#love him as a character bc he does horrible things all for the good of his people

[lactoseintolerentswag]

Rise Characterizations

Last month I did an in-depth re-watch of rottmnt s1 to take some notes on writing the characters of rise from their perspective and such. Figured I'd share what I found, but I'm also posting this bc my docs have a nasty habit of blipping out of existence.

We'll start with Raph bc he's the oldest of course, but I'll post the others sep. bc this is gonna get long!!

Raph Character Notes

Language Habits:

Catchphrases: "like a boss", "smash"

Verbalizes his attacks such as "smash", "knuckle sandwich", "power smash jitsu", "tonfa power jitsu", "mystic punch jitsu"

Uses older song titles for surprised exclamations or in place of cursing, most notably "jumping jack flash!"

Uses aave/bae, For example: 'em instead of them, 'ey instead of they, 'cause instead of because, forgoes the g in ing words (going becomes goin')

Uses less and less grammar the more he's stressed, and his voice will come to a higher pitch

Will speak in a softer tone to his little brothers if he's concerned about hurting their feelings. Aka babying them

Mixes up both metaphors and idioms. Would be one to say how the turn tables unironically

Does say "hero" a lot, lost count, especially in phrases like "hero town"

Refers to his brothers as "boys" or "fellas"

Refers to Splinter as "pop(s)" most often

Refers to strangers he's directly talking to as "bubs" or "hoss"

Personality:

Protective of his family

Plays up the hero act/has a strong sense of duty and justice

Impatient, rushes in without a plan (pre-movie), doesn't finish books until the end, falls asleep during "boring movies"

Oblivious, doesn't read into things beyond surface level. Struggles with empathy when something is beyond his understanding, but is still very emotional

Center of responsibility for his brothers, but also has a reckless sense of fun. As long as it's him doing the stupid unsafe thing it's fine

Carries the weight, in a literal sense he piggy backs his brothers, but will also use his body as a shield from danger. Unfortunately this also means he takes his brothers a little less seriously (Mikey the most common victim), and will try and either protect them from everything or as an oldest sibling everything has go "his way"

Doesn't do well in solitude. Needs to be looking after people to feel functional, and needs to be around people to feel safe

Clumsy, "takes horrible pictures", isn't very good at hiding, he's a big guy so it probably took a lot of time to find balance

A sweet guy who still won't shy from making fun of his family. Leo tends to be the brunt of his teasing since he is the most annoying, but he will also poke Donnie on his dramatics

Likes cute things!!! Has a teddy bear collection and loves animals. It's so cool how this isn't played off as a joke and he's still just as masculine for liking pink and cutesy stuff

Likes fighting!!! Gets a lot of energy out defeating bad guys (where he directs his anger towards), the one who is shown to train the most, and also weight lifts in his spare time

Doesn't do well under pressure, here the anger comes out the most. He gets stressed when it's all on him, especially since he tends to mess up the most in these moments

Miscellaneous:

Second to unlock mystic powers

Nicknames/codenames: "raph-a-doodle" by leo, "red rover" by april, "red king" by donnie

Teddy bear names: Doctor Huggenstein, Captain Snuggles, Cheech

Stinks: fear stink, amazement stink, sneaking up on people stink, victory stink

Seems to be less afraid of rabbits and more afraid of puppets

Went on his first solo mission at 13

Cannot lift a bus, at age 15

Thought about discussing fighting style, but I'm not as familiar with that concept and I've seen a couple posts dissecting such topic. So we'll end here for now. Hope this was helpful!!! I'll post the rest of the boys later and link here

Leo is up!!

Donnie is up!!

Mikey is up!!

Splinter is up!!

April is up!!

Cassandra is up!!

#rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rise of the tmnt #rottmnt #rottmnt raph #rottmnt raphael #tmnt #teenage mutant ninja turtles #character analysis #long post #fanfic #writing #critter talks

[fairyhaos]

how seventeen would act as a webtoon fantasy world prince

this was written with those virtual character dating simulation thingies in mind btw?? like. those unrealistic webtoon isekai-esque stuff. ive never played them before but this is based on my interpretation of them lmao

masterlist

seungcheol

either you fall in love with prince seungcheol at first sight or it's some charged enemies to lovers dynamic until someone finally realises they've fallen. he's just such a huge and great and formidable presence and he is just The Best protector. there's ofc gonna be some sort of altercation where you get hurt and you can bet that his eyes go stormy and he's asking "who did this to you" in a low voice, full of promise to murder anyone who hurt you. watches you with stars in his eyes when you descend the staircase in the beautiful outfit you're wearing as his partner to a royal ball, and that's how he knows that you're the one

jeonghan

prettier than you. every time he appears on screen there's a bunch of shiny sparkles and floating hearts and at least one of the other faceless side-princesses has to faint at his beauty in the background of the scene. he's charactertised by his soft eyes and the glinting teeth in his smile and the way he always has the most out-of-pocket sentences that leave his lips. he's really pretty and really smart but also???? unexpectedly does little things that show that he cares about you. prince jeonghan is written as the webtoon trope where he looks like a laid-back pretty boy but secretly loves you dearly and would defend you with his life

joshua

childhood friends who drifted away due to circumstances in their own kingdoms before finally reuniting at a ball and realising oh god... they both grew up to be so beautiful. there's some underlying, dramatic plot involving betrayal and corruption in the temple (dude it's always the temple) but your love for one another is always there, unspoken but ringing true constantly. does it kind of give you plot armour? yeah, bc the writer doesn't want anything to happen to joshua. (or you. but mostly joshua.) but there's also at least 6 shirtless prince joshua scenes bc the writer loves him so. take what you can get.

junhui

he's just Doing His Best okay. he's been married off to you, a royal from another kingdom, and he's kinda having a bad time bc the climate of your kingdoms are just so different but you're also kind of being all snappish with him like he chose to be married off to you?? but you're also really pretty and sometimes you're quite nice and it's obvious you're a good person from how you talk about your subjects and he knows that you don't like him but he thinks he might be falling in love with you, which is kind of confusing for everyone. comedy-fluff-misunderstandings webtoon style.

hoshi

playful younger prince. rebellious. you first meet him in some rundown, peasant area and you genuinely think he's just the illegitimate son of a noble rather than the prince himself bc he's just so friendly and blatantly disregarding all sorts of common court etiquette. as someone stifled by the rigid aristocratic structures, you find it refreshing, and talking to him is just so easy and you get to express yourself so well around him. before you know it, you're in love, and when you feel horribly betrayed at the reveal that he's the prince, well.... perhaps someone else out of the two of you managed to catch feelings too.

wonwoo

he's always so calm and composed and it makes you want to climb him like a tree and wring his shoulders to finally ruffle his leaves a little and find out what makes him tick. you want to be the one to crack the secret to prince jeon wonwoo, basically. will he let you? no. he hates you. at least, that's what you think, before something happens at a horse-riding tournament through the woods that you're participating in and your horse becomes out of control, and from then on, wonwoo never leaves your side. almost as if he was scared that he'd truly lose you, and he realises that he never wants that to happen, ever.

woozi

guys. guys prince jihoon is perfect for a prince x knight trope. prince jihoon who's head knight and always ends up sniping with you, the one knight in his charge that always snarks back. prince jihoon who spars with his knights often and always seems to be the closest in skill level with you. prince jihoon who mostly sees you in your armour so to see you dressed in finery at a ball makes him blink because you're actually rather beautiful. and you, who feel torn between your duty and the comfortable banter that you've developed with the crown prince that makes you crave more and more every time he turns to leave.

minghao

you rarely go out to balls but this time your family convinces you to come to the masquerade ball the royal family are holding for the crown prince. there, you meet a handsome masked man, who leads you through one of the fast dances and has you laughing into him before you share a fascinatingly intellectual conversation with him until the ball ends and from there, you're whisked away by your chatty (but well-meaning) family and you never see him again until a dramatic encounter at the market where you're about to get robbed but a familiar voice steps in. is it a cliche plot? yeah, but prince minghao is drawn to be utterly gorgeous so people will stay for the art

mingyu

is literally soooo drop-dead gorgeous that you promise yourself you're not gonna fall in love with him bc like???? he's the prince from a neighbouring kingdom that you're being forced to marry. this off-the-charts handsomeness is just a ploy to get you to act out a cliche of falling for him. but the more time you spend with him, the more you find that despite being (almost terrifyingly) handsome, he's also kind of... adorable? so... maybe you'll rethink your decision to not fall in love with him.... especially when he trips over his feet and accidentally blurts out how he's in love with you when on a walk in the palace gardens

dokyeom

ray-of-sunshine crown prince who is so annoyingly perfect that you feel kind of irritated. literally it's soooo obvious that the writer has a thing for puppy-coded sunshine bright boys bc it even makes the reader fall for him too. you have an (admittedly one-sided) rivalry with him, bc he's just so kind and loved by all and it fills you with hatred bc you've been nothing but despised and shunned your entire life. but then, some small, kind gesture that he does to you marks the beginning of change in your feelings, and it's as his eyes find yours during yet another ball that you realise... oh. perhaps you've fallen for him after all.

seungkwan

spoilt brat. but also your childhood best friend, so you've learnt to deal with his tendencies and know how to hold him back from kicking someone in the shins in a very un-royal way, and have even grown to love him. like a friend, ofc. however, the weird feeling in your stomach from seeing him having to entertain foreign royalty.... it's definitely not jealousy, right? definitely not. at least, you don't think it is, until seungkwan and you overhear his parents talking of an arranged marriage with another kingdom and you realise with startling clarity that you never want to lose seungkwan to someone else

vernon

honestly. vernon is probably the ordinary guy who was isekai-ed into a fantasy novel as the crown prince. but like, Why does he manage to do so well in his role???? he's panicking the entire time, but he's not necessarily doing badly, and he manages to make you fall for him even harder than you do in the original novel. the second male lead doesn't even have the chance to be an option bc vernon is literally the only person you see. he doesn't know how it happens, but he speed-runs the entire book in one month and then you're confessing your love for him and uh. he might actually be in love with you too.

chan

prince chan is the most gentle and most courteous prince of all time. bows all deeply and respectfully when you first meet him, and he's careful not to touch you without your permission. has such a captivating smile and such captivating words that you can't help but find your gaze gravitating to him at all times. stares at you all awed when you laugh at a particularly funny joke he made. he will 100% definitely treat you right forever. kisses you all soft when he leaves for a battle, your handkerchief tucked into his clothes as a reminder of what he can never leave behind

reactions tags: @weird-bookworm @minhui896 @bunnyiix @slytherinshua @haowrld @belladaises @newgirlygirl @moonlitskiiies @mirxzii @wonranghaeee @yonabutnotyuna @crackedpumpkin @wqnwoos @kthstrawberryshortcake-main @kawennote09 @a-wandering-stay @icyminghao @valenhui @sweet-like-caramel @evasaysstuff @odxrilove @kyeomyun @chansburgah @pepperonijem @jeonride @kellesvt @hanniehaee @astrozuya @eightlightstar @onlyyjeonghan @aaniag @amxlia-stars @all-american-fangirl @f1uffyjun @jeonghanfr

#fairyhaos.works #svt #seventeen #seventeen fic #seventeen drabble #seventeen headcanons #seventeen imagines #seventeen scenarios #svt x reader #seventeen x reader #svt fluff #scoups #seungcheol #jeonghan #joshua #hong jisoo #junhui #hoshi #wonwoo #woozi #jihoon #minghao #the8 #mingyu #dokyeom #seokmin #seungkwan #hansol #vernon #dino

[astrolionking]

TW: Abuse, drugs, emetophobia and (Implied) infanticide (it’s gonna end happily I swear)

Sorry this is much more darker than usual and it should NOT be this dark for a film abt singing Trolls with rainbow hair. But I have dark thoughts and project them onto my kins and comfort characters.

So anyways, as far as I know, Floyd has no story abt what was going on while he was gone (if he does, the novelization never said it).

So… Floyd is known to love rock music (as shown on the BroZone website) so I had a thought that maybe he found some rock trolls outside of Volcano Rock City and he met one that was a goddamn S N A K E.

He hurt him badly, did unspeakable things and Floyd managed to run away to safety… until he got kidnapped by Velvet and Veneer.

So the story with these: After learning abt different genres becoming friends, Floyd was calm… until a certain rock troll shows up. The troll harasses Branch even when he says no to him and safe to say Floyd is triggered and he knocks that fucker on his ass. JD and Branch pull him away and ask what was up bc Floyd is NEVER violent unless there was a good reason. And Floyd explains it all. They are HORRIFIED by the stuff he tells them and they thirst for blood.

And they may or may not have erased the horrible troll’s entire existence on behalf of Floyd with help from Barb. Once the deed is done Barb claims the troll never existed… ROCK TROLLS DON’T LET SHIT SLIDE.

What happens in the future is up to you. But just know Floyd is happier.

#dizzy (art tag) #dreamworks trolls #trolls band together #trolls 3 #trolls Floyd #trolls john dory #trolls branch #queen barb #tw abuse #tw drugs #tw infanticide

[readerwithsalt]

Sun and the Star Review: (With snippets from the book)

Since I just finished The Sun and the Star I’m just gonna say the first thing I have a problem with is the TELLING and NOT SHOWING.

• And I was wondering if anyone thought that they made Will super lame and ooc compared to previous cooler depictions of him. Like he’s supposed to be Super Chill under pressure and the Calm Dude but he’s so WHINY the entire book. He’s constantly complaining, judging, screaming, crying or sleeping. The cool, chill vibe Will had before is gone which was one of the things I liked about him before.

• someone else said ‘Tsats Will thinks there’s something wrong with Nico, something wrong with his personality. Will thinks Nico needs to be “fixed” and “healed” and so he can be “normal” and then Nico will be actually appealing to Will. Tsats Will may love some parts of Nico (or at least thinks he loves some parts of Nico). But there are more parts of Nico that Will finds unsavory or unnerving or scary or unsettling or unsatisfactory or unappealing’ I agree sadly

• Like he tells Nico in the beginning of the book that he’s just as capable of survival as Nico (which I snorted at cause no) and then is the hugest burden I’ve ever seen on a quest EVER in a riordan book. Like Nico tries to lift Will up every time he passes out from ‘lack of sun’ (which is so stupid btw) and Nico can’t lift him up cause he’s not strong enough so he’s constantly WAITING on Will. And it’s really boring to read about how every few seconds Nico has to turn around and let his boyfriend catch up.

I think Will’s character could have shined and been more likable in a completely different plot and quest.

Like, I thought since they weren’t giving Will any weapons that his strengths would lie in being the fast athletic character that didn’t need a magic item in order to show off…

• the whole ‘role reversal’ caretaker thing made Will look completely useless. Nico did 80 percent of the work and Will sadly fell flat. I thought he was coming along to keep Nico safe and to heal him when he got injured but Nico was pretty much doing almost every job. It was like he was riding Nico’s coattails to become a ‘hero’ and prove himself. But he didn’t really prove anything except that he complains a lot when things get rough.

They didn’t give Will a character weapon (even Piper has one and she doesn’t fight that much. Neither does Leo and he at least uses a hammer) they made him exhausted the whole book so he didn’t have his normal physical strength, his backstory was also pretty boring.

• and Will keeps randomly getting irritated at Nico bc Nicos irritated at him. Like?? Your shitting on his underworld home every chance you get. I’d be irritated too.

• in previous books he’s described as an archer. Even tho Leo calls him ‘the archer dude’ in TLH he suddenly doesn’t know how to use a bow AT ALL. He only said he wasn’t as good as his siblings not that he was complete shit at it. Previously he used a bow and had a dagger in BOO. Also will randomly says he never wanted to be a fighter and loved healing but in previous books he’s insecure about just that. Also the book forgets Will is a BATTLEFIELD MEDIC. Like he can fight and heal just like Apollo.

• Will whines constantly. And it’s grating and annoying to read. Either about the lack of sun (you knew what you were getting into dumbass) or the dead people walking around or about Nico’s horrible ‘darkness’ that he has to heal. It’s like he never thinks of Nicos feelings when he says stuff. And there little ‘fights’ end unsatisfactory.

• The vibe of Camp-Half-Blood is nonexistent. It does not feel like camp at all. It feels like we’re in a 12 year olds fanfic mind. ALL of the campers are gone even though it’s been established MANY are orphans and we see no beloved background characters and background chaos that makes us smile like in the past books. It made me surprisingly more depressed than I thought it would.

• it’s also missing the mystique of a quest. Like going up to the big house to have the quest recited around a table full of cabin counselor demigods all fighting to be the third member to prove themself a hero (mostly the ares cabin) no matter how important a quest in pjo was for Percy Chiron ALWAYS enforced certain rules. Even if they broke later on.

• Loose Ends. Reyna is. Not. Mentioned. Once. It never comes up how Nico feels about his big sister friend joining the hunters like his other one did even tho in BOO he tore apart a courtyard cause they took her. The girl whose shoulder he cried into, the girl who was with him during his last quest. The girl who thought of him as a little brother and tucked him in her cape and said he resembled his surname as he slept.

Hazel is mentioned… but it’s literally just a couple shallow mentions that don’t have anything to do with the fact that he may not ever see her again if he revisits Tartarus. He mentions his beloved little sister who was the actual first light in his life (don’t know why the book says Will is) in a long time only once and it’s because he can’t remember something and thinks Hazel would?? It’s weird that he iris messages Piper at the end instead of Hazel. I thought that’s what he was going to do and then it was just a big cringe fest of Piper shoved in at the end talking about the label of her sexuality?? Like we actually care??

And It’s never stated that Nico finds out where Jason is even though HE SHOULD KNOW. He literally talks to Beckendorf and Luke when they die in pjo to find out where they went but he can’t figure out where his best friend is??

Also at the end of the book it says Nico still hasn’t redecorated his cabin even though he told Jason he was going to a YEAR AGO bc the ‘decor was disgusting’ (I think that was the worst loose end not fixed 😂)

Every other relationship of Nicos is thrown away so he can admire Will Solace’s mediocrity. who’s kinda a loser in this tbh….

• The Percabeth scene was weird. What relevance does sally jackson have to Nico’s story? Why did he have to go all the way to Percy’s bedroom to iris message him?? And the fact he uses the ship name Percabeth to describe them (which he’d never done in previous books) proves a cringe fan is the one writing this.

The fact that they don’t OFFER TO HELP Nico is ooc of them. Bc even if Percy wants to chill at college he would never want Nico to clean up his mess without offering his help. Also the fact that Percy turns to Annabeth and says ‘oh man I forgot about him’ is like… WHAT?? And they just say oh yea if anyone can get through Tartarus it’s you two.

To Will who’s never been on a quest and doesn’t fight (at least in this book) that’s a weird thing to say. Percy and annabeth only survived bc they’ve fought together FOR YEARS. And bc of Percy’s big three power. It was just a forced add in cameo. Would’ve been better if they didn’t know till the end that Nico got Bob out and then they suddenly see Bob in an iris message and start crying or something…

• it broke my heart that Nico gave his SKULL RING to Will. The last gift from Bianca Nico ever got and he gives it to someone that doesn’t even appreciate his element.

And what does Nico get in return? A coin. I mean, an engraved coin but still. It’s kinda symbolic of the relationship. Nico giving Will something of such RELEVANCE to Nico’s character, something he’s always described with wearing and then Nico receiving a token in turn.

• Will asks Persephone how he’s SUPPOSED TO LOVE NICO. Like I almost blew up my house with me in it at that part. It never feels like Will is as attracted to Nico as Nico is to him. Nico instigates every kiss (which is ooc of him and his reservedness to touch). It seems Will likes to look at others a lot because one of Nicos insecurities were of him staring at fucking Paolo. While being right next to his boyfriend, Will checks out other people… Like Nico deserves so much better. He at least deserves respect.

I would’ve appreciated Nico and Ghost Jason way more than this shit. At least Jason described Nico better and they weren’t even dating. And I liked Solangelo before this. Will never describes physical attributes that he likes about Nico the same way Nico does about Will. Like Nicos inky dark eyes and baby bat winged hair, and his smile that is apparently like winter sun breaking through snow flurries, and his hair smelling pleasantly of rain against stone (I think Apollo is more attracted to Nico than Will is). But Nico has to call Will hot every five min.

• Also I simply don’t understand the idea that Will being away from the sun would drain him to the point where he can’t keep up with NICO’S WALKING PACE within a couple hours. Like the super athletic, physically strong character that can lift Nico over his shoulders and run with him (and Rachel in TON) walks into the underworld and has to be healed by a stupid portable night light within five minutes.

• Don’t even get me started on his JUDGINESS. I always pictured Will as the guy at camp that thought Nicos powers were cool and stuff, right? And now he just judges every ‘dark’ thing nico does like darkness is synonymous with evil. And only his light can heal him. I HATED that trope and honestly thought they would make him more original. But I have to say it: he was so boring. Like in a way that made my stomach hurt.

• Wills kind of a jerk in this. Like it’s weird to read.

• The PACING. It was off the whole book. The only part i enjoyed was the part where they didn’t know they were dreaming (that part got me) but that was it. But like gorgras scene keeps overlapping with the rest of the story and I kept forgetting my place. The fact that riordan or oshiro or whatever 12 year old fan wrote this put the words FLASHBACK & DREAM SEQUENCE over the chapters gave it SERIOUS fanfic vibes. The pacing is simply not suspenseful enough for a place like Tartarus.

• And do NOT get me started on Tartarus. Okay I’ll say it anyway: it wasn’t scary AT ALL. LIKE ANY OTHER QUEST. Actually it seemed easier than other previous quests which is a big nope. Hades might as well have sent him to Target.

• And about the fact that is was HADES who gave him that prophecy is SO OOC of him. He loves Nico. Nico is probably Hades most favorite child ever as of right now and he sends him horrible nightmares, and a prophecy respouted 12 times to get him to save Bob (whom Hades could care less about btw) and go back to a place that he knows haunts Nico every day MAKES NO FUCKING SENSE!

Also HOW did hades give Rachel that prophecy? He has no power over the Oracle of Delphi.

• Maria and Bianca MAKE NO SENSE! How in the hell is there any piece of thier souls left when Hades gave Maria ancient rites and was the one soul Nico was not allowed to see and Bianca reincarnated. WHICH WAS FORGOTTEN BTW. NOW SHES BACK IN ELYSIUM?? Like?? Like maybe I could see Hades letting Nico see a piece of Maria but Bianca is literally GONE forever.

Nico was ooc. Like not too badly but still bad. But the fact that Will didn’t let Nico shadow travel even once irks me. The fact Will didn’t let him summon Jules Albert irks me. The fact that Will kept brushing off nicos feeling about the underworld irks me. The fact that Will called Persephone the most beautiful PERSON he’d ever seen right in nicos face and then asked his (insecure) boyfriend if he was jealous irks me. The fact that Will is BORING AS FUCK irks me

• And the COMING OUT story. Horridly ooc. Nico shouting to the whole camp he’s gay and getting all the other kids to come out too is like??? and apparently he asked out Will before Will had even come out?? Nico would NEVER do that. Especially since not long before Cupid had done the same to him. And apparently Nico is like the first out character in a MODERN GREEK camp with DIONYSUS as a director. No.

In character Nico would’ve shadow traveled back to his cabin or the woods the moment he figured out what was happening.

• the nicknames are extremely cringe. Little ball of darkness is used to much and it made me itch. I think Will simply calling him babe or something would’ve been simpler and made them seem more like a real couple instead of a caricature of light and dark.

• ‘he’d always been the demigod who WOULDNT eat.’ ………..what the actual fuck is this. Nicos always been naturally skinny but being starved in jar is what messed up his hunger. Not that he WOULDNT eat. Why is everything always his fault in this book?

Like, he didn’t ‘LET’ himself get to the point of starvation over and over. I mean first of all he became homeless at ten years old, probably had to steal food items. And most recently he got KIDNAPPED by TWO GIANTS and starved forcibly. And then when he got out he was under so much stress of what just happened to him in Tartarus, the war with Gaea, his forced outing, and having to lug an enormous statue ACROSS THE WORLD. but nah, I guess he just LET all of that stuff happen to him

• the references are BAD. Out of touch bad. Unfunny and the joke never becomes a joke. It’s never explained how a kid from the 1930s knows how to use the internet and look up lil nas x in a camp that doesn’t use any technology. Doesn’t explain how Nico knows about Care Bear powers (I didn’t even know that) and the beginning scene with the Star Wars ‘joke’ set a weird tone for the book and wasn’t even funny.

• I hated the cocoa puff demons coming to live with Nico. Like I was fine they got created ig even tho it was weird and kinda dumb but the fact that Nico is so keen to have his worst memories and insecurities sleep in bed with him makes no sense once again. In character Nico would’ve burned them with hellfire.

• Also Nyx is a unfathomably weak villain. A PRIMORDIAL GODDESS that even ZEUS fears is taken down in two seconds. Also she’s just trying to get Nico ‘accept his darkness’. WHICH HE ALREADY HAS DONE. The moment he called himself The Ghost King in battle of the labyrinth at eleven years is when he truly accepted his powers and who he was. So… why is she even in the book in the first place??

• Also Will STILL insists it’s Nicos fault he wasn’t accepted. And that it was all in his head….

Also Micheal Yew was simply never mentioned again. Neither was lee fletcher. If they were I missed it.

There were a COUPLE of cute parts and lines but really this is simply too weird (and bad) to be canon to me. This book is just not canon. I see it as fanfiction from a random author that riordan probably let write the entire book or at least most of it. I think sadly riordan put his name on this for money and for fanservice because the writing is first draft material.

(And it kind of feels like they got this version of Nico and Will from cringy meme posts about them. Like, you know the ones where Nico’s all like ‘I am darkness, i am a vampire’ and Wills all like ‘come on, my uwu baby, no more shadowtravel for you, doctors orders~’ 🤣😭)

just because they thought that’s what the twelve year olds wanted and not realizing that a lot of those posts are simply made as a joke and not actually taken seriously in canon…. And that most people in the fandom thinks those are bad cringeposts

#tsats #nico di angelo #the sun and the star #tsats review #solangelo #rick riordan #book review #book rant #tsats rant #tsats preview #tsats spoilers #so bad #im cryin #nico rants #hazel levesque #jason grace #reyna ramirez arellano #bad writing #no plot whatsoever #publishedfanfiction #ooc #bad tropes #notreallyfuntoread #not cannon compliant #not canon #everybodyooc #pjo #percy jackson #pjo fandom #pjo hoo toa

[sn4pe]

absolute WORST severus snape takes you've seen?

gonna organize these from Batshit Horrible to Mildly Irksome

- “James Potter wrote the notes in the HBP potions textbook and Snape stole it”. saw it in a youtube comment and. what

- “Snape is an incel” does he blame all women for his problems? does he hold misogynistic views? does he do misogynistic things? no. just because he had weird history with a woman doesn’t make him a fucking incel bye ppl r so weird for this take.

- Louis Garrel as a faceclaim. who coined this, i just wanna talk. don’t mind the gun in my hand. i just wanna talk i just wanna talk. no cuz this shit has done IRREPARABLE damage to my pinterest i can’t find good snape fcs without being bombarded with louis garrel images (i’m being so dramatic but i HATE HIM) HE DOES NOT LOOK LIKE SEVERUS SNAPE AT ALL

- That he and the marauders’ thing was a “rivalry”. A 4 against 1 is not a rivalry. Just admit your faves are bullies it is 1000% okay to like antagonists.

- that he “deserved” what happened in the SWM chapter. idc what awful shit he believed at the time, he was FIFTEEN. he was a CHILD and anyone who doesn’t understand that is likely a child themselves

- that he’s “greasy because of the potions fumes” no bc then everyone would be greasy after potions class and it would be mentioned. severus was a severely neglected child. he never got into the habit of properly bathing himself and that carried on into adulthood.

- when people snatch his entire character and personality and everything and push it onto regulus, then claim to hate snape but loveee regulus black. like bro you just gave him snape’s entire arc word for word but now suddenly bc it’s regulus it’s a good redemption arc? bffr

- every single time he’s ever been mentioned in that rlly popular fanfiction All The Young Dudes. actually every single take in All The Young Dudes is bad. and this isn’t snape specific or anything but i heard that some professor at a university made his students read ATYD for a project. and i’m. flabbergasted bc it’s the biggest piece of horseshit. like snape stuff aside its not a well written fanfiction. it just has all the shiny bells and whistles that the marauders fandom likes.

- relating to that point, the draco malfoyification of severus snape in marauders fanfics in order to make him the antagonist. like i get you want an antagonist but. ugh just irksome it’s not true to his character

- JKR’s drawing of snape w a beard. like who the hell is that

- when ppl hc him to have abs. why?? because he lifted a few cauldrons? bffr

I could probably think of a billion more since this fandom is a nightmare but. yes there u go <3 ily ty for asking i genuinely love answering these

#i love to yap #if you disagree with any of these ur wrong btw #severus snape #snape #harry potter #pro snape #the marauders #ATYD #SWM #hot takes #not hot more like lukewarm

[skipppppy]

CARMEN SANDIEGO CHARACTERS + MOVIES

Boo I felt like making headcanons again bc I spend more time wondering what these assholes do in their free time than I do on my job

CARMEN

Didn’t have access to movies growing up so Player, Zack, and Ivy have been catching her up on the most popular ones

HORRIBLE to watch with. Doesn’t really understand “suspension of disbelief” as a concept and will ask stupid questions the whole time. Player almost ended their friendship because she nitpicked Lord of the Rings for being “unrealistic”

Enjoys low stakes 2000s girl chick flicks like mean girls and legally blonde. She has enough stress in her life man she just wants to relax

HATES heist movies because of how innacurate they are. Team Red has taken to watching them JUST to hear her pick them apart

PLAYER

Sci-fi/fantasy junkie. Anything and everything that has aliens/magic and shitty practical effects from the 80’s/90’s he is all over

Has never said a single kind thing about the Star Wars franchise in his life. They are his favourite movies of all time

ADORES Edgar Wright and has slowly been converting Team Red to his movies. Zack loved Baby Driver. Ivy loved Shaun of the Dead. Shadowsan loved Hot Fuzz. He considers Scott Pilgrim the pinnacle of Canadian cinema

Cannot STAND the amount of remakes happening in Hollywood recently

ZACK

Canon enjoyer of blockbuster action movies. Everyone dreads the nights when he gets to choose a film bc his taste is so generic

Does not know what the Snyder cut is. Thank god

His only redeeming quality is a love of early dreamworks. Will not stop quoting Madnagascar

Has seen every Marvel movie and thinks all of them are good. Player has BEGGED him to watch better movies but he won’t. He’s the type to rag on Scorsese for being “boring”

Has seen Kevin Feige’s extended filmography. Does not know who that man is

IVY

Horror fanatic

Banned from choosing movies for film night after convincing them to watch her “favourite lesbian romcom” with her. That lesbian romcom was Saw

Ellen Ripley was not only her personal hero but also her gay awakening. The Xenomorph queen was her second gay awakening

Also loves period dramas. Enjoys the tiddies and knows she would look SO good in those fancy waistcoats the men wear

Watches old slashers with Carmen and laugh whenever someone dies in a stupid way

SHADOWSAN

Faculty considered movies “low brow” entertainment so he hasn’t seen a movie made before the year 2000

Loves a good mob flick. Got into Scorsese specifically because Zack hated him. Goodfellas is his favourite

Everyone assumes he enjoys samurai movies but he actually HATES them. Hideo would ramble about historical inaccuracies the whole way through and he’s still bored just thinking about it

Used to love Yakuza films back in the day but they were soured for him after actually living as one

Loved Knives Out, found Daniel Craig VERY attractive, and has since fallen down the James Bond rabbit hole

CHASE

The most pretentious film hack you’ve ever met in your life. He is taking you to a back alley screening of some arthouse eastern european gay porn on a first date and it will be the most profound thing you’ve ever seen in your life

Detective noir movies and cheesy black and white romances are his favourites. He likes falling asleep to them

He and Player both appreciate animation as a form of cinema, but while Player is referring to like. the Mario movie, Chase is talking about some 3 minute Russian stopmotion surrealist piece from 1951. He attends Annecy every year and has been banned from the Oscars due to threats of violence

He likes Poirot tho. Transmasc king

JULIA

If she has a few hours to herself she’d rather watch a documentary than go to a movie theatre, but she loves historical dramas

Enjoys biopics but thinks it’s stupid to make them for people who are alive

Likes watching movies for the sake of trash talking them, so she is the only person who can tolerate sitting through one with Carmen

LOVES Wes Anderson though. Chase got her into his stuff and the symmetry scratches an itch in her brain. But don’t tell him that

Also enjoys period dramas for the tiddies

CHIEF

Shitty cop movie enjoyer. The kind of person who insists that Die Hard is her favourite christmas movie

LOVES heist movies because of how inaccurate they are. Will mentally nitpick whatever secret service is going after them and be like “ACME wouldn’t do that lol”

She’s semi aware that she’s the antoagonist in Carmen’s own heist narrative so she’s started having fun with it

Closet lover of b-tier comedy movies. Like the ones with Adam Sandler and Kevin Hart on the cover

Does not enjoy watching movies socially. That is quality time for her and her cat. She does not have to shush Commander

#carmen sandiego #carmen sandiego 2019 #carmen sandiego netflix #player cs #zack and ivy #shadowsan #chase devineaux #julia argent #tamara fraser #chief cs

[useless-donut]

so i was messing around with astarion and the description for his camp clothes includes a POEM HE EMBROIDERED ON IT he is so cute such a cute little gay

anyway as someone bent on cataloging everything he approves of, i have a decent grasp of what he likes and dislikes (at least in act 1, im almost to act 2) and it can SEEM contradictory but my thoughts and also spoilers below

sometimes hes just being a brat, like when he likes when you care for the owlbear cub, but also likes when you poke a dying bird to death (my theory here is less that he loves animals/hates them and more that he enjoys the chaos of an owlbear pet)

so generally speaking, he's pretty forgiving of a good (ish) path for a generally evil character, though if i had to pick an alignment, i'd say he's something like chaotic selfish

then there's the whole disliking any sympathy/aid for the deep gnomes/prisoners in general which had me thinking because we all know the cazador situation but here are my unorganized thoughts

astarion was jumped by a group of Gur & essentially killed

his "savior" was a vampire who enslaved and tortured him for 200 years

so it stands to reason that

he has a significant distrust & dislike of "saviors" in general, both because no one saved him and moreso because when someone DID it was horrible

he also dislikes heroics not so much because he's evil, but because they are a) boring and b) heroes are people like the Blade of the Frontiers/Wyll, the monster hunter, all of these are people who typically want to kill him for what he is

OF COURSE he disapproves whenever you act heroic/saviory, it's showing you're the type of person he categorically mistrusts

and also re: the gnome issue, i think he's also just really really BITTER. he doesn't want other people saved because fuck saviors and heroes, right? let everyone rot because everyone let him rot

(this is all just my fun little conjecture/headcanons based on what we know in act 1, i am ready to stand corrected)

anyway, we know he does have a soft side and even though he is very leery of deep bonds (jokingly says "i love you," gets weird and suspicious whenever you're altruistic to him), he does appreciate kindness. and i really think he's getting fond of the party despite himself

i'm hoping we will get a cazador betrayal arc bc itll be so dramatic and heartbreaking itll be so funnnn

but yeah imo he is a bitter, traumatized person who is self-interested by matter of necessity and very reasonably wants vengeance. BUT he is also someone who deeply appreciates being alive, and enjoying things like sunlight and poetry and even your company. and he deeply mourns everything he's lost along the way 🥺 AND DESPITE IT ALL HE IS SO SILLY AND "GIRLS JUST WANNA HAVE FUN" ENERGY HOW CAN PPL NOT LIKE HIM

anyway ill be burning down all of faerun if he needs me to

#astarion #baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #i think about him 24/7 in a healthy normal way

[circus-complex]

shen jiu + shen yuan swap au idea

ok so an AU when shen yuan is the original owner of shen jiu's body, and shen jiu is the og owner of shen yuan's body.

shen yuan went through everything shen jiu did, but instead of taking on a "I went through something horrible, and since you are similar to me i'll make you feel the same" view for luo binghe, he takes on a "I went through something horrible, and since you are similar i'll make sure you never feel this way"

this makes luo binghe develop a crush on him a bit earlier, and luo binghe is generally more stable. sqq is known for being kind, forgiving, and generous. he treats all his disciples well, and equally. he has a good relationship with most, if not all, the peak lords.

shen jiu reads PIDW, but unlike sy who fawned over lbh, he hates him. hates him with every fiber of his being. he isn't even sure why, lbh just pisses him off in every way. most of the characters do, actually. only nyy is good! lbh should of ended up with her, or shl, or any of the girls! he would of loved it if lbh built a harem up! but no. he ended up with his stupid teacher. and yqy - he likes him.

i have two ways to take this idea

Option A: so when sj transmigrates, everyone is confused, but in a new way. his complements, which used to be kind, now have a slight edge to them. he treats lbh with such hatred, he develops a grudge with lqg, he favors mf and nyy (mostly nyy). and once he unfreezes the OOC feature OH BOY! in the og book sqq would protect lbh when the ridge opens, but lbh falls anyway, and sqq mourns him for five years. this time however, sj pushes lbh in himself.

naturally, lbh has no clue whats going on. at first, he thought sqq just was in a bad mood bc of his fever, but then it started to seem personal. sqq would beat him, verbally and physically. what happened? so lbh goes down this other path, one where he blames himself for everything and works his ass of to please sj, possibly dying in the process. if he doesn't, he's just miserable and has unintentionally become sj's unstable minion, doing everything he can to please him but always failing. in the end, lbh kills himself and sj after he's driven to a qi deviation

Option B: same thing as option a, only sj plays the role of sqq MUCH better. he is kind, but is secretly planning to take lbh down. he follows the course of the book, winning lbh's favour, unfreezes the OOC function, and slowly becomes a little meaner. but he molds lbh to be his. in a cruel, twisted, jealous, slightly romantic way. he molds him to follow his every order. molds him to the perfect for his plans. molds him to hate his sect, but love sj. helps him uncover his demonic heritage under the mask of wanting his disciple to be true to himself and discover his full potential!, but secretly wanting to use it to his advantage. and he does.

he succeeds, taking down most of cang qiong, leaving only him, lbh, nyy, yqy, and sqh. he left nyy and yqy because he adored them in his past life, and sqh because he wants to torture him for all eternity for making that book (sucks tho bc sqh has mbj on his side so he can't do anything till he gets lbh to take mbj down). so yea. sj is just pulling lbh's strings behind the scenes, even going so far as too get married and do everything with him if it gains him another advantage. he's extremely emotionally manipulative, and he's smart enough to be subtle about it so no one will notice. and it kinda just ends with lbh being his puppet. lbh may be the head of the world, but sj is the neck turning his different ways. and so yea super toxic yaoi

#svsss #luo binghe #shen qingqiu #airplane shooting towards the sky #scumbag self saving system #mxtx svsss #svsss au #shen yuan #shen jiu #yue qingyuan #liu qingge #scumbag system #sqh #lbh #mobei jun #sj #sqq

[the-cookie-of-doom]

Hiii

I remember when you were posting about your Kim/Wik Twins AU and I was so hooked! There’s so much potential for angst in this AU😩🤌 I always wondered if there was anything new going on with this WIP.

PS: I’ve been following your blog for a little while (I don’t interact bc im shyy) and I love all your Kimchay WIPS and little excerpts you’ve blessed us with (they make my day everytime I see one). So I want to personally thank your brain for all these wonderful ideas and just thank you for being you 😊

send me an ask and I'll tell you about one of these WIPs!

Oh anon, you're a darling! This was so nice to wake up to <3 I actually haven't worked much on that AU since originally posting it, but you're right, there is so much angst potential in this AU between Wik and Kim. One of the inspirations from it actually came from World of Warcraft, and how the character Varian was split into two people, the other one being Lo'Gosh. I really loved how it wasn't just "this is the good side vs. the bad/feral side." Varian was polite and charming and good at socializing, but he was also vain and easy to manipulate (which was the point of splitting him), whereas Lo'Gosh was definitely a barbarian, but he was also all of Varian's strong will and ambition/motivation, and passion. I hadn't seen that kind of character splitting before, because it's usually an easy shorthand for doing a good/evil thing.

So for the purposes of this fic, Kim isn't just all the evil mafia while Wik is the sweetheart singer. Wik is very driven and tbh a little selfish, he's kind to his fans but ultimately very cold, because he grew up in a world where anything he cared about could be used against him. Both of them are still calculating in clever, but it's Wik that begins investigating Chay, intentionally using his stardom as an in, and purposefully manipulating him to get more information. He takes it to a stronger degree than we actually see from Kim in the show.

Whereas Kim is the quieter, more contained side. They both love music but Kim prefers guitar/piano over singing because he doesn't want to draw attention to himself the way Wik does, although he does write a lot of poetry/lyrics. One of the betrayals from Wik leaving is that he stole Kim's songs. The other is that he left Kim behind. He loves his brother more than anything, and Wik leaving him without so much as a goodbye was devastating for him.

Here's your slightly less than 500 words!

“You left me!” “Would you have even come with me?” Kim’s voice breaks on a desperate, “Yes!” He wants to take it back as soon as the word leaves his mouth, too honest in the heat of his moment, chest heaving with the weight of it. The only good thing about the admission is that his brother is too stunned to reply; Kim takes satisfaction in that, in the implication of it, as Wik realizes the depth of his own selfishness.  “Kim…” “I would…” Kim swallows. Days of captivity have left his throat dry. It hurts, speaking these words aloud, tearing them out of his chest to release them after all these years. “I would have. If you asked me to, I would have.”  He would have followed his brother anywhere. They were always meant to be together. Kim and Wik, two halves of the same whole, mirror images down to their names. Until Wik decided he couldn’t bear his own reflection anymore.  “Kim, I’m sorry, I didn’t know—” “How could you? You only ever think about yourself.” Kim laughs. It’s wet. It hurts, like everything else about this damned conversation. Maybe Wik was right; they were better off alone. “I thought you knew me better than anyone, but you don’t know me at all.” Maybe Wik never did. What a horrible time to realize how truly alone he really is.  Wik doesn’t speak for a long time. Neither does Kim, keeping his head bowed and his breaths measured, cracked ribs aching with every rise and fall of his chest. What a cruel joke that the first time they’re sharing a space in years, something Kim has longed for since the day Wik left, and it’s only because someone else has forced them together.  “I don’t think you would ever leave the family,” Wik eventually says, his voice quieter than Kim has ever heard it. “You’re not like me, Kim, you never wanted to leave.” Of course he didn’t. Why would Kim ever want to leave his brothers? But at least if he had, Kinn and Tankhun would have had each other. They wouldn’t have been alone, not like Wik is now. Not like Kim is, forever missing his other half. Neither of them were meant to be alone. "It doesn't matter anymore." "Yes it does. Kim. I never meant to hurt you. I—" But there's no more time to talk because their captors are walking in, and Wik is throwing himself in front of Kim, both of them bound and unable to put of any kind of fight. Not that it would have mattered; Wik already got himself kidnapped. Too nosy to stay out of the family completely, but apparently the idealistic fool didn't bother to keep up with his martial arts. Still. Despite blaming him for the current predicament, Kim is a little bit touched that Wik is trying to protect him now. Too late to matter, maybe, but it's something.

#cookie writes #kimchay #honestly this wasn't going to be an ot3 kind of fic #KimChay was going to happen and leave Wik out of it #but Kim has SO many issues towards Wik #i think they should fuck about it

[pansy-picnics]

Sorry but your recent artwork has me thinking about parent Varigo and I have to dump my thoughts somewhere. I feel like, if they actually had a kid it would be really emotional for them but in different ways. Varian finds out he’s pregnant and is a little scared at first, but he actually adjusts to the idea pretty fast and is excited about it, because he’s in a good place now and has a good support system. He doesn’t have to worry about his family judging him, he knows they’ll still see him for who he is. Hugo on the other hand is terrified. But not because he doesn’t wanna be a dad, he’s pretty excited about that, he’s just really scared that Varian is going to get sick from the pregnancy, or that the whole experience is gonna be too much for him. He feels like this is just another thing he’s “putting Varian through” because he’s still not quite over the guilt of his betrayal years ago, and now it’s coming back to haunt him. They work it out of course and Hugo realizes that it’s gonna be okay and that he also can depend on Varian’s family for support because they’re his family too. Now I’m emotional. Anyway I love your art <3

AUGHHHH YEAH YEAH THIS IS SO REAL!!!!! i love plots like that fr, their characters are so fun to explore😭😭😭 Honestly? i think in the right circumstances hugo could be a deadbeat dad. like he could just straight up leave bc he’s paranoid varian or the kid would get hurt or he’d put them in danger or something. he’s the kind of guy who’s always Running! like i could think of scenarios where he’d run away on their wedding day too. those are both horrible extremes SORRY FOR THE ANGST I JUST THINK IT’S NEAT.

i think hugo’s always WANTED a family but its something she’s always viewed as unachievable, mostly bc of the shitty living situation hes been in for most of his life. she could barely survive on her own and she’d never want to drag someone else into that yk? and she’s still scared of that commitment even after she moves into the castle, bc what if she DID have a kid and then something happened and she couldn’t take care of them anymore, or she ends up on the streets again….and what if she just ends up abandoning them? what if she’s no better than the parents she never even knew? it’s like, obviously she wouldn’t do any of those things or be in those situations but she has….a Lot of anxiety around it for sure. but i also think that she tries to adopt literally every orphan she and varian see. she LOVES kids as much as she pretends she doesn’t and its very obvious….she just hasn’t really had the privilege to be able to think about it until now.

varian…i think he goes either way, he doesn’t really plan to have kids but he’ll kinda learn to adjust to whatever, he’s also just a very family oriented guy so he’s definitely not opposed to that kind of role. in my head they usually adopt bc i think varian like, Hates anything related to the human body at all so even disregarding the gender dysphoria pregnancy is SO gross to him. idk why i just think he’s silly like that. hell make bombs and poisonous chemicals but he remembers people have organs and he wants to throw up. i’m not opposed to the idea of them having biological kids at all though…especially considering all the art i’ve already drawn for it’s us against the world LOL. personally i think even if he weren’t opposed to the idea he’d be miserable the entire time, and not even like in a serious way necessarily he’s just REALLY mad that he can’t work in the lab anymore. he’s pissed about EVERYTHING, actually. he’s bored and he’s tired and he can’t work and he feels like shit and he doesn’t really have any other hobbies either. his whole life and routine has been completely fucked over for nine months and SURE he loves the kid and he’s excited but like why does it need to be in there that long. why can’t it just come from the stork or something. 🙄/j

i think he might pick a few fights with hugo bc of it, just because he’s so overwhelmed and emotional and doesn’t know how to handle it, but hugo’s really understanding; also they’ll honestly take any kind of treatment from him because they’re like, “Yeah i probably deserved that”. which varian does NOT like btw and always gets on his ass later to stick up for himself more while also in tears apologizing for yelling at him

idk i just think them as parents would be Sooo silly. neither of them have any clue what they’re doing. dude if those two had a baby? Dude can you imagine? varian’s sooo fucking sheltered i think he’s only interacted with like, 2 babies in his entire life. quirin stays with them for tje first few weeks bc varian literally just has NO clue what he’s doing and is crying to him all the time. and hugo like, has an idea of what to do but he’s also SUPER paranoid. they’re both just staring at the kid while they sleep not so much out of adoration but because they’re just terrified they’ll stop breathing at any moment. you cant convince me that either of them know how to change a diaper. They’re gonna bring out like full lab gear. like the gag where the dads will pull out full hazmat suits for the diaper change. That’s them idc

ruddiger is also SO protective of their kids from the moment they’re born, like he jumps up into the crib and snuggles up with them and they always IMMEDIATELY stop crying. olivia is the opposite. she’s kinda like a toddler who just got a new sibling she didn’t want. shes pissed that she isn’t getting hugo’s full attention and keeps being a brat about it. hugo’s just trying to calm down his baby and olivias glaring at him while she’s about to push a glass off the table

yeah idk i. have a lot of thoughts abt them too they’re so beloved to me

#tangled the series #rapunzels tangled adventure #vat7k #varian and the seven kingdoms #varian and the 7 kingdoms #varigo #tts headcanons #varian #vat7k hugo #pansy rambling again #ask #tangled ask #hugo rottewange

[juneviews]

another thing I loved about not me (yes I'm still unpacking my feelings about not me in 2024 that's how dense the show is) is that it's one of the rare thai shows that allowed its characters to be angry, especially sean. usually thai dramas always have their characters "be the bigger person", even when they're constantly unfairly mistreated they just take it & keep being nice. but sean is ANGRY. all the time. it makes him vindictive, violent and aggressive. and he's allowed to have this very human feeling due to his generally very horrible life and hold onto it until he decides to heal & let go of it. I swear it's so rare to see a thai character be truly angry, for good reasons or not, and 1) still have him be a hero of the story & 2) allowing him to manifest this anger on screen in the very real disproportionate ways that true anger causes on people in real life. I think thai dramas are excellent at depicting different emotions, from the most basic to the most complex, however anger is one that was left on the side, perhaps bc it's not in line with buddhist beliefs and the notion of karma. however, sean's anger is one of my favorite things about him. it's what makes him the most real character I've seen in my opinion, bc he does have this uglier emotion and shows it, just like I've been angry & nasty, and just like everybody else has. in conclusion, not me keeps being the best show ever created & I would die for sean bawongittacha 🫶

#axelle rants #not me #not me the series #off jumpol #and off's depiction of anger... OOF. SO GOOD BRUH. #I swear it'll be 2045 & I'll still be pondering on new not me things I love about this show 😆😆😆

[bearhugsandshrugs]

Oh if you don’t mind, I would love to hear your thoughts on Raphael’s and Gortash’s gray areas! 😊🫶

This is going to be a whole ass character study and sorry I wrote days on this bc I didn't have time

Raphael

He’s a lawful neutral devil tied to the laws of the Nine Hells. Souls are a currency there. Contracts are how things run. Without either, the Hells would likely dissolve into chaos. He's also the son of Mephistopheles, second only to Asmodeus, ruler of all Hells. That's already an interesting context.

He says several times that mortals choose despicable and tyrannical acts when given free choice. He says that disapprovingly – and positions himself as the fairer, more just option. So this is already interesting: He isn't evil for cruelty or evil's sake. He's evil within the construct of his realm, upbringing, and very being (he *is* a devil/cambion after all), but authentically and ambitiously wants to use that for "good" (or at least: for better than tyranny, or horrible things mortals would do).

But then he bought a child, tortured his obsession, and does all kind of fucked up shit. Does he do that because he enjoys them? I think for Raphael, it's necessary and "correct". He probably doesn't fathom the concept of altruism or compassion; instead everything is a transaction to him, opportunistic, and cynical almost. Still, there's something that motivates him to do *better*, which I find interesting. It's also possible he's full of shit, but I think it makes him more interesting and complex if he's actually honest with the player, so I choose to believe that.

Gortash

He grew up poor, hungry, and without a future. His parents were so shitty they sold him to the Hells. There he was beaten, abused, and who tf knows what he saw there. He's similarly ambitious to Raphael in the sense that he wants to rule it all. Rule it all for Bane – only Gortash's tyranny is more structural, systematical, focused on oppressing opposition, rather than torturing individuals. Gortash probably doesn't know (care?) who's dying for his rule. It simply does not matter to him. Why? Because he thinks that everyone holds their own fate in their hands.

I will cut him some slack for his childhood trauma to a certain degree. Also being a follower of Bane? Cult. Brainwashed. Delulu. Sorry Enver but you're wrong. You're brilliant but so stupid. Wtf.

He doesn't seem to find joy in the tyranny, however. Rather, his end goal is control – which he lacked his entire childhood. But then again he sold Karlach. When pressed, he says she had the opportunity to turn that situation into something good – I wrote about it here. I think he's firmly in the camp that every individual has the power to turn their life into what they want. It worked for him – but he doesn't understand that it's not how the world works. He's completely blinded by his own upbringing and experience and falls into confirmation bias.

----

Raphael's core belief is that mortals cannot be trusted to make their own decisions, as their tyranny makes them weak.

Gortash's core belief is that mortals must make their own decisions and have the power to change their own fate.

So, do I think either of them is "evil"? No. Do I think they are complex characters who do evil things? Oh absolutely.

But that also means they could be redeemed. Potentially. 👀

#enver gortash #bg3 raphael #my writing #bg3 spoilers

[bunnywan]

i get that when it comes to writing fiction you as the author have complete control of the story you want to write and don’t have to take canon into account at all but considering who anakin is on top of you not even really giving a shit about anakin why write obikin at all (you’re obviously not the only obikin writer and i’m sorry for only asking you but i would really like to understand the appeal of writing about such a horrible character especially because you couldn’t care less about him anyway) you don’t owe me an explanation so feel free to ignore if you want

genuinely cannot decipher the tone of this ask and it’s sending me.

anyway: my relationship is anakin is Extremely Complicated. as a character in a story, i do give a shit about him. i fell in love with star wars and specifically the prequels and even more specifically obi-wan — and that’s all anakins story. as a character he’s brilliant and awful and terrifying and tragic and so fucking doomed it makes me insane. i LOVE anakins story.

however, anakin just … as a guy or whatever. does not matter to me in the way he does for a lot of other people. he’s not baby girl. he’s not a meow meow. i don’t find him particularly endearing or attractive. he’s exhausting. and, when you add in my love for obi-wan (which i won’t even try to explain cus that’s too much), anakin becomes an asshole. it’s like having a friend with a boyfriend who treats them like shit. JUST DUMP HIS ASS !

and you’re right, anakin is horrible. he’s a murderer and a facist and a creep and he’s fucking EVIL. but here’s the thing: i love obi-wan, and obi-wan loves anakin. and through obi-wan, i can love anakin. through obi-wan, anakin becomes endearing and beautiful and worth all the trouble.

their dynamic is so fascinating to me bc obi-wan is so good. he’s literally described as “the bedrock that all goodness rests upon” or something like that. and yet, he loves and misses and longs for that horrible murderer facist evil creep. so yeah, that’s it <3

#anon asks

[floralcavern]

Lemme talk about Darkstalker because the fandom seriously misinterprets his character arc and it bugs me

The fandom is all like “Darkstalker is just an asshole. He’s not some tragic villain.” But.. he is????

Like, I’m not defending his actions. Man was a TERRIBLE person, but people, let’s talk about how he was before Queen Diamond.

Darkstalker was a good kid. He defended his sister and was patient with Clearsight and gave her time to come and meet him when she was ready and he only used his magic occasionally and never for truly selfish reasons (a lot of his early spells were for Whiteout!). He always rushed to his sister’s side when he saw his parents fighting.

Darkstalker LOVED his family (not Arctic tho bc he was an abusive dad). He LOVED Clearsight. He LOVED Fathom. “But when he was born, he was selfish and kept his powers to himself!”

BESTIES. HE WAS LITERALLY A MINUTE OLD. And he said later on that he regretted not helping Whiteout, but he still loves her for the way she is, all the weird quirks as well.

His relationship with Clearsight was healthy. He made the scroll to ease her mind. He often tried to help her unwind from work. They joked, they played, and she always teased him and he took it with a big smile.

The first ever sign of Darkstalker’s descent was when Indigo attacked him. He had NEVER been in a vulnerable situation like that. And Darkstalker was just a kid. That scared the shit out of him, but his ego is too big for him to truly admit that. So he makes his scales invulnerable so he never has to feel that fear again. Remember. He was a fucking kid. And him wanting to be king at the beginning wasn’t originally formed out of just lust for power. It was him genuinely wanting to his his powers for good. It was only later down the line when it developed into a want for power. But him being attacked by Indigo probably caused that desire for power, that need for CONTROL. Because when she attacked him, he wasn’t in control, which caused him to make his scales invulnerable.

The thing that really pushed him over the edge, though, was when Diamond took his mom. His whole world shattered. He had no reason to keep tolerating Arctic, but he still had to keep him around because Clearsight told him not to hurt Arctic. So he’s still forced to stay with his abusive dad, despite that fact that he was part of the reason that Foeslayer left. He HATED the Icewings. And I’m his situation, who can blame him??? His dad is abusive, the Icewings are killing the Nightwings because they’re bitter, and now Diamond took his mom. This is THE stepping stone for a villain origin story. And, again, he still did love Clearsight. But over time, it got more twisted. No longer having his mother for a good role model and now he’s too bitter toward the Icewings, he started to become his dad. A cold, angry guy who feels his violence is justified. The spell on Clearsight’s earring was horrible. One of the worst things he did. He manipulated her own powers because he found them to be ‘annoying’. Which is a TOTAL flip from how he used to think of her powers. He thought her abilities were fascinating and wonderful and he loved seeing how her mind worked. He LOVED the way her powers worked. But now he’s hellbent on avenging his mother, and Clearsight is trying to stop him. I think in a way, this shows he prioritizes not only his own vengeance, but also his mother over Clearsight. Remember, the whole entire start of Darkstalker’s path toward villainy was losing his mother. His path wasn’t started out of pettiness or just him being an asshole. It was having one of the people he cared about most being ripped away from him. But losing one person caused him to push everyone else he loved away. Him losing his mom caused him to lose EVERYONE and turned him into his dad.

Now, one thing that does bother me, and shows that Darkstalker does have a bit of an ego, is his lack of sympathy toward Fathom. This is something the fandom doesn’t talk about much. He thinks Fathom’s trauma is just Fathom overreacting and being dramatic. This is.. rather fucked up and I really cannot defend Darkstalker for this, especially since this was before his descent into madness/villainy.

But let’s talk about his relationship with Whiteout. He’s been treating his best friend and girlfriend rather terribly as he was going down his path of vengeance. But with Whiteout, he was still just as veraciously protective of her as he was before. Whiteout was the only person in the whole world he thought was wholly good. He knew that even Clearsight had flaws, he never truly believed her to be perfect, even before he started to get bitter. But with Whiteout, he truly believed she was one of the only truly good dragons EVER. So seeing his dad control her is what truly broke a piece of him and caused him to truly go off the rails. Seeing that someone can just take advantage of his sister like that caused him to lose all faith in his dad and the Icewings and in the end, losing faith and any sense of sympathy for them is what caused him to do all the shit he did. All of this, all of his anger and evilness stems from the Icewings fucking with this family and with the Nightwings.

The Icewings started his descent into villainy, but Darkstalker was the one who let them get to his head.

#Darkstalker #WoF #wings of Fire #Clearsight #Clearsight WoF #Whiteout WoF #Queen Diamond #Arctic WoF #Foeslayer #Foeslayer WoF #fathom WoF #Character analyses #character analysis

[samarecharm]

i love makoto so much but fanon does her so much better (the good parts of the fandom) because in the game her character is so lack luster. they butchered her confidant it is so borning and not even about her. they made her a cop. A COP. they pushed this "canon waifu" role onto her (before sumire came along and did it Even Worse). and it SUCKS because SHE IS SO MUCH MORE!!! SHE IS SO MUCH BETTER!!!! SHE COULD'VE BEEN SO MUCH BETTER!!! the way i feel about canon makoto is the same way i feel about the canon ryuji events post komoshida where he's horribly mistreated and used purely as comic relief: i ignore them <3 my game now <3 never happened <3 my ocs <3

You are so right. I generally apply this to all characters in p5 bc the game does such a shit job of staying consistent with character arcs and personalities. Theres a desperate need to throw in perverse jokes at the expense of female characters and a need to show that the police (as a whole) are reliable people who are not influenced by things like money and power; only the BAD cops do that. Not to mention this obvious fatphobia and homophobia but i feel likes thats a given.

But back to Makoto. Shes a victim of bad writing just like everyone else. Ryuji during the kamoshida arc was fighting with self loathing and genuine anxiety, and aside from the like. One comment on Panthers outfit in the metaverse, hes more than well behaved. All of that is shelved as soon as Kamoshida is gone and replaced with him being weird comic relief (and the focus of alot of sexual jokes that were nonexistent in the beginning of the game). Anns arc about self love and empowerment is completely dropped as soon as the nasty bad guy is put away (so that its good to be weird about her w the Good Guys). Makoto loses her a chunk of her personality to be the mature waifu which is INSANE to me bc shes like. Not okay or normal at all 😭😭😭 she THINKS shes responsible and so does everyone else on her team, but its an act! She doesnt know shit! And she doesnt know that she doesnt know shit bc shes respectful and adults dont care about anything as long as u respect them!

Its very telling that for literally every single thief (and goro), you can see the exact moment the writers gave up on adding anything of worth to their characters outside of the social links. Its like they didnt know what to even do w the characters at their disposal after their main arcs were complete. No mention of friends hanging out without you, no mention of having group hangouts. Everyone is treated as a core, important member of the friend group DURING their arc, but outside of it, they are acquaintances at best. Theres nothing in the game that convinces you that these guys are legitimately friends who care for each other and do Friend Things. And i describe it like that bc there IS a game that treats them all as friends, and its strikers! Strikers/Scramble genuinely feels like the game p5 wanted to be; a road trip w your team where they stay up at night talking to each other and hanging out and doing things together that dont necessarily include you, the player. Its refreshing and lovely but it sucks that u get that kind of attention to detail in a ‘spinoff’ title

#chattin #i hesitate to use spinoff bc its a pretty big game #and theres an amazing plot with wonderful characterization #and their handling of jails and jail owners is LEAGUES better than the bs they tried to make up w palace users #and all the thieves feel like family. and not in the annoying fandom way; like #were family in the same way a family is forged and tended to. i love you. no one is left behind. no one is made to feel inferior another #its really good and honestly if u want more interactions between everyone i really recommend a playthrough #but yeah #p5 sucks #i love it but i love the version of it i made in my head LMAO #maybe p5r did a better job w the dialogue and some questionable scenes #(i wouldnt know. i didnt play it lol) #so maybe thats what people need to be using as a point of reference #but i only plyed p5 so this is what i have; a group of people who show up for meetings and then go about their life #and that kinda sucks. why make this wholly unique experience in which these teens can only relate to each other #make them bonded over their shared experience w this unbelievable world #and then not only make them NOT interact; but have the end be ‘okay by akira.’ and leave it at that #they just. didnt know what to do w anyone #they needed their girls to be waifubait and the boys to be an afterthought #they needed a buffet of older woman for pathetic men to fuck through their self insert #and they needed a story convoluted enough to keep people stuck trying to figure it out themselves #its bad. its so bad. its so fucking bad. but i have to be here. WE have to be here. #bc who else is going to take these characters out of hell and treat them right ??!!!

[bestworstcase]

Hello and good day. I hope that this isn't too much to ask, but what are your thoughts about Adam? It has always been my belief that Adam and Yang are mirrors to each other. Well, Adam has a lot of things to connect with Team RWBY, moreso with Yang, I think. Just wanted to hear your thoughts about Adam, I guess. Thank you.

i rattle him around in my brain from time to time. a lunar eclipse. he and yang are absolutely character foils; power vs strength, cruelty vs compassion, spite vs love, revenge vs justice. he refuses to control his temper, yang is defined by her meticulous control over her anger. moonslice and burn are almost the exact same semblance, even. a dark mirror.

he’s also doing… something… thematically salient to summer rose. which is what i’m picking over in that linked post. i’m not sure what it is yet but the setup is pretty evident.

tbh i think the narrative is far more sympathetic to him than most of the fandom cares to admit. the triumph and vindication burns bright when adam realizes he’s lost in V5 and runs away—that’s the moment where the narrative framing is like “fuck yeah, the bastard got what he deserved.” but when he dies? there’s just exhaustion, pain, and relief that yang and blake survived. it’s not played as a proud or happy moment. it just sucks so much that they had to go through this ordeal and it’s pitiable that he chose to waste his life on this. blake breaks down crying and all she and yang can do for a moment is cling to each other.

like. -> “there’s no cause to celebrate/another soul consumed by hate and spite/another destroyed life/there’s no pleasure, there’s no joy/it’s just the story of a boy who lost his way/into shadows strayed/he’ll see the light of day/nevermore”

he chose over and over and over again to be cruel, letting his anger rule him. chose to be vindictive, chose to pursue vengeance over justice. chose to hurt people. every time he was offered an out, he refused to take it and brutally punished the people who gave him second chances. sienna, blake, yang. in the end, he left blake and yang with no other choice but to kill him before he killed them. but… the narrative still mourns the person he could have been, if he’d made better choices, if the world had been kinder to him.

there is no question that blake and yang made the right call. they did everything they possibly could to avoid killing him, and they had every right to defend themselves when he refused to stop.

BUT,

it’s sad that they were forced to do that. it still weighs on blake’s conscience as a terrible ordeal and a choice she never wants to have to make again. because killing another person—no matter the circumstances—is horribly traumatizing. and that’s why the narrative refuses to frame his death as a triumphant moment. (the same thing happens with jacques’ murder in V8: it’s sudden and shocking and unjust and there is zero satisfaction in watching him die. and it’s terribly unfair to weiss, who specifically chose not to leave him to die. rwby is a story where every life matters and every death is sad.)

great character. the final battle between him and blake/yang is done really well and one of my favorite fights in the show mostly bc it brings the foiling between him and yang into really sharp focus. “what does she even see in you?” is such a raw fucking line because the things blake sees in yang are exactly the things she once saw in adam: he’s so consumed by his obsession his vengeance his spiteful rage, he’s strayed so far from the person he was that he can’t even recognize her when she’s staring him in the face.

i do think that when adam was 16-17 at the very start of his character short, he was genuinely a lot like yang. angrier and more aggressive, because his mentor encouraged him to be that way, but i think his ideals were true and his commitment to the cause of his people was genuine.

he was only a kid the first time he killed someone—sixteen, seventeen, about the right age to be enrolling in one of the huntsmen academies. and i truly do not think he meant to kill that man; he saw a dangerous person running towards his already-wounded leader with a gun and reacted. and this?

this is a lot.

no matter the circumstances, killing another person is traumatizing. after this happens, adam slowly straightens up and sheathes his weapon, then just stands there frozen, staring at the body, until the other assailants make noise and he startles. his face falls when ghira says “that wasn’t necessary.” he’s slow to turn around, but he does, and he listens quietly to what ghira has to say to him. he didn’t mean to. he can’t be older than seventeen. he is in shock—he doesn’t know how to react, how to feel, and like any teenager would, he looks to trusted adults for guidance. (much like yang looks to ironwood and qrow after she hurts someone by mistake.) ghira starts to scold him (not ideal), but sienna cuts him off and calls adam a hero, and then everybody starts to fucking cheer; “that was amazing!!”

this moment, while adam was reeling and unsure, this is when adam desperately needed to hear from an adult in the middle. ghira is right that using lethal force wasn’t necessary; sienna is also right that adam likely saved ghira’s life by taking action. what adam really needed to hear was “you were right to take action, but this man was not such a grave threat that he needed to die. why did you react the way you did?”—not to be scolded or lionized, but to be treated like a teenager who made a bad choice for a good reason and given support and understanding so that next time, he would know what to do better.

instead he got swamped with praise and the came away from this experience having learned that Killing Humans is Cool and Awesome and Heroic, Actually.

(i have a secondary thought here that the white fang’s fatal weakness—under both ghira and sienna—is treating children like adults. if adam had been an adult when this happened, he wouldn’t have been so dependent on his mentor and his leader to guide his reaction and an adult would be better equipped to hold “that wasn’t necessary” and “he saved your life” as non-contradictory ideas. similarly, ghira and kali respecting blake’s decision to stay with the now expressly militant white fang when they left sounds great until you remember that she was twelve years old at the time and then they didn’t contact her in any way for the next five years. it is… probably not a coincidence that adam’s splinter group skews young.

not that teens can’t be good activists but good activism does require pragmatism and emotional maturity and an understanding of nuance, and if you throw a teenager into a high-stress organization where they’re involved in often-violent direct action and give them zero guidance beyond “here’s how to fight!” because they’re assumed to have adult-level maturity and critical reasoning, then… yeah, you’re going to end up with an extremism problem. the kids are not going to just magically know the difference between tactical violence and violent revenge.)

anyway, i really like his character short. i think the narrative is very sympathetic to the boy he used to be and the thread of sienna inadvertently enabling and reinforcing his violent tendencies is interesting. my sense is that in the beginning she sort of used adam to score a point against ghira in their clash of opinions over the direction of the white fang, and later made a habit of being overly indulgent with him and turning a blind eye to his excessive violence—like.

during the fight in the SDC building, sienna rips through the AKs just as ruthlessly as he does, but once the human security personnel arrive, her tactics immediately change. she uses her whip to snag a man’s gun and yank it out of his hands, flicks bullets away, disarms, trips, disarms, trips, disarms, trips. the only time she uses the bladed dart, it’s to disable her opponent’s weapon. meanwhile adam is hacking and slashing behind her. she stops him when he moves to kill an man who’s disarmed and on the ground. faced with living opponents, sienna holds back and fights strictly to disarm. adam is not like that, and she knows it and presumably doesn’t approve—she doesn’t kill anyone herself, and intervenes to stop him from killing—but it’s also clear that there were never like. Consequences. she never took him to task for crossing these lines. as his leader she had a responsibility to do so, but she kept letting it slide until it was too late.

(tbh i think the biggest disappointment i feel regarding her death is well never find out why she cut adam so much slack. did she want to believe he was better than that? had she known him for so long that her memories of what he was like as a teenager blinded her to the adult he was becoming? was it that she found him too useful or realized he was too popular to chastise, finding herself in the same trap she once sprung on ghira? did she, like blake, convince herself it was just “accidents” or “getting carried away” and ignore the warning signs that it was a deliberate pattern? was she like the albains, fully aware that he was dangerous and unstable but confident that she could control him? there’s so many possible reasons she might have had and i think it’s unfortunate that her motives and her side of the relationship didn’t get explored at all.)

also this is stupid and doesn’t matter really but he’s not a fucking bull 😭 those are goat horns. he’s a goat. A GOAT!!