#like even in the original story wherein she appeared

[el-lionne]

The Truth About Lilith From Hazbin Hotel (Historically)

So, I recently binged Hazbin Hotel and LOVED IT. I also happen to be a historian who studies ancient religious texts connected to Christianity, so I kind of already knew the truth about Lilith at the start of the show. However, I quickly learned the fandom as a whole were surprised by Lilith's appearance in the last episode and didn't even know the nature of the deal she made with Adam/ God - so I decided to share it here.

Lilith's story can be found in the Alphabet of Ben Sira (8th - 10th century AD). This text is famous for many reasons but mostly because it's the first time Lilith is formally introduced and she is acknowledged as Eve's predecessor (Lilith's existence is suggested prior to this by assorted Babylonian, Greek and Jewish texts, but this is the first time you hear her story. It is assumed the story came from oral tradition so it's unknown how old/ original it actually is).

I attached the relevant passage down below but do feel free to check out the book yourself (it's translated from the original Aramaic - sorry if it sounds odd) Also, slight spoiler warning, as this will explain what Lilith's deal with Adam/ God most likely was, thereby providing the real reason why the exterminations have been happening (if the show is using this as it's inspiration, which I suspect it is given the details in the passage).

"After God created Adam, who was alone, He said, "It is not good for man to be alone." He then created a woman for Adam, from the earth, as He had created Adam himself, and called her Lilith. Adam and Lilith immediately began to fight. She said, "I will not lie below," and he said, "I will not lie beneath you, but only on top. For you are fit only to be in the bottom position, while I am to be the superior one." Lilith responded, "We are equal to each other inasmuch as we were both created from the earth." But they would not listen to one another. When Lilith saw this, she pronounced the Ineffable Name and flew away into the air.

[She essentially ran off cause Adam's a dick. They do this in the show, which is why I immediately assumed they were taking inspiration from this text.]

Adam stood in prayer before his Creator: "Sovereign of the universe!" he said, "the woman you gave me has run away." At once, the Holy One, blessed be He, sent these three angels Senoy, Sansenoy, and Semangelof, to bring her back. Said the Holy One to Adam, "If she agrees to come back, what is made is good. If not, she must permit one hundred of her children to die every day." The angels left God and pursued Lilith, whom they overtook in the midst of the sea, in the mighty waters wherein the Egyptians were destined to drown. They told her God's word, but she did not wish to return. The angels said, "We shall drown you in the sea." "Leave me!' she said. "I was created only to cause sickness to infants. If the infant is male, I have dominion over him for eight days after his birth, and if female, for twenty days." When the angels heard Lilith's words, they insisted she go back. But she swore to them by the name of the living and eternal God: "Whenever I see you or your names or your forms in an amulet, I will have no power over that infant." She also agreed to have one hundred of her children die every day.

[Leaving aside her being a demon who kills kids, and these three angels having more power than her, Lilith essentially agrees to let daily exterminations happen to keep her away from Adam. Is Lucifer involved in any way? It's not clear. In the show it's suggested he was. The show also adapted the deal so that the killing is yearly and not limited to just 100 demons, alongside some other changes. That being said, the principle is the same. Lilith made a deal for her life and now demons die.]

Accordingly, every day one hundred demons perish, and for the same reason, we write the angels' names on the amulets of young children. When Lilith sees their names, she remembers her oath, and the child recovers."

So, using this source material, I theorize that Lilith (and probably Lucifer) made the deal in order to essentially spare her life and keep her away from Adam. And that is why the exterminations happen. However, now Adam is dead, I guess the deal no longer stands and Lilith has to bargain for her life again (hence the ending of episode 8). I've no clue what she was doing hiding up in heaven but I look forward to finding out.

I think it's clear the overpopulation/ fear of rebellion thing is why the angels wanted the deal, but that they needed the king and/ or queen of hell to agree to it. Which would explain them threatening Lilith's life. Or...maybe even Charlie's? Who knows with this show.

Anyway, I hope that was interesting for you guys! All the best!

#hazbin hotel #hazbin lilith #hazbin adam #hazbin heaven #hazbin god #hazbin theory #hazbin thoughts #hazbin hotel episode 8 #hazbin hotel lilith #hazbin hotel adam #hazbin hotel the show must go on #hazbin hotel theory #hazbin hotel headcanon #hazbin headcanons #hazbin hell #hazbin hotel hell #hazbin hotel ep 8 #hazbin hotel thoughts #hazbin hotel prime video #hazbin hotel spoilers #hazbin hotel season 1 #hazbin hotel angels #hazbin angels #hellaverse #hazbin finale #hazbin hotel finale #helluva boss

[morningstargirl666]

what are your top ten favorite klaroline fics?

Ooooo let me think... in no particular order:

The Lost Prince & The Eternal Queen by @3tinkgemini /3tingemini

Oh this is a beloved favourite. Caroline's a werewolf alpha and Klaus, fresh from breaking his curse, searches her pack out to turn them into hybrids. Instead of forces them to turn, Caroline makes a deal with him, teaching him what it means to be who they are, offering him a place in her pack and if by a certain amount of time her pack want to become hybrids, he may turn as many as he wishes. It's got some great lore and delves nicely into Klaus' werewolf side. I adore it.

The Stubborn Grace of Being Loved Regardless by @helpless-in-sleep / perfectpro

Also an all-time favourite, this fic is beautiful. Caroline isn't turned into a vampire and when Klaus rolls into town, she's still human. That doesn't deter his affections. AND DID I MENTION YOU GET TO SEE HIM IN WOLF FORM? NO? WELL YOU DO AND I AM STILL NOT OVER IT 😭😭😭

Wisteria by @little-miss-sunny-daisy / sunnydaisy

Caroline meets Klaus before he comes to Mystic Falls, without realising he is in fact, The Klaus, The Original Hybrid. A beautiful love story unfolds that leaves you all soft and gooey inside.

The Howling by @bellemorte180 / BelleMorte180

I LOVE the idea of this two-shot. It's a werewolf mate au - wherein both Klaus and Caroline are werewolves. There's also ✨Damon murder✨ Need I say more?

From The Eastern Mountains by @cupcakemolotov / Cupcakemolotov

Read this not too long ago actually and kicked myself for not finding it sooner. In between grieving her mother, travelling and finding her own place in the world, Caroline keeps bumping into Klaus. The scene at the market haS changed me on a fundamental level, i even don't know why that scene's the most vivid for me but it is. There's just something so mundane about it. AND HELL YES WE GET KLAUS IN WOLF FORM!!! Go forth and read.

Their Nightly Ritual by bellamywinchester

A fic from my ffnet days, this has got to be a contender for my favourite kc fic of all time. Again, there's just something so mundane about it, even with all the supernatural shenanigans - I guess I have a type? I NEED THE DOMESTICITY OKAY? Caroline and Klaus exchange phone calls while she's in college, diverging from season 5 canon.

Blood and A Quick Murder (and isn't that how it always is?) by @ks-caster / KS_Caster

A beautiful character study on how Caroline will always come first in Klaus' books. It explores a really unique idea I've never seen before, and if you like this one-shot you should definitely check out ks-caster's Red Queen series too, which diverges from canon at season 4.

Till I Tasted You by @kirythestitchwitch / KiryTheStitchWitch

GOD this fic is a favourite because never have I ever been ruined so severely by one line of dialogue: “As if I could be jealous of a boy who has no concept of what it is like to touch the sun and then spend a millennium looking for daylight in every strangers’ face.” YOU SEE??? HOW WILL I FIND LOVE NOW THIS IS MY STANDARD???

[muffled screaming]

Wicked Schemes by willowaus

This one is probably on every klaroline rec list, but eh, I don't care. It's a good classic. I love that its set in New Orleans and Caroline gets her own powers. It also has Klaus in wolf form and any fic that has that instantly earns my seal of approval, as you should know by now.

the fate makes for a lousy poet by @stars-and-darkness / for_darkness_shows_the_stars

I binged this in a morning and after I finished it I was left shell shocked, in that high state after a fic has completely changed you on a spiritual level where you don't know how to move on with your life. I just remember lying atop my bed and staring at the ceiling like??? What do I do now??? What was I doing before I read this??? Fuck if I know. It's an amazing fic, canon divergent from season 3, a tattoo soulmate au with brilliant appearances from Kol, Elijah and Rebekah as well. And hey, in my shell shock after reading it I left an essay-length comment on the fic and now I'm best mates with the author. Our tastes literally align so perfectly it's like we share the same brain cell, so I could probably make a top ten klaroline fic list out of Ella's fics alone - every fic of hers takes all my hopes and dreams and weaves them into art. So check her stuff out, and not just the popular ones either (she's also got an amnesia au in the works which has me FERAL so come help me pester her to finish it)

#klaroline #klaus x caroline #fanfiction #klaroline fanfiction #fic recs #fic rec #fanfic recs #caroline forbes #klaus mikaelson #anon ask

[dailydemonspotlight]

Day 16 - Queen Mab

Race: Night

Alignment: Neutral

April 11th, 2024

Irish folklore is a strange rabbit hole to plunge down, filled with legendary heroes and strange villains, but the story of Cu Chulainn, the protagonist of the Ulster Cycle, is one that has always caught my interest. This story was the originator of many a trope, many a book series, and its main antagonist, the menacing Queen Medb, is an incredibly fun example of a femme fatale and a warrior queen.

Medb was the queen of the kingdom Connacht, a woman who had many lovers and was famous for her promiscuity... and trickiness. Cunning and ruthless, and with a propensity for manipulation, she served as the ultimate enemy of Chulainn, at first trying to seduce him with her daughters until eventually realizing that the plan wouldn't work, likely due to Chulainn's fealty towards his wife (or, alternatively, his asexual swag.) According to irish folklore, Medb could also be very, very similar, if not the same as Medb Lethderg, goddess of sovereignty in the irish Kingship of Tara.

Medb came to power in the story 'Cath Bóinde,' wherein she was born under the care of High King Eochaid Feidlech, a man who was purported as having killed the former king to take his place. Medb was married off to the king of Ulster, Conchobar mac Nessa, and in spite of them having a daughter, the marriage soon fell apart. They left, yet Medb held a grudge, and seeing that Eochaid had given Conchobar another one of his daughters, Medb went ballistic. She slaughtered her while still pregnant, leaving the child to be born via a medieval C-section. The king of Connacht was also desposed of around this time, and Eochid put Medb back in her rightful spot, now as Queen of Connacht.

After all of this, several marriages and kids, and a rise to power, Medb felt on top of the world. In her bloodlust with all of the power she gained, she soon grew jealous of her husband being richer than her... albeit only by one bull's price. Since the person who held onto this bull, Dáire mac Fiancha, rejected her offer, she went to take it by force, landing her in her first major conflict with the wandering teenaged warrior Cú Chulainn.

Ever since this very first conflict, their storied rivalry encompasses many a tale, eventually ending in Cú Chulainn's death, in which the warrior ties himself to a stone to keep fighting, even as his life comes to an end. I'll go more into this in the future during my Sentana/Cú Chulainn analysis, but needless to say, Medb's involvement in the Ulster Cycle makes for a fascinating deep-dive into Irish folklore.

As far as her design goes, the epithetical Warrior Queen has a rather strange appearance in the SMT series, almost appearing like a punk rocker such as a member of KISS- albeit with much more color. However, I have a personal theory as to why this may be- and it all has to do with cultural perceptions.

Queen Medb was seen as deviant, a cruel woman who rose to power with her own overwhelming strength, and while she was a bastard, a bit of the hatred felt towards her could be due to a sort of misogyny common in the middle ages. This is all purely conjecture, of course, but a controlling and domineering woman could've been something seen to be feared...

Much like how punk-rockers were seen as satanic in the 90's. During the satanic panic, a lot of people outside of regular circles were ostracized as being demonic in some way, shape, or form. Metal bands were especially targeted by this moral crusade, and it may just be where the influence for her design came from!

Past my own pet-theory, though, the rest of her design is rock-solid. A helmet-esque mask, steel breastplate, and long blade all play well into the 'Warrior Queen' quality she's well known for, and her gloves appear as snakeskin or even latex at first glance, playing into her domineering and controlling role. All in all, while Queen Mab wasn't my favorite demon at first, the research into her folklore has led me to finding an all new appreciation for the Ulster Cycle's main antagonist.

#shin megami tensei #smt #megaten #persona #daily #smt nocturne #queen medb #queen mab #ngl i'm very proud of this one #the ulster cycle is unironically great #like its almost like a fuckin shonen

[discluded]

Congrats on getting Mileapo bingo! 🎉 I was just wondering - what does ‘boyfriend soft/hard launch’ mean? Thanks! 😅

OH THIS IS FUN

I think I posted about it a while back, but I never quite tagged for it, but this R29 article probably has the most succinct definition:

Soft launches are great if you’re not totally ready to shout about your new romance from the rooftops. "They’re a subtle way to show the world that you are no longer single or that you’re currently immersed in the dating process with someone," she says. "It’s almost a way to test the waters with that person too, about how you both would like to manage the snapshot of your relationship that shows up on social media." [src]

The term soft launch originates from marketing, wherein: "A soft launch, also known as a soft opening, is a preview release of a product or service to a limited audience prior to the general public." The marketing part is about the fact that it's there, but you have to stumble upon it more than a direct push to make people know about it. It's there but not actively being advertised.

Here's some more details about how people online typically "soft launch" their relationship:

Evie soft-launched her situationship by posting photos of her food and drinks while on dates with him. "I didn’t tag him or show his face," she says. Soft-launching also mirrors the excitement of these early stages of a relationship – because although soft launches appear nonchalant, there’s an air of mystery about them which makes them exhilarating, too.

This one is funny too.

The term “soft launch” initially went viral thanks to a since-deleted tweet from Bottoms actor Rachel Sennott. In 2020, she aptly described the social media trend when she wrote: “Congrats on the Instagram soft launch of ur boyfriend (pic on story, elbow and side profile only).” [src]

(ps - watch Bottoms, a high school comedy you've seen before, but this time gay!!!)

Apo originally led with these on his IGS from the Vogue Gala last year:

it's even more obvious in context here lol:

okay yeah yeah obviously we know this is Mile, but let's not take the fun out of it for them :P

But let's not forget this is a part of it too -- if they are. :) but part of the fun of the soft launch is that they don't have to commit to it.

Fear of public backlash is especially prevalent in queer relationships, according to Madeleine Ciano, a television program coordinator who identifies as bisexual. It’s hard enough with societal pressures, but the added layer of homophobia and bigotry raises the stakes, according to Ciano, especially when it calls your safety into question. Ciano explained that she didn’t hard launch her girlfriend, knowing that she would “open [herself] up to a lot of vitriol” on social media.

But these are more of the "hard launches" where they show up straight up with the entire face and looking so boyfie on social:

#boyfriend soft launch #boyfriend hard propel #maybe #mileapo #people who absolutely disrespect the single people community #mile phakphum #apo nattawin #they're so boyfriend!!!! #boyfriend behavior

[susandsnell]

The Batman/Reevesverse Scarecrow Speculation Post

So, with the hope that the Reevesverse Scarecrow spinoff still goes through (what with WB's currently tenuous position under Zaslav), here are some speculation points I've had for a while with regards to how dear Dr. Crane could fit into the Gotham universe of 2022's The Batman --

The Drops Trade: Probably the most obvious thread wherein to integrate him. As some rumours about the Penguin spinoff TV series have hinted that they'll pick up on this subplot (since we do see Oz is involved in it in the movie), and there is apparently already an epidemic in this universe's Gotham City, lacing a new strain with fear toxin would be an easy way to spread it massively through the city. This could easily tie him in with the mob characters (Oz et al), and would work well with the Se7en-esque mystery/detective story approach they're taking to Batman's character, with the inexplicable terrifying effects of this new strain of Drops leading Bats down a trail that ends with a disgraced former professor of psychology. What works against this is that it's argably too similar to the very rapidly abandoned drug dealer Scarecrow plot in The Dark Knight. But given that as with every Nolanverse Scarecrow plot point, that kind of just happened and went nowhere until Crane Barbied his way into a new job, and the fact that the series hasn't shied away from similarities/nods to TDK trilogy, there's still a solid chance for there to be a unique spin on it here.

Riddler leaks: Since this universe's Edward Nashton is big on exposing corruption and has a strong online presence, maybe he - or one of his following, acting in his name - will kickstart the start-of-darkness plot by prompting his firing from Arkham or Gotham University (if he works at either in this continuity) by leaking Dr. Crane's more unsavoury dealings and/or unethical practices and experimentation. Perhaps the Renewal Fund flowed through Gotham University and Crane siphoned from it to finance his fear toxin research? While I love the "this man fired a gun in his classroom to illustrate a point and got extremely mad that there were consequences" origin to death, I can admit this origin might be either considered either too silly or in poor taste for a grounded universe like the Reevesverse that does have at least some social commentary. Points against this route, however, are whether they intend to do much more with Edward Nashton; Paul Dano is reportedly signed on for more entries to the series, but given he had a whole movie to himself, and a prequel comic run, they might not want to saturate us on him. On the other hand, Matt Reeves has expressed an interest in building a full and robust Rogues Gallery, and the most successful visual adaptations that have done this have understood the value of the Rogues' relationships amongst themselves.

Arkham Doctor: A usual starting point for Crane, but nonetheless, we've established Arkham already in this universe, and with named and known characters staying there. There's also rumours of an Arkham Series that could bridge with the Scarecrow spinoff proper, and while Crane experimenting on the patients is rather typical, we do have some interesting opportunities -- a chance he interacts with Riddler and Joker, who are set up to be there, again laying the groundwork for a new Rogues Gallery (Poison Ivy is also confirmed to have a spinoff in the works, so she might be involved also), but moreover, an access to the records on Martha Wayne, nee Arkham, could bring him into the leverage/Wayne family drama, which would be especially fun if he still doesn't figure out Bruce's identity as Batman, he just resents the Waynes. Then again, even though Scarecrow's class struggle angle goes back to the earliest comic appearances, this ground has already been well-trodden with Edward Nashton and Selina Kyle in the first movie, so it depends on whether they want to take a new tack or expand Gotham's class disparity to be a major theme of the series.

anyway, these are just a handful of ideas - would love to hear other thoughts!

#scarecrow #jonathan crane #the batman #the batman 2022 #reevesverse #bat-tag #cranerot

[samasmith23]

The best G. Willow Wilson Ms. Marvel scene

Easily my personal favorite scene from the entirety of G. Willow Wilson’s original run on Ms. Marvel was during the phenomenal Mecca arc wherein HYDRA seizes control of Jersey City’s mayor’s office to begin enacting discriminatory policies against Inhumans & Mutants (which heavily mirror the real-life Islamophobic presidential policies of Donald Trump...), and Kamala discovers that underneath the mask of one of the HYDRA regime’s lead enforcers, Discord, is the face of her old classmate Josh Richardson.

This revelation heavily affects Kamala on an emotional level as it forces her to come to terms with the fact that the things people might perceive to be familiar or safe are not always what they seem to be. She learns how specific circumstances can reveal that individuals who once appeared to be rational and reasonable on the surface may actually believe in ideologies that are controversial or dangerous. Therefore, Kamala is forced to ponder whether or not bigoted & fascistic ideologies have always existed within the hearts of people like Discord and if they're truly representative of who they are, which in turn causes her to doubt both her own place in the world and her mission as a superhero. While Kamala is inflicted with feelings of self-doubt in light of these revelations, she understands that she still has a moral obligation as Ms. Marvel to protect the people of her city. She realizes that the so-called “silent majority's” animosity towards her & super-powered peoples does not give them the right to place their own grievances above the law, and that there are still people who believe and are depending on her. And because Josh revealed his true self underneath the mask of Discord, Ms. Marvel responds in kind by taking off her own mask to reveal the face of his former friend Kamala Khan, and all of the pain and suffering that his actions have inflicted upon herself and others like her…

But while Kamala does convey feelings of sadness and remorse towards Josh, she simultaneously understands that she cannot excuse his actions since he's still an individual who wrongfully succumbed to the temptations of far-right extremism and fascism. Essentially, even though Kamala desperately wants to believe that Josh is an inherently better person underneath, she recognizes that he was the one who ultimately made the choice to join HYDRA and help them oppress superhuman minorities. Therefore, Kamala acknowledges that Discord is still her enemy regardless of his reasons or whatever sympathy she might feel.

Kamala decision to NOT condone or excuse Discord’s actions reflects an astonishing level of maturity on her part, and is further indicative of her overall character arc in Mecca. In large measure, Kamala’s character arc is the reason why the storyline is titled “Mecca” in the first place. Although she does not go on a physical pilgrimage to the actual Holy Islamic city, she does experience a spiritual pilgrimage as the HYDRA takeover of Jersey City forces her to realize that not everything is what it seems, that some evils cannot be fought, and that although she’ll endure hardship and failure in her mission she must stay true to herself and others even if there are some people who will never agree with her actions or who she is. It's these revelations that further develop Kamala into "the most human superhero of them all" in my opinion, as it's not just her kindness and willingness to do good that makes her a hero, but also her ability to continue to do good even when confronted with external and internal doubt. And since the entire story takes place over the two-day period of Eid al-Adha, the holiday in which millions of Muslims embark on the pilgrimage to Mecca, Kamala’s psychological journey of self-discovery resonates with the reader on a much deeper level.

And that is why this scene remains my personal favorite Ms. Marvel moment in the entirety of Kamala’s comic book history!

From Ms. Marvel (2015) #21 & #22 by G. Willow Wilson & Marco Failla.

#ms marvel #kamala khan #ms marvel kamala khan #ms marvel comics #Mecca #discord #Josh richardson #g willow wilson #Sana Amanat #ian herring #marco failla #marvel comics #mini essay

[unproduciblesmackdown]

ummmm princess tutu post here where the starting point / inspiration is “romance doesn’t particularly matter here lbr” which honestly is further inspired as a counterpoint re seeing occasional mention of like oh it’s Thematically Relevant that ahiru realizes she’s Not actually in love w/mytho b/c like, tl;dr it’s not really imo, when her having a crush at the start of things was always Kind Of beside the point. bring your mytho appreciation and/or willingness for that perspex to be illuminated & know that this will have plenty of tangents b/c it’s me & b/c already it’s like, this has to build on how there’s that essential theme throughout the series of Hope vs Despair as opposites. in fact, spoilers, idk this post is me getting down things i was just Thinking Through while trying to fall back asleep earlier, it’s like, the Hope overlaps with Love so much that it’s like, it might be Essentially the same around here. and i don’t know, maybe in actual life too, see you next week for poetry hour, but for now here’s a cut where i just really start going off on Ideas

anyways like whenever people are going like “people’s roles in pt are subverted and changed & they have to fight against them sometimes” it’s like Yeah but then when an example given is like “ahiru being In Love w/The Prince was Assigned to her & her Questioning that is a key part of the self acceptance & defiance needed to avoid tragedy” like No, again it really never mattered how much she was or wasn’t in love with him in like, a [becoming the princess] endgame romance soulmates way, b/c it was always about her having this genuine love for him that really didn’t hinge on that. and Questioning whether she wants to be with him is really more a matter of drosselmeyer having this shallow understanding / disinterest in the feelings & motivations of his own characters, when a) those characters are Real People (in their world. of course in Real Reality these are all fictional characters) and b) he just wants One Conclusion that’s as tragic as possible for fun, so saying like oh the princess marries the prince, the knight protects the prince, etc, as these simple but high stakes asserted goals for everyone’s roles, is conducive to that

like it’s right there in the first scene like, ahiru’s talking about wanting to dance a pas de deux with the prince, which is certainly potentially romantic, and it’s not like a secret once she’s human that she does Like him, but even then, once she does Sort Of get such a moment when mytho dances with her in the Fire Festival episode deal, she’s excited about having danced with him herself but a) is more substantially excited that Mytho Wanted To Do Something and did it, and then later b) isn’t bothered about him dancing with rue instead. and in that first scene, although she originally says she’d give her life for the chance to dance w/the prince, she also says he looks sad/lonely, and that’s what she repeats later and builds on to say that she’d give her life just to help him on that front in some way, which makes drosselmeyer appear again. drosselmeyer needs princess tutu to also want to restore mytho’s heart so that the story can reach a conclusion, rather than kraehe being fine with him having no heart if it means she can have him, while he wants tutu to also confess her love so that there can be that tragic ending for her, so wanting to generally help but also be with the prince would seem like the key elements to who should get to be tutu out here, while of course for ahiru she does actually want to help him more than she wants to Be With Him in the first place. it’s evident again in the season one finale wherein she does For Intents And Purposes confess her love through dance, but that love is also tied to, again, just wanting him to have his heart back and be Able to dance with her or do anything else, whereas kraehe’s love can’t reach mytho because her approach is a destructive and controlling one about trying to possess him as a Concept of the prince who should be with her as the princess. whereas tutu is like yeah i want you to have your heart back, and then if that meant you wanted to dance with me that’d be cool. and that when they Do dance together afterwards it’s sure Able to serve as an ending, but doesn’t need anyone to really more directly declare Love or eternal togetherness or anything, it’s all good b/c mytho has his heart back (i mean, he doesn’t, but only when there’s Definitely a season two, b/c otherwise you could believe that Love was the final piece. and even if you don’t you could just presume tutu kept doing her thing until he was good to go)

anyways and then season two when there’s like more blatant will they won’t they with her and fakir which, maybe unsurprising disclaimer that that just falls flat for me lmfao b/c a) i think their unfolding dynamic is fun re being friends and a team but everything else just feels kind of tacked on to that wherein also b) idk it never really seems to affect what ahiru does in any especial way lol which would potentially make it more interesting if she did. but otherwise it’s like well great job morally supporting each other out here, fakir’s having antics on his end, but other implications of like “ooh...romance???” are like idk, it just doesn’t do anything for me, and in the end, Again we don’t need any unambiguous answer when it’s like, we’re talking about accepting True Selves and not needing to worry about being alone and then that means hanging out with a duck on a lake, doesn’t really Need to be asked like, is this guy in Love with that duck? when again the love is There between all these characters and drives them already and any potential for romance is, if anything, just kinda like the bonus layer after everything else has already served as adequate motivation all around

anyways i have to go ahead and link it to Hope wherein like. it ends up firmly established that tutu is literally this embodiment of hope, which saves the day in the series finale, so that’s Relevant. and then the raven is embodying despair, but beyond like wanting to destroy the prince and all, that involves people not being able to be themselves, and having to give up on getting to be themselves, and we see from the raven himself and from the people who stand in for the raven / as that antagonist (so kraehe and/or raven mytho) that the general approach to interactions that aren’t just “im gonna kill you” are about trying to control someone, and possibly also still being like “im gonna kill you” but as a less imminent threat, or even “haha yeah you should also kill me, go for it” possibly, re mytho when his jumping in for episodic antagonist lets kraehe’s material become more about her as rue again, and her obviously feeling pretty hopeless with this new context like oh, also, she thinks the prince and kind of also the raven are the only people who even Could possibly love her, b/c of the raven. 

meanwhile there’s also drosselmeyer who wants characters to have enough hope to continue the story and to provide Setup for the later tragedy, but also wants them to be able to despair at the Correct time (namely, the Ending, when tragedy is great / players dropping out of the narrative is fine) and all these characters are dealing with their stories being controlled by someone who does want to push things towards more tragedy. which like, surely Not Very Coincidental overlap of tragedy, despair, and control there. drosselmeyer has a degree of control over everything, though it seems More direct the more people are getting into the “staged” zones, or say, being in his clockwork puppets behind the scenes world, whereas edel’s function was to try to exist within the world and direct the story the way drosselmeyer wanted it to go, rather than him just being able to do it himself (or necessarily Wanting to do it himself, since he’s just here to be entertained, and even if he Could write it all into reality, seems he might instead be letting it play out w/o more interference b/c that’s more fun for him), but we see even through edel, who’s entirely a puppet rather than a person and definitely has never had a heart in the first place, that she still manages to become interested in and understand more about emotions and arguably have them herself, since she ends up having motivations in conflict with drosselmeyer’s and takes actions he didn’t direct, and if that goes for her, it has to go for his created characters turned real people, too, even when, say, they don’t have their heart

which idk i’m making up segues as we go here, but at the start, you have people who see mytho as a Concept and how he has a role in whatever role they imagine for themselves. like rue seeing him as the prince to her princess, or fakir being threatened by his being the prince to his knight, and their sort of begrudging alliance when neither of them want mytho to have his heart restored b/c rue knows he could wind up with someone else and fakir knows if the story could possibly resume, as the knight, he’d have to die. yet they both see mytho as enough of a person to also want to protect him, which is sure a manifestation of love that we see around here. but that protection also involves control: they both control what mytho gets to do, when they know that otherwise anyone Else could potentially direct him around, b/c mytho can’t know what he wants or doesn’t want to do, but he would if he had his heart. which they Can’t return, b/c apparently only tutu can do that, and evidently drosselmeyer hasn’t tried to give either of them the ability to return it, but even before it’s started to be returned they’re both decidedly Against that happening. and when they do realize it’s being returned, you have rue taking that role as kraehe and doing everything she does trying to stop tutu or tell mytho about how he Has to be with her, and just kind of shove fakir out of the way if he’s trying to interfere with the latter, while he’ll Also get in on trying to stop tutu, and while when push comes to shove he won’t really try to oppose mytho once mytho tells him what he does or doesn’t want, it takes a minute to get there, and his approaches to trying to stop mytho from regaining his heart are the classics like, tell him he sucks all the time, lashing out like hitting him that once, the “if i lock him in a dark room forever that’ll be so depressing it’ll just make him stop having feelings” effort lmao like it’s not gonna work....instances of the connection drawn between control & despair like, thinking of someone acting out of despair as, say, despairing of their being any other options for themself. which someone else can try to push them into by telling them there’s no other option / trying to put them in a situation where they seemingly have no other options

and it’s interesting how it’s not only like oh Despair / thinking you have no options is only something antagonists engage in, because we can say it’s in the choice to Self Sacrifice as a way to protect others, which comes up a lot, for example, mytho’s drive to protect defenseless things as a quality that motivates him even when he has no emotions. and you have the finales where, in both cases, fakir has to figure out how to fight anyways (and the second time around is inspired to risk tapping into his Author Powers again b/c he’s aware of how everyone’s been protecting him, like mytho managing to stop his dramatic Evil Self from just killing fakir w/a sword lol), and the first time around tutu’s supposed to see no other option but to save mytho by confessing her love and thus vanishing into a point of light, but she trusts in her own feelings and thus herself and refuses to give up, in the series finale, it’s rue who sacrifices herself by confessing love (which now manifests as her desperate to save mytho from the raven rather than her standing in for the raven, when she was willing to control him just so she could possess him, whereas now it’s been made entirely obvious to her where that approach wound up) and ahiru has to again face down despair, but then brings in Hope in the end for everyone else’s sake even when it seems she has no options b/c she seemingly can’t do anything. fakir won’t give up writing even when it seems he can’t do anything (and is told that), mytho won’t give up by shattering his heart again and figuring he can only die in the end even after defeating the raven, and ahiru’s apparently like summoned some form of the original tutu via all this Hope, wherein it’s sure interesting how original tutu apparently Also self sacrificed but did successfully give the prince hope in the process, because people are considering the self sacrifices in the first place to protect others, who in turn might try to stop them from doing that to protect Them, and that means creating other options / convincing them of other options

so tutu is out here sure creating options for mytho by returning his heart, and the reward in this for her is all about helping him and seeing him getting to be more of himself again and exercise his agency. which is so genuinely important to her that she also was ready to give up returning his heart / being tutu at all when she thought she was only hurting him and that he might not even want his heart returned; and that returns again in the next season when she again can’t know if he wants his heart back b/c he again can’t be his full self to communicate the answer one way or another, but she’s realized that she’s had a piece of his heart with her all along and that that being the source of her power to return his heart means that regaining his heart was always a genuine desire of mytho’s and why they should risk everything now to restore his heart in full when they don’t know that’ll go great. and at that point it’s obvious that rue no longer acts on her love through the Despair angle of thinking that her only option is him loving her, so she can only accept his loving her being His only option too, thus trying to control what he does so she can own him; now rue is acting out of hope, encouraged by tutu, where even if she can’t see it working out she knows that acting on that despair Isn’t The Way and is now trying, even as distantly as this, to work with mytho’s genuine self and what he wants, even just trying to let him exist again, really

and it feels like all the Birds all over the place might have to do with the freedom and creation in hope vs stifling and limitations via despair, what with flying and all, not to mention one intro being about the fairy tale with someone who wants their Magical Winged Lover to be guaranteed to stay with them, so magically removes her wings, but the wings were the source of her life, so she dies. it’s like kraehe with mytho in season one, where by trying to control him / remove his freedom she can technically be with him by virtue of like, yes, he’s physically present, but she can’t actually engage with him as a person nor he with her in turn because, as i’ve just remembered, her ripping away his feeling of Love while kissing him just shuts down his access to his emotions again, which is sure Something, tap into some [metaphorical trauma response?] if you want maybe....she can’t truly be with him as a person, with any actual relationship, when her efforts at getting there via the despair/control route are incompatible with him getting to actual exist and live as his full self, even if he’s technically physically there, she can’t truly just Have Him like that....meanwhile, mytho has this affinity for / connection with birds, he saves that canary chick who’s trying to fly in the first episode (and Does manage to fly when tutu also steps in to save them both), and ahiru is also actually a bird (who can fly a bit but seems to struggle with that) while tutu appears to others as either a swan or a figure with wings for arms (which might be tutu’s Original form as well), and ahiru as a girl is already out here supporting mytho as a person so that in that moment that’s just like, Scream, there’s that instance in the first episode of season two where he says that ahiru is like his bff and the person he feels he can trust most? or i think what he says is she’s the one person he feels he can tell anything. and then never knowingly interacts with her again lmao like scream....but the fact that Relationship is established even without him knowing she’s tutu where he still feels like yeah i can trust this person with my heart too, in essence. and to tie this back to the Ostensible premise of all this lmfao, it’s clearly not particularly outright Romantic, but that really doesn’t matter, and when he eventually at least realizes tutu is like, a duck, obviously he has no negative reaction to that whatsoever like yknow what, sure, who Isn’t kind of a bird, god bless you

anyways i think it’s sure neat how like. sure maybe only a few people know mytho’s literally a fairytale prince with literally no heart, and everyone else just thinks he’s like kind of weird / mysterious, but ahiru notes he doesn’t seem to be happy / seems lonely and she hopes(tm) she can help change that, and soon embraces knowingly returning his heart, even though she could’ve taken the route of going yeah oh since he Can’t want anything, why both returning it, if his current experiences Can’t upset him, why try to give him anything else.....she sees him as a person from the start, and wants him to have as much ability to want and enjoy things as possible, whatever he chooses to do with that. Couldn’t Be Me when ppl think mytho’s just boring or he’s basically not a person like, well again in reality none of them are people b/c they’re characters, but in that world like, even with yes him being technically a character There, drosselmeyer’s creations Are just real people, where even the actual puppets can gain autonomy and have wants and feelings of their own, and ahiru was sure always able to treat edel like a person, too

running out of steam here lmfao & i always of course take long pauses in writing these so remembering what was going on takes even more effort lol but as a fun postscript like galaxy brain of autistic appreciators of mytho lmao like, that’s me, it’s Fascinating like again i don’t think [oh boring] about him not having feelings, i think that’s interesting & fun of him lmfao. and of course it’s not about like oh autistic people Can’t feel anything, or that they even feel any less, any more than it’s about autistic people all being fictional princes who can summon a swan sword and defeat the raven or anything. but it’s like, thinking of people being seen as Not Expressive Enough and how that must mean they don’t have feelings (and the fact like also mytho sure does Have the capacity for those feelings, and there’s even some ambiguity about whether those feelings are still Active while separated from him / affected by things that are happening to him, but he just can’t draw from that at all until its returned) or those feelings are like, diminished / deficient. also thinking of, i forget the word for it, difficulty identifying what you’re feeling, wherein you know it’s like, being autistic where people misinterpret how you’re expressing yourself or a lack of some particular expected/desired manifestation of expression, and react (negatively) to that misinterpretation (thinking of like. all the times people around mytho are reacting to misinterpretations about him and his intentions and feelings. second episode where mytho hasn’t had a single heart shard returned yet, but already is getting hit by someone b/c while he’s giving No Reaction and expressing No Emotion b/c he can’t feel anything yet, she’s reading this like desire to sabotage her / disdain for her into it) and people being left to wonder if They’re the one misinterpreting their own emotions / ways they’re expressing it when nobody else is recognizing this or responding to that, and rather asserting they must be acting on some xyz other emotion actually....and all this pushback as mytho Is exploring his own genuine emotions and trying to act on his own genuine wants and interests even while other people are like what no, that’s ridiculous, cut it out, etc, and being shocked & surprised when he does show some open expression of [whatever emotion] like, king of not masking lmao. thinking of how i could surprise ppl with the most mundane things like “i think basketball is fun” like i have a zillion opinions & things i can talk abt & i’m fairly spontaneous & excitable & theatrical & talkative as hell but like the “default” or safe approach i have has none of that and people will then just assume like oh if it’s not being shared with me in a way that seems obvious enough or expressed Naturally / Correctly Enough, it must not be there at all. and ahiru just seeing mytho as a person in the first place and gaining the ability to Help Him Be Himself because of that. i think it’s soooo neat and i love that funky little guy, again s/o to the wisdom of autistically enjoying mytho as a character

and you know i think that’s ahiru of course acting as this force of Love by supporting mytho’s personhood & autonomy & wanting him to have options and the ability to actually choose b/w them, and Hopefully i connected that to Hope b/c you know, it’d be Despairing to figure actually no she’s not going to try to help him and there’s nothing anyone can do and this is the only way it can be. where people’s love for each other in all ways and all combinations around here is about not giving up, wanting to give the other person hope / getting hope from that person. the heart shart tutu gets is hope, wherein even interacting with her lets mytho feel hope, and where in turn there’s that line in the season one finale about her wanting to protect him and that the way she feels when she sees him is what lets her become tutu, wherein clearly also that is powered by the hope heart shard, so another love / hope link, wherein does it even seem like that love being Romantic was what really mattered, vs just that it’s a more general love for him as a person, where Liking him sure can fall under that, but it’s clearly never really that big a deal, like, even recognizing rue as a rival doesn’t introduce any conflict when instead ahiru’s like wow i love rue she’s the best yeah if she was with mytho that’d be cool, she’s my best friend now, i want the best for her too....there’s no like, “oh she Liked mytho at the start b/c she was Supposed to, it was an imposition of her Role” like that might be more of drosselmeyer’s assumption but what Really mattered from the start was simply wanting to help him, and Everyone Wanting To Help Each Other keeps being what wins....ahiru gets to be tutu for that reason, not b/c she’s determined to be with him romantically, which, you know, it’s also pointed out that tutu’s role being so Tragically Fated means you’d have to accept not getting to be with him anyways, in theory....and what motivates her re: mytho was never imposed, it’s love powered by hope & vice versa, and even when season two is all will they won’t they abt her and fakir that never like gets in the way of her main goal still being helping / protecting mytho, b/c again, that was never Just All About Liking(tm) Him anyways, so if she ever wonders about Liking(tm) anyone else it’s like yeah okay that actually is not that related lmao, her crush on mytho in the first place is mostly just like, funny and lively lmao. Wish the would they wouldn’t they material in season two was that way also b/c then it might’ve been engaging / interesting to me lol, but if it’s enjoyable like cool then, it’s just not really in conflict with anything actually lmao or that glorious defiance. all the climactic moments of the like ultimate Hope and Love saving people isn’t outright about romance. b/c this is all about any forms of relationships really, it’s not like oh yeah this way of treating people is good for Romance, but not other kinds of love, or vice versa

#this isn't even that long but who knows how much sense is made in there....efforts at coherency were made but #princess tutu #the point really is just me going shoutout to mytho shoutout to mytho enjoyers

[writernopal]

🦎The Angel's Lyre🦎

A snippet wherein the author is slowly falling in love with describing the majestic Lizardfolk vessel, The Angel's Lyre. She was one of the first ships I ever characterized in the original telling of AASOAF, so as cool as some of the others are, she is very near and dear to my heart and I'm so glad I can FINALLY do her justice in canon. Enjoy this snippet or don't! Do whatever you want! BUT if you are going to read it, I highly recommend reading it to The Flower Garden by Joe Hisaishi. (excuse any mistakes, this is largely unedited 💙)

WC: 946 CW: none

I arrived at the bottom of the stairs that led to the main deck above. From here, the once muffled sounds from down below were now clear and identifiable, as if I’d just raised my head above the water’s surface. The low of hum of men going about their duties acted as a sort of tenor to the bassy sound of the sails flapping in the wind. The groaning of wood and straining of line harmonized with them, ever backed by the choir of the waves, repeating their shh-ah, shh-ah against the keel and hull of this ship and all others who’d cleave them until the end of time. I carefully ascended, skirts clutched in hand to avoid tripping, but nearly lost my footing once I reached the top. Not because of my indulgent imbibing the night before, but because it felt as if I’d just passed the portal to another world. And it was breathtaking.

Every surface was painstakingly carved with motifs depicting the grandeur of The Holtep Empire. The rising of their divine goddess Kava, spear pointed heavenward, and whose features were sharp enough to cut stone. The triumphs of many storied warriors, among them the familiar one of the Son of the Moon, greatsword victoriously aloft as the moon gave way to the shining sun. And of course, their emblem, that of a three-headed Lizardfolk clutching Oepus in its claws. A reminder that they believed themselves to be kings. Gods even. And each work, robed in rich red and gold paints, lustered with an incomparable fire and life in this western sun. 

Her four masts towered overhead like giants, each one handsomely decorated with scale-like engravings, as if strangled by the bodies of giant snakes. And her yards were wide. All proudly hanging white and gold brocaded sails, adorned with moving men in all colors and forms across their widths. Each one worked tirelessly to catch the wind precisely as their crewmates on the deck below instructed. I’d never been to the theater, but the way they moved, with such grace and certainty, evoked images of the elegant dancers I imagined might perform in a place like that. Gliding across the stage with all manner of pomp because they knew they were beautiful…

The decks themselves glistened in the afternoon sun from the sea spray and the ballista seated at her waist and bow glimmered along with it. Their filigree, as rich looking, perhaps more than any others I’d seen, rippled in the golden light as if these armaments might at any moment draw breath, stand upright, and strut alongside me. Ropes and barrels and devices I couldn’t even begin to name, made their home all along the ship, tended to by clusters of men performing their equally mysterious duties. None noted my presence, entranced instead by their vessel’s care and appearance like that of a dedicated potter to the lump of clay that spun on his wheel.

And now, in the calmness of observation, I could appreciate that she was the sort of vessel to have a quarterdeck and a poop deck. The latter term always sounded comical to me, but any trace of how funny-sounding the term was melted away as I looked upon her so directly. Both decks possessed handsomely bowed railings, calling to mind the tender and swelled shape of her instrumental namesake. And indeed, from those parts did sound a song. The rich voices of the men stationed there floated about the decks and air so pleasantly that I wished I could levitate, if only to blanket myself fully in their tune. And somewhere buried in that fortress was the wheel. I couldn’t see it, but I didn’t doubt it was a sight to behold. Perhaps like a crown on the head of a king.

I was not a sailor, but even I knew that calling The Angel’s Lyre ‘a ship’ was a disservice. She was a work of art. A masterpiece. Glorious and graceful and musical and dream-like. I could understand now why men so easily took to believing these masses of timber and nails were living, breathing beings. Why they named them. Why they would dangle themselves from dangerous heights and even be willing to die in service upon their decks. A single, indispensable truth, and one so expertly hidden that, despite always being seen, was rarely perceived. They were the blood to her life and the air to her lungs. And she belonged to them as much as they to her. Each capricious, but loyal. Tempestuous, but resolute. And with the sea stretched so far beneath them both, the sun on the horizon, and the wind to their backs, who in all the world could rightfully fault these men for loving such a dangerous mistress?

AASOAF 3 Taglist: @outpost51 @thelivingdeceased @faelanvance @captain-kraken @illjustpretend @elshells @writeblr-of-my-own @the-mindless @zestymimblo

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#aasoaf #aasoaf 3 #the angel's lyre #my writing #i wish to be abandoned on her decks please

[alovelyburn]

Saw some of your Berserk meta and really like it - wondered if you had already written about or had any thoughts about this: Do you think Miura regrets the Eclipse, and Femto? Not giving Griffith power, but the lengths he had to bend the story - basically break it - to undo the drastic abuse he put Griffith through after Guts left the Band of the Hawk? The reason I get this vibe is that we don't actually see a whole lot of Femto after a certain time, but we see a HELL of a lot of Griffith - healed, healthy, powerful Griffith. I always kind of got the vibe that he felt like he had written himself into a corner after Guts left and Griffith crashed and burned - and he needed a way to fix that and get the story back on track. While I'm sure that something like the Eclipse was a key event in his plan... it felt to me like Miura took some steps to walk it back during his lifetime, and shifted NeoGriffith's focus on mostly being that 'angel' and half Moonlight Boy and all... because as Femto is, there's no way for human Guts to really effectively counter him, and that kind of punches a big hole in the story's logic.

Hello hello, thanks much for the compliment! So this is a bit of a yes and no.

Yes - There is reason to believe Miura may have regretted at least some of what went on in the Eclipse, but not for the reason you're suggesting.

Basically, he said that when he looks back at it he found it disturbing and was distressed at his own abnormality. He also said he couldn't do it again.

And Mori had mentioned that the reason the Eclipse went so hard and got so extreme was because he (Mori) had told Miura that only something extreme that truly destroyed Guts's life would really work to make the guy from the Golden Age turn into the guy from the Black Swordsman arc. But after he did it, Miura called Mori a bit upset and it kind of depressed them both.

It's also been noted that despite the sheer length and prominence of the rape scene with Femto, that is actually very rarely referenced in the series afterward - a bit at first, like when Guts has his flashback in Godo's cave, but as time goes on it seems like most of the weight of Casca's trauma is relocated to the mass sexual assault by Apostles - that's what she flashes back to when she remembers the Eclipse almost every time.

So yeah, he may have regretted at least some parts of the Eclipse, although I would argue that the Eclipse conceptually was obviously present since near the beginning - thus the brand, but more importantly, thus the Slug Count's backstory in the BSM arc.

But, do I think it's because Miura had written himself into a corner and was trying to get back on track? Not really.

I mean we have to understand that the whole point of the Golden Age, per Miura, is to give the reader insight into why Guts is so upset at Griffith. In that sense, everything in the Golden Age is leading up to the Eclipse and the birth of Femto, which is all we go into the Golden Age knowing for sure is going to happen. Guts's departure, the torture and the breaking of Griffith, none of that is stuff he spontaneously did and then had to figure a way out of, that's stuff that was done specifically in order to create a situation wherein the Eclipse would be narratively justified.

In other words, it's not that he had to break the story to get out of a situation, it's that he broke the status quo of the story in order to trigger that very situation. Griffith was always intended to become Femto - he even shows up as Femto before he shows up as Griffith.

One of the things Miura mentions in the interview at the back of the Berserk guidebook is that originally Femto was meant to be Guts's enemy in his, well, Femto form but he found that Griffith stood out too much as a character during the Golden Age to let go of, and so he decided to bring his original appearance back. He then noted that the other thing is that if he were acting as Femto he would be back in the Astral Plane. So basically, the reason we see Griffith as he is rather than as Femto is a combination of Miura just liking Griffith's human self/design and wanting to bring it back in some form, and the worldbuilding having evolved in such a way that a full-Godhand isn't normally walking around the world in their purest form.

That said, there isn't that much of a difference between NeoGriffith and Femto. You can make an argument (and I do routinely) that NeoGriffith is a different aspect of Griffith's personality/persona than Femto (Hawk of Light vs Hawk of Darkness) but their powers aren't any different as far as we can tell - Griffith dominates apostles on sight. He can still brainwash people with his Od. He can still casually knock the walls off a mobile palace without moving. He's still impossible to hit with a weapon. Being in his presence alone still puts Schierke in danger of losing her astral form due to his overwhelming strength. A lot of what Griffith does in his NeoGriffith form - the army building, the having people fight beside him instead of just going in and curbstomping the monsters on his own, is just pretense of humanity stuff that seems designed to prevent people from feeling like they're being herded by some overwhelming inhuman force. He acts like he needs help because he wants them to feel needed and helpful not because he actually does need help.

Basically, if Guts can't counter Femto he can't counter Neo-Griffith either, which we see when he completely fails to land a single blow even though Griffith is just standing there naked, looking at him. That only hurts the story logic if the assumption is that Guts is meant to be able to counter Griffith effectively and I would argue that he is not.

Guts is, for all his strength and determination, ultimately a human being trying to fight what amounts to a demon god/archangel. While he can hold his own against apostles (and overpower some of them), Griffith brings Apostles to their knees just by showing up.

He even has Skull Knight/Gaiseric still tilting windmills at Void after 1,000 years to make the point that there's no conceivable way that a human can realistically take down a Godhand. There's no reason this battle should seem anything other than completely impossible.

#ask #anonymous #ariel talks about berserk

[sycsubs]

[ENG TRANS] SOOYOUNG ON MARIE CLAIRE JUNE 2023

Q. You went to Paris last April for this photo shoot, right? What memories do you have from the days you spent there?

Sooyoung: I’ve had a few chances to go to Paris during my activities, but with the opportunity brought by this pictorial, I was able to visit (Paris) again after a long time and stayed for about four days. Perhaps it’s because I’m lucky when it comes to the weather (laughs), but the sky was so clear and the sun was shining beautifully too on the day of the shoot. Thanks to that, I had fun working and I also enjoyed the atmosphere on the site during my spare time. After working, I went to Switzerland to travel with my mom and sister.

Q. Some moments you experience on a trip can give you inspiration in life for the future. Did you feel anything new while traveling to Switzerland?

Sooyoung: I realized that experience is important. I went to Matterhorn and faced the snowy mountains for the first time in my life, and I was overwhelmed by the magnificent beauty of mother nature. I personally prefer trips in the city, but I want to go backpacking and enjoy nature. Another new experience was paragliding. Before I jumped down, admiration of the scenery and fear crossed my mind. But when I returned to the ground, I was like, ‘Do birds feel this way?’ it was strange, something I’ve never felt in my entire life. It was a trip that made me determined to actively try out things that I haven’t done before.

Q. Coming back after your trip, the drama <NamNam> is about to be released. It is based on a webtoon of the same name which depicts the story of Hopeless Mother ‘Eunmi’ (Jeon Jyejin) and Cool Daughter ‘Jinhee’ (Choi Sooyoung). I think it would have been necessary to have a process of adding new interpretation while still reflecting the original version.

Sooyoung: Jinhee’s job in the webtoon and drama are different. The Jinhee that appears in a drama is a police officer, and we thought that a neat short hair would look good so I didn’t dye my hair red like Jinhee in the webtoon. It was a choice made to bring out Jinhee’s personality in the drama, different from the webtoon. In terms of the development of the drama, there is also an episode wherein Jinhee is only a police officer. I referred to the tone and disposition in order to preserve the unique fun of the original version, but I focused more on the character in the drama itself that I had to express.

Q. How do you feel about waiting for the first episode which airs on July 17th?

Sooyoung: I’m the type to clear my mind once the filming is over and it goes out of my hands, but I’m hoping <NamNam> will do well. I hope this drama becomes a meaningful work for the viewers. Recently, there have been a lot of works that make female protagonists stand out such as <Queen Maker>, <Kill Boksoon>, <Work Later, Drink Now> and there are various genres as well. I hope that <NamNam> which captures the daily life of Eunmi and Jinhee, will also receive a lot of attention, and further help more female narratives to appear.

Q. A lot of people are looking forward to the kind of chemistry that you will show together with Actress Jeon Hyejin who plays the role of Eunmi.

Sooyoung: I like Jeon Hyejin sunbaenim so much. Just the fact that I’m participating in a project with Hyejin unnie makes me feel like I became a ‘successful fan’, and appearing with unnie as mother and daughter makes it an even more special opportunity. I thought that I have to be in harmony with Hyejin unnie in order to act to my heart’s content with her. (laugh) I was at a drinking party with unnie recently, and she said “I’m so happy that I got to act with Sooyoung”. Hearing her say those words made me feel relieved and touched.

Q. I’m getting curious about the chemistry that both actresses will show.

Sooyoung: It might feel strange at first. The relationship between Eunmi, who raised her daughter alone as a single mother, and Jinhee, who treats her mother like a friend, it’s not something common around us. <NamNam> is a work that tells us that there are also mother-and-daughter like this in the world. I think the charm of this drama is seeing Eunmi and Jinhee quarreling and living with complex emotions which are a combination of love, resentment, and respect.

Q. After wrapping up the filming for <NamNam>, you posted on SNS saying ‘Jinhee-ya, thank you for coming to me’. What were you feeling when you wrote those words?

Sooyoung: I was thinking that I wanted to tell a story about a mother through my work. I was lucky to be able to express and act out the emotions that Jinhee feels while looking at Eunmi. It was a point that I wanted to act out someday.

Q. It seems like a work that makes you think about the relationship between a mother and daughter. It may be the most intimate relationship, but like the drama says, they are also like ‘Strangers’ right?

Sooyoung: That’s right. I started living alone in the latter half of my 20s and I was so afraid that my mom might completely disappear from my life. When we met each other again after silently holding out and spending time separately, I was able to truly love my mom. When I was young, my mom cared for me and kept me safe, but now I feel like I should be the one to protect her. I want to know if anything hurts, and I want to show her a lot of good things. We also traveled to Switzerland because my mom often showed me photos of that place while saying, “If heaven exists, is it a place like this?”. I was glad that my mom liked that trip.

Q. Everyone, including mother and daughter, are fundamentally strangers, but there’s also a saying that ‘Only others save us’. Sooyoung, you also have moments where you feel the preciousness of other people, right?

Sooyoung: Of course. There are people who cross the line that I drew in an affectionate manner. They remember the food I enjoyed, or they suddenly give me something pretty as gifts. When someone is willing to give something for me like this, I realize that I have the power to exchange with others. I also want to convey this kind of emotion to the people around me.

Q. I had this thought when I heard that you and Yuri participated as flight volunteers for abandoned dogs on your trip to Los Angeles not long ago.. Sooyoung’s kindness reaches not only people but also animals.

Sooyoung: I heard that there are a lot of abandoned dogs waiting for help from volunteers. I thought that sending many more abandoned dogs to places where there are people waiting for them through planes that fly every day would ease their pain even just a little bit. Even if it's not often, I look into flight volunteer information when I go to places like the US. It was Yuri’s first time being a flight volunteer, and she thanked me for giving her the opportunity to help the dogs. I was also grateful that Yuri was able to feel those emotions and expressed them in words.

Q. It’s not easy to keep a relationship going for more than 15 years, but Girls’ Generation members have already spent that much time together. Not to mention in the closest way. It’s a relationship that started through work, but now, you have become very important people in each other’s lives.

Sooyoung: “When I went to Los Angeles with Yuri and Tiffany this time, every process went smoothly. It was very comfortable because we are used to honestly voicing out if we’re upset about something as well as yielding to each other fairly. We’ve been together for a long time so we know each other well, but I think it’s a blessing that I have friends beside me with whom we still have a lot to talk about whenever we meet. It felt as if we were being compensated for the days we lived intensely together.

Q. Girls’ Generation members, who received a huge amount of love right after debut, are now continuing activities in their respective places. Sooyoung is also solidifying her position as an actress.

Sooyoung: “I used to be shy about saying ‘I’m actress Choi Sooyoung’. Looking back now, I think I had a similar mindset to ‘Forky’ in <Toy Story> who didn’t think of himself as a toy. I was conscious of the prejudiced view about idol-turned-actor and obsessed over a kind of inferiority complex. But now, I have come a long way from such thoughts. I felt a great thirst for this freedom. I hope I can gain a lot more experience and show various faces as an actor using the freedom that I finally found.

Q. Are there more things you want to achieve in the future?

Sooyoung: “I’ve been ambitious/greedy lately. I talked to Yuri and Tiffany about it and they said, ‘It’s my first time hearing such words come out from Sooyoung’s mouth.’ (laughs) I don’t have a specific goal, but I do want to be loved more.”

Q. What is the fundamental reason behind such thoughts?

Sooyoung: “If you were to compare a person to a jar, my jar is filled with water very shallowly. If the amount of water is this little, it’s not an easy thing to share it with someone. I don’t think I’m that big of a person to an extent that I’d share what I have until the very last drop. That’s why I should fill myself up even more. It would be nice if I get filled to the point it overflows so that I can share even more.”

Q. So it’s being filled to be able to share.

Sooyoung: “There are a lot of people around me whom I’m grateful for and they tell me, “Even if you don’t pay me back, I will fill you up.” I wish to become that kind of person too. I want to be more relaxed so that I can give more. Then I will be able to deliver greater love to the people I cherish.”

#sooyoung #girlsgeneration #snsd #choi sooyoung #snsd sooyoung #marie claire

[hippogriff]

Astolfo Fun Facts! ✨

Any Servant (such as a Ruler-class) who can see the statistics of other Servants will notice that Astolfo's profile has been heavily edited. He has access to powerful magic through his Noble Phantasm "Casseur de Logistille: Destruction Declaration," which allows him to perform feats of magecraft. Rather than using this to his tactical advantage, he instead graffitied his statblock with rambling remarks and doodles. He also covered his gender, preferring to let people guess for themselves on that matter.

Astolfo has great respect for King Charlemagne and considers himself a knight in "Charlie's" service above all else, even his existence as a Heroic Spirit. Nevertheless, they have a uniquely terrible sort of chemistry wherein they bring out the worst in each other: If left unsupervised, they will undoubtedly get up to mischief. Although Charlemagne considers Astolfo an idiot (in the gentlest and most affectionate usage of the term), Astolfo is shockingly adept at convincing his King to do stupid, dangerous, and otherwise fool-hardly things, purely for his own amusement. It's for the best that eleven other paladins were present to dilute their chaotic behavior.

Speaking of other paladins, Astolfo is biologically related to two of them: Bradamante and Roland. His hippogriff originally belonged to Bradamante, one of his cousins. He found himself in need of flight during his journey, so they traded with one another; Bradamante received Rabicano, his magical horse made of hurricane and flame, and his enchanted lance, Argalia. Because his most famous adventure involved flying to the moon while hitched to the aforementioned hippogriff, the Throne of Heroes recorded it as his possession, and determined his class to be Rider. Bradamante, in turn, was recorded as a Lancer. She does not seem overly thrilled about this. If Bradamante were to be summoned as a Rider, she would also have ownership of the hippogriff, but Astolfo seems incompatible with the Lancer class (though his primary weapon is indeed a lance).

Astolfo's relationship with his cousin Roland is unusual. Though he proudly wears the ribbons Roland gave to him in life, he also accuses his fellow paladin of being an out-of-control pervert with a number of alarming fetishes. He seems almost in awe of Roland's degeneracy. Roland, in turn, speaks to Astolfo like he's a child. One could say they're more like brothers engaged in sibling rivalry than cousins.

In Fate/Grand Order, Astolfo is classified as a genderless Servant. He is immune to skills, Charm spells, and Noble Phantasms that target men and/or women specifically. He does, however, have the "Appears Feminine" trait, so Blackbeard's Gentlemen's Love skill will restore his HP. This is the only skill in the game that impacts Servants with the "Appears Feminine" trait.

Astolfo's first major story appearance in Fate/Grand Order is during Subsingularity II: Agartha. He and D'eon are guest Servants during this chapter; however, they leyshifted into the singularity by bribing a certain staff member and are not rogue Servants confined to the singularity. In short, this means that both Astolfo and D'eon are canonically present within Chaldea during Fate/Grand Order.

[FATE/APOCRYPHA SPOILERS] Though Astolfo and his Master did not win the war for the Greater Grail in Fate/Apocrypha, they both survived the conflict. Sieg's transformation into Fafnir also turned him into a limitless font of mana. Despite being separated by different planes of reality, Sieg's mana still reached Astolfo through the veil, making him effectively immortal. He chose to take advantage of this for a time and went on a plethora of adventures, just as he did in life. Some of his journeys are recorded in the short story Fate/Apocrypha: Story of Survivor (which has not been translated into English). During this time, he visited with some of the other surviving Masters, tried and failed to reach Sieg on the Reverse Side of the World, and researched how Ruler Amakusa was able to summon Assassin Semiramis. Once he was satisfied with what he'd learned, he released himself from his Contract with Sieg to await another summoning.

#!keep #FAST FACTS. featuring astolfo

[true-blue-sonic]

Hi blue and have a nice morning/afternoon/evening/night!

I have an au about espio and silver and I wanted to talk about

What about to see silver and espio's family (I mean their mothers for now)

I wanted to ask you, what will you choose to silver's mother like a name, her style, outfits, if you have

And about espio it won't be a problem, bc she appeared in the Archie comics, she's called "Juanita" ( i think it's a very cute name)

BTW may if you have a design and a story for silver's mother, I could draw them both!

(and if you don't have you can just not answer)👍 (⁠^⁠^⁠)

Hullo!🍀

I did actually put some thought into Silver's parents, both his mother and father. Though, that was for a fic wherein Silver was born in the present, got yote to the future somehow where he ended up under the care of Tikal and Chaos, and then travelled back to the past at fourteen years old with no idea of his origins... ending up there about a day after his toddler self's disappearance, and right in his birth village. Shenanigans follow aplenty! His mother there is named Onyx, and she is a very dark brown-furred hedgehog with yellow eyes there. I didn't have much in the way of a design for her otherwise, but her story is that she explored all over the world in search of Cool Artifacts for her job. That caused her to come into contact with Chaos energies more than once... So I imagine she dresses rather practical, a typical explorer vibe. Though, I'm not sure if that is a fic that will ever come to fruition, and furthermore I might change Onyx's name anyway because it reminds me too much of Onyx City from Genesis (which I don't believe I'd started writing yet when I came up with the idea of Silver's parents). And Onyx (and Shale, her husband) only exist in that one specific universe, so for Silver's 'canon' parents I'm not too sure. But I like the idea of them being a dark-furred and a light-furred hedgehog, to have him fall a bit inbetween colour-wise!

#for Espio in my Pirate AU I actually created a different mother #she's still a purple chameleon but her name is Kusa and she's got green eyes #and she also dresses rather differently than the Bride of whatever aka Espio's mom in Archie #but also that is not entirely worked out yet so far haha #silver the hedgehog #sonic oc #? #good luck with your AU! ^-^

[rapifessor]

Wanderer and Faruzan First Impressions

Wow, I wasn’t expecting I’d be doing another First Impressions on two BRAND NEW characters so soon. Actually... I tell a lie. One of these characters we have seen before, just not in their current form, and they are now known as the Wanderer.

I am of course talking about Scaramouche, whose debut as a playable character has been long-awaited since he first appeared all the way back in version 1.1, in the Unreconciled Stars event. He comes to us bearing a palette swap and... an Anemo Vision...?

Yeah, that does seem a bit odd. Fans of Scaramouche might be a little disappointed to see these changes, as this redesign is arguably less cool than his original getup, and the Anemo Vision is an odd choice. To me though it says a lot about his character development and there are some very notable differences between OG Scara and his new Wanderer design.

For starters, there’s a very strong implication that Scaramouche will either lose his memory or have a change of heart following the events of the upcoming Archon Quest, wherein I assume we’ll be kicking his ass with the help of Nahida. That’s the only explanation I can think of for why he’d go through such a drastic change and be willing to join the Traveler on their adventure.

Then there’s the matter of the Vision. You may have noticed its shape, which indicates that it was given to Scaramouche in Sumeru. Obviously this is a brand new Vision, and even more curious is that Scaramouche didn’t have a Vision before this. Which raises even more questions for me, like how was Scaramouche so powerful if he didn’t even have a Vision before? This is obviously the case while he’s a member of the Fatui Harbingers because he ranks higher than Signora, and Miko confirms this, even though she says it after she’s already given him the Gnosis.

In any case, I’m sure we’ll learn quite a lot from his inevitable Story Quest in version 3.3, including what exactly happened in the aftermath of our battle with him if it wasn’t already made clear. I’m also curious to see if his relationship to Ei gets brought up. Maybe they have a mother-son reunion or something, that’d be cute. We’ll just have to see though.

Okay, let’s have a look at our second reveal for version 3.3.

So here we have Faruzan, sporting an elegant white dress that is also surprisingly colorful. She doesn’t strike me in the same way that Layla did as a surprise reveal, but she is very pretty and also quite cute.

She is yet another Anemo Vision holder, making her the same as the Wanderer. Bit of an odd decision from HoYoverse here, adding two characters of the same element in one update. With Collei and Tighnari it made sense, because we didn’t have any Dendro characters prior to their arrival, but Anemo has been in the game since launch. Perhaps they’re trying to add some diversity to the element, pushing it away from the standard Elemental Mastery, succ, and just being very OP in general.

We’re given a little bit of information about Faruzan as well, as is the standard practice whenever HoYoverse reveals a new character. She’s a member of the Akademiya, known for assisting Kshahrewar students with their studies, although strangely she’s a member of the Haravatat Darshan. Yet, she is also shunned by the Haravatat for some unknown reason.

Faruzan is also apparently more than a century old, and she’s the first non-Archon, non-adeptus (and non-Khaenri’ah) character to my knowledge to sport such an impressive lifespan. Really makes you wonder how she does it, but she seems not to like it when you express surprise at her youth. Whatever it is, she clearly has some sort of secret.

There was a lot to unpack about our new reveals this time around, which has left me very interested in what their full stories are. If I had to choose one to gacha for based on first impressions alone, I’d probably go for Faruzan although she’s most likely a 4-Star character. I don’t have anything against Scaramouche but I dunno, he just doesn’t appeal to me that much. Definitely has cool lore though.

#genshin impact #first impressions #thoughts #analysis #rapifessor rambles #genshin impact 3.3 #scaramouche #faruzan #genshin impact scaramouche #genshin impact faruzan #scaramouche genshin impact #faruzan genshin impact #long post

[chernobog13]

BELATED HAPPY MIRACLE MONDAY!

It totally slipped my mind that yesterday was the 3rd Monday of May, Miracle Monday.  It is a legitimate holiday, more so than that May the Fourth nonsense.

The holiday traces its origins back to Elliot S! Maggin’s 1981 Superman novel Miracle Monday.  Despite the cover photograph, and the fact that the novel’s release coincided with the release of the film Superman ll, this is an original story, not a novelization.

Warner Books had wisely eschewed publishing novelizations of the first two Superman films.  For the first film Warners published Last Son of Krypton, a novel they had in their inventory that Maggin had written a couple of years before.  For the second film Warners went back to well, and Maggin produced  an even better story than the first.

This is a tale of the most powerful demon in Hell being sent to Earth to corrupt Superman and claim his soul.  Of course Superman triumphs in the end.  He even manages to make everyone on Earth forget just how close it came to extinction from his conflict with an unspeakably evil entity.

But there’s still a lingering memory in everyone’s minds of what happened, and an overwhelming feeling of joy that they had been saved.  The feeling is associated with Superman, seen streaking through the sky, who everyone knows is somehow responsible for their salvation.

So great is humanity’s collective joy that the day, the 3rd Monday in May, is commemorated and celebrated from then on each year.

Just as he did in Last Son of Krypton, Maggin reused and reworked some themes and story ideas that he had used in some of his comics work for Miracle Monday.  The biggest element came from The Miracle of Thirsty Thursday from Superman (vol. 1) #93, November 1975.  Luckily, Maggin tossed away much of what happened in this story - it is extremely silly - and kept the really good parts.  I’ll let you read the novel and the comic to figure out what those are.

Miracle Monday introduced the character of Kristin Wells, who played a rather prominent part in the narrative.  Maggin would eventually get to introduce her in comics in DC Comic Present Annual #2, July 1983.  Kristin gets to meet Superman again, wherein they reference the adventure they had together in the novel.  Kristin also combines technology from the future and a costume Linda (Supergirl) Danvers was going to wear to a costume party, to become the new heroine, Superwoman.  This was the first in-continuity heroic Superwoman (as opposed to Earth-3′s evil Wonder Woman doppelgänger), as all other appearances of a character by that name had either been in imaginary stories (Lois Lane was the first Superwoman, back in the 1940s), or future tales of Supergirl as an adult.  Kristin as Superwoman would only have a handful of appearances before being wiped from continuity by Crisis on Infinite Earths.  The evil, alternate Earth Superwoman would eventually reappear post-Crisis.  Likewise, another Superwoman (wearing a costume similar to Kristin’s) would appear in the Superman family of books.  This time she was Lucy Lane, who had taken a heel turn, and she would primarily be an opponent for Supergirl.

The holiday of Miracle Monday would finally get its introduction in the 1984′s wonderful Superman (vol. 1) #400.  This was an over-sized issue celebrating Superman’s milestone, written by Maggin and featuring story art and pin-ups by some of the best artists in the industry at the time (just take in that cover by Howard Chaykin!).  This issue is worth it just for Frank Miller’s version of  George Reeves as Superman (the only Miller art I really like)!

In this issue Klaus Janson illustrated a short story wherein a time-tossed Superman got to share Miracle Monday with a family in the far future.  It’s so far in the future, in fact, that only the oldest son - who is a history buff - recognizes Superman.

So, again, a belated Happy Miracle Monday, folks!  If ever humanity needed a day of overwhelming joy, now would be the time.

#Superman #Miracle Monday #Elliot S! Maggin #Christopher Reeve #Lois Lane #Kristin Wells #Superwoman #Howard Chaykin #Jor-El #Lara Lor-Van #DC Comics

[phantom-le6]

Episode Reviews - Star Trek: Voyager Season 6 (2 of 7)

Episode 5: Alice

Plot (as adapted from Wikipedia):

Voyager finds an alien junkyard and trades for supplies with the junk dealer, Abaddon. Ensign Tom Paris discovers a derelict shuttle in the yard and convinces Chakotay to let him bring it aboard and restore it, just as he has been doing with old cars on the holodeck as a hobby. He discovers that the shuttle is equipped with a neural interface. It reads and communicates directly with its pilot's mind, giving it instantaneous manoeuvrability. He tries out the interface and the ship makes a record of his brain patterns.

 As time goes on Paris becomes more and more obsessive about restoring and caring for his new shuttle, which he has named Alice. He can even hear "her" speaking to him in his mind. His behaviour becomes more and more strange. He wants to spend time with Alice and no one else. Lt. B'Elanna Torres, Paris’ girlfriend, becomes very concerned about his obsession. He begins to neglect his appearance and duties, looking more tired and frantic as time goes on, and he wears a spacesuit designed for use with Alice instead of his Voyager uniform. When power cells from Voyager's back-up systems go missing, Torres finds them in the cargo bay where Paris fixes Alice. She then sneaks aboard Alice to see what is drawing Paris there so strongly, but the ship springs to life, traps her inside, and shuts off life support.

 Paris gets Torres out of the shuttle before she is seriously injured, but soon after that he loses control of his own behaviour. He boards Alice and speeds away from Voyager with her, disappearing from Voyager's sensors. Janeway contacts Abaddon to try to learn more about Alice, and discover that Abaddon too still struggles with his previous encounters with her. From him, they identify that the intelligence behind Alice was trying to head toward a particle fountain, which it called home; the fountain would destroy the craft and its pilot should it get inside. Voyager arrives in time, but find they cannot use weapons to stop the ship without harming Paris, his mind still linked to the ship. Torres uses Voyager's comm system to project herself to Paris via Alice’s neural interface and convince him to return to Voyager, allowing Tuvok to sever the neural link to Alice. Paris is transported back to Voyager moments before Alice is destroyed in the fountain.

Review:

This is another of those Voyager episodes that that tries to be about something and fails. Is it character development?  No, because it takes Paris back to being an irresponsible fool like he was at the show’s beginning, and at this stage it’s getting boring and annoying to see that.  The character is supposed to have an arc of settling down, getting more responsible, becoming less of a delinquent and maverick, so why are we sitting through a season 6 episode that puts him back to his old ways as if this was still season 1 or 2?  Answer, this show is as bad as Fox’s run of X-Men films for story-to-story continuity, and shows how anyone trying to make Trek episodic backfires.

 Likewise, is this episode about exploring a certain issue?  Possibly, but if it is, it’s not being original.  The Borg was set up as a species to stand for the perils of technological obsession, and between the novelisation of Red Dwarf’s Better-Than-Life total immersion video game and the TNG episode “The Game”, we’ve certainly had at least two further sci-fi examples of tech obsession beyond the Borg. Do we really need an episode wherein Paris cheats on B’Elanna with an AI girlfriend?  Um, yeah, not really.  The fact that there’s barely any background info for this episode on the Trek wiki site Memory Alpha shows how little Trekkies proper must think of this episode, and goodness knows I’m not thinking much of it.  4 out of 10, next episode please.

Episode 6: Riddles

Plot (as given by me):

While returning in the Delta Flyer from a diplomatic mission, Neelix tries to keep himself and Tuvok entertained, with Tuvok not really engaging as usual.  Checking the Flyer’s aft section, Tuvok detects a cloaked alien, which attacks him with some kind of energy weapon before fleeing.  Neelix sends a mayday to Voyager, which soon retrieves them and the Flyer.  Captain Janeway contacts the Kesat, who they just met, to ask if they can shed any light on the attack.  A Kesat law enforcement official, Investigator Naroq, explains that the attack fits the profile of the Ba’Neth, a highly xenophobic species who go to such great lengths to remain a secret, most of Kesat society believes they are a myth.

 Naroq is assigned to Voyager’s case in hope of proving the existence of the Ba’Neth, while Neelix works with the Doctor to try and bring Tuvok out of his coma.  Tuvok does indeed awaken, but neurological trauma from the Ba’Neth weapon has caused various impairments; he has amnesia and has lost many abilities as a result, including the ability to control his emotions.  Tuvok then regains his ability to speak, but when confronted with all the things he used to do and no longer can, he lashes out in anger.  Ultimately, Seven of Nine points out to Neelix that he can’t succeed by trying to make Tuvok the person he originally was, just as Janeway did not try to restore Seven to what she had been when Seven was freed from the Borg.  Instead, Neelix must help Tuvok become someone new.

 Seven’s suggestion works and Tuvok begins to feel better, especially when he learns cooking from Neelix, though Tuvok is only interested in making desserts. Tuvok then remembers the cloaking frequency he scanned before he was attacked, drawing it in cake icing.  With this new information, Janeway and Naroq are able to confront the Ba’Neth, and trade information on how the Ba’Neth can better hide themselves in exchange for knowledge of the weapon used on Tuvok. This information enables the Doctor to devise a treatment for Tuvok, who is less than thrilled by the idea of returning to his former self.  However, Neelix explains that while he has enjoyed the companionship of a more emotionally free Tuvok, neither of them can put what they want above the need Voyager has for its best tactical officer.  Tuvok is then treated, but some element of his emotionally liberated self still persists afterwards.

Review:

This is a pretty interesting episode to watch. First of all, B’Elanna actress Roxann Dawson makes her directorial debut with this episode, adding a rare female name to the list of Trek actors who have become directors through their time on a Trek TV show.  Second, as Memory Alpha notes, we’re presented with moments that echo the controversial season 2 episode ‘Tuvix’; Tuvok’s superior cooking ability with desserts echoes what Tuvix accomplished in his episode, and Tuvok is as reluctant to go back to his old self as Tuvix was to be split back into Tuvok and Neelix. Indeed, the Tuvok we see for this episode is in some ways his own separate entity to the Tuvok we normally see, and so we’re really seeing another born from an accident, then killed off to maintain the main cast status quo.

 What I like about this episode is the moment where Seven corrects Neelix’s methods in how to aid Tuvok.  As anyone who has read my reviews and other posts for a while will know, not only am I myself autistic, but I see Tuvok himself as a metaphorical representation of autistic people in some cases, and the same is true for Seven and the Doctor.  Now, one could argue that what Tuvok goes through might be a form of autistic burnout couched in the metaphor of an alien attack.  The brain has been overloaded, its ability to function impaired, the real-life scenario of autistic burnout caused by trying to act neurotypical for too long and too hard, the Trek metaphor caused by an energy weapon.  In the same way that Tuvok’s efforts to be what he was meet with failure due to his neurological damage, an overloaded autistic brain can’t just go back to acting like it can be the same as everyone else. One is impossibly physically, the other is impossible from a mental health standpoint.

 The real commonality between these two examples lies in what Seven says; you cannot make someone be what they were or what you want them to be.  They have to become whatever it is they are now, and when Neelix does this in the episode, it succeeds.  By the same token, society fails neurodiverse people by trying to make us play neurotypical. We’re not neurotypical; never have been, never going to be, and frankly I wouldn’t want to be, because the more I understand how neurotypicals do things, the less appealing I find that notion. To me, neurotypical people have created a pointlessly complex and convoluted society that needs neurodiverse people to come in to highlight why that society must change to more simplistic and direct functionality.  That cannot be achieved by trying to force what is neurotypical on the neurodiverse, but by accepting that both sides of the divide have equal value and can benefit from each other.

 Given this, the episode then becomes flawed by Tuvok being returned to how he was before, because after all that effort has been put in to accepting a newer, possibly better, Tuvok, all of it gets chucked in the proverbial dustbin.  For me, this episode would have been better if we could have seen Tuvok go on dealing with the mental changes and maybe work towards some fusion of old and new Tuvok. Instead, it’s putting the status quo ahead of really taking this point on neurodiversity and running with it. Once again, episodic television and inadvertent ablism trump all else, and so on balance, I can only give this episode 7 out of 10.

Episode 7: Dragon’s Teeth

Plot (as adapted from Wikipedia):

In a city under attack, an alien called Gedrin convinces his nervous wife, Jisa, to enter a stasis chamber and then enters one himself.

 Voyager is caught in a “subspace corridor”. A vessel of the Turei species helps Voyager re-enter normal space. When Captain Janeway discovers they have travelled more than 200 light years in a few minutes, she requests that the Turei aid them further, but the Turei insist on wiping Voyager's computers of any information regarding the corridor. When Janeway refuses, the Turei ship attacks and summons reinforcements. Janeway has Voyager land on a nearby planet, shrouded in radiation that prevents the Turei from following them. The crew begins repairs while the Turei remain in orbit.

 The planet contains the remains of a civilization that was destroyed nearly 900 years earlier. Detecting lifesigns, Janeway, Lt. Tuvok, and Seven of Nine discover stasis chambers, containing several hundred alien bodies. Seven, without waiting for Janeway's orders, wakes Gedrin. Jisa's body has decomposed and Gedrin mourns the loss of his wife. Recovering aboard Voyager, Gedrin explains that his race, the Vaadwaur, discovered the subspace corridors and were attacked by other races who wished to seize them. He and hundreds of other Vaadwaur, along with their weapons and ships, entered stasis in caverns below the planet's surface, anticipating being revived five years later, but their control equipment was apparently damaged. Gedrin struggles with how much time has passed. The Vaadwaur were familiar with Neelix's species, the Talaxians; Neelix recognizes the term "Vaadwaur" as an old Talaxian word meaning "foolish."

 Janeway and Gedrin plan to fight off the Turei and return to the subspace tunnels, and proceed to waken the other Vaadwaur; Commander Chakotay is reminded of a Greek myth whereby warriors would rise after the teeth of a defeated dragon were buried in the ground. Neelix and Seven research the Vaadwaur in Talaxian folklore and a Borg database, discovering that the Vaadwaur were the aggressors, using their subspace corridors to invade planets; Neelix informs Janeway. Meanwhile, Voyager's crew are unaware that the Vaadwaur plan to hijack Voyager in order to conquer a new colony for themselves. Gedrin warns Janeway, siding with Voyager's crew against his own people.

 After the Vaadwaur turn openly hostile, Janeway allies with the Turei. Tuvok and Gedrin return to the planet to commandeer a satellite, allowing the Turei to use it to target the Vaadwaur ships. After Tuvok returns to the ship, Gedrin stays behind to maintain the signal; he is killed when the chamber collapses. Voyager escapes and leaves the sector. They detect that 53 Vaadwaur ships escaped the Turei assault and could threaten them in the future. Seven apologizes for causing the new war by waking Gedrin, but Janeway notes she might have done the same.

Review:

Another episode that appears to lack a real point to it.  No characters are developed, and exactly what issue is being explored with the situation Voyager gets into here?  If it’s just a simple “look before you leap” story, that really is a waste of any Trek episode.  Annoyingly, Memory Alpha is devoid of any intel on the subject, so I’m guessing this is just mindless fodder for Voyager’s action remit with no real consideration to the purpose of Trek story-telling at all.  4 out of 10; here’s hoping there’s not too many more of these pointless endeavours before I’m done with this series.  They’re part of why I’ve really slowed down on writing reviews; who wants to review something this hollow?

Episode 8: One Small Step

Plot (as adapted from Wikipedia):

Voyager encounters a graviton ellipse: a massive body of subspace energy that temporarily leaves subspace and travels through normal space for a time. After Seven of Nine provides Voyager with Borg information on how to avoid being harmed by the ellipse, the crew begin scanning it. They recognize it as a similar phenomenon that reportedly consumed the Ares IV, a command module used in Earth's Mars mission in 2032, and its pilot, John Kelly, and that had stranded his two other mission officers on Mars for weeks before they could be rescued. The mysterious disappearance of the Ares IV had almost caused humans to abandon further space missions but ultimately would be the precursor for humankind's future exploration of deep space.

 Further scans detect signs of the Ares IV within the ellipse in a stable field that acts as the eye of the storm. Plans are made to modify the Delta Flyer with Seven's information to allow it to enter this field and recover the module. Chakotay and Tom Paris, history buffs for the Mars missions, quickly volunteer. Captain Kathryn Janeway encourages Seven to join them as part of this historic event, even after Seven initially rebuffs the effort as a worthless exploration mission.

 The modifications work as expected and the crew soon finds the module, nearly in one piece. Voyager detects the ellipse being drawn towards a dark matter asteroid and warns the Delta Flyer to escape before collision. Chakotay insists on leaving with the module despite Seven's concerns that this will slow the Flyer down. They are unable to clear the ellipse in time and are caught in a shock wave from the collision; Chakotay is injured with plasma burns and the Flyer's shields and engines are knocked off-line. Voyager warns that the Flyer only has a few hours to escape before the ellipse returns to subspace, where they would be trapped indefinitely.

 After stabilizing Chakotay, Paris begins effecting repairs but the Flyer's power converter is beyond repair. B'Elanna suggests salvaging the power converter from the Ares IV module to bring the Flyer back online. Chakotay instructs Seven to go, but asking her to not only collect the part but to take time to download data from the module. Seven arrives and powers up the systems. While she works at removing the power converter, John Kelly's logs of the few days he remained alive after being consumed by the ellipse are played out. Seven begins to come to appreciate what Kelly had done, continuing to take readings and collect as much information as he could before his power reserves died, hoping that it would be useful to somebody someday. With little time left to escape, Seven spares enough time to download the module logs and instructs Paris to bring Kelly's preserved body to the Flyer. They are able to install the power converter on the Flyer in time to escape the ellipse with Voyager's help before it returns to subspace.

 The crew holds a formal memorial service for Kelly to pay their respects. Among others, Seven provides a brief eulogy, praising the man's exploratory nature that would eventually lead to Voyager and her own existence.

Review:

Ok, this episode is much better for depth, as it develops Seven’s character by teaching her, and through her the audience, the importance of exploring history.  Much of how the world is right now, in fact, is evidence that too many people do not explore history or value it in any fashion.  If they did, they would see the parallels between the rise of right-wing political parties in many present-day governments and the rise of the Nazis, originally a right-wing political party, in inter-war Germany during the 1930’s.  A more historically-minded society would even now be undermining these parties that echo the Nazis of old, but alas, the present so often belongs to the ignorant and forgetful.

 However, like Chakotay actor Robert Beltran, I do think it’s a shame that Seven takes up a lot of the episode when it was originally going to focus a bit more on developing Chakotay.  Seven’s had a lot of focus since she joined the crew, and I think this episode might have been better if Chakotay could have been more active, perhaps taking on the mentor role normally taken by Janeway in opening Seven’s eyes to historical exploration.  As it is, Chakotay is made to side-line himself by putting historical exploration above crew safety, and that seems a very dodgy thing for a Star Fleet character to do.  If exploring any subject is going to endanger lives, that’s when it’s best to stop and walk away.

 The only other flaw in the episode is that it maybe spends slightly too much time going into scenes showing Kelly’s perspective for my taste.  Mostly, this is because as time goes on, the would-be history we see in Star Trek becomes increasingly divorced from real life history, and at times that interferes with my investment in the world of Trek.  In some ways, this is where Star Wars has an advantage over Star Trek; not being tied to a history that links into real life over time means it’s easier to take Star Wars as it is.  Frankly, I think Trek would have benefitted from keeping its historical explorations away from the 21st and late 20th centuries just to avoid this kind of problem.  Anyway, it’s still a pretty good episode, and I’d probably give it 8 out of 10.

[katarhol5]

Ruins (1995) Issues 1 & 2

"Ruins" is a two-issue comic book mini-series co-created by writer Warren Ellis and artist Terese Nielsen. The story follows a man named Phil Sheldon as he traverses across a post-apocalyptic America where exposure to nuclear radiation caused mutation amongst many humans and animals. The government hires Phillip Sheldon and his wife to document cases of human and animal exposure causing grotesque disfigurements leading most affected individuals to be subjected to social pariahs exiled from society due to fear of contamination by others. The duo eventually find themselves becoming more isolated even among other social outcasts. When Phillips is unable to provide any hope for improving his own life or offering meaningful change, he takes his life allowing his now socially-outcast wife to continue making sense of how she fits into the rest of humanity.

Warren Ellis uses character development techniques such as dramatic irony, sarcasm and cynical wit combined with elements of satire throughout the story line. One example of this technique used within the narrative includes an encounter between the Sheriff of Splendide and Mr. Shellton wherein Shelton explains how the radiation causes humans physical anomalies including “hideous overgrowth of scar tissue resulting in hyper-extended joints, oversized organs”. This encounter ultimately leads to a discovery that not only is the townspeople suffering from physical abnormalities but so does all living creatures in the area leading him and his wife having no ability or desire to improve their lives or offer anything beyond mere documentation of existing tragedy.

With regards to plot development we see Shellak himself begins to fall victim to the nuclear ravages around him, leaving the once nihilistic observer realizing he may need to develop greater empathetic qualities of humankind just to simply survive as both he and his wife become physically scarred. There is also little room for redemption for this family given their unwillingness to attempt to seek treatment/care outside of the quarantine zones thus making them unable to escape isolation regardless of how close potential medical facilities might actually exist nearby. Given this lack of agency there appears no chance of escaping the grim reality, nor reason to believe the nuclear devastation could lead to something positive such as innovation around cleanup efforts to prevent further environmental harm through mutation - thus seemingly fulfilling Ellis’ pessimism for a world without hope.

In summary, this comic leaves behind far less optimism than what originally existed upon reading through the first issue - this is primarily focused upon the personal experiences of this family and likely mirrors how other families felt upon being displaced following this disaster unfolding in their environment. It’s difficult to imagine how anyone could derive entertainment value from witnessing another family suffer so significantly. With little light left remaining to guide those readers who wish to follow similar stories - the door remains open to question whether continuing the readership would potentially leave someone in a place worse off than prior to picking up this particular graphical novelization of a dismal future.