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cy-cyborg · 14 days

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The Untrustworthy Fake: Disability Tropes

[ID: A screenshot of Willy Wonka from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory as he limps towards a crowd using a cane. In the picture, he has a brown top hat in his hand, and he's wearing a suit with a purple jacket, multicoloured bow tie and cream coloured pants. Beside him is text that reads: "Disability Tropes, The untrustworthy Fake" /End ID]

Tell me if this sounds familiar: A new character is introduced into a story with some kind of disability - usually visible but not always. Maybe they're a seemingly harmless person in a wheelchair, maybe they're a one-legged beggar on the street, or maybe they're an elderly person with a cane and a slow, heavy limp. But at some point, it's revealed it's all a ruse! The old man with a cane "falls" forward and does a flawless summersault before energetically springing back up to his feet, the wheelchair user gets to their feet as soon as they think the other character's backs are turned, the one legged beggar's crutch is knocked out of his hand, only to have his other leg pop out of his loose-fitting tunic to catch him.

All of these are real examples. Maya and The Three introduces one of it's main protagonists, Ricco, by having him pretend to be missing a leg in order to con people (something that works on the protagonist, at least at first), Buffy The Vampire Slayer had the character Spike, pretend to be in a wheelchair, until the other characters leave and he gets up, revealing it's all a ruse and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory introduces Wonka by having him slowly limp out into the courtyard of the factory, only for his cane to get stuck, causing him to "fall" and jump back up, revealing that he's actually perfectly fine. Virtually every single major crime show in the past few decades has used this trope too, from CSI to The Mentalist, Castle, Law and Order and Monk all having at least one episode featuring it in some way. Even the kids media I grew up with isn't free from it; The Suite Life of Zack & Cody sees Zach faking being dyslexic after meeting someone who actually has the condition in the episode Smarter and Smarter and the SpongeBob SquarePants episode Krabs vs Plankton has Plankton fake needing a wheelchair (among other injuries) after falling in the Krusty Krab as a ploy to sue Mr Krabs and trick the court into giving him the Kraby Patty Formula.

No matter the genre or target audience though, one thing is consistent: this trope is used as a way to show someone is dishonest and not to be trusted. When the trope is used later in the story, it's often meant to be a big reveal, to shock the audience and make them mad that they've been duped, to show the characters and us what this person (usually a villain) is willing to stoop to. Revealing the ruse early on though is very often used to establish how sleazy or even how dangerous a character is and to tell the audience that they shouldn't trust them from the get go. Gene Wilde (The actor who first played Willy Wonka) even said in several interviews that this was his intent for Wonka's character. He even went so far as to tell the director of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory that he wouldn't do the film without that scene because of how strongly he felt this trope was needed to lay the foundations for Wonka's questionable intentions and motivations. His exact words are: "...but I wouldn't have done the film if they didn't let me come out walking as a cripple and then getting my cane stuck into a cobble stone, doing a forward somersault and then bouncing up... the director said, well what do you want to do that for? and I said because from that point on, no one will know whether I'm telling the truth or lying."

There's... a lot of problems with this trope, but that quote encapsulates one of the biggest ones. whether intentionally or not, this trope ends up framing a lot of actual disabled people as deceitful, dishonest liars. Now I can already hear you all typing, What?! Cy that's ridiculous! No one is saying real disabled people are untrustworthy or lying about their disabilities, just people who are faking!

but the thing is, the things often used in this trope as "evidence" of someone faking a disability are things real disabled people do. A person standing up from their wheelchair or having scuff-marks on their shoes, like in the episode Miss Red from The Mentalist isn't a sign they're faking, a lot of wheelchair users can stand and even walk! They're called ambulatory wheelchair users, and they might use a wheelchair because they can't walk far, they might not feel safe walking on all terrains, they might have unstable joints that makes standing for too long risky, they might have a heart condition like POTS that has a bigger impact when they stand up or any number of other reasons. Also even non-ambulatory wheelchair users will still have scuff marks from things like transferring and bumping into things (rather hilariously, even TV Tropes calls this episode out as being "BS" in it's listing for this trope, which it refers to as Obfuscating Disability). A blind beggar flinching or getting scared when you pull a gun on them isn't a sign they're faking their blindness like it is in Red Dead Redemption 2. Plenty of blind people can still see a little bit, it might only be a general sense of light and darkness, it might be exceptionally blurry or just the fuzzy outlines of shapes, or they might only be able to see something directly in front of them, all of which might still be enough to cue the person into what's happening in a situation like that. Even if it's not, the sound of you pulling your gun out or other people nearby freaking out and making noise probably would tip them off. A person needing a cane or similar mobility aid sometimes, but being able to go without briefly or do even "big movements" like Wonka's rolling somersault, doesn't mean they don't need it at all. Just like with wheelchairs, there's a lot of disabilities that require canes and similar aids some days, and not others. Some disabilities even allow people those big, often straining movements on occasion, or allow them to move without the aid for short periods of time, but not for long. Some people's disability's might even require a mobility aid like a cane as a backup, just in case something goes wrong, but that still means you need to carry it around with you, and unless it can fold down, it's easier to just use it.

Disability is a spectrum, and a lot of disabilities vary in severity and what is required of the people who have them day to day. This trope, however, helps to perpetuate the idea that someone who does any of these things (and many others) is faking, which can actively make the lives of disabled people harder and can even put them in very real danger, physically, mentally and even financially.

Just ask any ambulatory wheelchair user about how many times they've been yelled at for using accommodations they need, like disabled toilets or parking spaces. How many times they've been accused of faking and even filmed without their consent because they stood up in public, even if it was to do something like get their wheelchair unstuck or as simple as them standing to briefly reach something on a high shelf. I've caught multiple people filming me before, so have my friends and family, and it's honestly scary not knowing where those images have ended up. This doesn't just impact the person either, a friend of mine was filmed while standing up to get his daughter (who was about 4 at the time) out of the car. He was lucky to have stumbled across the video a few days later on facebook and contacted the group admins where it was posted to get it taken down, but had he not stumbled across it by chance, pictures with his home address and his car's number plate, his child's face and his face all visible would have just been floating around, all because a woman saw him stand briefly to pick up his daughter.

Many people don't stop at just saying a nasty comment or taking a photo though, a lot of people, when they suspect people are faking, will get violent. I have many friends who have been pushed, slapped in the face, spat on or had their mobility devices kicked out from under them. I've even been in a few situations myself where, had I not had people with me, I think the situation would have turned violent.

There's even been cases where those photos and videos I've mentioned before have been used against real disabled people and they've been reported to their country's welfare system as committing disability fraud. While cases like this are usually resolved *relatively* quickly, in many parts of the world, their payment will be halted while the investigation is in process, meaning they may be without any income at all because of someone else's ignorance. If you're already struggling to make ends meet (which, if you're only living off one of those payments, you probably will be), a few weeks without pay can mean the difference between having a home and being on the streets.

Not to mention that when there's so many stories about people faking a disability in the media, especially when the character is doing it to get some kind of "advantage", such as getting accommodations or some kind of disability benefit, it perpetuates the idea that people are rorting the systems put in place to help disabled people. If this idea becomes prevalent enough, the people in charge start making it harder for the people who need them to access those systems, which more often than not results in disabled people not even being able to access the very systems that are supposed to be helping them. A very, very common example of this is in education where accommodations for things like learning disabilities require you to jump through a ridiculous number of hoops, especially at higher levels, only to have some teachers and professors refuse to adhere to the adaptations anyway because they're convinced the student (and usually disabled students as a whole) is faking.

Yes, the "untrustworthy faker" is a fictional trope, and yes, it does occasionally happen in real life, but not as often as media (including things like news outlets) would have you believe. However, when the media we consume is priming people to look for signs that a disabled person is faking, it has a real impact on real disabled people's lives. "Fake-claiming" is a massive problem for people in pretty much all parts of the disabled community, and it ranges from being just annoying (e.g. such as people spamming and fake-claiming blind people online with "if you were really blind, how do you see the screen" comments) to the more serious cases I mentioned above. It's for this reason a lot of folks in the disabled community ask that people leave this trope out of their works.

#Writing disability with Cy Cyborg #Long Post #Disability #Disabled #Disability Representation #Writing Disability #Writing #Writeblr #Authors #Creators #Writing Advice #Disabled Characters #On Writing #Disability in Media #Tropes #Disability Tropes #faking disability trope

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mauesartetc · 5 months

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A while back I got a comment that demonstrated a misconception as to what the character design process actually entails, and I thought it had real "teachable moment" potential. So let me make this perfectly clear:

Drawing a character is NOT the same as designing one.

Let's say I wanted to draw a guy. No backstory, no defined personality traits or preferences, no details about his current life, just doodling some random, generic guy who popped into my head.

That's just a drawing.

But what if I decided to flesh him out more? What if I wanted his appearance to reflect his lifestyle and inner life as well? Here's where the note-taking comes in.

And now for the visual research:

I thought the bodybuilding angle would provide a fun contrast with this guy's profession. The mental image of a huge, burly dude working on a clock or watch with tiny, precise movements just makes me smile. Perhaps I could give him small, nimble hands that would suit his line of work.

Now that I have a better idea of how Mikhail's face and body will look, it's time to establish a pose.

Of course, I never expected to employ all the personality traits I started out with inside this single pose; those were just a jumping-off point. No one drawing will ever be able to encapsulate every single facet of a character, unless they're extraordinarily flat and generic (see also: random guy I doodled at the start of this post). If I wanted to write a story with this guy, I'd have to figure out how all the traits play off each other and how they'd cause him to react to different situations. There would be a lot more note-taking and development involved, but for the sake of keeping this post (somewhat) brief, let's just focus on visuals for now.

On to color!

I decided to give Mikhail a carnation in his pocket (for its round shape), specifically a red one, which represents deep love and an aching heart. Thus, the flower needed to maintain its red color for the symbolism to come through.

For some reason I initially pictured this guy wearing a pink shirt (perhaps as an offshoot of the "romantic" angle), but I wanted to try some different colors inspired by the 70s catalog pages I found. I ended up really liking the contrast of the cool blue shirt with the warm red pants, and that option made it into my top three as a result. I lined them up next to each other to compare them, and in the end, blue won out over pink. I think it also reflects the "colder", more cerebral, less-emotional parts of his personality well (namely "systematic", "stern", and "callous"- one from each column!). Just goes to show that you shouldn't get too attached to your first draft, as better ideas are just around the corner.

I then lightened the blue of the shirt so it wouldn't compete so much with the rest of the outfit, and wouldn't be quite as loud and "in your face". Mikhail strikes me as a bit of an introvert, so the calmer, quieter blue is a better fit. I added a darker belt and watchband and de-saturated the flower just a bit to make the values feel more balanced, and I think we've got it!

Let's see the final result!

Y'all, I was not expecting this process to make me emotional, but there's something special about fully realizing a little guy you've spent hours working on. All of a sudden you look at him and go, "Oh my god, there he is. That's him." This man wasn't even a twinkle in my eye a couple weeks ago and now I'd protect him with my life.

And the thing is, the only reason I'm calling this design "done" for now is that I basically just brought it into existence to make a point. But if this dude were attached to a larger story, he'd be nowhere near finished. I'd have to make a ton more iterations and go a lot more in depth with my research than I did (especially with the Armenian cultural stuff). Overall, though, I hope this quick project properly highlighted the difference between a single drawing and a more fleshed-out character.

Later!

#character design #art tips #art advice #art help #concept art #long post

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wisecrackingeric-2 · 4 months

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LONG ASS MESSAGE UNDER CUT!!!!!!!!!!!! ITS A MASSIVE THANK YOU TO EVERYONE!!! I’ll tag everyone whose made a star for this drawing in the replies- if I’ve missed anyone or if you wanna be added, PLEASE LET KNOW!!!!!!!

At the time of writing this, there’s about 40 minutes let of 2023, and I’m VERY DETERMINED to get this posted before 2024 so I am in a bit of a rush so alas, this may not be as well-written as I’d like it to be but that’s the price I must pay alas HDNEHENEJDN

I wanna start this by saying I’ve always had a lot of anxieties surrounding the New Years, and things changing- even just seeing posts that were from the year prior always seems to give me anxiety. Things change, people move on, while I stay with the same interests- it’s always been something I’ve struggled with, but making this has helped me come to terms with all of that and I’m glad.

Theres no better words I can say right now other than; Thank You. Thank you so, so, SO much to my friends, both new and old- my friends who’ve been here since the very beginning and have stuck by me through this whole rollercoaster- and to all of my new friends, who it sometimes feels like I’ve known you all for at LEAST five years and not like, five months or something HDBWHNWUDNDHDJS thank you to everyone who has ever been kind to me, supported me and enjoyed what I’ve created- I’ve recieved probably the kindest words I’ve ever heard in my entire life this year. Thank you to the people who stuck by me when times got tough and helped me through my own seemingly very insignificant or silly problems HDNEJENSK

This year has easily been one of the best years of my life. 2022, to keep it short, was awful- I came out as a Transgender gay man to my parents and it went awful. I was dealing with the worst mental health of my entire life and there were times it felt like there was no hope. On top of all of that, my childhood dog passed away- so all and all, I wasn’t looking forward to the future. But my loving partner introduced me to Resident Evil, and as a result the community as a whole- and to say it changed my life would be an understatement.

I know it’s obviously no secret that I have a favourite character, Luis Serra Navarro- but to say his character has changed me as a person for the better would also be a MASSIVE understatement. I’ve never ever in my entire life resonated with a character so profoundly before- as a queer and trans man, I saw myself reflected in his performance, and that means more to me than words can even describe. His character encapsulated me in a way no other has done before, and genuinely helped me accept my autism, my queerness and my trans identity as a good thing- I could write absolutely ESSAYS on his character and I have. I’ve consumed more Don Quixote media than I think I ever would have otherwise HDNEHENEJD and to say I’ve genuinely become a more confident and happier person because of his character would, again, be SUCH an understatement. It’s truly hard to describe how much he means to me, but I hope my words give a good idea.

For the first time in a very, very long time, I get to look forward to my future. I don’t see my Queerness or my Trans identity as a setback anymore; I have things to look forward to, plans I’ve made and a future I can look towards. And I cannot thank my friends- all of you know who you are- André and Andrea and everyone in my life and this small little community I’ve unintentionally formed for giving me that opportunity. Words will never be able to describe how grateful I truly am, but I hope this is close enough.

Thank you for letting me fully indulge in my autism and enjoy Luis’ character to the fullest. I’ve never felt happier enjoying something in my entire life.

Thank you everyone. For everything. May you all successfully defeat your own windmills <3

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starlazergazer · 1 year

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You Deserve Better

Character: Anakin x Reader

Request: How Anakin would be if someone he cared about was in an unhealthy relationship

Warnings: Reader is in a very unhealthy relationship

Word Count: 3K

A/N: I went with a soft supportive Anakin for this one so I really hope everyone enjoys and appreciates that and I really hope I did this request justice and that this is something close to what you were looking for! Let me know what you think!

You weren’t sure how long ago it was that your meeting concluded.

You still remember the relief you felt when it was over, that you could finally go to your room, take off your shoes, and just collapse comfortably into the nearest chair.

You made it as far as the front door before you remembered.

Logically you knew it wasn’t your fault.

Logically you knew that you didn’t do anything to set him off, that even if you did it was unintentional.

However, logic didn’t stop you from trying to blame yourself for any possible inconvenience he might have experienced.

It wasn’t until you were frozen in front of your door for a solid five minutes trying to figure out how best to apologize for something you didn’t even know you did that you realized you couldn’t open the door. Even if you had figured out what you wanted to say it all boiled down to the fact that you really didn’t want to.

You were tired, your feet hurt, your brain was overworked, you couldn’t deal with another fight. Beyond that you weren’t even sure if your absence for the last few hours would have made his anger worse or better and you had no interest in finding out, not yet.

So you walked away, barely noticing the turns you took until you stumbled across a dark empty room with an open door.

Closing the door behind you you let the darkness fully encapsulate you, sitting on the floor just a few feet away from the door, leaning your back against the wall, letting the full weight of your situation hit you. Letting the immense pressure of always having to be on top of things, be perfect, push you into the floor. Letting the knowledge that even being perfect wasn’t enough for him kick you while you were down.

You hadn’t even felt the first tears slip down your cheeks until the door opening shocked you to your senses, the light from the hallway suddenly illuminating the dark room making you squint as you looked up at the backlit figure standing in the doorway

“Y/N?” the familiar voice made you relax, sniffling softly with a small shake of your head, the embarrassment of being found on the floor of a dark room already looming over your head.

“Ani hey sorry” you started to push yourself to your feet, ignoring the wobble in your voice, desperately hoping he would do the same “I thought the room was empty I can-“

A hand on your shoulder stopped you from standing, effectively cutting off your words as well, your gaze coming up to his in surprise only to see him looking down at you with concern. “are you crying?”

And you tried to laugh it off, hands coming up to hastily wipe your cheeks, a million practiced excuses jumping to your lips immediately “ahh you know it’s been a day, Coruscant politics are something else ya know?”

Slowly Anakin knelt next to you, his posture nearly mirroring yours as he kept a hand softly on your arm, eyebrows drawn as he spoke “so this is about your job?”

“Yeah” and you wanted to feel bad about the lie, almost wished it wasn’t the first answer to pop into your mind before telling the truth even occurred to you, but this was better, this was easier. He didn’t need you to unload on him and you didn’t need to spend the next hour explaining the complexities of your relationship to him. So let it be a work problem, in the end what difference did it make?

Anakin’s eyes bounced back and forth between your own for a moment, searching for something before his brows slowly unknit and he dropped his hand from you, a small sigh escaping his lips before he spoke “you know you’ve been doing that a lot lately”

This time it was your turn to furrow your brows, “crying?”

“Lying to me”

And you felt your breath catch in your throat, your lips fall open ready to speak but to say what exactly? To deny it? Pretend like Anakin didn’t already know exactly why you were crying in the dark? He deserved better than that didn’t he? But that certainly didn’t make admitting it any easier.

Your eyes broke from his once you realized you had nothing to say to that, dropping to your lap, a deep breath forced out of your nose as you closed your eyes, the shame and guilt all piling on top of you before he spoke again, his voice holding so much sincerity it surprised you.

“I miss you”

And you chuckled softly at the absurdity, wiping the last remnants of tears from your cheeks, bumping his knee with your own playfully “come on you know you can never get rid of me. I’m right here with you, always have been always will be”

And you watched a small smile grow on his lips in response, something that you think was supposed to resemble a chuckle pushing past his lips, the smile never reaching his eyes, you felt your own melt from your face “yeah but it’s not the same”

You’d heard that message too many times to count, never quite in those exact words but the sentiment always the same. You felt your defenses naturally coming up but found yourself unable to fully keep them there, your walls crumbling around you as you stood in the middle vulnerable all the same. You were tired, tired of defending yourself to your own friends, tired of having to beg your friends to stay with you, tired of dealing with the consequences of actions that weren’t even your own.

“Relationships have their ups and downs” you shrugged but your words sounded hollow even to your ears, uttered so many times they had lost their meaning.

“Not this many downs” Anakin’s voice was a near whisper from beside you.

You shook your head at that, pushing yourself to your feet before him, wiping your hands off on your pants trying to force the conversation to end, feeling your frustration start to well within you “it is what it is we have our good moments, and we have our bad moments nothing I can do about it”

With a sigh Anakin followed suit, pushing himself up to his feet but leaning back against the wall, arms crossing over his chest as he stared down at you, letting the silence hang in the air for a brief moment before speaking. “I lost my home, I lost my mother, Obi-wan is great but he’s usually on the counsel’s side second guessing my every move, you are the one person I have, the one person I have anywhere in the galaxy, I cannot lose you too”

“and I keep telling you I’m right here” you shot back, jaw clenched tight enough you could feel the ache in the muscle.

“And I keep telling you that you’re not, not really” and you hated how calm he was able to keep his voice. Anakin was the hothead, Anakin was the one always ready to start a fight over nothing, Anakin was the one who always started yelling first. So why now were you the only one doing so?

“How?” you demanded, “how am I any different? I go to work, I hang out with you, nothing has changed”

“I found you crying on the floor in the dark”

You felt your chest deflate at his words, any spark you had within you ignited by anger gone in a flash until you were left with nothing but a hollow chest and a familiar ache in your throat “I’m allowed to have a bad day”

“A bad day sure” he conceded with a nod “but it’s not just a bad day its crying on the floor, its spacing out in meetings, its flinching at every loud noise, its second guessing your every decision, its not speaking up for yourself” and his list seemed to go on forever, pointing out things you hadn’t even noticed yourself.

You went quiet, hating the way his list ruminated in the air, hanging over your head as if it were a scarlet letter pinned to your chest, but you had no words to get rid of them, had no excuse.

“So yes you are different” Anakin filled the silence, his eyes practically begging you to listen “because you were confident, you were funny, you were personable, you were great at your job, you were my best friend and I can’t find that version of you anymore and that hurts me”

And you felt yourself reaching for anger once again, desperate for anything other than the numbness in your chest, still you couldn’t quite summon the bite to your tone like you wanted “so what? It’s you or him?”

He sighed at that, forcing a small smile to his face as he said “come on you know you can never get rid of me. I’m right here with you, always have been always will be” and you recognized your own words, recognized the olive branch he was extending your way, still you didn’t reach for it, Anakin’s smile slowly fading as your expression never changed “I’m just saying you deserve better”

You saw your vision start to blur before you felt the tears welling in your eyes, quickly blinking to get rid of them, starting to pace on the spot “he’s a senator, his people love him, his colleagues respect him, hes on five different committees-“

“But do you love him?”

And you felt your ‘yes’ jumping up your throat, ready to spill out of your mouth without a second thought. But Anakin’s look gave you pause, forced you to consider your answer for longer than the fraction of a second you usually did. You were used to bating off that question, knowing there was more context, more nuance to your answer than most people wanted to hear, more than you wanted to share. But Anakin was waiting for you patiently, not judgmentally but looking like he was truly ready to listen, and at this point he deserved the truth.

You sighed softly, giving a brief moment to let your gaze bounce back and forth between his eyes “when thing are good, they are really good ya know?”

And Anakin nodded at that, letting the silence hang in the air for a breath before prompting “but?”

And you felt your answer bubble up inside of you, ready to come out but you found yourself forcing it back down, not ready to give such weight to that answer, as if speaking it into the open could make it any more true, any more devastating, knowing that answering his question would break down the last of whatever walls you still had left.

But since when had you ever built a wall between you and Anakin?

“But” you conceded with a shaky breath, your eyes darting to every corner of the room but his, a lump welling uncomfortably in your throat “I’m scared to go home”

And you could see his jaw clench at that, his fists ball at his sides, could see him struggle to push down his own rage. But you were thankful for the effort because even though before you had almost wanted him to be mad at you, to yell and tell you how stupid and pathetic you were being, you knew you couldn’t handle it now.

“I just never know what version of him I’m going to get and-“ and paused as you felt the first tear hit your cheek, a warm streak running quickly down to your throat but you didn’t make a move to stop it “Ani I’m so tired”

And you watched his expression melt at that, hesitating for only a moment before he was bounding across the room in giant steps, arms wrapping around you before you could really process what was happening, squeezing you tightly against him, your head naturally finding the crook of his neck. And you tried not to sob into his chest but you couldn’t help it as you spoke “I’m sorry”

Anakin shushed you softly, one hand running slowly up and down your back as he whispered into your hair “darling you have nothing to apologize for”

But you only shook your head at that, clinging to him tighter “I didn’t mean to change, I didn’t mean to make you hate me I-“

But you couldn’t get the rest out, Anakin pulling back from you quickly, hands coming to your shoulders to still hold you close as he stooped slightly to your eye level, hands coming up to cup your face as he whipped away your tears with the pads of his thumbs “Y/N I could never hate you”

You sighed softly at that and tried to push his hands away “I know that but-“

But he didn’t let you go, his hands staying on your face as he forced your gaze to stay on his “no but, I could never hate you end of story” and he paused for a second to let it sink in, the seriousness of his tone throwing you off slightly, your gaze never breaking from his before he finally let go of you, slowly retracting his arms but still staying close, still at eye level “I just want you to be happy. And I really don’t think this guy is doing that”

“He just-“ and to your surprise for the first time it was the truth that first came to mind. Not some excuse, not a half lie to get you out of the conversation, but an actual reason as to why he didn’t make you happy all the time.

But you were done explaining yourself, done talking about him, done emotionally draining yourself on this man. “I’m tired of second guessing my every move, I’m tired of always trying to figure out what I did wrong to set him off, I’m tired of walking on eggshells I just” and you took a deep breath before letting out the words that had been swirling around in your mind for far too long “I don’t think I can do this anymore”

“Okay” he nodded trying to keep his face neutral though you noticed his small sigh of relief at your words, the act almost making your chuckle “what do you want to do about it?”

And though a part of you wished he would tell you what to do you were glad he didn’t push the obvious answer onto you. Because though it was objectively the correct answer it was ultimately your decision and Anakin was showing you that, showing you that you still had some power, you weren’t helpless.

“I think I need to break up with him” and it shocked you how easily the words came out, how once they were out there you didn’t regret them for a second.

Anakin stayed silent for a moment, nodding his head softly before slowly standing back up to his full height “do you want me to come with you?”

You shook your head, a small smile naturally lifting the corners of your lips “no, I need to do it alone”

“I’ll be right outside of your door then” he nodded back to you, a small smile growing on his lips in response “non-negotiable”

“With chocolate?”

And he chuckled fondly at that, a small shake in his head and an expression you hadn’t realized how badly you missed on his face as he agreed “I think I can swing that”

And you felt yourself chuckling genuinely back at that, nothing close to a full laugh but for right now it was more than enough, it felt good.

“Tomorrow though” he interjected, grabbing your hand and nodding to the door “come on you can crash in my room”

“No I should go back I don’t want to…” and you realized where your sentence was going just a second too late “…start a fight”

You watched his expression harden at that, his smile slowly slipping from his lips as he held onto your hand still, raising his eyebrows at you slightly in response.

“Sorry force of habit” you tried to laugh it off though you know it didn’t fully work, feeling yourself slip back into old habits and reaching for excuses “It’s just especially since so many of our fights were about how close you and I were-“

And you felt his grip on your hand tighten at that, not enough to hurt but enough to notice, before he pulled you softly after him as he headed to the door, his voice coming out slightly more clipped than before as he spoke “If he tries anything I will handle him”

“No it’s okay I can-“

“I will handle him” he cut you off quickly, his voice dropping lower as he met your gaze, silently daring you to say otherwise.

And you couldn’t help but laugh, recognizing enough of the old angry Anakin you were used to, another part of him you hadn’t realized you had missed.

You bumped your shoulder into his as you walked beside him towards his room “I don’t deserve you Ani”

And he chuckled softly at that, letting go of your hand to wrap his arm around your shoulders bringing you into a side hug, your head resting comfortably on his shoulder as he did so “darling you deserve so much better”

#anakin x reader #Anakin Skywalker #anakin fanfiction #anakin skywalker imagine #anakin imagine #anakin fic #anakin x you #anakin x y/n #anakin skywalker x reader #anakin skywalker fic #anakin skywalker x you #star wars fanfiction #star wars imagine #star wars x you #star wars x reader

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mae-i-scribble · 1 year

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tonight i was thinking about orv’s theme about how yjh as a character, and to a larger extent people, will in some ways always be unknowable. (orv spoilers following, read at your own risk)

i feel like i’ve seen a few posts on here that somewhat take this theme to an extreme, leaning *hard* into that “kdj doesn’t actually know yjh like at all” which while on the right track, i feel completely misses the point. Orv goes out of its way to showcase that kdj actually understands yjh to a scary degree, even once they’re out of the early scenarios and the gap between kdj’s knowledge and yjh’s personhood grows larger, there are still things about yjh that *only* kdj can fundamentally understand. And I don’t think that the novel does anything to discredit that understanding, only says that there is much more to yjh. In the same manner, even if you’ve known someone for years, spent all your time with them, there can and will always be new things for you to learn about them. The danger that orv speaks of is trusting in that assumption, that your understanding will be enough and you don’t have to keep an eye out for more developments. That the person you know will forever stay the same. And this isn’t a kdj problem either, fundamentally a lot of the big disagreements that happen between kdj and yjh in the latter half of the novel are born from both of them misconstruing what the other is thinking, trusting that their understanding of the other is deep enough to base their judgements off of. (Post first murim destruction, divorce arc, yjh thinking kdj scattered his soul on purpose, etc.)

As always with orv’s themes, we can view it in a meta sense as well. Kdj’s understanding of yjh as a character is so complete that it’s nearly flawless- until the story begins to deviate and a yjh grows outside the parameters that kdj’s judgements are based on. Even before then, there was always more to yjh- but as readers, we can only understand a character as much as we see them. What you come away with from a story is your complete understanding, there is no growth outside of those boundaries because then it wouldn’t be an understanding of *that* character, you would be putting your own ideas and such into it. But talk to another person, and suddenly the same character you understand so clearly becomes someone else. Talk to the author, and they say something completely different. And can one truly claim to understand a character when the story will never talk about them in every conceivable way? What does it take to truly understand such a thing? Learning that 1863rd round hsy wrote ways of survival with such limited resources and knowledge on who yjh even is, and yet despite it all, still manages to write a story that captures so much of his essence. As orv readers, we know it isn’t everything- it could never encapsulate all of yjh, but the idea that even when one knows nearly nothing, you can still put on a facade of understanding.

We can get into a chicken or the egg argument with this, as 1863!hsy dictates how yjh acts with her writing, and that yjh in the 1863rd round is the one she comes to know before ever starting this story, but when it comes to this theme of the unknowable in the people around us, I don’t think this sort of debate is worth much. We know that yjh exists outside the story written, and how much of him is determined by hsy’s writing is negligible because no matter what, he always grows beyond it. Whether as 1864 or secretive plotter, it all comes back to that same point of there is always more to see within a person.

I don’t know quite where I want to go with this, only that I wanted an outlet for some of these thoughts inside my head, but one of the best things about this theme for me is how it answers itself. When the people around you become unrecognizable, what should you do? And orv says to reach out. To try. To understand. Kdj loses access to omniscient reader several times but always, always gains it back in orv (as far as i remember), because at the end of the day, he is not someone who stays trapped in his idea of who he knows yjh to be. Yjh too, even at the end of orv, is trying to learn more and more about kdj. Only when you are willing to hear out the other person, to learn about them every day, does this unknowable aspect become something less daunting.

#orv #omniscient reader #omniscient readers viewpoint #kim dokja #yoo joonghyuk #joongdok #meta #analysis #it just kinda ended up kdj and yjh focused because this is what the theme is most applicable too #i wish i had more thoughts on how 1863 wrote WoS bc that definitely fits in here more than what i said about it #i think too it can be applied to ysa and kdj #while not as relevant as it is with yjh since their relationship doesnt stretch back as far #they still spend so much of this novel learning more and more about each other #compared to back at minosoft where at least to me it looked like they already had an idea of who the other was as a person #so sorry if this is disjointed i need to stop writing meta as 3 am #in my defense its the only time my thoughts come out like this #on the verge of sleep #orv spoilers #omniscient reader spoilers #i forgot them early on my bad

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blossomthepinkbunny · 27 days

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The sins not being really sinful and how I would rewrite them

So we have met four of the seven deadly sins so far and I feel like three of them were pretty mishandled.

I have seen a lot of people talk about how the sins were really undermined and don't really present each of their sins well. We know Asmodeus as the sin of Lust, Beelzebub for Gluttony, Mammon for Greed and Lucifer as the leader of hell and the sin of Pride. And in my opinion the only one who makes sense as one of the seven deadly sins is Mammon.

He might be one of my favourite characters from either show because he is genuinely entertaining and is the only sin we've seen so far who fits the description. Lucifer has nothing that says pride about him (though that might not be explored in HH as the sins are more relevant in HB). And for Beelzebub and Asmodeus the scenes people often refer to when talking about them not fitting their sin are the one were Beelzebub worries about Blitzø when hes partying too hard and the one were Asmodeus talks about lust not being about force and agreeing with consent.

It seems to not make sense as to why the embodiments of gluttony and lust would care about someones well being or consent. Because a lot of people argue that the inherent idea of a sin is to be hurtful and not good. Which makes sense because someone partying and indulging in wild behaviour occasionally or someone following their desires and acting on them aren't things that are necessarily bad. It only becomes bad when it becomes too much and one starts hurting others and affecting them negatively.

That is why most people would agree that Mammon is the best written sin, because he actually gets to be an asshole and we get to see the negativity of his Greed. But to me there is more to it than that.

One thing I saw being brought up is that the sins would obviously want people to want to indulge in them. That's why Beelzebub wanted Blitzø out of her party, because he was ruining the vibe for the others with his obnoxious behaviour. And also why Asmodeus wouldn't want sexual assault to happen, since then only one person would want to experience lust. So while this makes sense it still ignores the fact that sinning is something bad you shouldn't do.

For me it should be shown as something you would wanna do, but also as something you shouldn't because you either hurt others or yourself. This is why I liked how Mammon was presented. He encapsulated the ideas of both sides. We got to see why someone would want to be like him, through seeing that he makes people happy with his shows and the obviously wealthy lifestyle he lives which is desirable for others to have. But we also got to see the side of his character that qualifies him as a sin, when we see how he treats Fizzarolli and we get to understand why one shouldn't be all Greedy like him, because it hurts others.

Mammons writing (wether intentional or not in that regard) is very good at showing us the good and bad sides to being Greedy. And while some people might say that the sins should only be presented as negative (which is also fine), I think it would also be good to show us why someone would want to be involved with the sin in the first place.

For Beelzebub and Asmodeus the issue is mainly that we don't really dive into the bad sides of their sin. That is mostly because these are characters Vivzepop doesn't want to present as negative which isn't necessarily bad in theory but it then makes no real sense as to why they would be sins.

Gluttony is all about overindulgence. It's something being too much. And the partying presents that well, but when Beelzebub starts to tell Blitzø to stop it stops feeling genuine, because he is basically doing what her sin is all about and she has a problem with it. Beelzebub's situation was pretty easy to fix as well. I would've just written it so that she doesn't care about Blitzø when he gets all drunk. It would be clear why Gluttony is something a Demon would want to indulge in, with partying of course being fun and sometimes you just needing to let loose. But the excessive drinking and the chaos that Blitzø causes while he obviously isn't okay would show why you should never be gluttonous like her, because it's destructive and unhealthy.

The Demons at the party and Beelzebub should hype Blitzø up and encourage him to keep going, while Loona realizes that this isn't good and would force Blitzø to leave for his own well being.

In Ozzies case it's a bit more difficult because what some people take issue with is the fact that he cares about consent. And im not going to say that they have to make him agree with rape for him to represent Lust. But we also never get to see bad sides of his sin. I feel like that is something that could be solved with the show acknowledging that Lust isn't just about sex. While it is often purely associated with that it's actually more about satisfying your desires and acting on your needs without care for others. That can also be in regard to money, possessions or status.

They could've made Asmodeus purely care for what he desires (for which they wouldn't necessarily have to focus on sex) and show how that might be affecting Fizz. Then we could see that the good sides to Lust include satisfying your needs and experiencing pleasure, which is why someone would want to indulge in it. But also that just taking what you want isn't good for other people, which is why you wouldn't want to do that.

And Lucifer is just not representing his sin at all. Atleast I didn't recognize anything that has to do with pride from how he was characterized. In my opinion they could have just gone full out bad for how he presents his sin. Because pride is often interpreted as the original and therefore worst sin Lucifers reason for not being active with leading hell or interacting with his daughter could just be that he is too prideful to do that.

Otherwise I wouldn't mind giving him the same treatment as how the other sins sould be treated in my opinion. Maybe the good thing about him is that due to his pride the demons view him as a worthy and strong leader who they respect, while his pride is also what causes him to not interact with Charlie since he sees himself as too good for that.

Though I get that this would basically change his whole character and that that would involve showing him to be flawed and not just the silly little guy Viv wants him to be (I would prefer it like that but idk).

That's why I think the sins we have been introduced to so far don't really work and how I would rewrite the them so that they would be more like my love Mammon.

#helluva boss critical #vivzepop critical #hazbin hotel critical #helluva boss critique #helluva boss criticism

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hellfire-fist · 8 months

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This is an appetizer for my upcoming "ZoLu in the Live Adaption: borderline delusional analysis by a humble shipper"

The chemistry?????? I wasn't even pretending to be clueless about their scenes when I started watching, but WOW—the actors delivered their whole entire being into playing Zoro and Luffy, it's wild.

Where do I even begin 😭

Iñaki, God bless this child, he really encapsulated Luffy's character well, but I have to be honest, to me, he's more of a variation of the original, I mean obviously. You can tell they tinkered with Luffy a little, and I haven't decided if I'm truly okay with it. But I love this Luffy, like what everyone has been saying, we love him in every universe/medium. Anyhow~ the way he looks at Zoro is just straight out of a romance novel. He looks at him with so much awe, like the mere sight of Zoro gets him so giddy it's so asfskdjklagslshkskahs don't even get me started on how he first held sight of Zoro, he fanboyed so hard 😭 his facial expressions were so cute 🥹 I just—it really was the perfect way to translate Luffy's veneration and approval of Zoro. 10/10

Now with Zoro 🧘🏻��♀️ (there's a lot here)

In every universe he truly is just whipped for Luffy. Granted, he was full of distrust in the first episode which was normal in his situation. Him somehow going along with Luffy's whims in one way or another is just comedic and quite romantic really. It's crazy how they have so much pull towards each other, even without them intending to 😫

Props to Mackenyu because he played the fascination with Luffy so well. That scene where monkeyboy got him out of the cross, and asked him to close the hole for him?? Zoro's facial expression in that scene was one of intrigue and *mild* curiosity. And then we get to Syrup Village and he just couldn't hide the fondness anymore, it was so funny to me. Like even if I take off the romantic lenses I have for this ship, the way Zoro just looks at Luffy—it's like he's barely holding it together. Like he can't believe he's following this boy, but it just feels so right you know? 🥹

The fcking dialogue he had with Cabaji fcking killed me.

"Got somewhere else to be?"

"didn't used to think so but Luffy changed that" BOY—

Luffy literally changed this man's brain chemistry, he gave him DIRECTION! how can I not be feral about this??? HOW TF 😭

anime and manga Zoro would be so proud of L-A! Zoro.

#there's more I have to say but I have to chill #I'm in college y'all forgive me #one piece live action #one piece live adaptation #one piece #roronoa zoro #monkey d luffy #zoro #luffy #strawhat pirates #strawhats #zolu #otp

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grassbreads · 1 year

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What Tai Sui is and Why Everyone Should Read It

So if you follow me, over the past couple weeks, you've probably noticed me obsessively screenshotting and posting about a book called Tai Sui. And now that I've finished it, I'd like to try and convince y'all to give it a chance.

What Is Tai Sui?

Tai Sui is a chinese web novel—a relatively unpopular work by the very popular author Priest (author of Guardian and Sha Po Lang, among others). Unlike a lot of the most popular web novels on tumblr, it's not a danmei. It's in fact rather important to the plot and themes that there is almost entirely no romance, but I promise you, it is absolutely worth it regardless.

What is Tai Sui About?

Tai Sui is a steampunk xianxia cultivation story. For those unfamiliar with xianxia and cultivation, this is a particular genre of Chinese historical fantasy.

The official summary of Tai Sui reads as follows:

“If I had a choice, I would only want to be a little insect in the mundane dust, born in confusion, dying in mediocrity, never seeing the light of day beneath the fog of Jinping City.

Better than taking this wrong road to heaven.”

You may have noticed that this summary is not in fact really a summary. It gives you a glimpse into the story's themes, mood, and destination, but it doesn't exactly tell you what happens in it.

That's because Tai Sui is one of those works that's incredibly hard to summarize. The story is incredibly wide in scope and changes massively over its course, to the point that any summary that encapsulates the whole thing is going to feel like a spoiler. However, I can try my best to add a little detail without giving too much away.

Tai Sui is the story of Xi Ping—an obnoxious, trouble-making rich boy with no interest in cultivation—who gets unwittingly involved in a plot to resurrect the "evil god" Tai Sui. This plot pulls him into the cultivation world against his will and, over time, threatens to rewrite everything he is.

Tai Sui is the end of immortality.

Why Should You Read Tai Sui?

Tai Sui is one of the most compelling stories I have ever read. It is a love letter to the power and promise of the whole world and its many mundane people. It also has some of the best worldbuilding I have ever seen.

Tai Sui is written in omniscient perspective, and though Xi Ping is very much the main character, as the story progresses, we spend more and more time alongside characters that aren't him. By the time the novel ends, his entire continent is at stake, and we the audience know that continent and its troubles inside and out from countless angles. Everyone from the immortal demigods of the cultivation world to the most wretched, miserable paupers is given a grand sense of emphasis.

Tai Sui is a deconstruction of the cultivation genre. It establishes a magic/cultivation system and its history, lets the main character live in that system for a while, and then dives deep into that system's depths. It looks at the cultivation genre, at the idea of people who leave behind their status as mortals for greater things, and asks "How does this really work?" and "Is this how the world should be?"

Tai Sui is the story of countless people who were never supposed to be powerful coming together to make the world a better place. It's well written (and very well translated), exciting, heartbreaking, and incredibly beautiful. It's also funny as hell.

I cannot recommend this story enough.

Warnings/Caveats

As I said before, Tai Sui is a deconstruction of the cultivation genre. If you're unfamiliar with this genre, while the book is certainly readable, you are going to be thrown head first into the deep end with the tropes and terminology at play. It's absolutely worth the learning curve, but it will be kind of a lot. Maybe do some light googling about what a cultivator is before you pick it up. (Or just ask a fan. I think most of us would happily explain anything that would win a new reader).

There are portrayals of people/cultures in Tai Sui that are heavily inspired by minority cultures in real-world China, and some of these portrayals play into pretty harmful stereotypes. It's not SPL "Barbarian" or TGCF Banyue levels of racist, but it's something to be aware of and careful about. I'd really recommend reading from the perspectives of those from the cultures in question (including but not limited to the post I linked) for more about the issues I'm talking about.

Tai Sui's English translation is 930,000 words long. I believe this is a strength, since its length is what allows it such an incredible scope. It is also a fucking daunting commitment, and I acknowledge that.

Finally, while Tai Sui doesn't need too many trigger warnings, it does contain some pretty viscerally upsetting depictions of inequality and mistreatment, as well as a few instances of violence toward children. You can't uplift without first seeing what the people need uplifting from, and hooboy. They need it.

There's also some scenes that are technically rather violent, but the goriness is not presented as gore, if that makes sense. It never feels intensely or overly violent in the way some fantasy novels do.

Links

If all my gushing and propagandizing has convinced you to give it a try, you can find the original Chinese version (where you can buy chapters to support the author) on JJWXC.

The complete English translation is free on the website of E. Danglars, who does a truly incredible job with the translating.

Happy reading :).

#my desperate shot at propagandizing now that my followers have sat through months of on and off obsessive tai sui posting #besties it is genuinely so good #it made me cry. and that is a fcking feat.#tai sui #priest #cnovel #webnovel #long post #I'm not putting a readmore on this bc I want to force y'all to look at it #sorry #book rec #invasion of the frogs

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alicedrawslesmis · 24 days

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I know I just said I didn't want to just be complaining about everything so I'll try to word this in a more constructive way asdfghjkl

It's hard to be an Eponine fan in a world where the musical -and On My Own specifically- is sooooo mainstream. Because imo as much as On My Own itself is kind of a half-decent, if simplified, encapsulation of Eponine's struggle with her love for Marius if you analise the lyrics in isolation, the musical as a whole, her role in the narrative as the unrequited love diva (I'm also simplifying here. I don't think this is super fair to the anglo musical, but compared to the book there's no question of how they reworked her into a glamorous 80s diva contralto because musical theatre has usually very strict gender roles), did her so dirty. So dirty. And imo often her character is reduced to her pining in fandom as a result. And I don't like that, personally.

I love that girl so much. I love that she is just young enough to still be a child but adult enough to be aware of her social role. She has one foot in the gamin life and one foot in the adult world. I love the tragedy that is the fact that she likes the beauty and pomp of high society girls and wish she could have silk shoes but knowing she can't.

And also being super resigned to her class despite it, she doesn't believe she ever will have any of that. She resents that too, somewhat. The tragedy of her knowing that she couldn't be with Marius because of his social class and her accepting that (angrily? sadly?). I love her self-banishment as his guard dog because of this. I love her drunk sailor voice. I love how manipulative she is and that she isn't Marius's friend at all. He's just her one neighbor who wasn't a total asshole one time. He was, later. But not at first. And she can't be in his head and know he thinks she's kinda despicable because crime because Marius is a judgemental little shithead.

And Eponine isn't an idealist, she's resigned to her position. I understand why she gets paired with grantaire in fics but her canon narrative parallel is Javert, they both believe they are excluded from society from their outcast position and so become the watchdogs for it. Eponine a kind of guardian (in her own words a devil, not an angel) and Javert the same. That's why he's the one person who sees her in the barricade, he's the same as her. Marius saw her but that's only cause he had a use for her in that moment, as soon as she didn't he forgot all about it.

I think also Gavroche, with his ability to be kind of a figure above the narrative, with his gamin skills of being almost omnipresent is something Eponine used to have, but with her age she's starting to lose that. She's starting to grown old enough that she's required to be IN the world and not supercede it. Gavroche is also almost there, if he had been allowed to grow up he would've lost that ability too. They both inhabit this sort of magical surreal world superimposed on our own.

A lot of Les Mis and Notre Dame de Paris can be kinda described as magical realism, I would go so far as calling them urban fantasy. And characters like Babet, Thenardier sometimes, Gavroche, Eponine (and Javert sometimes as well) are inhabiting this magically charged layer. This reality that's imposed Over the real world.

Talking about that One Series Of Wizard Books is a bit passé rn so uh. Doctor Who. Particularly the initial New Who seasons before they got that huge budget. That's a good parallel to what I'm getting at. The real world is still the same but there are certain characters that inhabit this mystical overlayer and are able to transverse from one to the other (Javert can't really because he is stuck forever outside and the second he understands that you CAN'T be an unbiased outsider who only enforces the norm without participating he freaks out and literally dies about it). Eponine is right in the eye of the storm tho. She manipulates reality to get her way, to die with Marius, because that's as close as she can get to being with him. And she manipulates reality to protect him too. Contradictions be damned. She has many contradictory feelings that make her complex and cool and an awesome character whom I love and wish would stop being reduced to the glamurous mysical theatre role with a single black stain on her face and a beautiful actor and a big unrequited love song about a random boy (whose personality was also changed for the musical and I argue is probably the character that was most fucked up by it in the public perception because he's such an weird little self-insert of an even weirder guy. But I get it, the musical is long enough as it is).

Anyway, I wish eponine could be more of a mongrel, a little gremlin. A little rat child that's just beginning to grow into an adult and is self aware of her role in the narrative society. She's a teenage girl which already sucks to go through when you're not constantly starving and cold and being forced by your father to work and do con jobs. Marius is the object she attaches herself to, but it could've been literally anything. Javert did that with the social order, he protects and guards it. She just chose Some Guy instead. Which, we all have that one friend who does that too. Like girl you're too good for him. Come on let's get you sone ice cream. And clean clothes and a roof. Literally anything. Bread.

I think if Eponine had a roof over her head and like, food on the regular she would forget Marius exists. Same as Cosette if she had moved to England. Like he'd be that one intense crush they had as teenagers. Can't say the same for him tho. He would hold onto that for the rest of time.

#rambling #idk. anyone has any thoughts?#if you disagree with me. go right ahead and say your piece! I'm open to being contradicted here #I'm no authority asdfghkkflsbsg like I'm just some rando on the internet with a les mis blog #long post

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nyaagolor · 1 month

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What are your thoughts on Apollo Justice (the character)?

OH BOY. OHHHHHH BOY. I have a fever and some free time lfg.

So honestly, I think part of the reason I love Apollo so much is because he runs parallel to Phoenix but also counter to him at the same time. I always saw Simon and Athena as the successors-- in terms of ideology and job and all that other stuff-- to the Phoenix-Edgeworth dynamic and status rather than Apollo and Klavier. Athena and Simon, to me, feel like extensions of the arcs of Phoenix and Edgeworth + the vibes of the original trilogy. Apollo and Klavier ( who I will not talk about bc we will be here all day)? They're the antithesis.

Apollo Justice The Game directly foils the original trilogy in so many ways, but I think even on a more base thematic level it runs counter to a lot of the ideas that we take for granted about the original trilogy, and because Apollo sits at the center of this, the things I love about the game are encapsulated in why I like him. There are a ton of themes in the ace attorney trilogy-- support networks, faith, trust, the truth-- and Apollo is defined by their limits, their failures, and their absence. He is let down, kicked around, defined by abandonment and betrayal and distrust. Apollo is defined by everything that Phoenix is not, and bc of how the timeline goes we don't really get any retribution for that, just a steady march forward, and I think that gives me a lot to think about with his character

Phoenix's arc right from Turnabout Sisters is about the building of a support network, and the ways that developing this support is integral for when things go wrong. We contrast Phoenix with Godot, Maya with Dahlia, and see how people left to stew in their resentment can chase vengeance to dark places (wow I wonder who also does this after the death of a dear friend leading to a crusade of misplaced revenge that almost leads someone they care about being killed.). With Apollo we get to stand on the precipice of resolution, but the important part is we don't get it. Apollo's life falls off the rails, and he's the one left to pick up the pieces.

We see through him how our trust can be betrayed by people of good and bad intentions, and the lingering consequences that has on one's ability to not only trust the people around them but themselves. And yeah!! That's why I adore him so much-- he's tested not by the possibility of failure like Phoenix often is, but climbing up from the reality of it. It's less "how do we make our way out of this mess before it goes nuclear" and more "things are already destroyed-- where do we go from here?". It has more of an element of recovery than prevention to me, and I think that's a fascinating avenue to explore in stories like these. Apollo pushes the envelope of the themes of the narrative and the characters-- he is the epitome of what it looks like when things fall apart, and it gives him and the trilogy characters something to reconcile

A lot of people have complained that Apollo barely feels like the protagonist in his own game, but that's honestly a huge part of the reason why I love him so much. He's defined by the spaces between, the limits and failures of things we had up to this point taken to be true, and left with a pretty limited degree of autonomy through it all. He's pushed around and puppeteered by people who mean well and those who don't, and I feel like a major theme of AA4 that I love but don't often see talked about is "what does it mean to have autonomy-- and by extension, control? What does it mean to take it back? What does it mean to lose it, and what does it mean when you'd do anything to keep it." Most of what I said is only partially resolved bc AA4 is... a game. A technically finished game. but!! Because it eviscerates our expectations of the franchise so thoroughly AND leaves open so many avenues, it makes Apollo and the rest of his crew some of my favorite characters because there's so much you can think about and do with them!!

also he's like. An insect to me. <3

#apollo justice #ace attorney #meta #mod vex #ask #im sick rn and I'm Tired so I didn't edit this

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mapoeggplant · 10 months

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skip to loafer chapter 53 // spoilers

the analogy of between a crab and falling in love: what’s hidding in between all the sand that shima hides himself in?

this chapter kinda encapsulates a lot of unresolved plots and bring back things that were discussed before, as a way to, little by little, start to close shima’s arc on understanding his feelings. and, for my happiness (and for a lot of you guys reading me, i supposed), we finally had a confirmation that shima doesn’t quite understand or can’t even separate his feelings inside him, all because of his history with rejection, broken family, and the coldness of the ones around him. the boy, who tries to grasp his sandy feelings, who stubbornly kept slipping between his fingers, is finally dipping his toes in the ocean.

what mukai and shima discussed at the sauna is very important for a lot of things. not only for the present narrative, but for a context in general about how skip to loafer deals with feelings and love. instead of approaching a safe solution and going for the “she was the one who could save him”, takamatsu-senpai chose to go through the more complicated and bumpier road: she started to make her own characters question the idea of romantic love that was shoved down their (and ours) throat since they were born.

is not that shima doesn’t love mitsumi — he just doesn’t understand the concept of romantic feelings or how everything “ends” with it (it was interesting to me how he said “ends”, the never-ending idea that romantic love is the final goal. it never “starts anything; it’s always “the end” of things). for him, everything falls in the same blurry and messed up category and end as easily as it started. however now, after years and years of being shutten down and used for people’s own selfish desires, shima is finally free to think and act for himself. but we don’t learn to swim at the bottom of the ocean: we need to start at the beach.

mukai telling shima that he’s often shutting people down and pushing people away without noticing was there for two main reasons, in my opinion: one, show a little more about mukai himself and his own feelings in relation to shima, a friend that he holds dear and wants to see opening up a little more, warming himself towards others; and two, to make shima start to question “what am i doing to the people that care about me?”. this is a trigger that sensei used to bring back a lot of important moments between shima and mitsumi and connect the dots inside his head. what i didn’t expect was that she would such beautiful analogy: a crab.

by swimming around their past, shima starts to ask himself: how does mitsumi feels about me. it’s funny how, even after all that conversation with mukai, he didn’t start with the obvious and questioned himself. he was thinking about her — about the other. what brough him back to his own heart was the girl herself, without both even realizing it.

grabbing the crab in the middle of it is the safest option. you’re protecting yourself of a possibility of being hurt and are able to maintain a safe distance from all the dangerous attributes of the crab. by always staying in the middle of his own feelings and never really going for the claws of his own mind, shima maintained his safety and “never got hurt” (and here i strictly mean hurt by his own ghosts, who he tried to deny instead of facing it). i mean, if he doesn’t move, they won’t be able to attack him. if he stays protected, there won’t be a necessity of changing what you know so well.

but…there’s always a first time, right? and i don’t mean this only for the act of holding a crab: this might be shima’s not only first time doing so, but also the first time he ever felt something different for someone — something more. something he never met before.

and mitsumi, on the other hand, appear serene on his eyes. she did have her first time already — and was bitten by the crab. she was the one who put herself out there and risked being hurt. and, unfortunately, he was the one who made this happen.

by shima’s reaction (the full-on blush), it’s easy to interpretate that he had some kind of realization and that…well...yeah it involves the crab. and mukai. and mitsumi. and the beach. and the ocean. and the sand, that he could never grasp before. what did he realize? he himself isn’t sure, as he tells mukai (“how was the crab?” “i don’t know). and, well, how can someone who has never seen a crab be so sure that what they are seeing is, in fact, a crab?

sensei made it clear, with all the words, with mukai being a sensei for a day: shima is, for the first time in his life, having to deal with a feeling that’s completely new and scary for him. romantic love isn’t easy. for a kid who grew watching his own understanding of romantic love (his parents) be so broken and twisted, romantic love is something that can only cause harm. so no, it’s not that he doesn’t understand love per se: he just doesn’t know how to approach it within himself. it’s up to him, now, if he's going to sing his hands in the sand and find the answer for all the questions he’s dealing with.

as for my last words, what i want to remind everyone: no, it won’t be resolved so fast. not next chapter and, maybe, nor the next. i mean, why should it be? love, be it platonic or not, isn’t something to be forced out of someone. it’s something that requires more than a simple “yes or no”, something that doesn’t grow overnight. none of them are wrong. mitsumi never imposed something on him, she only did what her heart told her to do. shima never wanted to hurt her in some way — in fact, this is one of his biggest fears, up to now. they both are trying to understand themselves, the world, and the universe. they are in the apices of their teenage years, in the apices of committing mistakes for dumb reasons and for sealing peace with simplicity. they all have lot of different crabs with lot of different meanings hiding inside their particular beaches. it’s up to them if they are going to start digging it or not.

and, as always, thank you thank you so much for reading what i have to say and my crazy rambling. i hope that we can now start a great discussion about it 💛 oh and people!! don't be afraid of talking to your crab — sometimes they know more bout us than ourselves 🦀

🌻 this analyze was originally posted on my twitter

#skip to loafer #skip and loafer #skip to loafer chapter 53 #this analyze feels like all my other analyzed compacted in one iofjasifja #i will never stop studying these kids #specially shima #shima I love you sm #as your mother I'm very proud #duckmetas

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maleyanderecafe · 3 months

Text

Rot with Me (Visual Novel)

Created by: Gothic Ilustrations

Genre: Horror/Romance

Rot with Me is a short game created for #72HourMurderboyMayhem jam, and it does a good job with the horror elements it has for the endings. I like how some of the endings go more into the gothic horror that the game is running with, which is always very fun. You can find more from this creator at @gothic-illustrations.

The story starts with the MC going on a hike and getting lost in the forest. As it starts to rain, they spot a giant mansion and run inside of it for shelter. While feeling guilty for essentially running into someone's house, they meets a strange man who welcomes them. He introduces himself as Fyodor Voronin and they introduce themselves back. The two talk about why Fyodor is living there and that they are the first person to come to his manor for a while. Fyodor shows them around, inviting them to dance. Accepting it will make Fodor very happy and he ends up dragging them into the basement.

The basements is filled with a lot of bodies, blood and various diagrams of the human body, all with the same Y-shaped scar that Fyodor has. Fyodor basically traps the MC into the basement and they look around for information. Upon looking around the MC finds taht Fyodor has an obsession with killing (well, specifically plunging a knife into someone's chest) and as a result attempts to extend his lifespan so he can continue to kill. He finds something called the Crawling Rot, which extends his life, however, still causes his body to rot, thus why he seems to be replacing parts of himself.

The MC can choose to wait for Fyodor, which results in him declaring that he will keep the MC in his manor forever. Whether or not the MC feels alright with this determines a slight variation of the ending, though in the end, they are trapped with Fyodor forever.

If the MC decides to call upon the Crawling Rot, they will perform a ritual on one of the decaying bodies, which summons them. The MC talks about how Fyodor made a deal with them and that he hasn't paid back his end of the bargain. When Fyodor comes back down, the Crawling Rot drags him away into another dimension, with Fyodor begging for the MC's help before disappearing. After this, the Crawling Rot offers to make the MC a proposition to become a debt collector, essentially finding and making people who owe the Crawling Rot pay.

If the MC agrees, they are infected with the Crawling Rot, and become the debt collector for them.

If the MC refuses, the Crawling Rot leaves, and the MC returns back to their normal life.

If throughout the visit, the MC decides to be distant towards Fyodor (giving him a fake name, not dancing with him), he will fall in love, but instead try to take the MC's heart instead. Being captured will result in Fyodor succeeding in cutting out the MC's heart to make their own. If the MC successfully escape, they will attempt to call the police, but will only find the MC's missing items and will be anxious constantly about what they saw.

The story itself feels very gothic horrory, mostly from the characters themselves as well as Fyoder's ties to the Crawling Rot itself. It's kind of neat. The is only one sense of sound within the entire game, which is the sound of the music that plays when the two are dancing (or rather about to dance) which I thought was an interesting choice, but does add to the eeriness of the game itself. Personally, I really like the design of the Crawling Rot, the way their chest opens up and the eyes crying blood really does contrast with the other white tones of a more ethereal being. Fyoder's life of killing and then remaking himself really does encapsulate the kind of gothic horror feel that I think the creator was going for, even in some endings using the MC's own heart to replace his own. It's pretty cool that we can end up being the Crawling Rot's debt collector in the end, with the description of how when it does enter the MC's body, that they described it at something right, that has always been there. In terms of a yandere, Fyoder encapsulates this in two endings- one where he keeps the MC forever against their will (or cooperating) where likely they live with the MC until their deaths, or when the MC tries to escape and fail, taking their heart to keep forever, along with whatever remains of their body. I'm not sure why he doesn't seem to run after the MC after they escape the mansion, possibly some magic that won't allow him to leave, but there are implications that it does haunt the MC afterwards, something that never leaves their mind.

Overall, a pretty cool and short game made for the jam. Though it is a work in progress, I think that it's pretty solid for a short game, as it goes in through some world building about how Fyoder and the Crawling Rot came to be. Might be cool to have a bit more of a romance with Fyoder in the future possibly in another update.

#Rot with Me #male yandere #yandere #yandere boy #recommendations #visual novel #completed

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makeitastrength · 3 months

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What are your top 5 cold opens??

Do you mean Rookie cold opens, or just for any show ever? Because this is probably my favorite cold open of all time:

youtube

Just kidding, obviously you mean The Rookie.

You know, for as many times as I’ve watched this show, you'd think this would be easy. Instead, my brain immediately blanked on most of the cold opens and I just spent 2 hours looking through all the episode transcripts and then rewatching a bunch of them and struggling to narrow it down.

(I couldn't find gifs for most of these so I decided to just use images; image sources are linked)

Top 5

2x06 Fallout I’m such a sucker for simple comedy, and this one is that for sure. Nolan’s steadily growing horror combined with the guy’s cheeky smile when Nolan realizes he has a dick piercing? Perfection. It cracks me up so much!

4x17 Coding Don’t get me wrong, I love a good short, comedic cold open. But this one… holy cow. It punches me in the heart every single time. It’s so intense and so sad, and just a really moving scene. I’m listing these chronologically, but if I was going in order, this one would probably be at the top.

5x09 Take Back Grey is such an underrated character, and I always love when he gets his own storyline. He’s typically so stoic and professional, so to see him completely out of his element is just endlessly hilarious to me.

5x13 Daddy Cop This is another one that just makes me laugh every time. It’s such an annoyingly catchy and hilarious song. And Celina singing along at the end is really just the icing on the cake.

5x16 Exposed I mean… isn't it obvious? We start off with Chenford in bed together, with Tim curled towards her and his head basically laying on her pillow. Which is just adorable. And then we immediately transition to Lucy being just an absolute badass. This cold open encapsulates the softness of their relationship, Lucy’s UC skills, and Tim’s unwavering support for her so well.

Honorable Mentions

Because there are so many other good ones!

1x13 Caught Stealing This one makes the list because it's the first time we ever really see Tim mess with Lucy. Like... the fact that he could get mad at her, but instead he takes a picture of her and makes t-shirts? I love it!

1x19 The Checklist Again, simple yet funny. And Talia’s reaction to meeting Will.I.Am is probably the funniest moment we ever saw from her.

2x14 Casualties This one just cracks me up. That’s really all I can say.

4x02 Five Minutes The only reason this one didn’t make the top five is because the boot prank is just one tiny piece of the entire cold open. Which is also a good scene… just not quite top 5.

4x22 Day in the Hole It was hard for me to push this one out of the top five because this scene has so much. Chenford bickering like an old married couple. Tamara’s awful driving. She and Tim joking with each other. The fact that he gave her the name of his mechanic. And, of course, let’s not forget the fact that this scene sets up the entire Dim/Juicy storyline.

5x10 The List I mean. Do I even need to explain this one? If it was just the deciding what to wear scene, 100% this would be top five. But I get a lot of secondhand embarrassment from awkward scenes, and that date has some great moments but overall it’s just so awkward.

#asked and answered #this one was harder than I expected #but I also enjoyed going back through all the cold opens #the rookie #chenford #tim bradford #lucy chen #john nolan

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