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#mostly i take her opinions with a grain of salt but she said something to me recently that just

imreallyloveleee · 8 months

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Where do you think it all went wrong with Riverdale?

honestly, part of me is like, the show's over and nothing but fandom matters. so who cares?

the other part of me loves to complain about Riverdale and will continue to do so until the day I die in the parking lot of Michael's Diner in Montgomeryville, PA at the age of 86. so, long-winded answer under the cut

I'm tempted to say it's the s4 b*rchie kiss. It was so wildly out of character for both Betty and Archie that it's laughable. You know how you can tell when something is just blatantly OOC with no justification? They...don't justify it. They find ways to dance around any interaction that might offer clarification. They mute the reactions of the characters who should be devastated by it. And then they jump ahead 7 years so it's easier to just handwave it away as something that happened a long time ago.

but the thing is, I did keep watching after that. I thought: okay, at least we should get an exes-to-lovers arc out of this, which is one of my favorite tropes. there is no way they would spend 4 seasons developing Bughead as this loving, supportive, communicative, sexy, and almost-unbelievably-compatible couple just to tear them apart and never do anything with that dynamic again. maybe it'll be even sweeter seeing them come back together after so much hurt and longing.

boy was i wrong!!!!!!!!!

so, the episode that actually made me stop watching for good, with the exception of some standalones like The Jughead Paradox and the finale, was the s5 musical. that was when i realized that this team of writers was 100% willing, maybe even eager, to completely drop storylines they themselves had been building over the course of a season - do a 180 with all of the characterization and relationships - and then act as though the buildup they wrote never even happened.

in this case, i'm specifically talking about the Bughead reunion storyline they dropped in s5. i'm not going to pretend like it was a GREAT buildup - and it was mostly on Jughead's side, Betty's character in s5 was basically an emotionless misery bot that had sex sometimes - but it was there. Jughead told Tabitha he had unresolved feelings around Betty. that's followed by an entire episode that lays out Betty & Jug's time jump relationship, and how Jughead still believes she's the one who saves him from himself. they work on a case together, they start opening up to one another. Jughead's so worried about her he can't eat.

and then...you know what happens.

(i'll also note here that there was random bts stuff that strongly indicated the musical ep storyline had a drastic last-minute rewrite: lili tweeted a blue dress, suggesting the song with that line was meant for her character; RAS said cole had to do last-minute recording sessions; supposedly crew members have confirmed this was the case, too. since none of it's 100% confirmed you can take it all with a grain of salt, but i believe it.)

it was so fucking insulting as a viewer to give my time and attention to a show made by people who would not only randomly drop the threads they set up, but torpedo them altogether, and then behave like the fans are the ones somehow at fault for expecting a story that actually follows through on its own emotional and plot beats. we're just shippers, so our opinions are dumb and biased! it's just a tv show, so who cares! get over it!

so, i stopped watching, because i knew they would continue to write without any thought or respect for their characters or their audience, and therefore inevitably write themselves into another corner. and, shocker, i was right. they did it again, whisking everyone away to the 1950s because actually resolving any of the scenarios they set up was ToO hArD. why bother when you could just make every single character Righteously Angry and Incurably Horny all the time, lecture the audience about social issues that have already been mainstream progressive for the last several decades, and call it a "love letter" to your fans?

#WHEW ok anon idk if this was what you were looking for but it's what you got #hopefully this has fully exorcised my need to Go Off against the creators of this show but you never know!!#my capacity for bitter resentment is apparently endless when it comes to this show #rd negativity #riverdale #anti b*rchie #anti j*bitha #just in case #anon

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showtoonzfan · 11 months

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The whole "Stolas gets a boyfriend but ends up breaking up with them for Blitzo" reminds me of one of Viv's tidbits that she said I think at her Momocon panel a few years back, where she said that Angel will get a boyfriend at some point in the show.

Oh yeah, can’t wait for that lol. Unpopular opinion but I don’t think Viv is good at writing relationships. Like…period. I feel like she has no idea how real people talk, communicate, struggle ect, because none of her characters feel realistic and are just mostly bland cardboard copies of one another. Her relationships overall are either toxic painted out to be cute, boring, or having barley any chemistry or time dedicated to it to be believable and satisfying. Stolas having a boyfriend is clearly just going to be used for more drama since Viv is writing this shit up as she goes even though a blind person would be able to tell from a mile away that Stolitz will be canon eventually, but of course the show ain’t over so we need to drag this shit out until the very end. A good writer would have Stolas’s character maybe learn something from this experience since a breakup will obviously happen (since it won’t be his uwu Blitzy,) but PFFT….this is Stolas we’re talking about. He never fucking changes or learns from his experiences.

As for Angel, when I heard this information I…wasn’t surprised. He’s a gay character who’s a hot porn star and prostitute and talks about sex 24/7, of course he’d get a boyfriend eventually, him being attached to men is the majority of his character. Now I will say, one trope I am a sucker for is the prostitute or sex worker character actually finding a decent person who loves them for them and not just their body, and the character learns what real love is like and gets to experience it for the first time. I have the feeling Angel will get that maybe, but I honestly have no idea what Viv is planning regarding this. Then again I don’t care. We also can’t forget that we shouldn’t take everything Viv says in livestreams to heart and rather with a grain of salt, especially since this particular one was years ago. For all we know she could have changed it, and lord knows it probably won’t play out the way some are hoping or expecting. Maybe it’ll be a relationship with nuance, but knowing Viv and thinking to how she’s written Blitz and Stolas and Chaz and Moxxie, aka all her gay male characters, I feel like it’ll just stem from sex. Man…Fizz and Ozzie better be the exception.

#vivziepop critical #spindlehorse critical #helluva boss critical #hazbin hotel critical #helluva boss critique #helluva boss criticism #helluva critical #reply #ask

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anamericangirl · 7 months

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Hi! I'm sorry to bother you with this. Anyway, my brother is extremely smart and has always studied/known a lot about politics and history. I have/do not. As for the Palestinian and Isreal conflict while I don't know his views completely (as he discussed this with our mom), he's kinda "they're both terrible." And said: "Israelites have also stated that they wish to eradicate the Palestinians." 1/4

"Isreal has not always been their land. When Christians travel to Isreal they're spit on, and that Isrealites all have a pretty high opinion of themselves. They're belive themselves as God's chosen people." This is basically from what my mom told me through him. And I don't know. I tried telling her some of the things I've seen, but politics wear her out so I just mostly get "mmm." 2/4 But now because she listened to my brother, and he does have extensive knowledge she's, like, trying to prove me wrong or something? and saying "listening to brother is super interesting." She sent me a Vox youtube link from 7 years ago about their conflict, and I told her I will not watch Vox. I guess my whole point is, I'm really bad at just reading headlines... 3/4 And I don't even know where to begin for research or which articles are the most credible and least biased (something truly rare). So any help would be greatly appreciated. Sorry for bothering you with what is essentially family drama (I'm just basically ranting, too) and for the very long asks. Thank you for reading these! 4/4 Ah, I lied! 5/4. I forgot this part, sorry. He also apparently stated that the Gaza Strip is like a concrentaion camp basically?

Hello! You're not bothering me at all. I don't mind rants or long asks and this conflict between Israel and Palestine has been going on for centuries and there's a lot of details so it's hard to get all the information regarding the entire history, especially in a couple of days. And also finding reliable sources is very challenging as well because everyone has picked a side and has a bias, but sources with a bias can still be credible and helpful. You just have to pay attention to whether or not they are up front about their bias and account for it in their reporting and even though they have a bias consider if they are giving a fair picture of both sides. And Vox definitely does not do that, so kudos for refusing to watch them!

Though I know a little bit about it I'm certainly not an expert in this conflict so take whatever I say with a grain of salt.

In wars people often want to act like both sides are equally at fault but that's not always the case. Sometimes the lines are blurry and sometimes they're not. Like in WWII it was pretty clear Germany was the main culprit and the allies were fighting to stop the atrocities and end Hitler's regime. In this case, though over the years both Israel and Palestine carry blame, I think it's pretty clear there's one side that's the main problem and the main aggressor and it's pretty obviously Palestine.

This whole conflict is over a piece of land both the Israelites and the Arabs say they have a right to and Israel is literally surrounded on all sides by Arab countries that are hell bent on wiping them off the face of the planet. Palestine isn't even really a country, and that's something even the PLO wants known. They are a group of Arabs from the surrounding Arab countries like Syria and Jordan that came together specifically to fight Israel. It's not like they are just a group of people innocently trying to exist as a country. The sole reason they exist is to destroy Israel.

And I'm sure your brother is smart so no disrespect to him but there's not really hostility towards Christians or even really Muslims in Israel. There is a significant Muslim and Christian population in Israel and when you compare that with the religious diversity of the surrounding Arab countries, including Palestine, it's easy to see which countries are more accepting of diverse faiths. Palestine is over 95% Muslim and they do their best to kick out Jews from the area because they don't want them there.

And yes over the years Israel definitely has done things wrongs and been part of the problem but frankly this conflict could have been over years ago if the Arabs would agree to compromise with Israel. Israel, several times, has offered to compromise with Palestine and give them even most of the target land so they can both live as their own countries, even if they don't like each other. But Palestine refuses to accept any deal that allows Israel to exist. They want full religious control of the entire region and want Israel off the face of the planet.

But regardless of where anyone stands on this issue and who they feel is more justified overall in this conflict, what is going on right now in regards to how Hamas has attacked Israel is not justified and not ok and can't be brushed off by saying "both sides are bad." Even if that's what you think, people should be able to outright condemn the rape and murder of children, even if they are living on the side they don't agree with. Because that's what Hamas is doing. They aren't there to take down the IDF or liberate their people. They are targeting civilians. They are there specifically to brutalize innocent people and destroy their homes. Killing pets for no reason, beheading babies, slaughtering innocent people in the streets, raping women, children and the elderly and taking hostages. I don't care what side a person hates more or if you think they are equally bad what Hamas is doing right now is evil and they are the only side doing it.

I noticed you also mentioned your brother stated that Israel wants to eradicate Palestinians and if that's true they are incredibly bad at it. Why, if they want to eradicate Palestinians, do they do everything in their power to warn civilians before they will be sending missiles and giving them several chances to evacuate the area? If they want to eradicate them that seems counter-productive.

The IDF takes more care than any other military in the world really, to avoid civilian casualties. They send out texts, calls, and leaflets days before any attack telling the civilians where they will be targeting and urging them to get out of the area because they are just trying to destroy Hamas and they don't want to hurt civilians. Meanwhile, Hamas tells the Palestinians not to leave and to stay where they are because they are literally using their own people as human shields. They fire their missiles from civilian structures like hospitals and schools so that when Israel fires back they will kill civilians and Hamas can go "look how evil Israel is killing children" when those children are only dead because Hamas used them as human shields to protect their missiles. And Hamas is constantly firing missiles at Israel. If it weren’t for the Iron Dome there would thousands more Israelis dead.

It's not the same.

And I don't know whether I would call the Gaza Strip a concentration camp but Israel completely vacated the Gaza Strip back in 2005 I believe and Hamas has been in complete control of it for almost 20 years so everything happening in Gaza right now is entirely the fault of Hamas.

Sorry this was so long but I hoped it helped you out at least a little. If you want further information, I don't think you'll find anything without a bias, but what I would try to do is look at it from both sides and use sources that have a bias both ways. Maybe watch the Vox video but also watch the video Prager U did on the conflict or watch Ben Shapiro's break down of it. Those can all give a pretty good overview of what the conflict is but it's when they start talking about who is right and who is wrong that you have to be careful.

#anon #answered

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a-tale-of-legends · 5 months

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You know, I've noticed how in recent years, pokemon rivals that end up choosing a starter tend to have a signature pokemon that's most associated with them that isn't said starter. Like Nemona and Pawmot, Hop and dubwool, Silver and Sneasle/Weavile, etc etc. And I was thinking about this and thought " wait what about Barry". And like. Of all the pokemon that's been consistent of his teams, it's his staraptor. But I never really seen it as "Barry's signature pokemon" you know? Tbf, I don't know a lot of Barry's official art, and if he is shown actively with his staraptor.

I think the only other rivals ( that get starters) that doesn't exactly have a signature pokemon outside of their starter is Shauna ( again, maybe I missed something, but she's never really shown with her delcatty or Goodra I believe, so her signature pokemon is usually her starter), and the gen 3 rivals ( again, much like Shauna, it seems those rivals are most established by starter and are seen with them in art. It doesn't help that the rivals are just the protag you didn't pick).

Blue is weird in that, from what I've seen it's a mix of one of the Kanto starters ( which mostly Blastoise from what I've seen, but it's still pretty diverse), his Eevee that only ever appears in yellow and evolves in that, but everyone likes to give him an unevolved Eevee ( which is technically a starter now lmao)( also I think this is more in fan works that official stuff so again, take this with a grain of salt), and I would say from personal bias, Pidgeot( again, I don't know how much art there is of the two officially so. Take this with a grain of salt). So he both fits the "rivals getting a signature pokemon that isn't there starter" and yet also doesn't fit it, in my opinion.

#r rambles #pokemon #pokemon rivals #rival barry

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cy-cyborg · 2 months

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Any predictions about what they're going to do with Toph in the live action Avatar? I actually kind of like the changes they made like making Sokka no longer sexist. The story feels more real, honestly, I think Toph is a bit of an overdone character. Like she's super strong because she's blind, that's not good writing. I hope they make her better.

Ironically, I got the notification about this ask while I was talking about this very subject with my partner lol.

I'm only a few episodes into the live action Avatar so far, so take what I say with a grain of salt i guess, but I'm honestly a bit concerned. While I'm glad you enjoyed it (and legitimatly no hate on anyone who does), I'm finding so far that the creators of this version have attempted to "fix" a lot of things that either didnt need fixing, or they didn't really understand why they were issues, so they have ended up "fixing" the wrong things in a lot of cases. I worry this will be the case with toph eventually, too.

I'm planning to talk more about og toph soon (I'm working on the draft for the post atm) but basically, I agree, I absolutely love og toph, but she does have issues that its important to acknowledge. Its worth keeping in mind though the context of when the og show aired. the fact that she's a good bender specifically because she's blind/a bit over the top is, in my opinion, an overcorrection from the kinds of disability rep common in fantasy (and other genres but especially fantasy) at the time: chatacters that were mostly just sad or helpless who were left out of the action and/or used to show how sad a world is.

If they were to make changes to toph, it's important to recognise that this isn't really the case anymore, and what made toph work back then might not work as well now. Now characters like toph are so common it has become a trope in and of itself (the supercrip trope, to be specific, something ive already talked about before). to move away from that, they need to do a better job of recognising her blindness as a disability outside of her bending and maybe not necessarily toning her down, but adding layers to how her blindness effects her daily life and lean into the idea of her earthbending being used as a kind of disability aid rather than a cure for it.

The problem is, I don't think they will. I think they'll either add some (unnecessary) sad undertones to her character and backstory to match the "darker tone" they seem to be going for, or they'll lean into the supercrip aspects of her character even more that the og did and kind of forget she's blind at all.

It's a pessimistic take, and like I said, I haven't finished the series yet, so my thoughts might change, but from what I've seen so far, my hopes aren't super high.

#q and a

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blade-that-was-broken · 7 days

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You know DJ Suki from Trolls, right?

Do you think she will ever be back?

Honestly I’m not sure if she will ever be back as I heard that her voice actor is busy in real life or something.

What do you think what happened to her? I know in TrollsTopia, it showed where she went in the final but as we know it’s not canon to movies and she wasn’t seen in TWT. (Never liked Legsly, I’m surprised I never realized that until now that DJ Suki wasn’t in TWT-)

I’m not sure if she will be in next movie but I’m kind of hope The Snack Pack will get more attention like in Trolls, unlike TWT and TBT.

Yes of course they were awesome in TWT, like Cooper having the important role and have a backstory to his family, Yay! :D

I’m fine with Biggie except how he did was great, as we saw in the end of TWT and how he said that the good queen should be listening, he helped in good way even if I don’t like him.

But TBT… what happened? Where they are?! If Tiny have big role in then should Guy be? He’s Guy’s son after all! Poor Guy…. :(

I hope some missing members are back in too, I like Smidge, she’s the great character.

I actually kind of liked DJ Suki. I'm not sure if she will be back. I guess it depends on a lot of things, even if there ends up being another movie. Not that she had a ton of screen time in the movie anyways; it was mostly the show which I don't think is technically canon?

Cooper's backstory kind of came out of nowhere but it also kind of makes sense cause he was so different. When it comes to that, I kind of understand Poppy's point. Like, despite Cooper being so different, no one ever treated him like he was an outsider and his differences are fairly obvious.

Biggie kind of drives me nuts sometimes lol but it might be his voice. also, controversial opinion, Mr. Dinkles wigs me out.

TBT was very Branch- centric. Tiny was mostly there because kids love him and he's got that extra comedic effect. I understand why the snack pack isn't really involved. That would be WAY too big of a cast for kids to understand and handle - and the cast was already big to begin with for that movie. We have to remember, in the end, no matter what age people are watching - these movies primary audience is children. Sure, it's got some adult humor - it's kind of like shrek. Kids can watch and have fun but the parents also watching can be amused at the same time.

Anyway, I got a little off topic.

If they do another movie, I'm kind of hoping it might be a bit more Poppy-centric? As we all know I LOVE Branch and JD and the rest of the bros but I'd love to see a bit more Poppy-centric stuff too. Especially now that she has a sister by her side. Possibly.

I think we think of the Snack Pack as this huge thing because of the TV show mostly. In the end, the movies are very easily about Poppy and Branch. It's the characters the audience focus on and since it's mostly just them, it can be easier to digest for kids. The rotating cast of new characters invites new jokes, new toys and new interests for the kids who don't always remember some of the side characters of other movies.

This is something that I generally like to keep in mind, that some of the movies we love and watch are made for children a lot younger than us. So I take everything with a grain of salt and that in mind and it definitely helps my enjoyment. I don't expect questions to be answered or deep themes to be addressed. That's something I - and others - can do through fanfiction.

So yeah... my two cents lol

#ask #I also have the dream that Branch and JD will get along due to their similarities and such but that is FAR FAR hopes #JD was the butt of the joke in TBT so I expect if he's in anything else #they will continue to make him that way

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myloveforhergoeson · 5 months

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i'd love to read some good ol' hockey romance novels but idk where to start lol; would you happen to have any recommendations? (it's totally cool if not!!)

YES OMG ok but something you must understand about me is that all of my book recommendations come exclusively from booktok or instagram so please take this with a grain of salt. i like them dumb, stupid, cliche, and smutty!

i am very new to the hockey romance genre, so i only have two books that i have read as of now to recommend, but i've got three on my to be read list so i can talk about those too <3

the one i just finished is called behind the net by stephanie archer and friend... god... i thought this one was just going to be just like pwp but there was plot and it was good and had me actually shocked something so interesting popped up in this book bc i had expected something completely different. it centers around jamie, a hockey player (goalie) for a fake team called the vancouver storm who trades his life playing for a team in new york to move home and take care of his mother after a series of mental health crises. he's a bit mean, a little arrogant, but he is mostly and above all... say it with me... MISUNDERSTOOD. god i eat this shit up. his counterpart is a young woman named pippa who just got out of a pretty one sided (read: slightly emotionally abusive) relationship with the only guy she'd ever dated. her ex is a pretty famous musician and it's her dream to write and record her own album one day, but after the break up and a little bit of a traumatic experience with her ex and his manager, she's not quite sure that's the right choice for her. she's very sweet, determined, and overall someone i found to be a very interesting character. anyway, she ends up as his assistant, chaos ensues, things happen that i won't spoil, but i enjoyed it very much.

(he calls her songbird a lot and though i do not have the claim on the pet name every time he said it my mind immediately went rames rames rames rames like a dog chasing after a squirrel)

i've got a little journal where i keep track of all the books i'm reading and i gave it a 3/5 stars on quality of writing, 5/5 stars on the strength of the characters, and a 4/5 on the plot. and my own extra rating, 4/5 on the spice scale

also! the author is writing a series that includes other members of the team and some minor characters from the first novel! the next one comes out in a few days and i can't wait to pick it up!

the first book i read out of the hockey romance genre is a book called icebreaker by hannah grace - this one was pretty popular when it came out and many people have many opinions on it. here are my own which are very general because i read it almost a year ago

the summary of the book is a little misleading, the main conflict is supposed to revolve around the captain of a fake college hockey team (nate) and a figure skater (anastasia) who's shooting for olympic gold having to share an ice rink after the one the figure skaters use is put out of commission. long story short, anastasia blames nate, but they're put in a bit of a forced proximity situation that lasts like... five chapters max. the rest is them figuring out their feelings for each other yada yada which is fine and i enjoyed but it was not what i thought the book would mainly be about. so, personal warning there lol. this one is a bit closer to pwp, but both of them have goals they want to accomplish and they help each other through that. i liked stassie a lot and found her to be an interesting character - watching her fall for nate was very sweet and i think i would have enjoyed it even more if i really liked him. he was just kind of mid to me with his only two personality traits being rich and team captain. but also, as a college student myself, i liked the atmosphere of the school they attended, the dynamic between stassie and the other players on the team as she slowly got to know them, and the way both nate and stassie worked to better themselves in order to be with each other!

in my journal i gave the quality of writing 3/5, the strength of the characters a 3/5 and the plot a 2/5 (it would have been 4/5 but i HATED the epilogue. if you read this book do not read the epilogue your life will be so much better without it) and my own special 3/5 on the spice scale

this one is also a series involving the other players on the team! the second book came out a few months ago and i'm planning to read it soon. it's been sitting on my shelf for ages.

i would recommend behind the net over icebreaker, but both were enjoyable to me!

on my hockey romance tbr:

the graham effect by elle kennedy

wildfire by hannah grace

the fake out by stephanie archer

but, i am a well-rounded (romance) reader so if you'd like to know my favs or other books im reading or like reviews just lmk... i'm slowly turning this blog into one where i just share whatever i want instead of it being focused toward my story LOL

#ash talks books #fresh new tag helllll yeah #behind the net #icebreaker

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theizzifromosaka · 9 months

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Here it is! I'm starting my review series of Monster Girl media, and for the first entry, I'll be reviewing

Monster Musume: Everyday Life with Monster Girls

To be perfectly clear, this review will be foucsed on the Monster Girl aspect of this series. I'm not sure if my opinions on the actual show itself would be worth listening to, I'm not trying to sway anyone one way or another.

Monster Musume follows "Darling-Kun" as he adapts to life with a rapidly growing cast of Demihumans. They learn about Japanese culture, and he finds himself pressured to pursue a relationship with one.

Darling-kun, whose name I don't think we ever learn in the anime, is kind of a weird dude. Throughout the course of the series he sees a LOT of naked girls, and he NEVER gets used to them. Other than that he's mostly just one of those generic anime nice guys, though he's aware the girls like him, unlike most of his peers.

Moving on.

Miia the Lamia

The Classic

The most iconic and recognizable character from this seris, Miia is a Lamia (go figure) with a lot of affection for Darling. She gets jealous easily and can be very clingy but still manages to be one of the most reasonable girls in the roster. She tends to see every new girl as a rival for Darling's affection and at this point you've probably noticed her entire personality revolves around Darling. This is standard for all the girls in this series and any deviation from this is considered strange.

Lamia in Greek mythology was the queen of Libya who, as you do, had children with Zeus and incurred Hera's wrath. Hera killed her children and this drove Lamia to madness, she lived out her days eating children and became monstrous in appearance. The story of Lamia was kinda like the Greek version of the Boogeyman.

I always encourage doing your own research on these topics, and take anything I've said with a grain of salt.

I'll refrain from asking why an apparent reptile has breasts as I could ask that about most Monster Girls, but aside from that, why are her genitals at her waist? They should be at the end of her tail.

Papi the Harpy

God damn it.

Okay, so Papi's name comes from the Japanese pronunciation of Harpy (would be something like Haapi). She's a very childlike adult, which is apparently typical of Harpies. They don't completely physically mature so they're light enough to fly, and she's a "bird brain". She claims to see Darling as a big brother but seems to have no idea what that really means.

Harpies are also Greek, they were birds with features of human women. They were seen as undesirable, ugly and foul and yeah, all the boxes are checked here.

Okay, it's not fair to judge Papi on these terms. We ought to be judging the creator of the series here. Honestly if not for the constant sexualization I probably wouldn't mind her too much.

Centorea the Centaur

Double damn it.

She's one of them warrior women that acts all stoic "but hides the heart of a woman" or whatever. I don't care for her, and unlike with Papi, I think it's her fault this time. I don't like her character, and I don't like her design.

Centaurs, yet again, are Greek in origin. They're half horse half man and are named after Centaurus, the first Centaur. Pop culture depicts Centaurs as being a Warrior Race, probably stemming from Chiron, among the most famous Centaurs in Greek Mythology. It is speculated the image of a Centaur arose from people seeing horse mounted warriors and either misinterpreting what they saw or a Telephone Game effect eventually resulting in what we're familiar with today.

Her design is a perfectly passable Centaur besides her Serious Honkers. Her real set of Badonkers. She's packin some Dobonhonkeros. I'm sure you don't need me invoking a copypasta to tell you she looks ridiculous.

Suu the Slime

Oh baby a triple!

Another child coded character. Suu is a shapeshifter so she doesn't always resemble a child, but her mannerisms are harder to change. Throughout the course of the series she becomes more intelligent and capable, going from a shapeless blob to barely coherent to regularly speaking full sentences. Suu is like... THE Slime Girl too, the first case of the author coming up with a wholly original design.

I'm not actually sure if Suu is the first Slime Girl but her influence can't be ignored. Slime Monsters overall are a pretty recent thing, and hard to track the history of (by that I mean they don't have a Wikipedia article). Their origins can be traced back to many sources, including classic Monster Flick The Blob, the Gray Goo Global Catastrophic Scenario, Tabletop RPGs and Dragon Quest.

(in absence of a Wikipedia article)

Honestly Suu would be cute and endearing if she wasn't subject to so much fanservice. Her personality, as it develops, is very childlike, with no sense of tact and little in the way of a filter. In this case I think I'd prefer it if they made her MORE childlike, and I wouldn't mind one bit if she remained a shapeless blob the whole time.

Mero the Mermaid

it was Big! Scary! and PINK!

Mermaids in this universe romanticize tragedy, and that ends up being one of Mero's most defining features. She states outright to ease Miia's worries that she does not want to marry Darling, she just wants to be his mistress. She's very soft-spoken but occasionally says some weird things.

So Mermaids have a lot of history and multiple origins, ranging from Greek Sirens to misidentified Manatees to just disoriented pent-up sailors seeing a Thicc Fish. The story of The Little Mermaid is very influential, and the in universe reason given to why Merfolk romanticize tragedy so heavily.

Honestly Mero might be my favorite of the main cast, her taxonomy is vague, she states that her skin secretes mucus, she's got tiny little arms on her hips, and in the 11th episode she tries to drown Darling, which if you ask me makes her best girl by default. I lament that most of the time she just looks like a girl in a wheelchair, and I also have to mention the fin ears.

Rachnera the Arachne

Not so itsy-bitsy

Rachnera is perhaps one of the most fleshed out characters in the show, she has a backstory and is capable of a range of emotions. That said most of the time she's just horny. Her initial foster family greatly disliked her but tried to "put up" with her, and after an incident resulting in their daughter being injured they sold her to a shady man who wanted to sell her silk on the black market. She starts off not exactly fond of humans but in typical fashion a single interaction with the main character all but changes her opinion.

The Greek story of Arachne is about a woman who challenged the Gods and was turned into a spider by Athena. She won by the way, the moral of the story is the Gods are jerks I guess.

This girl is a mixed bag. On one hand she has motivations that don't involve the main character, but on the other hand she very quickly becomes a vessel for bondage fetish pandering. As for her design, I like her eyes, it's a bit overdone to represent spider eyes like this but that's for good reason. I also don't really like how if you erase her human parts you're left with kind of a dumb looking spider. Overall I'd rank her pretty low, but not the worst.

Lala the Dullahan

So no head?

Lala is only in the show for about one and a half episodes, plus gets some screentime in the OVAs. She's a Chuunibyou who claims herself to be Death and gives the rest of the cast quite the spook.

The Dullahan is from Irish mythology, originally referring to any headless spirit, but eventually invoking a Headless Horseman, said to use a human spine as a whip. The image of a Headless Horseman can actually be found in various parts of Europe, and even in the Americas thanks to The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, which is apparently where the Jack-O-Lantern head thing comes from.

This is probably gonna be a recurring point of friction throughout this review series but you can't just paint a girl blue and call her a monster. Given the monster she's supposed to represent in this case I suppose I can't fault them too much, but in my opinion painting her blue somehow makes the design feel MORE lazy. Other than that I could criticize her inaccurate scythe for not having grips but that seems to be an anime thing.

Overall I'd say this series has surprisingly competent worldbuilding, reason is given to why most of the infrastructure doesn't accommodate demihumans and, though shallow, the different cultural origins of the girls play a part in how they interact with Darling and each other. That said the girls' designs are all very safe and same-y, with the most out there design being Polt, a character that only shows up in one of the OVAs. If I had to pick a favorite from the main cast though, it would have to be Mero. Her little arms really sell her design for me, and her gimmick of wanting to live out a tragedy actually got a chuckle or two out of me.

Overall, would I recommend this series? It depends. If you're a fellow Monster Girl Connoisseur then the sheer influence of this series earns it a watch, and if you're the kind of person that enjoys a good hate watch, or if you like ecchi (no judging) then you could probably get some enjoyment out of it. Outside of those spheres, nah it's not worth it.

Next review:

#Monster Girl Reviews #monster girls #Monster Musume #Lamia #Harpy #Centaur #Slime #Mermaid #Spider #Dullahan

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golbrocklovely · 5 months

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when we’re talking about the 2016 rn (refering to anon) i wonder why he didnt have serious relationship since 2016? was that relationship SO serious to him that he didnt want to be with someone else or anything? Its actually kinda sad to see this tbh, because that means it really hurt him somehow.

Also im so sorry his grandpa died, i can imagine, my grandma almost died because of sickness and i cant imagine lost her absolutely. hope that man will be okay soon, hope he knows people are here for him💜.

(this is a bit of an older ask, from a couple days ago)

sorry for the delayed response :)

with colby's past serious relationship, it's hard to tell what happened or how things played out bc he mostly keeps that info to himself; which is totally understandable. he's let slip some things, like how he was very needy and depended on her a lot and how he wanted to be with her all the time and overall - he was just too much.

the worse thing he's ever said about her is that she was a bit flaky, and in reality he only implied it. he's mostly blamed himself for things falling apart or that it was just draining to be that in love with someone.

this is all my assumption, so take what i say with a grain of salt. i'm just basing my opinion off of things he's said and also a lot of old tweets from back in the day (some of which have been outright deleted but i saved lol): i think he fell madly in love with this girl, and just depended on her too much. i think he came across as needy and clingy, and she pulled back. she didn't love him as much as he loved her, and then eventually things ended. and he spent the next year just being heartbroken and trying to move on. then by 2018, he tried dating again (and by that i mean putting himself out there, not really having any serious relationships), and it went south once again. and he became bitter to love and dating and everything else. which is why he said the infamous quote of "all the girls in la suck". and i think only recently has he "tried" to dip his toes back into actual dating, and not just hooking up. but even then, he's not really trying.

i think his past relationship really hurt him. bc, while i don't think he wanted to marry this girl, i think that's how much love he had for her. hence why he said in his deep q&a "i only want to fall in love that deeply again with someone like my wife". i don't think he wanted to marry her, but i think he saw a future with her when she didn't feel the same way. and when they broke up, her reasonings tied with his past self esteem issues, it all just became a lot for him to process. i mean, he only recently just started to like being by himself and alone alone (ie solo vacations). respectfully, he has a lot of dependence issues. i don't know if that's bc he doesn't feel like he's enough, or if it's something else entirely. but it's clear that he's been hurt a lot in his life, and it effects the way he goes into relationships.

and i'm in the same boat as him lol

i hope in the near future he allows himself to open up to ppl. i know it's hard, but holding that area of his life back and blaming it on work or whatever other issue is never gonna fix what happened. you also can't allow your heart to grow dark. i think he has a lot of love to give, and he shouldn't hide that in fear of getting hurt.

as for his grandfather, he seems to be a bit better now (according to what he posted yesterday), so that's good. obviously the initial shock is a lot. so i hope he eventually goes home to see family and is around them for love and support.

and i pray that next year is nicer to him.

#ask #personal #cb ll

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manic-pixie-dream-dude · 2 years

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Some warmer than luke warm takes? Go for it, I love reading peoples thoughts and opinions on episodes

OHHH BROTHER, this ask has been here for a WHILE and I kept rewriting my thoughts (aka distraught venting) because I couldn't finish a single sentence or close off a point so here's my nteenth attempt. Enjoy.

the thing that bothered me with luz and hunter's relationship was that it had so much potential to go somewhere but simply didn't.

I don't mean this in terms of romance, honestly, I understand that a big part of Dana's vision for this show was having lumity be canon (plus huntlow), but rather in their general relationship development. it felt to me like during s2b there was a sort of... dissonance between Luz and Hunter's relationship vs the experiences they went through together, and what you'd sort of expect narratively to happen.

Luz is a caring person who's gone out of her way for people before, even enemies, so I was confused as to why we couldn't get any lines in about her being worried for Hunter, or showing us visually that she's attempted to contact him, or even have them hug/acknowledge what happened last time when they met up again.

I was expecting/hoping for a "You're okay!!!" from Luz and an "uh YEAH I'm okay I'm so competent haha please don't mention what happened last time to anyone EVER" which is. sort of what we got? I just want Luz to be relieved to see him, is all.

Just something?? to show us that they Get each other, so to speak (because s2 had to squeeze in a lot, I get that much plot that had to be skimmed over off-screen but STILL. Even small things would've been great).

I don't expect them to be BFFs. Cus i mean, he has spent more time with Willow and Gus so yeah, duh, he's gonna be closer with them. I just wish their relationship got the same treatment, or we at least got to see it grow during their scenes together.

imo the writers did seem to not let them interact as often as they could, for whatever reason. I still.... don't get why luz and amity had to be away while Hunter went undercover at hexside. The shenanigans that would've ensued.....

This isn't even exclusive to Hunter and Luz, I see it with Amity and Willow too. Again, this is mostly due to Disney's decision to axe tf out of this show, but I still think that they could've done quite a bit with what they had.

Alas, the writers are taking some of the relationships in a direction that I personally don't agree with which is 🤷‍♂️ It sucks, but that's how it is. I can always redirect my preference to fanon.

BUT!!!!!

s3 seems to be a bit different in that we look to be getting more hunter and Luz interactions! so hey! maybe all of what i said will be rendered null and pointless in like a week! we'll see i Guess!!

tldr: There are alotta missed opportunities, a lot is up to the show being canceled early but there are times when they could've squeezed in SOMETHING but decided not to. It's a huge shame but hopefully, we get to see them more in s3 so take my complaints with a grain of salt.

#toh #mani.txt #OOF well there it is #I'm tired and have been mostly studying recently so i hope whatever i wrote is in english.#doesnt make sense? i dont get it either! i just have emotions and some sort of a grasp on language so here's my attempts at utilizing both #much of my feelings are just: WHY CANT THEY BE BEST FRIENDS PLEASE DANA PLEAAASE I WANT THEM TO BESTIES SOOOO FUCKING BAD #hey but whatever 'doom for destruction' relationship based on secrets that they've been developing appeals to me greatly. keep doing that.#like yessss be fuckt up and traumatized together YESSSS #🐦🦦#mail? in MY chicken coop?

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moonchildridden · 2 years

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NottPun, that couple (who’re not exactly a couple) that showed a lot of nuances in less than an hour: dream stealers, Gen 1 stalking, popping hot tea, 701 in shambles, pimps in manager's clothing and innocence lost (Episode 4)

Before I start, I wanna say that the main reason it took so long for me to post this is because I had a migraine crises for the whole week, then two days of cramps and back hurt but since I had a post to do and opinions to share, I said fuck my body and let's do this.

Hi. Hello. It's moonchild here, back again with another (late) post about WOY's episode 4 and, oh boy, it was a doozy, at best, and a burning mess, at worst. So many things that I had suspicions on were confirmed, other things that I never put too much thought into it came back with a vengeance and we had so much pain shown to us that it left me feeling like crap for literally days. I was expecting drama, a very heavy drama, but I was not ready for what I was about to receive.

Also, I cannot believe that after we complained and asked for the messages/social posts/comments translation, we FINALLY GOT IT! For real, I was expecting yet another episode where I would have to do the translations myself or wait for somebody else to do it but, maybe because the universe wanted us to suffer with understanding, the translations came.

I'm not gonna comment to much here, because I will have a lot to comment in my "prediction" section after the exposition of the themes of this episode, so for now, just me being a responsible adult, as always: everything that you guys will be reading in this post is the result of my observations into very specific parts of the episode, frame by frame repetitive viewing and me getting to the most plausible conclusion after taking all in, meaning that most of the things will be on the speculative territory, others in (maybe) theory territory and some can (or so I think) be proven by in-dialogues and scenes arrangements, so take things with a grain of salt, ok?

I will divide this post in two major sections, one with the themes that I managed to identify and the other with the view that we had about NottPun’s relationship, instead of dividing it into segments, because the episode itself didn’t gave me other choice than to use this format. However, the sections will be divided into sub-sections and those will (mostly) follow the order of events presented in the episode, with things in bold being mostly dialogues and things in italic being me emphasizing or exaggerating my thoughts.

As an addendum, I will reference a few things that I talked about in my previous posts so, if any of you reading this hasn’t read them, don’t need to worry about needing to read those posts first because I will paraphrase when necessary. But if after this you feel the desire to read them, head out to my masterlist and you can find all three previous posts there.

Without further ado, let’s uncover some crimes, shall we?

1 – Themes

1. Criminal mismanagement

Before I start, allow me to say something rude: fuck Koon, I hope that bitch has a painful death and burn in eternal hell for what she did, that fucking bitch. Jail is not enough for her, I want her blood smeared on the floor.

Ok, back to regular programming. While I was watching the episode, I kept asking myself how on earth was I supposed to talk about her actions in this post, considering that everything we saw on episode 4 was the culmination of what she has been doing since episode 1 (and two tweets that the official Copy A twitter account posted after episode 3 and 4) and how her behavior was swiftly unraveled to us but we kinda didn’t pay attention until it exploded in our faces.

Between NottPun’s managers, Koon was the one whose appearance gave a more serious and knowledgeable look, also trustworthy, like a person we could rely on for anything. Pun said, in his lunch with Tai on episode 2, that his parents were secretly afraid to let Pun go with Koon but Koon smoothly talked it out and that made Pun’s parents trust him to go and live with Koon, basically saying that she has a way with words and is capable of convincing people to do what she want. Looking back to that conversation, with all the information that we have about her now, and seeing her expressions during that conversation, is very easy to actually see her reactions to certain parts of it as a sort of foreshadowing of her actions:

Tai: Khun Koon and Nong Pun seem very close. How long have you been taking care of each other?

Koon: It’s been 5 years. I went to pay pilgrimage in Ayutthaya and met him there. So I asked his parents’ permission.

Tai: Good for you to ask for him to come. Not deceiving him here.

[Look at Koon’s expression here. She was “smiling” but after Tai said those words, she averted her eyes, like she was hiding something]

Tai: Now there are a lot of scammers. Even my own channel often got impersonated.

[Again, her expression changed. The mention of “scammers”, people who basically deceive people to get what they want, was enough to put her a bit uncomfortable. Perhaps she felt called out?]

Pun: When she talked to my parents, they were secretly afraid. But fortunately, P’Koon smoothly talked it out. So my parents trusted me to come and live with P’Koon.

This conversation only lasted for 40 seconds but in those 40 seconds, when well analyzed, it showed three focal points of Koon’s personality, that she uses around people: she’s a liar, she’s well aware of what she’s doing and she’s very convincing. Those traits, separate, are not exactly dangerous (albeit they are still wrong) but together they are a major red flag, because it basically shows that that person is capable of doing a lot of things and still make you think that it was for the best or that it wasn’t their fault that the things turned out to not be the way they promised.

Up until that point, I confess that I didn’t actually saw something weird enough to catch my attention, and episode 2 was an episode filled with topics like sexual harassment, the conversation about fanservice, public pressure and stuff like that, so my focus was on how those themes were being showcased and how Pun was reacting to all of them, instead of other characters. However, one thing that made me keep an eye on her, at least for a few seconds, and also made me feel like there was something wrong was in the changing room where she and Pun were with the makeup artist, before the event where Pun fainted; the worst part of it is that it was such a minor detail but it spoke volumes because it was a break of character (or at least the character that we had been perceiving on Koon) for Koon: after the makeup artist finished doing their job and asked Pun if they could take a picture, Pun looked at Koon with that expression of his that says “do whatever you have to do but don’t let them take a picture of me” but Koon, instead of doing what Pun wants, something that she usually does, she actually says yes, receiving an almost shocked expression from Pun as a response for that.

When I saw that, I was like “so, we’re not doing what Pun wants anymore?”, because that behavior was not something expected from her and it rubbed me the wrong way for some reason. Yes, it could’ve been because the makeup artist was someone famous and that picture could give Pun, and her, some exposure, simply a business decision, but it doesn’t make the fact that she made a decision that she knew Pun was not comfortable with in the first place and that tells a lot about what she’s doing with Pun: she’s using him for her personal gains and hiding her decisions behind her “manager” card.

But it doesn’t stop there. Her shady behavior as a manager can be traced back to when Pun wasn’t even her artist and can be boiled down to one simple word: innocence. (put a pin on that and let’s go back to the present for a moment)

After Pun went home to ask for explanations about why Fang was the one that signed the contract with TTV and not him, saying that even after she took him to talk to the manager (I assume the manager is Khun Chalerm), the contract was still not for him, Koon said that she “talked to them” (meaning that it was supposed to be a sure thing that Pun already was signed with TTV, considering that he had already told his mother about that) and that “Khun Suthat liked Pun very much but he said that Pun’s sweet look is not right for the channel”, prompting a very explosive reaction from Pun, that asked “’not right’? Well, isn’t you the person who told me to keep this look? They why are you saying it’s not right now?”.

This exchange took me to two tangents (me again with these, shocker):

1 – Pun’s real personality, his real image, the way he really expresses himself is being crushed under the image he has to project to the world, because of his job

In my post for the second episode, the first thing I talked about was how Pun used personas in certain situations for certain people as a way of getting attention and continuing working in the acting industry. Quoting what I said about it: “[…]Pun projects specific images of himself to certain people and he tries to sell the image that he deems best to a specific person. To the TTV producer, he tries to appear interested in his works, in the cast and crew’s well being, in being nice and always willing to do his utmost best in the pursuit of doing a good job. To the crew and rest of the cast, he shows a distant and cold man, someone who’s above all of them and should have his desires granted as soon as they are vocalized or expressed. To his fans, he shows a sensitive and caring man, someone worth of being adored and taken care of, someone whom they can put their trust in and follow without an issue. None of those images are really what he is, his real personality.” At the time, I viewed that behavior as a personal decision from Pun, because it aligned with his goals in the industry, like a conscious action in pursuit of a dream, where you sacrifice a part of yourself to get what you want, and it also made sense with the profiling that I did for Pun, so I didn’t think much of it.

But after Pun said that a part of his image, the one that I associated with his persona to his fans (I mean, Pun’s fans are literally called “Mummy”, meaning that they view Pun as someone that “needs” to be babied or is “sweet and innocent like a child”) was Koon’s idea, a lot of my thoughts shifted to something that I had been suspecting for a while but never actually wrote on any of my posts because I didn’t want to accuse someone of something so serious, even if it could have proof of it: Koon deliberately made Pun keep an “innocent persona” because she knew it would cater to some people in power and it would make her job much easier.

Meaning, Koon did that so she could pimp out Pun.

2 – Innocence is being used as a trade tool inside the industry

This is where things get a bit creepy (or more creepy, whatever you prefer) about Koon’s behavior. We don’t know how old NottPun are exactly but I don’t think both are over 25, so it’s fair to assume that when Koon meet Pun he was fairly a young adult, still with a bit of innocent look; that being said, we have someone who seems to be in the industry for a long time, knows exactly what the industry likes the most (in terms of appearance and behavior, specially), telling a young adult that knows nothing of said industry to keep an innocent look and the young adult does exactly that because he trusts the person that told him that…after all, what reason would Pun have to question that decision, Koon knows what she’s doing.

Koon knew exactly what she was doing when she said to Pun to keep that look. She knew that the right people would go head over heels for a man with a sweet look, would want to be in touch with that man, keep him around, give him stuff (is this starting to seem like a sugar daddy thing or is just me?), pamper him, give money, in exchange of a small thing, probably a dinner, or a full night with said man. This was not showed in full picture in the episode but Copy A’s twitter account posted the full conversation (and translated by BillySengFC) and I’ll put it verbatim so you guys can understand exactly what I’m talking about here:

………………………………

Khun Miao TTV: 30k. Is that ok?

Koon: Thank you for loving Nong.

Khun Miao TTV: It’s ok, he is cute, my boss really like him.

Koon: Just eating and talking, right?

Khun Miao TTV: Yes, but if he can do more like I told you earlier. From 30k to 100k, my boss can pay for it.

Koon: Let me consider first.

Khun Miao TTV: Thank you for not rejecting me.

Koon: You’re welcome.

………………………………

Read that conversation as many times as you want or need (or don’t, it made me sick just by typing this here) because Koon was promising sexual acts in Pun’s name in exchange for money. Money, mind you, that would go straight to her and Pun wouldn’t even see the color of it. You know who else markets sexual acts in other person’s name in exchange for money? Pimps.

I dare to go even further and say that Pun is not the only one Koon’s been pimping out or even that she’s getting sexual favors from her artists as well (not from Pun, obviously), considering this image taken from the trailer, something that makes this already fucked up situation even more fucked up because she’s using her position as manager not only to sell her artists sexually but also to gain sexual favors herself. Just thinking about this, I feel sick and tired, for real.

(A side note before I continue. This image right here, is this feet Pun’s? Because it seems like it)

Anyway, about the look thing, just before I move on to the next sub-section, when she said that Pun’s “sweet look” was the reason he did not get signed on TTV, I called her on her bullshit because this TTV thing did not start from Pun, it was someone from TTV itself that went after Pun and showed him that the possibility for him to be part of a big TV station was within his reach. Or is she really saying that Tai, someone who works on TTV, directed many series in there, would go specifically after Pun if he didn’t think that Pun could fit inside the company? Because after the fiasco that was the NC shooting scene on episode 2, Tai admitted that he was eyeing Pun but because of what happened (a situation that he mistakenly thought that it was Pun just not being comfortable with love scenes or some variation of that) he think that Pun was not suitable for TV drama; not TTV itself, TV drama.

Also, if the “sweet look” was really the problem as she said the executive, the man that was willing to pay 100k if Pun did something sexual to him, “said” it was, then Tai wouldn’t have shifted his attention to GusBew, a ship where Bew also have a sweet look. To make matters even worse (believe, it always can get worse in situations like this), the meeting between Pun and the executive happened after the decision of not signing Pun into TTV, based on another chat that Copy A’s twitter account posted (and translated by BillySengInt), which I will post verbatim:

………………………………

Khun Tai TTV: Koon, you’re not angry with me that I didn’t choose Nong Pun, are you?

Koon: It’s fine, I understand.

Khun Tai TTV: Thank you.

Koon: Khun Tai?

Khun Tai TTV: Yes?

Koon: [sends two pictures, one of Fang and other of Song]

Khun Tai TTV: It’s better if I call you

[A 05:04 call made]

………………………………

Three things that we can take from this conversation:

1 – The decision to not sign Pun on TTV came from Tai, not the executives. And I’m almost sure no one tried to talked back on that decision because they trust Tai’s judgment, so people assumed he had his reasons to do so.

2 – Not only Koon did not try to talk Tai into changing his decision for example, just like she did with Pun’s parents to let her take him with her) but she also quickly pushed Pun aside and “sold” her two other artists as soon as Pun stopped being “profitable” for her. Like, it took her two minutes between her saying that she understood his decision to her sending the two pictures to him; two minutes that could’ve be used to try to convince Tai to give Pun another chance.

3 – This conversation happened on August 16th. The conversation and subsequent meeting between Pun and the executive happened on August 23rd. A full week. She kept that a secret for a full fucking week.

Oh, and remember on episode 3 before Pun went out to meet Nott? There is this scene where Pun kicks a box of cosmetics that was on the floor and the first thing Pun asks is “Khun Chalerm sent this?”, to what Koon says “Yes. Pharaoh is about to get a drama job. So I asked him for a skin care kit”. Pun then laughs and says “just an extra, I think you don’t have to do this much” and Fang, instead of answering back like he would usually do, simply stays quiet. Pun, expecting an answer, nods while still smiling but after not receiving one, he just smiles victoriously, thinking that he had succeeded in humiliating Fang one again, and goes towards the door; Koon, noticing that he was about to leave, asks Pun where he’s going and he said that he was going to see Nott and this exchange happens:

Koon: You go out with Nott often now. Who said that he doesn’t want to be a shipped partner forever?

Pun: I did. I won’t be a shipped couple forever. I’m going to be in the TV channel soon.

When I saw her expression in this scene, I assumed that it was related to Pun being very close to Nott, so she was suspecting that something was happening between them. Now that we know that at that time, Pun was no longer going to be in TTV, her expression was a mix of “guilt” and probably fear: “guilt” because she was hiding the real information from Pun and fear because there was a chance that Nott could say something about the fact that he had signed with TTV and that could make Pun realize the truth.

Also, Fang not reacting to Pun’s teasing was just him keeping himself calm because he was expecting for the opportunity to humiliate Pun back with the news that he was the one that TTV took, not Pun. He probably had already envisioned how things would turn out and was salivating for the moment.

Wow, who imagined that talk so extensively about how trashy and vicious and disgusting Koon is would drain my energy, huh? Anyways, let’s move one and talk about the second sub-theme I found in this episode, that pertains to nothing more than the media.

2. Media intervention: from love to hate

Yes, let’s talk about the influence the media has on how we perceive people, because who doesn’t love to talk about media manipulation, right? (I’m being ironic here)

I’ve talked about how the media influences before in my post for episode 3, when I mentioned how the media had a hand into the feeding process on “rivalry” between actors and was also more busy with the possibility of petty feuds between them than do a more informative work of talking about the actors’ jobs and aspirations inside the industry. Quoting from my closing thoughts about that matter:

“[…]the industry and the media work together when it comes to which image project about certain people and how people will perceive them. Both choose what to show, what to say, what to highlight, all in the pursuit of the next big thing. Both make and break the stars at their whim and will continue to do so as it pleases them.”

Based on what happened to Pun in this episode, guess what the media decided to do? I’ll give a few seconds to think in an answer.

[I’m not going to defend or whatever variation of that Pun’s actions towards other people in this episode nor will I ignore the fact that Pun was trying to fight off something that he thought had been done wrongly to him, because let’s not forget that his “explosion” on set only happened after he knew that his shooting schedule had been cut on half and the other actors got theirs doubled, receiving a half assed excuse that it was because he wanted to “have new actors” and “the customer wanted that way” because it wasn’t.

When you think about that, two possible situations can come across your mind and you asked yourself:

1 – Did the schedule cut happened before the announcement that Nott was the one that signed with TTV?

2 – Did the schedule cut happened after the Instagram story that Pun posted?

Because if it happened before the announcement, Koon, Pun’s manager at the time, did not informed him of that and decided to roll with it, something that is already not good. But, if it happened after Pun’s Instagram story, then it was Koon’s spiteful action towards Pun, and I’m willing to go with the second option because of one small detail: the orange box on Pat’s table.

That orange box had an appearance before on episode 3, when Koon decided to give one to everyone on set, including the staff that worked on set. That orange box was some sort of “bribe” from her part and here on episode 4, we can attribute that same reasoning to the act of her giving one to the person responsible for the series. Because you cannot tell me that it was a coincidence that Pun’s shooting schedule was cut in half and Pat so happened to have something sent by Koon, the same person that not only was no longer Pun’s manager but also had reasons to destroy his career, after all Fang was her new golden goose.

This is me being as impartial as I can, to avoid making biased posts and lean towards certain characters just because part of their story resonates with mine, that’s why I’m giving you guys the most logical conclusion based on the evidences we have from the episodes we were given.]

Going back to the media image manipulation, as soon as the video of Pun “losing it” on set became viral and one of the staff made a live telling their side of the story and, all of a sudden, everyone was telling all the bad things Pun had done, either on set or not, sharing pictures taken suspiciously (I’m gonna talk about this a bit further down) or making twitter spaces to discuss what had happened/was happening. The media itself, instead of trying to approach Pun to get his side of the story or, at least, get an explanation as to what had exactly happened in the set on the day the video was taken, decided to create news saying that Pun was “whining on the set” (talking about the video), that behind the scenes he was “an entertainer” (talking about the picture of him and Khun Chalerm from episode 1) and that the series, or the people behind it, had “casted out main actor”. To make matters worse (because Pun did not caught a break in this episode, Murphy law style), GusBew ended up being interviewed and, instead of people talking about them, you know, as actors and stuff like that, they spent the entire interview session asking questions about Pun, if he had always been like what the viral clip showed, if they had seen Pun often, if one of them had seen any strange behavior and so on.

But, instead of the “tea” the interviewers were actually expecting, i.e GusBew confirming that Pun was the bogey man of the industry and the big bad wolf, they instead got GusBew telling them that Pun was a very good and professional actor in the industry (something that was not a lie), that they only had contact with Pun only on set and events (not a lie) and that Pun was very kind (a half truth) and that he even brought an ice machine on set (again, not a lie) that he let anyone use. The faces of the interviewers listening to that was simply gold because they went there with an agenda to be fulfilled (getting more dirt on Pun) but left with a list of compliments from Pun’s coworkers. Sorry you didn’t get your scoop, honey, that’s how life is.

Now, talking about the pictures the GossipXoxo’s twitter account posted , I have two questions about it: the first one is how did the person that took the picture (assuming that it was the same person that posted the picture) managed to be so close to be able to take the picture of Pun and Khun Chalerm? Because that person had to clearly be either inside the office, without being caught, or installed a surveillance device in there and managed to get the picture. Regardless, that person had to be inside the building, probably inside the office, at night, and be sure that no one would bat an eye to them.

The second one is about the picture of Pun in front of 701’s room. Considering that he was wearing a mask, glasses and a hood over his head, unless you knew that it was him, had followed him there or knew about his “meetings” with Nott, there was no one someone would pay attention enough to take a picture and keep it for so long (we are talking about a scene that happened in episode 1, being used three episodes later. That’s weird, to say the least). Who took the picture knew exactly who that person was and kept the picture for a reason.

My bet is that the person showed during the twitter space thing was Atichon. Who do you guys bet on?

2 – NottPun: the couple that is not a couple

Let’s talk about NottPun? Let’s talk about NottPun.

So…NottPun in this episode was the biggest emotional mess that they’ve been since their story arc started and I wish I was lying about that. I keep using the expression “that showed a lot of nuances in less than one hour” in my titles but I’ve never actually felt that way until episode 4 aired. BillySeng did an amazing job in portraying NottPun’s emotions through their eyes, through their facial expressions, their voice tones, everything. It was gut wrenching watch their suffering (specially Pun’s suffering) in this episode, seeing them getting hurt, seeing their world shatter in front of their eyes, without having any chance of stopping it or slow it down.

Anyways, before I repeat what I said in this impromptu post about Pun, let me untangle the tangled mess that we got with NottPun in this episode. However, to talk about NottPun in this episode, I will need to explain his attitudes in context, so that my train of thought makes sense and I will use subsections to do that:

Phase 1: Pain infliction

NottPun in this episode already starts on a bad note, with Pun discovering that Nott signed the contract with TTV and not him. Nott, upon waking up and seeing the ad on television (I'm sure the moment he looked at the television, it only had his picture and not the picture of him with Fang), hugs Pun and says that he would also be part of the TTV, which means they "would work on the same network" (when I said I wouldn't make any judgments or comment on this subject until I had Nott's version, it was because I was assuming there was something wrong with this whole story and I was right). Pun, obviously annoyed, asks Nott "why was he doing that" and Nott replies, still half-excited but confused by Pun's reaction, that he "had signed the same contract as Pun, so why was Pun angry?", making Pun point to the television, which was still showing the news of the hiring of new actors, and this time it had a picture of Nott and Fang on the screen, and says that he (Nott) and Fang had signed a contract with TTV and that out of the two of them, only Nott had been taken, "they didn’t want him"

To give you an idea of how slowly Pun was processing events, he wasn't even worried about the fact that Fang was on the same network he had fought so hard to get into, but rather that Nott had gotten what he wanted, making Pun direct his growing anger at the person closest to him at that moment, who was also the person who had hurt him (or at least one of them). With that, Pun begins by saying that he "knew Nott was stupid, but I didn't realize he was stupid up until that point" because "big network channels never signed contracts with the two members of a ship" (I wonder if there is any plausible reason for that because I was surprised and genuinely curious).

Nott then says something very curious in response to Pun's words, which piqued my interest, that (probably when they presented the contract for him to sign) "they said it was a contract for 2 people and the other person was being managed by Koon" and it made me think of two things: the first is that even though Koon had two other artists under her belt, Pun was the one that was getting the most attention at the moment, especially considering he had just come off a hit series and was currently recording its sequel, and since it was a big network and the same one that Pun had shown interest in, it made sense Nott would have concluded that the other person who would sign the contract was Pun. The second, and this is more speculation than anything else, is that Nott probably only signed the contract precisely because he thought the other person who was going to sign was Pun, i.e. Pun was the reason he signed the contract.

Nott has never struck me as a liar (I'm not saying he doesn't lie, just that he wouldn't lie in such serious situations), so I'm inclined to believe what he said that he had no idea the other actor joining him in TTV was Fang and not Pun, because it would be a very stupid move for Nott to intentionally steal Pun's dream and then act like he didn't know anything, considering how desperate Pun was to get that contract and how unstable and a little out of control Pun tended to be when things didn't go his way. Obviously, Nott could just be manipulating Pun, just like Koon had done, but you don't spend that much time trying to earn someone's trust and then do something like that.

It's basically a shot to the foot or a stab to the chest.

[As I'm trying to be unbiased, I can't help but comment once again that we're taking this story from Pun’s perspective, which means that any attitude that doesn't come directly from Pun is intrinsically linked to him. That is, the story revolves around Pun.

We don't know anything about Nott, except what directly affects the relationship he has with Pun. Yes, we know he has been jealous, has always been concerned about Pun's physical and mental well-being, enjoys working with Pun and is comfortable being around Pun and always makes it clear that no matter what, Pun could always count on him. he. However, the problem with not having more knowledge about Nott's personality is that it leaves room for several interpretations, one of them being that everything he did is nothing more than manipulation on Nott's part and this is a possibility that I definitely I don't want to think because I need Pun to have at least one person as an ally, someone on his side, supporting him.]

After that interaction, we had that scene where Koon tried to manipulate Pun into thinking he was getting it all wrong (like the classic "it's not what you're thinking" line after he read the messages coming into her phone that same time was a well-known and most often failed tactic of manipulation), he walks away from Koon, Fang and Song (with how much that people are starting to reveal themselves as real snakes, I'm starting to distrust him too because the Song boy here is too innocent for my taste) and then posts the Instagram story, in which he hints that Koon had done something hateful enough to result in their professional separation.

Phase 2: Counter-attack rain

One thing I noticed while re-watching the episode for the fiftieth time is that everyone who interacted with Pun (Koon, Nott, Pat, Candy) was telling him to calm down, as if Pun's actions were from someone just throwing a tantrum and not really him having reasons to do so (it makes sense, at least from a literary point of view, that these people would have these thoughts because unlike us who have the advantage of seeing everything that happens and having access to all the information, we can see the full picture of everything that happens at any given time, but the people within the New Ship universe don't have that same advantage and act on the information they actually have access to) but none of those people were really willing to listen to what Pun had to say, understand his reasons or why he was acting that way, unlike Pun who was willing to listen to everyone and give the benefit of the doubt even when the person didn't deserve it.

Confirming this, Pun even asks Nott “why? Why is everyone telling me to calm down? If it were you, would you be calm?", as a way of expressing exactly what was going on with him at that moment and then says to Nott "I want you to listen to me, not tell me to calm down", that is Pun he just wanted someone to hear what he had to say.

It's after this scene that the nuances I mentioned come into play and we get to see exactly how hurt Pun was by it all, and because of that hurt, his self-preservation instincts kicked in. Pun knows, or at least has the confidence that Nott was on his side, but feels that there is no way Nott can help him because it was this same Nott who “stole his dream”, since Nott knew full well that Pun “wanted to being on TV", so why was Nott "doing that", because Nott "didn't want to be on TV let alone be an actor" (this was the first really personal information we've had from Nott since episode 1 and it didn't even came from Nott himself but from Pun). After that, Pun goes on the real attack and says that Nott "just wanted to be famous" and that "if he didn't have money he wouldn't even be there" because the industry only cared about having "superficial people, beauty and money instead of talent and effort”, which is why Nott was chosen and not Pun; Pun wasn't exactly saying that Nott had no talent or that he didn't make an effort to deliver a good work, but that Nott being a person who had money (which Pun didn't have), in addition to being handsome, made Nott "one of them" , someone who had the right appeal to catch the industry's attention.

The attack was working, because Nott decided to counterattack and says that Pun "thinks that way because he was no different" (from what he was criticizing) and Pun makes his counterattack saying that "he used to be that way", that "used to see Nott as a boat that would take him forward, but if today that same boat was useless, he had no reason to continue with it”. Even though it was too painful to listen, after all Pun had just said that he didn't see Nott as anything more than a boat, a tool for him to achieve his goals, there's something we need to pay attention to and it's the tense he uses when it says this: past. Pun does not say that he “sees” (present), much less that he “is seeing” (present continuous), but that he “used to see” (past tense) Nott as a boat, that is, his view of Nott has changed.

An interesting thing about this tense is that unless the person using it in a sentence specifies the exact tense (in days, month, year, etc.), everything that happened up to the time the words were uttered could set to “past” (e.g. “five seconds ago” is past). By this I mean that we have no way of knowing exactly when this change took place, much less what caused this change. Was it after they started their sexual relationship? After the events of Episode 2, more specifically their conversation after the event where Pun passed out? After Nott's confession in Episode 3, after Pun asked to spend the night with him?

I have the impression that Pun was ambiguous on purpose, precisely to not give Nott space to know exactly what had happened (I mean, Nott didn't even record the tense used by Pun) and also to get a specific reaction from him, which fact happened. And it is in this reaction that opens up a very important moment in the final moments of their conversation:

Nott: What you said, did you think about it?

Nott: Was I just that to you?

Nott: So I must have been wrong to have fallen in love with you.

At ANY MOMENT did Pun respond to Nott's words, having held still while Nott asked him the questions, and turning away as Nott said he had made a mistake in liking him, before bursting into tears. His silence and the act of turning his face away so Nott cannot see his facial expression are not the attitudes of someone who is talking about having used someone else for personal gain, but someone who is trying to appear cold and indifferent, someone who is trying to give the image of a person with no weaknesses that can be exploited. In fact, Pun only spoke again after Nott left the room and it was only to say that Nott "was stupid to have fallen in love with a person like him", demonstrating the side of Pun that thinks he is insufficient and not worthy of being loved, someone broken; to Pun, Nott was better off without him, at least sentimentally speaking.

Phase 3: The point of no return

Here comes the conversation that Pun had with his mother, one of the most painful moments that Pun went through in this episode. We have a man who has just pushed away one of the very few people who was able to see beyond the walls he had erected around him, trying to seek refuge in someone who, despite his regrets, was still a source of comfort to him, and receiving the response that Pun “would be better off where he was”, as he “had a good, comfortable job, and didn’t have to work as hard as other people” (there is a misconception in some people’s minds that it’s easy to be an actor and that there is no effort behind this profession), not to mention that his mother still had the idea that Pun was still going to be a TV star. She didn't ask how Pun was doing, didn't find it strange that he suddenly wanted to return home, and didn't offer any updates on the state of Pun's father's health; she ended the call with a “take care” and that was it.

At the moment when Pun felt most fragile, needed his family the most, his attempts to approach him were mercilessly stopped. I wonder if Pun's mother's attitude would have been different if Pun had called her to say he had already signed the contract with TTV, if she wouldn't have let Pun stay at home for a few days, if she wouldn't have been more affectionate. and paid more attention to Pun if his situation was different. Because Pun knew very well the image that his work had in his mother's head, he knew very well that his work was only tolerated because it made money and that money was sent to his mother and he helped her at home, and he knew very well that that contract with TTV would have been a starting point in his goal of earning the respect and pride of his mother; and he didn't have it anymore.

As if it wasn't enough that he didn't have the contract signed, it made it that much harder to get his mother's love back.

Phase 4: A man with nothing to lose is dangerous

Trigger warning: sexual abuse, suicide

When GusBew said that Pun was a professional and dedicated actor, they weren't just saying that out of nowhere, it was something they had personally seen and knew to be true. A big testament to this was how Pun, even though he felt like his world was crumbling at his feet, probably with a little hangover after he'd had a few drinks to drown his sorrows, prepared himself and went to the movie set to do his thing. job, after all he didn't have the luxury of just not showing up, not when he was an actor without a manager.

However, what happened on set was one misfortune after another: the cut in his shooting schedule and the increase in GusBew's schedule, Koon's bribe, his fight with Bird, the recording and the viral video, not to mention total silence and distance on Nott's part (to be honest, if I were in his shoes I probably would have done the same thing), though he reacted with mild surprise when Pun said he wanted to know "how the show would go on without him" . But other than that, Pun was standing officially alone, his dreams shattered by the people he'd placed his trust in, with nothing but his pain, his anger and his tears; as he always thought, he was fighting alone, trying to hold on to anything that would give him the slightest sense of control, yet he was fighting alone, surrounded by people who wanted nothing more than his downfall.

After that, we had his suicide attempt, something that being a person who also carries traumas of the same nature that Pun carries, I understand very well the weight he must be feeling at that moment, seeing his image being destroyed and not being able to defend himself , seeing the encounter he had with Khun Chalerm seen as him “entertaining” the man when the truth was far worse than people were saying, seeing his hard work on the series where he spent so much of his time being thrown into the garbage (he wasn't the only one to blame for this), having to remember the abuse he suffered at the hands of the old man he crossed paths with the day he returned home (honestly, seeing that gave me such a trigger I don't even know how I kept watching, and I've never felt so sad to see a theory of mine confirmed) and how it fucked up his head, with his life, turned him into the person he was today, how people looked at him and didn’t see a person but a sex object, available for their pleasure, how the one person who promised to be on his side was gone, how his life was basically over and he had no reason to keep trying to survive one more day, not when he had no one or nothing else to live for.

The way our body, our mind, processes trauma is one of the scariest things in nature. There are those who endure as long as they can and manage to find something that gives them the strength to continue, others reach their limit and simply stop along the way, but none of these people deserve to be judged because only they know exactly how much they endured and what was/is the its breaking point. Seeing how the world seemed to treat Pun like a disposable object, there's no way to look at what happened in the car as something that was almost not meant to happen. And just seeing the look of helplessness, loneliness, fear, defeat, on Pun's face, I can't think of anything else but “sorry for the way the world has treated you”; no matter how rude/arrogant/unnecessary he was to other people, Pun didn't deserve to go through what he went through, to be used the way he was used, treated the way he was treated.

I think this is where my impartiality decided to take a vacation, sorry.

Phase 5: Hope is the last to die

Nott going after Pun. Nott's despair at seeing Pun unconscious inside the car. Nott taking Pun to the only place where Pun ever felt safe, free to be himself, the place where so much joy and so much pain was shared, their refuge.

In Pun's mind, Nott would never come back to him, not after the hateful words he'd said to the one person who couldn't get enough of his assurances that he would fight on his side against the world. And that's exactly why, as soon as Nott asked if Pun was hungry, the first thing Pun asked was "why Nott had come back", to which Nott replies "how could he not be there?", that he "couldn't let Pun get away" again", before apologizing for stealing Pun's dream (something he didn't intentionally do, but which still caused heartache and pain in someone he cared about) and also for "not being on Pun's side when he needed it most.” Here was more Nott apologizing for not keeping his word and abandoning Pun, when he said so many times that Pun could always count on him, come what may.

Pun, who is fully aware of why Nott wasn't on the side, says he "did terrible things to Nott", so he didn't understand "why Nott was still taking care of him" and Nott says he was doing it because he "didn't care anymore" and that the rest could fuck off that he didn't care. Then he adds that “whatever Pun wants him to be, he could even be a boat, as long as Pun stay by his side” and that he is aware that “the world has been very mean to Pun but Pun should not be forget that Nott would never be mean to him", before asking Pun to be his and letting Nott take care of him, something Pun accepts, just like he accepted every time Nott promised he would take care of him because Nott never lied about it. , his having returned was the greatest proof of that.

Nott was giving Pun an attitude full of their love language: words of affirmation and acts of service. Pun knew he could trust Nott when that happened.

After that, we had Nott trying to reduce a little the damage that had been done, saying that he "was going to cancel the contract", receiving a surprised attitude from Pun, who asked "why would he do that, wouldn't it make things better" and received a “so what should I do to make things better?” from Nott. Nott, as I suspect, was probably only staying in the industry because of Pun, so being in a place like that without his motivation didn't make much sense, so he'd better not waste other people's time and just give up. Pun says that he "doesn't have to do anything" and that he would "wait and see him on TV as one of his fans" (I can't even imagine how painful it must have been for Pun to say that, after all it was his dream that were talking, but if Nott was willing to make that sacrifice for him, Pun could do the same in return. The industry had done nothing but cause him more pain than was necessary), getting a “as a fan? More like a boyfriend", which embarrassed him and made Pun respond with a "shut up".

I'd really like to say that NottPun cuddled in the hotel room, enjoying each other's presence and that Pun was finally starting to get his "happily ever after," but Pun seems to attract trouble as easily as he breathes, so let's go. talk about the last part of the episode.

Phase 6: Sleeping with the enemy

Ignoring the discussion between Pun and Fang, where Pun confirmed (not that we didn't already know that) that Koon did indeed pimp out his artists, let's focus on the fact that Nott, for some reason, at some point in his life, slept with Fang. Honestly, I was ready to dismiss the “how do you know his name is Fang?” from Pun, followed by “did you sleep with him?” like him doing what he does best and jumping to conclusions, but then Nott showed a guilty expression and the episode ends with an image from Nott's private Instagram story, as if it were visible confirmation that Nott did indeed sleep with Fang.

Far be it from me to defend a man online but I've seen a lot of people saying that this whole thing between Nott and Fang happened after the argument that Nott had with Pun, as a form of revenge or something but the fact that they showed that story demonstrates the opposite . In the first episode, before we were introduced to Room 701, during the NottPun encounter, Pun complained that Nott was late showing up and Nott said he was busy before he went to Pun. Later, when Pun goes through Nott's stories, one appears in which Pun asks "is this the subject you told me about?" and the story he shows Nott is exactly the story they showed at the end of episode 4. Again, far be it from me to defend man online, but if we follow the logic that nothing in New Ship is random (which so far it really hasn't been, each point is well connected to the other and so on), then showing the story was a way of say exactly when Nott slept with Fang, and no, it wasn't after the argument he had with Pun.

[Making a little space to complain, Nott, honey, you could have had sex with anyone, but did you really choose Fang for that? Was you desperate, by any chance? It's the only explanation I can find. Not to mention the possibility that Fang knew there was something between Nott and Pun and, given his track record of apparently wanting everything Pun wanted, decided to seduce Nott just to gloat about it later.]

Another thing I wanted to comment, which I found funny, is the fact that Pun's first conclusion to justify Nott knowing Fang's name was precisely that there was sexual contact between them, as if Fang's name was a state secret so well. guarded that could only be discovered through sex.

Small predictions

It’s 4 am in here and I can barely think straight, so I’m gonna make a quick prediction, that follows this ask that I received last week. So, in terms of what I think will happen to NottPun, I'm under the impression that we're going to have an ambiguous ending, where we'll have some hints that NottPun might be able to get together as a couple, even if it's not immediately at the end of their arc. Whether they end up together romantically or not, I'd like them to stay together, side by side, although I think that Nott sleeping with Fang is going to spoil a lot and I'm trying not to get annoyed with Nott about it. why couldn't he have chosen someone else to sleep with, other than the person that the owner of your heart hates the most?! I can't have a moment of happiness with these two, for God's sake.

#warofy #war of y #war of y: new ship #war of y: new ship episode 4 #nottpun #nott x pun #nottpan #pun x nott #billyseng #analysis #theory #megapost

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away-ward · 9 months

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Part 2, because im not done with my rambling lmao. This can be a separate topic, because it's not exactly about the same thing, but more like an explanation of part 1, but mostly just satire and observation about emmy's characterisation and interactions with others.

I dont know how to feel about the one i mentioned in Part 1, because I really love female characters who have flaws, even better when they have a great and believable arc about it (doesnt even matter if they got redemption or not), but this constant narration of emmy being "judgmental", we're always reminded of it, as if it's a fatal flaw, as if she has the worst character flaw than any others when we we kept on being shown how she wasnt at all each page we read, felt so unsatisfying, weird and illogical to me. I dont get the same satisfaction as when I read about Rika, Banks and Winter learning their own judging, internalised misogyny and changing for the better. Emmy's "judgmental" arc was so flat, i hated it. If PD really wanted to make Emmy a judgmental bitch, they should have at least made Emmy's thoughts and actions worse than 75% of Rika, Banks and Winter, combined. Thats the only way to go, because if I had Emmy as a friend, theres not much to her words that would be cutting to me, because most of them were true, people just dont like to hear it, and i dont always have to hear what i want to hear from my close ones, but then, Emmy IS a kinder person than me, lmao so take my opinion with a grain of salt. Like even when Emmy was "judging" these people yeah, I remember her making counter-arguments to temp down her negative arguments in her head about what was going on, and it was never malicious or evil. She was more analysing and critical, than maliciously judging, as the word "judgmental" implies. She wasnt even going after the people she criticises, at most, she made fun of them here and there, and they werent even as disgusting as her bullies, or Arion Ashby. It was so unsatifying to see. I thought we'll get a Nesta Archeron from Sarah J Maas' universe, or Silver from Rina Kent's universe, level of bitchy, but Emmy wasnt even half close to Nesta or Silver, and she got so many stones thrown her way. Before I read nightfall, i thought she was an evil bitch or something but then i read nightfall, and i was like, huh? Whats this? I fell in love with Emmy still, but not because of what i thought coukd be the reason to it: that she was mean, judgy and bitchy. Lmao, it was a very weird experience tbh. I fell in love with her character still, but at what cost? Hahahah.

No wonder Micah and Rory trusted her and took her side in the train, because Emmy was always just minding her own business, took care of others & only fought when necessary or under duress, which was probably very contrasting to the kind of people that Micah and Rory have probably met and had to deal with in the lives at home before and during Blackchurch with Aydin and Taylor (Micah being a son of a terrorist, watching innocents being killed left and right, and his mom being sixteen when she birthed him, and Rory a son of a rich high profile politicians, but had no one who cared enough to serve his brutalised sister justice so he had to do it himself, then he was sent away from it, kinda remindd me of The Glory, a Korean Drama about serving revenge for unjustice. Rory's character that we see when he was with Micah, Emmy and Will, especially, was also very contrasting to the way Alex described him to Emmy). When emmy said to the blackchurch gang about their rich privilege lives not having to worry about going home and work bare minimum wage or smth, it was made under stress, and everyone was shitting on everyone, aydin was even more violent towards Micah and Rory just because he was a loser ass bully. But even then, emmy's "insult" was only made after many threats thrown her way to assault her and some classist things said here and there to put her down like "oh yeah you wear something from target that my mom own", (which was sad because she knew her class without anyone mentioning it but it was kinda funny too ngl because aydins mom was girlbossing ebing aceo of a wel-known company, and he was being a loser ass flop bully in vlackchurch? Yea, i giggle a bit at the irony actually).

Unlike Aydin or Taylor, emmy didnt go out of her way to cause pain to others, even through others (like how taylor used aydins protection to hurt Micah, Rory and Will, but Emmy did the opposite and helped them instead), and i think these moments were the moments where Micah and Rory saw her character and personality the best, and was able to start to get along well with her, because even in duress, she took care of others, eben stranger like them first, before she did anything. Like cook for them, fight for and with them, playfighting etc., joke around with them, etc. She could literally just try to instigate something about Micah Rory to Aydin like what taylor did, but she never did, and like i said, she surprisingly get along with them and caring for them instead, so why wouldnt Micah and Rory NOT trust her, more than anyone in that train. Maybe even faster than when they trusted Will, lmao, no womder Will was sulky when they took her side, and had to take them on acar ride to show them around time. Even better when they found out Will was mad at a kinda embarrassing thing, because 1. he got dumped in high school and 2. she put them in jail because her abusive brother tried to kill her grandmere ☠️ it's so embarrassing when you think about it in their povs, they probably made fun of will and co. in their heads because didnt Rory asked will why emmy was here? And didnt will "mysteriously" said something like "oh everyone has a reason to be here", like WHAHHWHAHAHA thats so funny. I bet Micah and Rory were making fun if Will in private because of it before they slept beside mmy in the train, and continued to be her allied after for that prison break scene. And after all the good things they saw and heard she did, why the hell wouldnt she side with her? Like think about it yeah, maybe even Rory probably can see her struggles and relate to her about not having anyone to reach out to when something bad happened to her sister. And now he knew its because she wanted to save her grandmere when she was abused by her own brother? There was no reason to trust Grayson's annoying mysterious ass answer anymore, lamoooo, Ahhahaha! You see why this is funny, right? I cant be the one laughing here. I cant lie, everytime i came to Micah and Rory's scenes after the train, i kinda giggle a bit because wtf is going on with these guys? Why are they so dramatic? And they have a good and safe home and family to come back to, so why were they always complaining?

Anyway, coming back to that "emmy judgmental" discourse, basically, i already ran out of things i want to say about it because i think i already made it clear about how i thought emmy was like and how i wished her character was instead earlier, but some other cases of being judgy but not really: i remember Emmy talked to ella at school, and said soemthing that can sound kinda judgy to others, but really she was just saying "ok yeah, if thats your kinda fun, go ahead" but then she saw how ella's face changed and quickly made up for it because ella was just being nice, and it wasnt ellas fault for whatever that was happening then. When she saw damon in the train with winter and made a general assumption about his love life, saying something about damon being married and winter liking someone like damon. Was it not fair to do so, kinda? But damon himself had a history of treating girls like shit, and suddenly when she meets him again, he changed, so i dont think it's a bad assumption to make, because his change was drastic. 80% of kill switch he was shit to winter, but then she confessed, and he wasnt shit anymore?? This was also why i hated damon's arc, because the last 20% killswitch and the whole conclave damon was so??? As if PD wrote a whole different character. We disnt even see him slowly change, it's exactly like a kill switch, as if he was suddenly kinda good now? What the hell was that? It's so unsatisfying to see. Like winterdamon's conclave arc was literally winter being bitchier than damon, like what the hell was that? Maybe damon is the only person she"ll be bitchy towards, but still, why is this man suddenly soft? And out of nowhere he was shit to misha? As if misha wasnt the first to notice will's disappearance? Huhhhh? Anyway, conclave solidified my opinon towards damon's character arc: pure shit. Also, how was he suddenly better than michael? Huhhhh? Its so confusing, but then michael was shit too, i cant even imagine damon doing all that michael did to rika with his friends to winter, so i guess comparing them is really not helping anyone at all, lmfao!

+ your discussion with that Anon about Damon And Emmy being mirrors is kinda interesting 🤔 I feel like if Damon chose to build more than to destroy, he could be more like Emmy, and if Emmy chose to live in hell rather than heaven, she could be more like Damon. To me, Emory and Banks were more similar to Damon than Rika, because lf their personalities. But i can see why Rika was Damon said that Rika was similar to him instead, because what they wanted was to be the centre of chaos, but Banks just wanted to be safe and happy, and Emmy just wanted to be with Will, build things, and destroy things with her loved ones. But at the core, Damon and Emory's personality was more familiar than they would ever like to admit. In fact, i dont think they even noticed this, might even need one or some of their family members to point this out, only then, they might notice it. Because both are highly secretive loners, so it needs a lot to peel off their masks, kinda ironic that they were the ones who saw themselves in the other first before anyone even relise this. They're like foils to each other, so similar, yet so different. Maybe their dynamic is like Ill and Alex, but not quite either. Because i believe, Will and Alex was only mirrors when they enable each other, but in reality, they too, were like foils, like Damon and Emory, bcause what they want in life is different. Alex wanted to be rich, indelendent and fight against prejudice against her for being lower than these high class people yah, but Will always wante dto just do better and more. So even when these four are mirrors to their pain, there not parallels to their wants. Emory's wants and needs are the ones that are parallel to Will's, that's why they ended up together, because their main motive of life is very similar, to do better and go beyond everything.

Now, i also saw one of the latest anon post bout POC DN, but unfortunately, i dont think we'll ever get that from PD. I'm a POC myself, and i never expected or thought PD would go for this route, in fact, when i read DN, i knew the kind of fictional characters that im reading (everything that i cant relate), which i was very grateful for. Because i dont think PD had it enought in them, of the knowledge or sensitivity about POC or religions, to go about this topic. Ive read most of their books, and anything related to race, ethnicity, and religions are just a no-go for PD so far, and its totally ok, better for them to write what they can and want to write rather that asking for the impossible. The story is gonna come out ok, but was it honna be good? Idk. It's like a fish climbing a tree, can they do it? Maybe, but can a fish climb it well? No one knows. It was always implied in text that PD wasnt really interested to write these kind of things, and like i said, i think thats totally fine. Their niche is always about "doing whatever you want to the fullest", and even then, a lot of context are still very western-values (this observation coming from a non-western POC myself). I hope that anon understand that if they wanna find something POC related, better to find it from other POC writers instead, you can just search it up on tiktok for it, theres a lot of similar books with POC characters i promise, theyre just not as popular. I think With Cindy on Youtube made similar and good arguments about this POC thing in two of her videos for: deadly Education (?) by naomi novik, and that addie la rue book by ve schwab. You guys might wanna check it out about this kind of discourse if you're interested i guess.

Other than that, i like that anon's observation about wanting damon's love interest to be just as intense or razy like him, because i was expecing the same!!! Like, even rika was crazier than winter. You can take winter out of the story, and it still wouldnt change a thing, thats how useless her character waa in the series. Her character only serves the purpose of being Damon's love interest (LI). I thought inter was going to be fiesty as we get deeper into their story, but it never happened, and the one (1) time she was being mean to damon about his mom, she was being shit on by a lot of readers, as if damon did not soend the entire kill switch being horrible to her, especially in that haunted house. I expected more but she didnt even fight him much? Idk, damonwinter was just so unsatisfying to me not only because of damon, but also because of winter partly. So much potentially for her to bully the fuck out of damon and made him her lapdog or something you know, but it never happened! But i dont hate winter though, idk how anyone could hate her, but still, she still brought nothing for me. Even when she was soft, kind and nice, it wasnt intense. As annoying as rika was, at least she was in everyone's face about it, but winter was just? There? I guess? I love soft, nice characters, but i love them like i love Esme from the Bride Test and Eve from Act Your Age Eve Brown, like their softness, niceness, is just soooo deep you know, but winter was meh to me. For a book thats supposed to be about feeling everything the most apart from corrupt, kill switch didnt deliver for me for this reason, and also because the plot was shit. But then every dn book has shitty plot sooo idk.

Ok, I think thats all, i wanna say (me saying this after posting two separate essays about fictional characters, + response to unknown anon on the internet, lmaooo) and im interested to hear your thoughts about them. Those anons whose posts are mentioned, if youre interested to join in the discussion, please do join, and lets have fun having long anonymous "chats" like this, lmao (away-ward) only if dont mind of course. Anyway, I like to read your answers, rambles, agreements and disagreements with anons here, it's like im in a fun discord group discussions or something with people who ACTUALLY wnat to talk about anything and everything, rather than just "yeah, i dont agree okbye". So please, do keep posting long stuffs, im sure a lot of your mutuals here like and appreciate them if they might not say anything in the comments.

Have a good day!

Ramble away

Except... I’m kinda gonna derail you for a second because your comments got me thinking. Another reason why it bothers me that blackchurch happened towards the end of the series is that we don’t really get to see Emory act in normal circumstances. In Nightfall, she’s always stressed. She’s either dealing with her life as a teenager or she’s literally been kidnapped and dragged to an island to be threatened by men who are so bad, their families don’t want anything to do with them (at least as far as she knows). Like, we can agree that being judgmental is not the fatal flaw that the narrative makes it out to be, but then… what are Emmy’s real flaws? It can be a little difficult to determine because she’s always reacting from the gut in NF, not making decisions how she’d normally make them. And while I love that she’s quick and decisive enough to protect herself and deal with the situation, I’m kind of left wondering.

So I did some research and looked up character flaws to see which ones I can see in Emory, just so I have an idea. I think it’s important to note that any trait can become a flaw if it’s imbalanced, which is why it’s hard to tell under the circumstances. Who wouldn’t be off kilter in the same situation? Based on just a few lists (that are in my likes if any of you are interested and what to offer up your own), this is what I’ve come up with:

Argumentative – even if she did agree, she always had a comeback or never went along easily. I think she liked arguing in her literature class, as long as the topic didn’t hit too close to home. When they're disembarking the train, Will asks if she's going to stop fighting and she says never (something to that effect). Girl likes her verbal spars.

Blunt – she had a habit of saying things the way they came to her head, or what she was really thinking, even if it hurt someone’s feelings. She could also be opinionated, and offered what she thought without being asked. Even though it was often true, it wasn't the nicest way to convey the thought. In certain situations, she would speak first and then apologizing when it came out wrong.

Competitive – not always a bad thing, but I think if she didn’t have Martin holding her back, she could have fallen into the trap of taking things too far.

Critical – I think this is where people get her confused for being judgmental. She is highly critical of people. She has high standards for herself and those in her company, but she doesn’t judge others for their legitimate failings or mistakes. She judges them for not meeting the standards, especially when they have every opportunity open to them and the path cleared.

Maybe a bit of a perfectionist, but it’s hard to say. If so, it would go along with her competitive nature.

Maybe a bit stubborn, but then she’s been pushed around so much it’s hard to say it’s a flaw that she tends to dig her heels in when she can.

Maybe a bit aloof – the tendency to go off on her own/work on her own. But we’re shown that she’s willing to make friends, she’s just awkward at times because of her history. I think she probably found it easier with Micah and Rory because there was no need to explain. They had an in immediate understanding of difficult families.

And these are all guesses. Some are more accurate than others. But even reading through those lists, the amount of things Emory was not far outweighed the things she might be, even at her worst. It might have been nice if she had a real flaw, like a shining one, that wasn’t caused by her background and one she was unashamed of. But Emory is, I think, the only truly good person in this series. The rest are either morally gray or neutral, for all intents and purposes. Winter might come next. She’s not exactly neutral, but I still don’t see her has being as having as good intentions as Emory does.

Okay, thanks for indulging me. Back to your comment:

as if she has the worst character flaw than any others when we we kept on being shown how she wasnt at all each page we read, felt so unsatisfying, weird and illogical to me. I dont get the same satisfaction as when I read about Rika, Banks and Winter learning their own judging, internalised misogyny and changing for the better. Emmy's "judgmental" arc was so flat, i hated it.

I agree with this. I’m not sure if it was the situation or what, but what I did find is that the build up to what made Emory so bad was super anticlimactic because I just looked back and everything I read and was like “Yeah, her decision makes total sense to me. What do you mean this is the reason you’re mad????” I mentioned before what I felt Emory needed to learn, but even then these weren't the same as what the other girls had to unlearn to move forward.

It was kinda the same with Winter, to be honest. Like, I know Damon was mad that she didn’t come to his defense, but at the same time he did lie to her. He manipulated her senses, used the lack of her sight to his advantage, and deceived her into thinking he was someone else. Again, she did herself the disservice of sleeping with a man she didn’t actually know, didn’t even have a name, but even if he did give her a name, that would have been a lie. I don’t completely fault her for refusing to tell them anything. She felt violated. So yeah, she didn’t owe Damon anything. But in saying that, I didn’t feel like Winter had it as hard as Emory. She had friends she could rely on, people already on her side. The hardest I’ve seen readers come at her is that she’s boring or dull (but I'll be honest, I haven't looked that hard). This is so different from Emory, who I felt had more of a defense for her actions both before and after the “event”.

even when Emmy was "judging" these people yeah, I remember her making counter-arguments to temp down her negative arguments in her head about what was going on, and it was never malicious or evil. She was more analysing and critical, than maliciously judging, as the word "judgmental" implies.

Yes, exactly! She’s critical, sometimes to the point of making fun of them, but she’s not being malicious. She’s not trying to hurt anyone or planning to hurt them. And I think even if she wanted to, if given the chance, she wouldn’t take it. I’m not sure, but I think abuse victims are more likely to be re-victimize than to become abusers themselves? I think this would be true for her.

I thought we'll get a Nesta Archeron from Sarah J Maas' universe, or Silver from Rina Kent's universe, level of bitchy, but Emmy wasnt even half close to Nesta or Silver,

So I don’t want seem weird or anything (here on the being openly weird site) but sometimes I notice that people who are Emory fans tend to also like Nesta. Never having read the series, I’m not sure what the correlation is. Does anyone wanna feel me in?

I fell in love with Emmy still, but not because of what i thought coukd be the reason to it: that she was mean, judgy and bitchy. Lmao, it was a very weird experience tbh.

This took me a minute, but I eventually got it. So you were hoping for someone sarcastic and mean to put these men in their place, and instead you got compassionate and kind, and yet still put them in their place? But because her story was so genuine you still came to love her?? If so, I get it. I don’t know what I was expecting from Emory, but I wasn’t disappointed. However, I was a little shocked to see all the Emory hate. How could anyone hate someone so sincere as Emmy? But to each their own, I guess.

Emmy was always just minding her own business, took care of others & only fought when necessary or under duress, which was probably very contrasting to the kind of people that Micah and Rory have probably met and had to deal with in the lives at home before and during Blackchurch with Aydin and Taylor

Good point. I think Micah could see the kind of person she was before Rory even cared, but it does seem to be that once she was under Micah’s care, she was under Rory’s as well. Not that it mattered much in Blackchurch, considering they were the underdogs, so to speak. But it was an important line to draw. They saw the truth of her character and I think at that point, it wouldn’t have mattered what anyone said about her, they were convinced of the type of person she was. Like when they fell from the balcony and she had the mind to protect his head? I'm not sure I could have reacted so quickly and thoughtfully. And then to not doubt herself that she just saved his life when he could turn around a hurt her? She did the right thing because it was the right thing to do. And that speaks volumes.

but it was kinda funny too ngl because aydins mom was girlbossing ebing aceo of a wel-known company, and he was being a loser ass flop bully in vlackchurch? Yea, i giggle a bit at the irony actually).

I forgot about that, but it is really funny. It’s hard to take him seriously when I’m reminded that he threw his entire life away for Alex. I mean, I’m happy they’re happy and all that, but come on, man? You got sent away for refusing to marry the woman you don’t want, okay fine. That’s an okay hill to die on. But kidnapping another girl because yours is busy sleeping with everyone but you, almost intentionally avoiding you? Seriously??

And why did not one person apologize to Emmy? She forgave them, sure. But still. No, I'm not over it.

no womder Will was sulky when they took her side, and had to take them on acar ride to show them around time. Even better when they found out Will was mad at a kinda embarrassing thing, because 1. he got dumped in high school and 2. she put them in jail because her abusive brother tried to kill her grandmere ☠️ it's so embarrassing when you think about it in their povs,

Oh my gosh can you imagine their discussions! After hearing everything, they’re just side eyeing each other like 'did you hear that or am I crazy?' And when they’re alone, Micah’s just like “wait, did I miss something? Are they really mad because she was backed into a corner?” and Rory’s like “No you got it right.” Like neither of them can fully grasp or wrap their heads around this concept. And then they have to go to the wedding and hear about Rika… no wonder they were trying to grab the girls and run. They for sure mock these guys when they’re alone, or maybe even with Emmy who can’t help but laugh at the ridiculousness of it all.

Rory probably can see her struggles and relate to her about not having anyone to reach out to when something bad happened to her sister. And now he knew its because she wanted to save her grandmere when she was abused by her own brother? There was no reason to trust Grayson's annoying mysterious ass answer anymore, lamoooo, Ahhahaha! You see why this is funny, right? I cant be the one laughing here.

I can see this being the thing that solidifies Rory’s loyalty. Like, I never paid much attention to them (sorry, I know people love them. Sometimes side characters slip off the edge of the story for me), but now talking about it, I can see that Rory is loyal to Micah, and Micah feels something for Emmy, so now he’s protective of Emmy too. But only as far as it doesn’t put Micah in danger. Now, though, I can see this being the moment things shift for him and suddenly Emmy moves from secondary to a higher priority.

It is funny that Will got all sulky after that. From now on anytime Will’s like “This is a serious problem.” They can be like

“Really? Serious like the time you went to prison for crimes you committed and recorded, and then you tried to convince me that was Em's fault? Is it that kind of situation? Remind me how long her grandmother lived after that? Was it seven years?”

“…it was seven years.”

“Wow. Seven additional years with the only person who cared about her. And how long were you in prison for?”

Micah and Rory never fail to remind Will just what a drama queen he is.

When she saw damon in the train with winter and made a general assumption about his love life, saying something about damon being married and winter liking someone like damon. Was it not fair to do so, kinda? But damon himself had a history of treating girls like shit, and suddenly when she meets him again, he changed, so i dont think it's a bad assumption to make, because his change was drastic.

Right, we all make assumptions or judgments based on prior information. That’s just how humans work. But Emory also adjusted when new information became available. That’s why I don’t think she deserves to be labeled judgmental. She works off information and evidence she already has, not what she assumes to be true.

This was also why i hated damon's arc, because the last 20% killswitch and the whole conclave damon was so??? As if PD wrote a whole different character. We disnt even see him slowly change, it's exactly like a kill switch, as if he was suddenly kinda good now? What the hell was that? It's so unsatisfying to see.

Yep. There’s a tik tok somewhere in the damon tag that I rb specifically for this reason. I’ll try to bring it up again for reference. But yeah. I agree that he healed too quickly, and it’s not even that he ‘healed’ he just… fixed his ways? I feel like he should have still be a bit messy and manipulative. He was just sarcastic with Misha a little, but then he's never liked his friend’s family members. He didn’t like Trevor either (though, that proved to be for a good reason). Like, I bet if Kai had a sibling, he’d dislike them just as much. He likes Banks and sometimes Rika, and that’s it. Those are the only two valid siblings in his book. Stupid.

Anyway, I wanted him to cause problems and instead I got him softening the blow for when things went wrong and casually joking around.

I don’t know what you mean by how is he better than Michael. Do you mean to the readers? I think the readers just find him more dangerous than Michael and dangerous equals sexy in fiction. I will admit that he’s more fun to read and his character is more fleshed out, but that doesn’t make him a better “person” than Michael. Is that what you meant?

your discussion with that Anon about Damon And Emmy being mirrors is kinda interesting 🤔 I feel like if Damon chose to build more than to destroy, he could be more like Emmy, and if Emmy chose to live in hell rather than heaven, she could be more like Damon.

I see what you’re saying. Yeah, maybe 'reflection' isn’t the right word. I can see foil working, but I don’t know if PD ever intended for them to contrast each other like that. Still, I like the idea of them as a duo, however that works out.

I found it difficult to understand Will and Alex in NF, especially when she was saying things like “you’re my reflection.” I think it’s because we were so far removed, Will hardly ever gave clarification on what his relationship with Alex was actually like when they were alone. And then when she did show up, he had Emory on the brain, so nothing was the same. But what I thought was interesting is that I think Alex was trying to say they were the same. That she could hide all her pain under her smile, same as him, and no one would know. And like you said, they enabled each other, possibly mistaking that for strengthening each other.

But when we look in the mirror, our reflection is backwards. We don’t see ourselves the way other people see us. With a bit more pondering, there might be something there in that.

I was thinking the same with Damon and Emory – that they reflect the parts of each other no one else can see. But really, to compare it to Alex and Will, Damon and Emory would have to deal with their pain the same way, and as you said, they don’t. Damon destroys things and Emory tries to restore. So, they aren’t reflections of each other, but I think they can help each other and that’s the important part of a friendship.

Now, i also saw one of the latest anon post bout POC DN, but unfortunately, i dont think we'll ever get that from PD. I'm a POC myself, and i never expected or thought PD would go for this route,

I wouldn’t expect it from PD either. Truthfully, it takes a lot of research and consultation, and it will still never be as good as an ‘own voices’ story. But what I do appreciate is them not changing or completely casting all white characters, if that makes sense. It would have been easy to squeak by with “their skin was golden” or “tan” or “dark” and never really label it. But they did give a clear distinction when needed. We know that Kai is Japanese, and we know that Emory is Jewish, and we know that Winter is blind (if we're talking about diversity, I think that gets to be included). They didn’t shy away from giving clear details like that. Could it have been done better? Absolutely. And maybe in the future, they will be able to do better. There’s always room for growth. It still never be as good as if someone from that specific race or cultural were writing the character.

For me personally, not shying away has been a difficult part of writing and something I had to learn for myself. I’ve never been openly criticized for it, but more of a self-reflection. Sometimes, when a character comes to me, they are just automatically a different race or background from what I’m familiar with. When I first started writing, it felt easier to soften those details, maybe try to hide it so no one could tell if I got it wrong. Eventually, I had to gain the confidence to not change the character, but instead do the best I can to do research and talk to people, maybe even let them read to see what they have to say, and then take their advice or correction.

I don’t know how PD builds their characters, but they didn’t shy away from including POC, so there’s something to that at least. And I know it’s not PD’s forte, but there is something more I would have liked from specifically Kai and Emory’s storyline. I can’t articulate it right now, so I might have to circle back to this another time. I think the Anon was just noting the lack of diversity within the story, and then when POC were brought up that wasn’t Kai or Emory, it was in a sex scene. I can see why that would bother someone.

I mean… I can see both sides of the discussion and both have valid points. The area that PD was writing about has mainly a white population, added to that, Thunder Bay has a population of about 10,000. So their private preparatory academy is going to be made up of mainly white kids. I think there should have been more than two (2) POC in the whole school, even if the kids were coming from a different town because it’s a good private school, but that’s just me. I don’t know what the class size was like. At the same time, they would have just been minor characters at most. Maybe members of the basketball team, or even Elle could have been something other than white. It would be hard to mess that up, and none of those characters were sexualized.

But then does that count as representation? Does it only count if it’s a main character? And do we consider PD the voice we want to hear a POC character’s narrative from? Like you said, they can do it, sure, but is it going to be good?

Much better to look for a POC narrative from a POC author. Like you said, they’re out there, they’re just not as popular.

Side note: I don’t often get over to booktube, as often that I’m on youtube, but I do love With Cindy when I do.

i like that anon's observation about wanting damon's love interest to be just as intense or razy like him, because i was expecing the same!!! Like, even rika was crazier than winter. You can take winter out of the story, and it still wouldnt change a thing

Same. I think the moment Winter lost me was when she did the dance to Mister Grinch. One, why are you using Michael and Rika’s engagement party for this, though I’m sure Rika loved it. And two, if you’re so scared of Damon, why are you mocking him publicly? It sort of ruined her story for me. From that point forward, I felt like she was always crying crocodile tears. I couldn’t take anything she said or did seriously after that because like... are you just lying to get your way?

As annoying as rika was, at least she was in everyone's face about it,

Very true. Like a tiny little dog.

For a book thats supposed to be about feeling everything the most apart from corrupt, kill switch didnt deliver for me for this reason

I hadn’t thought about that, but you’re right. What was all “this is red” “this is how black feels” who are you, tswift? Regardless, I felt nothing. As always though, I enjoyed Kill Switch’s past scenes more than it’s present. I like the scenes where he took her driving, and even though in NF I was annoyed that Em’s attention had to divert so that everyone can have their cameo, I didn’t mind her seeing Damon get the bike to take Winter on a ride. That was actually nice.

And on that note, as annoyed as I was, it was also like “em was so invisible that she notices everyone else but no one ever noticed her in their story… except for one person.” which was something to think about.

if youre interested to join in the discussion, please do join, and lets have fun having long anonymous "chats" like this, lmao (away-ward) only if dont mind of course.

I don’t mind. For me, it feels like I step up to the mic and shout into the void, and sometimes the void shouts back. Sometimes it’s crickets, and it’s like “what did I say?” but it's still fun.

It feels Like this:

It’s nice to know someone is reading, even if it doesn’t get any likes or anything.

Feel free to respond to each other. Just, as I’ve said, be respectful. Even if you disagree, don’t be mean or insulting.

Thank you so much!! I do enjoy reading your thoughts. have a great day!!

*bolded in paragraphs are not for emphasis but to help me in skimming a lot post for editing*

#asked and answered #devil's night series stuff #nightfall #emory scott #character analysis #emory's flaws #continuation of prev ask #asked and answered 76 #asked and answered 77

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userholland · 2 years

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you're not racist for not liking zendaya, people are just nostalgic.

so, i have been wanting to bring up this for a while. i do not expect this to blow up or i expect a huge like/reblog ratio. this is a personal rant i've been wanting to give for a while now not only because of how outrageous it is, but how it has also affected my mutuals as well. (and with enough anger, i decided to literally do this so. yeah. my degree is getting put to use.)

a HUGE disclaimer that this is NOT a hate rant nor do i have the intention of hating on zendaya rather i am more focused on how people/fans have been speaking to others when bringing up either her as a person, her acting career and/or regarding her (skeptical) relationship with tom. mainly, these points will be actual reasons why people are slowly losing their interest in zendaya that i've seen brought up or talked about in the last few months. so, this not out of spite, just an increasing amount of unnecessary hate being spread about if one says they do not like her.

please do not blow up my ask box if you're not even going to read what i have to say, and i think it's something that should be said, at least once, and in full explanation than just a quick remark.

overall, the reason why i'm bringing this up is because of the sheer amount of "division" of fans within the spider-man fandom now that the nwh trailer dropped. no one deserves to be harassed or bullied over their preference to a celebrity nor should they be called racist or "someone who does not want to see black women succeed in media, tv, etc." (which i will explain why it's mostly false later). please take this with a grain of salt, but also understand where everyone is coming from aka knowing they are entitled to their own opinion.

1. outgrowing a disney star as she matures / little to no screen time when very promoted.

zendaya is someone we all grew up with on disney channel and for the most part, we all admired her and thought she was one of the best people that came out of the disney industry. i grew up a huge fan of zendaya because she was someone i wanted to be like, we all have those kind of celebrities growing up and she was a good role model.

now, it wouldn't be fair to go off by just her disney acting because let's be honest... all disney acting is overdramatic and not good, and that's really all the young actors can work with when they are given a contract. but for what it was, zendaya was a great dancer and singer in her disney career. she even got to produce her own show & had her own website/youtube channel to post videos of her daily life or hairstyles and cooking videos. she seemed to show a bit of activism as she grew as well. it was empowering to see a successful girl of color take interest in things that mattered to other girls of color. she was this bubbly, fun, and quite an adorable person who seemed to have a lot of passion in her eyes. but, everyone grows up.

as zendaya got older, so did all of her loyal fans so, that means closing the door on her disney life and opening to new and "mature" projects as a young adult. thus, the huge renewed franchise, spider-man, was her first big movie role－ yet she had 2 minutes and 50 seconds of screen time (even less than marisa tomei) and not even the love interest, yet her face AND name were big enough on the poster that you would think she had more lines. laura harrier, the actual love interest, is no where to be found. another factor is that tom holland was not a well known actor at the time, so they probably needed a familiar face in order to get people to say "i'll go see it for zendaya". it sold. it worked.

and of course we want to see our fav, miss zendaya, but for what we got & only for it to be relieved all along that she's mj? (as a new character, michelle jones, not mary jane)..... [opinion] it could have been squeezed into the second film if i'm being quite honest if the budding love between peter and mj weren't one of the main plots of far from home. it seemed sudden that it was revealed she was the new love interest when the role of mj seemed to be a goofy/fun role as one of peter's possible sidekicks in future movies.

there's no avoiding the accusation that throughout the films it seems that ned is becoming less of a main character the further the petermj / t*mdaya narrative is being pushed by both the mcu and shippers. even though mj was more introduced in ffh, she still got her own poster promo while jacob batalon did not. mj went from having 2 minutes of screen-time to 19 full minutes, ned leeds went from 15 minutes of screen-time and cut down to 14:30 in the sequel, less than the amount he was given in the first movie. [ this sudden shift in character stories is not stated or confirmed by marvel or batalon himself, just a theory by fans. ]

since the drop of the spider-man: no way home full trailer, some people do not think the character of mj is deserving of what seems like a gwen stacy parallel, which is understandable considering the big jump her character takes from barely being in the first movie then suddenly peter's girlfriend after the events of homecoming with liz moving + half the population was blipped so, peter & mj's relationship can only be condensed down to a few weeks, maybe 2-3 months.

recently, the dune press was massive knowing that two young talented leads, timothee chalamet and zendaya, were going to play "side-by-side" in a sci-fi movie remake that had an amazing director. everyone expected to see a new dynamic on-screen, yet some people weren't surprised that zendaya got 7 minutes of total screen time of a 2 hour film.

while the argument has been made that chani (her character) has more of a significant part in the sequel of the movie franchise [ set to come out in 2023 ], the question of "why was she bigger than some of the actual main characters?" is plausible. i'll answer honestly... profit from familiarity / knowing the audience that will want to see this movie. same business idea as spiderman: homecoming.

while zendaya did state she was disappointed about only spending a total of 3-4 days on set, it is still surprising for some fans to see how publicized her face/image was and the amount of interviews she had with chalamet yet they weren't in most scenes together within the whole movie.

2. she plays the same roles (as of now) aka it doesn't matter that she won an emmy.

she's had roles in greatest showman, spiderman: ffh, malcolm & marie, HBO's euphoria, the OA and most recently, dune & spiderman: no way home while also having voicing roles in childrens' movies such as smallfoot (zendaya is meechee) and the space jam sequel as the iconic lola bunny.

now... if you don't already see a theme in zendaya's physical roles, look a little more on the surface of all of them. it's no lie and not unseen to almost everyone that she always plays the "too cool to care" character in most of her acting.

rue bennett, michelle jones, and marie can all be compared to being the same character. the basis of a cold, bare-faced character with a monotone voice who tries to be emotionless until provoked, has a rough backstory (2/3 are being a semi-recovering drug addict) and someone who subconsciously pushes away the people they like because they are too scared to care. this character has not only had trust issues from others who have wronged them, but they has some mystery to themselves－ enough that the audience can either hate them for being unnecessarily angsty or love how blunt and quick-witted they are. it's common trope used in media, not just zendaya's way of portraying her characters.

important to say that no one is saying winning an emmy is easy!!!, but there was much speculation that zendaya won because of how well-liked she is. her performance as rue bennett was amazing, a bit more emotionally driven than most of her acting, there's no doubt in that. she even admitted how she feels connected to the character of rue in some way & wanted to take same levinson's personal story about addiction and treat it respectfully. but, people still questioned the nomination, wondering if because she was a hot, relevant and talented young person contributes to that award when winning nothing huge previously [ since she was the youngest person to receive that award as of 2021 ].

"And she [Vernieu] argued vehemently to showrunner Levinson that the series needed the magnetic good-girl Zendaya to draw in the audience, giving them someone familiar to make them feel secure within a challenging contemporary milieu that often feels too authentic for comfort." stated by casting director, mary vernieu in an Indiewire interview in 2019 about the casting of euphoria.

zendaya, herself, even said, "Essentially [Levinson] said that I was on a mood board for Rue, like he had put me on this thing for Rue," she explained. "And I was like, 'No he didn't. There's like, no way. There's nothing I've done for you to ever think that I could do that.'"

it was never confirmed she had the most likable vote, but speculated by some, especially when the other women in her category were much older than her and in award winning series with previous seasons (killing eve, the crown & ozark).

interviewed by collider magazine with sam levinson, she is asked what she was planning to do after the first season of euphoria wrapped. she says how euphoria felt like home to her and that she'll miss it & wants to be a more open actor, but ends with, "But it’s gonna be hard because this is such a special experience. You don’t get to play people like this often. It’s just a special thing. So, I don’t know what I’m doing. Thank god I have Spider-Man." This statement can be seen as something relatable of an actor or just knowing her luck, either way, she knows she has a safety net/enjoys spider-man.

where zendaya has always shined most is in fashion. not specifically modeling, but choosing the brands she wears and having a personal relationship with her stylist. in whatever she wears, everyone agrees that no matter what she wears, she has the body and struts the pose. but, it's really the only thing some people can say that they think she is expert in.

3. the feuding of t*mdaya... and the eruption of racist comments / the problem with shipping celebs / how hollywood pr is a profit driven business within its own industry.

while the other points have been proven more as fact, this is where the drama has exploded the most in recent months. drama that no one wants to deal with when simply what happened is they allegedly started dating.

for years, people and fans accused tom holland and zendaya having more than just a friendship. once a small, innocent joke that holland made about having a crush on zendaya turned into an ideal pairing that fans latched on to for the next 4+ years.

i'm not talking just about people who thought they were cute together, but i'm speaking about those creating dedicated pages to stalking any time that both tom and zendaya were together. all of these can be seen on instagram, twitter, tiktok and tumblr while also tagging tom and zendaya in their photos. not only does it cross a line of safety, but also privacy for the two when stories of their friends are screen-shotted by random "fans" only to post to a wider audience to the users own theories.

after denying multiple times that they themselves were not dating, in july of 2021, there were sudden pap pics published of them kissing in a car. while shippers have tried to prove someone (another shipper/fan) anonymously paid for these pictures, there is tons of speculation that this was the start of a spider-man pr relationship. not only are they're millions of followers for these accounts, but there are also trending tags (most likely since 2017).

for example: on tiktok, the #tomdaya has 893.3m views and on instagram, the hashtag is used 298k times. it's not unseen or surprising how it's always been talked about/vouched for before they were seen together + fueling the tag when the papz pics dropped and quickly spread around the internet.

with these, allegedly, candid pictures came a storm of mixed opinions and boy, was it messy, to say the least. a number of accusations were made of the two's sudden connection, including that the funko pops for spiderman: no way home came out later that day or that both of their previous movies, cherry + malcolm & marie did not do well in viewings, ratings and reviews.

hollywood has proven time and time again that it is a business within a business. pr teams, more likely than not, contact the papz because it is their job to publish big news. "According to Rolling Stone, it's likely that 90 percent of the paparazzi photos in Los Angeles are taken in West Hollywood and Beverly Hills -- specifically at celebrity hot spots." A HuffPost article from 2014 posted. so evidence/statements like this can leave people with different opinions on pr relationships, so it shouldn't be so far-fetched to believe that some people believe and don't.

[ this isn't a rant to prove t*mdaya as fake. i'm taking sources that i found about hollywood media and stating facts. do not say it is bias because i don't mention tom's gq article specifically mentioning their sudden relationship. ]

while we'll never know what couples throughout time were and weren't pr, it wouldn't be strange for papz to get called while other family members and friends agree to a contract of said relationship, they are usually never forced to do something they don't because they have the money and management. this is a fact that people have to keep that in mind-- in order to not slam "non-believers" and saying it's false or using the excuse "i know how the business works".

[ this is not truly fact, but been circling around lately, ] some fans have also noticed the attention to "details" on both holland's and zendaya's instagram pages. while tom has posted zendaya a handful of times from july to this november, zendaya has not posted about holland, other than in temporary stories. holland is referred to as "zendaya's hype man" which makes some fans upset since he, as well, is an actor and should be more than a zendaya fan page. basically what i'm saying is, some people think this is all zendaya driven while tom gets nothing in the end.

papz or otherwise, it will still wrong to invade the privacy of both. this is not an opinion, it's something everyone should know. if you respect tom and zendaya so much, as a couple or not, don't ask for their whereabouts or if they're with one another 24/7.

besides the i told you so's and invasion of privacies, the one that stuck out to me the most was that stans/shippers seemed to use the argument that "if you don't like tom and zendaya together, you're racist" or "if you dont like zendaya, you're racist" which brings me to the actual topic of this whole thing. not everyone who doesn't like zendaya is racist & using that it is racism as an excuse is unacceptable and misused.

it's not only abusing what racism actually is, but not an actual reason to say someone dislikes a celebrity. not to mention, i've seen this brought up by more white people than others (again, this is just from what i've seen) who don't/shouldn't have the right to say it unless with true evidence of said racism. shippers gear toward the argument of, "you're just jealous of zendaya because she's dating tom and that's why you don't like her" which is also not true, for the most part. no one wants to see tom or zendaya bitter, lonely and unhappy, but to, once again, falsely accuse others of this with no backup of said accusation is a far reach.

nevertheless, both are weak and immature responses to someone simply saying "i dont like zendaya". people and fans have to have different preferences or the world wouldn't go round. i'm not encouraging any kind hate toward either of them. it's the lack of respect toward others in each fandom that is very disheartening and toxic over celebrities who they, will probably, never be friends with / get to know since they like to defend them as if they do personally know both tom & zendaya (couple or not). i'm also not saying to abuse celebrities for their pure kindness, just know the boundaries they ask you to set.

no one, absolutely no one should have to sell /manipulate others on the idea if zendaya and tom (or any celebrities, for the matter) are dating or not or using racism as a "valid" excuse. both ways are toxic enough and they don't deserve to have their every move photographed or written down. and no i am not saying this was provoked by either tom or zendaya, they are not in charge of the way their fandom decides to act because it doesn't reflect on their characters.

conclusion !

i know this was titled "you're not racist for not liking zendaya" but i think it all simmers down to that let people like who they like and dislike who they dislike. no one has a choice on who admires who or who thinks is an amazing / terrible person or couple. i'm not saying that celebrities aren't human or don't or do deserve anything given to them, but they don't own your world nor do we know them.

i don't know if anyone needs to hear it, but changing your appeal of celebrities can be seen as a part of growing up. it's loosing a flame they once had because they seek out different celebrities who have similar or attractive qualities.

#anyways. pls dont flood the ask box #this is my blog. im entitled to my opinion as much as you are #rant

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garrothromeave · 2 years

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I want your opinion on Kawaii Chan as a character (mystreet version) and her dynamic with Zane

ohhhh boy. okay so i won’t lie i don’t think my opinion is much different than a good handful of aphblr users, and that being:

ew. what.

now allow me to explain!

[real fast, i would like to say that i have not ever watched season 5 and i haven’t seen season 2 in years, so take this with a grain of salt. (i am aware to an extent about the character development she gets in season 5 and i will mention it, so don’t worry).]

to start it off simply, mystreet kawaii-chan is not an interesting character. she’s an annoying, obnoxious and stalker-y person, and that in itself is enough to make me want to turn off any episode with her in it. i’m not saying she doesn’t have potential to be a good character, because she… kind of does, if you really, really look hard enough, but the character she is that we’re given, in my opinion, isss shit.

not only is kawaii-chan the most annoying character i’ve ever come across (excluding kim because kim just takes the cake,) she’s actually a horrible influence in general. i’m going to speak from experience here. back in 2016/17, when i was first into mystreet, kc’s character made me genuinely think it was okay to ship friends in real life. and that i did, and it made manyyy people uncomfortable. and i look around and people are still doing this with kc’s influence, and that’s not good. her little “aarmau frenzie” thing she had going on was nothing more than to force watchers to consider aarmau and make her friends uncomfortable. (like, legit, kc was asked many times by aphmau to chill out on the whole aarmau thing and kc literally did nothing with that. it’s fucking awful.)

i think kc as a character was significantly more interesting character in mcd. but the moment she was thrown into mystreet, like many characters, she was done horribly dirty.

of course, i could also bring up the whole japanese anime girl stereotype, but that’s already been said so many times. just know that i agree with that as well. the uses of the whole ‘-chan’ and ‘-sama’ etc etc are actually rather inaccurately used on a general basis. (not saying all of them are, but… over time, yes, they’re just not right.) also back in the day that also influenced me and i was also using those terms on my friends anddd yikes… yeah please don’t do that.

and her character development. if i’m wrong about it, i apologize, because i’ve just heard things here and there about it. but from my understanding, her whole “kawaii-chan” persona was just that. a persona. something to make her stand out in her family. which — okay, yeah, i can see where her character could get better from here. she dials down how annoying she is after this i think, but i still don’t think that fully erases the three and a half seasons of her awful characterization. and i dunno, i just don’t like her so it’s hard for me to see her in a much better of a light :thumbs_up:

i feel like there’s much more to be said about her specifically, and yes there definitely is, but eh i don’t really like talking about her so i’m not going to go into major detail.

now for her and zane’s relationship and dynamic.

personally? whyyyy.

okay. look. i think their dynamic has a lot of potential. i just personally wouldn’t make it a romantic one. i feel like zane and kawaii-chan would be absolutely amazing friends given time, but the yin-yang dynamic was forced onto them and hard. i see the appeal, i do, but it seemed so sudden and it was mostly to just satisfy the zane-chan shippers (in my opinion). i love the idea of zane being able to open up around someone else, and based on interests alone kawaii-chan could have been that perfect person, but in the light it was given it falls flat. i can appreciate how zane helps her grow in s5 of course, but their relationship felt sudden and out of place. like why did zane even sneak her in anyways??

overall for their dynamic: yeah, okay, sure, but do it better at least.

final thoughts!

i just don’t like kawaii-chan lmao. she could have been something, but she’s not, andddd yeah. amen

#aphmau #mystreet #zane ro'meave #nana ashida #kawaii chan

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evita-shelby · 2 years

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Between the Shadow and the Soul

Chapter 35

As much as Eva hates surprises, she hates pretending to be surprised even more. The twenty-nine-year-old witch had known the activist was going to corner her on the way to Tommy’s office, but since everyone is supposed to think the strange Mexican woman has no legitimate supernatural power, Eva must play along.

“Miercoles.” she mutters when Jessie Eden ‘scares’ her. Jessie finds her oddly fascinating, so much so that she’s made it her job to seek her out and see if she can annoy her into getting Thomas to rehire his workers back.

Eva wonders if Jessie Eden is queer as well. The witch remembers her strange admiration and dislike for the nude model at Gabe’s art school and her realization that she also likes women. “Every time I come to my husband’s Digbeth office I run into you. I’m starting to think you’re doing this on purpose, Eden.”

Eva had started to like Jessie, but her moods change faster than she can change Diane’s nappies. Just this morning she cried because Dia took her first steps, but they had been towards Tommy and not her.

“No children today, Eva, I thought you weren’t the type to hand ‘em off to nanny the second you grew bored of them.” Eden smirked as if she’d gotten something over her. Her new informant was one of Eva’s Smith relations, a Macdonald cousin from her grandmother’s side. Sara, second cousin once removed, invited to both her weddings and once or twice gotten caught talking shit behind her back. The young communist should take her words with a grain ---better yet, a jar--- of salt.

“Pretty difficult to fuck my husband if the children are there.” that had been said mostly to shut her up, but who knows, it might happen. “You should remind Sara not to run her mouth, one day she might find that my patience runs out.”

“She says you’re a bitch, that you wouldn’t lift a finger to help others ,but everyone thinks you’re a saint because you had to leave your country in a wooden crate.” Jessie keeps talking. Sara never liked her, and Eva stopped trying to like her after she said Eva kept Tommy at bay because he was poor. Never spoken to her after that.

“Sara also thinks if I hadn’t come to Small Heath Tommy would’ve fallen in love with her.” Eva snorts. Sara would have been the one asked to take care of granny after the previous nurse was caught stealing. But she lacked one thing to attract the attentions of man like Tommy: novelty.

Men were attracted to her because she was like an oddity at a curiosity shop. Sara was pretty and sharp as a knife, but she wasn’t the pretty foreign girl who dabbles in the occult. To get Tommy’s attention you had to stand out amongst the crowd.

“How did you know it was her? ”Jessie asked surprised. Sara didn’t know she was a witch, or at least not a real one.

“You need better informants, Jessie.” She mocked her. “Unbiased parties will tell you how it is, Kitty thinks of Thomas Shelby with fondness, Sara hates me for simply breathing.”

“What makes you think that’ll affect my judgement, maybe I’m capable of making my own opinions, Evie.” Her name drips with something akin to contempt.

“You think my husband will change his mind because you brought up Greta, and you think I’m incapable of caring for anyone else because Sara thinks I am a snake in the grass.” Eva points out.

“You don’t think he will?” Eden had assumed he’d cave in soon, but she doesn’t know Thomas Shelby, OBE.

“Tommy would’ve never let his workers suffer like that, but this is Thomas and this man you met would let the world burn out of stubbornness. If you hadn’t made things worse, I would’ve gotten him to compromise by new years.”

“I smell a wager, Mrs. Shelby.” Jessie smirks, if she had not been happily married, Eva would’ve so pursued her too.

----

“You know when I came here it was on a Manchester Car Factory crate. Made up a whole Pantomime about wanting a crate big enough to carry out some valuables I was selling and the company’s warehouses only had that one.” Eva sits at the edge of his desk, cross-legged with her skirt hiked a little too far up. His fingers play with the sheathed knife ---same one she almost killed him with long ago--- and she knows her husband will say yes to anything she asks. “Next thing you know, I was being helped out of it once we were out of the gulf.”

“What do you want, love?” he sighs irritated. Tommy knows her games, she knows his and everyone’s much happier to cut to the chase after five years of her seducing him to get something she really wants. Like him teaching her how to drive, his signature on an investment that made them millionaires and now the same factory Communists and disgruntled workers kept trying to burn to ash.

“The factories.” Eva keeps his gaze, she never backs down and her husband needs a reminder that he is not the only businessman in the room.

Thomas arches his brow, he looks handsome in his glasses. Eva used to associate glasses with old men leering at young ladies at balls, old maids looking for any fault they could find and ,worst of all, the word no.

For an entire year, every time she saw him wearing his reading glasses, it was always a no. Would you like to go see a picture? No, I'm busy. One week in Brighton for our real anniversary, just us and the seaside, mi amor? No, it’s me, Lizzie, Thomas is at some work thing with Tiago. Do you have any real excuse as to why you missed your own children’s birthdays? No, Eva, at least not one you consider a legitimate excuse.

If he says no, she’ll kill him with the paperweight she had made for him on their first anniversary.

“You could ask me for anything else, but you chose that?” he sits back on his chair, usually she’d climb on his lap ---or get on her knees if he let the game continue a while longer--- but this time Eva stays on the desk, standing her ground on the matter.

“What, two and a half children and suddenly you’ve forgotten your wife is also a businesswoman?” she asks, scoffing that he’d think her incapable. Its insulting, really.

“Remind me how great you are at business, love. Tell me why I should let you have them and we’ll see how it goes.” he was amused now, got that look in his eyes and that quirk in his damnable lips that told her that he’d make her work for that fucking yes.

“They'd still be yours, or Arthur’s, if you want, but I’d be the one managing them. Devlin works better with me, the workers trust me and you’ll be busy with your political career for the rest of your fucking life to even remember the mess you made here.” she leans forward, coquettishly even, as if daring him to refuse her.

“Tell me what Eden promised you and I’ll see if I can part with the mess I made.” He stands, looming over her, Eva subconsciously uncrosses her legs and he takes his place between them. They work like clockwork, like professional dancers so in tune with each other.

This was her Tommy, the man who never liked saying no to her even when she had a bad argument. He reasoned that Eva has never lead him wrong business wise, so he knows better than to take her words lightly.

“Her support. I may not like communists, but if you have her approval, you won’t need to blackmail or bribe too many people into making you a Member of Parliament.” Eva turned her face to his and she's lost in his eyes again, like she was twenty-three again and he was the young man who refused to back down no matter how politely she refused him.

“Are you decent? There's a Mrs. Ross to see you.” Lizzie’s knock breaks the spell and by the time the door opens, Mrs. Shelby is looking at a ledger over her husband’s shoulder, standing without a hair out of place.

---

“Well, you see, tomorrow would have been my son's 21st birthday. Had he lived. A- and I'm having a bit of a thing. Just sandwiches and beer and looking at old photos.” she gulps, her eyes dart around the office, avoiding the very discerning eye of the lovely witch she used to clean for. “And, as a gesture, I thought I would invite your brother, Arthur.”

Eva remains standing behind him, certain gestures, like her hand on his shoulder, confirm what he already guessed.

“A gesture of what, Mrs. Ross?” It’s a trap for Arthur, he has no doubt of that.

“Not exactly forgiveness.” Mrs. Ross is caught off guard when Eva takes the words from her mouth.

“But something like that.” she looks flustered, people often did when Eva did something that was a little strange. The timing was always a little off, the wording too exact or the unmistakable feeling that she can hear your thoughts. His wife wasn’t a mind reader, but she could ‘hear’ words and sentences before they were uttered. Something that always fascinated him about her.

Mrs. Ross used to clean for the late Mrs. Smith and she had been one of the few people to somehow grow used to Eva’s occasional strangeness, or so she had told Polly once. Can't look at a human lie-detector in the eyes, can’t she.

And also it's a way of saying thank you to the Shelby family---” her words are scripted, but she stutters and finds herself trapped in the eyes of the witch at his shoulder. “---for helping me and my children get by since the death of my Edward.”

The murder of her Edward, she means. The Italians might have scared her, but they were not half as terrifying as the witch called Mrs. Shelby. Changretta can kill the body, but Shelby can damn the soul as well if he wanted.

“How kind of you, Mrs. Ross. And you said the invitation was just for Arthur?” Eva asks, coming to sit at the edge of his desk. He can see her warm and polite smile as Mrs. Ross turns as white as bone.

“That's very kind. Well, I will let Arthur know.” he dismisses her, but she remains there. Scared like a bird caught in the deadly gaze of a cat.

“It'll be at my house at midday.” she adds, looking at him, but ever so often she can’t help, but look at Eva like she holds her life in her hands. She would be right, Eva is the one person who decides if she’s worth the trouble. “He should come at midday.”

“Your house, midday tomorrow. All right. One of us will be there.” he dismissed her as if she were unimportant.

“We’ll make sure its Arthur, like you asked.” Eva keeps her words short and curt, like she was politely asking her to leave without saying it.

---

“I thought you said the trap was for Arthur, why are you here?” Michael asks her while she sits with her knife ready in her hands.

“I saw two visions, one where they go after Arthur and one where they come after you.” She answers calmly.

“They could hurt you, you know, these people don’t care if there’s innocent bystanders, they would've killed Esme if the Lees weren't there.” the young man warns her. Reminding her that Esme was there with John. “If anything happened to you or your baby, Tommy would---"

“John’s not dead, just gone from here.” She interrupts. Eva no longer trusts him, there is a ten of swords above his head now, but this bit might be what makes him change his mind. “He survived his injuries and we hired Gold just as he and Esme asked. You weren’t supposed to go with him that morning, kid, I’m sorry.”

“Does my mum know?” he is not angry at being lied to, but he will be when he realizes that Polly’s supposed betrayal isn’t real. Especially because he will be the one caught red handed.

“Yes, couldn’t have made it happen without her.” Her ears perk up like a hound. She moves quickly to hand him his gun and close his bag. “They’re here.”

------

Notes:

Miércoles, Wednesday in Spanish and often used to substitute mierda/shit when children are present. Eva is used to moderating her swearing to the point it became a habit.

Peaky Blinders version of Jessie Eden has queer vibes written all over her, like maybe bi or pan. Anyone else get that vibe from her?

---

Taglist(I'll assume anyone who rbs wants to be in it, really likes aren't enough to sustain me anymore): @joossieisdabomb @johnathancanines

#tommy shelby x oc #thomas shelby x oc #thomas shelby fanfic #peaky blinders fanfiction #thomas shelby imagine #oc fanfiction #tommy shelby fanfic #peaky blinder fanfic #thomas shelby #ocappreciation #between the shadow and the soul

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