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rnelodyy · 1 year

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The Owl House And Restorative Justice

At the end of Season 1 of The Owl House, it is revealed that Lilith, the main overarching antagonist of that season, was the one to curse her sister Eda, one of the protagonists, to win a tournament when they were teenagers. This information causes Eda to fly into a screaming rage and attack Lilith, and understandably so.

Eda’s curse is essentially a chronic illness, one that, in Eda’s own words, has ruined her life, being the reason she’s considered a social outcast and why, before meeting King and Luz, she hadn’t gotten close to anyone in years. In season 2, it’s revealed that the curse is why she pushed away her partner Raine to the point that they broke it off with her, and that during a particularly bad flareup, she accidentally maimed her own father, leaving him half blind and with permanent nerve damage to his hands, making him unable to continue working as a Palisman carver. The curse has ruled Eda’s life for decades now, so to Eda, this is the ultimate betrayal.

In the first episode of Season 2, Lilith has defected from the Emperor’s Coven, split the curse between Eda and herself to mitigate the symptoms for her sister, and has moved in with Eda at the Owl House. While Lilith herself still feels guilty and feels she has to make it up to Eda, everyone else, Eda included, has seemingly either forgiven her or chosen to look past it. Eda even makes fun of her for feeling bad about cursing her, and Lilith’s guilt is seemingly absent for the rest of the series.

The response to this was… Less than stellar, shall we say. A lot of people were angry, saying Lilith got away with her crimes without even a slap on the wrist, and that Eda’s forgiveness of her was far too sudden.

This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this kind of critique. Amity spent years bullying Willow after her parents forced her to break off their friendship, and when she began trying to mend that relationship, the response from fans was that Willow should have been a lot more angry at Amity, and that they went back to being besties far too soon. I’ve even seen this criticism leveled at Hunter for the things he did while working for Belos, at Vee for impersonating Luz for months to trick her mother, and at Luz for hiding the fact that she helped Philip find the Collector from her friends. And it does seem strange for the show to keep tripping on this same point again and again.

Except, it’s not really. Because I think that, when viewing this show from a different angle, those supposed flaws are actually symptoms of something very important to understand – The Owl House operates on a system of crime and punishment that is very different from our world’s.

More specifically, our world mostly utilizes retributive justice. The world of The Owl House utilizes restorative justice.

So first, what do those terms mean? Broadly, they’re two different forms of handling interpersonal disputes, or dealing with crime.

Retributive justice is the one our current justice system uses, where the focus is primarily on punishing the perpetrator. Retributive justice can mean detention, suspension, expulsion, jail time, monetary fines, some kinds of community service, exile, or in more severe cases, corporal punishment or the death penalty. It’s the lens most people view the world through, where if someone hurts you, hurting them back is the correct response.

Restorative justice is a very different approach, where you instead focus on helping the victim recover from what happened, and rehabilitating the perpetrator to prevent this from happening again. Restorative justice can look like verbal or written apologies, monetary compensation for costs and trauma, therapy for both victim and perpetrator, education for the perpetrator, mediation between victim and perpetrator, a restraining order, etc.

When viewed through a retributive lens, The Owl House lets its characters get away with a lot of shit. Lilith cursing Eda, Hunter rounding up Palismen knowing they’ll be killed, Amity tormenting Willow for years, it’s all stuff that, in a retributive environment, they should be punished for, and they’re just not. Eda is only genuinely angry at Lilith for two scenes, Amity and Willow fix their relationship very quickly once Amity starts making amends, and Hunter isn’t punished at all.

However, I believe the story of The Owl House is best viewed not through a retributive lens, but through a restorative lens.

Let’s look at the Lilith-example again. Lilith’s offense was cursing Eda, which she did because she wanted to win a spot in the Emperor’s Coven. Knowing Eda was better than her, she cast a curse on her, thinking it would only last for a day. But when the time came, Eda forfeited the match, soon after which she transformed into the Owl Beast and was pelted with rocks until she ran. The curse turned out to be very permanent, and Lilith spent the next 20 years trying to fix her mistake by working for Belos to try to capture Eda, since he promised to heal her curse.

However, when she finally succeeded, Belos went back on his promise. Instead of healing Eda, he ordered her to be publicly executed. When Lilith protested, Belos essentially told her to shut up, that it was the Titan’s will, and left her there.

So, having realized her method of fixing her mistake has gone real bad, Lilith sneaks down to the Conformatorium to free Eda herself, but arrives too late and finds Luz instead. After a brief fight they end up teaming up, and Lilith leads Luz to the elevator, but they are captured by Belos and Lilith is thrown into the cage with Eda. There, she restores Eda’s partially petrified body, and after fleeing with her, Luz and King, uses a spell to split Eda’s curse evenly between their two bodies.

From a restorative justice point of view, Lilith has done pretty much everything she reasonably could do to fix things. She’s denounced the Emperor’s Coven, returned Owlbert to Luz, helped Luz find the elevator to the execution platform, saved Eda from petrification, apologized to Eda, and while there’s no way for her to cure Eda’s curse entirely, she took on half of the curse at great expense to her own health, in order to ease Eda’s symptoms.

Eda isn’t angry anymore because in her eyes, Lilith has already fixed things with her. Punishing her more at this point is pointless. What more could Lilith do, really? What other lessons could she learn? The only thing that punishment would bring at this point would be more suffering.

Let’s look at another example: Amity and Willow.

Amity’s offense was breaking off her friendship with Willow because she was a late-bloomer, bullying her for years, and allowing her friends to do so too. Willow is left with horrible self-esteem issues because of this, and combined with her failing grades, turned her into a horribly shy and withdrawn wallflower (no pun intended). After she’s moved to the plant track she starts actually getting better, but Amity and Boscha especially continue to torment her. While Amity’s bullying of Willow does peter out over time, Willow is clearly still extremely resentful of her. In an attempt to make Willow forget their friendship, Amity accidentally sets most of Willow’s memories on fire, leaving her confused, amnesiac, and unable to grasp basic concepts like that chairs are for sitting in.

Luz pushed Amity into fixing Willow’s brain by going into her mind together and piecing her memories back together. There, the Inner Willow revealed what happened to Luz and the audience.

At this point, Amity shows her that her parents were actually the ones who forced her to end the friendship because they didn’t think Willow was a suitably powerful or influential friend, threatening to make sure Willow would never get accepted into Hexside if Amity didn’t force her to leave. Amity then apologizes to Willow for going along with it, and for the bullying, and vows to make sure her friends never mess with Willow again.

Willow accepts her apology, but also makes it clear that, while it’s a start, she’s not yet ready to accept Amity in her life again. Restorative justice has not been fully attained, because to Willow, Amity hasn’t fixed everything – Boscha and her squad are still bullying her, and still consider Amity one of them. This changes two episodes later, when Amity tells Boscha to grow the fuck up when she starts bullying Willow again, and joins her and Luz’s Grudgby team despite her personal issues to get Boscha to back off. Willow doesn’t make a grand gesture of forgiveness in this episode, but it is after this point where the two become comfortable around eachother again.

Did Willow forgive Amity too quickly for years of trauma? Maybe. If she had chosen to continue keeping Amity at a distance I certainly wouldn’t have blamed her. But in the end, Amity fixed the mess she caused as best she could, and has proven herself to want to be a better person, to want to be Willow’s friend again. She worked hard to prove herself to be a person worth trusting, and Willow decided to give that trust a chance again.

And while they did become friends again, that friendship was clearly still affected by what happened, which led to bumps that the two of them had to work through. Like in Labyrinth Runners, where Amity’s overprotectiveness over Willow makes Willow feel like Amity thinks she’s incompetent, and still only sees her as the helpless person she used to be.

Willow continuing to be mad at Amity and punishing her for what she did wouldn’t be an unreasonable reaction, but it wouldn’t have fixed anything. It would certainly have an impact on Amity, seeing her former best friend rejecting her attempts to make up for what she did, but the hurt on both sides would have continued festering, because deep down, Willow missed Amity too.

In Hunter’s case, there’s the question of whether he can even be held responsible for his actions. The Palisman-kidnapping in specific was explicitly done under duress – if he failed he would face verbal and physical abuse, and be threatened with his nightmare scenario: getting thrown out of the Emperor’s Coven.

And that’s not an empty threat either. Hunter has no magic, and Belos has drilled it into him that witches without magic have no future. Without the Emperor’s Coven, his only future prospects would be starving to death on the streets or wasting away in prison. Either way, Hunter would be alone, without family or friends, without a job or job prospects, without anyone to turn to for help. Any child would be terrified of that. Hunter wasn’t always acting on direct orders – in fact he defied direct orders to stay in his room in Eclipse Lake to go look for Titan’s Blood, and then again in Hollow Mind to arrest the rebels. But he made those choices based on the idea that Belos wouldn’t want him if he was a failure, and that he needed a chance to prove that he could still be useful.

And contrary to popular belief, Hunter does know right from wrong. He has a very strong moral compass, he’s just been forced to ignore it in favor of doing whatever the Emperor wants. To shut up that little voice telling him he’s doing the wrong thing, he uses what’s called a thought-terminating cliche, a statement that feels so fundamentally true that the argument need not continue. In Hunter’s case, that statement is “It’s for the greater good.” Sure, kidnapping his new friends and abducting Palismen to feed to the Emperor and threatening someone who’s been nothing but kind to him to take the portal key from her girlfriend and justifying terrorism makes his stomach feel like he swallowed a cactus and saying it out loud makes him sound like a horrible person – but it’s for the greater good. He’s doing it to serve Belos, and Belos knows what’s best.

So by the time Hunter is out of active danger and able to rest and recover from what happened to him… what would further punishment accomplish? He already knows that he did fucked up shit while working for the EC, and he’s proven time and time again that while he’s not fighting for Belos’s approval, he’s actually a genuinely kind-hearted kid. Punishing him now would likely cause him to react very poorly, because he’s been at the wrong end of that stick so often that he’s developed severe PTSD because of it.

And if you think restorative justice is still in order – Hunter is currently hyperfixated on making sure Belos can never hurt anyone again, and for the long term, he has expressed that he wants to become a Palisman carver when he grows up. While it won’t bring back the Palismen that were killed, it will help the current Palisman population recover and reintroduce Palismen to witches who may have had to give up theirs.

When viewed through this lens, the writing of The Owl House starts to make more sense. As a show, it is extremely forgiving towards its characters – they’re still held accountable for their actions, but as long as they’re willing to grow and learn and fix the damage they caused, they are very quickly forgiven.

However, I do understand why these writing choices can be… controversial, so to say. Because it doesn’t feel very satisfying, does it? When someone hurts you on purpose, your first impulse would be to try to hurt them back, that’s just how people work.

That’s the hardest thing to come to terms with when you become an advocate for prison abolition for example – you’re not just arguing for freeing a guy who got 5 years because a cop found weed in his pockets, you’re arguing for the release, and most importantly, the humanity of some of the most vile, disgusting people this planet has ever produced. Even now, when someone commits a truly awful crime and gets sent to prison for life, my first thought is “Good, I hope they rot in there.” But that’s not justice. That’s just revenge. And revenge is not something we as a society should want to build our justice system on.

It’s not satisfying to see Lilith go from using Luz as a human shield in her fight against Eda to sleeping on the couch in Eda’s house within 2 episodes. It’s not satisfying to see Willow let Amity back into her life when Amity has hurt her so badly before, or to see Hunter become romantically involved with Willow after he literally abducted her the first time they met. But that satisfaction isn’t really the point. Revenge is satisfying in the moment, but an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, and if someone shows a genuine willingness to change, it’s often better to give them a chance to.

However, my final point is about what happens when this approach fails. Because not everyone is willing to change. Some people, when faced with the consequences of their actions, decide to dig their heels in and refuse to admit fault, or blame the victim(s), or use those same thought-terminating cliches that Hunter used to justify their actions, “I was just following orders” being a big one.

And thus, we come to Belos.

If Belos showed a willingness to change, a genuine one, not an attempt at manipulation, should he be given the chance to? That vengeful part of me is VERY empathetically saying no. But logically, reasonably, he should be given that chance, if only because he’s a human being and no human being deserves to be mistreated. That doesn’t mean his victims are obligated to forgive him or be around him again, in fact I think that, for the sake of Hunter’s mental health, Belos should stay as far away from him as humanly possible. But he should be given the chance to start over, to truly better himself and do something good with the rest of his life.

But Belos isn’t willing to change.

Belos is a product of a bad environment and grew up with a cult-like mentality and hatred for witches that he had to adopt for his own safety. It’s hard to break out of that mentality, but not impossible. Case in point: Caleb. The tragedy of Belos’s character to me is that he had so many chances to change, so many people to help him make that leap, but all of the people who offered him that help ended up dead by his hands because he couldn’t handle the idea that he may have been wrong.

At this point, Belos is stuck. Changing would mean not only giving up on his life’s work, but acknowledging to himself that everything he’s done, mutilating his body, killing his brother, slaughtering thousands and installing himself as God-Emperor of a population he despises more than anything in order to facilitate a genocide, was completely pointless.

He can’t admit that to himself. Especially the thing about Caleb’s death. He’s sunk-cost-fallacied himself so far into a corner that all he can really do when faced with opposing viewpoints is dig his heels in even deeper and lash out in a rage at anyone who challenges him. Even now, when his body is literally falling apart at the seams, he’s still trying to commit witch-genocide, because it’s all he has.

Restorative justice doesn’t work in this case, because the perpetrator needs to be receptive to it. Logically you would assume the show would default to retributive justice, and characters like Willow and Camila do take a very vengeful glee in imagining themselves beating the snot out of Belos. But right now, the primary motivation of the Hexsquad and Hunter in particular when it comes to Belos is to end the threat he poses. As long as Belos is alive and free, he will continue to hurt and kill people, and if he can’t be talked down, he needs to be either contained or killed to prevent him from causing more harm.

The Owl House provides, in my opinion, a very nuanced take on restorative justice. It shows how it works in action, how different situations impact what it looks like, and what happens when it’s simply not an option. It’s not the most satisfying story to tell your audience, because when someone hurts our babies we want them to suffer, no matter how sorry they say they are. But in this case, I think that sacrificing that bit of audience comfort is worth it to tell the story like this.

#the owl house #the owl house meta #toh meta #toh lilith #toh amity #toh hunter #toh belos

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probablyhuntersmom · 11 months

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Part 2 of 2 (link to Part 1 here)

Some extra notes:

I was thinking, he'd be easily triggered if he touches any palismen after the finale battle, terrified of harming them. It'd be a parallel to this:

whereby there's no more Belos, but if something sets him off, he would have that spooky trauma experience of feeling like Belos could actually still be there, controlling him and getting him to hurt others. Imagine what a hurdle this would be, even before he can be mentored by Dell to learn how to carve new palismen.

The nightmares would be frequent in these early weeks. Sometimes Stringbean has a mind of her own and does her own thing around the house, at odd hours on some days. But Hunter has a little breakthrough in my edits here, where he's able to touch Stringbean and carry her upstairs, since this isn't the first time she has appeared to wake him from a nightmare. They find Camila in the kitchen, who says she also can't sleep.

In the first pic, Stringbean just squeaked and he's muttering (out loud) to her about what he remembers from the nightmare: that he saw himself in his old uniform...and then he looked down and saw that his hand was Belos's clawed hand.

@childlikegoblinqueen was telling me how when Hunter first petted Flapjack, he was slightly too rough (ugh, the foreshadowing...) but adjusted to be gentle pretty quickly. But now, Hunter would imagine that he’s unable of being that gentle ever again, since he hurt Flapjack as badly as he did while being possessed. That's where the therapy sessions would have to come in.

The ideas for this scene are also inspired by some headcanons:

this Stringbean-related post (link) by @drabbles-of-writing

a Camila-related post (link) by @kraviolis, specifically about Luz leaving Stringbean with Camila at times while she spends time in the Boiling Isles

#toh hunter #toh stringbean #camila noceda #hunter noceda #the owl house #toh edits #loz's edits

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sepublic · 4 months

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Expanding on my Irish Clawthorne reading; That just adds to the whole story and the colonialism aspect and how the Wittebanes are of British descent, and the British colonized the Irish while declaring them 'savages' and the like, sound familiar?

Big orange hair is such a thing for the family; Eda's hair can store objects in it, Lilith's was curly. And I dunno just; It's not just the angle of white folk colonizing America, it's also the Irish and we have Caleb learning to love Evelyn, whom people like to portray with orange hair. The consensus is that Dell, a ginger, is their direct descendant.

So there's also something to be said about Lilith as someone who was made to assimilate; In the Emperor's Coven, she was deliberately cut off from her family. She was 'taken in' by an older relative ashamed of his brother's fraternizing, who resented Lilith on multiple levels for her identity and for eventually scarring his face (in retaliation to manipulation and attempted murder).

Lilith was so blatantly abused in the Emperor's Coven, and there's a sick joke in how she wanted to be a historian, yet was made subordinate to Flora, who bastardized history on Belos' order, and also belittled Lilith. Lilith was constantly made to feel inferior and with how she was always more of a desk job than a field agent, unlike the coven heads, and it really feels like she was elected as a stunt, a prop to show off with; Look, see! Even a common wild witch like Lilith can rise to the top!

But Lilith still had to assimilate, she had to conform; People like her can still fit under the coven banner, so long as they fit the mold and cut away those 'ugly' bits. So she straightens and dyes her hair a dark blue, cuts it down. Lilith hides herself, even her own Palisman is forced to constantly stay in staff form; A reminder that nature can only be allowed to exist as a tool, nothing else!!! And that's also dark because the Clawthornes are palismen carvers.

So yeah, we have Lilith trying to engage with her past and heritage, yet being deliberately blinded from it, made to participate in her own ignorance and erasure. Forced to hide physical aspects of herself to blend in, mistreated as more of a prop to show how any wild witch can be 'tamed', to prove a point to Belos himself. His own sick victory against Evelyn; A trophy seized from the locals, separated from her family and trying to pull them in with her because that's the best Lilith can have, even as she belittles them and thinks she was improved herself.

Lilith obviously has personal agency and thus blame regarding the curse, and the finale's themes do assert that, as does Lilith’s effort to atone; But it was Belos' coven system that helped pit Lilith against her fellow witches and even family members, and estrange herself from them. Lilith WAS legitimately interested in magic, too... But because of the system, she cursed Eda.

And Lilith didn't use any old curse, she used one created by the Archivists, who came from another world to 'tame', that itself had reduced another wild, native creature to just a prop. That curse was used to dehumanize and delegitimize Eda's stance against the system. It reduced her connection to her bile magic, something also important to witches and Clawthornes, and especially Eda who loved and was great at it; And to mitigate the curse and take responsibility, Lilith also lost her bile magic.

But at the same time, she and Eda re-established contact with glyphs, thanks to Luz; And Lilith made the breakthrough of rediscovering glyph combos! So there's an ancient practice, older than even the Deadwardian Era she obsessed over, that Lilith found and brought back, for a time at least; But that will still apply once King's glyphs so in full-swing. And Lilith even got to visit the Deadwardian Era, scar her abuser after he scarred her and so many others, and come to a better understanding about her own ancestral past, something that continues with Lilith’s self-actualization as the historian she always wanted to be; So now she’s helping everyone better understand their past and origins!

Lilith and the Clawthornes as a whole are still cut off from knowing about Evelyn and Caleb, and they may never know; But at least they got back Hunter, whom Lilith was also pitted against in the Emperor's Coven, which really divided Caleb and Evelyn's descendants. And what tops it all off is Lilith having parallels to Philip, what with the Wittebanes and Clawthorne sisters; One more open-minded and outdoorsy, going against society, while the other is bookish and bitterly insecure and absorbs prejudice to feel better about themselves. Even their names are structured similarly!

They both wear blue coats and hurt a sibling they cared for but also resented... But Lilith grew beyond all that. She went above the hatred and jealousy. The system was more prevalent in her life, yet Lilith still chose to go against it, taking the chance to stop when it came and work for real happiness. She stopped needing to put down others to feel better about herself, Lilith made a friend with someone as strange as Hooty, who was once connected to the Titan and also forgot his past, but is now connected to Dell's old tower; Abandoned but given new life by Lilith's sister Eda. So the past is still lost to some extent and unrecognizable even, but it still lives on anyway.

Anyhow, Irish Lilith Clawthorne who is a victim of assimilation by British colonialism and that tried to erase her Irish features and make Lilith conform by cutting her off from her heritage and feeding her a bastardized, demonized version of her own past, while turning against her own people and culture and thinking herself superior for climbing up the ladder she left others at the base of; A promised justification of imperialism. But then Lilith breaks free from all of it and reconnects and re-embraces everything she lost, including her family and heritage, and just gets to be weird with other weirdoes like herself, so there's both blood and the covenant (not THAT type of coven tho).

#the owl house #Lilith Clawthorne #character analysis #meta #colonialism

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lollytea · 2 years

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I’ve seen takes that are like “do we need to label every platonic boy and girl relationship as being like siblings, can’t they just be friends?” And these takes are correct, we do need more of these relationship to be defined as friendship. BUT Luz and Hunter are the pinnacle of a sibling dynamic, I could not describe them in any other way.

The last time they saw each other, they parted ways on very tense terms, Hunter threatening her with a staff and Luz sadly admitting that he wasn’t her friend but just a servant of Belos. And then immediately afterwards he defended her from Kiki, a distraction she used to escape with the palismen. They never addressed their last interaction ever again.

In Eclipse Lake, Hunter is dealing with the failure of his last mission. He could have resented Luz for being the reason he failed, but he doesn’t. He only blamed himself. The extent of Hunter’s anger towards Luz in that episode seems to be that she’s been going around calling him a “bad but sad boy” which embarrasses him. And in turn, Luz’s description of Hunter to Eda seems to be of a similar opinion. Nothing she says about him comes across as resentment. But she’s clearly poking fun at him, just a little.

And then the next time they interact, it’s Luz annoying him with emoji-filled texts, as though they’re buddies. And he’s pissed about it and yet he doesn’t ignore it or block her. (Idk if he knows how to block people but him replying with “LEAVE ME ALONE” is so very big brother-ish of him.)

And then when Luz saw him in town and needed to talk with him, her first instinct was to TACKLE HIM TO THE FUCKING GROUND (self explanatory) and then he’s all in a huff and it’s like he was about to win at Mario kart and Luz deliberately fucked it up for him. And THEN he tears off his mask because it’s just Luz and he really doesn’t give a shit about upholding his persona for her. Luz doesn’t need to know that she has angered the Golden Guard but Luz DOES need to know that Hunter thinks she’s an asshole.

And then they’re in the mindscape and Hunter manages to stay pissed off at her for like less than a minute before he gets bored of being mad so they just start chatting casually about how mindscapes work and he sees something cool and he’s like “HOLY FUCK LUZ LOOK AT THIS” because that’s just how they operate.

The way Luz smirks at him when he’s being cutesy with Flapjack, the way Hunter smugly nudges her when he thinks she’s been proven wrong. The way these two kids have legitimate reasons to despise each other but they just don’t. Neither hold serious grudges as they’d rather just bicker about petty shit and then buddy it up two seconds later. It’s like.

They’re best friends. They both think the other is the most annoying person on the planet. They would do anything to protect each other. They would break into a fist fight if given the option.

What the fuck could I possibly call them but siblings??

#the owl house #toh #toh spoilers #I keep feeling weird about tagging spoilers cuz I don’t wanna clog up the tag or actually important new ep relevant stuff #but I don’t wanna get yelled at for “oh fuck you now I know Luz tackled hunter to the ground in this ep’’

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mdhwrites · 5 months

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TOH: The Problem With Waffles

So someone who has lost someone close to them takes palistrom wood and starts carving. They make them in the image of that which they have lost, imparting upon them a desire for them to be what they once were. Alongside this, their new form allows them to also act as their will made manifest upon the world as both lackey, partner, family and pet. Their life is only meaningful until thrown away, abandoned or ended by that which made them.

Am I talking about Hunter being made by Belos or Hunter making Waffles?

Waffles and Hunter actually have a lot in common, such as how as an orphan Philip likely saw his brother as the man who gave him a chance at life after his parents died, just like Flapjack explicitly did for Hunter when Hunter was going to die. A core element of the problem though is actually with how lame the Grimmwalkers are and the lack of magical materials in the Isles. Rather than a complex set of reagents for witch's brew, we get maybe a handful of items and the big two are Titan's Blood... And Palistrom.

Because of this, it's kind of easy to look at Grimmwalkers as advanced Palismen. Hell, it's actually weird that Hunter CAN'T use magic. Palismen have innate magic just by being made by Palistrom wood. Luz proves that they can do magic on their own since she uses Owlbert to activate glyphs from far away, something she cannot do herself. It's implied as part of why witches are commonly stronger with their staffs than without (not that that ever comes into play at any time). Meanwhile, Hunter has multiple magical components, at least one of which is INCREDIBLY powerful and far rarer than Palistrom wood which would make one assume they're stronger because one of the only ingredients we know of for Grimmwalkers is a Galdorstone. So... Why can't he cast magic? Because he doesn't have a bile sac? Does that mean every Palisman actually gets split in half during carving so you can carve out its tiny organs before sealing it back together without any sign of this crack? Because I REALLY doubt it.

Add to that the fact that Palismen are regularly abandoned by their witches for SOME FUCKING REASON (I think the Bat Queen in S1 should have claimed that witches "...No longer are able to care for them" to imply they died because otherwise, what the fuck?) and most seem perfectly without a Palisman and they don't seem all that different from how Belos treats Hunter. Narratively and functionally the two are just treated the same. One simply takes on a more human form since Palismen are PLENTY sentient and able to talk with others.

It makes how Hunter's arc ends, as a clone of Caleb by how many people read it, including myself, suck even harder. He's not just taking cues from the man he was made to look like after all. By chasing a lost loved one like this instead of letting go and looking to the future, he also copies Belos.

And that is the exact opposite of ANYTHING his arc should imply.

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I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead. If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

A Twitter you can follow too

And a Kofi if you like what I do and want to help out with the fact that disability doesn’t pay much.

#hunter toh #palisman #Grimmwalker #the owl house criticism #toh critical

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loosescrewslefty · 1 year

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Important question: What do you think all the Hexsquad's love languages are? You seem like the kind of person who could answer this question well.

Going to phrase this answer into two parts for each character; First covering the way that they SHOW love, and then by their preferred method of RECEIVING love.

Luz: Words of Affirmation, Physical Touch

In terms of showing love, Luz SHOWERS the people with compliments, praise, admiration, and encouragement. She is determined to make sure that everyone knows how amazing her loved ones are, especially her loved ones themselves. Even when she can't talk properly, she still tries to find ways to tell the people she loves that she adores them.

But when is comes to receiving love, Luz prefers that her loved ones show, rather than tell her. Hand holding, embracing, kissing, physical touch is something Luz CRAVES from her partner, and she is always her happiest when she gets it.

Amity: Acts of Service, Words of Affirmation

Amity is a very goal oriented person, and when she loves someone she becomes hell bound on making sure that THEIR goals come to fruition too. She is determined to prove her love by helping the ones she cares for, sometimes even to the point of overstepping, because in Amity's mind helping someone accomplish things is the best way to show you love them.

When receiving love, however, Amity is a sucker for Words of Affirmation. She didn't get compliments or verbal affection much from the places where it most mattered growing up, so hearing someone tell her that they love her, that they appreciate the things she does, and that they still love her even when she fails or messes up, makes Amity an absolutely giddy mess, as we clearly saw when Amity was told that Luz thinks she is "Cool, Classy, and Smart"

Willow: Quality Time, both ways.

Willow likes to give and receive love the same way; through spending time with one another, making happy memories together, having meaningful talks, and shows of support and comfort. That why, to Willow, it doesn't matter when things go wrong or plans don't work out so long as the people she loves most are there with her on the journey, and they can look back at those moments later together. Willow is at her most miserable when she is all alone, or when those around her won't listen to her, and really appreciates being treated like her presence is important to her partner. She likes to know that they will take the time and effort to include her in moments of their lives, no matter how big or small, because she is important to them and they want her there, and she in turn goes out of her way to make sure that the people she loves know that she always has time for them, no matter what.

Gus: Acts of Service, both ways

Much like Amity, Gus believes that the best way he can show that he loves the people in his life is to prove himself useful to them, and much like Amity not being able to be useful to the people he loves makes him feel frustrated and depressed.

But Gus has deep seated anxiety about being used/lied to that make it hard for him to trust that people are being honest to him, and often feels stressed that others expect him to do or know more, since he is so advanced for his age. So having others who see him struggling and stop and take the time to help him back up is something he cherishes deeply.

Hunter: Gifts, Quality Time

Hunter has long been taught that actions mean very little, if they do not get results. So, for Hunter, the best way he thinks he can show his love is to give the people he cares about things that they want. It doesn't matter how he gets them, as long as he can give them something that'll make them happy. We saw this early in his determination to give Belos the Selkiedomus, Palismen, or the Portal Key. We saw this in Hunter's determination to win the Flyer Derby match for his teammates, and then protecting them from Darius. And then again, when he helped save Gus from Adrian. His intention is typically less about providing aid like you see with acts of support, and more about making sure that the people he cares for receive whatever they want, gift wrapped with a ribbon on top.

But when it comes to receiving love, Hunter most appreciates Quality Time. His entire life, Hunter has been made to feel replaceable, ignored, or unwanted. Being around people who not only want to be around him, but even PRIORITIZE him in their lives and enjoy doing silly nonsense with him means more to Hunter than words could possibly express.

#the owl house #toh #love languages #lumity #huntlow #emerald trio #luz noceda #amity blight #willow park #gus porter #hunter noceda

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anguigenus · 2 years

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Oh yeah, I've seen people talking about whether Flapjack living in Hunter's head means he's going to be able to cast magic or not. My thoughts on this, as someone who thinks way too much time thinking about how TOH magic works:

Belos doesn't actually get his "magic" from Palisman souls. Belos can cast his magic because of the glyphs that he's carved into his body.

[Image: a screenshot of Philip's arm from Elsewhere and Elsewhen. There are glowing red glyphs visible on it, and the arm is bubbling and losing its shape.]

The glyphs are what are actually causing the magic effects. However, one thing we know about glyphs is that they consume the material they're drawn on. For example, Luz's glyph papers being absorbed into the spell.

This means by drawing glyphs on himself, Philip is being slowly consumed whenever he uses them. Again, as we see in the earlier screenshot.

That's where the palisman souls come in. They provide raw magic for the glyphs to feed on instead of consuming Philip's body. And as we see throughout the show, this isn't a permanent solution. He has to keep consuming palisman souls to have enough magic.

[Image: Philip crouching down in front of a pile of broken palismen. The glowing glyphs are still visible on his arm, and he's holding a mostly-intact palisman.]

So this brings us back to Hunter.

Hunter, as he is, will not be able to cast magic.

Hunter does not have any glyphs carved into him that let him harness that magic, first of all. Secondly, Flapjack's magic wouldn't something that stays with him. It would be a one-off benefit.

And actually, I think Flapjack's magic would've been already consumed by healing Hunter. So unless there's some kind of exception that comes up with Hunter being a grimwalker, I really don't think there's good reason for him to be able to cast magic.

I myself am leaning more towards the idea he's going to carve his own palisman. After all, that would tie into the idea that he's his own person, not just another Wittebane.

Besides, he's gotta get back to flyer derby with the Emerald Entrails somehow, am I right?

#hunter toh #the owl house #toh spoilers #toh season 3 #toh theory #golden guard #de anguigeno #toh meta #also also I am absolutely 100% fucking convinced that Willow is going to use the palisman seed to bring back palisman wood #and since the show seems to be leaning in a huntlow direction that would make a good bonding activity #parallel Evelyn the palisman carver and all that jazz

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sassytheturtle · 1 year

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Thinking about how we’ve never once seen Hunter fighting at full strength and power in toh.

You need to remember this dude has been trained his entire life to serve as an elite soldier under the emperor. Belos wouldn’t have made him his right hand man and eventual coven head after Lilith left if he wasn’t capable of handling himself, anyone who might seek to harm the emperor or anyone else of importance, dangerous monsters and demons, and capturing powerful wild witches.

I mean, think about all the specifics of his job and training that he’s mentioned. He had to have been really freaking tough and talented to have been able to make it through all that.

And we never once get to see what he’s truly capable of.

In Seperate Tides, Hunter doesn’t see Luz or Eda as any sort of threat. He knows they’re both powerless. He’s clearly relaxed and toying with them. He’s confident that he has the upper hand and isn’t worrying about having to handle a couple of troublesome criminals.

Hunting Palismen takes place late at night. He was expecting this to be a quick and easy in and out mission. It’s understandable that he would be tired this late. And again, you have to remember that he still doesn’t view Luz as any sort of threat. He’s annoyed by her and gets caught off guard because he wasn’t expecting her to be any sort of challenge to handle.

Plus he was just in a crash and doesn’t even have his staff the majority of the episode, but is still able to easily keep up with Luz. And he willingly goes along with her afterwards so that he can get the palismen quicker and then dispose of Luz.

By the time he fights Kiki, he’s been running around all night and clearly just wants this mission to be over with. Kiki has been shown to be a pretty powerful person fighting wise, and even though she’s barely conscious, Hunter bests her fairly quickly. It wasn’t something that was really that hard for him.

Then comes to Eclipse Lake. By the time he and Amity fight, he’s exhausted, just had a mental breakdown, and fighting on an unfamiliar staff. Mental breakdowns like this leave people feeling super drained and burnt out, but he still gives Amity a pretty good run for her money.

I believe he would have easily won if not for the events in the episode leading up to the fight. I mean, he was literally just involved in a mine cart chase before he got to the lake.

In Any Sport in a Storm, other characters clearly point out the fact that he’s very talented at what he does. But he doesn’t exert full effort. He’s trying to recruit teens and play a sport.

In Labyrinth Runners, he’s dealing with the impacts and trauma from Hollow Mind. This dude has just learned that everything he thought he ever knew was a complete lie. He knows the man he once saw as his uncle wants him dead. He’s terrified. All he ever had to do before was follow orders, but now it’s up to him to make decisions and he has no idea what to do, where to go, or who to turn to. All he knows is that he has to stay as far away from Belos as possible.

All of this is clearly mentally and physically draining him. But even at this weak point, he’s able to push through and get to Gus when several other scouts and a literal coven head could not.

Again in Clouds On the Horizon, he’s still terrified and dealing with everything that happened. He’s still not in a good head space.

In King’s Tide, he’s been in yet another crash and is being effected by the draining spell. But he’s still able to push through and fight Belos, holding up fairly well, when everyone else with a sigil can barely even move.

It wasn’t even him fighting in Thanks to Them. That was just Belos using his body. But still, an argument can be made. He’s able to push through Belos’s possession after being rusty on fighting and all of his training for literal months. Belos was clearly trying to hurt Hunter when possessing him and didn’t care whether he lived or died. Hunter pushes through in minutes.

When Belos possessed Raine, he didn’t want to hurt them. He needed a body and to sustain Raine as long as he could. Raine has been trapped as a puppet, but they haven’t been conscious for months. If they were freed from puppet form, then they’d still be as used to fighting as before they were enslaved into a dreamless sleep.

Belos even comments on how powerful Raine is, but it still takes them a lot longer to push through his control than Hunter did. They did also have to push through Collector’s, but there’s still a point to be made.

In For the Future, again Hunter is still rusty, in painful grief, having to deal with all of his worst traumas coming back, and now has no magic at all. He figures out he’s able to use it later on, but it’s only ever that one spell.

This brings me back to my main point. In all of these instances, Hunter has either been tired, burnt out, in mental distress, just previously dealing with another physically taxing event, not really trying or having to use effort, rusty from lack of practice, using unfamiliar magic, or a combination of those. I believe that if we ever got to see him fight in his prime—with a staff and magic that he was used to, in a mostly stable emotional state, physically rested or not just previously having to deal with another taxing event, and with all of his training in tact and not out of practice—then we would see just how powerful and terrifying of a foe he could have really been.

#finally caved and got this hellscape of an app #time to flood it with my bs ramblings #toh #owl house #the owl house #golden guard #the golden guard #hunter #toh hunter #owl house hunter #hunter toh #hunter owl house #hunter noceda #hunter deamonne

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notgeorgelucas · 8 months

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I was going through my "Hollow Mind" memory portraits and noticed something:

This is obviously his "memory" of meeting "Dirtrude" & "Luzura" in Elsewhere & Elsewhen, but notice that they're each holding staffs very similar to their modern-day palismen (or in Luz's case, her mentor's).

The thing is, going back through the episode, this is the actual scene where all parties met:

At no time does Lilith summon her staff in that episode, and Luz obviously doesn't have Owlbert handy.

I got to wondering if Belos/Philip in the present day "enhanced" his memory of the meeting. Or maybe Belos just mayyyyyyy be an unreliable narrator?

#the owl house #elsewhere and elsewhen #philip wittebane #luz #lilith clawthorne #speculation #hollow mind

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asherisawkward · 7 months

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What mental illness does Philip have?

I’m just going to briefly list what I’ve noticed and what others have noticed for him. I am not trying to demonize or harmfully depict any of what I list, and I have several of the disorders that I’m listing while another suggestion was made by someone diagnosed with that disorder. Some of these aren’t actual disorders but are instead symptoms or behaviors I’ve noticed in him.

Having said that, I’ve noticed traits for the following:

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (Related to the Grimwalker cycle of death and rebirth)

*Unspecified Schizophrenic Spectrum Disorder (hallucinations and “delusion” associated with the BI inhabitants)

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (Incredibly obvious)

Possible Trauma-Induced Memory Issues (Portraits in Hollow Mind)

Substance Dependence/Addiction (palismen)

Unspecified Anxiety Disorder (Dread and anticipation leading up to the expected betrayal of Grimwalkers, the creation and use of multiple back-up plans)

Major Depressive Disorder Symptoms (Lack of care for his own degrading state, inability to care about other things)

Lack of Regard for Safety and Health (Continued use of palismen, putting himself in dangerous situations [Eclipse Lake, Stonesleeper incident, betraying the Collector], continued use of curse despite negative side effects)

Lack of Care for Life/Possible Suicide Ideation (“I just need to live long enough to see this through,” indicates a lack of regard for his own life and a lack of plans after something that takes significant effort; when I was at my worst, I had this feeling of, “I’ll do this one last thing, and then I’m done” that he seems to mimic, and he doesn’t even notice or care that his body is decaying in WAD)

Self-Harm Issues (Cut his ears and carved glyphs into his arms, continued to absorb palismen and transform when it negatively affected his health)

*This is the diagnosis suggested by @streya-nova. I’ve read it, and they make a ton of great points. Additionally, one of my aunts has paranoid schizophrenia, and I’ve recognized some overlapping symptoms. Their discussion of this is in the link below.

I hope this all made sense for you!

#The Owl House #TOH #Philip Wittebane #Emperor Belos #Mental Illnesses #Trigger Warning: Suicide Ideation #Trigger Warning: Self-Harm #Ask

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rfswitchart · 1 month

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What Redemption Means to Me

With the passing of Akira Toriyama as well as some things going on in my life, I think I'd like to talk about something that means a lot to me in writing... Redemption Arcs. Obviously, Vegeta's gonna be talked about here. Hunter from Owl House, sure. And I'll even throw Zuko from ATLA in here for free.

All three of them are considered evil right off the bat. They don't hide that they will do cruel and horrible things to either get their way or because it's fun. Then we find out that they weren't really evil so much as horribly abused and used to serve a purpose (Vegeta was basically handed to Frieza because King Vegeta and the rest of the Sayians were oppressed. Hunter did everything for Belos, who he thought was his uncle, and that Belos 'cared' for him. Zuko was 'dishonored' because his father said so, not to mention he got his face burned by his father.) And that their behavior is a reflection of the suffering and lives they've had. That, of course, is why we see them change...

Vegeta, on his dying breath in the battle against Frieza, basically told Goku everything about the fate of the Sayians, crying tears of anguish because he couldn't avenge his people after what the alien tyrant did. His heart changes even further when he has a relationship with Bulma and they have Trunks and Bulla. Does he lapse back into old habits and desire to defeat Goku? Sure. But even when he becomes Majin, he realizes that his family give him something strength can never give him. Love, the love of family long lost, and hope that his species will live on through his children.

Hunter, meanwhile, meets Luz and it made him question if helping his uncle is worth it. This was further compounded after kidnapping the Entrails when he realized he was hurting Willow and would rob them of their palismen to feed Belos and grant him a longer life. After seeing he was just a disposable puppet and clone of Belos brother (That he murdered,) Hunter fled to Hexside and eventually befriended Gus. Hunter lived a sheltered life and is saved by friendship and love (yes, Hunter and Willow were basically in love from the get go. Y'all need better media literacy if you think otherwise.)

Now, Zuko is a little different. Sure, the Gaang did help him figure things out and help him see the error in his ways, but who are we kidding. The thing that truly put Zuko on the path of good was his uncle, Iroh. Iroh never lost faith in his nephew, even when the boy lost his way and betrayed him. He always tried to show Zuko the right path to follow and give him advice when he needed it. Granted, it couldn't help Zuko make a decent cup of tea, but hey, he did at least come to understand what was right and gave him the tools to forge his own destiny.

Personally, I like these stories because my life has also been a redemption arc of sorts. Stop me if you've heard this one before. I was bullied and abused by family, classmates, friends, and lovers. I hurt people and lashed out because I was hurt and scared, even people I care about. And then, realized I messed up and having people who genuinely love and support me, I started to change into a better, more loving and compassionate person. Characters like Vegeta, Hunter, and Zuko are the kinds of people I am. People who have been misguided and done wrong, but also have worked hard to become much better people. No one is ever beyond redemption... I mean, unless you're Frieza, Belos, or Ozai. Fuck them.

#dragon ball #dragon ball z #akira toriyama #rip akira toriyama #the owl house #toh hunter #avatar the last airbender #zuko #prince zuko

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probablyhuntersmom · 1 year

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It's me again. The therapist/illustrator who can't stop squeaking and screaming about her beloved son Hunter.

I've been thinking nonstop about him finding the terrible grimwalker graveyard, imagining what would be going through my mind if I were him. Sifting through whatever moments, dialogue and frames that I can find from the existing material, along with references outside of the show, to formulate what an offscreen scene would've been like.. (And seeing if I can find editable and salvageable enough backgrounds so I could perhaps even depict this scene one day)

A soul like him who not only wants to help others, but also acquire knowledge:

heading back here to see the graveyard:

You can't tell me that this wouldn't still be on his mind, and he's even anxious while saying this below, scratching his face a little:

Whether he follows up on this or not, also depends on how he looks back on being shown this:

And is he just going to go cold turkey and totally drop these leads he was pursuing in the episodes before the finale? :

Three things prompted me to finally write this post:

@polyhexian's and @ashanimus's analyses of Hunter's fight scenes in Hunting Palismen and Eclipse Lake (links here and here, they're really cool to read!!), based on their years of experience with martial arts. Reading those was a revelation to me because learning about how high Hunter's skill level is, how in touch with his body he is by default, portrayed so well thanks to the crew...that allows me to make far more educated guesses about his mental health in the early stages of the pre-epilogue gap of about 4 years. Because he is so used to high activity and being on high alert, no thanks to having C-PTSD.

Observing how light and free Hunter's expressions are, and how transformed his demeanor became, in the epilogue sequence. That transformation is an indication to me of the magnitude of grief which had to be transformed within him. To be put back together, in order to be so radiant, generous and self-actualized in the epilogue...imagine how much had to be deconstructed and further broken beforehand. He wouldn't have room to fill his life up with all that amazing newness if the old isn't emptied out first.

This psychoeducational video by my fave author, also a practicing therapist, who specializes in traumatic grief: link. Hearing her address the topic of entering the second year after a bereavement vs. the first year, was interesting. Definitely confirms to me that Hunter wouldn't have carved Waffles until past the 2nd year of navigating his bereavement.

In the years that pass before the epilogue, Hunter will not be able to understand why the efforts he puts into all the rebuilding work, coordinating and leading others, and trying to have fun - only cycle back to him experiencing a mix of a restlessness and emptiness in the deepest layer of his mind. It'll exhaust his energy bit by bit. I bet he's going to generally look as tired as depressed Luz does below, even if he's had an acceptable hours of sleep per night:

That restlessness will be an awful psychological itch that he'll be unable to scratch, caused by losing Flapjack and now also Belos. This is the same as what happened with his anger in For the Future, except Belos was still alive back then. It will be harder to understand and messier to navigate the bereavement this time round. It'll be something gnawing into his soul which I really think only professional help can heal, especially since the show promotes that it's okay to not be okay, and more than okay to seek professional help (Steve and Lilith's conversation in Edge of the World).

He will be trying to claw his way out of that C-PTSD pit, but he'll be aware deep down that he simply cannot reach any emotional high points for long, and something will be blocking his feelings of connection with his loved ones. He won't feel nearly as free and easy the way he used to be in the human realm:

Having a routine like he used to in the Castle, and moving around a lot, was what helped him survive. However, he won't have the awareness that the shift resulting from Belos passing away has been at such a fundamental level: to the point that those old, supposedly tried-and-true methods no longer serve him in any positive way. At least, not until his mental health will be back in better shape.

As he puts in more and more effort to escape that restless emptiness, getting annoyed at himself because he doesn't know what's going on...he'll use up the rest of his strength and eventually crash. That itch won't be solved by going back to overworking tendencies, and like how it is with addiction cycles, he would need some kind of fix for the deep restlessness within. The answer? Productivity to feel useful, which we have seen even in his efforts to fix damaged clothing and well, making stuff in general.

Where the grimwalker graveyard comes in is...once he hears news about its existence, he will stubbornly insist to want to help in investigating it, saying he has already read a bunch of books about them, and can be useful, etc. Worse, if his offer to help to investigate is refused, he will do what he did in Eclipse Lake. Go to the location anyway, to fill that deep void within.

Old habits die hard.

I don't know if he may hear from King (who he'll be seeing fairly often, I think!), The Collector or even Kikimora about it. Since they were the three characters who went all the way down there in King's Tide, and The Collector already knew about these horrors for literal centuries. King and The Collector are also still young kids! Will they have the sensitivity and awareness about breaking this news to Hunter?!

On the other hand, I don't know how the timing will be with Darius, Raine and Eberwolf..Darius will want to get serious about investigating his mentor's disappearance. Once the searching and scouring extends to the location of the Head of the Titan, they will find the evidence staring them in the face. If they want to scour every inch of the Isles, there's also a high chance they'll find the godforsaken grimwalker lab.

Worst of all, Darius would be aware by then of how much Hunter loves to help out in operations like this to be productive. At the same time, Darius's own grief will surface even more, I'm not sure he'll be able to hide that, and Hunter is highly observant. If Darius is trying to hide his own priority of finding closure re: his mentor, I think Hunter will sense that.

Therefore I wonder if this will happen except it's Hunter with Darius:

and then this poor beloved skrunkly son of mine, who so famously said these words at the beginning of his arc:

is probably going to get reckless, and endanger his mental health...not unlike moments like this:

by venturing to the graveyard, whether stealthily or accompanying the grownups, because he'll rationalize it as "getting closure" and once again "being useful". Remember how used he is to moving around so much and being active, combined with growing up isolated so that asking for help can still be a foreign concept to him. He would be anxious about grinding to a halt, and he'd want to be on the move instead.

He may demand to see the graveyard, and holy Titan I'm not sure any dilemma will be as tricky for Camila and Darius to navigate as this one. Because preventing him from seeing something he already knows exists is, in a very twisted way, also an unhelpful form of avoidance. Avoidance is a hallmark criterion for diagnosing both PTSD and C-PTSD.

How far do they go in protecting him from himself? Where do they draw that line? They might reach a compromise where Camila and Darius accompany him there. Once he sees it, it'll hit harder than this:

Letting him see it means his new parents would have to fall with him, in the sense that they follow him to that emotional place: but while he figuratively does not have a safety harness when falling into this deep dark hole, Camila and Darius are equipped with harnesses a.k.a. higher maturity, less of a trauma history, and some tools to help him get better, navigate the trauma, and manage his symptoms.

Camila will have the warmth and sensitivity to catch and meet him as he falls (she interacts with animals in her profession, who don't have the capacity for human language, in a similar way to how serious trauma can't even be put into words at times: it makes you voiceless). Darius's shared past living in the Castle and grieving over his mentor will help Hunter not feel as alone once he has seen these horrors.

And because his heart generally became more open to receiving love and support,

I doubt he'll close himself off almost completely, the way he did in the first two-thirds of For the Future (god, remember these deleted storyboards??):

It wouldn't surprise me if he weeps and panics as soon as he sees the graveyard, and his parents give him maximum support through that breakdown. As complicated as it would be for Camila and Darius to give in to his desire to see the graveyard, a response like this from him - a child seeking attachment with proper timing - is a good sign of growing into healthy attachment with parental figures.

It is an arguably better response than one of the hardest aspects of C-PTSD: where the outpouring of grief only happens after a delay, sometimes a significant delay, at very inconvenient or strange times. Hell...if I were Hunter, I'd probably want Camila and Darius to just hold me close in wordless silence for half an hour until my initial distress and shock passes.

If I use King - a child who is securely attached to Eda, who's definitely had a more stable upbringing - as a control experiment here, he could have the appropriate response immediately in Echoes of the Past and expressed his emotional needs clearly enough:

Whereas this is what Hunter has to now learn, at twice King's age, as he settles in with new parents who take care of him instead of mistreating him the way Belos did. Hell, I can't imagine what kind of Belos punishment awaited him if he cried to demand attachment.

(I need to use more King scenes as a comparison to Hunter's upbringing in my next metas! I realize this can make my explanations clearer)

Anyway, what may happen next after he can't unsee the graveyard is...Hunter will then swing to the other extreme of high activity. I.e. being passive, physically inactive and psychologically crashing into depression, which may translate into habits such as oversleeping (catching up on all that lost sleep...but at what cost?). Supposedly sliding deeper into the C-PTSD pit. A place from which he has to express the desire to seek the forms of help he needs.

Remember that this kid has only known extremes for most of his life. Until he settles in properly with his found family and attends therapy, he has no clear reference point for more balanced approaches in living.

The trauma he went through is a quadruple whammy for a 16-year-old who just survived growing up in a cult. It would be so much. I can't see him not falling into months of deep dark depression, as unfortunate as this sounds.

Grieving over Flapjack, grieving over Belos, over his childhood/upbringing, and now a grisly memory of his predecessors who didn't make it (to add to what he saw in Belos's mindscape). I simply cannot see him handling a load like this without a highly-equipped and sensitive professional, paired with his support network of family, friends and even possibly the wider community at times. Especially now that we've seen him in action during the epilogue.

The epilogue sequence would've had a different feel (and in my opinion, a not-so-good feel) for me if Dana had established that the grimwalker graveyard was still untouched after those 3.5-4 years and if Hunter never found out about it. Something like that is different compared to Dana mentioning in the recent Post-Hoot that in the he does not know about Caleb and Evelyn, or that he is related to the Clawthornes. Mysteries like the Clawthorne heritage can remain an eerie secret that only us in the audience know about, but I wouldn't feel comfy if this were the case for the graveyard as well.

To quote @idlescree's video essay about Hunter's death (link), the show's writers didn't pull any punches when it came to Hunter's development arc. Which means they had to take his story to the "categorically appropriate place for him to overcome" his greatest challenges.

Something tells me that with respect to the grimwalker graveyard and the avoidance theme in C-PTSD recovery, Hunter would've had to put in more work to confront a number of terrifying foes even beyond his Thanks to Them speech. One of which was the graveyard containing the remains of his predecessors.

PS: This is a spontaneous post which branches out from my giant post-finale meta (link) that I pinned to my blog, I suppose.

#toh hunter #the owl house #hunter noceda #camila noceda #hunter deamonne #darius deamonne #toh analysis #grimwalkers #grimwalker graveyard #loz writes a meta

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midwesternnerd-owlphibiafalls · 11 months

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Does anyone else imagine Belos stubbornly refusing to let himself fully pass on?

We know that after physical death, a being will pass to the in-between, and that being will have to accept their own death in order to go wherever’s next. Wherever’s next could be some sort of afterlife or nothing at all, it doesn’t matter.

What matters is the fact that we saw Belos physically, but didn’t see him pass on.

I imagine Belos trapped in a hell of his own creation. He waits in the in-between with some desperate, long shot hope that he can someday escape. Meanwhile, he has ready access to those cubes that will let him hate-watch any being that he knows the name of.

For the first while in the in-between, the souls of palismen swirl around him. Taunting him. “You absorbed us to live longer and complete your mission. Yet it was all for nothing. You fought with us for decades, yet it was all for nothing. How does it feel to be a failure, Belos?”

The voices enrage him. He yells at them that his name is Philip. He isn’t Belos, he’s Philip. “Belos is the name you chose. It is more your name than Philip.” The voices of the palismen are the only companionship he has.

And one by one, the palismen pass on. For whatever reason they wish to move on, and they do so. They don’t allow their spite for to hold them captive. At first he’s grateful, but it slowly dawns on him that every palisman that passes on is another step toward loneliness. When the last few pass on, he demands they stay despite his hatred of them. He calls them cowards that don’t wish to face him anymore. He calls them weak. Whatever he thinks will shame them into staying. It doesn’t work.

And so eventually, he is alone with nobody talking to him. He continues watching the cubes.

He watches Luz and Eda, Lilith and Kikimora. He watches the Collector and he watches King. Most of all, he watches Hunter, seething with hatred.

Watching them is painful. It’s painful for him to see anyone on the Boiling Isles. It’s painful for him to see them heal and rebuild from the harm he’s caused. It’s painful, and he wants the pain to stop, but he’s too clouded by hate to understand that he’s causing his own misery.

He blames them all for what he’s become. He blames the Titan and Luz and Hunter and Flapjack and Caleb and Evelyn and Eda and Raine and King. His situation is everyone’s fault except his. It’s their fault he won’t let go.

Eventually, even the ones he so hates pass on. Sometimes, they even pass through the same area of the in-between. Whenever he can, he tells them that he’ll be back to destroy those evil isles. But they don’t listen. They don’t care.

When his time comes, Hunter passes through. Belos demands that Hunter stay by his side. “It is your duty,” “I created you,” “You owe me for your treachery,” “I’m the only one who cares for you.”

By this time, Hunter has lived a full life. He’s settled down, had kids, grown old. He’s carved thousands of palismen. He’s taught multiple apprentices. Hunter has had people in his life that truly cared for him. More importantly, he’s had people in his life that he’s cared for. He knows that when he cares about someone, he doesn’t call them worthless. He doesn’t test them or hit them or demand that they prove themselves. Hunter’s trauma has been difficult to deal with, but he’s been able to live a fulfilling life with truly kind people.

Hunter wants to tell Belos that he’s worthless, to say something that will sting. But that will only validate Belos. Hunter passes on, leaving Belos alone.

Belos watches for centuries. He watches for millennia. He learns the names of generation after generation of witch and demon, watching with a burning hatred as they forget the harm he’s caused.

He could stop watching at any time. He could pass on at any time. Nobody is forcing him to hold on to his anger. He tortures himself, and blames people born hundreds of generations after his death. He yells and screams in rage as the world moves on. They forgot him. They healed from his abuse. And he can’t stand it.

#the owl house #philip wittebane #emperor belos #belos #toh

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sparklyballoonballoon · 2 months

Text

Owl House Roleplay Request

Let’s use both OCs and CCs for the roleplay

Ships, yeah, I’m okay with having romance

In the roleplay as well since I have some

Ideas of ships in mind.

Luz x Amity

King x OC

Cat x Pufferfish bipedal demon in the abominations track with the sloth Palisman

Boscha x OC

Amelia x Lucas (the blond guy with the black beanie in the oracle track uniform who is a part of Boscha’s group in the episode Once Upon a Swap)

Eda x Raine

Jerbo x Edric

Viney x Emira

Bo x Skara

Gus x Matt

(Au, Hunter attends Hexside

Lumity is not together yet. That will happen in the rp

Flapjack is already dead and Waffles will eventually be introduced in the rp

Vee and Camila on the isles

King starting Hexside eventually

One of Boschas posse members, the healing girl, Cat having a character arc. I wanna give her a tragic backstory since he’s a background character and I can be able to have freedom

I wanna rp Luz, Hooty, King, Principal Bump, Edric, Gus, Viney, Bo, Gavin, Angmar, Amelia, Cat, Vee

Perhaps neutral, maybe a mix of angst and some fluff

And plenty of comedy and funny dialogue

I also wanna try to make this as literate as possible

Also I want to have Luz finish her high school stuff at Hexside and not go back to her old school

I had this idea for a plot. I wanted to have Del perhaps organize a big project to lower the age limit on Palisman at Hexside to maybe a minimum grade of 4th with some exceptions depending and perhaps have another Palisman receiving day. King and rest of his classmates and other students without palismen yet can get theirs

Like Del can host one with the collaboration of Eda, Gwen, the Bat Queen and Principal Bump. And maybe have Hunter and possibly anyone else once we get to that will be volunteers or something

And the adoption is is open to grades 4-12.

The 4 and 5th graders and all the middle schoolers can get theirs. And to be high schoolers who didn’t get theirs yet can finally get one

Maybe that’s when Hunter finally gets Waffles or something. Though does Waffle already exist or will you introduce her later in the RP?

Also does Matt have a palismen already or will his palisman be introduced in the rp? Also have you heard of Matt’s headcanoned palisman Garth?

(I wanna do a plot or some sort of Darius plot with him, Eberwolf, Steve, and Raine and potentially others working on a murder mystery in the RP as well and perhaps have some sort of trial

I want Cat (the healing girl with the glasses who’s in Boscha’s friend group) to have younger twin siblings who’s around Kings age. Their mother is framed and accused for a crime that she didn’t commit and the three are framed and accused as accomplices

This is related to something called the Dynasty Wars

The wealthy families of the boiling isles compete against each other of who makes the most contributions to the Day of Unity and who gets the biggest rewards from Belos. This causes them to get drastic measures to get on top

It’s a tactic that Belos created and used in order to make his job easier and have less witches to eliminate because witches will be eliminating each other through their feuds

I also wanna have boss fights at Hexside. Like similar to Labyrinth runners but with Luz and other characters included

I want to have all of Hexaide and their parents to fight off against each covenhead and their army of covenscouts to fight them off to keep them from getting branded

One day they’ll take on Adrian, another day Terra, then Mason, Hettie, Vitimir, Osran…and keep taking them on until all the covenheads are defeated and then there’s this final one with Kikimora and all the covenheads along with the biggest covenscout army yet

if you wanna roleplay with me, lemme know in the comments below or just PM me

#owl house #the owl house #toh headcanons #toh #the owl house rp #owl house rp #toh theories #lumity the owl house #lumity #toh lumity

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