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winters-rose-daughterofcain · 5 months

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Okay It's no long 2AM so Everlark and their mommy issue lets go lol and how their parents have impacted them and their relationship but the first one has a better ring. (This is actually part one it got too long so this is just Katniss sorry Peeta)

First, Katniss. Now I'm not here to just shit on Mrs Everdeen, I think my final opinion of her falls in the 'good person but bad parent' category. She was never malicious or cruel and would never do anything to intentionally hurt her children, she feels awful about how she reacted after Mr Everdeen's death and actively makes strides to improve and work on her and Katniss's relationship. Depression and grief are not pretty and as Katniss says, sometimes things happen to people and they're not quipped to deal with them. She even grows to empathise with and understand her mother eventually.

However her children were still starving, an eleven year old Katniss was still forced as her families main provider with no resources and no help, she was still parentified at a very young age and that had had a great effect on how she forms relationships and how she trusts people. The main way being that she doesn't, not without work. It takes her and Gale months to years of mutually beneficial back and forth and a foundation of a transactional relationship for her to allow him in, and even then never in a way in which she was relying on him for something she couldn't do herself. Mrs Everdeens kindness was a detriment in some ways, as Katniss has now internalised that people still have to capacity to hurt and leaver her no matter how much kindness and softness they show. Kind people are still a weakness to her she says it herself, but I think subconsciously she's a little wary of them. It takes work for Katniss to trust someone, they need to prove themself to be dependable and consistent, and I think that is a core value she looks for in a partner.

And with Mr Everdeen, Katniss has nothing less then positive memories of him, obviously coloured by her losing him as a child and that loss potentially erasing certain flaws in her memory, but regardless it's clear they had a very positive relationship. He taught her to hunt, to provide for the ones she loved and to keep herself alive, he was kind and strong and a man not unfamiliar with sacrifice, but he still retained the fundamental joy of music. He still retained this creative, useless to survival skill because he wanted to, because he valued it as something important to him and even if Katniss dismisses music in the beginning, it clearly holds great value to her as well.

The relationship between her parents before her father's death was honestly quite a good example for her. She grew up in a home where people loved each other, in a house of poverty yes, but a home where her mother lit up whenever she called her farther name, a home where her parents clearly adored each other and her and Prim and made no pretence of hiding or dimming it. The story of her mother's abandonment by her own family showing her early on however that this has not come without sacrifice. I think, due to her limited interactions with other people she internalised this version of love and relationships as the only true one, further confusing her later on when the messy situations she finds herself in and feeling love for do not match this image exactly, even if she's drawing similarities.

We as people are drawn to familiarity, it's the reason why a lot of people from abusive homes end up in abusive relationships, a burnt child loves the fire and all that. When we love, we intrinsically seek out things that feel familiar, because with familiarity comes a sense of safety whether or not that is actually the case. Katniss is drawn to Peeta partially because of the ways in which he reminds her of her father, she draws the connections constantly this isn't even speculation. She describes her father as strong, as kind, as a person who left her feeling safe, a feelings no ones arms have ever given her again until Peeta, again something she explicitly says. He also has the softer, more creative side that her father did, with art and painting instead of music yes, but he still holds room and importance on something seemingly useless and impractical at first glance.

With her mother I think is where Peeta's dependability come into play. Katniss longs for stability, she was never given it with her parents, and while not their fault or something they could control was damaging to her. She wants something unmoving something stable and dependable and reliable, someone who, while she's busy taking care of everyone else will take care of her, the role her mother should have taken. And who fills that for her? Peeta. His love for her, she admits in Mockingjay, was something she had as a given, as something unmovable, dependable. He is stability for her, he's strength and reliability because from the moment she stopped second guessing his intentions him and his love for her has been a constant.

She also draws parallels between her relationship with him and her parents relationship with each other a lot and narratively they parallel each other a lot, but other people have already talked at length about that. Their love may not be as uncomplicated as she remembers her parents being, but the similarities are there regardless. When Peeta is taken by the Capital Katniss loses it. She finally understands her mother. She doesn't say it explicitly, never actually says 'I love him' but it's excruciatingly obvious she does. The Katniss in Mockingjay in a girl in mourning. This also comes with her understanding her mother more, the comparison between Peeta and her father are not for lack of want, but Katniss resents the similarities between her and her mother at first, many girls do especially when their mother has let them down in some fundamental way. The wretched mirror of mother and daughter a curse as old as time. But the more Katniss lives, the more she understands her mother's life, the less she resents being similar to her, the more she grows to forgive her, allowing certain comparisons to come thought even more.

Her parent's and upbringing have played a big role in how she loves and who she loves, and it's so obvious in the progression of her and Peeta's relationship. Her initial distrust, her wanting to like him inspire of herself, their slow growing together, the absolute certainty she has of her care for him, how utterly destroyed she becomes after almost losing him, the fact that after everything, they were able to grow back together and find something worth having. Katniss choses Peeta for a lot of reasons, honestly there was never even a choice, but I think her upbringing and the ways in which she saw or didn't see her parents and their love in him definitely played a role.

#the hunger games #thg #katniss everdeen #peeta mellark #mr everdeen #mrs everdeen #everlark #katniss and peeta #part 1 #character analysis #Katniss my darling #deserved so much better #this is so messy but like I think it's coherent #definitely missing things but this is long enough

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nekropsii · 2 years

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what are your interpretations for those classes and aspects, out of curiousity? (or a link to an interpretation thats good)

[Re: This post.]

Okay, that's an incredibly complex, multi-tiered question. I'll try my best to summarize it as briefly as possible, though!!

FOR THE CLASSES:

The fact that Bards are the Wildcard Class is true, and I'm not going to dispute that... But I think the way that some people go about interpreting Bards is a bit weak. Oftentimes, they're made out to be forces of pure, unpredictable chaos, when... That's not the case at all. That has, in my opinion, never been the case. From my observation, the role of a Bard in the greater context of a Session isn't that they create Pure Unpredictability within the field of that Aspect, but rather that they're representative of Instability within the field of their Aspect. Those are two entirely different things. Bards do, in fact, have some greater purpose and reasoning behind their actions- it's just that those reasons might not make sense to someone who is particularly mentally stable- or, "hinged", as some might like to put it. Their status of being rather Unhinged and/or Unstable individuals is why they're known to Make or Break Sessions- especially since I'd argue that their existence may hint towards a general feeling of instability within that Aspect throughout the entire session... They are Passive Classes, after all.

Pages are not "Baby Knights", because that would fundamentally defeat the entire purpose of their journey and existence as a Class. Pages represent Lacking, and their journey revolves around Deficit- both in themselves, and in those around them. When their Deficit in their Aspect is healed or resolved somehow, they are stated to be one of the most powerful Classes from the viewpoint of baseline power. If a Page evolved into a Knight upon their full realization, that's not a victory. That's the start of an entirely new journey as a character with a power level that many, many people were able to start with. That's just a cruel joke, at that point. I have so many choice words for the whole "Pages evolve into Knights" theory that if I enable myself any more space to talk about it here, that's what the entire post will turn into, so I'll forcibly stop myself there.

FOR THE ASPECTS:

Doom is a very complicated Aspect, and it hurts my heart to see people boil it down to Misfortune and Death. That is... Nowhere near the full picture, and it's so saddening that no one ever seems to truly take the effort to dig deeper. It's also about Control, Self-Sacrifice, Restriction, Necessity, and so many other things. It's fascinating!! There's pros to being a Doom player- it's not all bad!! Also... The Doombound do not bring bad luck. Think of them like an Absol, from Pokemon- if one of them starts hanging around you a lot, their presence isn't going to kill you. It can, however, serve as an omen- the Doombound are attracted to those that are already Doomed. Come on.

Hope is not inherently good, nor is it inherently positive. In fact, we have yet to see a single example of a Hope player who is a happy person... Lol. Hope is about Belief, and that's an entirely neutral concept. My personal pet theory as to why Hope was elevated to be this paragon of good in the eyes of the fandom is that it has to do with the western world's relationship with Religion- especially the USA and its relationship with Christianity. That's a topic for another day, though... But anyways, Hope can very much so lead to toxic idealism, an inability to accept reality, and suffering... And quite easily, too! I'd argue it's actually a key part of the Aspect! It's not an inherently wholesome or fun Aspect. No Aspects are. That is how they work.

Rage is not "The Hope Aspect, but Evil", it is representative of Disbelief... Which is, you know, the actual opposite of Belief? I'm not sure why Rage gets so commonly misinterpreted as "The Evil Aspect", nor do I understand why they're so heavily related to Demons. Demons are a construct of Hope, actually, and so are Cults. Sorry! It's also not an inherently bad or negative Aspect- it's just Skepticism, Anger, and Pessimism... Which would sound bad, if you forget the fact that those are necessary parts of life in order to have an even moderately healthy experience with being alive.

I'm going to plug one of my besties here, because I will take literally any excuse to do so, and you kind of asked for it. @scalematez is an absolute scholar on the subject of Hope and Rage as Aspects, and she is the only person I've ever seen actually understand them on a deeper level without defaulting to some of the most common, rather egregious stereotypes regarding those Aspects. Here's an essay of hers about their dichotomy, go give her a follow!

#homestuck #homestuck meta #homestuck analysis #homestuck classpect #classpecting #bard class #page class #doom aspect #hope aspect #rage aspect #bard.pdf #page.pdf #doom.pdf #hope.pdf #rage.pdf #nekro.pdf #nekro.sms

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anghraine · 1 year

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I read an interesting post this morning about the rhetoric around "trauma porn" and "misery porn" and so on. It's here.

I'm not reblogging directly because my response is fairly tangential, so I'm handling it in ye olde journal fandom way by making a separate post. But the short version of the other post is that "porn" is doing a lot of heavy lifting in those formulations in ways that reflect on cultural discourse around pornography, tragedy, exploitation, and spectacle. Also, there's something iffy about the way things like trauma or tragedy are conceptualized as intrinsically flawed and excessive if they don't directly further the core of the story or have a clear "point."

That's all true, though I think the "x porn" formulation extends faaar beyond dismissal of tragedy or misery or dark fiction. In these formulations, "porn" becomes a convenient shorthand for "this exploits [something, usually real] for the benefit and enjoyment of others, frequently others who are not otherwise involved with [thing]."

For instance, as someone with a disability, I'm accustomed to hearing criticism of "inspiration porn"—in which actual or fictionalized disabled people are exploited and reduced to hopeful inspiration for other, usually non-disabled people (in short, so others can feel good). You could say "inspiration exploitation" but ... meh. So it's important to be clear that this terminology is far from just disapproving of grimdark or whatnot.

That doesn't mean that "[x] porn" isn't worth interrogating as a catchphrase in terms of how it relates to cultural perspectives on pornography etc etc. Just that it's used in a much broader context than this particular issue.

Secondly, some of that insistence on trauma/tragedy/unhappiness as intrinsically excessive unless there's some clear point sounds very much to me as a sort of New Criticism approach as overheard on the bus. Maybe this leans a bit towards conspiracy theory, lol, but I can explain.

The OP probably knows this, but New Criticism is a now largely outdated theory of literary criticism which is, among other things, deeply concerned with the unity of literary texts. Elements of a text which do not further the core themes and ultimate coherence of the text are often seen as weaknesses or excess from this POV. It owes a lot to previous traditions and takes on What Art Should Be, going back at least as far as Aristotle's Poetics:

The plot, being an imitation of an action, must imitate one action and that a whole, the structural union of the parts being such that, if any one of them is displaced or removed, the whole will be disjointed and disturbed. For a thing whose presence or absence makes no visible difference, is not an organic part of the whole.

So trauma or tragedy or misery that does not seem fundamental to the unity or wholeness of the piece and doesn't seem to make much difference to what the text is about or thematically preoccupied with can feel disjointed. It's not difficult for otherwise hardline anti-intentionalists (which also smacks of overheard New Criticism) to assume this arises out of a lack of discipline, control, or critical thinking about subject matter.

Of course, it frequently depends on the case. There's often a certain amount of "if I like it, X element is necessary to The Unity, and if I don't, it's a disjointed and problematic mess." But still, the emphasis on coherence and conservation of detail as intrinsic to artistic merit of literature is also a much bigger conversation than "misery porn" discourse. Aristotle himself, for instance, argued that tragedy is a higher art form than comedy. I think the discussion is at least partly as much about minimalism/a NC-influenced value for unity.

(FWIW New Criticism is very much out of style, but the impact on how literary criticism is taught in at least the United States, especially in K-12, is very profound.)

#anghraine babbles #long post #literature #literary criticism #anghraine's recs #not my meta #but also #anghraine's meta #aristotle #general fanwank #rare breed of attack unicorn

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bg3tales · 27 days

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Obra - The Gith Druid

In Photo - My Tav "Obra" who is a Githyanki Druid (Sage) & Jaheira Some facts about Obra:

Performed all her Gith training (even killed a classmate because she was asked by her teacher to do so)

Did things out of "duty" to her race

Suffers from "Good Girl Syndrome" in a twisted way, she has the skills to make people think that she is doing what they want her to do

She is naturally good and would prefer not to kill anyone if given the chance

She is a quiet person, not shy, but she tends to keep to herself

Growing up, she would keep plants of all kinds around her bed and would read a lot

She is actually a good fighter but can be clumsy

She is not flirty and have little interest in sex

When she left her Creche, no one really expected her to make history and she liked it that way

She yearns for the slow life, away from all the bloodshed and having to kill each other as "training"

Too "humble" for a Gith, also has her head in the clouds a lot (lol) and sometimes dissociates

Her full druid magic came to her later in life but when she was young, there were already small signs like being able to "smell when plants are about to sprout from the ground"

Was abducted by the Absolute while she was practicing her new wild shape magic (haha)

Her relationship with each companion:

ASTARION - No sexual attraction whatsoever. She lets him drink her blood (started because he was curious with how Gith blood tastes like). Astarion likes that Obra does not talk too much. She looks at him all judgey when he proposes something unhinged but will still participate with his shenanigans, often without saying anything to him and just immediately moving to help him. Obra's eyes widen when Astarion trauma dumps every once in a while, not knowing how to react to the horrors he experienced. All the while having flashbacks of her own horrors.

GALE - Obra is a Sage so she loves learning and they would converse over books or certain information. Gale does most of the talking though. Sometimes, he talks too much for Obra's liking and she dissociates. A bit of unspoken affections here as Gale "may" have a crush on her. Obra knows that Gale is a bit physically weak so she always heal him when they fight even if he does not ask (does not help with Gale's "growing interest"). They cook together at camp sometimes, but Obra brings some weird ingredients she found from nature. Gale tries to incorporate them, resulting to some weird flavors.

SHADOWHEART - Obra and Shadowheart both understand what it's like to do things just because you are "programmed" to do it. They don't talk so much but they have a deep understanding of each other. Has each other's back and they usually agree on things by default. During a battle, these two would usually exchange a look and start healing their teammates. When drunk, they have uncharacteristically deep philosophical conversations.

LAE'ZEL - Lae'Zel thinks Obra is weak and often wonders how she made it to adulthood. Every once in a while, Obra does something badass in the battlefield which surprises Lae'Zel. Their general relationship is that of 2 kids who grew up on the same block - they are fundamentally different people, but share the secrets of the neighborhood. Lae'Zel is usually dominant during conversations and tend to impose her will. Obra just "listens" to her but does whatever she wants after the conversation.

KARLACH - Obra smiles the most with Karlach. She is also the most talkative with Karlach. They have conversations where their responses miss the context and they confuse each other. They bond over activating the "Speak with Animals" ability, with Karlach speaking with every animal she finds around the camp and Obra trailing along. In the battlefield, they turn into beasts - Obra is usually an owlbear and Karlach is the berserker that she is. A combo enemies don't see coming.

WYLL - They are both good natured by default and sees eye to eye on certain idealistic beliefs. Obra is more used to the bloodshed though. Without realizing it, Obra started treating Wyll like a little brother. She encourages him during battle, often giving him an opening to attack, but makes sure he does not get hurt too much. Wyll trusts Obra and would often tell her stories of his life. She just sits quietly, nodding along and smiling from time to time.

JAHEIRA - Obra admires the druid that Jaheira is. This admiration goes both ways as Jaheira likes that this young druid acts more than she talks. Jaheira is worried that Obra says "yes" too easily.

HALSIN - Obra is reliable and Halsin has fallen romantically for her. He confessed, she said yes and they started a relationship. However, Obra might have said yes because she was touched by how Halsin chose to stay by her side, instead of leaving after the shadow curse has lifted... She is not sure how to reciprocate Halsin's kind nature... MINSC & BOO - Minsc talks and Obra answers in 1 word responses like "Okay!" She does not think too much with Minsc and is sometimes scared of Boo. Obra caught Boo looking at her eyes aggressively once and is now quite wary of the hamster gouging her eyes.

#bg3 #baldurs gate 3 #bg3 tav #tav #baldurs gate tav #my tav #tav profile #bg3 fanfiction #bg3 roleplay

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mqrianos · 9 months

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jess/lorelai/logan? who is who? dumbledore comes to rescue?

saw a comparison of lorelai to logan on here and i’ve been mulling this one lil theory in my head for a while now, and i want to put in my two cents. so, obviously people are there from both sides comparing lorelai to jess and also to logan. before i go deep into any of that, i wanna give an analogy that i think fits perfectly here. i will assume everybody here has a basic knowledge of harry potter lore. the main rivalry throughout the story is obviously between harry and voldemort. and one thing that’s hinted throughout it all, is the constant similarities between voldermort and harry. and there are a lot. both of them being highly intelligent, rule-breaking, half-bloods, orphans and i could go on and on. and there is even a specific scene where harry asks dumbledore about all of it, and dumbledore reassures harry saying despite similarities, what makes both voldemort and harry fundamentally different is the choices that they make. harry choosing the greater good everytime, and voldemort choosing to be evil. obviously things are not that serious in gilmore girls, lol. but applying this simple analogy explains a lot, actually. logan and lorelai do have similarities. manipulative parents (emily and mitchum), wealthy background, wanting to escape that lifestyle. i could partially say cheating (but the lorelai/luke situation at the end of s6 was clear on both sides as both lorelai and luke were aware that they crossed a point and that they were not together anymore, while rory was still thinking her and logan were just in a fight, nothing serious. but, let me include that as well for the sake of this argument). but, to me, these similarities are surface-level.i am not going to call harry and voldemort, the same people cause of their surface-level similarities. both logan and lorelai despite having parallels, FUNDAMENTALLY differ at their core. inspite of lorelai growing up in a wealthy background, she despised that lifestyle and everything that was associated with it. the dressing up, the partying, the high society, the people in it, the expectations that comes with it. from what we see in her childhood flashbacks, she doesn’t even have friends from that same society and comes off as annoying to those people. on the other hand, logan thrives in the billionaire setting, he loves the dressing up, the partying, the high society, the people, the friends, he is able to charm everyone in that society unlike lorelai. the only thing he doesn’t want is the expectations that comes with being born in such a society. he still wants all the wealth and luxury his dad has to offer, but he wants to do what he wants instead of following mitchum. that’s the only difference whereas lorelai wanted nothing to do with that world. that is exactly why even when he tries to branch off in s7, he goes back to his dad again cause he ultimately misses that golden cushion of luxury. he can’t live without it, he is weak. lorelai can live without it and is very firm on wanting to be independant. lorelai hates that world and moves away from it, logan doesn’t hate that world (infact proudly admits he is a part of it), only thing he wants is to do things his own way with all that wealth. i used to think before that “logan is who lorelai would have grown up to be, if she lived with her parents”.....but that was until i realized her parent’s world only seemed to drain her and not nurture her in anyway (keep in mind, im referring to the “parents world” in particular, not the “parents” cause logan’s parent’s world nurtured him but his parents didn’t). when we’re shown lorelai’s first proper interaction with emily’s world in the show, she tries to escape through the window. logan’s first interaction with this world, he is pleasing all the adults and winning them over and being charming (at rory’s party set up by emily in s5). if lorelai had grown up in emily’s world, she probably would have only become a stressed out adult constantly trying to escape it, loathing it and beating herself up over not doing anything, basically a fish out of water. by the revival, logan seems more than comfortable with his life, happy even with the way things are except for his love life. this is not me saying logan=voldemort and harry=lorelai, lol. i once again bring the wisdom of dumbledore here, “it’s our choices that show us what we are, far more than our abilities”. despite having surface level parallels, lorelai and logan are very different people at their core, their choices in life prove that. now, there is one other person, harry shared parallels with other than voldemort. they were both highly intelligent, did things for the greater good, were excellent leaders, lived a loner for the most part, amazing magical abilities. it was none other than dumbledore himself. here’s where jess comes into this equation. both harry and dumbledore had different childhoods, dumbledore grew up rich and in the magical world while harry was an orphan in the human world. lorelai and jess don’t have similar backgrounds either, jess grows up abandoned in a poor setting while lorelai has her wealthy background. yet, both are the same people at their core in many other ways. the chip on your shoulder bit (which lorelai herself tells that she had mastered, to none other than jess himself). their sense of humor/sarcasm is so identical, it baffles me. i especially noticed it the first time we see jess at emily’s and him making comments like “i am a carnivore”, “i wanna be buried there (at walmart)” “thanks for the paycheck” etcetera and cut to lorelai everytime at friday night dinners with her quippy comments annoying emily. both her and jess have almost this kind of will to be independant/free and to stand on their own feet. both rebel a lot as teens but end up well-established as adults having done everything on their own. lorelai becomes the owner of dragonfly inn and jess, one of the co-founders of trucheon. they came to where they are, on their own. both are sincere and hardworking if they put their minds to something. cue mia praising lorelai’s dedication as a maid in s2, and jess getting praised by the manager at walmart for being an excellent forklifter. they even lived in crappy places when starting out. jess at his s4 apartment and lorelai at the shed in the inn. both of them think running away is the solution for a problem. jess abandons rory without a word in s3, lorelai abandons max before the wedding without even a discussion of any sort and goes on a roadtrip with rory. jess in s4 asking rory to elope with him and lorelai asking luke to elope with her in s6. both jess and lorelai have no pre-formed ideas to do any of this, after jess is misguided with the advice by luke and lorelai is misguided with the advice by the therapist, they make this rash decision to force their partners to elope with them even though both know enough to understand it’s not a good decision, yet they want to desperately hold onto each one’s failing relationship (in jess’s case, an already broken one). both of them are sarcastic, impulsive and rebellious (in a way diff from logan), run-away-from-problems-type, despise the porsche kids, self-reliant. again mentioning that this is not me comparing logan to voldemort or jess to dumbledore or even harry to lorelai, for the record. the voldemort/harry/dumbledore analogy served as a good template to compare romantically unrelated stand-alone characters, with similarities or parallels. so, from the outside while it does seem like logan is like lorelai, they are very different in their personalities and are not alike beyond surface level and while we don’t see any outright parallels between jess and lorelai, they are the most similar in nature at the core and have very similar tendencies/behaviours. if i start listing actual dialogues and scenes jess and lorelai have in common, i would never stop. so, let me end this long ass essay here. this lil theory seemed more coherent when i was mulling it in my head and now it looks so stupid, lol. ignore it if it does. am i just talking sh*t? probably? am i having fun talking this sh*t? ABSOLUTELY.

#is this a rant?#does it even make sense?#i dont fucking know #jess mariano #gilmore girls #lorelai gilmore #rory gilmore #jess and rory #logan huntzberger #luke danes #literati

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somewhereinthepines · 1 year

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dunno if you were asked this before but what you most favorite dynamic out of all your supermassive ships?

i don’t think, that i answered it on such a scale before tbh. i’ve been asked about my supermassive otps separately tho, so like mmmm….

idk. i can’t say, that i have a specific favorite among all of them. each pair has elements that fascinate me, and while they all have smth that tangles them together, they’re also fundamentally different. i look at chris x ryan, and john x andrew, which at first glance is what i’m calling a caretaker + their silent, younger companion sort of gimmick, but they’re also go deeper than this, and there is very big difference even in how chris & john handle situations or how andrew & ryan react to things. how andrew will always be more pushy, and how ryan essentially can enter yandere mode, where andrew seem to be just kind of prone to violence of less motivated, less personal kind…..or even a big separation in how chris always tries to cling to imagery of a good person, and john is just kind of embraces the fact, that he’s not a decent man. still, chris somehow fucks up more royally bc of it all vs john, who’s just kinda goes with the flow lol. and then, the roles of who defends who in both ships are reversed. in the quarry, ryan canonically goes out of his way to pretend like everything around him doesn’t scream ‘my mentor isn't who i think he is'. it's so plain. so into your face, yet rayn being unresponsive, being abrasive. and then, he also gets hella passive-aggressive, once someone suggests that he's in denial (he is lol). in LH, it’s john, who canonically closes eyes on andrew’s mishaps and stunted disturbance, downright to forgiving him accidently killing angela (in some routes). i talked in more detail about john & chris’s differences and similarities here. but while they do share the same roots of dynamic, i feel like it evolves into its own category along the way. so honestly, even between those two, it’s kinda impossible for me to pick which is the most preferable or interesting. bc they both are! i'm a sucked for complicated pinning & favoritism, that makes person pick side based on their own selfish pref rather than logic. i love how creepily easy it is for ryan & john to endanger others, if it means that they can keep chris & adnrew 'safe and sound'. i love how this is their first, organic reaction. the quarry kinda messed it up toward the end, but y'know lol. it's the narrative point / the main intent, that counts with me. and where LH wasn't very shy about andrew & john being a 'thing' in whatever way, you might see it....like them being stuck together as oddly 'similiar' unlucky folks or as john being there to mislead you, well, they still were very *cross fingers* like that. in the quarry, you have to actually look a bit more closely to see how much of plot is revolved around ryan & chris's relationships. around ryan trying to save someone, who is in fact, was partly to blame for everything. but honestly, this is what i like about the quarry vs until dawn. at least, chris had someone, who did try to see the best in him. vs until dawn, where by unpopular opinion, i always stuck feeling like josh deserved better friends. i can't watch the prologue and not think, that aside from sam, the rest of josh's friends actually suck tbh. including chris, bc dang, he just abandoned him like that. for a girl..........so while josh did messed up thing, i struggle to feel any sort of sympathy for anyone, but sam in that game. naturally, some characters grew on me and chris was even my fav back at the time, but i don't and cannot respect a half-assed commitmet he showed josh. like man, be more like ryan, dude. point a gun at weird looking gal, that suggest that she's about to kill your camp leader. be like john, and literally ignore safety of everyone, but yourself and that one, young dazed student that you like lol. chris from until dawn is too weak for it. even non-existent dr hill was more devoted to josh vs his best bud. i mean, it kinda sucks, when your mental illness is the only thing, that agrees to keep you company, bc your bff wanna gets laid and just forgets about u. it's realistic tbh, don't get me wrong. but it still stings lol.

*clears throat* sorry, tangled lol.

anyways then, we have the other 2 ships, which are kind of opposites of one another. i mean, dulie & dalim do have similar narrative bits, esp since both pairs have power imbalance as its main trait. but where du’met x charlie will always be a predator/prey, with prey barely being able to do anything against its pursuer, in dalim it's never fully established, who 'controls' the situation in the end. bc realistically, salim would kick dar’s ass, if he saw so fit lol. and the funny part of their relationship is that dar is completely unaware lol. he seems to consider salim to be weaker, more naive and less likely to fight against his commands, since he's kind of a kiss-ass lol. it never occurs to dar, that salim can rebel against him. and if/when salim does, dar basically instantly gets angry/absolutely enraged with him, bc how dare he lol. in dulie, du’met kind of expects charlie to struggle and whine, and cower, and try his hardest, so he’s not holding it against him. he even humors him kinda. still, it's where the big diffence is. charlie is du'met 'prey', whatever intentions he has for him are always 'justified' inside his own mind. dar would only hurt salim, if he goes out of line. he won't randomly harm salim, or consider doing it, even if he might have such impulse. like, i do believe, that he does have them. still, where charlie being du'met 'favorite' means, that du'met would exact more pain and fear on him....with dar, it's the opposite. he would try to keep salim from harm's way, at least to some degree and he certanly won't treat him as poorely as he treats those other people, who are unimportant to him. canonically, out of the whole unit, dar only searching for salim. he's not sorry for all those wasted lives, it seem to barely register with him even. more so, he's actually allows salim to stick in the background for the most part, when he shots around like a maniac lol. it must mean smth comming from a war dog like him. also i must say, that dar & du’met, while both clearly sociopathic, still have very, very different stans there, not to mention, that even their sadism is kinda different too. not even in level, but also in how they apply it. they both clearly love hunting down people. they both enjoy the thrill of chase. but dar in a way uses his position, the situation he’s in as an excuse for it. while, du’met is just like that lol. salim & charlie are also opposites. there is SO very little to connect them by. besides, a very surface level things, such as them being the low-key hyperfixation/main companion for antagonists, and then how they both wander around with a lighter. so once again, its kinda impossible to pick between them, bc they represent very different things, and the characters themselves have way less in common up close vs the chris/ryan and john/adnrew.

taking all 4 ships into account is like examining 4 of your favorite foods. it’s not the matter of which you prefer more, it’s more of what you wanna eat at the moment lol. the silver lining of all my supermassive ships be that they all have a specific brand of fixation/care/pinning/longing for one another. and they usually all have smth, that makes it difficult to approach those relationships/feelings. at least, for one party lol. but it’s kinda impossible to shove them all into some check-box tbh. i mean, it will be very hard to fit let’s say, caring chris, who tries to be good to ryan, even when he scolds him, and dar, who backhands salim, the second he fails to answer him fast enough. or compare andrew, who can push john around and shut him up by mere suggestion of disagrement, and charlie who would most likely fell on his knees and suck du’met off, rather than risk invoking his displeasure. even if simply bc du'met is capable of murdering him lol.

so idk, i can't name the most fav one tbh. i love them all for their own reasons. not to meation, that there is so many ways to explore obsession and other bits, that i love in each ship in its own way. before, i assumed, that i might have a secret fav, but looking at it now, i don't think that i do, haha.

#asks #long post #du'lie #dalim #chris x ryan #john/andrew #and look josh is kinda there too in between it all lol

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red-eft · 1 year

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Vowels for Cordelia and Ivy if you want!!

hell yeah! always happy to talk about my two favorite mage ocs <3

i accidentally wrote a lot about them, so i’m chucking it under a readmore ^^;;

ivy first-

A. what nicknames do they get called?

ivy ! tbh i keep forgetting that her actual name is ivanna

E. what is their love language?

physical touch! ivy stays close to those she cares about. she often follows them around without realizing it. she loves holding hands with cordelia and giving her little kisses on the forehead.

I. what makes them feel safe?

lorne makes her feel safe. he’s like a big brother (despite being younger lmao) that she knows would protect her to his last breath. once she gets closer to cordelia, that’s another person that makes her feel safe. ivy finds refuge in people more than anything else!

O. what motivates them?

she wants to get rid of the fear/superstition that always surrounds dark magic. it's banned throughout the country the story takes place in, and dark magic practitioners are feared and shunned by most.

about a third of the way through the story she’s in, ivy also gains the motivation to rescue her mentor, fiensal, when ydrenth captures him.

U. what do they like to do in their spare time?

ivy loves exploring old ruins and observing wild creatures! ever since cordelia started teaching her how to fight unarmed, ivy has also started to practice for fun in her spare time.

Y. what physical object do they value most?

she really values fiensal’s grimoire. he gave it to her shortly before ydrenth captured him. it’s a well of knowledge and a deeply personal item. she tries not to read it. it feels like an invasion of his privacy even though he outright told her to study it.

—-------

now for ydrenth! this one’s a little difficult because i just decided earlier today that she’s not getting a redemption arc.. here's Mean Ydrenth for u

A. what nicknames do they get called?

i’m not sure if it counts, but “the necromancer” is something she gets called pretty often lol

E. what is their love language?

ydrenth’s love language is words of affirmation. she likes to make the object of her affection feel like the most important person in the world. however, she has a mean streak and can quickly become very manipulative. ydrenth is 100% aware of her behavior and doesn’t care to fix it. she is not a good person.

I. what makes them feel safe?

her home/research facility is the only place she feels truly safe. only she knows where it is and how to get in it.

O. what motivates them?

ydrenth wants to rebuild the old world and shape it to her liking. she keeps herself alive by sapping the life from other creatures, but as time goes on, she needs more and more energy.. she's starting to fall apart. ydrenth's current goal is to obtain a dragon heart, which is rumored to grant immortality.

U. what do they like to do in their spare time?

ydrenth likes to read, conduct experiments (usually focused on dark magic), and observe the world to learn about how it's changed over the centuries. she also likes cooking wjdslfk, you get good at it when you live alone for a couple hundred years

Y. what physical object do they value most?

her most treasured possession is an old-world pistol that she found in some ruins. she carries it with her everywhere she goes. the new world has recovered and developed to the point of being able to make basic pistols, but they’re too weak and unreliable for her liking.

—-------

since this ask is about my ocs that use the most magic, i'm gonna throw in a bonus and add some context for how magic works in my story setting :-)

dark magic basically = radiation

in my story, magic came to earth (idk how yet lol). humans combined magic and science to study both. unfortunately, they went too far and caused a nuclear/magic catastrophe that wiped out most of civilization. the earth and everything on it was fundamentally changed. radiation warped to gain "magical" traits and dark magic was born :0 i know it isn’t realistic, but the idea was too fun for me to pass up !! plus nothing that has magic in it is going to be realistic anyways wsdfjlk

there are four races in my story- humans, elves, drakonians, and orcs. i could write actual essays about them.. anyways they were all created/influenced by magic & genetic engineering. humans and drakonians are resistant to dark magic, orcs are immune, and elves are very weak to it. however, even an elf is more resistant to radiation than an actual human on earth irl

dark magic can be used to cast incantations with “unnatural” effects: seeing through walls, healing injuries, creating undead, etc... there are a lot of creative uses for it that cause harm, but there's also a lot of potential to help others.

accepted types of magic include divine magic (very rare) and common elemental magic (fire/water/earth/wind/etc- used for mundane tasks like purifying water or generating electricity)

#asks #magmacannon #ty for the ask btw !!!#i had a bad day but writing this cheered me up ^^#post-apoc world #my ocs #c:ivy #c:ydrenth

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llycaons · 10 months

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ep20 (1/3): genuinely quite horrifying

generally I like the chewing of the scenery because it's usually really well done (jgy never had a bad dramatic scene), but this overacting seems clumsy to me. the actor is doing 'drunk' but really overdoing it imo. his only bad scene

oohhHHHHHHHHHH

this is so fucking tragic you KNOW she's a victim of the wens and she was so young and her fear and sorrow are all she has left of herself until wwx lays her back to rest

oh fuck I forgot about this. for all her crimes this may have been a step more than she deserved

fuck he looks SO cool. I have seen a lot of complaints about the cql necromancy not being the same as literally pulling corpses out of the ground like in the book, and while I understand the annoyance I think the smokeshow aesthetic rules and the ghosts are really cool looking

I feel like my grasp of jc and lwj is a bit weak since I've not rewatched in a while so it's nice to get some characterization in this episode. jc is not stupid or ignorant by any means, but lwj immediately realizes what's going on and explains it to him because he doesn't understand. lwj is more book-learned but he's also quicker to pick up on practical things, which makes sense given his reputation later for being a phenomenal cultivator in the field. on the spectrum of political figure to practical cultivator, jc is leaning further towards politics

jc is also a pragmatist and somewhat black-and-white in his approach, which makes sense for him given the situation but is a bit simplistic. lwj is...I would call this look uneasy. he's apprehensive, upset, and/or angry this entire episode. this is not a good time for him

jc rescues wq and her immediate thought is wwx I cannot make this shit up. do chengqing shippers really think she would ever love jc more than she loves wwx OR that he'd be happy with someone who's closer to his brother anyway

I do think it's weird that she doesn't ask after wen ning, but I assume she thinks jc is more likely to know where wwx is

this is it. this is the entirety of why their relationship wouldn't work, and why they're fundamentally incompatible people.

jc claims he can only save her. she refuses. she is not willing to abandon her brother or her people to save herself. and jc will only protect her if she separates herself from her clan. she doesn't even look at him. she thanks him and their debt is even. and she's going to leave to find her family. all the chengqing meta in the world could not explain away this simple truth about them as people.

so that was a fucking lie

okay, in fairness she did return that comb without asking for anything, but like. she was a refugee in a starving commune, he could have done SOMETHING

here it is again, lwj with unshakeable principles, not losing sight of this potential threat even though it's helping them. and jc, seeing only an ally who's helping them to destroy the murderers of his entire family. I don't actually think jc is in the wrong to think this, but the irony of when their positions reverse is always interesting. lwj adjusts his perceptions of right and wrong because he realizes that they can't account for all nuances in the world, and jc digs in deeper out of grief and anger

another neat characterization moment. jc all emotion, about to rush in and attack. lwj careful, thoughtful, observant. let's check out the situation and act based on that. tendencies they both exhibit decades later, and teach to their children

oh boy he doesn't look good. eating out of wzl's hand though. lol. lmao

I did find this scene and this revenge rather disturbing (and I think it's meant to be) but I'm certainly not going to criticize wwx for it after he lost his entire home, was hounded and torotured, was dropped into a soul-destroying abyss and crawled out for revenge. I'm a little sick of the 'revenge is wrong uwu violence makes us just as bad as them' when they were all victims of horrific violence and this is a war, and this man is personally responsible for much of their suffering. and it's not like this happens again. after this run of vicious revenge, wwx is remarkably forgiving and gracious. so you know what I think a little torture is warranted. it's not fine but it's not the end of the world

making him eat his own dick in the novel was really fucked up tho

this is very funny to me I wonder if anyone ships them

jc's face has the standard confusion/fear/upset during this scene but lwj has such a look of 'wtf' I love it

HIS SHADOW!!!!!!!!!!!!! CHENQING!!!!!!!!!!!!

taken aback? concerned? confused?

xz's acting in this scene leaves me breathless. literally one of my favorite parts of the entire show. the dialogue, the mini expressions, the tension between characters, the body language. whew

#cql re-rewatch #there are three parts because I love this scene so much I had to microanalyze it

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just-a-cryptid-mushroom · 1 year

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I give my friend pictures and quotes and they guess CHnT characters

The only knowledge they have of this is my infodumping. I did not give them a list of names, just images I found and quotes (that were not matched up to each other). I made it difficult on purpose.

I've described/shortened most of the quotes because some were very long.

*My comments between these*

(Art I found of Matthew, and Matthew glitchtext quote): Matthew? (I'm pretty sure your info dumping gave it away...)

*Yeah*

(Wiki art of Salem, and Juniper's "The prospect of that is horrific" coffee quote): Idk Joshua? The vibes of D & 2 just fit so...

(Art I found of Soren, and Adam's "There is no such thing as 'should' darling" quote): Just look at that smug little face! Idk for a name... Elija? I know there's an Elija

*The image of the other person who would start a cult and a quote from the other antagonist is pretty good in my opinion*

(Wiki art of Marisol, and Sydney's "Temporally displaced physicists" quote): I'm trying to think of names... They look like a Liam? (I'm pretty sure there isn't a Liam but oh well)

(Wiki art of Rowan, and Salem's "You think the kids need to be hearing this?" quote): Uhhhh Samantha?

(Wiki art of Sydney, and Rowan's "I think you’re fundamentally misunderstanding … a lot. Of stuff. Here." quote): Sydney? I think you said Sydney has long hair

*Indeed he does*

(Wiki art of Adam, and Lucille's "Oh dear. Have I forgotten to mention something?" quote): uhhh Kiren? (I'm struggling for names now...)

*I think the quote actually kinda fits the picture here*

(Wiki art of Yvonne, and Jedidiah's "So now I’m in the forest… trying to kill a priest." quote): Josh? (And by that I don't mean a Joshua I mean just straight up Josh) ((I know there probably isn't another but uhhh)) They look high in the pic

(Wiki art of Juniper, and Elijah's "A mirror — you — N—NOOOOAAAIIIEUUEUHCKG —" quote): Greg? I really don't remember names now...

*The only weakness of the British: mirrors.*

(Art I found of Lucille, and Yvonne's "This is not the fucking Discovery channel!" quote): imma guess Lucille

*Correct for the image part*

(The MAP art of Elijah, and Joshua's "Search party is such a funny term. Like, what are they celebrating?" quote): Dylan (I'm pretty sure I'm just making stuff up now)

*Elishua lol*

(Wiki art of Jedidiah, and Soren's "After countless man-powered-hours of thankless labor… [...] the time for It… has finally arrived." quote): Jim or Tony (I know it's probably not Tony but...)

*The quote could fit Jedidiah tbh with his projects etc*

(Wiki art of Joshua, and Marisol's "Let’s do some cleaning while we talk. Keep us occupied." quote): Will? Just idk

#chnt #camp here and there #they find out how well they did from this post

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skaterfc · 2 years

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continued: i assumed ghosts dont go to limbo because ghostbur wasnt there until he actually like died so i assume its more like switching places from the point that a character dies (im not sure how death and revival exactly works on the dsmp--this is my assumption). so i thought that was kind of how tommys ghost was canon ? cause hes the only one who hasnt had a ghost at all to this point but it could also be a plot hole. idk you have me thinkin

Alright this is gonna be long. Not in a bad way! This isn't discourse or anything, just analysis and that's just how it goes when talking about this stuff.

Long discussion about Ghosts on the DSMP ahead!

One thing you have to get straight about this, is that there is little consistency between all the ghosts on the DSMP. For this we are going to talk about our 4 confirmed ghosts, Boo, Ghostbur, Ghost Mexican Dream, and Glatt. (austinshow and velvet are both dead, but since they don't have ghosts (nor a time when they were alive for us to compare to) they will be left out of this "essay"(i can't believe i have to say this, only in the dream smp lmao)) The only consistent aspects I have found between all ghosts are as follows:

- A "washed out" color pallet/ grey skin and hair

- Overall more carefree (while they can have moments of distress, a neutral state for them is one of a carefree attitude)

- And a weakness that would "kill" them or send them back to limbo. For Ghostbur its water, for Glatt its the sun, for MD its possibly Quackity, and for Boo its doing a song and dance

That's all! you would think more fundamental aspects of ghosts need to be set in stone, but no. You would think that maybe ghosts need to be separate from their selves in limbo, but MD and Glatt both make reference of traveling back and forth between limbo and the overworld. Maybe the ghosts need to be stagnate characters, set in their ways and unwilling to learn or change, but Glatt goes through a whole character arc in Tales. They need to be happy? nope. They give out stuff that meant something to them when they were alive? also no. Its frustrating!

So, the the idea of Tommy not having a ghost while everyone else does is consistent with the inconsistencies of ghosts. Confusing, right? Never said the dream smp didn't have plot holes lol. So it is not out of the realm that Tommy is just special and didn't get a ghost, for some reason.

Lets look at what you said, though.

Limbo is weird. And that scene with Glatt in the gym is good for us getting to know more about limbo (and is really funny).

Im rewatching that section of the stream here for this, and the gym does seem to be Schlatts limbo. From Boo's description of what limbo is (a type of ball where sometimes the faces will cross into each other, and that is how people can see each other in limbo.) we could say that Schlatts gym is a place in limbo where this "face" of the "sphere" crosses into the overworld. Like a place where ley lines cross.

Then again, Schlatt also said that Wilbur would come in to the gym occasionally to annoy him, while Wilbur has said he did nothing of the sort, and has instead said that Wilbur couldn't leave the train station. So this might not be totally accurate.

When Schlatt alludes to Tommy here he does say "he comes down here" (present) but also its important to note that when this stream aired, Tommy had only recently been revived. (Quackitys vod says march 17th as its upload date, so the stream was likely a day or so before, and Tommy was revived on march 3rd) While limbo time works differently, we don't know what time Schlatt's gym operates in. In this encounter, real time, but who knows. Maybe when talking to different people time is different? How long does Schlatt think he's been dead for then?

Food for thought, but its also to be noted this clip does NOT prove Ghostinnits existence. I've been trying for like the past hour to find a clip where cc!wilbur said that Ghostinnit isn't canon, or at the very least he's not in limbo, but I've had no such luck. There is a very good unofficial vods channel for Wilbur so I'm sure someone more dedicated could look though those to find it exactly, but that's a bit overkill for me and for this haha.

Now for a bit easier thing to ... disprove? argue against? You were under the assumption that ghosts didn't go to limbo "because Ghostbur didn't go there until he actually died" and that's false!

The two ghosts we see instantly after revival are Boo and Ghostbur, and both actually talk about their experiences in limbo that they briefly had before getting put back into the world.

When Ghostbur comes back initially, several people asked him what death was like (i think mostly Tubbo and Quackity, this was like the day after the 16th), and while he insisted he didn't go to hell, he described death as "nothing." Sound familiar? maybe like Tommy's limbo?

But wait, why would Ghostbur's limbo and Tommy's be the same? And if the void was Ghostbur's limbo, why is he at the train station now? For the first one, we could take it as Tommy heard this description of what Ghostbur's death was like, and as such that's what he expected of limbo, so it became like that. It could be like the sphere thing, where Ghostbur just took a peak into either an empty space, or Tommy's limbo (if it pre-existed). Or we could take it as, since at this point, only Schlatt has died, there hasn't been enough time for a proper limbo to form for Ghostbur to see.

Which brings us to Boo (we'll get back to the train station). Boo didn't describe his limbo, so much as tell us that he was able to see Ghostbur crying at the train station limbo. And then went on to describe the ball thing. If that were the case, a Ghost's brief visit into limbo when they die (or are born) could be looking at a section of this "sphere." And limbo's for people only are on the "sphere" if there is someone to inhabit that limbo.

So when Ghostbur died, there was only 1 limbo on the "sphere" as such there was a lot of "blank space" and so Ghostbur saw nothing. When Boo died, there were more limbos there so he was able to peak into Ghostbur's limbo.

And when Ghostbur goes back to the train station, I believe that this is just a factor of Ghostbur and Wilbur being, at least from the same person, if they are not still the same. So they would have a smiliar limbos. Ghostbur just wasn't able to see it the first time around because it didn't exist yet (quite literally, cc!wilbur hadn't thought of it yet). It also to be noted, its not exactly the same as Wilbur's train station. Cc!Wilbur has said that it is dirtier, darker, and Wilbur had no TV's telling him what everyone said about him. This shows that this is Ghostbur's unique limbo, that while similar to Wilbur's, is his own.

I hope that makes sense! I know Boo's explanation of the way he thinks limbo works is confusing enough, so this could make it even worse haha.

One way I've seen that has the most merit for being canon is that Tommy did get a ghost, he just appeared in the prison cell with Dream (where he died, which is consistent with Ghostbur showing up where Wilbur died) and Dream killed Ghostinnit to revive Tommy. i think this is the most likely, if it were to be canon, but no other people from limbo have mentioned seeing Tommy's ghost, or Tommy since he died, save for that one Schlatt clip.

Finally, your totally good artemysty for not knowing how death and revival works. I don't totally know myself, and its not made very clear in canon so I don't blame you! I've seen even theories that the revive book is not a revive book at all, but a wish book where your wish is to bring the person back. (because when Dream tried to revive Techno they got a wish) We don't even know how many canon lives a person comes back with when they are revived! Why is it called "limbo" instead of "the afterlife"? Wouldn't limbo be Lady Death's domain? Why is Dream XD feeding on the souls there then, cursing them to a afterlife of misery? There are a lot of unanswered questions!

I saw a very good theory awhile back, i forget who by, but they said that Ghosts are possibly the parts of the person alive or the personality traits that that person didnt want others to see. Ranboo didn't want other to see his suicidal thoughts, Wilbur didn't want others to see his emotional heart, but Schlatt was confident til' the very end, and that's why his ghost is much the same.

I, somewhat similarly, thought that perhaps when someone dies, they are only split into two (a ghost version and a version in limbo) if they are a person with a lot of emotional turmoil. Where you are very divided in yourself, in your head. I think this works for Wilbur and Ranboo, since both tend to compartmentalize their past actions, seeing them as different people entirely (the different burs for Wilbur and Ranboo's enderwalk). And like I said before, both Schlatt and MD were much more confident in themselves.

Feel free to look into this with me! I am open to discussion here! I love talking about the ghosts on the DSMP, I'm even open to talking about hcs regarding Ghostinnit!

#dsmp #dream smp #ghostinnit #ghostbur #ask #artemysty #this actually took ages to answer omg im so sorry #I was actually more dedicated to this ask and like getting my sources right and making sure all my refrances were good and rewatching vods #than i was to the actual essay i had to write in class today #oops lol #hey i would say something even better came out of this #i was able to find all of tubbos lost vods from the new lmanburg era!!! :DDDDDDD #a new era of ghostbur commentary is upon me i can finally confirm all the things ive been saying about him with those early vods #im actually so stoked about finding those tho #anway its late and cold here so im going to log off #but please rb with your thoughts as well!!! friendly ghost-related discussion is encouraged here!!!!#i wont see them til morning but i appricate them!

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ambiguousdisorderken · 3 years

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in your expert opinion what are some of the most destiel-heavy episodes of spn? i stopped watching around season 7 and have no interest in engaging w the plot of the show at all but i’m in the mood for some gay yearning ykwim

Hi anon! Thank you for reaching out to me about this, I’m, no-joke, very flattered. I’d seen a couple posts on this same question, very thorough and detailed lists on Destiel-centric episodes, but at the moment I cannot find any of them, that would’ve answered your request much faster. So, in advance, sorry, my reply is probably coming in extremely late, but I did write this from scratch, so yeah.

Even though storylines in SPN can be very shitty and hollow, I do feel that to get the full Destiel experience -that long-drawn yearning- one would have to watch the entirety of the show, even if Cas isn’t in the episode or if there’s no explicit mention of their relationship/bond because it gives you a better understanding of them as characters and of how their relationship affects the narrative.

Now, you mentioned you stopped around S7, which is completely understandable and justified given the Dick plot game was very weak and, in my opinion, annoying (so little Cas!). I’m going to start listing from S7 in case you want to refresh your SPN before jumping straight into unseen episodes. Also, since you mentioned no interest in the plot and are specifically craving those sweet crumbs of gay yearning, I’ll skip most one-sided / too subtle episodes and cut to the chase.

Lastly, I hate spoiling things, but you’ve probably seen it all on Tumblr. I tried to keep the episodes’ descriptions short, as it might come in useful. Stuck to key words, quotes and/or little comments.

Season 7

7x01 – Meet the New Boss: Godstiel, sincere apology. Cas: “I'm gonna find some way to redeem myself to you.”

7x02 – Hello, Cruel World: Mourning. Trench coat melancholy. The heart-wrenching eulogy: “Dumb son of a bitch.”

7x17 – The Born-Again Identity: Emmanuel!Cas, reunion, longing, hurt.

7x21 – Reading is Fundamental: Honey!Cas, hug, hurt, reunion, that painful SORRY (board game) scene.

7x23 – Survival of the Fittest: Honey!Cas, forgiveness, adorable, wified Cas. Dean hits us with: “Nobody cares that you're broken, Cas!" but also “I'd rather have you, cursed or not.”

Season 8 (this season is so good and Destiel is the driving motor of it, I swear. If you can, watch it complete.)

8x01 – We Need to Talk About Kevin: Dean in Purgatory looking for the angel. Cas is referred to as “your [Dean’s] angel.”

8x02 – What’s Up, Tiger Mommy?: HUG!!!, Purgatory reunion, face touch, very romantic. Monster: “ You'll find your angel there.” // Dean: “Let me bottom-line it for you. I'm not leaving here without you.”

8x05 – Blood Brother: Cas vs. Benny cat fight lol. Dean: “Cas... we're gonna shove your ass back through the eye of that needle if it kills all three of us.”

8x07 – A Little Slice of Kevin: Cas comes back from Purgatory, but before that Dean starts seeing him in places. Very tragic; hallucinating your dead significant other trope. Has That boner scene. Dean: “I did everything I could to get you out! EVERYTHING!” Cas helps Dean see what truly happened in Purgatory and not his self-altered memories. PACKED!

8x08 – Hunteri Heroici: Hilarious, romantic, intimate. Dean and Cas have an heart to heart. They actually communicate. Cas “I’ll watch over you.”

8x10 Torn and Frayed: They work a case together, and when I say heart eyes…

8x17 – Goodbye Stranger: THIS. EPISODE. Dean “I need you.”

8x19 – Taxi Driver: Separation. Naomi to Dean: "You're hoping Castiel will return to you. I admire your loyalty; I only wish he felt the same way."

8x22 – Clip Show: Lack of trust, hurt, tense interactions. Romantic too (basically, Cas gets Dean an apology basket).

8x23 – Sacrifice: Meaningful conversation and a gay couple hit by Cupid parallel. Dean “So this is it? E.T goes home?"

Season 9

9x01 – I think I’m Gonna Like it Here: Dean prays to Cas IN.A.CHAPEL. Worry, longing, separation. Dean “Please, man, I need you here.”

9x03 – I’m No Angel: Human!Cas and jealous!Dean.

9x06 – Heaven Can’t Wait: Human!Cas TEXT-BOOK LONGING. GAY AS FUCK. Gazing, touching, they even TALK (for real).

9x09 – Holy Terror: Adorable Cas, flirty vibes, happyish, funny. Cas: “Cas is back in town!”

9x10 – Road Trip: Cas comforts Dean, Cas and Crowley bitching at each other, overall protective!Cas.

9x18 – Metafiction. Cas finds out about the Mark of Cain.

9x21 – King of the Damned: Hug, strong boyfriends vibes.

9x22 – Stairway to Heaven: Cas gives up an entire army, for Dean. Metatron about Cas “He's in love………………………. with humanity.”

9x23 – Do You Believe in Miracles?: At this point, it’s canon stated that Cas will do anything and lose everything if that means saving Dean. Metatron to Cas “You draped yourself in the flag of heaven, but ultimately, it was all about saving one human, right?”

Season 10

10x01 – Black: Demon!Dean and sick/brokenhearted Cas in a slutty robe missing his man.

10x03 – Soul Survivor: ICONIC. Angel on Demon action! Cas turns down Hannah because he’s too gay and in love. Intimate Deancas talk.

10x05 – Fan Fiction: No Cas, but Destiel references.

10x09 – The Things We Left Behind: That.Lunch.Date. Deancas introduction to co-parenting.

10x14 – The Executioner’s Song: We get Daddy Murder aka Cain. This is a Pivotal episode to understand Dean’s character development. Plus, it has Deancas interactions.

10x16 – Paint It Black: No Cas, but Dean opens up in confessionary; repressed BISEXUAL AS FUCK.

10x18 – Book of the Damned: Charlie meets Cas. Gay energies everywhere. Cute domestic little scene.

10x20 – Angel Heart: PARENTING! Essential to understand Cas from this point forward.

10x22 – The Prisoner: Just… just watch it. One of THEE Destiel episodes.

10x23 – Brother’s Keeper: No Deancas interactions but it’s the finale, and I recommend watching it because next season takes off literally right from here. No time jumps.

Season 11

11x02 – Form and Void: Could skip to the very end which is when Cas comes back.

11x03 – The Bad Seed: Cursed!Cas. Dean takes care of him, even wraps him in a blanket. He also cradles his face. Extreme Hurt/Comfort. Jacting joices rejoice.

11x10 – The Devil in the Details: Could skip but has Casifer in it. Interesting to see his dynamic with Dean.

11x18 – Hell’s Angel: Casifer. Dean "It? It's not an it, Sam, it's Cas!"

11x23 – Alpha and Omega: Huggg! Cas willing to go on a guaranteed suicide mission with Dean. Very tender and sad.

Season 12

12x02 – Keep Calm and Carry On: ANOTHER HUG! Dean presents his boyfriend to his mom<3 Soft and romantic.

12x09 – First Blood: Reunion hug<3, Cas pining… as in he counts his every minute without Dean.

12x10 – Lily Sunder Has Some Regrets: Direct parallel with canon couple. Crystal-clear mutual affection. One of the best. Angel Ishim to Cas about Dean “I'm gonna help you. I'm gonna cure you of your human weakness same way I cured my own… by cutting it out.”

12x12 – Stuck in the Middle with You: A dying Cas confesses his love. “I love you. I love all of you.”

12x19 – The Future: We find out Dean gave Cas a MIXTAPE!!! Very romantic and full of yearning, also worry and what could be seen as a betrayal (ish…).

12x23 – All Along the Watch Tower: Hands down, one of the most distressing Destiel episodes. Cas dies.

Season 13

13x01 – Lost and Found: This is the worst because you have Dean trying to assimilate Cas’ death. Core of Dean’s widow’s arc. Jack introduction, that’s their new kid.

13x02 – The Rising Son: Widow’s arc (you could skip it, but why would you?).

13x03 – Patience: Widow’s arc (you could skip it, but why would you?). Dean to Sam “He manipulated him, he made him promises, said, ‘paradise on earth’ and Cas bought it and you know what that got him? It got him dead! Now you might be able to forget about that, but I can’t!”

13x04 – The Big Empty: Continuation of widow’s arc and Cas wakes up in the Empty. The Empty to Cas: "I know who you love. There's nothing for you back there." // Dean to Sam “I need you to keep the faith, for both of us. ‘Cause right now, I… Right now, I don’t believe in a damn thing.”

13x05 – Advanced Thanatology: Suicidal and hopeless Dean gets his win. Cas comes back. Gives me the chills.

13x06 – Tombstone: COWBOY BOYFRIENDS!

13x14 – Good Intentions: Happy and fun Destiel scene. So Very Married.

13x23 – Let The Good Times Roll: Season finale, Dean talks about retiring (plans include Cas of course) and just very nice to see them interact.

Season 14

14x03 – The Scar: Reunion.

14x08 – Byzantium: Deanand Cas dealing with their child’s death, then bringing him back by Cas making a deal with the Empty. IMPORTANT EPISODE.

14x09 – The Spear: Cas uses the royal We – married behavior.

14x10 – Nihilism: Dean is stuck in his own mind, and Cas and Sam try to bring him back. Cas “Please, you have to -- you have to try to remember, because the people in your life -- in your real life, out there -- we need you to come back.”

14x12 – Prophet and Loss: Dean gets his very own Dr. Sexy, aka Dr. Cas.

14x14 – Ouroboros: Basically another date (their kid tags along) and They TALK. Very intimate and established marriage vibes.

14x18 – Absence: Shits starts to go south. [ Dean: “Who cares what Jack said? We don't know what happened! But I swear, if he did something to her, if she is -- (points to Castiel) Then you're dead to me. (Castiel looks crushed after Dean says that).]

14x20 – Moriah: Tense and very upsetting. Relationship very damaged.

Season 15 (I would advise watching the entire season because it relies heavily on Destiel. They’re the heart and the emotional motor leading the plot onwards.)

15x01 – Back and To The Future: Deancas’ in the aftermath of their kid’s death. Tension gets worse.

15x02 – Raising Hell: Tension rises, this is very intense. Cas “Dean. You asked, "What about all of this is real?" We are.”

15x03 – The Rupture: Breaking point ends in divorce.

15x06 – Golden Time: Painful phone call which speaks volumes about the current state of their relationship at the time. Also, good to see where they’re standing and how they’re coping.

15x08 – Our Father Who Aren’t in Heaven: Strained relationship so obvious they’re offered couples’ therapy.

15x09 – The Trap: MASTERPIECE. Back to Purgatory. Can (and is) taken as Dean’s love confession (because it is).

15x12 – Galaxy Brain: So married. Little domestic date, you can see LOVE written in their faces.

15x13 – Destiny’s Child: AU!Dean and Sam. Not a yearning episode per se, but AU!Dean? SO GAY.

15x17 – Unity: God reveals that the only act of free will in any universe he ever created has been Cas choosing Dean.

15x18 – Despair: Cas confesses his love to Dean.

#Anonymous #thanks for coming to my ted talk #im posting this at 2:30 am so i'll most likely reblog it at a more reasonable hour ..in case anon is closer to my time zone #why am i even saying this..im sleepy #destiel #answered #destiel episode guide #there might be number/name mistakes because again sleepish.forgive me #long post

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areyougonnabe · 3 years

Text

Fic Writer Questions!

tagged by @palamedessextus !!! thank u i love to procrastinate on writing by writing about writing

1) How many works do you have on AO3?

110 on my main account (+ 4 on my sneaky sock for Crimes™ lol)

2) What’s your total AO3 word count?

614,551 on my main account which is. hm. a lot

3) How many fandoms have you written for and what are they?

obvi the main ones are the terror (50 fics) and good omens (35 fics). beyond that: TMA, the OA, doctor who, LOST, red dwarf, what we do in the shadows, the aubreyad, legends of tomorrow, banished, MCU, bbc ghosts, jeeves & wooster, russian doll, true detective, twin peaks, fleabag, & it's always sunny.

so technically 19, but wow a LOT of those are because i am a fiend for crossovers. (true detective x red dwarf... twin peaks x hannibal... the OA x lost.... russian doll x doctor who...) and many of the others were one-offs for yuletide. i'm pretty monofannish when it comes to writing!

4) What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

lol they're all going to be for good omens... let's see

1. "it's a new craze" - the podcast fic. imho this fic is the definition of "The Claw," a.k.a. the phenomenon that sees some fics plucked out from the fray to become super popular. i'm not denying that it's good! i still think it's pretty clever! but its popularity was probably as much a function of timing as of quality

2. "what a way to make a living" - the uber driver fic. honestly still pretty proud of this one, it flows well and is structurally interesting and genuinely very funny and the perfect length. i had a blast in good omens fandom writing comedic fic, this one

3. "dearly departed" - another one i'm still very happy with. my first ever finished multi-chapter fic & the story that proved to me i could sustain a plot and original characters and also that people would actually enjoy it. so a pretty big deal!

4. "blame it on my juice, baby!" - the fake love potion one. i wrote this fic while delirious with horrible fever cooped up in a tiny council flat airbnb bedroom in london. i think it's still pretty strong although since writing it i've developed a severe aversion to the "meddling friend engineers a get-together" trope in fic & so cringe a bit when i read it back, lmao

5. "greatest hits" - the one with the original songs! the songs are still good.... the fic is ehhhhhhh i guess.

5) Do you respond to comments, why or why not?

i don't respond to comments on most of my gomens fic anymore because 🤷‍♀️ but i do try to reply to everything i get on my terror fic/smaller fandom stories! my replies are usually very lame but i do like to take the time to thank people for reading.

6) What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

i usually don't write angsty endings because i'm a weenie BUT the one exception is probably my terror/TMA crossover which cannot be said to end well by any means lol

7) What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

dearly departed has a very lovely ending... i will also plug my OA fic heat rises which is GREAT and has a GREAT ending and nobody read it because nobody watched the OA. i'm fine it's fine

8) Do you write crossovers? If so what is the craziest one you’ve written?

as mentioned above, yes, compulsively... award for craziest simply has to go to It's Always Sunny In Another Dimension which is, yes, an IASIP x OA crossover. i apologize for nothing

9) Have you ever received hate on a fic?

not that i can recall, [bubbe voice] tenks gad!!!

10) Do you write smut? If so what kind?

i do i do.... when i first picked up fic writing again after college i thought smut would forever totally beyond me but after some very kind encouragement from friends i tried my hand at it & was off to the races.

i would not say i am an expert at it by any means but i have a lot of fun with it, & people seem to generally appreciate it, so i will keep going!

11) Have you ever had a fic stolen?

also no, phew

12) Have you ever had a fic translated?

yes, a bunch of my gomens fics have been translated into chinese and russian, which is so so super cool!

13) Have you ever co-written a fic before?

yuh, i had a few legendary cowrites in GO! the slow show metafic with cherry @fremulon and the shitscript crossover extravaganza with hallie @kalelraejepsen !!! both tremendously fun experiences

14) What’s your all time favorite ship?

that is a very tough one. if you go by my ao3 bookmarks it's aziraphale/crowley, which might be true still tbh... but i dunno. maybe ten/rose because that shit never leaves you.

15) What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

in terms of fic i already started posting, there's my one terror WIP with amnesiac tozer that i swear i WILL finish one day... and same goes for my good omens music & lyrics AU, which i fully expect to pick back up and finish off when i inevitably return to the fandom for series 2.

as far as stuff that never made it out of drafts, i started a hodgson-centric fic a few weeks ago that i got like 4k into before realizing i need to seriously refine my approach. so hopefully after exe fest i will get around to that!

16) What are your writing strengths?

well i am funny. so i've got that going for me. other than that ummmm i don't know. i don't think of myself as a particularly good or strong writer bc i really am just here for a laff. i think i can turn a phrase well and get the most out of imagery; i'm good at coming up with compelling story concepts and weird gimmicks, i guess?

17) What are your writing weaknesses?

i fundamentally don't know or understand how People Actually Act And Feel so i have a hard time getting realistic or interesting reactions and conflicts out of characters. my plots (when my stories have them at all) are very powered by external events, i wouldn't call myself a character-driven writer by any means. for the same reasons i struggle with voice and dialogue beyond superficial signposting via vocabulary/syntax. also, sustaining a long story/finding enough Stuff To Happen to fill it up/having the patience to keep writing... is something i need to work on for sure.

18) What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

i'm a lame american who only speaks english so honestly i don't really have thoughts!

19) What was the first fandom you wrote for?

i distinctly remember hand-writing in my notebook two or three pages worth of a story about what happened to the main precog in "minority report" after watching the movie when i was like seven. the first fandom i actually wrote fic for and posted it online was probably doctor who circa 2010 ish? but my warrior cats RP career predates that by a few years and i did a LOT of writing there. oh warriorsforest39 dot proboards dot com you are missed....

20) What’s your favorite fic you’ve written?

SEX GHOST AU! SEX GHOST AU!

tagging folks :))) @laissezferre @titleleaf @theburialofstrawberries @girdedheraround @flanneryoconnorfanfiction @wreathedwith if u want!!

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poppykru · 3 years

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I've asked this before and I'll ask it again (not to you specifically to the fandom at large): what would you HATE to see brought to the SaB adaptation... mine is Botkin dying and the way Botkin speaks in the books because his character was left on the cutting room floor for the first season then i hope we get him for 2 and 3 (especially with making Alina Shu in the show)

That is a good one! I think we could've seen more of Botkin in the books as well as the show. Seeing more of him in the show would make a lot of sense, given him and Alina's shared ethinicity. Yup, yup, I agree.

Honestly, there are more things that I would like the show to add to the story to make it make sense because I would change sooo many fundamental things about it lol. But there is one specific thing I would hate if they bring to the SAB adaptation and its the ending...which I know it's unavoidable, but a girl can dream. I really dislike the ending of TGT because it doesn't make sense. Many a people have said waaay better than me, but I will try nonetheless. Before I start, I want to preface that my dislike has nothing to do with ships. If you follow me, you will notice that I have a preference for darklina, but I honestly don't mind malina. In fact, I do find them cute. Ok? Cool!

Putting this under the cut cause it turned out looong. 😁

So almost all of my problems with TGT stem from Alina's arc, and since she is the story, it means it impacts everything. I am confused what Leigh was trying to convey with this character, what was her plan... It seems like her story is the typical YA arc of self-discovery, acceptance, empowerment, finding your place in the world--all the things young people deal with. And we see that in S&B. She feels like she doesn't belong anywhere (I believe even with Mal at one point, but i might be wrong). She feels different, she looks different. She is just small at the beginning of the story. Then she discovers her powers and her life changes. Suddenly, she is part of something, of somebodies, she is a Grisha. At first she doesn't fit in because she is resisting, because she isn't letting go of the past (Mal). But when she does, she is happy (which then honestly confuses her story with Mal tbh, but that's a whole other thing). We find out suppressing her power all these years is what made her frail and sickly, and unhappy. (In fact, we are continually hit over the head with the idea that her powers feed her and make her happy. In the beginning of Siege and Storm when they have to hide she expresses her frustration, her feelings of powerlessness (physical and emotional). In Ruin & Rising when she is trapped underground, she is weak, but the moment she is out, she literally glows with happiness. So Alina loves her power.) So now she doesn't have to hold back, she can be herself - self-discovery, moving to empowerment and self-acceptance. Now here is where it gets confusing. After the stag and the sea serpent amplifiers, Alina's story shifts from an empowerment arc to "power corrupts" arc. So the protagonist finally finds her strength, finally gains agency in her life, but now when more power was thrust upon her (cause let's be honest, how much choice did she really have in wearing those amplifiers), she is greedy??? You can't make a character greedy just completely out of the blue. Alina was never shown as greedy. Hell, she was never ambitious even. Quite the opposite actually!! She doesn't even have a choice. It's not like they have another viable solution to stopping the Darkling (which...don't get me started on the big flaw in this whole story). And yet, Alina taking those amplifiers and wanting to get the third one is framed as greed. But this is not the worst part--this is about the ending after all. Then Alina gets punished for doing the thing she had to do to survive. Alina finds her power, becomes powerful, makes tough decisions, and then gets severely punished for it by the narrative. This is made even worse by the fact that she seems to be the only. Nikolai doesn't get punished for wanting the throne. Him wanting to rule is never framed in this way. And I hate that so much askdhaslds. And to make it worse, Alina is not even ruling in any way. Alina, with her unique perspective as a Grisha, brought up as a mortal (mortal? otkazat'sya?), would have been instrumental to bringing actual change to Ravka. Nikolai doesn't understand Grisha, and as many years as he has spent as a privateer, he never was just a common citizen of Ravka. Zoya--look I will admit I'm not her biggest fan, and I haven't read KoS so this is an opinion more than fact-- has grown up amogst Grisha and we say her turning her nose up at otkazat'sya. Same with Genya-- like all of them have known hardship, but none have know the hardship of common people, so how are they really fit to govern them? How are they supposed to make Grisha accepted again if they don’t know the people they are trying to convince? N e way.

Not to mention the big question of what happens to Grisha now. They are still murdered by Fjerda, still experimented on by the Shu-Han, still enslaved by Kerch. What happens to Grisha? What was the plan? Where was the consideration for the constantly prosecuted marginalised group? I could write another rant on this tbh.

I think Leigh tried to pull a Hunger Games ending, but with none of the actual story to back it up.

Honestly, there are so so many things that are just wrong about Alina's character. For a protagonist, she feels the least fleshed out, and her story the least planned out to make sense lol.

To summarise, I think Alina's arc doesn't make sense, because from an empowerment arc, we made a sharp turn to "greed corrups", which doesn’t come with proper buildup. I find her ending unfeministic, as the narrative punishes her for her liking her power, while it never does that with any male other characters.

#sorry it took me so long to answer this 🙈#this is a little ranty but oh well #sab #sab wank #grishaverse wank

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genderhoax · 3 years

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I used to want to be an artist but then i stopped drawing for like 7 years. I want to go back but i'm scared and dont know where to start. So yes, i am interested in those drawing videos can you post them if you dont mind? ^_^

Of course!! I am in the same situation as you actually. I used to draw a lot in middle school (2010-2012) but my depression worsened during high school and in college, I’d only draw as a distraction, never seeking to study or improve. I decided to get back this year, since I decided drawing was the only thing I could see myself doing professionally. I felt very lost, because how do you get back? How do you know what’s your actual, current, art skill? What are your weaknesses? Your strong points?

That’s how I learned to study the fundmentals of art. Because visual art is not a skill. It is a set of skills, if you are very good at anatomy but not really when coming to painting your art is going to look differently than someone who learned anatomy in how to draw manga books but paint like a pro. I am going to divide this post in categories, Also, all the videos I link I also recommend all the channels they are from! My favorites are The Drawing Database, Sycra and Ganev, Sycra and The Drawing Databse have a little of everything and are great at explaining. Ganev is a bit sarcastic but I like the way he teaches. I took some parts of the text of this post from here.

How do I begin? How do you even get back at art? What tips should you use? These are general tips videos, usually nice to draw along. /the fundmentals and how to get started/ /5 tips for better drawing/ /perfect pratice/ /beginner’s guide/ /5 tips for digital art/ /10 tips to improve/ /why your drawings are stiff/ /what level is your art/ /improve your art fast/ /drawing basics/ /how to hold and control your pencil/ /intuitive drawing method/ /iterative drawing/

The Fundamentals: Proportion & Placement Proportion is relationship between one element and another. In the visual arts proportion relates most importantly to the abstract quality of scale and placement. You know how stereotypically an artists puts a pencil to their eye when looking at an object? They’re mesuring the proportion of the object in question and how to represent it corectly in the drawing. /principles of proportion/ /ways to create illusion of space/ /drawing the human figure/ /how to draw proportions playlist/ /how to use proportion in character design/ /basic anatomy and proportions part one/ /part two/ /part three/ /part four/ /proportion basics/

Form & Construction The idea of form is how we see the 3D objects in or world and transform them into 2D in the paper/canvas. It’s understading that eveyrthing is made up of basic forms. /dynamic sketching part one/ /part two/ /how to draw forms/ /structure/ /building form/ /another how to draw forms/ /how to visualize 3D forms/ /form study process/

Perspective & Depth Perspective is knowing that as things move away from the viewer’s eye, things seem to get smaller. Get familiarized with terms like horizon line and vanishing point. This is the basic that must be understood to learn perspective. Here’s a good article about this. /an intro video on the subject/ /step by step tutorial/ /perspective basics part one/ /part two/ /part three/ /part four/ part five /part six/ /another basics video/ /20 perspective lessons/ /eye level tip/ /linear perspective/ /simple form perspective/ /drawing the figure in perspective/

Anatomy Anatomy is something I think it’s one the most crucials things to learn in order to make your drawing look good. Once you understand how joints work you’ll be able to see how bones and muscles move. And this goes for anything with a skeleton. It’s one of those things of you learn the rules before breaking them. I am linking different playlists, since linking different videos on various parts of anatomy would take forever. Just study a body part at time: head, eyes, nose, lips, ears, shoulders, neck, hairline, breats, torso, hands, feet etc. /how to do an anatomy tracing/ /playlist 1 / /draw the head from any angle/ /anatomy for artists/ /draw facial features/ /how to draw and paint/ /playlist 2/ /draw 3/4 head with loomis method/ /playlist 3/ /drawing a head in 3 hours (this one is great to draw along with the artist)/ /how to draw a body/ draw a head with loomis method part 1/ /part 2/ /part 3/ /decipgering bridgman’s anatomy/ /anatomy quick tips/

Gesture Gesture drawing is a method of capturing figures in exaggerated poses, usually drawn quickly. It is important to undersand that the goal of all gesture is to study the figure and see how it moves. I like looking at poses and copying them. Here’s a good article. /how to draw gesture/ /how to draw any pose/ /draw interesting poses/ /a guide on gesture drawing/ /tips for expressive dynamic poses/ /figure drawing tips/

Composition The overall layout of a piece is very important. Artists often consider things like the rule of thirds or the infamous golden ratio. Neither truly defines a composition, but they can both go into your decision making. /composition in art/ /understanding composition/ /10 composition tips/ /beginner’s guide to composition/ /art fundamental: composition/

Value Studying value is very much the study of light and shadow. But there is a technical side of light that you’ll want to pay attention to if you’re going for technical rendering. /guide on rendering/ /seeing light and shadows in daily life/ /10 minutes to a better painting/ /understaing colors and values/ /shading basics/ /ambient occlusion/ /shadow colors/ /tips on how to shade/ /draw shadows on objects and people/ /lighting tutorial/

Color Theory Color theory is understanding which colors go good with eachother, and knowing the pyschology behind it. (what are cool colors? what colors make someone feel comfortable?) It is fundamental in art for you to understand the relationship between colors and what makes them look good. Best color theory books. A comprehensive guide to color theory. /hue value saturation in photoshop/ /color theory for noobs/ /understanding color/ /what you should know about colors/ /warm and cool colors/ /the basic elements/ /choose colors that work/

Traditional Media If you draw in traditional media, all videos above can be used easily. These are just videos for general tips in traditional media, there isn’t many since my focus is digtal ^^’ /watercolor tips/ /draw with colored pencils/ /blending colored pencils/ /4 how to draw lessons/ /Block in colors/ /holding the brush/ /

Digital Media Digital art is how everyone’s been doing art these days. It doesn’t matter if you’re doing with your phone or your computer. I don’t do art on my phone, I know the most used app is mediabang for android and procreate for apple, and I think anyone who is able to do art with their finger is very skilled. If you are like me and prefer doing art on your computer, you probably have your tablet. If not, well you should have. Not having a tablet is not an option if you want to get better at art ^^’ Best tablet for beginners in 2020. Or you can just buy an old used one, if it still works, and you are a beginner, a small intuos is all you need. When talking about softwares, the three big ones I see people using are: Photoshop, Clip Paint Studio and Paint Tool Sai. The best one is CPS, but I find Sai easier to navigate, but CPS is extremely complete and I hope to be able to master it someday. CPS Tutorials. I don’t have much to say about photoshop, people use it mostly because they’ve been using it forever lol I divide my digital painting process in steps: Sketch/Lineart/Color Blocking/Shading/Blending/Color correction. Sketch is the basics, draw your idea. Lineart is to clean your sketch. Color Blocking is to color your drawing one color, so it’s easier to work in it. Shading is to understand where the lighting sources are coming from and apply them. Blending is to blend the colors of your drawing with brushes. Color correction is when I use filters of hue/saturation and others to make the drawing more appealing. These require understadings of the software of your choice which I am not very good at the moment so I can’t give you more tips than that ^^’ Hopefully these videos can help. /perspective grid/ /clean line art/ /coloring process/ /make lineart interesting/ /best brushes for digital painting/ /skin shading tutorial/ /lineart vs painting/ /art in clip studio paint/ /hair tutorial/ /3 tips for improving/ /10 digital art mistakes/ /color block tutorial/ /shading skin/ /from lineart to painting/ /cleaner lineart/ /add texture to your art/ /improve your art with better shadows/ /the importance of brushes/ /use layer modes/ /improve your lines/ /how to blend colors/ /another blending tutorial/ /color blocking/

Exercises It’s no secret that to improve on art, you must pratice. Everyday, even if it’s just a little! A great way to pratice is make use of youtube picture in picture function to draw along in your software of choice. /pratice drawing forms/ /proportion exercises/ /perspective exercises/ /value studies/ /creative drawing exercises/ /simple drawing esercises/

Resources Senshi stocks, a deviantart page full of poses photos. Quick poses, pictures of models, contains nudes. Character design references DesignDoll, create a personalized sketch doll and make it pose.

Phew!!! This took forever to make and is way more than you asked for, but I decided to go all in so I can have a masterpost for me too and for anyone else interested in art. As soon you can understand the fundamentals, you can do your own research and study, youtube is really great for this. I hope this helps, let’s get better at drawing together!!! Ganbarimashou (ง •̀_•́)ง

#anon #askbox #I feel there's a lot more to add but I'm tired I've been working on this sicne yesterday ^^'#Like there's more softwares and resources I could link you I know of that #So when I think of something else I may add to this psot #post #if you feel overwhelmed because this is a lot of info you can start with the beginner section of this psot #and sycra's channel

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heinzpilsnergonewild · 3 years

Text

Vegeta’s Character Analysis Looooooooooong Read

Oh my, what can I say? I just really love to write long essays in a language that isn’t even native to me, lol.

Well, nobody’s perfect, I guess. ... Were you expecting a Cell joke here? I may not be perfect, but that doesn't mean I have to be that predictable.

Ahem, anyway.

This isn't exactly a psychological analysis of the character - more like, hmm, a storytelling analysis. Or something in between, really.

You may not find anything fundamentally new in this text, but I definitely had fun writing it, haha.

It's mostly amateur. I have a useless psychology degree, but not a literature one.

My classic rant about vegebul fics is included, of course.

Summary: proper psychological analysis requires a single continuous personality, which Vegeta simply doesn’t have.

The more I think about Vegeta, the more I come to the conclusion that he is only pretending to be a consistently evolving character.

In fact, he's a bit like 10 different characters in one, which abruptly replace each other (and that's without considering the difference caused by the voice actors’ approach and the changes in his looks). Essentially, Vegeta's a collection of disparate images, arbitrarily lined up by Toriyama and hastily glued together. And the beginning of this line is so far from the end of it that these two extreme images cannot be perceived as belonging to the same person. Well, because human psychology just doesn't work that way.

(Not that Vegeta is unique in this respect – it’s a common feature of characters in long stories that authors compose as they write. Still, his case is quite extreme and interesting as example.)

I mean, take Vegeta in the Saiyan or the Namek arc. He's a complete psychopath. He clearly doesn’t suffer at heart from the unnecessary violence (as, for example, Guts from Berserk). His behavior looks like something natural for him, not an unhealthy defensive reaction. He enjoys it, he smiles happily, killing and torturing weak innocent people. And such a degree of psychopathy is not something that can be healed by a couple of deep personality crises or years of peaceful family life. Vegeta's redemption arc works through strong emotional impact and forgetfulness of the audience, but makes very little sense when viewed in retrospect.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Perhaps the biggest, hmm, splitting of the personality occurred with Vegeta right after the Namek arc. Toriyama had already made a small retcon of the character’s motives before (to include Vegeta in the context of the Freeza army after the Saiyan arc), but it didn't feel that drastic.

You see, until Vegeta was invited to Bulma’s house…..

(Gosh, Toriyama, you could’ve done it more subtly, really. Vegeta killed Yamcha, threatened to kill Bulma, gutted Zarbon in front of her eyes, slaughtered an entire Namekian village... Oh well.)

…Ahem, anyway, right up to Bulma's invitation, Vegeta looked to me like a character who, hmm, has a life of his own? I mean, you have always felt that his motives and behavior were generated by the bizarre social system, not related to the little world of Goku and his friends. Simply put, Vegeta was a natural product of the big space civilization, an organic part of it. His whole personality was formed by it, all his plans, motivation and ambitions were associated with it. And although in the Saiyan arc, he gave the impression of an independent entrepreneurial chief at the head of a small hierarchy, in the Namek arc it was revealed that Vegeta is actually far from independent. He lost his throne and his people, he was in slavery to the tyrant all his life, and wants to take power for himself. So, his social background and the motives caused by it post factum get much more complex. But in short, Vegeta wanted a highest possible position in the hierarchy he knew. In this way, he was… social? His belonging to the Saiyan race was only a small (although important) part of the overall picture. Because the Saiyans were dead, but the Freeza Empire was alive.

But when Toriyama realized Vegeta's popularity and decided to keep him in the story after Namek, it came as a blow to the character's personality. Apparently, the author simply couldn't come up with an elegant way that could keep the character in all its complexity around, and therefore did a very clumsy thing. He roughly cut Vegeta out of his social context and almost forcibly glued him to the main character group like a poorly done appliqué. But although you see rough edges and glue drips, the story moves on rapidly, distracting you with Freeza and Future Trunks, and you don't stop to think about what happened. This is how, almost imperceptibly, Toriyama changed Vegeta's motives (and, consequently, the basis of his personality). Yes, Vegeta's saiyan pride was also significant part of his character previously, but when it became his sole and central motivation after Namek, you feel like a very big and important piece of him has been arbitrarily cut off. This wouldn't have happened if Toriyama had followed the logic of previously established social motives, rather than his desire to make Vegeta a convenient figure. Now, bound hand and foot by the author, the character is forced to behave as the plot requires.

Still, all this can be justified by the fact that Vegeta experienced a deep emotional shock as a result of death, which forced him to rethink his life priorities and wait for Goku (especially in the manga, where he just lived with Bulma for a whole year after Namek, without even trying to use dragonballs) ... And then he waited for the androids (despite the final death of Freeza and his father, which was an excellent chance to try to take over the decapitated empire). Anyway, this rationalization doesn't negate the fact that the character, as a result, has lost a significant part of the fire that he demonstrated in the Namek arc. His new energy, the energy of obsession with surpassing Goku, turns him into a new character – bitter, marginalized and focused on training.

(Ironically, the very splitting that made him a less attractive character in my eyes allowed vegebul to take place. After all, imagining the romantic relationship of the nice Bulma and Vegeta at the height of his villainous ambition is really difficult. That just would be a psychologically implausible story.)

In the Android and Cell arcs, after brief glimpses of the SSJ superiority, Toriyama turned Vegeta into a plot tool, whose personality flaws he could use to spoil the situation favorable for the heroes. As a result, Vegeta continued to be an angry and unhappy character who has lost most of his charisma, but on top of that, he also started to be really annoying. ... Still, also kinda amusing thanks to his truly impressive inability to draw obvious conclusions from the ego bruises he gets.

(If you ask me, the character's biggest contribution to the Cell arc was to ignore the existence of condoms, lol. Although strictly speaking even it was an achievement of Future Vegeta (RIP). But seriously, Vegeta's relationship with Trunks turned out to be one of the few things that I was really interested in about this part of the story.)

And then there was Goku’s death and the 7-year-gap. ... At the end of which Vegeta still didn't look like a happy man who has found his place in the world. Even though he had seven whole years (and a spaceship) to change something. I mean, this is the case when it'd be logical to expect changes in the character, but for some reason they didn't really happen (or they did, but veeery quietly and unstable). I mean, Vegeta trains with Trunks, yes. And he's married to Bulma now, apparently (which we learn only at the end of the arc though). And he hasn’t killed himself yet, which means that he sees some meaning in his existence. Hurray, I guess?.. The problem is that when we first see Vegeta after the timeskip, he keeps walking around with such a sullen expression, as if Goku had died just yesterday. (Remember Vegeta in the Saiyan arc? He smiled quite often. For the wrong reasons, but hey.) Basically, Toriyama tried to sit on two chairs at the same time here - 1) keep Vegeta as recognizable as possible (because he hasn't decided what to do with him yet) and 2) keep him around (which doesn't make sense for the character if he hasn't undergone significant changes during the timeskip). And the result of this hesitant approach is an undesirable effect - it feels as if Vegeta hasn't built a new life for himself all these years, but only waited for Goku to return.

As if the man is unable to evolve without Goku's influence. Until Kakarot does or says something, or is just around, everyone else in Vegeta's life and his own reflection has little or no meaning. Old social ambitions? His wife and child? New insights gained from life on Earth? Pffft. Goku is able to destroy the seven years’ worth progress (no matter how small it may seem) in one day, and at the same time, one fight with him is enough for Vegeta's character development to jump forward explosively. It sounds like a solid ground for shipping, but In fact it’s just a direct consequence of the author's poorly chosen narrative structure.

The thing is, Toriyama tend to avoid romance and slices of life, and shows Vegeta's personality mainly through fights and their consequences. And at the time Goku just turned out to be the only significant character for Vegeta, the fight against whom could be used as an excuse to develop the character in front of the audience. Well, Toriyama couldn't get Vegeta to fight Bulma or himself, you know.

I believe that the plot structure chosen by the author (rapidly changing action events immediately after a long timeskip) is not a very good basis for a redemption arc. For a good redemption, a character had to have screen time during which small changes accumulate gradually, between the big points. And Vegeta simply didn't have it. Besides, the scheme by which Vegeta develops is really messy. Because at first, Toriyama kinda froze his development at the neutral point (thereby partially devaluing the influence of Vegeta's family on him). Then in one moment, the author abruptly reversed even this the-end-of-the-Cell-arc development with Majin Vegeta (this time completely devaluing the family factor, because the betrayal was Vegeta’s conscious decision). God, how I hated the Majin Vegeta idea. And in the next scene, the author made a quick retcon, which gave the family’s influence the status of a ground for Vegeta’s personal growth again for no apparent reason. It's as if a huge bundle of family values was post factum squeezed into the character in defiance of everything that we just saw with our own eyes. This is a complete narrative mess.

But... oddly enough, Vegeta's redemption still manages to work, and work spectacularly. My guess is that it's because by that time the audience is already SO sick of Vegeta, frozen in his bitter anti-heroism, that it desperately wants the author to finally do something new with the miserable guy. Well, at least get him out of his misery. So people are willing to accept it in any possible form.

... And the author chose the form of a powerful emotional catharsis. The explosion was legendary, haha.

I don't even know if this is a good reason to call Toriyama a genius (after all, he found a very clever way out of a difficult situation, in which he found himself thanks to his own bad decisions.)

The only thing I'm sure of is that despite everything I was very sad because of Vegeta's death. I didn't even realize that I had become emotionally attached to this asshole until he made such a spectacular exit, lol. As if something had broken inside of me, and all the analyticity of my mind couldn’t prevent it. I was surprised when I found myself crying really hard - usually my emotions don't reach this level due to fictional stories. (Well, maybe it was due to the fact that my own father was dying of cancer at that time, and the moment just triggered my emotions. ... Oops, it seems a little too personal, doesn't it? Well, at the end of the day, this fact is an integral part of my unique dbz experience. Come to think of it, in dbz, fathers die regularly).

But while this scene greatly affects emotions and forces a new viewer (or reader) to truly reconsider their attitude towards the character for the first time, the absence of a neat gradual movement towards this moment weakens its influence somewhat.

At this point, Vegeta’s character splits once again (perhaps the last time within DBZ). You simply cease to understand who this man really is and who he was before.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Now, when I look at all the images of Vegeta in general, I come to the conclusion that I like this character the most in the first two arcs and in the end of the last arc. Two directly opposite moral poles.

(Funny enough, because my initial reaction to Vegeta and Nappa was annoyance: "Well hello, the next stereotypical villains who like to chat and laugh maliciously instead of simply killing their victims." (Still, against the background of Freeza, Vegeta turned out to be a much lesser evil in every sense, haha). You see, usually I'm not a person who likes villains. Basically, I only distinguish such characters from others as a result of romance or redemption. It’s only after that I begin to see aesthetics in their villainous charisma as well.)

And now, in retrospective, I believe that at the beginning of the story Vegeta is at the maximum of his vitality and charisma. Especially compared to his ever-crisis moody version (who supposedly lives happily with a loving family). In the Saiyan arc, he's objectively the most powerful character (Freeza didn’t even exist in Toriyama's head at the time). Vegeta is domineering, playful and unpredictable, but most importantly - his self-confidence is fully justified. Oh well, it was good while it lasted. He's really in control. These are, if I may say so, quite exciting qualities in a man, haha. Even if he looks like an evil dwarf in stupid armor and bullies some weaklings. I'd even say his demeanor in the Saiyan arc (especially with the voice of early Horikawa) is suspiciously easy to translate into a sexual context (well, until he loses control and gets hysterical, lol).

The Namek arc, placing Vegeta in a broader context, somewhat spoiled his original image (after all the big words, it turned out that he was running errands for Freeza all this time), but gave him a more interesting background and a strong drive. He had ambitions and a socially significant goal, and he actively and passionately fought for them against a clearly superior enemy. In addition, his inability to defeat Freeza by brute force forced him to use his brains from time to time, and not just pull another power up out of his ass, as is now traditionally done in DragonBall. (Needless to say, I consider high intelligence to be one of the most attractive traits). All this made his position in the plot as interesting as possible. He literally sparkled with energy.

Well, we know what happened next. Brain Death, an eternal chase after Goku, and an off-screen family life on a backwater planet that Vegeta is supposedly happy with. Until he suddenly became a really beautiful character without a proper justification for this (well, at least the explosion was spectacular). Really, I like the general concept of redemption, and yet... the way Toriyama portrays it in the story just doesn't work convincingly enough for me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another point I’d like to cover in this already too long essay ahhh I'm a monster is Vegeta’s personality in fanfiction.

Reproducing (?) Vegeta is a bit like playing with a lego set - his personality and behavior is always the result of a conscious reconstruction, which is based around a specific point on the long contradictory line. Depending on which end of the spectrum the chosen point is, the author is forced to shade facts related to the opposite end, or to give new context to Vegeta's past (or future) actions. It's always noticeable when the author extends the later, sympathetic Vegeta's image to an earlier segment of the story. Apparently, it's possible to kill the person who raised you (with an evil smile on your face) just because the situation was too stressful lol. Likewise, when the authors allow Vegeta to remain a charismatic psychopath, the story wouldn't work without ignoring some parts of the later canon.

(And, of course, there is always a "medium" type of Vegeta - Vegeta from the 3-year-gap, whose personality is almost entirely based on anime fillers. Yay, here comes the promised vegebul rant

Honestly, I'm pretty tired of this "gravity room exploded again woman grrr" type of Vegeta.

Because if you take the manga, we have no idea how Vegeta actually behaved with Bulma and her parents, what his training regimen was, and what he did in his free time besides unprotected sex. People elevate his rudeness and irrational self-torturing to the absolute because of all these filler patterns, but this is just one of the possible versions of the events and the character's behavior during this time (albeit partly canonical). But... there are also alternatives. There are smart Vegeta, curious Vegeta, civilized Vegeta. Honestly - I don't think Bulma would've married him later if there was nothing in his personality that’d make communication with him enjoyable. I mean, she's a rich modern woman, she doesn't need a husband just for convenience and Vegeta is a marginal freeloader anyway. And if we subtract good looks (which people often attribute to Vegeta) from the equation, then the idea that he has no interest in anything other than training and cannot maintain an interesting conversation becomes completely unconvincing. Toriyama clearly didn't attach much importance to the fact of their marriage, and generally avoided romantic scenes as if they were on fire (and, perhaps, did the right thing), but these two just had to be capable of adequate and mutually pleasant personal interaction in order to take this step.

In general, Toriyama's lack of attention to most aspects of the characters' lives other than fighting and training, on the one hand, can be considered a drawback of DBZ, but on the other, it creates a lot of room for fans' imagination. But not everyone uses it. Most authors generally repeat the same tropes over and over again and don't try to look at the three-year-gap from a new angle, although the canon provides all the possibilities for this. Because of this, fics in this genre often seem boring. But in fact, it's not the setting itself that is boring, but only dusty formulas in the heads of the authors.)

Ahem, so where were we?.. Oh yes.

Actually, Vegeta's inconsistency is a very handy character trait for the authors, as it minimizes the chance of accidental OOC. Indeed, it's quite difficult to make someone to behave out of character if he has many different canon versions of himself, lol. On the other hand, this leads to the fact that the character seems to... kinda disintegrate. You never see his whole face, because he simply doesn't have it. As a result, Vegeta turns into a mosaic that must be reassembled each time. And I keep staring at this crazy kaleidoscope like an idiot.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, that's... quite a lot of contradictions in my relationship to Vegeta, haha. Still, life without contradictions would be somewhat boring, I guess.

Thanks for your attention I suppose?..... lol, as if someone really got to this point

The End.

P.S. 1: The antisocial version of Vegeta who doesn't understand stupid human rituals and hates crowds, but puts up with it for the sake of his family is my spirit animal, haha. This is just so damn relatable to my autistic personality. Maybe I'm an alien myself.

P.S. 2: Actually, my favorite dbz character is Piccolo. Yep.

#vegeta #it's really long #3260 words kind of long

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