#advance bravely... meta?!

[danmeiljie]

Just Say It: 说

Remember this scene:

It is one of my favorites from Advance Bravely.

We get Flirting. Awkwardness. Tall actor/models making other tall actor/models look tiny. The almighty Loom. So it made me want to remind myself how this scene played out in the novel.

I thought the phrasing "just spill it" and "dont be mouselike" was a bit odd sounding to me, and since American English is my first language and Im forever inexplicably interested in Mandarin, I wanted to do some research.

DISCLAIMER: This post is in no way attempting to criticise or put down the original translation team and their work on this novel. They did a fantastic job with this insane story! Im just being a very curious language learner. Neither am I claiming to have any training as a translator or in the Chinese language. I am just taking advantage of the few tools available to me.

@sugarbabywenkexing helped me think this thru and got me the screenshots from the show. Thank you friend! She also worked on updating a translation for her own gif project and was the one to catch the difference between the book and the drama. We both found that they adapted the scenes from the book very faithfully as they could!

Note that the line in Mandarin in the novel and the line in the show are a little different. Notably, the show drops the little bit at the end and takes out a character:

Line from novel: “下次再想吃就直接说，可怜劲儿的。”

Line from script: 下次再想吃直接说。

First I decided to see what google translate does with the line. Google is usually hit or miss for me, but I find if you include enough context it comes out okay.

Line from the novel:

Line from the script:

(Im ignoring the improper usage of "I want" since I already know the subject of the sentence is "you" or Xia Yao and not Yuan Zong, the speaker)

I noticed the difference between "mouselike" and pathetic and decided to consult Pleco, my favorite chinese dictionary app.

Seems that it checks out.

Also the Mandarin verbage of "直接说" which google is saying means "speak directly", seems to be fairly straightforward enough, and my guess is, the phrasing "spill it" is trying to invoke his casual tone by relying on english slang. It made me think at first there was a euphamism going on here since this novel is chock full of sexual innuendos, but it seems the Mandarin here is not a slang term. (Native speakers welcome to correct me!)

CONCLUSION:

I love the flirting tone of Yuan Zong here. Xu Feng does a great job portraying that with his performance and the voice actor who delivered the line had great inflection. I guess the script writers decided to cut out the "its pathetic" comment, but I like it for this scene in the book.

I think the original fan translation does a creative job of expressing Yuan Zong and his teasing of Xia Yao, but like I said it felt a bit unnatural in English and if I were to take a stab at the line, I'd go with something closer to the MTL.

"Next time if you want to eat some, just say so. It's pathetic."

Why does any of this matter?

*shrugs*

It doesnt really like I said before I love languages and am curious about translation and wanted to see for myself. The gist of the scene as written in the novel comes across accurately in the fan translation and the drama adaptation.

Remember, if you want something, just say it. ;)

Thank you to the original translation team for allowing me to read this danmei novel! Unfortunately I like it too much.j

#说 #中文 #xu feng makes learning mandarin fun #advance bravely... meta?! #advance bravely has a plot i swear #advance bravely #xu feng #gong jun #my bad gifs #chai jidan #shengshi #danmei #chinese bl #censored bl #yuan zong puts the dom in domestic #l watches advance bravely

[mollywauk]

I remember the entire fandom exploding about this fight and let me just say Fjord is the only one who comes out clean. Everyone else is an asshole and I love it.

Beau is being belligerent on purpose, she has good points that normally would appeal to Caleb and Nott, "don't do something that will fuck me over when we've agreed to throw our lot in together". But also she has major trust issues and she's been clashing with Caleb for days now so the vitriol which is fueling her argument seems disproportionate out of context. Molly is actually being way worse than Beau but since he isn't played by Marisha (public enemy number one for no reason that I know of other than she's a woman who doest censor herself?) he got a pass.

But Molly's coming down hard on this situation because it violates his carny moral code and the carnival is quite literal his brief but entire life. When you work in a group, you protect the interests of the group first and then your own a close second. But that distinction matters. And he's tried to get this across to them before, so this is strike 2 in his mind. Also he can't help but throw in that little "you're not nearly as smart as you think you are" barb after Nott's speech which is funny because Nott actually has really high intelligence and I'm pretty sure her impassioned defense of Caleb rankled him because of his own feeling of being the odd one out in the group now that Yasha is gone again.

Jester is staying relatively quiet, I feel like she doesn't want to upset anyone so she isn't speaking up, but also I feel like Laura isn't speaking up because she's registered that this situation has pinged some of the other characters personalities and she knows that Jester isn't one of them. Also she keeps trying to remind Nott that she has helped her and Caleb, I think Nott disregarding her because the comment was aimed at Beau and Molly more than anyone else may have hurt her feelings but also Jester would definitely be the most cut up about potentially dropping Nott and Caleb because at this point she's the only one who has made any sort of attempt to befriend them.

Fjord is doing the most here. His is the only argument that is coming from a place of calm. Which isn't to say that Beau and Molly aren't valid but they're lashing out to get a reaction and have a fight not to sort an issue out. When he pulled that sword on Caleb it wasn't because he was snapping in the moment, it was a calculated ploy to bring Caleb back in line because he has noticed that Caleb's personal goals can put the rest of them at risk. He was checking him back into the task at hand. And now, that it's time to talk about it, that's what he wants to do; talk. Both Beau and Molly want to get their point across too but Fjord's the only one who listens in return.

Nott is par for par for righteous fury but I like her more in this moment so I want to take her side. Simple bias on my part.

And Liam is sitting there grinning the whole time because he started the fire and now he gets to sit back and watch it burn without having to be tempered by Caleb's own agenda.

#like yeah I feel the tension #but I get where all the characters are coming from #and it's so interesting to watch this in hindsight #knowing what we know now #about Beau and why she had such rigid defense mechanisms #about why Caleb craves advancement in his magic #about Molly's whole shtick being five lies in a gaudy coat held together by one or two intense convictions #even Jester's anxiety about people liking her and this being a friend group to her when it's a travelling crew for everyone else #cr2 rewatch #cr2 #meta #cr2ep13 #cr2 spoilers #I love Marisha and I'm so glad I wasn't here for the hate #the mighty nein #caleb widogast #nott the brave #fjord #jester lavorre #mollymauk tealeaf #beauregard lionett

[tiffanybluesclues]

HELLO! I'm making an obnoxiously long meta about the inconsistencies of Dick's and Bruce's relationship. I'm ALMOST finishes but I need an instance of adult-ish Dick Grayson saying that he didn't want Bruce to be his father pre-flashpoint

Also if you have instances of the writer hammering they're brothers pre-flashpoint that'd be cool as hell too, but I already got at least one instance of it (when dick goes to college)

Thank you in advance!!!! I'm still on the Kory-Bruce meta lmao I'm so annoyed he barely mentions her lmaooo

Somewhere in the decades and decades of pre-Flashpoint DC Comics, there may be an instance where Dick Grayson (as an adult or at least as a teenager) said he didn't want Bruce to be his father, but I've never seen it and I'm kind of glad I haven't because tbh based on what I *have* seen it would be Dick lying to himself.

I'm guessing the page that inspired your quest is this court scene from "Batman: Year 3" (1989)?

– Batman #439, 09/1989.

Maybe it was a modernized explanation for why Bruce took Dick in as a ward instead of adopting him – as opposed to the version in Batman #213 (08/1969), with the court saying Bruce couldn't adopt because he was a bachelor.

Something that speaks volumes to me is that in the same story as the above court scene, in the preceding issue actually, Dick thinks to himself that Bruce was like father to him. There is no internal conflict in this statement, no thought about how he at some point didn't want this. "He was like a FATHER to me and I LOVED him." He follows that up with a sad reminder of the distance between him and post-Crisis Bruce: "...and though he could NEVER bring himself to say it, I know he loved me too."

– Batman #438, 08/1989 or 09/1989.

You're familiar with the college-send-off, so please keep it in mind when you read this scene with [regard to] Bruce and pre-Crisis Jason.

– pages from Batman #376, 10/1984.

Alfred's response makes sense, it's a good explanation. It's also a complete rewrite of history, so these two are lying to themselves – or, more likely, the writers are trying to emphasize the current day stakes and emotions at the expense of the past. With the above panels in mind, let's look again at how Bruce actually reacted when Dick left home...

– pages from Batman #217, 12/1969.

Oh suuuuure, he definitely didn't mope around feeling lonely and depressed at all – and closing up Wayne Manor and moving out was a ~totally~ chill and non-dramatic reaction to Dick leaving for college... lol, okay, Bruce. I guess 159 issues and almost 15 years can make memories faulty.

The following are two pages I saved because of their references to the history that Bruce and Dick share. I want to highlight the page on the left though, because on a single page this comic manages to pay respect to the long history between Dick and Bruce while also disrespecting Dick's role as a surrogate son in Bruce's life.

– pages from Detective Comics #533, 12/1983; The New Titans #61, 12/1989.

That final yellow panel is so rude to me lol, like how dare you say "for the first time" as if like-a-son-to-him Dick Grayson didn't happen.

Comics from the 60s and 70s were probably the peak time for the idea that Bruce and Dick were like brothers. As far as I can tell though, writers didn't really have other characters describe them as brothers. I've seen mentor & apprentice, friends, partners, guardian & ward, knight & squire, and (primarily when there are no other children in the mix) of course Dick is also described as Bruce's heir pretty often.

I feel like, compared to Batman comics, the 1980s Teen Titans comics were more willing to say Bruce and Dick had a father and son relationship. Donna even contrasts her sisterly relationship with Diana to the parent and child relationship of Bruce and Dick during "Who Is Donna Troy?"

– The New Teen Titans #38, 01/1984 (Donna); The New Titans #61, 12/1989 (Alfred); The Brave and the Bold #197 04/1983 (Golden Age/Earth Two Bruce Wayne).

At least they let Earth Two Bruce remain true to Golden Age vibes.

My headcanon is always that he is the Bruce who every Dick Grayson grew up with, regardless of era, regardless of rewrites. Here are some panels that kind of support that – a significant factor in how Dick views Bruce is that he had a "softer" version of him than the man we see now.

– Batman: Gotham Knights #26, 04/2002 (Barbara); Nightwing #134, 09/2007 (Dick in flashback); Batman #437, 08/1989 or 09/1989 (Dick again).

A repeated theme from Dick is that he is insecure about his place in Bruce's life, and in some instances Bruce even made it clear that Dick's role was as a soldier, or at best a partner, and that being part of his family was conditional.

– left: pages from Robin: Year One - Part 2, Part 3, Part 3, Part 4, 01/2001.

right: panels from Robin: Year One - Part 4, 01/2001; Batman: Gotham Knights #43 09/2003; Action Comics #613, 08/1988; same; Nightwing #134, 09/2007; Nightwing Secret Files #1, 10/1999; same.

With that underlying insecurity, and the deep love and loyalty that Dick has for Bruce, I think that by the time he came of age it's likely that Dick actively wanted Bruce to be his father.

The first 20 or so issues of Gotham Knights offered some great material about their familial relationship (leading up to the adoption storyline). In issue #14 Dick writes a letter that he still never send. I swear half the delay in my response was probably me deciding which panels to include from this because it is a gold mine for the kind of meta you're writing.

– panels from Batman: Gotham Knights #14, 04/2001.

& with that I've hit the image limit, but I'll reblog with some panels on the point about how Bruce and Dick were often described as friends (something I saw possibly just as often as ward and heir).

#dick grayson #bruce wayne #batman and robin #dc meta #tiff.txt #long post

[what-is-love-babey-dont-hurt-me]

Been mulling over the vague idea of a sci-fi Kirby au that features Meta Knight as a lone human taken from his home and struggling to survive in a galaxy that is very much not made for him.

One of my favorite concepts for it so far is that Galaxia is a type of alien parasite.

Eons ago, when the universe was very young and unstable, two forms of life so different from each other had found themselves living on a planet whose name is lost in time. This planet is a legend in the present, believed to house technology so advanced it might have been magic, and the inhabitants were said to be immortal. Speculation claims that the god-like aliens grew bored of the young universe, choosing to abandon it and ascend to a higher existence. If you unlock their secrets, you would receive the throne of godhood as well.

The reality of the forgotten planet is different, and some of these so-called “gods” are still alive and could tell you such.

Galaxia is originally from the forgotten planet, and she remembers that the environment was so hostile that technology never developed past primitive space travel. There was no grand magic, and while the inhabitants were long-lived, neither species were immortal. Life on the forgotten planet found a way to struggle and hold on, and not much else ever was accomplished.

The modern tongue refer to the two species which had inhabited the planet as Fire People and Parasites.

The Fire People were cunning, swift, and beacons of endless energy, but the nature of their bodies left them vulnerable and easily snuffed out into ash and coals. The Parasites are armored, vicious, and nearly immortal, but this came at the cost of never being able to live without the energy of another.

The modern tongue misrepresents the latter of the two.

Both these species survived the hostile conditions of their planet by depending on each other. Fire People were so easily extinguished, but if they offered a Parasite their energy, then a Parasite would act as protective shield. Two lived as One. If One became separated into Two, then both are sure to die. Symbiotic is the proper word to describe Galaxia.

Galaxia in particular had been distinguished due to being the companion to the Fire People’s king: Photron.

The two had bonded when the king had only been a young spark. Not many had been brave enough to approach such a old and powerful Parasite such as herself. The power Galaxia demands is so great that most Fire People are sucked dry of their life energy and extinguished in mere moments. The royal parents had been terrified that their young spark was approaching such a monster, but it was of no consequence. Galaxia’s many gold-red-green-blue-pink-white eyes saw the potential Photron held, but even more important was the young spark’s charm. Seldom had Galaxia come across another mind who she enjoyed the companionship of, and she had been gleeful to accept the bond with young Photron.

The bond between such a powerful Parasite and Fire is responsible for Photron eventually claiming the throne. This powerful bond is also how Photron survived long enough to see the rest of his people die.

The hostile planet which these species resided on was not stable, the atmosphere was unwinding and the ground crumbling. The Parasites would try to fight this fate, to defend their beloved Fire, but even their power can not match that of nature, and slowly Fire after Fire were snuffed out. Soon the streets were empty of people; instead littered with the sleeping bodies of The Parasites lain amongst piles of coals and ash. Although these Parasites were still alive and merely in a hibernation of sorts, they would perish when the planet fully shatters.

Overcome with the grief of being unable to save his people from the decay of their planet, Photron wondered if he could save at least one life. The King Photron did not know if there was anyone else in the universe outside of his dying planet, and space travel was not a proven concept, but he valued the life of his companion over his own. This inspired Photron to hatch a scheme.

In secret, Photron commissioned his last few engineers to make a vessel capable of leaving the planet. Upon the night of the machine’s completion, the clever king used the flames of his own body to burn a special herb which was known to paralyze The Parasites, making them fall off. Galaxia felt betrayed that her companion would not take into account her wishes to stay until the end, but she was in a death-like sleep before it mattered. Put into a primitive space capsule and launched blindly into the depths of the universe, Galaxia would not be awake to see the light of her beloved companion be snuffed out.

The Parasites share similarities to the tardigrade. By succumbing to a death-like state, she had survived eons outside of her home planet without a host. In recent millennia, this parasite had become a legend, alongside the sparse few other who had survived the destruction of their home. She and the others are sought after in the belief that they hold the secrets of immortality.

Upon being awoken by such a person looking to cheat death, Galaxia had not been impressed, but she agreed. She was lonely. Her new host, of course, had not been worthy of her gifts like Photron had. In just two lunar cycles, the new host proved to be too weak, unable to meet the high amount of life energy which The Parasite fed off of. This fool paid for their hubris with their life. It was of no consequence to Galaxia. The next fool would come along sooner or later. And each one would be drained of their energy just like the last.

This was how Galaxia once again gained the reputation of a monster, and how her kind shifted from being seen as symbiotic to being Parasites.

Of course, while many would avoid her completely, there were others who would be interested in the services of such monsters like The Parasites. Nefarious companies looking to get rid of “failed investments”. Headstrong warriors hoping to get her aid in battle. All sought out stories of a nameless monster for one reason or another. All were unworthy.

Galaxia extinguished flame after flame until a peculiar life form had crossed her path. The alien was one she had never seen before, but obviously a warrior. Scars littered it’s skin, with the most gruesome of which had been slashed deep across its eyes. All that remained were two pale white slivers which ghosted over Galaxia’s golden form with no recognition. This alien was blind, seemingly a result of a battle, and did not know the fate that awaited it.

In a echo of a memory from eons ago, the alien approached Galaxia without fear, and she let the pitiful thing blindly stumble into her. The process of bonding was easier through physical touch, and Galaxia hungered for fresh life energy. Prehensile hands clumsily found hold on her massive golden form, enabling a basic mental connection, and the Parasite began picking through the mind of the fighter before her.

She dissected the language of the alien—the Human—and then spoke with him. Galaxia saw bits of herself in the man before her. Ripped away from their people and her planet, never able to return, living a life being seen as a monster when all they really wanted was a companion. Both have true names which mean nothing to the rest of the galaxy, both are simply called monsters and parasites. The Human expressed frustration and grief which struck a chord with the monster. Galaxia’s many gold-red-green-blue-pink-white eyes saw the potential the nameless Human held, but even more important was the fact that she had found a kindred spirit who was tired of being alone like she was.

Galaxia decided to make an offer.

“Give me a name, give your life, and I will protect that life. I will be your sword, your shield. I will give you my eyes to use as your own and I’ll give you a name in return. Let Two become One.”

After that fateful encounter two monsters did not leave the cave. Meta Knight and Galaxia instead chose to travel the universe as one.

#snappy speaks #meta knight #Galaxia #sorry for going insane over making an au it will happen again #Photron (kirby) #this au has a hold over my brain but it also does not have a name #uhhhh send asks if you want to know more ig #sci-fi au

[stoopid-turtle]

hello... 😅 uhm, first of all, i truly am sorry in advance for being awkward 😭 but for once i decided not to let my awkwardness keep me from sharing (what i think/hope are) positive thoughts with a stranger on the internet, so here i am.

i'm not around much and legit only made this acc bc like you i'm a late bloomer here and needed as many outlets for my yizhan/wangxian obsession as i could get my greedy hands on, in the big year of 2023... sigh. anyway, as an avid lover of meta/analysis posts since my early fandom days began around 15 (oof 🥲) years ago, finding your acc was such a lovely surprise. i agree with your views a LOT, and really appreciate how eloquent and well-written your posts are! even more so bc there's a lot i still don't know and most of the time the source material is very hard to reach and/or understand due to the language barrier, so having other turtles to rely on to access those, even if filtered by their own biases/opinions, is wonderful. besides, such input coming from a new fan is also comforting and imo refreshing, juxtaposed with that of older fans... it keeps the fandom alive and all that jazz. it's also very brave given how ruthless some folks can be on the internet, and on this corner in particular 😮‍💨 it just felt like reading my own thoughts written by someone else sometimes. i gasped and nodded at your posts soooo many times djskdjdj thank you for that!

(btw you followed me back the other day and i legit fangirled irl bc ??? whatttttt 😅 i still think it was an accident but okay omg djskdjdj AHEM. sorry)

then today i logged in and read your recent posts feeling squeamish about sharing more thoughts and as much as i 100% relate to you saying that kind of attention makes you anxious, i just... idk, i had to let you know i enjoy everything you post, even though adult life has kept me from being able to read it all so far. i understand you stepping back and i respect that decision, i'm not by any means asking you to go against what you know is best for you. at the same time, i can't help but hope you'll still show up every now and then bc your posts will be missed 🥲 i guess the whole motivation behind this is that it just made me sad to think your valuable insights will be something i'm yet again late to, if that makes sense?

djskdjdj again, i'm so sorry for being awkward and weird and dropping all of this on your inbox unprovoked. you don't have to reply (or read this AT ALL omg 😭😭), in fact i'm so embarrassed by this that you'd probably have to reach me through inquiry lmaooo 💀 anyway, have a great life, thank you so much for the great job, bjyxszd etc ❤️💚💛

Oh, don't be anxious! I'm really not a big deal.

Thank you for dropping into my inbox! I love hearing from other turtles, especially relative newbies, like myself! One of my fav parts of coming out of lurking mode is getting to talk to other people. I kinda follow back anybody who follows me, cause it seems polite? I don't know tumblr etiquette. I just follow the tags when I get the chance.

I appreciate the encouragement! I try to avoid dramatics, so I'm sorry for the upset last week. The situation is largely resolved, and I am feeling more okay. I kinda backed off because I wasn't sure of my footing here in fandom as compared to others, especially as I do think I have some takes that fall outside fandom consensus. Again, I don't mean to rock any boats and I'm not invested in convincing anybody that they should have the same opinions as I do. Hearing from turtles who do want me to continue posting gave me some more confidence there.

So, yeah, I expect I'll post some more as I have time. I'd like to post more on dd (cause he's my fav). I'd also like to try to figure out gg cause that dude is so confusing to me. I do have RL stuff going on, and I don't have the time to be super-active outside of occasional posts. But I'd like keep posting stuff. At least until I get all my Yizhan thoughts out.

#asks

[bbygirl-aemond]

I love your characterization so much and my brain keeps thinking about HP crossovers so - What Hogwarts houses would you place the characters in? I just can’t quite decide on Aemond’s…

(I love Stormbreak and your meta so much!!! Thank you for sharing all your wonderful thoughts and works!!)

i'm not sure if this will be a controversial take, but aemond is definitely the kind of person who considers himself slytherin/ravenclaw but is, to his core, a gryffindor. he likes the reputations of intelligence and cunning associated with the first two houses. but the most important points of his life in canon- claiming vhagar, the strong boys toast, chasing luke at storm's end, abandoning his captive mother in king's landing to wild around in the riverlands- those all revolve around gryffindor character traits, both positive and negative, such as courage, lack of impulse control, arrogance, and recklessness.

helaena is 100000% a ravenclaw. she's the hotd luna lovegood.

aegon elder would be a hufflepuff who forced the sorting hat to put him in slytherin because of family expectations and ended up miserable, poor thing.

canon daeron is likely a gryffindor (the whole daeron the daring thing), but stormbreak daeron is much more of a slytherin. very pragmatic, intelligent, cunning, and ambitious. planned out every stage of his life, and all that.

alicent is a hufflepuff, very loyal and devoted and caring and hardworking, but fiercely protective and dangerous when she feels that her loved ones are threatened.

otto is very obviously a slytherin, just a very well-learned and intelligent one. he's the definition of ruthless pragmatism.

rhaenyra is a gryffindor, through and through. she's super confident, arrogant at times, has several big displays of bravery, the whole shebang.

this might also be a bit controversial but jace is a slytherin. hear me out!! he's super devoted to his family and he's obviously very kind and good, which don't come to mind when someone thinks slytherin, sure. but he's very cunning (the whole dragonseed idea) and in stormbreak he is just ruthless (for the greater good, but still). the abdication? the harrenhal arc? he figures out exactly what he needs to do in order to get what he wants and he does it.

luke is a hufflepuff. he's loyal to his family, sweet, doesn't care much about fame or ambition or recognition, just about him and his family being happy. and if he thinks his family's lives are at stake, he'll cut out eyes without hesitation.

joffrey is a ravenclaw, no further questions, my dragon-obsessed hyperfixation king.

daemon... daemon embodies many things. i'm truly torn between gryffindor and slytherin with this one, and whichever one you believe, the sorting hat was definitely torn between the two as well. he's a good fit for gryffindor in much of the same way aemond is, since he can be very reckless and impulsive and brave to the point of idiocy. but he's also very ruthless and cunning when advancing his family's goals, kind of like jace but with less morals and compunctions against murder.

baela is a gryffindor. she values her freedom and independence more than anything and has inherited every one of her father's gryffindor-like traits of arrogance and bravery.

rhaena is a hufflepuff, just like luke, which is why the two of them are so wholesome together. she's very loyal, similarly is content with a low-key but happy life. and she can be very dangerous and fierce when she wants to be; she just uses that side of herself rarely.

aegon is a hufflepuff like his older sister. his priority is primarily to his family, he's not highly fond of the spotlight, he values duty a ton.

viserys is a slytherin, but everyone takes him for a ravenclaw because he's quiet, reserved, and bookish. but he's canonically very cunning and intelligent; you don't successfully rule the seven kingdoms for decades (as king but also as hand) without a ton of political savvy and a ruthless side.

#thanks for this it was fun!! #ask #asks #answered #hotd #house of the dragon #harry potter #hp #fire and blood #fab #fic: stormbreak #fic #stormbreak #gryffindor #ravenclaw #slytherin #hufflepuff

[whomst-art-thou-whomst-whomst]

Oh No! Here Comes Trouble: Chuying Meta (via some key aspects of her growth)

If Guangyan is a fussy housecat and Yiyong is a tired puppy, Chuying is a bit like a tenacious bunny (the cop in Zootopia) who doesn’t look like she can throw down but absolutely wants to and will at the slightest provocation (Tbh I think she would be like this regardless of career choice).

I see a lot of posts and have written myself about the coming of age for our two male leads, but make way now for the queen, because Chuying’s development from the start of the show til the end is *chef’s kiss* as her friendship with her fellow disasters and her involvement in the cases evolve and come to change her. It's such a breath of fresh air to get a female lead character who isn't a carelessly added, poorly written and/or demonized figure. She is as complicated and brave and awkward as her bros, and her journey to maturity is oddly beautiful. Emphasis on odd. I especially want to focus on a turning point in her growth, the incident where the trio drinks together to celebrate (Chuying's words) her promotion.

One-Per: Two Years Ago...

Our first impression of Chuying is that she’s bored and feels cramped by her life, a la Belle in Beauty and the Beast. Poor kiddo is stuck at a desk or on light duties as a traffic cop, and the biggest thing in her normal day is setting up a table for a visiting calligrapher--hardly the stuff of Dirty Harry or Sherlock Holmes. We also see hints (similar to Guangyan and Yiyong) of personality traits that Chuying carries into her work that prevent her from actually being a good, positive force within her unit--traits, linked to her obsession for promotion and adventure, that she needs to grow out of: she steals her boss’s chair for an event outside when she could get a chair anywhere, and she’s so absorbed in her envy of the detectives that she isn’t even listening to the statement she’s meant to be taking from someone who looks like they either got beaten up or were in an accident.

It’s a subtle way to show that a.) the person most in the way of Chuying becoming a good detective is Chuying, and b.) she is so focused on her potential advancement that she doesn’t focus on being helpful in her job in the present, although—as Yiyong points out later—there’s a lot of value in her work right there and then. While the viewer can understand feeling stuck and frustrated in a role that you think is stifling your potential, at the start of the drama Chuying is a public servant who isn’t serving the public.

Chuying, Yiyong, and The First Case

There is one hiccup between her first scene and the case in which she first gets involved: she is one of the early people on the scene of the bus crash. The actress absolutely owns that scene, because her face does all the work to tell us this is clearly the most death she’s ever been around, the highest stakes, and her day finally has something happening but it’s bloody and tragic and she can barely do anything to help. But she does do something, as we find out.

Fast forward two years and milady is still bottom of the pile, still OnePer. She reports to a detective for a weird case of some missing body, and wouldn’t you know it, there’s a scruffy little shit lurking on the security feed who looks an awful lot like the person she rescued on the day of the bus crash???

Rewatching their budding partnership is particularly hilarious because Yiyong is so polite(ish) and intimidated by her at the beginning, like, my sweet grumblepup, this won’t last long.

(Also the moment he finds out that she gave him mouth-to-mouth is peak adorable Yiyong.)

Once she recovers from the what-in-the-shit realization that this kid has actually found an animated corpse with a spirit inside, full credit to her that she rolls up her sleeves and gets busy--we see her interest in Yiyong's point of view and that although she teases him for seeming like a delinquent, she respects his theories and follows his lead on a lot of things. In a way, Chuying is one of the first people to ever treat Yiyong seriously as someone who is smart and can do good things.

Chuying, Obsession, and Developing Empathy

Granted, Chuying’s obsession is understandable. In addition to the difficulties of being a female cop in a male-dominated workplace, she also lives with the moniker of OnePer—a constant reminder that she wasn’t good enough to pass the test that would allow promotion.

There’s a chip on her shoulder, one that’s narrowed her focus to Becoming A Detective. She doesn’t initially even focus on the practicalities of the job, or what difference she would or wouldn’t make—it’s about attaining that status.

The above scene, in my mind, is such an important scene for understanding both of these characters, and one of the show's big messages about understanding and empathizing with others. We find out here that Chuying is getting promoted, but that it's only because she managed to find (thanks to Yiyong) and solve (again, in large part thanks to Yiyong) multiple cases. So in her mind, it makes sense to thank him, and to carelessly joke about how meeting him has been so great for her (forgetting the first time she met him was the worst day of his life), and that all of these cases (involving grief and sorrow and loss and suffering) have been so great for her. Chuying isn't mean-spirited here, just thoughtless of her impact on others--and the show wants to tell us, this is an important problem for people in the world who regularly move through it without consideration for others. Chuying's carelessness is our carelessness.

Despite their similar kinds of ambition, one of the big differences between Guangyan and Chuying is that Guangyan, who expresses himself well and is a big thinker, is careful with how he talks, especially depending on who he is speaking to, and he has been unfailingly observant of Yiyong since re-entering his life why is that i wonder. Chuying's instinct is to blurt out her thoughts to everyone, but she is thoughtless about it--she doesn't recognize the effect her words and ideas have on people. This will become A Problem as she comes to confide in a certain shady baker.

So here she is, thanking Yiyong for reincarnating the devil, and he grabs the bottle. I have to tip my cap to these actors, because all three of them perform the hell out of this moment without so much as a single word. Yiyong's actor in particular is absolutely incredible here--the shock, pain, and frustration, along with his attempt to control himself are all in the eyes. He's not trying to hurt her, and he is scarily silent, wordless--the camera focuses on his shaking, clenched hand as he blocks Chuying's efforts to pour herself a drink in toast to their super fun partnership. He's just trying to stop her enjoyment of this awful thing, his eyes are begging her to stop and think about what she's saying.

Meanwhile, Guangyan is worried sick over Yiyong's response and trying to recover the situation--literally, he's catching the alcohol in a cup. Poor Chuying looks surprised and confused. Thanks to constant time spent with Yiyong and a lot of time in his own head, Guangyan has come to be better with feelings, but at this point in the show, Chuying is still focused on herself as the center of things, and while she understands Yiyong thinks differently from her about things, here she genuinely doesn't get what he's worked up about.

That's why I think it's so important when we see her marking down in a calendar to reopen investigation on the closed case they solved that Yiyong wants her to work harder at looking into--it's as though she's between the old and the new Chuying, the old Chuying who will put off doing this unpleasant task right away in favor of her current plans, and the new Chuying who is willing to take the risk of her superiors finding out she's reinvestigating something.

The Worst Baker Ever and the Rise of Detective OnePer

I hate friggin Zhuang Hezhen. And sure, mainly for being a murderous psychopathic creep, but in this post I hate in particular how he uses Chuying to keep track of his own crimes. It's really subtle, how the show does it--from my own criminology studies, I've seen that serial killers like to insert themselves into investigations and psychopaths like interacting with and one-upping/feeling superior to law enforcement. Chuying is a smart person in her own way, but he sneaks under her radar with his dumb baked goods and harmless-seeming demeanor and artful hair/wardrobe.

oh honey, oh no...

It’s something that I think she’ll come to understand Yiyong for—guilt over a situation that she didn’t cause. Because the baker is responsible, and we can only imagine her horror realizing that her innocent conversations with this nice guy who brought baked goods to her workplace paved the road for the museum scene. Imagine finding a person who you can confide in who comforts you and gives you shitty pastry (in an endearing way, i guess), only for them to turn around and use that knowledge to hurt the people you care about, revealing in the process that surprise, your dessert bestie is a psychopathic serial killer.

The guy fooled everyone, but Chuying would likely see it as a failure of her detective skills, because she didn’t see him coming, and when they were in the museum standoff and push came to shove (I'm so sorry, the pun wasn't originally intended) she wasn’t armed, wasn't prepared--wasn't the cop she believed she could be. She couldn’t stop Zhuang Hezhen from throwing Yiyong over the railing, and she couldn’t reach her friend to save him.

I've seen (and obsessed over) a bunch of posts with images of Guangyan's reaction to Yiyong's fall. But we can't discount Chuying's response, although it's quieter and less overwhelming. We see Yiyong with Guangyan much more often than with Chuying as the series progresses, and his growth is easier to trace and more visible--we see him question his career, himself, he's more noticeably introspective. But I think a huge amount of Chuying's maturation to the kind of great detective she can become actually happens in this museum scene, where she's finally called on to execute her duty to protect a citizen and apprehend a criminal. It's up to her. The thing is, we can see now how she's changed. Because looking at the incident as a whole, her bosses won't fault her--as Zhuang Hezhen points out. The new detective caught a serial killer, and did her best to help rescue a civilian, who did in fact survive (in a coma)--they'll be pleased. But she does Not Care at all. Like Guangyan, all distractions of personal glory are gone away from Chuying's mind and she knows what matters to her. Love her for that growth.

When we leave her, Chuying is miles from where she started—she no longer romanticizes detective work because yikes, it’s her actual job now. She is still herself, but wiser and warier, and disillusioned of her grand ideas. No more complaining and confiding in strangers bearing gifts of sugary sweets, no more self-focused caseloads. It doesn't benefit her career to regularly visit a comatose Yiyong and regale him with stories of her work, so when we see her there, it's clear how her priorities have shifted to care about those around her. The weight on her back (the back pain joke is beautifully timed) is her guilt, to some degree, but her optimism is a particular strength in the group--she believes, as does Guangyan, that Yiyong WILL recover. In the typical adventure trio, Yiyong is our Heart/Hero, Guangyan is our Brains, and Chuying is the Muscle.

Raise a toast to the tough, brave woman who grew so much over the course of a few cases and figured out what was important to her. I'm really hoping for a season two where we get to see her as a full-on detective.

#whomst #oh no! here comes trouble #chen chuying

[subway-tolkien]

Regarding Izzy's role in Ed's life, whether he was a father figure, mentor, jilted lover, whatever, this popped into my head and I'm just going to throw it out there for whoever wants some Izzy+Ed character study.

Season 2 spoilers, obviously. 2nd person, Ed POV. Not really a fic, more like meta-as-prose. I don't know, I just woke up and I'm hungry, leave me alone.

Listen, you're a traumatized teenager, you've just killed your dad, you've never had a positive male role model in your life, and you're on a pirate ship at the mercy of a vicious captain who might as well be your fuckin' dad all over again. You're questioning your life choices and maybe sometimes the churning sea below seems more inviting than it should.

Then one of the other crewmen, a gruff little guy with 2x4s on both shoulders, maybe he sees you struggling, maybe he sees your potential, maybe he sees you as someone easily manipulated—maybe all three. He finds you sniveling and bleeding in the hold after your nth whipping of the week, but instead of laughing and spitting on you like the other crew, he sits down wordlessly and hands you a hunk of bread and a flagon of pisswater ale.

You're a fuckin' idiot, he says. Mouthin' off to people like that's gonna get you killed.

Maybe if they weren't all fuckin' dickheads, you mutter. I'm gonna kill 'em all someday. You don't, not really, you don't want to kill anyone, but you're angry and scared and that's what comes out of your mouth. You hope you haven't just signed your own death warrant by threatening what amounts to mutiny.

Fortunately, your new companion laughs.

Guess I've got to toughen you up, he muses. If you're gonna live long enough.

He takes you under his wing, brings you scraps of food and shows you how to use a sword. He teaches you how to mask your pain, how to ignore it. He teaches you the value of ruthlessness, the importance of a reputation. He's your best friend. He's the father you never had. He's handsome and brave and everything you want to be. You're a little bit in love with him but you don't understand what it means, so you push it aside and focus on staying alive.

Over time, he turns you into a passable pirate, then a good one. At some point your own instincts kick in and it turns out you're not just a good pirate, you're the best, you're a natural, and eventually you're in command of your own ship. Of course, you bring on your mentor as your first mate. You owe him that much, and you're nothing without him by your side.

The glory days are beautiful.

As time goes on, that mentor relationship shifts and changes into something darker, something a little twisted. You can sense that something's changed for him, maybe for you, too. When you find out what it is—sexual attraction, romantic attachment, whatever form it takes—you're curious, admittedly, but your daddy issues, while pretty fuckin' bad, keep you from taking that final step. Maybe you do harbor some attraction, you do love him in your own way, but not the way he wants. Maybe you try, a drunken night here and there, but it's not what you want. You don't know what you want.

You dodge his advances, you change the subject, you fill your time together with plans and strategies so there's no space for the monster between you. You keep breaking his heart because you don't know how to have that kind of relationship with someone who effectively raised you the way your dad never did.

The chasm between you cracks and starts to widen.

Decades later, you're middle-aged, your mentor—though he's not really that anymore, is he? Your relationship has mutated into something almost unrecognizable—is stuck in a rut, happy to be behind the door you're throwing your whole body against to open. Where he once led you to freedom, he's now the keeper of your cage. Everything is gray, gray, gray. The days are long. The sea looks too inviting again.

Then, one day, you hear of a new pirate on the scene, who turns out to be a fascinating, silly, wonderful creature, and you fall in love for the first time. It's VERY different from the love you have for your former mentor, and he knows that. He hates it. Maybe he thought you were just incapable of giving him what he wanted, but turns out you are capable, it's him that's the problem. You've broken his heart again. You're changing, for the better, which takes you further and further away from him.

Then your heart gets broken, and he takes the opportunity to drag you back to his side, except the gray, gray, gray is now black, a void of pain and loneliness you can't fill, you'll never fill. He thinks he'll be enough. He is not. Pain gives rise to the darkest parts of yourself you hoped were long dead and you make the world regret the day you let yourself be hurt. You do the hurting, in the hopes it makes the pain stop.

Spoiler: It doesn't.

And then a bunch of weird shit happens, you kind of die a little bit, and there's mermaids and lesbians and drag queens, it's a whole thing. You claw your way back to sanity and the love of your life, while your former mentor finds himself and his capacity to love in a way he never really understood. You are learning who you are apart from each other and this machine you've built together. You learn to be softer, he learns that being softer is not a character flaw or a weakness. He learns how love is strength. You learn how to trust other people. It's a process, but you're getting there.

The chasm between you remains, but on either side are the beginnings of a bridge.

He said, in the beginning, he wouldn't die for you, except he sort of does, in the end. As he sends you off with his last breaths, he tells you to be yourself, to let yourself be loved. He got you this far, kept you alive long enough to find your place, the right hand to hold, the family you've been searching for since the last time you saw your mother. He didn't know that's what he was doing the whole time, but it was. He didn't know that was how he loved you. You didn't, either.

He dies in your arms, just as you've finally figured out how to love each other the right way. Not as mentor/mentee, father/son, lover to lover, but a secret other thing. Something uniquely yours, too real to define. You never did find your balance in life, but you find it now, your hands covered in blood as his big, stupid heart stops beating.

You lay him to rest in sight of the sea he loved so much, where you can visit and tell him about your days, the fun things you've done, the new life you've built for yourself. There's an even greater divide between you now, life and death, yet somehow you've never been closer. The two of you, a pair of lonely wooden puppets suddenly become real.

You miss him like a limb—and isn't that fuckin' hilarious?

There are nights you can't sleep and you find yourself standing at the window watching storms roll in, the lights of passing ships. You can hear something on the horizon, something in the way the water whispers to the sand as it kisses the shore. A message just for you, not in a bottle but carried by the wind.

You're still a fuckin' idiot.

You smile.

"Love you too, man," you say, an you go back to the life he never meant to give you. The life you wouldn't have without him.

#ofmd #our flag means death #izzy hands #ed teach #ofmd season 2 #ofmd spoilers

[thyandrawrites]

Blog update

Hi, everyone! I hope the holidays are treating you well. I'm doing okay. 

For those of you that missed my announcement, or didn't see my previous pinned post, I wanted to quickly clarify what's going on. You might have noticed that I didn't answer your ask. I'm sorry about that. 

I'm stepping down from writing meta and sharing my thoughts on recent manga events, on the fandom, on expectations/predictions for the series, and on any hot topic being discussed by other meta bloggers and doing the rounds in the villain standom. Basically, don't expect me to engage with much meta anymore. I'm taking a break for an indefinite amount of time because I find this fandom too hostile currently; since my anxiety is triggered by any tension, be it real or the product of my brain contemplating a fear and running with it, I have to disengage and just focus on myself. I hope you'll understand. 

What does this mean for this blog? 

Meta and asks are normally a huge portion of the contents of this blog. Most of you probably followed me for those. And let's be real, meta is my passion so it will likely resume at some point. Idk when that will be, tho. Maybe I'll wake up next week and be relaxed or uncaring enough to brave the thought of diving back into the disk horse pool, maybe it will be in a couple of months, maybe I will switch to another fandom entirely. I don't know yet. 

In the meantime, please know that I will most likely not respond to anything meta-related or any ask that expresses frustration, negativity, disappointment or anything in that vein, be it a comment on the series or a request to comment on the takes floating around the fandom. 

You're still welcome to drop by my askbox with anything else if you feel like it. I'm keeping it open because I do like chatting to people, and I'm too socially awkward for dms. I'm just trying to limit my chances of ending up being the target of someone writing an essay about why Take X or Y is wrong. There's been a lot of those lately, and they stress the fuck out of me. 

That being said, you're also free to unfollow me if you don't have fun here anymore. I don't mind. 

Oh, please also refrain from answering this announcement by showering me with support and positivity! While I do wholeheartedly appreciate the sentiment and feel very thankful for your kindness(💙), I don't really know how to answer it. Again, socially awkward! Just to put you at ease, I am aware that for every hostile take there's dozens of people who genuinely enjoy hearing my thoughts and talking to me. I do! I'm not looking for reassurance, I'm just trying to draw a boundary. Writing meta is my passion, and I normally have fun with it, but as of now it's not that fun anymore. That's all. I am taking care of myself and spending more of my time on my fics instead. 

Thank you all so much in advance for your understanding, and I hope you have a nice day/night! Take care 💕

#Thyandra.txt

[kachikirby]

Kirby: Mysterious Incident on the Pupupu Train! - Chapter 3: The Midnight Ghost Disturbance!?

Previous Chapter

Shortly after the party ended, all of the passengers returned to their rooms. For a while, everyone’s chatter echoed through the passageway, but little by little, it became quiet. The lights in the rooms one after the other were turned off. Tired from the trip, everyone crawled into bed. It was after midnight when the passengers went to sleep...

A single Waddle Dee walked through the passageway, in his hand a cup of water. King Dedede had ordered him to bring it. The Waddle Dee, who was walking slowly so as not to spill any water, stopped when he thought he heard a strange sound.

“...u...uu...u...”

It was a sad-sounding voice.

“...huh? Is there anyone there?” The Waddle Dee, his eyes wide open, looked around. There was no one there. The voice continued.

“Uu... hic... uuuuu...”

The voice was a broken sob, and it came from the other side of a certain door. However, it was a room that was used as storage, so there should have been no passengers in there. The Waddle Dee became scared. He couldn’t believe he was hearing a stifled sob coming from a room that should be empty...

At that moment, the crying suddenly grew louder.

“Uuu... UWAAAAAAAAAAAAN!”

“Eep!”

Horrified, the Waddle Dee jumped up. The momentum caused him to drop the cup he was carrying.

CRASH!

The sound of the glass breaking echoed. The sound made the Waddle Dee tremble even more.

“Wawawawawawa-!”

The Waddle Dee screamed and ran away at full speed until he reached the Waddle Dees’ room...

~~~~~~~~

The Waddle Dees who heard the story all turned pale.

“Sobbing coming from an unoccupied room?”

“N-no way! That can’t happen! You were hearing something else!”

“No! I’m sure I heard it!” The witness Waddle Dee said in a serious tone. “It was horribly sad sobbing. Like a ghost...”

“A ghost!?”

“The mere sound of that voice was enough to make my cup break into a million pieces! It must have been the voice of a ghost!”

In reality, it only broke when the Waddle Dee dropped it, but he believed it was all the ghost's fault.

“N-no way...!”

The Waddle Dees trembled.

“W-why is there a ghost on this train...?”

“How did it get in?! No, could it have slipped in with the passengers...?!”

“Everyone calm down!” Bandana Waddle Dee told his friends. “There can’t be a ghost. You need a ticket, or you can’t ride the Pupupu Train. Kirby did a good job of checking at the ticket gate, didn't he?”

“But... if it was a real ghost, you could get on the train without needing to go through the ticket gate. You could just pass through the walls!”

The Waddle Dees trembled even more.

Suddenly, the door opened with a loud noise and the Dees turned around in horror.

“KYAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!”

“THE GHOST IS HERE!!”

The one who peered into the room was King Dedede.

“Who’s the ghost?” He asked with a confused face.

“Ah... your highness!” The Waddle Dees all jumped up at once.

“Did you forget that I told you to bring me water? It’s inexcusable to ignore my orders and skip work...” Dedede said bitterly.

“Your highness, something terrible has happened!” The Waddle Dee reported.

After hearing the story, Dedede was taken aback. “A ghost crying in an unoccupied room? That can’t be! You must’ve been half asleep!”

“No, I really did hear it!”

“Hmph! That’s nonsense! I’ll go see for myself!”

Dedede then headed towards the room, but the panicked Waddle Dees clung to him.

“Your highness, it’s dangerous to go by yourself! You should call Kirby or Sir Meta Knight...!”

“You’re talking dumb. If I wake them up for such a small reason, I’ll be a laughingstock!”

Dedede advanced through the passageway without hesitation. Seeing his brave figure caused the Waddle Dees to finally regain their composure and follow after the king.

~~~~~~~~

Upon reaching the storage room, there was no noise.

“It’s quiet, isn’t it...” One Waddle Dee said in a soft voice.

Dedede looked down at the Waddle Dees.

“Did you really hear something from this room?”

The Waddle Dee who reported the ghost nodded.

“There’s no mistaking it! Earlier there was a terrifying, otherworldly crying coming from the other side of this door!”

“Well, let’s see.”

Dedede put a hand on the door.

“Y-your highness! That’s dangerous! You shouldn’t open...!” Bandana shouted.

“If we don’t open it, we won’t know if someone is in there, right?”

He reluctantly opened the door. It wasn’t locked, so it slowly opened. The room was empty except for spare blankets, towels, pillows, and others that were piled up on the edge of the wall.

“Looks like there’s no one in here.” Dedede said.

The Waddle Dees entered the room with trepidation, climbing on piles of blankets and tucking themselves in between towels, looking around for signs of a strange presence. However, they couldn’t find any.

“H-huh? That’s strange...” The witness Waddle Dee uttered in a daze.

“As I thought, you were half asleep.” Dedede said.

“It shouldn’t be... I clearly heard it...”

“Couldn’t this mean that the ghost escaped?” Bandana said.

“Where to?”

“That... I don’t know, but...”

“There’s no hiding place on the train and there’s no such thing as ghosts. Hmph! What a waste of time!”

Dedede let out a big yawn and returned to his room. The Waddle Dees also returned to their own room.

“I wasn’t half asleep. I really did hear it...” The witness Waddle Dee said in a depressed way.

“Don’t worry! I believe you!” Bandana blurted out. “The ghost passed through the walls and went outside the train! So there’s no reason to be afraid!”

“...that’s right.”

The other Waddle Dees nodded, but all their faces remained grim.

~~~~~~~~

The next night, the Waddle Dees talked in hushed voices.

“Will the ghost come again tonight...?”

“N-no way! It should already be outside the train!”

“But if there’s crying in the storeroom again...”

The Waddle Dees shuddered.

“Being scared like this will only make us more scared! I’ll go check!” Bandana boldly said.

“Bandana-senpai?!”

The other Dees clung to Bandana.

“Please don’t go! It’s too dangerous!”

“What will happen to you if you’re attacked by a ghost!?”

“It’ll be fine. Wait here, everyone.”

“You can’t go!” The Waddle Dees said altogether. “We should go together!”

“We can’t beat a ghost alone. We should go with King Dedede...” A single Dee said in a trembling voice.

Bandana shook his head.

“He clearly said “there’s no such thing as ghosts” last night, didn’t he? If you try to push it any longer, he’ll be offended.”

“That’s true, but...”

“It’ll be fine. I’m just going to go check it out. If it’s a ghost, I want everyone to run.”

The unit of Waddle Dees, with Bandana at their head, walked down the passageway.

~~~~~~~~

As they got closer to the storeroom, they could hear a stifled sobbing coming from inside.

“Uuuu... hic... ueee...”

The Waddle Dees stood at attention.

“I-I really can hear it!”

“It’s the ghost’s voice! We should call his highness, Bandana-senpai!”

Bandana hesitated, but it bothered him that the sobs sounded so sad.

“Even if it’s a ghost, wouldn’t it be better to comfort it?”

“Wh-What are you saying, Bandana-senpai?!”

“I feel sorry for it because it’s crying so much.”

He boldly opened the door.

“Hello? Is someone crying in here?”

Then the voice inside suddenly stopped. Bandana called out in a gentle voice.

“Did you open this door for me? If you wanted to talk to someone because you were sad...”

“S-senpai, senpai!”

The other Waddle Dees clung to Bandana.

“The ghost left after the door was opened!”

“This is too scary! We should run away!”

Of course, Bandana was afraid, but he couldn’t bring himself to run away like this.

“Let’s listen to them.”

He put a hand on the doorknob, however, it would not open. The door seemed to be locked from the inside. Bandana shook the knob.

“Open up! Hey, please open up!”

Just then, the Waddle Dees heard a voice from above them.

“What are you guys doing?”

The nervous and trembling Waddle Dees were surprised by that sudden voice. They turned around all together.

“KYAAH! KYAAAH! IT’S A GHOST!”

“DON’T COME NEAR ME! STAY AWAY!”

The one who picked up the crying Waddle Dee was King Dedede.

“Pipe down! It’s the middle of the night! Don’t’ be so loud!”

“Ah! Your highness!”

The Waddle Dees breathed a sigh of relief.

“We heard a faint sobbing coming from this storeroom and we were trying to open the door but...” Bandana reported.

“I don’t hear any voices.”

“The voice stopped when I tried to open the door.”

“Hmph. You must’ve heard wrong...”

King Dedede looked around at the Waddle Dees and then said, as if suddenly realizing. “...wasn’t there more of you?”

“Huh? What do you mean?”

“Ten of you total should’ve boarded. One of you isn’t here.”

“Huh? It shouldn’t be...”

Bandana counted the number of Waddle Dees and became shocked.

“Y-you’re right... there’s only nine!”

The Waddle Dees began to panic.

“What happened?! Since when?!”

“There were ten people until now!? Wasn’t he there!?”

“He...was there, right? I didn’t count but...”

“Maybe he was caught by the ghost...?!”

“KYAAAAH! KYAAAAHHH!”

“I told you to pipe down!”

Dedede pushed past the Waddle Dees and put a hand on the door.

“Open up this door or I’ll bash it in!” He shouted in a harsh voice.

With the clattering sound of a key, the door opened. What appeared was a Waddle Dee with tears in his eyes and trembling.

“...huh?!” The Waddle Dees shouted together.

“By any chance... were you the one crying in the storeroom...?”

“I... I’m sorry! I’m so sorry!” The Waddle Dee knelt on the floor, bowing his head.

Dedede then picked up the Waddle Dee.

“What the heck were you doing?”

“Well... um... I...” The Waddle Dee said as he fidgeted. “I... wanna go back to Dream Land...”

“What?”

“Um... the train’s rattling is a bit scary... and there are no forests, fields, blue skies, rain or rainbows here... and when I think about Dream Land, the more I want to go back and the more I can’t stop crying...”

“In other words, you’re feeling homesick?” Bandana said, taken aback.

“Homesick? What does that mean, Bandana-senpai?” The Waddle Dees asked.

“It means you miss your home or hometown.”

Dedede dropped the Waddle Dee he had been holding in disbelief and the Dee started crying again.

“So you shut yourself up in the closet and cried...” Bandana said.

“I’m sorry... I’m so sorry...”

“If that was the case, you should’ve said so sooner! Why did you hide it from us?” The Waddle Dee who heard the crying yesterday said.

“Well... because...” The crying Waddle Dee said as he rubbed his eyes. “I’m a member of the Waddle Dee Unit...so I have to be strong...”

“Last night, after you heard the glass break, you snuck out of the storage room and joined us in the hustle and bustle, didn't you?” Bandana said.

“...yeah.”

“Then tonight, while everyone else was talking, you snuck out of the room and cried here alone, right?”

“...yeah.”

“Geez! This Waddle Dee may be homesick, but so are you guys who can't even notice that one of your friends has disappeared! You’re slacking off!” Dedede said in a grumpy tone.

“Y-yes sir!” The Waddle Dees straightened up and spoke in unison. “We’re sorry, your highness!”

“Don't cry because you're homesick or something stupid like that. It's pathetic for a subordinate of mine!”

Hearing that, the Waddle Dee who was crying felt dejected.

“Whether it’s Dream Land or the Pupupu Train, wherever I am is where your home is! Isn’t that right?” Dedede said.

The Waddle Dee quickly raised his head.

“Or would you rather return to a Dream Land without me?”

“N-no!” The crying Waddle Dee said as he jumped up. “I want to be next to your highness! Being next to you is the best!”

“Hmph. Idiot.” Dedede turned his back to the Waddle Dees and let out a big yawn. “Go back to your room and sleep. You need it badly.”

The Waddle Dees followed after King Dedede.

While walking back, Bandana spoke. “Your highness, did you come here to find out about the mysterious crying?”

“...wha?”

“Last night, you said that there can’t be any ghosts...”

“So what?” The king looked back and stared at Bandana. “And there was actually none there.”

“Yes, but I’m glad that you came all this way to check it out.”

“Stupid. I didn’t come to check it out. I just happened to be passing by.”

“Yes! You happened to be passing by!”

King Dedede and the Waddle Dees then returned to their own rooms. Thus, the case of the mysterious crying was solved...

The next day, an even more mysterious incident befell the Pupupu Train.

~~~~~~~~

Table of Contents

Next Chapter

#kirby light novel translation #kirby light novel #light novel translation #bandanna waddle dee #king dedede #waddle dees #why yes g-witch this week hit hard how could you tell #dedede is a tsundere #or as they say on pixiv #tsundede #bandanna mvp #I actually did reach the translation goal I set before the next cour of bleach tybw airs #but i'll keep it up

[danmeiljie]

Episode 30: Advance Bravely Part 1

In which I aggressively defend their love confession: it doesn't exist in all versions of the show, as the audio is either dubbed over with different lines or omitted entirely. In other versions even the footage is cut.

In a voice over the actors clearly say these lines:

Yuan Zong: "Yao-er, I love you. I'm willing to do anything for you."

Xia Yao: "I want to be with you."

It is also the only time in the show they use their pet names for each other:

"Da Zong-zi" = Big Dumpling

"Yao-er" = Little Devil

Here is the grey site where you can watch the completely uncensored show plus the love confession at the end: (be aware tho there's a ton of ads and redirects on the site so use with an AdBlock)

#l watches advance bravely #advance bravely #xia yao #yuan zong #gong jun #xu feng #theyre in love your honor #my bad gifs #advance bravely... meta?!

[artsyjesseblue]

Slowly Going Mad - Part I - Zarkon

There’s a subject I’ve been meaning to write about for quite a while (of course it’s about VLD). A character analysis that, I believe, will justify their arcs and give a better view into some controversial turning points of the story. I’d like to zoom in a bit into Zarkon’s, Honerva’s and later, Lotor’s gradual psychological shifts. To set the premise, I intend to show that each of them - as presented along the episodes - had various stages of mental transitions - progressive changeovers, to be more precise . And even though some of the transitions are not so evident, they actually happen along the many millennia. Each of them are triggered by profound and very unique sets of reasons. Since discussing about all three will take up quite a lot of pages, this will be a three-part meta, and I will link each of them to the others. Here is the link to Honerva’s analysis. Update: Lotor’s analysis is also complete.

Zarkon

The beginning of the show paints a very stark and ominous image of the emperor. The absolute enemy, heartless, bloodthirsty, obsessed about getting Voltron back, especially the Black Lion. As the show advances, he becomes more and more maleficent, to the point where he declares a full-on annihilation chase against his own son. But as we see from snippets of his backstory, during Coran’s accounts in S3E7 “The Legend Begins” and way-way later in S8E2 “Shadows”, Zarkon starts from the point of a very brave paladin with admirable intentions, a loving husband who is over the moon about the news of having a son. Unfortunately, while Alfor regards the comet ore and the quintessence as endless sources of clean energy, Zarkon starts drifting into the lust for endless power. Along with his wife Honerva, they become obsessed with their rift project, to the detriment of their friendship with the rest of the world. As Honerva’s experiments progress, we see him transform from a jovial team leader into an irascible and deceitful individual.

As he later admits in S8, when the paladins awake his consciousness - the quintessence blinded him. But Shiro’s clone actually pointed out in S6: “Zarkon fell prey to his own evil instincts. The quintessence field didn’t create them, it revealed them.” We clearly witness his tendency for pride and need for power, before quintessence even touches him. Watch closely the scenes at the beginning of S3E7 "The Legend Begins", when the old paladins are gathered at the feast table; watch Zarkon’s stiff and dominant demeanor around his colleagues and his superior attitude towards the “servant class” that brings food and drinks to their table.

[Blaytz invites the waiter to "pull up a bench and join the feast. Zarkon, after intentionally clearing throat, scolds him: "You know that fraternizing with the servant class is not permitted. It erodes discipline."]

In my opinion, sustained by examples from the show, his own weak spot - power greed - became his downfall, and quintessence only acted as an amplifier, a catalyst; quintessence was not the original cause.

At this point I’d like to make a distinction between the substance called “quintessence” and the red little creature called “the entity”. The entity hails from the quintessence field (aka “the rift”, “the zone between realities”). Somehow, the notions got muddled together, but I believe - if the show was allowed to end the way the writers and EP’s intended to - we would have understood more about these two. So the entity is a living creature (somewhat sentient, as it seems, too), capable of some very magic and powerful stuff (it “gave Haggar the ability to conquer worlds”), while quintessence is a potent substance, (“the substance with the highest known energy per unit volume in the universe”, as described in S1E10 “Collection and Extraction”). The entity is responsible, among other things, for Haggar’s magic, while quintessence acts as a fuel (for ships, for weapons, for other living beings, for the entity itself - as we’ll further see). Quintessence can, indeed, poison one’s mind, as seen when the Paladins enter the rift, but stack the entity on top of that and you bring the game up a notch: once becoming “one” with the entity, there is a big risk of completely losing your reason, your memories, your own character and consciousness. Only someone with a higher spiritual training and with positive intents can properly handle such a potent entity (hint: Allura).

Back to Zarkon. After the comet hits Daibazaal, we see his first encounter with Honerva, who was assigned as a scientist to study the rift; we witness his shyness around her, his hilarious look at the sight of little Kova the cat. A very humanizing portrait, of a man capable of superior feelings, despite his hard shell. From here, unfortunately, things will only go down. I patched up the succession of events forming Zarkon’s backstory from the two episodes: S3E7 and S8E2: Years pass, Honerva continues her work on the rift. Zarkon, “softened up” by his relationship with Honerva, marries her. Alfor and Melenor have a baby - Allura. Alfor continues to visit his friends and discovers with great apprehension that Honerva is conducting experiments on an entity that arrived from the rift, in response to her call. Honerva’s Altean cheek marks still look intact. The entity trapped in Honerva’s tube screeches and calls out for its congeners. The rift monster attacks. Voltron defeats the monster. Honerva and Zarkon push for more experiments, while Alfor disagrees. We clearly see, from Zarkon’s verbal conflict with Alfor, that his greed for more power has grown, even after encountering such a dangerous creature as the rift monster (which is basically a mega-conglomerate of entities). Alfor (who wants to close the rift): “You have to know when it’s enough!” Zarkon: “I’ll decide what’s enough on my planet!”

Voltron continues to be a force for good in the Universe for the years to come, while Honerva pursues her rift work. Fast-forwarding some decades into the future (and jumping all the way to S2E8 "Shadows") Honerva announces Zarkon she is pregnant. Although I’ll revisit this when discussing her arc, it’s worth noting that pregnant Honerva features the distorted cheekbone marks, not the original Altean half-moons.

Zarkon receives the news about the baby with utmost elation. They discuss a name for the baby and together they come up with something that honors both cultures: Lotarious + Kaltor = Lotor. Around the same time, King Alfor visits their rift project again (jump back to S3E7... yeah, it's all scrambled). We see the Altean king visibly aged, while Zarkon continues to look young. Kova the cat shows up. As Honerva explains, the cat fell ill when the creatures attacked (!!), but she treated him with quintessence and Kova is now 28 deca-phoebs (~years) old. Alfor is shocked to notice Honerva’s facial features have changed. This is the first time in the show when we have a glimpse at who/what is responsible for Zonerva’s incredible longevity. We are led to believe it’s the continuous supply with quintessence, but there is more at play here: the entity. Honerva says: “He [Kova] revealed the truth to us. Quintessence is so much more than you can understand. It is life itself.” Logical conclusion: entity + quintessence = life everlasting. In this same scene we encounter the first major conflict between Alfor and Zonerva. Alfor: “You’ve gone too far.” Honerva: “You’ve always been a coward.” […] “You wish to close off our gateway to enlightenment. We should be expanding it.” [note the word “enlightenment” - put a pin in it - I will discuss about it during Lotor's analysis]. Zarkon: “If we use Voltron, we can enlarge the opening to the other reality.” Alfor: “It’s madness! This prolonged exposure to quintessence has poisoned your minds!” Zarkon: “We’ve only scratched the surface! We can rule this entire universe! We can live forever! All of us!”

Zarkon’s megalomania has definitely reached a new level. As suggested by Alfor, quintessence seems to fuel this madness. After Alfor leaves, Honerva suddenly collapses on the floor. While a bedridden Honerva mumbles stuff about quintessence being life, Zarkon is desperate to get her back. Here, we see the portrait of a leader corrupted by his grandiose obsessions of power, but still very much in love with his wife. An almighty emperor whose terrible fear at that moment was losing his family, the one family he never even hoped to have until he met this amazing, brilliant woman.

The next stage in Zarkon’s undoing comes with his monumental deceit of his Paladin team, driven by his unbridled love for his wife, but also by his poisoned intellect. He tricks them into believing they are using Voltron to close the rift, by telling them that first they need to enlarge it to gather more quintessence. Once inside the rift, he takes Honerva right into the Quintessence field. If we get to think of it, Zarkon pretty much had no other choice at this point if he wanted to save her. Alfor actually stated this: “You’ve gone too far.” Indeed, both are gone beyond the point of return. Honerva is actually gone farther than Zarkon. The fact that she exhibits the distorted cheek marks, she is sick, delusional, incoherent, and she talks about herself as “we” instead of “I” - these are clear and distinct signals that she is possessed by the entity (plus more hints, as I'll discuss in the next meta about her).

Kova fell sick when the creatures attacked, but then he was revived with quintessence. Similarly, a very ill Honerva, who has been playing with the rift creatures for years, demands to get quintessence, because quintessence is life. Knowing that there is no other choice, Zarkon basically makes a ‘deal with the devil’. In exchange for Honerva’s health and their life everlasting, they must give up their own souls, their own consciousnesses. Something the EP’s have mentioned in passage: they are “dead inside”. But how dead? Let’s continue with Zarkon’s own transition: Once in the rift, Zarkon carries Honerva outside of his lion, and, with a clear gesture of offering, he lifts her up in his arms. The rift monster (most likely attracted by the call of the entity already inside Honerva) encircles them. And this is where we see Zarkon’s eyes suddenly transfigured into glowing purple orbs. The entity has taken over them.

The paladins, believing they succumbed due to quintessence overexposure, hold a state funeral. When Zarkon and Honerva reawaken, they are transfigured, both physically and mentally. Zarkon is able to remember who he is. Honerva does not. She was clearly far more affected by the entity than him, since she’d already been sick from it. But Zarkon, on top of the fact that he still retains his memories, might also display some (very small) traits of family affection. Let’s see how much, and for how long… After rising back to ‘life’, Zarkon orders a doctor to the room immediately, since Honerva is incapable of remembering who she is. So… he still cares about her, in his own, new twisted way. Full of rage against the Paladins and especially Alteans for destroying his home planet, he gets his revenge by killing his former friends and nuking Altea. His wrath against the Alteans reaches almost absolute levels. Almost… because his wife and his son have Altean blood, yet he doesn’t obliterate them. A “weakness”? In a very early memory of Honerva (S5E2 “Blood Duel”), before giving birth, Zarkon asks a doctor: “Can you save the child?” “We will try, sire. There are many complications,” comes the answer from the medic. Next, here’s Honerva (now calling herself Haggar) after she gives birth to Lotor, and Zarkon is there to watch for her proper care. A shred of compassion left inside him? Interesting aspect: the doctor mentions that she seems to regain her senses when they administer quintessence, but their resources are finite. The doctor implies that both her and Zarkon will need quintessence in order to survive. In private, Zarkon asks her: “Do you know of quintessence?”. “Can you find me quintessence?” This, right here, is the beginning of ten thousand years of quintessence hunt around the universe, to the expense of entire civilizations and planets, for the benefit of two vampire-like rulers. Both parents reject little baby Lotor. But… not completely. If Zarkon were truly dead inside and showing absolutely no mercy, he would have not kept Haggar or Lotor around him. Instead, she became his right hand, and little Lotor benefitted from a princely education, however devoid of parental love that was. In fact, we are shown snippets of Lotor’s childhood at the court. Zarkon wants updates on his son’s education progress. That is a sign of care for his child, even if the motives might not be altruistic. We could say he did it out of pure pride of having an heir to his throne. No matter, he does request that Lotor goes through the Agotian trials, as stated by Dayak. Some sort of Galra tests, from what we can infer. We also find out that he wants to “remove his impurities” (Altean impurities, that is), which corroborates with his obsession of eliminating anything Altean from the universe. Yet, when little Lotor wishes to ask a question, although considered “speaking out of place”, Zarkon still allows him to proceed with his inquiry. This is when Zarkon confesses something significant about Honerva: “I will tell you this and no more. She was my only weakness. But now she is gone.” Corrupted Zarkon considers love a weakness, yet he acknowledges he had one, in front of no other than his own son, who has Altean blood; all while former Honerva stands right next to him. How fascinating. Somewhere, inside there, buried in the depths of his consciousness, a flicker of emotion still persists. A tiny, almost invisible morsel of what was once a loving family man subsists beneath the veils of darkness.

A number of years later, when Lotor is adolescent, we see a dismissive Zarkon, treating his “insolent boy” with a dominant attitude, excluding him from important meetings. Yet he does not oust him completely. Farther into the future, we are shown an adult Lotor, in charge of Ven’tar’s mining planet. Let’s forget for a minute the harrowing events that happen next. Let’s focus on the fact that Zarkon entrusted his son an entire planet. He was willing to give him power, provided that he walked the same path as him, a path of destruction and annihilation (which we know Lotor didn’t). Lotor was the heir to his throne, and as such, Zarkon wanted to see him follow his steps closely. Alas, the emperor’s lack of empathy towards his son reaches a whole new level. This transitions Zarkon from a somewhat ‘caring’ father figure (if that could be called ‘caring’) into a murderous despot who ousts his son from his empire and obliterates an entire planet. This is another big step down towards Zarkon’s complete loss of self.

What triggered this further devolving? Two things: 1) Lotor’s confessing that he worked “alongside the denizens of the planet”, which is something Zarkon despised even before becoming corrupted. Remember his conversation with the old Paladins? “[..] fraternizing with the servant class is not permitted. It erodes discipline.” Spot similarities with his new discourse: “You dare work with this pitiful race as if they are your equals? […] The heir to the Galra throne should not sully our honor by working with his subjects.” 2) Lotor’s second ‘mistake’: uttering the words ‘mother’ and ‘Altea’… As implied by Zarkon’s own horror-stricken gaze along with a suspenseful “dun-dun” soundtrack, this is the straw that breaks the camel’s back. When his own son dares to bring the subject of his one and only ‘weakness’, a line has been crossed.

But this is not yet Zarkon’s ultimate implosion.

Millennia pass, during which his son survives as an outcast (yet from what we see, he still has access to Galra tech and is able to form his own squad of generals). Zarkon allows his son to live, even benefit from some imperial amenities, most likely while Haggar keeps a spying eye on him. After Haggar revives the wounded husband and Lotor’s Emperor Pro Tem status is dissolved, Zarkon declares about his son: “he is no longer my concern”. So his attitude towards him is not yet wrathful, but rather indifferent, as if he doesn’t even exist. A complete lack of parental love, but no full-on enmity, yet. And right after this, comes the ultimate blow to Zarkon’s last thread of consciousness: finding out that Lotor hides another comet ore, building his own Voltron. The straw that demolishes Zarkon’s speck of family attachment is in fact his lifelong, biggest obsession: power. It is his most prominent “evil instinct”, the one that tripped him from the start. Along the many millennia, his son had been at best an heir with impurities, at worst an awful reminiscence of his only ‘weakness’ for an Altean woman. But now… now Lotor rises from the status of an ignored pariah and threatens Zarkon’s very own authority over the universe, his power. That cannot be forgiven. Thus, Zarkon starts a war against his own son, declaring him a “kill on sight” target across the empire. His final battle with Lotor is, tragically, the ultimate symbol of a man who completely lost himself to darkness.

But, in S8E10 “Knights of Light, Part 2”, we see Zarkon’s arc closing with a grand redemption of his lost consciousness. It seems that his essence is also trapped inside Honerva’s mind, just like the other old Paladins. Keith, Paladin of the Black Lion, challenges the monster: “You were their leader! They trusted you, and you betrayed them! You don’t deserve the Black Lion!” With the aid of the other four old Paladins, Voltron is able to defeat Zarkon’s mech and the emperor finally regains what seems like very old memories. Elated to see his friends around him - Alfor, Blaytz, Gyrgan, Trigel - he happily greets everyone, as if none of the ten thousand years of madness had ever happened. But Allura, enraged by the atrocities he had committed for millennia, makes sure to remind him of his dark past, through a mind meld: “You’ve killed millions!” Lance exclaims with a stupefied reaction: “Allura, what are you doing?” Allura, in raging anger: “Reminding him of the suffering he’s caused!”

Apocalyptic images from the past stream in front of Zarkon’s eyes, while he screams and grunts, pained by the heaviness of his own life. The last image brings back the memory of his final encounter with his son and it’s his complete undoing. Instead of a happy image with his one and only child, he gets the worst kind of parental farewell flashback. Kneeling, tears gush from his eyes, as he gasps… “No…”

Allura, unmoved by his remorse, continues: “You did that. All of it!” He attempts an apology, which appears to be truly coming from his heart: “I’m sorry, I… I didn’t realize what I —” Allura counteracts, though: “You knew exactly what you were doing. You deceived and betrayed your friends and allies!” Zarkon bitterly supplies: “The Quintessence… it blinded me. And you all suffered because of it.” Allura doesn’t seem to nod to his explanation, standing her ground once more: “If you’re truly sorry for what you’ve done, then help us stop her. You must have been placed here to protect something! What is it?” Zarkon: “I… don’t know. I… I’m sorry.” Allura, yelling back: “What are you protecting?” OK, let’s stop here with the dialogue, because we have enough to actually paint an image of this interaction.

I might ruffle some anti-Allura feathers, but I actually agree with her. Some have considered her demeanor here out of character and abrasive. When she yelled at Zarkon with all her might and forced old memories upon him, we all jumped out of our skin, like Lance - “Allura, what are you doing?” Like, what is she doing, going like that against a peaceful guy who just said “I’m sorry”? Also, with what authority does she bust into his memories, against his will? But based on how Zarkon’s portrait has been shaped along the >70 episodes, this is my conclusion: he knew exactly what he was doing when he deceived his Paladin friends, because, at that point, he was not yet possessed by the entity. He knew exactly what he was doing when he followed his lust for power, demanding more and more quintessence from the rift, more and more experiments alongside his wife, ignoring his friends, his duties towards his people, towards his unborn child. Sure, he was not himself when he was possessed by the entity, but before that, he was still in control of himself, even if the quintessence was starting to poison his mind. He knowingly allowed himself to drift to the point of no return. Of course, one can say that quintessence poisoning can be compared with substance abuse. And as such, it can justify his diminishing self-control, but when this converges into putting the lives of your friends and the future of an entire planet in danger, this takes on a different proportion. As the ruler of a planet, he had enormous responsibilities, which he neglected in his quest for more power. That is why Allura comes at him with such outrage. Because she, as a victim of his atrocities, as a leader of her persecuted people, as a representative of a Coalition of planets that suffered for 10k years, is entitled to accuse him, to point out his original sin (power greed), which… if Zarkon had realized it, did not magically appear because quintessence blinded him. It was his original, own evil instinct. Just like Shiro said: “Zarkon fell prey to his own evil instincts. The quintessence field didn’t create them, it revealed them.”

There needs to be accountability for what he’s done; Allura is right. It makes sense that her forgiveness comes with one condition: Zarkon has to help them defeat the witch. If the emperor truly wishes to redeem his consciousness, he needs to “ride one last time” with the other nine paladins and atone for his past sins. After aiding them unveil Honerva’s most hidden secrets - her deepest, unfulfilled wishes, Zarkon indeed helps the Paladins punch out of her mind trap. But not before an interesting conversation with Keith and the other Paladins. Honerva’s powers suddenly attack them and Allura falls on her knees, blasted by a terrible migraine. Zarkon: “You’re in her mind. She’s more powerful here.” Keith: “What do we do?” Zarkon: “There’s nothing you can do but accept defeat.” Keith: “No, we won’t give up!” Zarkon: “That’s your Galra lineage. It’s what makes you a great leader of Voltron. You and I share that trait. But look where it has led the two of us. My desire for unlimited Quintessence was the catalyst for 10,000 years of destruction. Your quest to save the universe took you into the mind of a psychopath.” Keith: “Yes, to gain the knowledge of what she’s doing. And now we know.” Zarkon: “Yet you still don’t know how! She’s too powerful.” Alfor: “Zarkon, Honerva may be more powerful than each of us alone, but the strength of ten Paladins working together as one is the strongest force in the universe.” Zarkon: “The Lions are gone, Alfor. Voltron is gone forever.” Keith: “No, Voltron isn’t gone. Voltron is within each and every one of us. We’re bonded to it, and to each other.” Alfor: “We have one last chance to set things right, but we cannot do it without you. Ride with us one last time, Zarkon.” Pondering on their words, Zarkon pulls out his bayard: “Form Voltron!” Taking a quick look at this dialogue, notice that Zarkon harbors quite a defeated attitude. He really needs a lot of convincing from his friends that there is still hope. Which is something quite uncharacteristic to a Galra warrior, but given the fact that for ten thousand years he’d been under the powerful influence of the dark entity, I can see why he believes defeating Honerva is an impossible task. Another interesting fact is Zarkon’s admission (finally… finally!) that his own desire for unlimited Quintessence was “the catalyst for 10,000 years of destruction.” Zarkon finally admits his sin! But he also thinks Keith is driven by erroneous intentions: “Your quest to save the universe took you into the mind of a psychopath.” To which Keith quickly explains the intention behind his quest, which is not driven by personal desires or ambitions, but practical reasons: to gain the knowledge of Honerva’s objectives. Keith does not have evil instincts to drive him mad. He does not get dragged into obsessive quests. His ‘stubbornness’, if we were to call it so, is bolstered by reason and a moral compass. Alfor’s final words beautifully close the emperor’s arc: “Ride with us one last time, Zarkon.” Their final ascent, united into one, 10-Paladin Voltron, is symbolic of Zarkon’s redemption, an uplifting message of unity and also of hope - that it’s never too late to atone for one’s past misdeeds.

Zarkon’s story, as I see it from this analysis, although at a first glance seems to highlight his abrupt change from a good guy to a rad villain and ultimately circle back with a redemption, is actually built through subtle shifts, and it’s challenging to follow because the backstories are peppered across the seasons, sometimes without a chronological order. But they are there, if you’re digging for them. I’ve used this quote in other metas and I’ll make use of it again here, because it has relevance to how they built Zarkon's arc. Here’s what the executive producers said, in a Syfy interview, about the way they shaped the antagonist characters:

LM: We’ve chosen to kind of selectively release little bits about our villains, like - along the way. We didn’t really have one episode where you expose everything there is to know. A lot of it is kind of underlying, for people to kind of - if they’re willing to look for it - they’ll find it. […] JDS: I think that - in our minds, and in the writers’ room - you know, there’s a full, fleshed-out backstory that goes back to… who-knows-when. Um, yeah, it’s all there, it’s all a matter of…, the viewers are gonna, like, find it, and… [motioning his fingers to suggest keyboard typing] Interviewer: …sift through it. JDS: Yeah.

The next meta in this series will focus on Honerva’s arc - the link is at the beginning of this article.

#voltron meta #zarkon #zarkon meta #vld meta #voltron legendary defender #madness in vld #jesseblue writes

[gascon-en-exil]

The History of Three Houses Saturation: An Impromptu Heroes Retrospective

I've been poking through the Heroes archives some more. There's been a predictable amount of wank over Engage's sales numbers, and its supposed poor performance is sometimes propped up by the fact that so far FE17 has only gotten a single Heroes banner. Ignoring of course that IS must plan out these banners months in advance, I wanted to take a look back and see just what the mobile game was putting out around the time that Three Houses launched.

In 2019, FEH released the following for Three Houses:

July: New Heroes banner, with both Byleths and the house leaders as well as Mythic Sothis

August: New Heroes banner, with Hubert, Petra, Mercedes, and Hilda, also Kronya as the GHB unit linked to the July banner and the Death Knight as the GHB unit linked to this month's

December: Seasonal winter banner including Sothis

And...that's it, actually. FE16 wouldn't get any more new units until March 2020. The units added in 2019 make a lot of sense considering that Three Houses is much more frontloaded in terms of its playable roster; counting all routes, the player has access to 25 of its 40 characters by Chapter 1, and Sothis, Kronya, and the DK are all revealed fairly early (Kronya less so, but the two large reasons that she was the game's first GHB unit go without saying). The two banners combined account for whales who chose any of the three houses, with the leader and a wide-appeal(?) waifu option available for each of them.

It's tough to compare because FEH was less structured the first year of its launch, but this is in fact more restrained than how hard IS pushed Echoes in 2017 which got four banners within the first two months of its release. Looking at that, it's little wonder that Valentia doesn't have enough for even one more new heroes banner at this point.

Now, as for 2020:

March: New Heroes banner, with Ferdinand, Bernadetta, Annette, and Lysithea, also the Flame Emperor as the GHB unit

April: Legendary Edelgard

July: Seasonal summer banner, with Duo f!Byleth/Rhea, Dorothea, Sylvain, Ingrid, and Lorenz as the TT unit

August: Brave banner with CYL 4 winners which was swept by Three Houses: the house leaders plus Lysithea

October: New Heroes banner, with Seteth, Flayn, Catherine, and Shamir, also Nemesis as the GHB unit as well as Legendary Dimitri

December: Seasonal winter banner including Bernadetta and Hilda with Felix as the TT unit

That's twenty-four new units from a single game in a year. It's easy to understand why Three Houses fatigue would be setting in, especially when combined with the pandemic and this being more or less when the discourse got infamously bad. But the oversaturation got even worse in 2021:

January: Seasonal desert banner including Harmonic Dorothea/Lene and Raphael, also Mythic Seiros

February: Legendary Claude

March: New Heroes banner, with Linhardt, Dedue, Ingrid, and Marianne, also Solon as the GHB unit

May: New Heroes Fallen banner including Edelgard and Dimitri

June: Seasonal summer banner, with Duo Hilda/Marianne, Caspar, Ashe, Mercedes, and Leonie as the TT unit, also Legendary m!Byleth

August: Brave banner with CYL 5 winners including Marianne and the Gatekeeper

September: New Heroes banner, with Yuri, Constance, and Hapi sharing a banner with a Heroes OC, also Balthus added to the standard summon pool and Aelfric as the GHB unit

October: Seasonal Halloween banner including Duo Sothis/m!Byleth and Rhea

November: Seasonal ninja banner including Shamir as the TT unit

December: Seasonal winter banner including Harmonic Lysithea/Lute, Manuela, and Ignatz as the TT unit, also Legendary f!Byleth

That's thirty-one units, with only two months out of the year not getting any new Three Houses content. One of those was also the notoriously meta-centralizing Fallen Edelgard, plus I think this was the first year to have a bunch of Reddit drama related to her alts with A Hero Rises? That's not really what I'm looking at here.

I've looked into this this far - might as well finish it up with how 2022 fared. This was the year that Hopes released, so there was some new-ish Fódlan content to pull from at last. I'll go ahead and throw what we've gotten so far of 2023 in here too:

May: New Heroes Fallen banner including Rhea

June: Seasonal summer banner including Harmonic Edelgard/Altina, Dimitri, and Claude

August: New heroes banner with CYL 6 winners including f!Byleth, also Jeralt as the GHB unit

September: New heroes banner with Ascended Hilda (uses her Hopes design), m!Shez, and Monica, also f!Shez added to the standard summon pool and Holst as the GHB unit

October: Mythic Arval

December: Seasonal winter banner including Dorothea and Annette using their Hopes designs, also Legendary f!Shez

January 2023: Seasonal desert banner including m!Byleth

March 2023: Seasonal spring banner including Bernadetta and Ashe, also Legendary Yuri

April 2023: New Heroes banner with Rearmed Ingrid (uses her Hopes design), Felix, Sylvain, and Rhea, also Cornelia as the GHB unit

May 2023: New Heroes Fallen banner including f!Byleth (based on Hopes)

A mere fifteen units in 2022, and ten so far in 2023. This gives Houses/Hopes 93 units so far - more than any other individual game aside from Awakening (which is only slightly higher at 97) and Fates (a hefty 129). Both those games have larger playable rosters and were pushed hard in FEH's early years to the point that people also complained about it, so FE16's oversaturation is impossible to ignore.

I very much doubt that it will get another New Heroes banner this year...not because there still aren't candidates but because there's exactly one Agarthan with a unique portrait (Thales) they haven't used as a GHB unit at this point. Seasonals are always a tossup, although I'm wondering if Fódlan can carry a summer banner for the fourth(!) year in a row when the only remaining high-value waifu IS has left to stick in a swimsuit is...um...Petra, I guess? Unless they go with church units - and Rhea's already been put in a bikini - or the Wolves, all the rest are the type to go for more innocence fanservice appeal, like Bernadetta and Lysithea. We can safely say at least that IS has been treating Hopes like an expansion pack after its single banner, using it out only for some seasonals, a limited selection of Legendaries (m!Shez incoming at some point, probably), Mythics (...this one's pretty much just Arval), and Fallen units (I fully expect Fallen m!Shez next year) and for easy Ascended/Rearmed designs, in the same way that the post-timeskip Houses designs seem to be reserved for Legendary and Brave units.

How much does any of this reflect on Engage? Probably not much, really. It's nowhere near as frontloaded in terms of units so IS can't dive too far into the roster for characters like the Brodians and Elusians without getting into spoiler writing territory, whereas both FE15 and FE16 had multiple starting groups to pull from for early banners. As I mentioned re: Valentia, they may have also learned that adding a bunch of new units in quick succession is an easy way to struggle to fill out new banners in the future and draw the ire of some of the fanbase at the same time. I do expect another Engage banner in 2023, although it'll probably be in the second half of the year. Maybe they'll be used more in seasonals? The Awakening-and-Fates-esque vibe of FE17 better lends itself to goofiness like the summer and Halloween banners, and if they do thieves again in August that'd be a sure way to slip in fan favorite Yunaka before she's scheduled for a regular banner.

#Fire Emblem #Fire Emblem Heroes #FEH

[zipp-os-official]

@archlinux-official an alpha demo will be open to the public for testing when I feel like it is stable enough for advanced users to enjoy. Right now the hardware I currently own is a Meta Quest 3, so that's what I am going to be focusing on for production.

With this in mind, this will be my first OS, so please be paitent as I brave this new frontier.

#ZippOS #Zipp OS #Zipp-OS #q and a #archlinux-official

[motivationaquotes1]

Releasing Motivation - Hardik Pandya Quotes that Resound

In the realm of cricket, Hardik Pandya has displayed excellent abilities as well as shared smart words that resound with fans and hopeful competitors the same. His statements go past the limits of the pitch, filling in as a wellspring of inspiration and life examples. This blog entry digs into the significant insight implanted in Hardik Pandya Quotes, investigating their effect and pertinence.

The Substance of Hardik Pandya Statements

Hardik Pandya's statements are not only an assortment of words; they exemplify his excursion, battles, and wins. These statements act as a guide of motivation for anybody endeavoring to conquer obstructions and seek after their fantasies. How about we dig into a portion of his most effective statements that keep on making a permanent imprint:

"Have confidence All the while, Results Will Follow"

Hardik Pandya's statement accentuates the significance of zeroing in on the excursion as opposed to focusing exclusively on the result. This way of thinking addresses that predictable exertion and commitment make ready for progress, paying little mind to quick outcomes.

"Dauntlessness is My Solidarity"

In a world frequently overwhelmed by self-uncertainty and misgivings, Hardik Pandya Quotes highlights the meaning of dauntlessness. An update embracing difficulties head-on and facing challenges are fundamental to individual and expert development.

Hardik Pandya Statements: Enabling Competitors

Hardik Pandya's statements are not restricted to the cricketing field; they stretch out their impact to hopeful competitors across various games. These statements give important experiences and inspiration:

"Stretch Your Boundaries, Break Obstructions"

This statement urges competitors to rise above their constraints and break liberated from apparent limits. It's a call to persistently challenge oneself and hold back nothing, both genuinely and intellectually.

"Consistency: The Bedrock of Accomplishment"

Hardik Pandya's statement features the significance of consistency in making progress. Competitors are reminded that consistent advancement and steadfast commitment lead to wonderful accomplishments over the long run.

Also Read : Motivational Quotes in Hindi

FAQs About Hardik Pandya's Insight

What enlivened Hardik Pandya's statements?

Hardik Pandya's statements are motivated by his own encounters, difficulties, and wins. They mirror his outlook and his excursion as an expert competitor.

How might competitors apply Hardik Pandya's statements to their preparation?

Competitors can apply Hardik Pandya's statements by involving them as mantras during instructional meetings. These statements can move them to remain committed, brave, and zeroed in on their objectives.

Where could I at any point find a greater amount of Hardik Pandya's statements?

You can find an assortment of Hardik Pandya's statements on his authority web-based entertainment records, meetings, and articles highlighting his bits of knowledge.

Search engine oriented Title and Meta Portrayal

Title: Release Your True capacity with Hardik Pandya Quotes - Bits of knowledge and Motivation

Meta Depiction: Find the extraordinary force of Hardik Pandya Quotes that enable competitors to embrace bravery, consistency, and development. Investigate how his insight stretches out past cricket.

Conclusion:

Hardik Pandya's excursion from a youthful cricketer to a carefully prepared competitor is set apart by assurance, boldness, and a persevering quest for greatness. His statements typify these qualities, filling in as directing lights for people from varying backgrounds. As we retain the pith of Hardik Pandya's words, let us be propelled to stretch our boundaries, conquer difficulties, and produce a way of valor and achievement.

Source: https://wordpress.com/post/motivationaquotes.wordpress.com/113

#Hardik Pandya Quotes #Hardik Pandya Quotes in Hindi

[arch-whatscanon]

@snaptwice asked : Meta + Grace with being a “witch”

clairvoyance is something that runs in grace's family . . . but is it necessarily witchcraft is the question. her other was arrested under the accusations of being a witch when grace was a young girl. while her mother didn't have cauldron or newts or spells, she did have an attunement with nature. grace remembers an herb garden that her mother had that was constantly overflowing with a variety of plants and flowers. often, so much so that her mother would dry and store jars upon jars of the herbs and often gift them to those her parents were close with. they were used for recipes and remedies. her mother knew at least ten different uses for each herb in the garden and how to fix any ailment with salves and brews in the kettle. a sniffle would be gone within a day. a laceration healed without a scar or sign of infection. she shared her salves and potions with the community . . . and that was the evidence used against her in the end by bigoted men.

although grace hardly remembers some of the lessons her mother taught her due to her young, she finds a natural gift with nature as well. she makes salves and remedies with similar success, but she reserves it only for herself, joseph, and abigail. she can sense days in advance when a storm is going to roll in, which has provided great success in protecting the crops that keep them afloat. she can feel a tingle through the wind, and there are often times, she swears she hears a haunting voice in it. one that assures her to be brave, that she's doing a good job.

the irony of her clairvoyance is that she was too late when it mattered the most, when her husband was tricked into drinking from a plagued cup . . . or so she thinks. after all, how else could he have survived a plague?

#𝖆𝖇𝖔𝖚𝖙 : grace haverstock #snaptwice #answered #˙ ˖ ✶ QUEUE