go leaderboard and get a legitimate reputation to build on.

Couple years pass and he’s a known Bedwars sweat who’ll also take care of some problems for you if you have the coin for it.

And Purpled’s received an invitation from an acquaintance who’d admired his agility and played a few rounds of Doubles with him recently.

This should be interesting. The last time he was openly invited to something was the voyage he’d joined that changed his career goals.

He’s quick to pack up and move. And excited to learn that the lot he’d parked his “UFO” in was directly across from a fellow Imposter.

This poor SMP wouldn’t know what hit it.

Tubbo and Hannah would also be imposters. They know Dream’s not human and Charlie’s not human and they suspect Quackity isn’t either.

Under the cut is my worldbuilding for what Imposters be like.

Imposters don't always eat their prey right away because of the way they hunt. Some find other means to sustain themselves and can afford to kill for sport.

They can be very social and charismatic but there are some that don't bother and get straight to business.

Their bodies are very easy to morph but it takes focus and practice to do. They can make shifts like height changes and stuff like that in seconds, which is how they crawl through tight spaces and pop out without any issue. But changing their appearance entirely is a process that takes time, though there's a subspecies of "Morphlings" who are adept enough to make these changes quickly before they need to snap back to avoid discovery.

An imposter will usually settle on an appearance that's close to the group's species externally. Internally, there are some organs they have that wouldn't be present in other species, which are dead giveaways unless they can explain away having three stomachs.

Due to the nature of their biology, the way an Imposter kills will vary. Some are capable of using their morphs to gain claws or fangs or sharp tongues to kill with while others make do with weapons. If you don't have a second stomach with teeth you can use for murder, a gun is fine.

Imposters can identify each other on sight. Through masks and helmets, they can know. Knowing whether or not an imposter is a Morphling though comes with experience.

After a certain amount of experience, an imposter can start recognizing other individuals as outsiders. Strange heartbeats, odd movements, bloodlusts, weird scents. If they're not an imposter but also not a part of the target species, it's usually not the imposter's business. To each their own hunt.

Imposters tend not to be in groups larger than three to avoid detection and for that same reason are fairly independent even when hunting together.

Imposters can use Respawn methods but there are ways for them to permadie outside of hardcore.

When exposed to extreme cold, Imposters hibernate. This allows them to last longer than most would when out in the unforgiving vacuum of space, but not forever. Eventually, unless they get picked up by a passing vessel, they will die.

Imposters cannot survive lava.

#my post #i speak #i write #purpled #purpled bedwars #mcyt purpled #purpled mcyt #alien!purpled #mcyt #dream smp #dsmp #ask to tag #character death

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