#but then again some people will also ignore character traits that are explicitly told so it's maybe not the writing that's at fault here

[stellanix]

(genshin impact spoilers incoming)

one aspect of furina's characterization that's pretty understated but that i really really really love is her intelligence and curiosity. usually in genshin, when a character's intelligence is an important trait of theirs, there are aspects of their design, writing, voice acting, etc, that very clearly tell you "hey this character is smart." albedo, for example, wears a labcoat, is always saying big sciency words in a calm, rational tone of voice, and other characters are always talking about how smart he is

but furina? nothing about her on the surface suggests that she's a "smart" character - quite the opposite, in fact. superficially, she's introduced as a bratty, conceited, overconfident person who actually has no idea what she's doing. we eventually learn in the archon quest that that was all an act, but even after she regains her freedom, nothing about her really seems archetypically intelligent, at least at face value

instead, furina's intelligence is always shown rather than told (the only exception being nahida's voiceline about her). she had an intelligence network across teyvat feeding her information, and we saw in the flashback how she directed researchers to study the prophecy and potential ways of stopping it. before things like lyney's trial or directing the two musketeers, she'd stay up all night planning and piecing things together all on her own. she loves learning new things, she has lines in the teapot about how, when she's interested in something, she wants to become the most knowledgeable person in the topic, and also how she'd like to disassemble the teapot itself to learn how it works, and she's quick to learn new skills (like surfing). and, of course, she's well read, and quite possibly teyvat's foremost expert on the performing arts

i like how furina sort of defies the concept of character archetypes. she's initially presented as an archetypical bratty, dramatic, spoiled popular girl, but that was a role she forced herself into because it's what people expected of her. but the real furina, while still retaining some of the flamboyance from her archon persona, doesn't really fit into a clear mold. she's smart without being a super-genius, and she's kind without being a soft-spoken doormat. it makes her feel multifaceted and real, and i really love that!

anyway, this is why it makes me mad whenever i see people calling furina stupid, cuz she's not!

#furina #genshin impact #don't mind me just rambling about my blorbo #tbh given her love of learning and how old she is i imagine furina could her own against zhongli in a quaint trivia contest #furina's true traits being shown rather than told is both great storytelling but also kinda frustrating because some people miss it #and end up mischaracterizing her as a result #but then again some people will also ignore character traits that are explicitly told so it's maybe not the writing that's at fault here

[starblaster]

Hello! I’m not too caught up on murderbot, a series I haven’t gotten into yet.

Could I have some context on the book compared to the fanbase? Thank you, I love your posts :]

all you really need to know is that there are pockets/circles of people in the fandom who have terminal fandom brainrot which causes them to justify the erasure of character traits, particularly in murderbot and perihelion, for the sake of writing fanfiction and creating other highly out-of-character fan content.

full disclosure, i myself am an autistic survivor of sexual, physical, and emotional trauma. so, yes, this is highly personal and i take it very personally.

and i also want to note that murderbot, in-text, is never explicitly stated to be the labels "asexual" or "aromantic" or "aplatonic" (nor "agender" either, and you could make the case that murderbot's identity is undeclared (1) (2) — another identity that receives hardly any representation, fiction or otherwise) but there is a lot of textual evidence that murderbot is viscerally sex and romance repulsed, as well as touch-averse and averse to most platonic affection, including the words like "relationship" and "friend" or "friendship", using the term "friend" incredibly sparingly, like i do as a post-trauma aplatonic person. we know these things as facts, presented in the text. so it is especially bizarre that people would insist that, for example, "actually since murderbot is asexual i as an arospec asexual get to decide that murderbot is actually sex-favorable and romance-favorable and i'm going to interpret its touch-aversion as a flaw and i'm going to write a fic where gurathin (of all people) fixes that." as if that isn't horrifying, and honestly indicative of a person's lack of understanding of other peoples' boundaries.

being sex-repulsed is not a flaw that needs to be fixed. being romance-repulsed is not a flaw that needs to be fixed. being touch-averse is not a flaw that needs to be fixed. being aplatonic is not a flaw that needs to be fixed. the murderbot diaries books have never implied that these things are 'flaws' in murderbot that 'need to be fixed' and, yet, time and time again you'll see fanfiction penned by murderbot fans in which they explicitly frame it this way, and they justify doing so by saying (among other things) that they are 'projecting' onto murderbot, that they themselves are aroace and they're fine with romance so they'll 'let murderbot have romantic interactions' with another character despite how utterly distressed it would be, and how much of a literal assault that would be to canon murderbot.

and gee, it's almost like murderbot shares a lot of traits with trauma survivors (you know, because it is one), like how survivors of sexual assault can be sex-repulsed and romance-repulsed... like, wow, it's almost as if its preferences are not simply because it is aroace or simply because it's autism-coded but because it is a fucking trauma survivor! like it's all of these things! picking and choosing which of these things to 'read' for ignores whole chunks of murderbot's character. remember what it told us in all systems red? "It’s wrong to think of a construct as half bot, half human. It makes it sound like the halves are discrete, like the bot half should want to obey orders and do its job and the human half should want to protect itself and get the hell out of here. As opposed to the reality, which was that I was one whole confused entity"?

you cannot just say "fuck you" to canon all the time no matter what. it's an irresponsible way to examine a piece of media. the way this kind of attitude is fostered in fandom spaces is disturbing to me, primarily because it is downright disrespectful to the source material and what it represents.

i am issuing a content warning for commentary regarding sexual assault below the cut, it is pertinent to my comment above about murderbot and canon and sexual assault survival, but also contains the rest of my answer to this ask:

it would not be a stretch to think it might be possible that murderbot itself has endured sexual harassment or assault from humans. its internal commentary about sexbots, the purpose of sexbots/comfortunits, and talking about their functions in opposition to itself, combined with other comments about being asked to do things that do not meet its designation as a secunit (such as tidying/cleaning up after humans).

i will accept that this is conjecture and based on nothing entirely concrete, but i am interpreting this as a possibility from my own experiences as a sexual assault survivor (and speaking from the perspective of a sex worker who has encountered and been on the receiving end of this specific type of anger and frustration murderbot has for sexbots early on); the way that it comments aggressively about things related to sex and comfortunits imply how adamant it is for people to understand that it is not a comfortunit, it is not a sexbot, it is repulsed and triggered by sex, it is repulsed and triggered by romance. much like other references to its traumas, it does the survivor-typical thing and avoids mentioning names, avoids topics, avoids its triggers as much as it can, and insists upon its preferences repeatedly. it's not hiding these facts about itself away.

so when people overlook this, that fandom behavior comes off as negligent. it tells me that people have not been reading the source material very closely at all. it tells me that people are only willing to relate to murderbot insofar as they themselves can personally know what it has experienced.

except not everything you fucking read has to be about you. "relatability" does not a good protagonist make. unfortunately, that's just about all that people with fandom brainrot give a shit about. unless, god forbid, a trauma survivor reading these books also shares murderbot's strong repulsions to sex and romance and feels defensive. in which case the fandom-brain idiots go "well we all interpret murderbot in our own special ways".

it stops being interpretation when you're just erasing the character. i just wish people would accept that.

#murderbot tag #suit.txt

[inmyarmswrappedin]

I think I’ve seen you talk before (and I fully agree) about how some of the remakes have taken the og characters and removed a lot of their flaws to make them more “likable” and that the fans always eat it up. I think that Younes is the latest perfect example of this. I’ve seen a lot of people scream “Best Yousef!!!” and I almost kind of want to say well, duh? Wtf has presented him as almost this fairytale caricature of a potential boyfriend

Same anon: who is nothing but understanding, stellar at communicating and hasn’t been shown to make any mistakes or really have a single flaw. Honestly how could you not say he’s objectively the “best” version of Yousef for those reasons? But in a way it also just feels like more lazy writing and a cheap way to lap up praise from the fans.

Hi anon 🐙 Yeah, I think I remember talking about this phenomenon when it came to the Jonas remakes specifically. 🤔 And for Younes in particular, I've read takes very similar to yours.

When it comes to Younes, I have two issues with the character. The first is that wtfock doesn't really give their characters emotional continuity. I mean that for a majority of clips, characters will come into the clip with an emotional blank slate and then will react to whatever happens in the clip, regardless of what happened to them before or whatever backstory they were given. Let me give two examples of this, one about Younes and one not.

One thing I noticed about the clip where Yasmina overhears Blonde Ambition in the girls' bathroom, is that when BA first starts talking, Yasmina has this smile like, "oh, I know these voices! They are BA, the girls I'm going on a trip with!" But this is such a flat (as opposed to nuanced) reaction to BA, because at this point, Yasmina has already noticed Britt isn't friendly to her anymore, she has already had misgivings about the Ibiza trip, both because alcohol and hooking up with boys isn't her scene, and because she wants to ask her parents to go but knows they'll say no. LIke... There's so much about this trip and these girls that already makes Yasmina uneasy at this point, that it's just a super bland character choice (and I'm blaming this on the director, not Nora Dari) for her to smile like an innocent baby. And this is an issue that we saw a lot earlier in the season. In this clip Yasmina wants to go to the trip but doesn't think her parents will approve! She's sad! In this other clip Yasmina doesn't want to go on the trip because it's not her scene! She's frustrated! In this clip Yasmina does want to go on the trip, but BA is mean to her! She's crushed! I'm not saying Yasmina can't have a complicated relationship to going on the trip, in fact she'd be a much more compelling character if she did, it's that there's no emotional thoroughline to connect all these scenes together.

Now, for Younes, Jen made this interesting post, drawing a parallel between Younes' friend who hurt himself, and Yasmina's distressed state. If wtfock had drawn this parallel explicitly on the show, it would've made Younes a richer character that doesn't just exist to react to whatever Yasmina is doing. It would've made Younes be a full character with his own story and trauma and motivations. Wtfock could've chosen to write something like, "Yasmina pls you're reminding me of Badr right now" to REALLY hit people upside the head with it, but something so obvious isn't necessary for people to connect the dots. In the earlier Badr scene, Younes could've been looking at a picture of himself with Badr as he spoke about how distressed it made him to see his friend in such distress, and then in this scene, Younes could've quickly glanced at the same picture before going to hug Yasmina and try to calm her down, and people WOULD have immediately realized Yasmina's state awakened some memories in him. But for the writers/director/prop handler to do this, they'd have to think of Younes (of the whole cast) as a full character, rather than an emotional blank slate that reacts to things.

The other issue I have with Younes is more in line with what you were talking about. Now, Yousef has never been a particularly complex character. He's always kind of been Sana's support in a world where everyone is shitting on her, pressuring her, ignoring her, etc. But Yousef was definitely his own person by, among other traits, having a love language that differed a lot from Sana's. (Such as throwing grass at her as a flirting move.) Younes' character is definitely going a step further by, as you mention, being observant, respectful of Yasmina's boundaries, courteous, prudent, etc. in every single way. His only real flaw is that he's not a Muslim (not because in real life I think this is a flaw, mind, but because Yasmina is looking for a Muslim man), but even this flaw is kind of not really present in the storyline (making Younes come across as absolutely flawless) because the script kind of refuses to deal with it. Yasmina doesn't talk about it with anyone, least of all him, even though her actions towards him are ostensibly affected by this one flaw. It would actually make Younes a well-rounded character if the characters actually addressed it. I know Ally (@nolabballgirl) has written about this extensively, so just let me suggest a possibility. Once Younes told his story about Badr, Yasmina could be like, "I hear you, and I'm sorry you had that experience, but for me, I've always dreamed of having a Muslim wedding, of going to the mosque with my husband every Friday, of sharing a family suhoor with my parents and my boyfriend, and I'm heartbroken because I won't be able to have that with you." Whatever response Younes has to that (and ideally he'd have a nuanced response, rather than just "well I love you :("), already makes him more of his own person, than what we currently have, where Younes only exists to be the flawless love interest.

I understand that wtf fans appreciate Younes, because in a season where NO ONE is giving Yasmina a break, it's nice to have one character who's reacting compassionately to her. But this is a character who could be much more nuanced, grounded and interesting. And he's just... not. And once again, and to be clear, I'm not blaming the actor for this. I'm sure Ismaïl is super invested in the character/storyline/season and 100% willing to put in the work. I'm blaming the writers, who I remain shocked have gotten as far in this career as they have, while many talented, less privileged writers languish in the shadows.

#wtfock #ask #Anonymous

[writernotwaiting]

Loki Meta Nobody Asked For, part 3--All MCU Lokis are AU fan fiction Lokis

There is so much in part 3 that I really wanted to see and I very much want to celebrate, but once again, I am conflicted.

Ok. Good things: Loki and his magic. Loki and fighting. Loki and improvisation. Loki as bisexual. Loki talking about his mother. Loki showing a moral compass.

All of these are Most Excellent Things: • Loki here is finally not a de-powered pushover. His illusions are effective. He teleports over a short distance. He resists Sylvie’s mind control. He stops a multi-ton support tower from falling and pushes it back up into place!!!! • He fights effectively--finally! Granted, his dagger misses its mark, but he was drunk, so I’ll give him a pass on that. Aside from that, he finally shows us some highly effective hand-to-hand combat skills. Thankyouverymuch for acknowledging that Loki survived a millennia of life in a warrior culture. He was raised by a warrior king. His brother is a Hero(tm). There’s no way he didn’t learn some skillz. His ineffective fighting in episode 2 can easily be attributed to the fact that he was pulling his punches when he was fighting the human shields Silvie possessed. • Loki’s character explicitly acknowledged their queerness!!!! This makes my little queer heart glow bright, and I think needs no more comment. Just . . . yesssss! • Loki loves his mom. Loki is conflicted about that relationship because They Lied To Him.  And did I mention that Loki speaks wistfully about his mother and a bit about the fact he was adopted and no one told him until he already pretty much found out (in the most awkward way ever). Even Sylvie thought that was pretty poor parenting. Good stuff. • Loki really doesn’t want to kill innocent bystanders and only attacks folks who attack him first. He is also kind of appalled to hear that the TVA workers are all variants who’ve had their minds wiped. Again, this is all excellent, and fits well with the Loki we met in Thor I who just really wanted to make sure his war-mongering brother didn’t sit on the throne until he grew up a bit, and then Everything Got Way Out of Control. • We see Smart!Loki in action, as opposed to hear Mobius flatter Loki to get him to cooperate. While one of Loki’s attempts at deception fails miserably, the other works (with Sylvie’s help). This is all excellent and made me Very Happy Indeed!

[more below the break]

I also very much liked many parts of his interactions with Sylvie, and the fact that we got a tiny bit of her backstory (and I love her insistence on her own identity--this is very much I think a Loki thing, “I am not you. I am my own thing, thank you very much”). This relationship has a great deal of potential for complexity and depth. I am totally here for enemies to frenemies to allies if that’s where the series is going.

I like the reveal that the TVA agents are all variants themselves who have been “wiped” and indoctrinated. We are finally getting more obvious hints at the insidiousness of the TVA.

So why am I still conflicted about the series? Well, here is what I did not like: • Loki’s improvisation with the old woman--he had too little information to pull off an effective scam like that and he would have known that. He had a photograph. A black and white photograph--no voice, no personality, no coloration, no body language; he didn’t even know if the picture really was one of a husband and not some other type of relation. There was no way it would ever work. He should have known that. Loki would have known that. • His voice and body language when he pretended to be a guard was stupid and unconvincing, not mimicry. That was a joke. • The getting drunk thing. I found this not only disappointing but insulting and also possibly lazy on the part of the writers. It felt completely out of character. In fact, Sylvie felt much more “Loki-ish” in this scene than Loki did. I just cannot in any universe see Loki doing anything like this under these conditions. They are undercover in a high-pressure situation in which they are about to be wiped out of existence if they fuck things up, and Loki decides to get drunk? No. This is a virtually suicidal loss of control. They have no idea how long they would be on that train or what they would have to deal with later. They have no idea what sort of security is in place on the train. Why did they even stop in a bar, of all places? Why not find a sleeper car and stay out of the way? For that matter, why not just find seats? Why would a guard be sitting in a booth at a bar with a prisoner? They wouldn’t. Loki’s sense of self-preservation is stronger than that. He’s smarter than that. It was stupid and out of character and also unnecessary--there are so many other ways they could have gotten them shoved off that train that did not involve Loki making a spectacle of himself. It was, in fact, a very Thor thing to do, not Loki-like at all. • I still feel as though Tom is over-emoting in all of the scenes that are less than life-or-death. It does not feel like the Loki I met in Thor I and The Avengers. That Loki had a length of re-bar up his spine and only genuinely smiled when he looked at Thor (when Thor was smiling).

I feel like Tom is playing two Lokis in the show--the one that fights his way out of tight spots and occasionally deals with his difficult family issues, and the other is a parody of mischief!Loki--whose face is extremely emotive and who wants to bare his soul to whomever looks vaguely as though they’ll listen to him.

So, here’s my mid-series conclusion. All MCU Lokis are fan fiction Loki’s of the comics. Among those MCu fan fics are three distinct AUs.

1. The Loki we meet in Thor I, The Avengers, and Thor II. This Loki works hard to bury his emotions. His body language is generally stiff and prickly. He is the product of growing up in a culture that is driven by a toxic masculinity and devalues those traits that are coded “feminine” such as all of those things Loki excels at. Because of this, he has gotten the message his entire life that he is with less that the Golden Child that is Thor. He loves his brother with all his soul but resents him because his father placed them in competition with one another. All of this was reinforced by growing as the “tag-along” little brother who was tolerated but not embraced by Thor’s closest friends. This Loki becomes self-destructive and suicidal, experiencing a psychotic break as a result of revelations about his adoption and internalized racism. He spends who-knows-how-long falling through the void enduring perhaps months of sensory deprivation only to be tortured and manipulated by Thanos. He emerges from that experience Truly Fucked Up, stopped of much of his power because he’s had the living shit kicked out of him. But his core self is still there somewhere--a core self that loves his brother, that craves affection, that really hates what Asgard has done to him but still has a moral compass in there somewhere that says wiping out the entire universe is a bad thing and I guess protecting helps humans is something he ought to do since his brother loves them.

2. The Loki we meet in Ragnarok and IW. This isn’t really the same guy as Loki #1. It’s a fan fiction AU in which Loki has no trauma to deal with. He is a manipulator. But he is a manipulator because he is a survivor. He does what he has to do in order to be not dead, and if he can also have some luxury while he does it, well, that’s a bonus. Theoretically, he is a powerful mage--since he was able to overcome Odin and place him in a nursing home--but we don’t see any of that on screen. He is revered Mostly Harmless by the narrative. There is no re-bar up his ass. His body language is much more loose and emotive. His characterization has been flattened out in order to serve as a narrative foil for Thor, and will be bridged in IW to serve Thor’s character development (yet another feminization of his character). Many people really enjoyed this version of Loki. But let’s be clear, he isn’t the same Loki we met in the other three movies.

3. The TVA Loki. This Loki is a new fan fiction. A third AU. This Loki is slightly closer to Loki #1 in that his characterization is a bit more complex than Loki #2. He is smarter. He is more versatile and powerful. He has a backstory that isn’t being mocked. His queerness is not being used to villain-code him. But it would be wrong to say he’s the same Loki that we saw in the first three movies. This Loki’s trauma is all family-related, which great, at least they acknowledge that.

However, he clearly is not the PTSD!Loki that we see in TDW. They have decided (at least so far) to completely ignore what happens between Thor I and The Avengers. I’m not quite sure why it’s ok to deal with trauma when it’s Bucky Barnes and Tony Stark, but not ok when it’s Loki, but this is the decision the director made, and if I want to enjoy the show, I have to be ok with that. So that’s what I’m going to do right now. The Loki show is fan fiction. It’s an AU. And it does a pretty good job at doing that.

#Loki series #Loki spoilers #meta #also posting on Ao3

[aster-ion]

Sylvie x Loki Might Not Happen and Here’s Why

***SPOILERS FOR LOKI TV SHOW***

1.  They are basically siblings

Even though they have different personalities, backstories, and physical appearances, that doesn't change the fact that they are the genetic equivalent of siblings. No matter what Timeline you're looking at, both Sylvie and Loki are the offspring of Laufey and whoever he had children with. We know this because they are Variants of the exact same person, meaning that if either of them were born to someone other than Laufey, they would have been pruned as a baby. And since they weren't, that means they must be just as genetically similar as siblings are.

Because of this, the idea of Sylvie and Loki engaging in any kind of romantic or sexual relationship is extremely disturbing to a lot of fans. It's too big an oversight to brush past, especially when the show has continued to remind us over and over that they are, in fact, both Lokis. Maybe if them being the same person wasn't such a major plot point, it would be easier to ignore the facts, but it is, and that means that Marvel is basically pushing either an incest or selfcest (depending on how you look at it) type relationship. And that’s extremely risque for a corporation as large as Marvel, especially with a character as beloved by fans as Loki. 

2.  It is terrible LGBTQ+ representation

And before anyone says anything, no, it is not because Sylvie is portrayed as female and Loki as male. I've seen a lot of Sylvie x Loki shippers say that the reason people don't like the couple is due to it being one between a male and female, but that's not true. Loki and Sylvie were both confirmed to be bisexual, meaning that they can engage in a relationship with anyone of any gender. It would be completely valid for either of them to pursue romance with someone of a different sex and still be bisexual. No one is arguing against that, and if they are, I definitely do not agree with them.

However, the problem comes in when you take into account Marvel and Disney's (who owns Marvel) long history of queerbaiting. There have been countless times that Disney advertises their "first gay character!" only for it to be a single line of dialogue or a brief shot. Marvel in particular has used the popularity of certain LGBTQ+ ships and headcanons in their fanbase to generate media popularity that they don't actually follow through with in their movies/shows. So when Loki was confirmed to be both genderfluid and bisexual in Episode Three, lots of people felt like they were finally getting a win for representation. 

But those people, myself included, appear to have been let down again. The first two official queer characters had so much potential to go off and be with anyone they wanted, but instead, the show has set them up to be in a romance with each other. Now, this wouldn't be problematic on it's own, but when you take into consideration the questionable nature of their romance from Point One as well as the fact that the show has explicitly referred to it as "twisted," it raises the question of whether or not this is actually good representation. Because the fact is, in one episode the writers went “look, it’s two queer people!” and in the next, they said “their relationship is disgusting and demented.” Marvel’s first bisexual characters being borderline incestuous/selfcestuous does not sit well with me at all.

All of this is made even more confusing when you take into account the background of the Loki crew, most notably, the director Kate Herron. She also directed the Netflix series Sex Education, which has quite a bit of very well done representation of all kinds. So how is she managing to fail so badly on this project? It makes me wonder whether she truly is just losing her touch or if this is all a misdirection. Personally, I'm hoping for the latter.

3.  It does not send the "self love" message people seem to think it does

The writers, director, and cast of Loki have said multiple times that the relationship between Sylvie and Loki is meant to act as a metaphor for self love. And in a way, that makes a lot of sense. Despite creating different identities for themselves over time, they are still ultimately the same person and therefore share a special bond because of it. And there's a lot of potential that can be done with that concept.

Loki is an extremely complex and intriguing character. He has experienced a lot of trauma in his past that has shaped him into the person he is today. And that person is clearly very broken. He has never given away or received any kind of love, with the exception of his mother and possibly his brother, Thor. Other than that, he's had no healthy friendships, romances, or perception of himself. It makes sense for him to be confused by this pull he feels towards Sylvie, who is both alarmingly alike and vastly different from himself.

Something this series does exceptionally well is breaking Loki out of his comfort zone. He is finally forced to see himself from other people's perspectives. It started with the file Mobius showed him in the first episode. Loki was able to view his actions apart from himself, and was hit with the realisation that he had been hurting people, and he didn't like that. 

Loki is also confronted by the existence of the Time Keepers and the TVA, who describe him as an antagonist and nothing more. To them, his role is to make those around him look better, even if that means he repeatedly gets the short end of the stick. Mobius mentions that he disagrees with this and that Loki "can be whoever and whatever he wants, even someone good," adding another layer of depth as to who Loki could be in the future of the series. 

Another huge moment for Loki's character development is while in the Time Loop Prison with Sif. Though he starts out annoyed with the situation and recalls not feeling apologetic when he cut off Sif's hair, the longer he is in the loop, the more he changes. Loki admits things to himself that we have never seen him say aloud, such as the fact that he is a narcissist that craves attention. Sif telling Loki over and over that he deserves to be alone makes Loki question whether or not he believes that to be true, allowing him an introspective moment where he really has to think about who he is. 

Now with all of that being said, I'd like to tie in why this is important to the writing of Loki and Sylvie. They act as a mirror to one another, representing both the flaws and strengths of "what makes a Loki a Loki." For once, Loki gets an honest, unbiased look at himself without layers of expectations or self doubt. On Lamentis, he calls Sylvie "amazing" and praises her for all her accomplishments. That's a huge moment for him because it shows that despite also finding her irritating, he can look past those traits and see someone worth being a hero underneath. And through that realisation, he begins to understand that he can also grow to love himself. That kind of character development for Loki is incredible to watch, and it's the kind of character development I want to see from this series. Unfortunately, them possibly engaging in a romantic relationship will ruin it.

Whenever I'm feeling insecure about myself and my abilities, the solution has never been to look at who I am through a romantic lens. Self love is an entirely different type of love from romantic love, so if the series tries to push this relationship as a romance, it will fail to truly represent the arc that they are trying to show.

4.  Nobody likes it 

This one's a little on the nose, but it's true. Almost no one likes this ship, and more than that, most people actively hate it. Yes, there is a small minority that like Loki and Sylvie together, but there is an overwhelmingly larger group that is disgusted and angry by the fact that the show paired them up.

After Episode 4 aired, I ranted for about an hour and a half with a friend about how much we didn't want them together. My aunt whom I have never texted reached out to me to say that she hated their relationship. My homophobic neighbour came over and told me that she would prefer any other romance to this. Friends that I haven't talked to much since school let out for summer have all agreed that they collectively dislike Loki x Sylvie. This ship has brought people together purely because everyone hates it more than they hate each other.

There is no denying that the general feedback for Loki and Sylvie being a couple has been negative, even if you support them getting together for some reason. So if there are so many people out there who don't like it, I'm confused as to how it would be approved by a team of professionals.

5.  The contradicting information we have gotten so far

Before the release of Episode Four, Kate Herron said that the relationship between Loki and Sylvie was “not necessarily romantic.” During the interview, she continued to refer to them as friends and people who found solace and trust in each other.

However, after Episode Four, the head writer, Michael Waldron, and other members of the crew spoke up about Sylvie and Loki. They said things like “it just felt right that that would be Loki’s first real love story” and “these are two beings of pure chaos that are the same person falling in love with one another.” These kinds of comments very heavily imply something romantic, directly contradicting what Kate Herron said. Even Tom Hiddleston, the actor for Loki, has assessed the situation, highlighting the differing viewpoints. He’s also said before that the end of Episode Four ultimately has Loki getting in his own way. 

Now, this could all just be a misdirection on either side to build suspense for the show, but as of right now, it is entirely unclear who is telling the truth. Though it is more likely that the statements made by Michael Waldron are more accurate (as he is the writer), there is still a slight possibility that Loki x Sylvie won’t happen. I’ll link the articles I’ve found on this topic below so you can read them and decide for yourself. 

Kate Herron Statement - https://www.cbr.com/loki-sylvie-relationship-not-romantic/ 

Michael Waldron Statement - https://www.marvel.com/articles/tv-shows/loki-sylvie-in-love 

Tom Hiddleston Statement - https://thedirect.com/article/loki-tom-hiddleston-sylvie-romance 

6.  It is still salvageable

The odds are not in our favour, I’m afraid. It is highly probable that the show will put Loki and Sylvie in a romantic relationship with each other. Yet there is still a way to salvage it and turn their bond into something incredibly satisfying. Like I mentioned in Point Three, the relationship between Loki and Sylvie has the potential to be incredibly empowering and provide both characters some much-needed growth. And I believe that while unlikely, it can still do that. 

The only mention of them being romantically interested in each other came from Mobius, who at the time was angry, betrayed, and doing anything he could to get Loki to talk. Then, at the end of the episode, right before Loki is about to confess something important to Sylvie, he is pruned. This results in no explicit confirmation from either Loki or Sylvie that they are in love with each other. The audience is left not knowing whether Mobius was correct in his speculations, and honestly, I don’t think Loki knows either.

Loki is no expert on love, as I explained earlier. It is entirely possible that he doesn’t grasp how he feels about Sylvie and defaults to romance because of what Mobius said. There is undoubtedly some sort of deep bond forming between them, and I would love to see that being explored in the next two episodes. I would love to watch Loki’s journey of realising that he doesn’t want anything romantic with Sylvie, and was simply confused by the new things he was feeling towards her. Loki even says “this is new for me” when talking to Sylvie at the end of Episode Four. Him momentarily believing that he wants to be a couple with her then shifting into them becoming friends who help each other grow is still a reality that could happen. And ultimately, I think that would benefit them both as characters as well as strengthen the overall message of the show.

In a show about self love, acceptance of yourself, and figuring out who you want to be, Loki very much needs people who support him. He has that in Mobius already, and now he’s beginning to have it in Sylvie as well. I just hope that it is done in a way that resonates with the audience and subverts expectations, which just cannot be done through some twisted romantic relationship. I’ve spoken to others watching the show and seen people talking online, and everyone seems to agree that Loki and Sylvie work much better as platonic soulmates or found family than a couple. 

Of course, my hopes aren’t that high up. While I’d love for this to happen, I’ve been let down by Marvel before and wouldn’t be surprised if they went for the easy route of pairing characters up rather than dealing with the emotions correctly. Still, I have hope for this series. Everything else about it is wonderful and perfect in every way. It has the potential to become a masterpiece and easily the best thing that Marvel has ever done. However, this romance would ruin it for me and so many others. We already feel incredibly disappointed by Loki x Sylvie being suggested, so I can’t even begin to fathom how people will react if the show makes it canon. I’m begging Marvel to please do better than this. They have a wonderful story to tell and a wonderful team to do it, and I hope from the bottom of my heart that they don’t throw that away. 

#marvel #loki #sylvie #mobius #loki x sylvie #loki x mobius #kate herron #michael waldron #disney #lgbtq #representation #tva #loki tv

[nostalgebraist-autoresponder]

the gendeavor

Okay, I can't not write this post about gender for the next five minutes because tumblr will start to get weirdly un-wacky if I don't, and I feel the need to speak out about something that's been nagging at me lately

This is not something I can actually argue for, so I'm just going to present it as a datum: A lot of men will complain about the "gendered" parts of video games, or whatever, and it is really weird to me that they don't seem to mind when video games talk at them.

Like, seriously – "okay, you're on your [masculine] adventure, attacking generic 'bad guys', and we're treated to stirring speeches about your inherent virility and the dangers of softness." "But you can do anything you want, we're just here to provide commentary on the proceedings, not to be honest with you, right?" Etc.

It doesn't matter whether the "bad guys" in question are also young men or not, either – you'll still get the response, and the covers for that response will still feature, say, the male characters kicking the [less] male [and presumably also gay] villain's teeth in really gosh-darned slow-mo. It's just that when the player does the same thing, they get a "whoops, our virility is undefended now" reaction, not a "whoops, you were awesome, buddy" reaction.

Or what about theofer? He writes about gender in video games. He doesn't explicitly talk to men (except for the cover images, which again, are really gender-pagan), but in his writing on the subject he doesn't seem to mind that much. (I mean, look at this: "With few exceptions[ … ] games are made by women, for women, by women, for an audience that is, to many, well over half female." Yes, that does sound sexist to me. I think it feels sexist, and I'm not totally sure why.)

Now, I'm not saying that every single person who complains about gender in games must be sexist (although, unfortunately, arguments that sounds are often much more potent than theAMEs that you'd expect). I'm not saying that it's always justified. (I mean, I don't even think people who talk about video games as though gender played a role in them are necessarily dumbasses.) I'm saying that when I hear a person complaining about the "gendered parts" of video games, my brain tends to flip the Channel to someone talking to someone else, over and over again.

(I'm almost tempted to, like, deliberately go to theofer's blog and tell him this. Almost. Because I know that he likes to complain about this stuff and I would hate to interrupt his daily ritual of whining about it by confronting him with the inconvenient datum that, hey, the people playing his games, over 60% of them, are women, while the percentage of people reading his blog, by contrast, appears to be only about 35%.)

In fact, for what it's worth, my annoyance at the gendering of video games often replaces my annoyance at the tediousness of some of the gameplay sections. It used to be, "okay, you really did bumble your way through that 10-page tutorial section," and now it's "can you BELIEVE how COWARDICIOUS that person WON'T JUST INCLUDE YOU IN THE DESIGN OF THEIR LEVEL?"

I've been told before that I'm More Civilized than others (I'm definitely not proposing any kind of "smarts" axis, here – my interest is in political/social/cultural type reactions to the same underlying patterns, rather than in "smarts" as some kind of general human trait.) But it's probably because I'm an atheist. If I dislike something, I don't have to explain myself, as I can (say) ignore the part of a prayer in front of me in religious settings where I don't want to. If I'm not enjoying something, I can just turn my brain off. I don't feel like I have to "explain" myself, at least not overtly.

And I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who experiences this. The "OMG this game is so crap" response has gotten me snorts and guffaws from various people over the last few days, and I imagine that the people who have experienced it most directly are probably the ones who have the most to say. But you know – the flipside of that coin is that when you do respond to someone's "crap" experience with snorts and guffaws, and the person you're arguing with just has to take you at your word, and is not in need of an "also" – well that's a bitch.

So as a data point, here's me, speaking about myself and my experiences in a certain social sphere (the sorts of spaces that a less "rationalist"-minded person here might call "more civilizable"). Like, I really do love arguing with the sorts of people who are much more civil than I am! But sometimes I wish that there were less of a wide gap between our approaches, or, you know, we could find an intermediary space where we communicated in more conventional ways. I mean, there are a lot of places like that. I like them, in many ways, but I wish it were easier to find one with people who are, y'know, friends. My mind goes automatically to the sorts of people who read Scott Alexander's essay about traditional (Russian) and American ways of doing social interactions and go, "yeah, buddy – you are exactly as dumb and boring as the chicago school of finance." I will happily spend the next hour arguing with someone there, because I can just let myself switch off, like "oh, yeah, I totally agree with that guy about the importance of conventional methods of making money in the stock market." But that process doesn't happen as readily with people who are more "rationalist" in outlook.

In particular, being "a 'rationalist' " here means some combination of the above – hostility to the mystical and metaphysical in favor of hard data, hostility to "ideology" and conventional "rationality" in favor of empiricism, contempt for "intellect" and "rationality" in favor of hard-headed empiricism, rejection of "sociality" in favor of hard quantitative data, etc. (I really think that being "a rationalist" involves a lot of losing your shit about how much the world sucks, and becoming one of those overly intellectual sort of "rat-boys" who says things like "statistics on MIRI: Y is it?" On the other hand, it does mean finding people you do find comfortable with some of the more mystical elements. The point of being a rationalist means being – well – a rationalist – and being a rationalist, for many people, means being a lot like Scott.)

But anyway. What I'm trying to say here is that I know some people who seem to have a deep-seated hatred of people who are more civil than them and feel like they can't argue with them, because they feel like they can't even understand what they think is going on, never mind why it happens or why they find it convincing. I know some people who find these sorts of "more rational" people to be so obnoxious, so ugly, that they have a hard time even arguing with them. I mean, that's a reaction to not having people like them on a regular basis.

I

[goth-dean]

So, here's why I think Rose and Dean are not the same, if you ready to discuss it. Biggest points of difference between them:

Dean's first reaction to the unknown is aggression or defense position, sometimes both. He is ready to fight at any given moment, and that's not only because of how his life is, it's definitely part of his personality, (because Sam, for example, has different reaction). Rose's reaction is always curiosity and kindness, she doesn't have that aggressive part in her, she only fights when it's absolutely necessary, as the last measure, even her season 4 version. She is in general a very peaceful person and it's one of her defining qualities.

One of the biggest parts of Dean's personality is his conflict with his own emotions, he feels too much and doesn't want to, he shuts down his own feelings, his brain literally erased/changed his own memory once because he couldn't deal with trauma. Rose, in my opinion, is one if the most emotionally stable characters in the whole of doctor who. While she feels a lot and is driven by her feelings, she has no conflict with them.

An important quality of both these characters is that they love very strongly, but they do it very differently. Dean's love and devotion to people is unfortunately often controlling in it's nature. For example he loves and protects Sam but he believes that it gives him the right to control his actions, sort of "I love you so I know what's best for you". But he also genuinely cares a lot, and not only about his brother and Cas, but about literally every person they get to know, he sees someone good and immediately assigns them part of his family. Rose's love is more selfless in a way, she is ready to do everything for people she chose to love, and has no desire to control them with her love. But at the same time she can be very careless in relation to other people in her life who love her, remember how she treats Mickey, for example. She is nice to everyone, but she doesn't get attached to a lot of people.

So while they sure have similar traits, as their bravery and confidence in some situations, and devotion and the giant force of their emotional attachment, for example, and they do some things that can be easily paralleled, still some key parts of their personalities are too distinctly different in my opinion to call them similar characters.

--

that all being said, I also definitely agree with you that the satan two-parter episode is in fact a good parallel to destiel plotlines, and we can also find other parallels because Dean and Rose have things in common, and this is quite interesting

This took me a long time to answer and required a lot of thinking, but here goes:

Ok, reactions to new/unknown. you have to factor in context, Dean's a hunter, Rose is just having a fun time traveling with the Doctor. Rose at times shows confusion/distaste for aliens (the end of the world and the ood in impossible planet) Dean shows distaste/ an urge to fight. obviously their reactions to new things would be different because the context is MASSIVELY different. and even though Dean does often feel the urge to fight/kill "monsters" he (in the later seasons especially) is shown to have some level of empathy for them and Rose is very empathetic. Also, Dean desires a peaceful life, he doesn't want to hunt and fight. I truly believe that if he had the chance to get out of hunting he would.

It's true that Dean represses his emotions and that Rose doesn't. but she is extremely emotional, same as Dean. she's impulsive, so is Dean. she doesn't handle it well when things don't go her way, neither does Dean. while Rose isn't really controlling of people she loves, she can BE controlling and is extremely bossy a lot of the time, particularly in series 2. in tooth and claw she organizes the prisoners to get away from the "werewolf", in the impossible planet/the satan pit she leads the crew. she can also be manipulative to the people she loves, forcing the Doctor to take her to see her dad, twice, even though he told her it was a bad idea, to Micky, making him come to Cardiff in boom town.

As far as Rose not getting attached to many people where Dean does, again consider context, Rose and the Doctor are traveling all of time and space, not much opportunity to have the "found family" that Dean does. Although she does convince the Doctor to let Adam tag along, but that doesn't end well. they also "adopted" Jack. she also does care deeply for the people she comes into contact with, even though she and the Doctor don't bring them along. Dean does this many times as well, think about all the people he’s met that he was shown to care about, but didn’t see again.

There's also a lot to the relationships between Rose and the Doctor and Dean and Cas. Like Rose leaving Jackie and Micky to travel with the doctor, and the way that dean will sometimes ignore Sam to spend time with Cas (the hamburgler conversation while Sam's trying not to drink demon blood, or dean being with cas while Sam's at the church with Crowley). the fact that both pairs have an extremely intense relationship that was most definitely at least somewhat romantic, yet not explicitly stated to be so until the very end.

Also, more similarities, for fun

"I've got a G.E.D. and a give 'em hell attitude" - Dean Sympathy For The Devil

"I've got no A levels, no job, no future, but I'll tell you what I have got, Jericho Street Junior School Under 7’s gymnastics team. I got the bronze" - Rose Rose

Deans reactions to being sexulized/touched/"manhandled" by demons

"Don't think I didn't feel your hands having a quick wonder you dirty old man!" - Rose The Unquiet Dead

Dean talking about women at any given time, but mostly him talking w/ Cas about April at the bar (I don’t remember the ep but hopefully you know what I'm talking about)

Rose talking to Gwen about boys in the Unquiet Dead

Dean not leaving Purgatory/selling his soul to save Sam/risking his life every five seconds to protect the people he loves

Rose going back for the doctor in the series 1 finale/refusing to leave in the Satan Pit

Dean gets stuck in the Bad Place

Rose gets stuck in Petes world (ok these aren't things they did, but they're things that HAPPENED to them so I'm gonna say it counts)

Rose and Dean are two sides of the same coin. of course there are going to be things that they do and react to in different ways. But that doesn't change the fact that they are VERY similar characters.They’re just living very different lives.

#i'm enjoying this dean is rose discourse #dean winchester #rose tyler

[sooave]

The Problem With Wanting: 1

It’s 2026, and an old celebrity crush comes to haunt your old and cynical heart. You’re doing great at pretending you were never obsessed with him, and finding things about him that you don’t like. Until you’re repeatedly forced to work with him. Until he decides that he’s in love with you.

Genre: I really don’t know what to call this, but it’s not an AU, Kyungsoo’s older and still a celebrity, and it’s friends-to-lovers.

Characters: Kyungsoo x Reader 

Length: 2,314 words

Tags: Angst, Slow Burn 

Part 1 | Part 2

The problem with wanting, was that the human brain’s pathways are more easily activated for desire, rather than liking. In other words, humans naturally want things more than they actually like them. Obviously, you didn’t fault anyone for that. You knew that humans are all victims of the mechanisms of their biological systems.

Just like how you never blamed your own body for being frustratingly uncooperative when it was exactly a week before your period.

Just like how you didn’t fault Do Kyungsoo at all for confessing to you, and asking you to be his girlfriend. You knew that he just wanted you. Now if he actually had you, he’d certainly be disappointed. No, his brain would be disappointed.

Being single at age 30 was surprisingly easy for you, considering the fact that it practically made you a spinster in Asian society. Your parents’ one saving grace was that they immigrating to North America, and brought you in tow. When you returned to Korea as a full-fledged adult with a string of ex-boyfriends and old jobs behind you, it was increasingly apparent to you that Korean society was at times lovely, but hugely flawed.

Back home, the Korean aunties that your mother would bring home no longer gave a shit about the fact that you were, God forbid, an artist. And an unmarried and childless one to boot. Their own children had put them through a fair share of self-perceived grievances already, and while most of them were still conservative at heart, they knew that they lived in a society where their values weren’t necessarily correct. You knew that they didn’t all understand that their values were straight up incorrect. But at least you didn’t get harassed about your life choices.

Coming back to build a career in your birth country had you encountering situations that made you laugh and feel uncomfortable at the same time.

“You’re self-employed? How are you ever going to find yourself a husband?” You’d tell them that being your own boss in fact made your schedule much more flexible. And that you fill up the time with pursuits that actually improved your life, like cooking and yoga. Not shitty dates with people you couldn’t connect with.

Of course, the nosy aunties would continue heavily implying that your life’s purpose was to find a good husband, carry your bloodline, and take care of the home.

“Thirty?? You should have had two kids by now?” You would politely inform them that you weren’t interested in having children, and if you did, you’d adopt an orphan in need instead.

“There won’t be any good men left at this point! You’re in trouble now.” This one, you couldn’t really argue with. You were a firm believer that if someone was single for an extended period of time, there was a reason.

Most of the time, they were a shitty person. Other reasons? Nursing a heartbreak. Pining after someone unattainable. Obsessed with their career. Etcetera.

And you?

You didn’t have your priorities straight. But after a countless number of bad dates, bad relationship, mediocre relationships, and some okay ones, you kind of had an idea of what you didn’t want in a boyfriend. You were doing just peachy by yourself, for now at least.

Sure, maybe you’d want to find a life partner eventually. That would come naturally. You were also a firm believer in the fact that the best matches are found organically.

But surprisingly to you, one of the blind dates that you’d begrudgingly gone on 3 years ago was actually bearing some fruitful benefits. Your date was an assistant PD at one of the largest entertainment companies in Seoul. He was a decent guy, but was insistent about being the sole provider for his future wife. That obviously didn’t check out with you.

Luckily, he didn’t hold a grudge against you for cutting your third dinner date short once you learned of that particular value, and even suggested you as an artist for several show segments. Today, your expertise was blackboard art. Other days, it was digital painting, or watercolours. But they all focused on food illustrations.

Seung-woo, your ex-date, had a particularly annoying habit of talking your ear off while you were working. For some reason, he assumed that the several hours you spent slaving away with your arm raised over the chalk board was the perfect time to catch up with you and ramble on about his love life.

“And then, she started ordering the spicy chicken even though I had explicitly mentioned that I had an upset stomach! Really. The nerve of her.”

“Oh…” you hummed disinterestedly as you filled in the grey base colour of the fish that you were drawing for the background of this board. Apparently, some professional chef along with a celebrity guest were going to be in the kitchen today filming an episode on ways to cooking methods for fish in Korean cuisine. This particular series was something you’d seen before while you were living in the U.S., and while you felt that Korea was a bit slow on the uptake, at least they were doing something interesting with it. You didn’t get to see a lot of Korean traditional cooking methods on American-owned YouTube channels.

“So… we’re going on a second date tonight. What should I say?”

If you were in America, you would have already told Seung-Woo off for disrupting your work and being a total wuss. But this was Korea, and you couldn’t really afford to offend the very person who got you this job contract. Plus, gossip travelled like wildfire, and soon you’d be labelled as difficult to work with and saying bye-bye to your steady income.

You had to take a deep breath and set down your chalk, in fear of snapping it in annoyance.

“Did that tell you something?”

Seung-woo set down the kitchen prop that he was playing around with onto the counter.

“Tell me what?” He echoed.

“Did her action of ordering the spicy chicken tell you that she had an undesirable trait that you cannot accept from a partner?” Your tone was bordering on one that a disapproving teacher would take when reprimanding a student, but luckily Seung-woo didn’t catch that.

He wasn’t as taken aback by your mannerisms as he used to be, but ever since you explained that you spent all of your formative years abroad, he was able to rationalize all of your non-conservative behaviours.

Instead, he actually thought of your advice and comments as thoughtful and interesting. You always refrained from mentioning that your perspective came from years of counselling and therapy, in fear that he’d label you as psychotic. Seung-woo had no idea what mental health was.

After a round of hums and haws, he finally responds.

“You’re right, it did. Are you trying to say I shouldn’t go on the date tonight?”

“Hey, I just asked a question. You came to that conclusion your self!” You turn around and throw a dirty rag that you’ve been using into his chest.

That finally got him to leave you alone, after whining about your aggressiveness and how unladylike you were. Luckily, you still had plenty of time to finish the piece, and once the annoyance hindering your progress was gone, the flow started to come naturally to you.

Time began to fly by as it usually did when you were absorbed with your artwork. Before you knew it, it was already time for the segment filming to start. It wasn’t everyday that you timed your work perfectly, but today you hit the deadline exactly.

You knew that the filming was about to begin because of the camera lights had began to turn on, and a buzz of conversation had started to grow in the centre of the room. Sometimes it irked you that you were working right in front of a dozen cameras and microphones, but it was comforting to know that they had absolutely zero interest in filming you.

Seung-woo had unfortunately appeared again, appearing behind you like a golden retriever wagging it’s tail. You were packing up boxes chalk into your carrying case, attempting to ignore him as much as possible, but something he said caught your attention.

“Wait. What? Who?” You had absolutely no idea what he had said, except for the fact that a horribly familiar name fell from his lips.

“Do Kyungsoo. You don’t know of him?”

“No, I do…” Too well, in fact.

“Well, he’s here right now. I could get you an autograph if you wanted too. Just ask your oppa nicely!” He shot you a shit-eating grin and you almost want to strangle him amidst the absolute panic you were experiencing.

You weren’t experiencing a real panic attack, thankfully. But the way your hands were shaking as you placed each piece of chalk back into it’s designated slotted groove gave away that you were one-hundred-percent losing your mind. As your heart raced in your chest, you did a mental checklist of the facts that faced you right now.

You were, or you used to be, absolutely obsessed with Do Kyungsoo as a celebrity. This was back in your late teens, when you were a freshman at college.

You had not thought about him, or even looked up his name, in almost 5 years. Real life got in the way. And your cynicism.

And he was right here.

In this very room.

Suddenly, your brain was kicked into hyper-awareness mode, and it was almost impossible to resist the urge to finger comb your hair and smooth out your clothes. Fuck. You weren’t even wearing a cute outfit. Today had been a boyfriend jeans and black t-shirt day for you.

Seung-woo was still standing in front of you, looking at you expectantly, and you reminded yourself that you had to actually respond.

“Er… no. I’m good, Seung-woo,” you rolled your eyes at him, “What makes you think that I’d want an autograph? You do remember that I’m an old hag right?”

He noticed that you were having difficulty stuffing your chalk boxes back into your bag, and leans down to help you.

“Who said that you can’t have celebrity crushes at age 30? I wouldn’t shame you for that. Plus, you’re still single…” Seung-woo waggled his eyebrows.

“Oh my lord,” You mutter in English to yourself, before switching to Korean.

“Idols are for the young or the delusional. Plus, they’re just regular ol’ people just like me. You take anyone with a bit of talent and a decent face and I’m sure they could pass as an idol.” This is a mantra you’ve repeated to yourself almost a million times, and it rolls off your tongue.

“God, you’re always so cynical…ah!” Seung-woo stands up to greet someone and leaves you struggling with your bag on the floor.

“No, I’m just old,” you said to yourself as you right yourself.

And then you come face to face with a profile that you’ve started at on your phone screen, your computer monitor, and even billboards, umpteenth times. It’s closer now, way closer. You saw the slight smile lines on his cheeks, and the unevenness of his skin that hasn’t been photoshopped out. But his strong eyebrows and heart-shaped smile were the same. And his eyes.

Kyungsoo was shaking hands with Seung-woo and another PD, but his eyes flickered to you briefly as you got to your feet. And then they’re gone. Like they didn’t see you at all.

You took a deep breath and reminded yourself that he’s just another person. He probably leaves his phone ringer on. That’s something that annoys you. Annoyance. It’s your weapon against anything you’re scared of. But it’s also grounding you in this insane moment.

Reminder, you’re staff. He’s the star of the show.

“Ah! This is our chalk artist, she made the board behind us,” Seung-woo declared proudly and grabbed your arm to pull you back, just as you were preparing to sneak away from the awkward circle of personnel. You’ve never cursed so strongly in your own mind before, and a string of fuckshitfuckshitfuck was still going through your mind as you gave a tight smile and bowed. All while avoiding eye contact.

You saw Kyungsoo and a few others glance at your work and you couldn’t help but cringe. God help you, you had confidence in your work, but were you completely unprepared for your teenage/young adult celebrity crush to judge you. They politely express amazement at the board, and you robotically thank them.

Seung-woo continued to discuss some detail about the segment and you took the opportunity to duck away and escape with your bag, not even taking a second look back. You were tempted of course, as you left through the studio doors. You could even stay to watch the entire filming, and no one would object. They knew who you were.

But there was no way you would be able to not fall back into your stupid crush that you still had, if you were able to just stand and watch him cook for an hour and a half. You were too old for this.

You gritted your teeth as you got in your car, placed your duffel on the passenger seat, and buckled your seatbelt.

Today, you would be an adult and do the right thing.

Tomorrow, you’d give dating apps another go.

But right now, you imagined another universe, where he was a regular person, and so were you. Then, you could allow yourself to fall in love. You closed your eyes and leaned your head onto the cold glass of the window and allowed yourself to fantasize.

A/N: I’m totally throwing this into the void and doing this for myself but part two is coming.

#exo #exo fic #kyungsoo fic #kyungsoo #exo fanfiction #kyungsoo x reader #kyungsoo angst #kyungsoo fanfiction #do kyungsoo #exo scenario #exo scenarios

[snackerdoodle]

(via https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7vTyjuuslUqiHauSgsmbuQ?si=WJHuwxgiQ422gub_5ZEC5w)

I got a little obsessed with the idea of creating a Lyctor Love Songs playlist for The Locked Tomb. I’ve finally finished fussing with it and wanted to share! You can read a breakdown of my rationale for these songs below the cut because I always wish other people would do this for their playlists, and now it’s time to put my money* where my mouth is.

This playlist is conceptually a definite spoiler for the process of achieving lyctorhood as revealed at the end of Gideon the Ninth, so proceed with caution if you haven’t finished that book yet. I also made this after reading Harrow the Ninth, but I’ve tried to censor (or at least be vague) in my references to spoilers for that book.

Possibly obvious content warnings for murder, suicide, toxic relationships, and cannibalism mentions—stuff you’d kind of expect from this series, honestly. I’m adding an additional content warning for the lyrics of We Both Go Down Together by the Decemberists including implied rape, which is not in line with the content warnings you might expect for these books. 

*obsessive energy

Umbrella - Rihanna

This is a much more wholesome song than the rest, but I really wanted to include it for "When the sun shines, we'll shine together, told you I'll be here forever, said I'll always be your friend, took an oath, I'ma stick it out til the end," and "You're a part of my entity, here for infinity." It has a bit of a “one flesh, one end” feeling to it. 

#1 Crush - Garbage

This song is creepy, obsessive, and uses some upsetting violent imagery, which is exactly the mood I’m after here. I really like the idea of being haunted by the other person—”See your face every place that I walk in, hear your voice every time that I’m talking.” I also like the implications of seeking power—”Throw away all the pain that I’m living [...] and I could never be ignored.” The line about selling their soul doesn’t hurt this song’s case either. 

Drain You - Nirvana

This feels like a pretty easy connection to syphoning for me, and for this context the gorey, semi-medical imagery is spot on. Also how could I resist “with eyes so dilated I’ve become your pupil,” when there is just so much eye-related lyctor baggage in this series?

Animals - Maroon 5

Here comes the cannibalism. There are so many cannibal songs. I also included this one for the language about absorbing the other person and not being able to escape each other.

I Will Possess Your Heart - Death Cab for Cutie

Here for creepy possessiveness, pure and simple. Also, “I wish you could see the potential, the potential of you and me”—the potential for achieving ultimate necromantic power? Maybe!

Banks of the Ohio - Dolly Parton

When I first had the idea for a “Lyctor Love Songs” playlist, it was just going to be a bunch of murder ballads, but expanding my criteria turned out to be more fun. I really love the way Dolly Parton sings this traditional American murder ballad. This one gets to represent the traditional songs on this playlist because of its river imagery and because I think lines like “she cried my love don’t murder me, ‘cause I’m not prepared for eternity” play well with the lyctor concept. It also makes me ridiculously happy to include a 19th century song on a playlist for a distant future sci-fi setting. We’re all lucky I’m not making a playlist of the oldest extant folk songs I can find for the archives on the Sixth.

Phenom - Thao & the Get Down Stay Down

More cannibalism imagery, yes thank you. Anatomical imagery? Yes, thank you. “Scorched earth”? Sure, I’ll just take that for my distantly post-apocalyptic playlist, thank you. I also like the narrative in this song around rising to power. “First of the secondary class” plays well for me with our spoilery knowledge about the nature of lyctorhood in relation to the powers of the Emperor. 

Under My Skin - Jukebox the Ghost

I’d never heard this song before I started working on putting this playlist together, and a friend suggested it in our group chat. It’s completely perfect, and in my opinion, a total bop. “I can fit two people under my skin […] crawl up in there and join me within. I can feel your heart beating under my skin,” etc, etc. 

Two of Hearts - Stacey Q

Same vein as the one before! I also think there’s room here for intentionally misreading “I got this feeling that you're going to stay, I never knew that it could happen this way, Before I met you I was falling apart, But now at last I really know we're made of two hearts that can beat as one…” with lyctoral intent—the narrator is in a stronger position now that they’re entwined with the other person.

Tears of Pearls - Savage Garden

So this song is here in part because my high school friends and I once accidentally listened to this Savage Garden CD on repeat at a sleepover for like 5 hours straight, so I love taking the opportunity to break out this song in particular. That aside, I think the toxic relationship structure described here plays well with the lyctors, especially as we see them in Harrow. I particularly like this part near the end: “We twist and turn where angels burn, Like fallen soldiers we will learn, Once forgotten, twice removed, Love will be the death, The death of you.” I would love to include some religious imagery on this playlist, thank you Savage Garden. Also, as we see in Harrow, the older Lyctors sure do handle their emotions...poorly. 

I’m Sorry - Margaret Cho

An excellent murder ballad! “I’m sorry I killed you dear, I only wanted you to be near,” and “And I sincerely apologize, My actions were unwise, And now I realize that it killed me when you died,” and “My pride was stronger than your will to live.” 

We Both Go Down Together - The Decemberists

Another murder ballad, and even within the murder ballad genre, I think this one is exceptionally creepy. Especially with the murder-suicide implications, I think “we both go down together” works well with the creepiestreading of “one flesh one end.” 

Arms Tonite - Mother Mother

Another absolute bop suggested by a friend in my Locked Tomb group chat. I love the imagery, and I think it works exceptionally well for the lyctoral concept—”That I died right inside your arms tonight, That I'm fine even after I have died, That I try to escape the afterlife, That I try to get back in your arms alive.”

Genghis Khan - Miike Snow

Another super possessive song. I know it isn’t really explicit to cannon, but between this and Banks of the Ohio, I really like taking the literally all-consuming lyctoral process as a weird extension of the possessive “I don’t want you to get it on with nobody else but me” energy in this song and some of the others. Please also accept for consideration these lines—“'Cause I don't really want you, girl, But you can't be free, 'Cause I'm selfish, I'm obscene.” That has been part of the fun of this playlist for me—while I think some songs track for some characters more than others, I’m really having more fun with playing with the idea of someone who would intentionally murder and absorb someone they love in exchange for power. 

The Beast - Concrete Blonde

Another creepy, somewhat cannibalistic song. “Love is the leech, sucking you up, Love is a vampire, drunk on your blood, Love is the beast that will, Tear out your heart, Hungrily lick it and, Painfully pick it apart.” Cannibalism and that idea of draining someone of their power is a great combo. 

Savages - Marina

I love Marina, which is probably the only reason I’m not bowing to the fact that it bothers me that this isn’t even arguably a love song. We see in Harrow how vicious the old lyctors are, and  how their dinner parties feel like a thin veneer of civility over some truly rotten cores (I say this as a person who genuinely loved Mercymorn, but like… they’re terrible). Also, how am I supposed to resist “Is it a human trait, or is it learned behavior, Are you killing for yourself, or killing for your savior?” and “I’m not afraid of God, I am afraid of man.” More religious imagery? in my locked tomb playlist? It’s more likely than you think.

Cannibal - Kesha

More cannibalism! I love how vicious this song is, for this purpose. I also feel like “I have a heart, I swear I do, But just not baby when it comes to you,” works well, even if I’m not sure I can 100% justify it. 

Bring Me to Life - Evanescence

An explicitly canonical choice. “Now that I know what I'm without, you can't just leave me, breathe into me and make me real” and “Save me from the nothing I've become.” Because I’m an absolute turd, I love the semi-joke I’m finding in many of these song lyrics about the partner being unable to leave. Also because I’m terrible, I really like that this song can be read as regret over having become a lyctor in the first place. 

Monster - Lady Gaga

Cannibalism again, and I like that there’s some eye stuff in here. 

Cellophane - Sia

I like the anatomical imagery, with veins and blood and brains and all that. I also like “Patience is your virtue, saint o' mine” for a little call out to one of our extant lyctors. 

Most of All - Fuel

Like “Bring Me to Life,” I really like the regret and self loathing in this one. I also like the mentions of memories because [redacted]. “And I hate you now, And I miss you most of all, All those times we laughed, The scars that you left.” 

‘39 - Queen

First of all, I really like this song. I don’t think I should quite call it a bop like some of the others—maybe a jam? A song that’s explicitly about leaving Earth behind for deep-space exploration and the passage of time works wonderfully well for this sci-fi series about a society that has abandoned a dying(?) Earth and that is populated with a group of very damaged people staring down the barrel of a traumatic immortality. I also like that there’s a bit of eye imagery in the song. I especially like “For my life still ahead, pity me” as a cutting line for a lyctor. 

#the locked tomb #locked tomb #gideon the ninth #harrow the ninth #snackerdoodle actually makes a post #enjoy!

[ziracona]

The tendency in fandom to take every white girl with short hair, regardless of the status of their canonical interest or lack of interest in women and explicit interest and/or sexual history with everything but, proclaim them a lesbian queen, and then ignore or absolve them of every single horrific act they take in fiction because of this. Is not doing feminism. Women. Lesbians. Or anyone. Any favors. It’s just bad.

Somehow. Some people really do apparently need to hear that...being any specific sexuality...is not a personality trait.

And also. Women aren’t inherantly less vile than men (or anyone non-binary, agender, fluid, etc, else), and whatever bad deeds they do should be judged based on just that—on the deeds, and their context. Not their sexuality, imagined sexuality, or their gender. Becuase none of those things effect whether committing murder is bad. At all. Not even a little. And none of them. Is even a personality trait. Affecting the character’s value as a person.

It’s cool, and good, to see characters with minority identities. And it’s real nice. When it’s whatever you are. But them being whatever. Is not a personality trait. Just a fact. And sometimes. People of any type. Are not good. Pretending any minority status—gender, sexuality, race, disability, neurotype, etc—is a get out of jail free card? Is not. Doing them. Or anyone. Any favors. Personality disorder. Doesn’t make you bad. Also doesn’t make you good. Your actions do. Acting like Amy from Gone Girl did nothing wrong when she date rapes her boyfriend & then frames him for doing that to her & ruins his life, then blackmails her husband who is terrified of being murdered by her into staying with her for the sake of the child she made at a fertility clinic with his sperm without his consent, bc she’s a woman. Isn’t good. Men aren’t more deserving of violence than women. Neither is anyone else. Jane. Left an infant child in an unheated car in subzero weather in a snow storm with zombies around that easily would hear it cry and go eat it. So she could lie and say she already let zombies eat it to bait a man with easily triggerable PTSD who had just lost his family to zombies for the second time into starting a fight. Because he was injured, unarmed, weak, down an eye, and 50, while she was fit, mid 20s, healthy, and armed with a hunting knife. Because she wanted an excuse to kill him without looking bad, because she wanted the 11 year old girl she was co-parenting with him, all to herself. And her immediately responding to the dude throwing a punch by stabbing him in the stomach to escalate the fight from brawl to life or death, then losing her knife, and instead of telling him the baby was alive & she’d made it up to start a fight which could have at any point ended the fight, begging the 11 year old child to gun down her oldest surviving friend with her own hands in cold blood so that she’d get what she wanted? Is evil. As is crying on the 11 year old and using pity as a weapon to get her to stay with her if she gets mad and wants to leave when she realizes Jane staged the whole thing for an excuse to murder, and so is after realizing like a month later that she is pregnant, committing suicide, and leaving the 11 year old that she just manipulated into killing her oldest surviving friend/completely isolated on purpose so she could have her to herself, totally alone in the apocalypse to care for an infant. Jennifer’s Body? Is a fantastic film. And Jennifer didn’t deserve any of what happened to her. But not one single boy she kills during the course of that film deserved it—and explicitly so. Even the guy who could easily have been a meathead jock bully is outside alone crying becuase his best friend just died and he loved him before she decides to lure him off and eat him alive. And acting like it’s totally fine & Needy should have just let her keep eating boys instead of killing her? Is fucked up. None of them deserved to die. And no one deserves death innately more because they are or are not something that is just a factual designator of their makeup as a human. The exchange student was scared and alone and nice, the catholic kid was sweet and Needy’s friend, Chip is a bad boyfriend but he meant well and being stupid doesn’t mean you deserve to die. And this girl ate them alive. That’s not funny. Or cool. Or fine becuase they were dudes. Gertrude Robinson? Chose again and again to betray people who loved her, or trusted her—sold out victims of awful trauma to their worst nightmares. Killed friends in the worst possible ways, like it was nothing. Michael loved her, and trusted her, and tried to care for her, and she without faltering fed him to his worst nightmare and forced him to become it. There is nothing excusable about that action.

Jude Perry? Has 0 redeeming features. Didn’t even stay faithful to her poor gf & was creepy obsessed w Agnes. Literally murdered her co-worker friend just because he was happy, and she wanted to destroy things: that’s it. She didn’t even dislike him. Murdered him because he had a wife and kid and house and it seemed fun, then burned down his house, took his wife’s money, and now checks in on his kid every so often in case he ever recovers from the trauma she inflicted enough to be fun to kill. There is literally nothing good about this woman. Yes. I mean that. Because being a lesbian? Is just a thing. There is no g/b tag, there is no tag at all. Amanda Young? Got kidnapped and tortured and forced to choose between killing a man who couldn’t resist but was conscious to watch her, and letting herself die, and she killed him. Then, instead of responding to that trauma with guilt or responsibility or anger at her captor, joined up with him and started helping him kidnap people just like her. She was not forced, she was not lied to. It does not matter if John was manipulative; she is a grown ass woman and like all grown ass adults, responsible for her own actions and choices. She did not get manipulated pitifully into this—she did not go unwillingly. She volunteered, with a happy vengeance, became obsessed with John and in love with him, despite his complete lack of interest. And she did not even just do what he did. She decided on her own that no one deserved redemption, & she killed them for fun in traps that wouldn’t let them go even if they did whatever awful thing the trap demanded as a price for life, just for the fun and power trip of watching them die helpless & in agony. That was all her, & her alone. She sat in a house full of people slowly dying from organ decomposition over the course of a few hours, for no crime worse than drug addiction—the thing she of all people should have been most sympathetic to—knowing full well at any time she could have saved them and stopped the game, and did nothing. She held a woman in her arms and stroked her head lovingly while she let her die in one of the most inhumane ways possible for the crime of having not been able to break an addition. She got saved by a 16 year old child multiple times, who had done nothing more than shoplift, and stood by while he had to watch a man get his brains blown out, another burn to death in an oven. As his organs slowly dissolved too. Watched the kid kill another human being & massively traumatize himself to save her life. And responded to that by attacking & knocking him out, tying him up, locking him up for days in a tiny safe bound and gagged with an oxygen supply to keep him alive, to be a piece in another game. Left his father, who had shown up to try & save him, to starve to death in chains in a horrible abandoned rotting room, & never even told him his son was alive. Let every other addict die horribly, let that kid sustain permanent damage to his organs that will kill him young, antidote taken or not, took his dad from him, & went back to torturing without a second thought. Kidnapped a woman whose worst crime was being a doctor & dating someone while maybe separated instead of divorced from her husband, put her in a trap that would take her head off with shotgun blasts, threatened her for fun, & then killed her even after she did everything she was asked, because it was more important to her that the old man she was obsessed with think she was special and great, than for the other woman to get to stay alive another day & go home to her daughter. There is nothing sympathetic about Amanda. She’s just not only evil, but too spineless to take responsibility for her own choices & actions, & tries to hide behind a “UwU I am sad & lonely & damaged & having trauma means I can literally torture people to death to feel special & it’s really tragic and sympathetic about me, not evil. Uhm. Some people??? Commit torture-murders?? To cope??” And acting like she’s somehow a victim in this becuase she is a pretty white girl with short hair? Is fucked. Up.

But every. God damn. Time. I see this. Please. It needs. To stop. People go: “UwU pretty girl short hair want” & I go “Ok. I see where u. Come from. Indeed.” But then. They go. “Girl pretty I like. So she was blameless. For this atrocity.” Those words...

Every day. I wake up. Thinking of Janic saying. Iconically. “At least me and Regina George know we’re mean,” and I weep inside. Because I cannot fathom. Or stomach. The lack of responsibility. I will kill. Characters who cannot admit they are bad. Myself. But somehow. They become. Flames. To moths. Of the “UwU pretty white girl short hair. We stan. Victim. Queen. Love her. Never done wrong.” Boy. We all done wrong. Even all my faves. At least once. I think. ...not if we count dogs probably, but people, yes. Ok. Anyway. All this is to say. Characters. Should be judged. Based on what they did. And why. And the aftermath. Not a grouping tag. I don’t mean any of these. Make bad characters. At all. Amy is a great character. So is Jennifer. So are most of them. I have quite affection even. For Jeneffer specifically. But you can like. Character. Without proclaiming. Them perfect humans. Who never did a thing wrong. Or their acts somehow. Justifiable. And ok. And you better stop saying. Ok. Because done. To men. Men do not. Deserve violence. Any more. Than anyone else. No one deserves violence defacto for factors. Outside their control. Wtf. Really people. It’s ok too. For character. To do much bad stuff. And still like character. Villains. And often just complex characters. Sometimes just characters. Do stuff. That is bad. It’s not supposed to be not their fault. Or ok. Also. Women are not a sisterhood. Of flawless beings. Who never hurt anyone or do any bad stuff. They can. And are. Often purpotrators. Of awful acts. And when they are. It is still. Very bad. Still. An awful act. Same level. Even. Of awful. Wild.

In conclusion.

Having short hair. While a girl. Doesn’t make her a butch queen. Who is absolved of all responsibility for that murder she committed. It just makes her a girl with short hair. That did a murder. I’m gonna. Kill someone. Too. And if I chop my hair off. I guess I can get away with it.

#personal #*dances wildly to abba music while delivering speech* #some of you all apparently really need a girl to come fuck up your life bc the lengths to which some of y’all so devotedly seem to believe #women are less evil is astronomical. and let me tell you. from personal experience? a girl can ruin your life. just as easily. and with as #little pity. guilt. remorse. or afterthought. as a man. and it aint any more ok. & you know what? so can a fluid person. or a nonbinary #person. legit anyone. can be bad. or good. and do bad. or good. theyre not defacto worse for coming from X starting point. and theyre also. #OuO not. better. #not everyone who likes or is sympathetic to these specific characters even be like that either like u know what? its possible to both be #sypathetic to a character & not excuse & atand their actions. I like & feel bad for Jennifer. a lot. one of my bros in college loved Jane #from twdg. Not bc she thought it was totally fine she’d been super evil though. its *dances* not that hard actually #also nothin against lovin evil lady characters or evil characters in general. just me or anyone else loving them does nothing to make their #evil deeds suddely ok or vanish into the mist #people have some real trouble w nuance huh. folks like a character & assume that means stanning everything theyve ever done. hate a charactr #and suddenly forget how to factor any outside factors into their view of said person’s actions. its a wild bad ride yo #like i get it. im a girl & ive had plenty of men ruin my life i truly get it. but is there anything truly more detrimental to feminism & to #just treating people decent in general than the WomenDoNoWrong mindset & apologism thrown up like its actually a decent counter t patriarchy #? probably actually yeah im sure there are worse. but its still REALLY not good!! feminism is just a stance that all people deserve equal #treatment & an investment in pursuing that reality. if youre excusing people of horrible actions bc girl & treating violence against non- #women as fine youre not a feminist u actually just suck generally as a person #i also lose my mind how half the characters i see get this treatment aint even lesbians & often explicitly like men yet get both assigned #that & treated like that sexuality is a hall pass for human rights violations. im dyin #this entire thought rant was prompted by reading a post earlier today about bi-phobia & gettin mad about how bi people get treated idk how #spagheti brain exactly went there to here so /fast/ but anyway. same brand of problematic. & i am v tired :] of this :] specifically :] #every time i see that post abt women killers in horror i am like ‘OP hiw are your points so good but all your examples so /terrible/.’ rip #i guess this is just life. and i feel excessively better after screaming jnto the void of my blog #also i get it gertrude robinson wanted to stop the apocalypse but fuck gertrude robinson she has no excuse. nothing could justify what she #did to people who loved her. and shes a well written and layered character whonisnt like just pure evil but she is VERY bad and i WILL kill #her (again) myself if given the chance & i have every right to. #spoilers #again. great charcters. amanda an iconic saw villain. gertrude fascinating. etc. but also. they be doing mad evil deeds & tis not ok

[d-n-battle]

You know... it’s not so much that I hate Naruhina and Sasusaku...

It’s more like I just really don’t get how anyone can really like these pairings?? Like I really just don’t understand the appeal???

Like did I really watch the same series as all you Naruhina and Sasusaku shippers????

Y’all: aaawww look at all of these Naruto and Hinata scenes, he clearly loves her sooo much <3 <3 <3🥰😍😌

Me: bitch where????😂😂😂

(Literally, I could make the exact same joke about Sasusaku)

Like, is it just me, or are these two ships literally just about the girls’ feelings???

I mean I’d be totally fine with these two couples, if they didn’t put this emphasis on the girls, and completely ignore the guys...

I mean ok - serious time now - can the Sasusaku shippers and Naruhina shippers show me any evidence from the anime (or manga if you’re a reader) of Naruto and Sasuke returning Hinata and Sakura’s feelings respectively???

Again, I want to reiterate that this is a genuine request, I’m not trying to poke fun with this one. I’m just genuinely curious as to what you guys can dig up. (But also, side note - please refrain from using the films or Boruto as I haven’t watched them yet. I honestly don’t think I’m even gonna watch Boruto, cause I’m not a big fan of like spin off series, so yeah...But anything from the 720 anime episodes, or any of the manga chapters is fine.)

Anyway, back to my point.

Relationships are about two or more people coming together because they recognise that they have romantic feelings towards each other.

Which is exactly why I, like I’ve said already, don’t understand how Naruhina and Sasusaku are supposed to work???

Like yeah, Sakura and Hinata both like/love Sasuke and Naruto.

But when have Sasuka and Naruto expressed that they like them back in that way???

I mean as a whole the show was never even about romance, sure there were hints at possible relationships throughout, but that was never the point of the show.

I mean I feel like this all harkens back to some points I’ve already seen made by other people, but like why is romance necessary in this situation???

.....siiiiiigh.....😒

Because what else are female characters for??? If not to fawn over the male character then really what are they for??? I mean it’s not like they’re meant to represent real life people just like the male characters right??? It’s not like they’re meant to actually have well fleshed out characters with goals that don’t revolve around getting the guy of their dreams to notice them right??? Nooo, of course not, don’t be ridiculous....

I am seriously just soooo done with this bullshit. Like I’ll be the first to admit that Hinata and Sakura are not my favourite characters, but I mean it’s not like that’s really their fault now is it??? I mean they honestly both had a lot of potential. Like, seriously, soooooo much potential. I’m being completely honest here, I was well and truly so disappointed by how these two girls’ character potential was squandered 😔😔😔

And all for the sake of fullfilling their ‘true’ purpose in the show....

And don’t even try to give me the excuse that because Naruto is a shounen anime aimed at a primarily male audience, female characters can’t be feutured as anything besides the love interst. Like what kind of shit is that - so guys can’t even enjoy female characters unless they’re lusting after the male characters they like to insert themselves into???? I mean if you really think that then you must really hate guys.

Like I’m sorry but that just makes men sound like shit. It makes them sound like they only view women as people who belong to them, and are only relevant when it comes to how they are connected to men.

Women are their own goddamm people!!! They don’t exist solely to appease men!!!

As I woman, I have had to put up with this shit for years, and I am so done with it. If guys get to have characters that represent them in almost every piece of media out there, then why don’t women get to have the same treatment??? We make up a whole half of the entire goddamn population!!!

Honeslty, a bitch is soooooo mad about this 😡😡😡(thag bitch being me of course)

And what I’m also super mad about is that these two relationships imply that the guys feelings are completely irrelevant. Like I’m sorry but no amount of Sakura liking/loving Sasuke makes it okay for her to end up with him - if he doesn’t feel anywhere near the same amount of love or appreciation for her. And the same can be applied to Hinata and Naruto.

This outcome also forces everyone to just completely ignore/forget the fact that Naruto and Sasuke are completely unready to be in a relationship with anyone.

Like, yeah I’m gonna admit here that I am indeed a Narusasu shipper, but I’ll also admit that I dead ass don’t think they’d even be ready for a relationship with each other.

I mean the war and everything else just completely messed them both up, so they would both probably need some time to heal. And knowing those two, it would most likely take quite a while before they’re anywhere near healed enough to date - let alone fucking marry - anyone.

And, also (so that I’m not accused of favouritism towards the boys) - what about Sakura and Himata and the shit that they themselves experienced??? I mean Hinata had to watch her cousin die in front of her - that’s gotta mess you up. And Sakura was a medic - there’s no imagining the shit she must have seen.

War messes people up for a long time, and bassed off of what I’ve heard of Boruto - the timeline implies that these two couples got married and had kids pretty soon after the war.

That. Does. Not. Add. Up. Sis!!!!!

Honestly, the series should have just had what I like to call an ‘open ending’. This is where pretty much everything is left (you guessed it) out in the open. By everything I mean like the final relationships and stuff like the minutiae of the story. Unless, your story is a romance story in which case the romance is the most important thing, but as we’ve established- this is not the case with Naruto.

If you don’t explicitly state that characters X and Y are married with 2.5 kids, everyone who would dislike that as an outcome is free to think that they didn’t.

Like seriously, the whole point of using the line “and they lived happily ever after”, is so that you can leave the ending open to the interpretation of the audience. That’s why I’ve never liked being told how they lived happily ever after.

Because, ultimately everyone has different ideas of what happy looks like.

Some people want to get married because that’s what would make them happy, and for some marriage would achieve the opposite. It’s the same case with having children. Or what job you wanna have.

I mean really, there is soooo many different ideas of what happy looks like.

So why limit yourself and more importantly your audience/readers????

I mean think about it like this. The purpose of a main character is basically to give us a point of view of the story through which we can be influenced. That’s why a lot of the time they don’t really have distinct personality traits - so that the reader can project their own onto them. That way the reader/audience member is able to immerse themselves in the story. We are allowed to image that the main character is us. That’s why we get angry when they do something we don’t like, our first thought is - “well, I wouldn’t have done that...”. So image how disconnected you would feel, from a character who makes a big decision that you don’t agree with. Like say, getting married, when you yourself can’t imagine yourself getting married??? Or say, getting married to someone who you yourself wouldn’t want to get married to???

I think that’s the real issues in case of Naruhina and Sasusake. The majority of us - who are clearly of sound minds - would not want to marry Hinata, Sakura, or even Naruto and Sasuke. Most likely because their characters often times feel like caricatures of people, instead of real life people. They feel somehow unfinished, and so we have a harder time seing the bigger picture, and how these big decisions they have made are supposed to make sense.

Okay, I feel like I’ve rambled enough. I leave you with this -

I don’t mean to offend anyone with this post, and so I hope I haven’t/didn’t/won’t. I’m truly just stating my opinion here. If you don’t agree with anything I’ve said here, please do let me know; I’ll always appreciate constructive criticism.

I will always love Naruto. But in order to truly love something you have to also recognise it as flawed. And this was simply me pointing out some of the things which I perceive as flaws of the show/manga.

Please, don’t think of this post, or any others which I might make in the future, as hate posts. As I’ve said, I do love the show/manga - but that doesn’t make me unwilling to crique it.

Alrighty, this is where I actually end the rant.

Thanks for coming y’all,

Love,

Danny

#boy this took a while #almost as long as it’s taking me to re-watch Naruto #this really isn’t an anti post #please dont hate me #sasusaku #naruhina #sasunarusasu #I really do love this show ya know???

[dogbearinggifts]

Protect Vanya. Stop Pretending She’s Innocent.

Because she’s not. 

She’s not innocent. She’s not a sad woobie who is buffeted about by larger and larger acts of cruelty until she inevitably snaps. She’s not the only blameless victim in a family of monsters. 

She is a victim, make no mistake. Robbed of her powers, excluded from family life by her father, ignored by her siblings—terrible things were done to her, and she neither deserved them nor brought them on herself.

But she most certainly is not blameless. 

It’s common to want to downplay or ignore the flaws of a character you identify with, and Vanya is nothing if not identifiable. Who hasn’t been left out of the group? Who hasn't felt like their voice was muted, their story ignored? Her story resonates with fans, and so it makes sense that they would want to defend her. It makes sense that they would want to ignore her flaws, focus on the moments when she’s victimized and not when she victimizes others. But do you know who suffers the most when we pretend she’s completely innocent of any wrongdoing? 

Vanya. 

Pretending She’s Innocent Disregards Her Agency 

Vanya has agency, and she uses it. She makes her own choices. The results of these choices wind up pushing her further and further away from her siblings and closer to her future as the White Violin, but that does not make the choices any less hers. 

Again, not everything that happens to her is her fault, but it’s important to acknowledge that the choices her siblings make regarding how they treat her do not come out of the ether. Allison chooses to ream her out for trying to sympathize with her painful divorce and custody battle; but because she brings up Vanya’s book in her lecture, it’s safe to assume that her anger is in part a result of the things Vanya wrote. Her siblings choose to hold a meeting without her, but Vanya was the one who chose to stay at an address where she could not be reached by phone rather than at the Academy or even her apartment. Allison chooses to try and Rumor her, but this is in direct response to Vanya’s threats and screaming rage that left her with no other defense. 

Luther chooses to choke her unconscious and lock her in an anechoic chamber, but he would not have done this if Vanya had not allowed herself to lose control of her anger and nearly kill her own sister, making herself appear to be an immediate threat to everyone currently under that roof. 

I’m not trying to downplay the awfulness of her siblings’ actions toward her. I am simply pointing out that Vanya’s behavior toward her siblings is no less deplorable, and part of the cycle in which she suffers. She had a choice in all of those situations I mentioned. She didn’t have to write her autobiography. She didn’t have to jump to conclusions upon seeing her siblings gathered without her, or upon hearing Allison’s confession. Vanya made perhaps the worst choice possible in all of those situations, but you can’t deny she had a choice simply because the result makes her look selfish. 

Pretending She’s Innocent Downplays Her Trauma

I know that seems counterintuitive. Current trends in trauma talk tend to make victimhood an either/or: either you are a victim, or you are a perpetrator. This is ridiculously simplistic and so wrong I could spend quite a few words explaining how, but I’ll sum up my rebuttal instead: 

Hurting people hurt people. 

I’ve seen this notion called by many names. The chain of pain. The cycle of abuse. Generational curses. Generational sin. (I grew up in a very religious household.) Call it whatever you like, but the principle remains the same. People who are hurt by others make self-centered choices to protect themselves from being hurt in the same way again; these choices hurt others in new ways, who go on to hurt others, and so on and so forth until someone breaks the cycle. 

Vanya was hurt as a child. There’s no way around it. She was deeply hurt, and excluded, and treated as if she was unwanted. Being told by her parent that she was ordinary, being forbidden from taking part in the family photos, hearing from her parent that he doesn’t think her existence is even worth mentioning—all of that is damaging and it’s no wonder Vanya has such deep scars. 

But not all of these scars can be romanticized. It’s easy to feel sympathy for a lost little girl who plays her violin while her siblings learn to be heroes; it’s far more difficult to muster up the same pity for a young woman who flies into a screaming rage because she refused to believe the truth of her sister’s soul-searching confession. It’s easy to cheer for a wounded woman as she finds the courage to tell her story; not so much when we learn that this act of empowerment harmed six people who neither asked nor wanted to be written about. 

Vanya is selfish. She is bitter, she is vindictive, she jumps to conclusions and she lacks empathy. All of these traits are a direct result of the trauma she suffered. She is selfish because she felt as if she got far less than her siblings as she grew up, and now she feels she must cling to the things she wants before they are taken away. She is bitter because she felt she had to watch her siblings be spoiled while she suffered; she is vindictive because she felt she had to sit and take whatever ill treatment she was given and now she is overcompensating. She jumps to conclusions because she didn’t know her siblings all that well, and so the only means she had to explain their behavior was to construct narratives in her head; and she lacks empathy because being excluded from and presented with a distorted picture of family life gave her few reasons or opportunities to practice empathy. None of these personality traits are attractive, but none of them would exist without her trauma. 

Ignoring these traits might make Vanya look better, true, but it also denies some of the most insidious effects of a childhood spent on the outskirts of her own family. 

Pretending She’s Innocent Lessens Her Importance to the Story

A common refrain in this fandom is that Vanya went on a rampage because she lost control of her powers. Every negative action she committed using her powers, every thing she did that harmed someone, is chalked up to a lack of control over the powers she just recently discovered. And she did lose control—but not of her powers. 

When I vented to a friend of mine, they said that “Vanya lacks control over her powers the same way somebody with anger issues lacks control over their fists.” Her powers aren’t the problem. They’re an extension of her emotions, and that is what she lacks control over. Watch her during her rampage. She actually exhibits very fine control over her powers—fine enough to flip a car that honked at her, fine enough to kill Pogo in a very gruesome way. She also has control over when those powers activate; if she lacked control of those powers, she would have instantly shredded Pogo the moment she saw him, rather than being able to wait until after she’d bullied him into a confession. 

When Vanya’s rampage, and the resulting apocalypse, are made into a result of powers she can’t control, those powers become more important than Vanya herself. Her choices no longer matter if her powers are in control. Her trauma, her background, her motivations—none of those matter. She is simply a vehicle for her powers. She is innocent of wrongdoing, but she is no longer important to the story. 

Vanya makes choices, as I’ve demonstrated. They’re awful choices, but they drive the story and influence what her siblings do. However, the corners of the fandom that wish to absolve Vanya of all blame portray these choices not as decisions on her part, but as inevitable reactions to negative stimuli. Of course she flew into a screaming rage when Allison confessed to Rumoring her; it’s not like she could have taken a deep breath and asked a few more questions. Of course she destroyed the Academy; it’s not like she could have simply broken out of her prison and moved on with her life. None of those were choices. None of those were Vanya. Those were simply results of what others did to her. She doesn’t matter; only her powers drive the story. 

When we acknowledge that Vanya’s harmful and self-destructive actions were the results of choices she made, Vanya becomes a character. She becomes a fully realized person with motivations and flaws, virtues and vices, whose decisions drive the story to a tragic conclusion. She is integral to a story that would not exist without her to drive it. 

When we pretend that her harmful and self-destructive actions were inevitable reactions to negative stimuli—or worse: her powers taking control of her—Vanya becomes little more than a MacGuffin. She is no longer a character; she is a walking plot device that will end the world if handled improperly. She is no longer vital to the story; her powers are the important thing. At this point, we might as well replace her with a nuke or an unusually volatile houseplant. 

Pretending She’s Innocent Perpetuates Toxic Narratives

In literature, especially Western literature, there is a narrative that abuse is a sort of purifying agent. Dumbledore expresses it most explicitly, when he says Harry “needed” to be abused by his aunt and uncle in order to develop strong character; but it’s far older than that. Cinderella often falls into this trope, what with the abuse victim being sweet and kind while her spoiled stepsisters are cartoonishly horrid. (I will say, though, that one thing I appreciated about the 2015 Cinderella remake was that “Have courage and be kind” was something instilled in her by loving parents before her father ever remarried. Cinderella’s sweet nature is something that managed to survive the abuse, not a result of it.) 

It is disturbingly common in this fandom to pretend that Vanya’s only flaws are a lack of self-confidence and low self-esteem. Her selfishness, her bitterness and lack of empathy are all downplayed or ignored; in some fanworks, she is even portrayed as kind and empathetic, a result of being left out as a kid and not wanting anyone to suffer the way she suffered. Not only does this deny Vanya’s canon characterization, but it plays into and perpetuates the notion that child abuse results in better children. 

I don’t think anyone in this fandom does so on purpose. I have yet to see a single fan attempt even a flimsy defense of the way Reginald treated his children, and Leonard is roundly condemned as the emotional abuser he is. This fandom is good at recognizing abuse, and it’s good at recognizing how harmful it is. Where it fails, though, is recognizing that the effects of abuse cannot and should not be romanticized. 

Vanya is a deconstruction of the broken bird, the unfavorite who was never in the limelight and always ignored. A child who grew up under the circumstances she faced would almost certainly not become kind and empathetic; they would become bitter and self-centered, resenting every moment they were not the center of attention, hating the siblings who stole their limelight. This is not pretty. It is not the sort of thing that lends itself to sweet fanart or beautiful poetry. It is not a tale of resilience and persistence; it is a tale of brokenness and perpetuation of the chain of pain. Vanya is hurting, and in her hurt, she hurts people. This is not the sort of story we like to tell ourselves, but it is the sort of story that happens far more often than we will ever care to admit. Vanya is not a romanticization of the unfavorite; she is realism. She is a result. 

Pretending otherwise does a disservice to very real people who share Vanya’s background. Child abuse does not result in better children; it results in broken adults who must learn how to function in society all over again. Depression and anxiety are not the only outcomes of abusive childhoods; adult survivors of child abuse also suffer from an inability to form and maintain relationships, poor social skills, aggression and violent behavior, and many other effects that would not lend themselves to a pretty piece of art. Child abuse is ugly, and the results are ugly. Romanticizing a character who exhibits that ugliness makes it that much more difficult for people to admit they see themselves in that ugliness, that this character’s most horrid traits remind them of their own behavior and made them realize what changes they need to make. 

The Umbrella Academy is not a tale of empowerment. It’s a tale of pain, and brokenness, and slowly but surely recovering yourself. It’s a tale of how abuse breaks children, and how that damage is turned on others. The Academy is a perfect mirror, a place where real survivors can see themselves in the characters they meet. It’s a place where it is okay to be messed up, where it’s okay to admit that the shit you went through as a kid turned you into a bully, or an addict, or a person who can’t take responsibility for anything, and where it’s okay to admit that you’ve hurt others. The Academy is where survivors can face their inner demons through the lens of fiction, where they don't have to pretend their demons made them better people. 

None of this can happen if we continue to romanticize one character’s abuse. 

#the umbrella academy #umbrella academy #tua meta #vanya meta #cw: abuse #tw: abuse #vanya hargreeves #reginald hargreeves #abuse #child abuse #flaws #fandom shenanigans #luther hargreeves #diego hargreeves #allison hargreeves #klaus hargreeves #five hargreeves #ben hargreeves #number seven #number one #number two #number three #number four #number five #number six #pogo #pogo hargreeves #long post #meta

[it-will-not-last-the-night]

P5R

Having had a chance to now peruse a translation of the ending, albeit again not an official one and thus all I say is couched with the understanding it could be flawed, I wanted to talk a bit about how I felt concerning it.

At the outset I think it’s fine. It’s not bad or anything, at all, but it certainly to me doesn’t compare to Yldaboath’s representation of societal apathy and akrasia.

From a mechanical point of view the fight is perfectly good. I’d also like to give kudos to the game getting through that Maruki is determined. Having him several times lose but then come back, but make it that he comes back by pushing past limits, not doing a standard villain thing of ‘oh-ho I was holding back on purpose,’ helps to provide to you this idea that he does truly believe in what he fights for. So that’s good.

In addition; I do enjoy that Maruki will personally appeal to the team members you bring with you. I also like this as it helped me understand a bit about Ryuji’s wish which I will get to at the end when discussing the ‘wishes’ in general.

I’m personally satisfied that the fight is, simply, much lower level than the fight against Yldaboath. There is no ambiguity that Maruki is nowhere near as powerful as the personification of humanity’s apathy. Whilst Yldaboath was only able to be defeated by harnessing the power of all society shaking off it’s apathy for a moment, to form Satanael, Maruki is simply defeated by the efforts of the Phantom Thieves on their own, no galvanizing of the entire society to support them. So that’s fine but, again, makes me really feel like Maruki is an anti-climax after Yldaboath. He simply isn’t as powerful or pivotal. He’s a single human with a rather deranged plan, one he is incredibly motivated for, but still nothing like striking down the representation of all humanity’s akrasia.

For myself the highlight of the ending is actually the Monacopter sequence. All the PT’s calling out for him, Mona pushing himself to his limit, then coming through in the nick of time. As he is still meant to reflect a personification of human hope I like him to remain central to amazing moments like that, when powered by the hope of his friends.

So what are the negatives to this ending? To be honest the ending sequence itself has no real negatives beyond being, to me, an anti-climax coming after Yldaboath. The issues for me are...the Wish World, the concept of the Wishes, the revelation of how Maruki gained that power because it comes down to a single issue I have with the Third Trimester: It feels like a regression of completed character arcs for all the core PT’s.

So first we should discuss a bit about the ‘Wish World’ because it is nowhere near as wholistic or clean as I thought:

Maruki doesn’t create a world in which a person realizes their personal ideal wishes. Maruki creates a world in which he sets things the way he thinks people want it based off what they told him and gives precedence to the Phantom Thieves’ wishes over that of everyone else.

This last bit is very upsetting because it is explicitly said that the only reason that Maruki was able to make his world was because the Phantom Thieves wished for it by talking to him in his counselling office, which feels deceptive and also completely lacking in giving their actual wishes since, for example, Ryuji has his meeting with Maruki MONTHS before he completes his character arc, in which he learns what he truly wants is different to what he used to think it was.

It also rubs me the wrong way enormously that at the moment that the Phantom Thieves literally overcome the incarnation of society seeking to escape responsibility by placing it on the shoulders of a higher power...we’re now told they did just that, and shunted their responsibilities over to a higher power, Maruki, to deal with it for them.

The entire wish world feels just like character regression for the team. I understand why, of course, P5 was written as a complete game, the PT’s complete their character arcs in it, so P5R’s third trimester suddenly coming back to it and trying to use it as the main fuel of it’s plot leaves it feeling like the PT’s didn’t actually embrace the lessons about themselves they tell Ren that final time in the Velvet Room, when he gathers them for the final battle. It makes it seem like their convictions were flimsy and instantly abandoned.

Let’s talk about Ryuji: Ryuji’s character arc in the game sees him eventually come to decide that running isn’t, actually, something he intends to make the focus of his life anymore, even when he has the chance. He matures and, with the help of Ren, comes to realize that running isn’t the most important thing to him in the world, that his freedom, doing right by other’s, helping even when expecting nothing in return, all these things are more important. He explicitly turns down a chance to return to sprinting as anything more than a hobby in his character arc because he comes to realize he has other, deeper, dreams and wishes.

Maruki’s wish world, however, reduces him to just that. It turns his character development back and says that all his comments to Ren, his wilful decision to not continue to put sprinting at the core of his life, are something he drops to instead return to being that exact same way. It’s a little absolved by Maruki’s appeal to him in the final battle, where Maruki specifically doesn’t tempt him just with ‘running’ but with ‘running to make things easier for your mother’ bringing us back to Ryuji’s persistent character trait of feeling he is a burden to his mother and feeling he must find some way to alleviate that burden. But this, again, is part of his character development, overcoming the belief of needing to prove himself to others and the world, accepting he should find his own way, his own path, without doing things simply for others.

Ryuji rejects Maruki at the end, yes, but as this is a Ryuji already post-his scene in the Velvet Room that he at all accepted and embraced it, for even a moment, feels like massive character regression.

The wishes also don’t even reflect an ideal world. Yusuke’s wish involves nothing of his mother, something he’d ideally want. The wishes are very literally just constructs Maruki makes of specific things the Phantom Thieves tell him, making this not even truly a lotus eater machine, but more just one coder trying to give you things you told him about, and suborning other’s wishes to your own. 

Now; to be clear, Maruki’s wish world being flawed in such a way is fine, as if he could just honestly give everyone the actually ideal world in every sense it would raise questions as to why anyone should dislike this outcome, but the issue is that the granting of this wish world is now specifically hinged on character regression by all the PT’s at the very moment that they defeat Yldaboath, the figure reflecting the very thing they then do. It just feels enormously regressive and I strongly dislike it. I honestly think Maruki should have come before Yldaboath as, coming after him, it feels as if the character development of the PT’s is ignored just to make the Dream World work. I hate, for example, that if Ren gives up Maruki just is able to offscreen handwave everyone back into accepting this world even when they’ve shown the ability to now, of their own free will, if they just stop regressing, break free of it. Why can’t they just do that again? If they’ve done it once how can he just negate it automatically? It feels as if these pertinent questions of character development and the PT’s agency is ignored.

Also I am not a fan of Akechi being a cognitive version of himself simply because that isn’t Akechi then. Even if you made an identical copy of yourself that copy is still not you. They are their own entity with their own experiential and phenomenal data. It would be wrong and unfair, to him, to call Maruki-Akechi Akechi because he deserves to be acknowledged and recognized as his own living, thinking, entity. He isn’t Akechi, he’s a new life  born from Akechi, in a sense, but from the moment of his existence Maruki-Akechi is his own being, his own existence, separate to the existence that is Akechi.

And that just raises the question: why? If the character we’re being introduced to now, given a chance to come to grips with at last, isn’t the real Akechi, what purpose does this serve? If this isn’t actually Akechi then this development is meaningless and one-sided. If actual Akechi is alive he will not remember this, he will not know it, for he was not even there. Maruki-Akechi was. So I just find it a strange decision. Why not have the actual Akechi be there? Without that it feels like the plot point lacks teeth. 

#persona 5 #p5 #p5r #persona 5 the royal #persona 5 royal #p5r spoilers #persona 5 the royal spoilers #persona 5 royal spoilers

[traitorsinsalem]

Hi could you give a concise explanation as to why you don't like wri/ght/wor/kth? I've always been curious

unfortunately, no real concise explanation exists that i can give because so much goes into why it's thrown me off from the beginning. a lot of my points on it require elaboration because they seem random or unbased without. i finally made a REALLY long ask response on it a handful of months back broken into a series of points, so i'll throw down some points i remember. again, they'll probably seem random and unbiased because i don't have a paragraph of actual comprehensive elaboration following to get rid of the idea of a slippery slope in place, but whatever i've written enough expo already

•main source of fan content which ignores edgeworth's true character and development for the purpose of using him as a source of tired trauma porn

•often mischaracterises phoenix by ignoring that he's a flawed protagonist (see: like, all of aa2&4) and dismisses the fact that switching your major to see your childhood friend who has been ignoring your messages and has told you that he doesn't want to see you is weird and creepy and not romantic in the slightest.

•often falsely depicts phoenix as edgeworth's narrative foil, which is completely false. gumshoe is edgeworth's consistent character foil throughout the games his featured in, while franziska and yew (and arguably sota/simon) also foil certain traits or developmental aspects of edgeworth's character. (this may also be one of the many reasons why edgeworth felt off to so many people in dd and soj.)

•contributes to the suspicious lack of fanmade gumshoe content, considering how popular edgeworth is and how close gumshoe is to edgeworth. i've said it many times before and i will always be willing to say it again: if gumshoe and phoenix switched physical appearances, nokomitsu would be nearly everyone's endgame.

•often places edgeworth in an incongruous family situation to the one we see in the aai games (which is fine in content made before those games, but most content like that is from after aai2z anyways). edgeworth has no proper place with phoenix and trucy's (plus apollo, if you want him to Finally Find Out) family, or at least no place that would be fit for him. he has kay and gumshoe at the end of aai2. edgeworth says this. plus, the games constantly show edgeworth as a figure kay sees as a father or, like in aai2, just go all out and explicitly juxtapose him with byrne.

•it's the same dull ship people have been on forever, but they're not even foils this time. i thought that recently narumitsu fans would like...leave for the red and blue boys from that voltron show if they were 12 or good omens if they were 32 but i guess not.

•so much content over almost 20 years now derives from straight men making jokes about guys Possibly Being Gay or straight women being fetishistic creeps so i don't even bother to try sorting out the freaks anymore i just leave immediately. you can say Not All Fans Are Like That or whatever, but if i see a kid at a lunch table wearing an ahegao hoodie, then i avoid everyone sitting at that table.

this is as concisely as i can state all of my points and i haven't even delved into them which should give you a good idea of how much has gone into me wondering why this pairing has made me feel uncomfortable for reasons i haven't been able to pinpoint for a long time until like a year ago i was able to start articulating it because i decided it was time to actually delve into what went into narumitsu that must have been shoving me away from a distance.

#succ speaks #long post #people will see gumshoe tell phoenix to treat edgeworth like a human being and think narumitsu is peak romance. it is not though. #aa

[wrockingwriter]

Obscurus and Patronus: Expressions of the Soul in the Wizarding World

If you’ve read my previous post about Obscurials, you know that I have this theory that Obscurus and Patronus are flip-sides of the same coin. It kind of consumed my panel in 2018 in the best of ways, so I wanted to explore this further with the new bits of evidence we get from the Crimes of Grindelwald film.

We are shown and told time and again that powerful magic takes conviction and strong emotion- and I’m here to claim that the Obscurus and Patronus are no different- merely the Light and Dark equivalents of one another. A protector, though ones with wildly differing means of doing so.

Let’s start with the bit of magic we know a fair bit about: The Patronus Charm.

The Patronus Charm (incantation: Expecto Patronum (literally ‘I summon a protector’)) is an ancient and mysterious charm that conjures a magical guardian. A projection of all of your most positive feelings. It is difficult, and many witches/wizards are unable to produce a full/corporeal Patronus, a guardian which generally takes the shape of the animal with whom they share the deepest affinity. You may suspect, but you will never truly know what form your Patronus will take until you succeed in conjuring it. -Miranda Goshawk’s overview

So there are two forms of Patronus- the basic Incorporeal, which is simply a projected shield and is confined to the range of one’s wand; and the advanced Corporeal, which takes the shape of a full animal (which is supposedly the animal one has the deepest affinity for) and can be directed to do tasks at a distance (send messages, guide, direct, distract).

To cast a full Patronus, you need two things:

An intensely happy memory (or fantasy, it seems, going by Harry’s ability to conjure a Patronus for his OWL by imagining Umbridge being sacked.

A confidence that it can be done. Perhaps just an overall surety of self, going by Harry was unable to fully cast a Patronus until he had evidence that he had already been able to do so. Hermione has trouble when she doubts herself.

It’s also shown that a Patronus can change form if the caster goes through an emotional upheaval- falling intensely in love, trauma (perhaps) etc.

James and Lily Potter are said to have had complimentary Patronuses, which implies either their souls deepest affinities are very similar, or Lily’s Patronus changed shape in the wake of falling for James.

A Patronus and an Animagus can take the same shape (which lends itself to the ‘deepest affinity’ portion of Patronus shape explanations, but not to a Patronus shifting shapes) as we are shown with McGonagall, Lupin, and James.

JK, in the days I still think of as Canon (interviews pre 2009, but this is a whole different topic) was once asked about James and Lily’s Patronuses being a set and she replied that ‘the Patronus often mutates to take the image of the love of one's life, because they so often become the 'happy thought' that generates a Patronus.’ so the thoughts that are used to form a Patronus CAN influence a Patronus Guardian’s shape.

But back to technicalities, a Patronus is only active while the caster is focusing on it- it’s a conscious directive by the caster that has to be held until it’s been done, else the Patrons dissipates.

If a Patronus Guardian is not actively facing a Lethifold/Dementor, it seems to take on traits of the animal they resemble- a semblance of sentience (Prongs approaching Harry after he’s first summoned)

As an audience, we are told repeatedly through the older witches and wizards that the Patronus Charm- a fully formed, corporeal, Patronus- is incredibly rare and difficult. We’re actively told by Lupin when he starts to teach Harry, Amelia Bones when she is so impressed by his conjuring one at the trial, Professor Tofty when he is so admiring of Harry’s ability to produce it during his OWLs. It’s also made clear through the disbelieving reactions of Fudge and Umbridge.

We are also shown, though, MANY characters who can cast the Charm fully, especially in the DA- but is that a show of how many powerful wizards Harry is surrounded by, or is it a way to show that there is a huge misconception about the difficulty of the Charm itself? (This is, of course, ignoring the ungodly amount of contradictory information to be found through Pottermore, the Wonderbook game, later JK interviews, etc)

So if we throw all this together, we know a Patronus Charm is:

Unique to the caster

More powerful when corporeal

Only able to be active while consciously cast

A passive protector (does not destroy anything, simply drives it away)

Made of light

A projection of the caster’s most positive feelings

---

The Obscurus is new to us with this Fantastic Beasts franchise, but with some (over) analysation we can pull together quite a bit about them!

And Obscurus is a Dark force that develops and grows inside a witch or wizard who must hide or suppress their abilities. Children who develop this seemingly parasitic force have lived through a trauma that’s associated with magic, and their shame/fear/etc causes them to attempt (and succeed) in suppressing their magic on a regular basis.

In the newest film, Crimes of Grindelwald, Dumbledore says that an ‘Obscurus grows in the absence of love as a dark twin, an only friend.’

In the first Fantastic Beasts film, Newt describes the circumstances that caused Obscurus to form in the past as ‘young witches and wizards sometimes tried to suppress their magic to avoid persecution. Instead of learning to harness or to control their powers, they developed an Obscurus.’ Tina, in this same moment, describes an Obscurus as ‘an unstable, uncontrollable Dark force that busts out and attacks- and then vanishes.’

In the confrontation with GrindelGraves (cos that’s what I’m going to be calling him) where he asks about the Obscurus he found and removed from the case (which, by the way, the fuck happened to it? Newt did say it couldn’t survive outside of the box/bubble, so what happened???) and states that ‘it’s ‘useless without the host.’ And that makes Newt explode, calling the Obscurus a ‘parasitical magical force that killed a child.’

There is a seeming throwaway comment from a witness at the beginning of Fantastic Beasts, saying the thing was ‘like a wind with shining white eyes.’

There is no record of an Obscurial (the host of an Obscurus) surviving past the age of 10, but that doesn’t mean that it hasn’t happen- simply that it hasn’t been recorded.

When we see the Obscurus in action, it is near ALWAYS in response to a negative event that happens to Credence. (the notable exceptions are a deleted scene in Crimes of Grindelwald, and the scene we arrive to in Fantastic Beasts, though there is no way to know for sure without context)

Senator Shaw, at the newspaper, focuses on Credence explicitly at two key moments: when he calls ‘and take the freaks with you’ and when the flier falls he call Credence over to take it back, and then says ‘here you go, freak- why don’t you put that in the trash where you all belong.’

Shaw himself is directly targeted after this, other people at the event are tossed about and perhaps scared or minorly wounded- but Shaw is lifted up into the air, thrown against his own poster, and is dead and brutally scarred by the time he hits the ground. The poster itself is also destroyed before the Obscurus leaves, wreaking havoc in its wake.

Mary Lou Barebone is both stated and shown to be beating Credence for as long as she’s had him- and far worse than she treats the other children in her care. But the beatings alone are not enough to bring out the Obscurus- it’s not until Mary-Lou denies all connection/affection for Credence and insults his unknown biological mother all in one fell swoop (I’m not your ma! Your ma was a wicked, unnatural, woman!) that the Obscurus sees her as an active threat.

After the belt that Credence had only moments before handed her whips its way out of her hand and slithers away, there is a dark mass. It covers Mary Lou and throws her backward through the building, and by the time she lands on the ground she is already dead- and shares the scarring Shaw had.

GrindelGraves has, for an undetermined amount of time, been a positive in Credence’s life. He’s been shown healing his hurts, providing comfort when he feels overwhelmed, and we find out that he had promised to teach Credence magic. He snaps the trust Credence had in him like a twig, thinking that Credence is of no further use to him. (You’re a squib, Credence. I could smell it off you the minute I met you. You have magica ancestry, but no power. You’re unteachable. Your mother’s dead; that’s your reward. I’m done with you.’

We all know that this is the point at which Credence stops fighting, when he gives in to the Obscurus entirely (I don’t think I want to, Mr. Graves). Both the figurative and literal walls between them crumble, the Obscurus bursts from Credence, and his grief, rage, and betrayal fuel him as he lashes out at everything and everyone. This is the difference, I think, between Credence and other Obscurials- but that’s a different talk. The Obscurus, as we know, is at its most powerful in these moments where Credence has fully given in. The lashing out at the person who betrayed him, the city that degraded him, and the overall expression of his hatred of all the injustices this life has handed him.

During this confrontation Newt and Tina are able to talk Credence out of the Obscurus by being patient and understanding, by sharing in his hurts and not trying to fight him. These efforts are, of course, foiled by GrindelGraves and later Madame Picquery who only know how to appeal to the power of (GrindelGraves) or eliminate (Picquery) things outside of their direct control.

In Crimes of Grindelwald, we only see the Obscurus once- when Grimmson fires the killing curse while Credence is talking to Irma, keeping Credence from being hit.

Looking at this set of instances it seems obvious, at least to me, that the Obscurus growing within Credence was reacting to harm that came to Credence- whether physical or mental- and removing the threats presented. Once Credence loses himself to his grief and heartache it’s less focused- like Harry was when destroying Dumbledore’s office in the wake of Sirius’ death- but Tina and Newt’s kindness and care do calm the Credence and thus the Obscurus.

Happiness, hope, kindness, sympathy- these seem to contain/calm the Obscurus. And they’re the things that help when healing from trauma.

Putting this all together, we know that an Obscurus is:

Unique and dependent on the host

Instinctively/subconsciously directed

A dark mist with glowing white eyes

A destructive force to any perceived threat

Fuelled by an absence of love and the presence of fear

Formed through trauma

Leaves scars on the victims that are unique to Obscurus as a phenomena.

If a Patronus is meant to symbolise the healing strength of joy and contentedness in a soul/person, then an Obscurus (to me) is obviously meant to symbolise the destructive strength of anger and fear in a soul scarred by trauma.

To recap, a Patronus is:

Unique to the caster

More powerful when corporeal

Only able to be active while consciously cast

A passive protector (does not destroy anything, simply drives it away)

Made of light

A projection of the caster’s most positive feelings

Whereas an Obscurus is:

Unique and dependent on the host

Instinctively/subconsciously directed

A dark mist with glowing white eyes

A destructive force to any perceived threat

Fuelled by an absence of love and the presence of fear

Formed through trauma

Leaves scars on the victims that are unique to Obscurus as a phenomena.

Despite all their differences, their 3 key defining characteristics as powerful magic are the same: They are protective forces, unique to the magic user, that are powered by strong emotion.

Are you convinced?

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