listen there really was just something about how in the book, snow’s 3-page descent from hesitant lover boy to deluded psychopath happens entirely in his mind. lucy gray gives him no indication whatsoever that she suspects him, that she’s going to leave or betray him. he’s just sitting quietly in the cabin waiting for her to return when that seed of calculated suspicion, which he has needed to survive the capitol, takes a hold of him and chokes the life out of any goodness left inside him. it really drives home your terror as a reader that “oh my god did he kill her? did she escape? what happened to her? why would he even think that?” in a way that when the movie had to adjust for visualization it lost some of that holy shit this guy has lost it emphasis.
Boy had such a horrible upbringing that the moment that he was shown a little bit of comfort, an opportunity to gain some solace and get away from the horrible situation he was in, he freaked out and ran away. Boy and the farmer were both a little troubled but they would have worked out, Boy needed someone that cared for him and the farmer needed someone to care for (missing his son that either died or moved out). But Boy freaked out and left.
He got lost, he found the stronghold. The stronghold is not fit for people to stay in, its full of monsters and at this point there was nothing there. This was before the end was destroyed and the stronghold was turned into a safehouse for the people fleeing. There was NOTHING in the stronghold except monsters and despair. He died somehow in the stronghold, either from monsters, falling, starvation, or literally any other way he could have died.
And now his ghost has been trapped in the stronghold for what? thousands of years. He doesn't even remember his own name, he doesn't remember who he used to be or what his life was like. He doesn't even remember if he WAS alive at one point.
He was there when the end broke, he was there when the stronghold suddenly became overridden with people! He was there when it became abandoned again.
He tended to the farms... felt a connection to the crops and the animals. He can't leave the stronghold, sure he can go to the surface now that he's a ghost, but he can't leave the area that the stronghold is around. He's tethered to the skeleton he's long forgotten trapped in the walls.
But then he met Aro. She was running away to the stronghold too. She could see him, she could acknowledge him and TALKED to him. Something he hadn't had for YEARS. They can find solace in each other.
do you ever think about how in the day i picked up dazai side b dazai had to lie emotionless and soulless—like a corpse, almost—beside the man that gently brought him in, nursed his injuries, held him while he was in pain? he had to keep those suffocating bandages around his entire face, lest this man gain some sort of recognition for the little boy he saved. he had to lay there curled in the fetal position, bleeding and in pain, perhaps thinking about how, in another life, this man cooked for him, tried to build up his strength. read to him to pass the time while he curled up against him like a child listening to a bedtime story. played cards with him. saw through the heartless mafioso. the ruthless killer. and instead saw a boy.
imagine knowing this man, the man who saved you in more ways than one, was going to die one day all because he knew you. because he reached his hand into the darkness and plaintively, like a small child wanting a parent's touch, you grasped back desperately. imagine thinking all of that while that man is just a stone's throw away, making coffee in the next room just like he used to for you in another life. the scent, although you've never been here before, is reminiscent of home. and the tune he's humming? it's the silent melody that plays through your mind seven years later, for the last time as you fall backward off the building with your arms out like an embrace. but, hey. that man is alive. he's happy, although he never knew you. you can die with no regrets.
wilson as a character is so interesting to me, because you have this guy who, on the surface, seems so fundamentally loving and sweet and giving. he adores his patients, treasures each one and their gifts to the point his office is a museum for them. he gives all he has to house, and is so desperate to be loved back that he married three times
and i think it's really interesting to dive deeper into his character, because he thrives off this neediness and being needed. he throws himself into his work and his patients, because they need him. he got married three times because, at some point or another, these women desperately needed him. his best friend, and lover, is the neediest man on the planet. i am not discounting his sweet and kind nature, because i think that's so integral to wilson, but i also think it's really interesting to look at the flipside of it, and the ulterior motive he has
his neediness to be needed is so crucial when considering him as a character, a plot device, and, most importantly, a foil to house. we all know how much they're head & heart, two sides of the same coin, etc. and one may think that wilson is incredibly selfless, and house the reverse, but i think that's so .. wrong, and a bastardisation of their characters
house can be selfish, sure, but at his core he selflessly pushes everyone away to "save" them from putting up with him. it's a trauma-addled response, of course, but one that has a selfless nature to it. and then you have wilson, who constantly and consistently gets into relationships with women he doesn't truly love, because they need him, and that's what he loves. he ignores them for house, because he will never not need wilson, and wilson himself needs that. sure, wilson is generous and kind, and i will never not love that about him, but considering that to come from a place of selfishness is really interesting i think, especially as a foil to house & his behaviour
psa that the day there are no jgy stans left on tumblr dot com is the day i am dead
but rest assured i'll go to my grave exactly as i lived: obnoxiously proclaiming to everyone within earshot how great lianfang-zun is. narratively, metaphorically, spiritually. sexually, too, like why limit myself. i like to keep my options open
@somerandomdudelmao you have given me a new hyperfixation and I literally can’t stop thinking about him, you made the perfect design and your work is amazing
sometimes i want to reach through the screen and shake sabo by the shoulders because. god. there's just so much going on with him.
he's first introduced through the veil of luffy's memories- here he's just another feral jungle kid, sticking it out with ace and luffy, the 'nicer' brother in young luffy's eyes. and then boom. you find out he's a runaway noble trying to escape his abusive, neglectful family- and this changes nothing, they still get to become sworn brothers, but just as quickly as this is resolved, his asshole of a dad takes the three of them hostage. and what does sabo do? he gives up the little sliver of freedom he'd fought for, is willing to become miserable and lonely again if it means ace and luffy are spared. and then he comes home to find that in his absence, his parents have already found a replacement! great!
and he doesn't even get to address how fucked up that is, because stelly runs his mouth and now sabo's too busy trying to figure out how to stop his brothers and their home from getting burnt to the ground. he never gets to give them a proper goodbye- he exhausts himself trying to reach them, but he can't because. you know. he's ten. so where does this leave sabo? ten years old, with nowhere to go- he sets out to sea to try and start over, and for the crime of wanting to escape a terrible life, he's punished with an explosion to the face. he loses his memories, his brothers lose him- and so the cycle continues.
then the army saves him, takes him in; he's essentially a child soldier, with how prodigious of a fighter he is from the get-go. but hey, he thinks he's finally found his footing, even if his past's a blur to him- then it all comes flooding back. in the worst way possible. he sees his brother's corpse and he remembers, but it doesn't matter, does it? he's too late, ace is gone, and sabo's lost ten years of a life he could have shared with his brothers. we don't even know how (if, even) he recovers from this- except for a single passing statement from koala, asking him if he's 'had that dream again' because he'd been crying in his sleep. this is never brought up or addressed again. great!plus, we never do find out if getting blown up at the ripe old age of ten could have left any lasting fire-related trauma; and if it does, what does that mean for sabo, who's pretty much made of it, now?
both of these questions are answered at once- sabo treats the fire as if it's ace. it's ace's legacy he's carrying on, and it's ace he seeks freedom for. he copes by making sure ace lives on in his flames, and how can he ever hate the fire living in him if that fire is all he has left of the brother he never got to see again?
i just have to wonder about him, because he's got so many Issues that just. don't ever get addressed? every time we see him deal with his grief (episode of sabo, his own retelling of events in dressrosa) we never really discover anything about him. i wonder how it felt to finally remember the childhood that eluded him, just to find out he was an unwanted, replacable child. how he feels, living with the knowledge that he could have done something to save ace, that he'd failed to remember the two people he loved the most? i wonder just how terribly that guilt must weigh down on him- because where luffy's already begun to heal, sabo still sees ace in everything he does. his title of flame emperor is a direct callback to ace's final attack in his fight against blackbeard. he talks to his goddamn fire like his brother is still in front of him, which is sweet and heartbreaking and, considering his backlog of unaddressed trauma... incredibly unhealthy. i know these will probably be left unresolved for the sake of moving the story forward- but god, sabo, are you okay?