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thedecadenceofwar · 9 months

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Elle Argent as Jesus Christ: Heartstopper art analysis.

Yesterday, I made this post where I wordlessly compared Elle's art piece for the Lambert School to the painting that draws her attention at the Louvre, Caravaggio's Supper at Emmaus, a depiction of Jesus breaking bread for his disciples after his crucifixion and subsequent rising.

Elle's perspective on the painting / a full view of the painting (source)

The first thing I noticed that helped me draw the connection between these two paintings was their composition, the basic triangular lines that guide the eye in each painting; from Jesus and Elle in the center to the innkeeper and Tao at the top.

Heartstopper also clearly wanted us to make some connection between Elle and this Caravaggio: they focus on her face before they show us the painting, so we wonder what exactly it is she's seeing, which increases its narrative importance. I assumed she recognized herself in a painting; she did, but not in the way I expected.

The National Gallery (see above source) has this to say about the Caravaggio:

On the third day after the Crucifixion two of Jesus’s disciples were walking to Emmaus when they met the resurrected Christ. They failed to recognise him, but that evening at supper he ‘... took bread, and blessed it, and brake and gave to them. And their eyes were opened, and they knew him; and he vanished out of their sight’ (Luke 24: 30–31). Painted at the height of Caravaggio’s fame, this is among his most impressive domestic religious pictures. He brilliantly captures the dramatic climax of the story, the moment when the disciples suddenly see what has been in front of them all along. Their actions convey their astonishment: one is about to leap out of his chair while the other throws out his arms in a gesture of disbelief. The stark lighting underlines the dramatic intensity of the scene. Typically for Caravaggio, he has shown the disciples as ordinary working men, with bearded, lined faces and ragged clothes, in contrast to the youthful beardless Christ, who seems to have come from a different world.

Jesus, in the story, opens the eyes of his disciples in more ways than one (I pulled my Bible out for this!). First, in the scene depicted in the painting, the disciples do not know that this man is Jesus until he blesses the bread and breaks it for them, revealing himself as Christ. Second is the context in which Jesus comes to share dinner with his disciples: they meet him on the road during the day before, and he interprets the Old Testament for them: (stay with me I promise we'll leave the Biblical stuff and get back to the gay stuff soon)

Luke 24:13-16 Now on that same day two of [the disciples] were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and talking with each other about all these things that had happened. While they were talking and discussing, Jesus himself came near and went with them, but their eyes were kept from recognizing him. Luke 24:25-27 Then he said to them, "Oh, how foolish you are, and how slow of heart to believe all that the prophets have declared! Was it not necessary that the Messiah should suffer these things and then enter into his glory?" Then beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them the things about himself in all the scriptures.

If Safe Space is an exact analogue to Supper at Emmaus, then Elle takes the position of Jesus, and she draws from the story of Christ's crucifixion and rising a trans metaphor.

Death does not always mean death. For example, in the world of tarot, the card of Death does not signify literal Death, but a transformation: that the idea of death is a catalyst for change. If you're trans or non-binary, you understand the idea of the person you were being dead; that's why they call it a deadname. For me, the girl I was is dead. The person I am now, a living, breathing, non-binary person, is alive.

Jesus died and lived again; the boy Elle was died and the girl Elle is lived. Elle takes the spot of Jesus. Elle is risen.

There's another half to this metaphor: of the disciples that don't recognize Jesus. See where I'm going with this? At first, after Jesus had undergone his transformation, the disciples do not recognize him; literally "Their eyes were kept from recognizing him." The fault is not on them – it is another stronger force that maintains their blindness. But Jesus stays with them, despite the fact that they don't know who he is, and he talks to them about the scriptures.

We don't know much about Elle, pre-transition. But we know that Elle, Tao, and Charlie, at least, were friends before Elle's transition, and she had to come out to them at some point. So, in essence, she is Jesus on the road to Emmaus; unrecognized, a stranger, until she reveals herself for who she is.

She takes the moment Jesus tells his disciples who he is and shows what happens when Elle stays. We don't all have the luxury of being the Son of God, who can just pop away at a moment's notice after coming back from the dead (which is what he does, in the story: once the disciples have their eyes opened, he leaves). But this is Elle, out, resurrected, staying.

"So. There've been a lot of changes in my life over the last couple years. But with this piece I guess I wanted to capture a place that holds a lot of happy memories. Even in the darker times. Somewhere I always felt safe."

Safe Space comes after the moment of realization, after Elle comes out, after her friends' eyes are opened. But implied in its source and its inspiration is the moment of truth, the moment of coming out. There's been a lot of that, this season, coming out. There's people that want to and are scared, and people that refuse to and walk away. We never had to go on that journey with Elle. But she's telling us about it, now. She's telling us that it was glorious, that it was godly, that it was religious, that she died and was resurrected.

Before I leave, I want to touch on Tao's importance in this piece. The disciples in Supper are the two men that are seated; the man standing is the innkeeper, who is not quite a part of Jesus' world. Interesting, that Charlie and Isaac, the two people of Elle's group who are part of the queer community, take the place of the two disciples, and Tao, the token straight friend, is standing in the place of the innkeeper; not a follower of Jesus but a witness to the miracle of his resurrection anyway. They are all different people in this painting; different identities, different lives, different loves. But they were all there to witness Elle revealing herself in her resurrection. Tao, afraid of being left alone, is brought into this inner sanctum of Elle's world. Into her safe space.

#heartstopper #heartstopper spoilers #heartstopper analysis #heartstopper meta #elle argent #tao xu #charlie spring #isaac henderson #heartstopper season 2 #my stuff #i am absolutely in love with this analysis #and i hope that everyone else likes it too!!!#userbarrow #userelletao

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arcane-strangeness · 1 month

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whats your is one thing that you feel strongly about a fandom/media you like that no one else gets?

Aloy, from the Horizon video game series (Zero Dawn, Forbidden West) is a rat, in the way that she's constantly weaseling her way into spaces she isn't supposed to be in and causing problems on purpose. whether that's clambering around the vents in the GAIA base, climbing absurdly high buildings with zero regard for safety (much to Alva's concern, in the Leviathan quest), or brute forcing her way through social interactions (so many questions, she needs to know everything always all of the time), the outcast lifestyle definitely had a lasting impact on her lmao

she is not the voice of reason among her friends, she is the voice of "i'll do it till it's done even if it kills me" much to the concern of EVERYONE around her. someone make this girl take a break because giving her one is not gonna be enough for her to take it. she fought what was essentially a god to her, fell 30-50 feet into water below, swam a decent ways away while being shot at by essentially alien laser guns, was sucked underwater by a current, bashed into several things, thrown off a cliff face in a waterfall, bashed around some more, knocked unconscious, and still tried to get up walk around and keep going a day after the fact. the only reason she seems like a somewhat rational person is because everyone else on the goddamn planet has lost their minds. i love her <3

#horizon zero dawn #horizon forbidden west #i feel like i see no one talk about the first half of this post. why is she like that lmao #poor aloy her problems only get bigger. she solves one and suddenly the entire planet is doomed by another big thing. this happened twice.#genuinely love aloy as a character though she takes no shit from anyone #gives no fucks about anything unimportant to her #and lets absolutely nothing stop her #horizon forbidden west spoilers #also the way things in zero dawn snowballed was insane #she is NINETEEN lemme remind you #my posts #my analysis #thank you for the ask anon i am so bored :D #was gonna make a post about this anyways sometime thanks for the opportunity

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note-boom · 1 year

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You know a silly thing I want?

I think that Naomi and Gin should team up and be a non-superpowered version of Soukoku. They're already enemies via being on different sides but more than that....Naomi's intelligence and quick thinking + Gin's almost supernatural skill with knives? That's more soukoku-y than the more fighting-based partnership Akutagawa and Atsushi have.

But even more than that...they are both sisters to powerful members of their organisations, they are both the only significant character-based rather than author-based characters, and they both have that whole illusion/more than they seem thing going on. Also, IRL Akutagawa and IRL Tanizaki bickered or something about literature, didn't they?

Anyway, yeah...it would be cool to me to see them team up....

#its probably not gonna happen BUT IT SHOULD #they are the more fictional of all these fictional people #and partnering up to shake their world would honestly be symbolically cool #like the way characters kind of surpass their author in a sense...though that could also be orv brainrot speaking #and dont kill me for this but if we go by that...then akutagawa dying and then tanizaki dying...#death of the author anyone?#(yeah def orv brainrot infecting my bsd thoughts sorry)#idk i do absolutely love atsushi and weirdly think he deserves more despite being the mc...#...but i also VIOLENTLY want side characters like half of the agency and pm and guild to be explored more #anyway i blame tachiguin for their amazing tanizaki sibs metas #and also orv for the tags....#and yes with this post i am officially back on tumblr yay!#bsd #bungo stray dogs #bungou stray dogs #bsd musings #bsd naomi #bsd gin #character analysis #anyway watch as i get attached to this silly desire

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aroaceleovaldez · 1 year

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i think there is a fundamental misunderstanding people make when approaching Jason’s character, but to explain it I must first go on a tangent -

One of the things that’s really interesting with the demigod characters is that, while they are independent personality-wise of their divine ancestors, and their personality is never fully reflective of their divine ancestors, demigods still always have personality traits that are strongly related to an aspect of their divine ancestor(s). For a lot of demigod character this is even the same trait that presents itself in different ways, particularly in CHB. Demeter kids tend to be rooted - usually presenting as them being stubborn and resistant to change or opposing opinions. Apollo kids tend to be self-focused. Hades kids tend to be driven by their relationships/bonds to others. Percy and Tyson are the only Poseidon kids, but Percy’s seems to be that outwardly he appears to be an unpredictable wildcard, when this is not necessarily true. The sea is not wholly unpredictable - if you learn it, you will learn the patterns that drive it, and that it is subject to many outside influences (the moon, the sun, winds, etc). It just looks unpredictable to those who do not bother to learn (which, btw, is a GREAT metaphor for ADHD imo).

Jason and Thalia represent two specific spheres for Zeus/Jupiter (and in Jason’s case, Hera/Juno as well). Thalia is Zeus as King of the gods. She is a natural leader. She works well in leadership positions and tends to lead logically. This is why she’s the lead Huntress of Artemis.

Jason does not represent Jove and Juno as King and Queen of the gods. Jason represents Juno and Jove as mother and father of the gods. This is why he tends to fall naturally into leadership positions in groups but simultaneously struggles in them in some scenarios but not others. He dislikes leading an army and being seen as perfect and above others because he is not acting from the perspective of a king, he is acting from the perspective of a member of a family unit. He is not the leader of an army, he is a wolf in a pack. He leads emotionally. He’s protective of his group. Yes, he is a bit of a dad-friend! But at the same time he is adverse to putting himself above the group! Yes, he falls into leadership positions, but only to a certain degree. He works best in a group he’s familiar with. He works better in smaller groups.

To Thalia those specifics don’t matter, because she’s not working from a more personal perspective like Jason does. Thalia could lead groups Jason is normally put in charge of, but Jason would not be able to lead Thalia’s groups. But also Thalia is not devoid of Zeus-as-a-father-god traits either! That was basically her entire dynamic with Annabeth (and Luke)! And Jason isn’t wholly devoid of Jupiter-and-Juno-as-rulers-of-the-gods either, he is capable of tapping into that- and he does so! But he is always primarily Jove-and-Juno-as-parents-of-the-gods first and foremost.

And that’s a really interesting character trait to play with! It’s so cool picking apart characters and seeing how they embody traits and aspects of their divine ancestors! And you can lean into that in so many things! If you’re writing meta/character analysis, if you’re writing a specific character for a fic or something, if you’re making a demigod OC - heck, I use this sort of analysis of what traits are common for demigods of specific divine ancestors for assigning cabins/etc to characters (and people, if I am requested to do so).

#pjo #percy jackson #hoo #heroes of olympus #jason grace #thalia grace #meta #analysis #okay there's my daily insanity #btw i am absolutely always down to talk about my analysis relating to this concept of demigods embodying personality traits of their parents #it is extremely fascinating to me and i love picking apart characters to begin with but this is picking apart characters PLUS MYTHOLOGY #so goodness knows i am obsessed with this #tbh not gonna bother to proofread this yall get pure brain-dump

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olliethescribe · 10 months

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It’s that time again where I’m absolutely insane. Just bear with me.

I can’t stop thinking about how the only person Warren has canonically told “I love you” to is Hypno. He doesn’t say he loves himself, which is funny considering he’s a little self-obsessed and is seen kissing his own reflection. He only says those words to Hypno. And his eyes are sparkling when he says it, and there’s so much feeling and passion in his voice, even as he misinterprets Hypno’s warning for the situation he just crawled into. Warren looks at Hypno as if the magician hung the moon in the sky just for him, that Hypno can do no wrong. He loves him so much, and it’s touching.

Warren hates his life, hates the turtles, hates everything it seems (including his old co-workers that he was shown to have had good prior relationships with), and even disliked Hypno at one point. But nah, he managed to get over this one thing and let something good in. He fell in love with someone he likely never would’ve met had the circumstances been different, and I think that’s really fucking beautiful.

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mysteriouslybluepirate · 6 months

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Can't send asks from my sideblog, but this is @chewing-the-drywall

I feel like much of s2 fell into Frenchie's "we put it in the box and then lock it and don't open it again" in the sense that it set up A LOT that I was intrigued about how they would address it, but it either never was mentioned again or was handled poorly.

Examples range from light, like how I wish we saw more of the crew interacting with each other in ways that built on their characters from S1, where in S2 they didn't feel any more developed, or even regressed. (Example, Fang used the word Fingies 2-3 times through S2, and it felt like they were using it almost as a shorthand for his character, rather than making him feel more real and multidimensional as a character.)

100% @chewing-the-drywall. When I first heard that line I had I was so excited for the story to prove Frenchie wrong. Or show how important it can be to put aside problems to stay alive in the moment. But in the end, this one line summarized how the season handled everyone, besides Stede and Ed. Below, is an in depth discussion on where this season decided to spend it's limited amount of time. Instead of focusing on the characters and plotlines they'd already established.

This season had so MANY ideas it wanted to touch on.

Izzy trying to deal with his unrequited love and opening up to a new way of living. The traumatized 'Revenge' crew trying to adapt to a softer way of life again. The abandoned crew learning how to help their traumatized friends. Introducing new characters like Zheng, Auntie, and Archie into our main group. Setting up a conflict to resolve in season three. Along the way, referencing Pirates of history like Ned Low, Mary Reed, and Anne Bonny.

Notice, I've said all this and we're not even at our romantic leads.

Which is fine. Stories are fluid things. As long as the story knows how to flow from our leads to our side characters. Which leads us to how I feel this show took a lot of time away from establishing our central crew-

[Warning- this will be a controversial opinion- I want to know what y'all think about this] Zheng/Oluwande. This seasons habit of retreading old plotlines and referencing scenes from S1.

What S1 did so well was paralleling the side stories with what was going on with Ed/Stede. Usually, highlighting how well Stede/Ed worked by showing how much Ed/Izzy DIDN'T work. Or general hijinks that tied into the plot (Oluwande and Frenchie on the French ship).

Season 2 chose to parallel our main story with what was going on between Zheng/Oluwande as a budding romance and Izzy's slow recovery. The reason Zheng/Oluwande scenes felt like a waste for me in that the story was JUST a retelling the story we watched from S1.

A frustrated first mate(Auntie), and a legendary captain(Zheng) fighting over the captain falling in love with an idiot(Olu). In season 2, much like every callback for me, it felt like it slowed down the plot by pulling us out of the story. Like...yeah, you did the thing again, do you want me to applaud you for it?

I LIKE Zheng and Oluwande as a couple! I like that Oluwande was debating leaving Stede and taking Jim and Archie with him. But at the same time, I didn't care about Zheng until episode 7 when she beat up Stede, showing that yes. She's not just some all powerful woman taken down by a mix of love(the crew in ep3) and thinking that she was above it all (ep 7). She's fast on her feet, smart, and willing to stab someone who gets in her way. She's her own person. But.

Every other scene that established her was about her romance, felt like we could have put Rhys and Taika in there. It didn't feel...unique. It's as if the show only knows 1 way to write a romance between a badass and a bumbling idiot. Again. Oluwande in season 1 wasn't dumb in the same way everyone else was. He was protective of Jim, a bit nervous overall, but he was the person the crew chose to lead them. The season just dumbed everyone down a bit and called it a day.

This comes to the larger issue. When we only have eight episodes I don't want to rewatch the exact same plot beats with different characters. Time spent here ends up taking away from other stories we could have told about trauma and growing as a family and other forms of growing as a family. We didn't need another romance plot line. Imagine taking this time instead to show Lucius reaching out to Pete AND the crew for help. Or Frenchie finally feeling safe enough to play his lute. Or Roach helping Fang get over his thing with cakes-you get my point.

The fact we took all the found family stuff from season one, and pushed it onto only Izzy in S2 means when he dies, all the found family shit falls away. His death makes us realize we've been ignoring the central family we were supposed to care about. Because in so many words, their trauma was ignored.

[I even theorize if Izzy was alive and sailed away with them. Showing how he was taken in and loved by his crew, the ending wouldn't feel so hollow. This crew doesn't feel like a caring family. The person who protected them for months died, wasn't mourned, and then they threw a wedding the same day. Not even a full day to mourn. The 'New Revenge' feels like a heartless crew of characters we barely recognize because they aren't a family like they were at the end of S1. More like coworkers who sometimes fall in love with eachother.]

Trauma, Timelines, and Tonal issues when jumping from Episodes 1-3 to Episodes 4-5.

When the crews meet up, the story chooses to focus on the fun plot. Ed and Stede recovering their relationship, only dipping back into that serious tone when Izzy or Lucius come on screen to 'make things sad' again. I don't think the transition from 'serious' to 'comedy' was handled well.

I don't have an official timeline of the events of season two. But from what I remember, everything happens within 2 weeks.

In episode 4, Stede ignored the vote of his crew- to let the man who was torturing half his 'FAMILY' for at least 80 days- back aboard. This rubbed me the wrong way, as it showed Stede being a selfish prick in a way that could seriously harm his crew. That's when I started to see how not adding a *single* time-skip mid-season would hurt S2.

Imagine if we had a one-week off-screen time skip between episodes 4 and 5.

Maybe it's implied that they stay in that town for a bit. Izzy would a bit more time to learn to move on his new leg and start to open up to those he already trusts. Include a scene of Izzy WITH the crew, maybe laughing about something with the old traumatized crew, even if it's just a 30-second opener. Imply that the traumatized crew would have more time to settle in with the family they miss. Show that yeah, the traumatized crew needs more time to heal. Imply at the start of the 'Ed apology' that Ed and Stede have had more time to talk their issues out.

THEN have Ed apologize. You can even keep the bullshit corporate to show that Ed still has to work for this.

Healing takes time. Setting a series over the span of two weeks after half your cast was tortured by your lead love interest? After five of your main crew thought they would sail off into a storm and die after months of stress and life threatening battles? Why did that shit get shoved to the side so quickly?

Framing episode 5 as the START of Ed making amends with the crew, only to drop the plot by episode 7? Not a smart move. Because let's be honest, 'poison into positivity' in episode 6, referring to the fact that they sold all of Ed's loot to pay for the party, ignores the sacrifices the crew made to live that long. (The death of Ivan, and intense trauma they all need to work through). In a way, Ed throwing this party was him asking the crew to start putting everything away in that imaginary box.

It's Ed retroactively letting himself say 'hey, that time I spent torturing my captives was worth it because we got something good out of it' while still ignoring his own guilt. Ed needed to take accountability for his actions. No more 'I took 'a' mans leg' bullshit. The reason his arc feels so unsatisfying is that the plot easily forgives him. Fuck. I hate what they did for Ed's arc, but that's not the point.

Overall.

My issue with this season is not that it chose to do these topics, it's that it didn't think about the implications of what they were bringing up. It didn't dare to think 'maybe it's fucked if we quickly brush off a trauma like this'. Again. I know we have to blame MAX for cutting off two episodes. But I don't think 2 additional episodes would fix a tone problem seen going from episodes 3-4.

Fucking hell. Each member of the revenge had the potential for their own arc, so it's baffling to see them all reduced to 'well meaning idiot' when they all felt so fleshed out in S1.

When izzy gives his speech about belonging, there's a reason the only image in the show of the crew all together was from S1.

At the end of the day, Season 2 didn't let our surviving side characters grow. This is a mean spirited bit on how I feel the writers see the their own characters.

Stede and Ed are our leads. They won't die, not in this genera. Their shitty actions will be forgiven because it's a comedy, and as long as it's joked about, it holds no weight. They won't die. They won't get fatally hurt. Their trauma will be taken seriously, but it's a 50/50 on if they'll talk about it before breaking up again. They will eventually get a happy ending, their trauma looked at head on, because duh.

Jim, Olu, Lucius, Pete? Characters who used to have defined personalities in S1, but haven't been defined much beyond their relationships with their partners? Whose trauma might be mentioned, but will quickly be 'resolved' in one scene? Shame. Seems like they're only useful as set dressing, But we might make you useful as interchangeable side characters to riff against. Oh, and you're in love! Isn't that cool!

Izzy? I'll just quote Jenkins here. "To have him become a father figure to Blackbeard, and on some level to the rest of the crew, and to see him become the heart of why we’re giving pirates the chance to stand for being able to live how you choose. In reality, they’re thieves and criminals, but what our pirates stand for is a life of belonging to something larger than they are in the face of a crushing, slightly fascist normalcy." So...Is Izzy a pirate and accepted into the Revenge family? Or is he still an outsider? Jenkins gave us a romcom but still defines Izzy's character as that of one stuck in a drama/tragedy. Point and laugh, because tonally these two things clash HARD and will make an audience lose trust in it's writers unless well established. Leading us to the entire issue we've pointed out of not letting your characters actions hold in dramatic weight in your story.

Frenchie, Wee John, Roach, and Fang- Ah. No love interests again...shit. Well. Background actors it is... for now. We'll see. But we need 2 more scenes of the couple breaking up, so MAYBE you'll get some backstory hinted at in dialogue. You all have 1 thing your good at, so that's easy enough to put you where you belong.

Buttons and Swede? Well. They're still alive!! Don't be sad, fans :) The actors just couldn't show up anymore. We don't want our silly happy queer pirate rom com to not end on a happy ending! (Closes the lid of the trash can where they're keep Con O'Neill a bit tighter, thanking God Con was silenced by a strike this entire season from social media)

Do you agree, or disagree? Leave any lingering thoughts down below!

I'd love to chat down below.

#I am absolutely screwing myself over spelling-wise by adding a poll but fuck it. That's what we do #Overall: Just because you can fit something into your story doesn't mean it needs to be shown on screen.#I wanted to add a section of all the scenes I'd cut/tighten to make my added scenes work but I don't think we're there yet as a fandom #I theorize that the reason they couldn't change the script and had to hack it up was due to them already having 10 episodes fully written #also I SWEAR I LIKE ZHENG- but the part of me that sees her as a hollow Ed 'narrative mirror' finds her a bit boring until episode 7 #I LOVED her ship and how she hated Stede. But that's just because I generally don't enjoy Stede when he's unquestioned #Stede on her ship was a pacified lamb slowly getting fattened for the slaughter. She would have turned on him SO EASILY. She almost did too #I semi-tolerated Ed/Stede's love story of not communicating and puppy love. Seeing it again but sped up didn't make me like it more #ofmd s2 #ofmd season 2 #ofmd s2 spoilers #ofmd critical #?#yeah I'll tag that just to be safe #izzy hands #edward teach #ofmd s2 finale #ofmd season 2 spoilers #ofmd s2 meta #ofmd s2 analysis #trauma

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mayashesfly · 7 months

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Rain Code Chapter 5 and Epilogue Spoilers

The ending of this game has given me such intense major brainrot it's unbelievable. And not to mention all of the FUCKING SYMBOLISM AND PARALLELS AND FOILS I CAN SQUEEZE OUT OF THIS THING

Yuma and Makoto being Number One, looking for a Perfect Solution without Emotion.

Yuma taking the first step to grow out of that ideal by entrusting his memories to Shinigami.

Essentially shedding himself from the chains of his previous identity as Number One. By giving Shinigami the Key to his memories.

Shinigami who creates Solution Keys. Solution Keys that can unlock the Chain of Mysteries blocking the path to the truth. (Chapter 4 Mystery Labyrinth)

And time and time and time and time again throughout the game, Yuma had others helping him. Being there for him. Taking care of him. Loving him.

And despite him falling in despair time and time and time and time and time again, as Shinigami reaps the soul of the culprit, someone was there to pick him up again.

It might've hurt. It might've been painful. Uncovering and facing the truth. But together, he was able to handle it. He was able to live more freely, more happily being unchained from mysteries. Having people there in his life.

Maybe he been different when he was Number One.

Maybe he had been alone.

At first.

But now, he is not.

And though he may have lost Number One, he has gained freedom and happiness through others.

It's ironic how The One chained to a Death God was the free one.

Now let's think about Makoto.

Did he had anyone there when he learned the painful truth?

Had he known during then that there was others like him?

Facing the truth of being a Homonculus all alone...

It would be painful.

It would be lonely.

And even then, when he had found out he wasn't the only one.

He alone was the only one that could've saved them from themselves.

Saved them from the sunlight.

Caging them all in the unending rain.

He faced all of the problems of Kanai Ward by himself.

Manipulating those he see fit in order to keep Kanai Ward safe.

Despite being Number One, He could not seek the Perfect Solution through the Truth.

He covered and chained himself in so many lies and mysteries that he could not help himself.

And others could not help him.

There was no Solution to be found.

Here was no keys to be found by him or someone else who could've helped him escape from the entangle of chains of mysteries he had trapped himself in.

Think about it, in the Mystery Labyrinth, his Mystery Phantom acted so much like the lost and scared Yuma we have known. So blinded by all of the mysteries and alone that he refused the truth.

There was noone in that Labyrinth helping Phantom Makoto except Actual Makoto.

There was noone in that Labyrinth helping Actual makoto except Phantom Makoto.

He, quite literally, wrapped himself up with all of his clones that wore masks.

He, quite literally, continued to change his masks as he see fit.

He, quite literally, hid himself among his clones that wore masks.

Masks upon masks upon masks.

And despite having had multiple Solution Blades at a few points, he had cut nothing. (From what I remember)

I can't help but think about how Yuma said Makoto was asking for help.

And how in Makoto's last stand, he was quite literally asking for help.

Makoto needed Yuma to use the Solution Blade, the Solution Keys, to cut his mask.

Makoto needed someone to help him.

He was looking for a Perfect Solution, no, an answer, as we stared at his real unmasked face.

He had begged for us to search for the truth and now here we are.

If Yuma making a pact with Shinigami was his cry for help to change.

This was Makoto's cry for help to change.

We just have to wait and see if Makoto can finally be free and happy.

(Though seeing the Epilogue, it seems like Makoto still needs some help to truly finally free himself fully.

His journey isn't over yet.

Let's just hope that help won't come too late yet again.)

#may asher rambles #rain code #makoto kagutsuchi #yuma kokohead #rain code spoilers #shinigami #I hope this is atleast a bit coherent #My brain is fucking screaming and squealing and going on overdrive because of these fuckers #My GOD #WHEN WILL I STOP FALLING IN LOVE WITH FUCKED UP GUYS??!!!#But yeah #It's fascinating seeing Yuma and Makoto's character development #And the Solution Keys and Mysteries and the so called Perfect Solution #Like I said THERE IS SO MUCH SYMBOLISM AND PARALLELS AND FOILS AND SHIT I CAN SQUEEZE OUT OF THIS SHIT #So I can't really say all of it and I am going absolutely fucking feral just thinking about it #Oh to be organized in brainrot to give an actual comprehensive meta analysis post #Ngl this also started because I wanted to draw Yuma and Makoto in their respective chains of mysteries #With Yuma holding one of the Solution Keys and Shinigami and the NDA's hands-#-all holding out their own respective Solution Keys to help him out #While Makoto was completely wrapped up in his chains of mysteries #Solution Keys all scattered about around him but out of his reach #Not a single Solution Key in his hand #Completely alone and helpless #If anyone wants to draw that #Feel free to for me #Knowing my track record when it comes to drawing I will never actually finish an art piece like that lol

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urproblematicfav-arsonk · 9 months

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I will never stop reading too deeply into Anthony's character voices. You know like how its a thing in writing where its like a character has a color or thing associated with them and then another character starts to take on those things because of the way the first affected them?? Yea, that.

Anyway so I'm obsessed with Lark and Willy sharing a character voice. Sparrow also has a very similar voice to Bear'Ry. I think its really interesting how much the twins more resemble the o-dads then their own father. Grant mentions that Lark was often the leader and decision maker due to him being very aggressive and scary. He would intimidated and threaten people into getting his way which is a very Willy Stampler Move. Lark and Willy are both very emotively flat unless they are yelling/excited(?). We see this in Lark even back in s1 where he's very flat and monotone when talking to Henry. Sparrow is obviously more like Bear'Ry even back when they were kids. He beats the shit out of Terry Jr because he technically got consent and immediately tries to restart the cult in oakvale but for Henry. I actually think Henry accidentally fucked up very bad by equating being a "love wolf" to violence. I think the intention was that violence can be okay if its for the right reasons but instead Sparrow took it as "violence is ok as long as you appear nice". He openly admits that being mean and condescending is his whole thing which is like 80% of Bear'Ry's whole personality outside of butthole tanning and tbh we have no proof that Sparrow doesn't also do that. I also think that Sparrow not being proud of Normal, who's ya know a freak but is still just a normal kid but being proud of Hero, the kid he abused and shaped for her whole life is inductive of that good ol' oak control freak shit.

Thats about as far as this current half thought is going

Anyway Autumn and Willy have the same voice and she shows extremely obvious narcissistic and abusive behaviors and the only reason I think Anthony pulled back on her being terrible was cuz Will wasn't matching that energy but its still canon to me goodbyyyyyyyeee

#cant believe i got into this show cuz i saw a post about lark apologisim and wanted to know who lark was and then start apologizing for him #and now here i am #absolutely not a lark apologist lol #i love the twins but i also hate them deeply #thnk u anthony ur a hero for writing so many different flavors of bad dads #dungeons and daddies #dungeons and daddies s2 #dungeons and daddies s2 spoilers #dnddads #lark oak #sparrow oak #meta #character analysis

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sgtprophet · 4 days

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"How they make a man sing!"

guys can i babble about sondheim again? :3

one of my favourite parts in sweeney todd is the part in Pretty Women where they sing "How they make a man sing!"

i absolutely love how they did this part in the obc recording, not only because of how Len sings it, but also because of how the strings in the orchestra builds up which really shows Sweeney's insanity before he will kill the judge; because while both of them are technically singing the same thing, they are meaning the exact opposite.

The judge sings about his newfound love for Johanna in a positive manner. When he sings "How they make a man sing!" the melody and notes does not rise drastically and it's more calm.

Sweeney is recalling his love for Lucy who he now believes is dead. When Sweeney sings "How they make a man sing!" the notes in the melody rises hauntingly, simultaneously with the strings.

He is slowly going more insane as he is singing the beautiful song with the Judge who ruined his and his wife's life and is now going to marry his daughter (pretty as her mother?).

#i absolutely love it when a production goes all out batshit crazy in this part #like im sorry but when the instrumental and vocals are both calm there it's just not it #am thinking of doing a cartoonization of this part bc ajahhduabab #me? overanalyzing again?#musical analysis #sondheim #stephen sondheim #sweeney todd broadway #sweeney todd #sweeney todd the demon barber of fleet street #musical theater #musicals #broadway #sweeney todd analysis

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minnwaa · 1 year

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fuuta analysis pt. 2, visual edition

i swear i like fuuta the normal amount, it's not like he's my little meow meow and it's not like I'm projecting to him in any way whatsoever.

lmao anyway i'm here to talk about the visual of backdraft. i'm mainly going to talk about the possible symbolism, the story in the mv, and hopefully can convince you to vote forgiven at least in this turn. long post ahoy (i even included the pictures to the point tumblr said "you used too many pics bruh")

we'll start the analysis with this image. i believe the can and him facing the camera to spray the paint was him saying that this is his time to tell the story through milgram. the can itself (+ barcode) actually led you to milgram's judgement page, so in a way it's like "this is my story, but I'm telling you through this medium (spray can/milgram)"

also just love that red color. red can either means passion, love, or danger. so in a way the color red REALLY suits him. just remember the color red for his "tag".

before we continue, let me write down the history of graffiti because it is heavily used in this instance. graffiti can either signifies the marking of territory or as part of a social/political movement. the marking of the environment is especially popular where gangs are prominent, so the graffiti sign can either act as a deterrent or just to show who actually owns the area. so in a way, it is connected to identity. a person's life. so let's use the graffiti as the symbol of someone's identity.

in the beginning, we see him looking forward with a smile on his face. this might mean that he was looking forward to and anticipating the task at hand.

using football/soccer terminology, he kicks off the first shoot. so he is the one who is starting the job.

in graffiti, you can use tags to show who created the graffiti. kind of like a signature. we can see there's "backdraft", "SAP", and one that i can't read. perhaps in Japanese? there's another one but i can't get a clear glimpse of it at the beginning of the graffiti on the left.

there's also this one, but much like the last tag on the first graffiti, this one is also unreadable.

but seeing that we have multiple tags in two artworks here, meaning that this is a collaborative act. this isn't just fuuta just leading them and them being ignorant, this is "them" working together to create an artwork, or in this case, a situation.

this is the first set of "pressure" graffiti that we've seen. no eyes, warm color, all bright and fiery. this shows that the pressure actually fueled fuuta's ambition. he's still all smirky and smiley, even looking at his target with a smile on his face.

remember when i said remember red as his tag? with this, it's low-key a confirmation that he started the action of erasing someone's mark. in fuuta's case, we know that he bullied people online, so this is him basically erasing the other person's identity. he started it, then followed by other people, signifies by the other color of the spray.

we can see 5 colors here, so it can mean that he was bullying a person with 4 other people. note that the character being erased seems monstrous in nature, so i believe this is fuuta basically saying "we have erased a monster!" which then continued on with another monster, started by fuuta and followed by other colors.

still the same 5 colors, meaning that this squad was the "original" so to speak.

i think fuuta has an extra grudge against the second person he targeted because he's taken the extra step to REALLY cover the artwork with more red. and he thought with this, his "task" is over.

he lets go of his spray can, or his medium to tell a story because he probably thinks that he doesn't need it anymore. his grudge is satisfied, and he can rest easy.

using the spray can as the symbol for his medium for a story, i think his modus operandi is basically overwriting the other story's person. with him covering the artwork/story of another person, instead of him being upfront in his attack, he might've worked by spreading rumors, thus overwriting the old story/artwork with his own spray, destroying the artwork. but he let go of that responsibility, he's done with it. BUT.

even though he let go of that spray can, it still followed his footsteps. the story/medium demanded that he continued by appearing once again, even though he wanted to walk away.

i think this marks the first time a milgram prisoner acknowledged the current reality--mahiru and mikoto are tagged "red" means that they are guilty, while yuno and shido aren't, so they're innocent.

i think that the red spray specifically marked the worst damage the person had in the fight. so mahiru broke her rib (or maybe her collarbone), mikoto has his whole torso marked, amane has less spray on her (which made me to believe that kotoko didn't attack her as much but still though.), and fuuta on the left side of his face. he's currently using an eyepatch, and according to the voice drama he could no longer see in that eye... so...

this then continued by him marking his own neck with the "off with your head" gesture (you know this gesture used over and over again to mean that 'you're dead') with now the eyes appearing, first staring at the fuuta who killed his graffiti-self, then to the graffiti itself. i think that the fuuta who "killed" his graffiti self was the fuuta who got beaten up by kotoko (so our current fuuta), while the graffiti fuuta is his old story. remember when i say that the graffiti represented the identity/the story of a person, him killing it off means that he doesn't like his old self, but the eyes are judging him now. that's pressure. what is Very Interesting is the color used for the pupils. the purple and the blue is the exact same one as the color tag, and the green and magenta one is new. it might signify that two members disappeared, but two new people took their position. they wanted the old fuuta back, and the current fuuta is horrified by it.

the eyes then multiplied, not just the original four. it means that the eyes on him have increased, and the pressure that once upon a time fueled his ambition now became poisonous. the purple here probably meant as poisonous than mysterious, because the shade reminded me of the poison-type pokemon. it's bright purple instead of royal purple which signifies a mysterious person. so now, all this pressure added with the eyes on him made the whole thing... unbearable for him.

when he turned around and realized his impact, he just realized that there is a fuck-ton of people who followed his example. see that the spray cans are now a lot more than just the previous five, and we even see colors that did not show up as the eyes, which probably means that they weren't exactly actively pressuring him, but only followed along for the ride.

remember when i said that the other graffiti reminded me of monsters? this one is the closest one we've got to a humanoid artwork. meaning, that this person (which then we see as a high-school girl) is different from the previous target. this one is a "human", so to speak, so he basically targeted an innocent person.

fuuta of course jumpstarted the attack on the person but notice that his spray is a lot lighter than before. he wasn't covering the face of the artwork, he literally barely covered it. this means that his story was flimsy at best, and he relied on his "friends" to cover the person in the spray.

it is now literally a group effort instead of just him being the leader and doing most of the job. his part even covered by another color, basically saying that yeah he only started it, but the others genuinely followed his steps. and fuuta didn't like that. fuuta is genuinely terrified of it. and if i see the color correctly (i might've missed some, sorry) the color used here is the same color on the pupil that starred at fuuta to pressure him.

again with spray as a medium to tell a story, they are quite literally covering the person with their "story" and we can see that it's not just teenagers who did this, noticed the person on the left with a ring on their finger, meaning that they either already married OR had a fiancee. that's an adult. not just male hands, we also have female hands. fuuta's army is literally filled with not just people his age, but both older and younger. and that terrifies the absolute shit of fuuta who only watched the attack from afar.

under "fire", the girl became a statue and broke under pressure. the hands reaching upward mean that she's probably asking for help, but there's no one to save her. so she broke up with no one by her side, and killed herself to end her suffering.

notice how the statue fell pointing to him. i think this represent the fact that the girl might've asked for his help or he might've saw her reaching out to him post-her death. it might be when he knew that his action has killed a person. sure, it's unintentional, but he created a situation where she might've considered death than surviving. and look at fuuta's expression.

he was also under "fire" and he is feeling the effect of the attack AND the guilt, and moments later his can of spray/medium of story exploded on him, both damaging him AND not allowing him to tell the story. this marks the moment where his "squad" turned their backs on him and now attacked him, probably for his moment of weakness. i also find it interesting that the can is "bloodied" so to speak, to basically say he's no longer innocent and his hands are now covered in blood.

he is running for his LIFE. notice that the gray color on his hand reached up his forearms now, meaning that he definitely did not leave his confrontation unscathed.

and now es, with their own medium to tell a story, covered him with black spray, meaning that "his story" is now overwritten by es, or by extension, milgram, and of course, the judgemental eyes that followed es' steps.

so this mv basically tells the story of him starting something and it went so big that it's uncontrollable. he never meant it to go this far, but it did, and someone died because of his action. he definitely bite more than he can chew. he showed remorse for his action, which is more than i can say for some people... *cough*

#fuuta kajiyama #MILGRAM #milgram fuuta #backdraft #backdraft analysis #LONG ASS POST #i cant believe i'm using my degree to analyze the absolute hell of an anime mv what am i doing with my life #i love him the normal amount i swear #not like i'm projecting or anything #not bc i have so fucking toxic and only bc of time and my friends that i was able to recover from that toxicity #of course not lmao

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autistic-shaiapouf · 25 days

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What's your opinion on Meruem x Pouf? :3

I saw this ask come in yesterday but wanted to wait until I had enough time to give it my full attention 👀

The short answer is that I support it with a resounding yes courtesy of the illustrious @ravenfeet222 👀✌️💖

The long answer is gonna give me a lot of space to talk about pouf which is why I wanted to wait to answer this 😭 Gonna live up to the url for just a moment 👀

ALRIGHT SO, let's talk about pouf for just a second. I truly do feel that a LOT of people missed the major points of pouf's character just because his arc had a lot of negative growth, plus the more flamboyant aspects of his character also seem to have made some people write him off U_U I've done a few large scale analysis pieces on him but I'm gonna reiterate a few points for the sake of the discussion at hand, and they're all points about how pouf interacts with and perceives the world around himself.

Pouf is afraid. It's explicitly said in canon multiple times that as the arc progresses, he understands everyone around himself less and less and grows increasingly more afraid of all the change. Pouf is also emotionally disregulated, he shows intense anger, he cries like his heart is breaking, all with little prompting. One thing I clung to was a line that seemed to be treated like a joke - pouf commenting that soldiers had no need for memory or emotions, ironic coming from the most emotional character in the arc, but what I believe it hints is that pouf doesn't view his own emotions as out of line. He thinks he's acting in a perfectly reasonable manner and minimizes his emotional expression to not conflict with his own personal image of being a perfect soldier (on his good days - there's still plenty where he thinks very poorly of himself).

Okay so pouf is afraid and he struggles! Where do we take this? My argument is gonna get a little shaky bc I'm a pouf scholar and haven't studied meruem to the same extent but I'm not gonna let that stop me 👀 In my eyes, meruem's arc progresses in an opposite manner to pouf's - meruem grows more stable and trusting while pouf feels increasingly more suspicious and borderline paranoid of the world around himself; meruem's desires become more grounded while pouf's grow increasingly more frantic and based in fear. They counteract each other in ways that would be conducive to each other's growth, with special regards to meruem acting as an anchor for pouf's fears and general anxiety about the world. Meruem, judging from his earlier-arc interactions, could still get caught up in his mind similar to pouf, but focusing on asking himself what he's meant to be doing, what his purpose is, and pouf would easily draw him out of that. I'd also like to believe that, somewhere in there, pouf learns to be more of an individual, likely with a little help from meruem pushing him towards his interests and helping him grow beyond what pouf initially considers to be his purpose.

I'm not generally someone who cares much for shipping (as someone who's aro and ace, though I do have very contrasting feelings for specific fictional guys lmao) but I can definitely see the dynamic between the two growing into something mutually supportive if both of them were given time to grow (which canon didn't do U_U). Let this also be my way of saying that I have strong opinions on the ants and the caa as a whole and I wish I saw it get discussed in a greater capacity but you can't win them all, I put out what I can and am always glad to be asked about them 😤 Also I just think that pouf deserves to be happy, the man entered a mental health spiral and dropped dead imagining himself as a failure; he's. very personally important to me and to see him get put in a situation where he can start to recover and become healthier means a lot to me, so that's also a bonus ✨️

#that being said - thank you for the ask!! i love talking about ants and i love talking about pouf!!#like i said I'm a little shakier on analysis for mr majesty over there bc. well. i am in fact autistic for pouf hjdfgds #but yeah! i'd consider those to be my baseline thoughts beyond ''the art is cute and my friend makes most of it'' lmaoooo #if you ever wanna talk ants i am absolutely game even though my blog has shifted focus - the pouf theme will pretty much be eternal lmao #i love. ants....#asks #also hi magnolia i tried to scrounge up what i could 😭 i dont say a whole lot about meruem ksjfkf i wouldn't say he's an enigma to me #but i haven't done a personal deep dive into his entire deal l m a o

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oscill4te · 6 months

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stan her w my entire life. if she asked me to walk off a building i would (tag rambles)

#i dont really talk about dorothy cramp much but she is such an interesting character to me...#i need to write up an analysis on her. I would now but i have to go to work soon :[#grandmas piano and agent x really illuminate how much dorothy struggles w depression and being raised #by an abusive mother #she is also not a good parent and even if you watch the show casually w/o a “edgy headcanon” lense (aka me) you will see that..#the way she treats her children is probably because of how her mother treats her.. i wish the grandma got more screentime too #i wish cramp twins season 2 was as interesting as season 1 #i just. ughhh #dotty.. i love u #txt #cartoons #the author describes dotty as a “voluntary stepford wife” ... which considering the way her mother is; it makes so much sense!!#Dorothy spends so many episodes in distress and fear bc her fear of contamination too. she is far from your usual cartoon mom #idk she is such.. an interesting character im not doing her much justice here #and i feel bad bc she has no support group other than her 2 fake friends who backstab her when convinient #and she was forcibly sent to a medical institute in another ep.. society is harsh on mentally women #esp mentally ill moms #yeah i read way too deep into this dumb cartoon oops #her husband is also an absolute useless dope no offense horrace.. i love horrace but he is sorta useless as a husband and dad #dotty deserves better okay. she may be a shitty parent but i stan her regardless bc that is who I am.#i luv imperfect flawed characters #its also good she had sons and not daughters bc dotty is. yknow. she has very flawed views on how to raise daughters #as seen in the pageant episode and other episodes. she would be so harsh on a daughter jfc #ok enough rambles i need to like. go lol

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dmclemblems · 2 years

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I do feel kinda bitter over AG though because of all those things you mentioned since i cant look at AM the same way for not having a lot of those things

I can get that. I feel a little similarly. Overall I like AM more because it really delved into Dimitri’s trauma, but AG definitely handled the Blue Lions’ friendships better. What I didn’t like about AM’s characterizations for Sylvain and Felix in AM is that despite five years having passed, they didn’t mature nearly as much as they should have. In comparison, AG was only two years of a timeskip and it felt a lot more fleshed out with their characters. Ingrid was on a lesser scale, but she definitely got the better end of characterization in AG.

In part I think this is also because the writers have had time to decide on some things. When they made Houses, it was a new game. With Hopes they were working with pre-existing characters, so it was probably a lot easier to flesh them out and change their behavior. It just feels weird to look back at Sylvain from a five year skip and see that he hardly changed, but with a two year skip in an AU he’s a much more mature and composed version of himself.

AG also gives us the possibility of having Rodrigue to the end, and I’m wondering if that was a decision the writers made because they saw how he was received and decided to swap his position in the story with Gilbert who was a less popular character. Having the possibility of losing him is like a callback to AM, but we at least have the option this time. There’s also the chance for us to get supports for him with the characters that needed to be more fleshed out in their relationships with him.

Granted, in AM Rodrigue died because that was the final nail in the coffin for Dimitri’s mental state. He needed to have that moment where he gave up entirely and stopped caring about everything, planning to just go out and kill Edelgard or die trying. Byleth was also able to prevent it because they spoke with Rodrigue the night prior and could bring Dimitri to his senses through what they learned when speaking with Rodrigue. In that sense I think it was too important of a scene to leave out, because if not Rodrigue, I don’t believe any other death could have impacted his story to reach that point.

For example, in Ailell Dimitri behaves the same way to everyone around him. When they meet up with Rodrigue, that’s when his manner of speech starts to waver and he is, for the first time in five years, scolded and essentially told to shut up and listen. With Rodrigue being, as Dimitri literally says pre-skip, a second father to him, he didn’t treat that situation as he would have with anyone else, ending it with referring to Rodrigue as his friend (which is more than he did for anyone else by that point, too paranoid and being unconvinced that everyone wasn’t his enemy. The one person he knew would never be his enemy was Rodrigue).

Since the stories are vastly different in both games I do get why things were altered. Going back to AM will just be unfortunate that Rodrigue fans can no longer use him as a playable unit or get all the character lore we got in AG (which was a whole lot tbh for the parent generation, as well as his relationships with the people around him). We also have things like Gilbert coming back to the Kingdom much sooner and thus mending his family relationships, bringing back the old Gustave who is fiercely protective of his family to the point he won’t tolerate any enemy laying a single finger on his daughter and brother. I love seeing him in SB as an enemy and getting to see how aggressive he really is when someone tries to harm his family. To me that shows us who he used to be before Duscur.

I guess in the sense of like, for the sake of fanfics I’ll probably love keeping both stories in mind and mixing the two for things like characterization. Like I said, I understand that they were reusing already established characters so it was much easier to create new situations and improve the characters (to which tbh I’d say was usually hit or miss, like how I can’t even begin to imagine what they were thinking when writing Caspar for Hopes but they did so, so good writing for Lorenz).

Really I guess it’s just kind of what happens when they use existing characters and improve upon them when the original story was already so good. I’m going to hate going back and not having all the Rodrigue content because he’s one of my favorite characters in the franchise itself. On the other hand I’ll like returning to all the sides of Dimtri’s character, because having that aspect of such severe mental illness I think is really important to use in media, particularly in our modern day where that’s a big and largely important topic in our society. While I’d say they also made the attempt with Takumi in Fates, at this point Fates is not a very well loved game and due to how it was handled overall, I think a lot of the attempt at mental illness and suicidal behavior went over people’s heads due to of how poorly the rest of the game was received by players (and admittedly the writing wasn’t nearly as clear with Takumi as it was with Dimitri).

Houses kind of has the vibes of like... a whole lot of “what if” situations that AG used to show the answers of that. SB is more of like... another rendition of Edelgard’s story with not much changed except that we get to actually fight Thales instead of the characters defeating TWS post game. GW is the total opposite of VW, so rather than creating it as a “what if” timeline like AG it’s more of a “what if they went the opposite path they took in VW”. AG focuses more on the possibilities that existed in AM and builds upon those, rather than SB’s choice of the same route but handled differently and GW’s choice of seeing what it would look like if VW was turned on its head (no upside pun intended...).

Technically it’s not bad in and of itself for them to have written SB and GW in those ways, and that’s not to say AG is just absolutely the best because of it. It comes down to personal preference and I saw a lot of people saying the same thing that they see SB as more of a retelling but altered CF, which at that point it’s up to the individual if they prefer the new or the old. GW’s plot in and of itself wasn’t an issue, but it was the treatment of its characters and how the plot wasn’t focused on the characters but instead focused on altering its characters to the plot instead of the characters being what made the plot (ex. AM being written to follow Dimitri, not Dimitri written to follow AM).

Following that thought too, AG follows the formula of its characters being the story itself because in SB and GW, the characters go here and there and everywhere and they’re dragged along. In AG if you try to suggest that you go west during a civil conflict, you’re basically told no, we can’t afford to do that and have to stay here where we already are to deal with this problem and we can head west after that. You’re in one place and kept in that place until the conflict is resolved, rather than being pulled west and then having to go back to where you already were.

In some ways I guess you could say AG was written too well, because now when we go back to AM we’re missing all those improvements on the writing. I do prefer chapter 19 to chapter, what is it, 9 or 10? with the way Claude allied with Dimitri because it felt way more natural in AM and was rooted in a trust that was forcibly finnicky in AG because they were trying to sneak in concepts of GW Claude and how he wasn’t someone people ordinarily trusted. Instead of writing him as just a different path Claude, they tried to keep aspects of him that applied to very different routes and it wound up feeling wonky. AM was much more rewarding, and even more so because Gronder had already happened. Comparably, AG Dimitri and Claude had not even fought each other and yet everyone except Dimitri (and presumably Seteth and Rhea based on the dialogue when they all met up) was highly distrusting of him and treating him like he was some infamous slimy plotter who was going to jeopardize something. It was very forced and kept trying to nudge at GW/SB Claude, so for me that was extremely awkward to see considering in AM, nobody really highly distrusted Claude when he asked for aid. They’d never even fought or had problems in AG, but for some reason most of the cast didn’t want to trust him.

Regarding Thales though, for sure AG did handle it way better. I don’t really like Edelgard’s story in the second half of AG since I prefer AM’s ending for Edelgard (and it makes more sense because she was hellbent on fighting to the end, even if her path killed her. Dimitri gave her a final chance to end it alive, but she willingly chose her death and for her that could’ve been a matter of pride which is more in line with her character, but AG took her character away entirely so that just wasn’t a possibility). Thales imo should’ve been the final boss in AM too, having escaped as Arundel in chapter 19 and fighting the Kingdom later on. Considering how deeply rooted in Dimitri’s entire backstory Thales is, it’s kind of insane to me that he wasn’t the final boss. He has the least connection to Claude but is the second to final boss in VW instead.

For me the perfect ending would’ve been like... a mix between the two, where Dimitri had to come to his senses because Rodrigue almost died but he survives just barely. Perhaps he can’t fight for the rest of the war, thus rendering him unplayable as a unit and making sense as to why he couldn’t be playable from beginning to end. Sylvain, Ingrid and Felix would have grown into who they became in AG when you get to the five year timeskip in AM. Obviously Dedue would keep his story about saving Dimitri with others from Duscur, but then maybe soldiers from Duscur continue to fight with the Kingdom army the way they do in AG. We’d have AM’s version of the Alliance getting the Kindgom’s aid, and we’d have Thales escape as Arundel but fight the combined armies later on. Maybe while they were allied, the Kingdom gets news that people from the Alliance, maybe even Holst, located TWS’ base (since they’re near Goneril territory I think?). Since they were basically one big army, Dimitri could defeat Edelgard as we know their battle to happen in AM, but then they could travel to the Alliance territories with the war being over now and from there, fight Thales and have Dimitri learn the truth. Maybe Rodrigue joins as an NPC in the final battle so that he can be present against Thales, even if he’s not fully recovered because he feels he has to be there since it’s the battle for the truth that he’s been waiting on since he lost his best friend and son.

Whether or not Nemesis would be at the very very end idk, but I think Thales at least should’ve been the final or second to final boss like how he was the latter for VW. I think it would also be nice if Claude hadn’t left right away and instead joined the joint armies, even if just as an NPC since in this case you’d be traveling through the Alliance to fight TWS, and since they’re in Alliance territory I think it would make sense for the Alliance to be much more invested in that fight. It would give Claude the truth he’d be seeking in VW, thus giving a nod to his story in his route, and would give Dimitri and everyone else the truth about Duscur. It would be a complete story imo that way with all loose ends tied up, and if they had Duscur soldiers show up with Dedue in the timeskip then they’d be there too maybe as some NPCs in the final battle, so their story would be concluded too with the truth proving their innocence. Imo it would be a perfect way to resolve the whole Duscur storyline.

I know they were probably going for an imperfect ending in AM in the sense that we can’t have everything, but the only problem with the way they wrote that out was that Duscur was the focal point of AM. At the very least I think they should’ve tied up that entire story from beginning to end, concluding it with everyone learning the truth and Faerghus finally being able to heal when the truth gets around that Duscur’s people didn’t kill their king. Not only do the characters we’re familiar with have resolution, but the actual story we’ve followed right from the start is finished in full.

The problem with ending it with Edelgard for AM is that Edelgard... wasn’t really the true enemy of AM as a route. She was Dimitri’s personal enemy and conflict and he would have to fight her if he was going to end her war, but with the way the actual plot goes, Edelgard should have been AM’s penultimate battle, exactly like how Dimitri is CF’s penultimate battle before she reaches her actual enemy and goal, Rhea. Edelgard’s war was most specifically against Rhea, thus why her route made Rhea the final battle and not Dimtiri. AM should’ve followed that same formula, because Edelgard’s overall gripes weren’t Dimitri himself. Similarly, Dimitri’s story and the plot itself was centered around Duscur and the truth, which defeating Edelgard doesn’t solve a single part of. It concludes Dimitri’s personal arc with his step sister, but it resolves absolutely none of the plot of AM. While it resolves a character arc within the plot, the plot itself remains unfinished.

Like I said, I get the whole idea that we can’t get a perfect ending, but in this situation I don’t think it’s even about a “perfect” ending anymore. You could argue that this ending still should be present even if Rodrigue still died. AG is in a better position for the plot because it actually thoroughly explores the true plot of Dimitri’s background as a character. AM is a character centric ending, but AG is a plot centric ending, and I hate that we don’t get both in either of them. We either get a very good character heavy story, or we don’t get the full depth of the characters (ex Dimitri’s mental state not really being a problem in AG and is only sometimes given a nod to) and have a completed plot.

Hence, I feel like for fic’s sake and headcanon’s sake I like to think there’s more to the point of the Alliance fighting alongside the Kingdom as one army and that the plot related final battle would be against at least Thales if not Nemesis (since Nemesis himself isn’t relevant to AM’s plot or any of the characters, but Thales is deeply involved in multiple characters’ lives). Also, it could maybe give resolution to Dimitri’s personal story with Edelgard, learning that Arundel was killed and that was why he stopped donating, and realizing why Edelgard changed so much post her stay in the Kingdom. Just a final battle against Thales alone would conclude both the story and character plots and make a full, true ending. AG technically has a full, true ending to its story since Edelgard wasn’t in a position to continue her war, so whether she lived or died becomes irrelevant at that point since what happened to her, whether we enjoyed that aspect or not, did resolve that particular conflict. In that sense, yeah, AG solved pretty much everything in one shot.

So yeah, I totally get why you feel bitter about it. AG had an actually conclusive plot while AM was just left hanging as an incomplete story. CF was “complete”, i.e. TWS was defeated post game, and VW was a fully complete story. Instead in Hopes, GW is left a huge question mark and incomplete and SB is still basically complete unless Edelgard continued her war for conquest, so that one is more like... complete(?), with that question mark being necessary. AG is basically complete, since what happens to Edelgard doesn’t really affect the plot which was finished.

Considering TWS is the center of AM’s entire backstory and Dimitri’s most intense trauma, you’d think that would be much more important to the story in AM and that Edelgard wouldn’t be the end of the game. I wish they were still making DLC or updates or something for Houses, because it would be so great if they added that as a late attachment to AM (like how, if you know Tales of Graces, the game ended up releasing and then re-releasing with an entire post game arc added, though in that case it was more of a remake because it was titled differently, adding “F” to the end of the title to indicate there was an addition to the game and changes made/added).

#Three Hopes Spoilers #sorry this kind of turned into a whole analysis of like...#why AG is a complete story and why AM is not #and how that can absolutely make AM fans a little upset at how good but incomplete it was #compared to AG which was a great story and also a completed plot #I love them both but it's still gonna be a bummer for me as a huge Rodrigue fan to go back to AM and have less content of him #Felix's story was also kinda left incomplete in AM but was handled far better in AG whether Rodrigue survives or not #Sylvain's story got more substance both with his family and Sreng in AG and in AM that's pretty much loose particles in the air #technically Sylvain probably lived with Miklan again and if he didn't he at the very least had Miklan in his life again #and Sreng was a topic more often and even given a paralogue while in AM it's just kinda... a background ''this happens sometimes''#both of those aspects were extremely helpful for Sylvain as a character but he was given literally nothing in the timeskip #his substance is his supports and in the main game he has almost nothing that he didn't already have pre-skip #I feel like we sacrificed a lot by making AM so heavy on Dimitri's conflicts with Edelgard bc like #it's fine that the story centered around HIM since he's the lord of the route #but the overall conflict ending with her was only a resolution to a character arc and not the actual plot #so AM is just kind of sitting there like... if you happen to have Hapi she just happened to have defeated TWS post game #while CF did that too it happens no matter what but AM relies on a side character being alive and present for it to happen #meaning before the DLC there was no indication of TWS being stamped out after Thales died #AM is definitely a great route but its actual plot was a disaster. CF had a messy plot with a disaster incomplete ending #VW and SS had complete stories and full character arcs so I don't feel like GW really hampers VW #SB could be seen as a more complete and better version of CF (especially since it's LONGER than CF just for starters alone)#so I wouldn't be surprised if CF/SB fans felt similarly about SB being more complete like how AG seems to feel for AM lovers #it's kind of just a problem with Houses in general that a lot of story threads were left unfinished #DCE Ask

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