#or do you make people look more conventionally attractive when ''redeeming'' them?

[helpimstuckinafandom]

All art I see of Hawks' father depicts him looking almost exactly like Hawks but more bloody and rugged when we canonically know he looks like this

#did y'all miss the memo? #or do you make people look more conventionally attractive when ''redeeming'' them? #because it's mostly done in relation to 'oh what if he was a good father and tried to provide' #bnha #bnha hawks #takami keigo #thief takami #bnha manga #just something to think about

[steelycunt]

Hi! Why is it so hard to fancast Remus? Is it because he is just some guy and most fancasts are famous people? Anyway I would like to put fort Levan Gelbakhiani and also recommend the film “And then we danced” cause its beautiful!!!

hey!! for me personally its hard because i can't imagine clear faces when reading/writing--i can imagine facial features, but i can't picture them all on one cohesive face (and the features i do imagine are sort of sketchy/cartoonish rather than that realistic), so its like trying to match a real person to a vague blur of an image in my mind that is incredibly specific but also v hard to pin down. i rambled in the next bit a little so i'll put it under the cut xox

more generally, the reason i find most of the common ones so terrible is because they're usually brown-haired extra conventionally attractive celebrities who are either models or looks like models. and i do not think he was an especially conventionally attractive guy at all i think he looked like a normal guy. in fact i think he was kind of ugly. i don't care that much about canon but sirius is specifically referred to as handsome, where remus isnt, ever, so i just don't really understand where it comes from. i also feel like a lot of these fancasts that are sooo desperate to make every character ridiculously hot as if otherwise they are not convincing love interests / interesting or redeemable characters / of any value as elements of a narrative (as if any deviation from the beauty standard is a sin that renders a literal fictional character unworthy of any further discussion) are just kinda fucking weird lol. idk why average looking people are so frightening to read or write about to some people but yeah :-/ soooo sorry anon to hijack your ask to go off on a tangent like that i know its really not that deep!! i've just massively overthought my answers to your questions xx

in reference to gelbakhiani--i KNEW i recognised that name and i realise now i think another anon way back mentioned him!! he's not QUITE perfect for me but i remember him being a pleasant surprise when i googled him the first time and he was a pleasant surprise this time too xx you understand the assignment!! im not mad about it!! in terms of the individual features i dont have many personal criticisms at all!! ++ also also thank you for the rec!! <3

#sounds dumb but soon as u show me ur garfield/laughton scott/claflin r fancast i hav to disregard any future thoughts #u have on his character like. you dont know him you dont get him youve just proven that to the class. i literally made him up #u gotta make up ur mind was r bitchless or not. because if he was bitchless u cant tell me he looked like andrew garfield. do u get that! #'he was this shy sort of plain bookworm and only sirius saw how attractive he really was :-( also he looked like this model i saw in this #calvin klein shoot :-(' do you hear yourself #extra points when they're referring to these characters as teens. 'this twenty-seven year old man with a six pack is s when he's 16' is he. #also this is just me but i dont want to read about a cast of people who are all unbearably unrealistically hot. like all this aside it #just doesnt interest me. im just bored sry. also u dont have 2 b physically conventionally attractive 2 b hot anyway. its a state of mind #long and short of it is i just think if characters + their relationships w each other + their romantic connections are only interesting or #convincing to you if they're both the definition of the beauty standard...are those characters really that interesting. are they really #that well written. are they really that developed. hm #like its fine if they're not!! but we can admit that they're not. #SO SORRY once again for the long answer anon xx did not mean to hijack your ask like that xx mwah xx #anon #telegram #final psa this is just my opinion !! u are free to do as you please this is just my explanation for why *i* do what i do xx

[alvadee]

i always think it's so insanely stupid when people mock others because they find "not conventionally attractive" or downright "ugly" people hot. like the whole "sis, you can do better" meme was funny in the beginning when it still felt more targeted at women who date ugly AND useless men (as in they have no obvious redeeming qualities) but i see that comment so often now just because someone's so doesn't have immaculate bonestructure and isn't ripped.

it's not only mean spirited it also demands an outrageous and worrying level of conformity. and obviously the most insane thing about that way of thinking is that the logical conclusion of it would be that everyone is supposed to pine after a rare type of physical beauty and everyone else who can't date a person who looks like that has to pick from the reject pile and be unhappy with someone they're not attracted to...

if we just accept/encourage that all types of people find all types of people hot it's much more likely everyone ends up happy because there's someone out there for everyone.

like, i have a friend whose type are rat boys, guys that kind of look like...rats, in a way... and we can joke about it! and she jokes about my taste but we still support each other's weird taste! what good is it if your type is brad pitt, chris hemsworth or jason momoa?? like, good luck looking for dudes like them but uhm there just aren't a lot. the person who finds a much more average looking dude hot, isn't weird, they're just lucky they have a much easier time finding someone they're attracted to, a win for them!

this whole attitude of there being a right way to be hot is honestly just propaganda so conventionally attractive people can still enjoy the social capital their looks give them and to make people miserable about themselves and their partners.

#also i personally high five all of you with a more weirder taste #thank you for being relatable #alvadee's shit

[ihatebnha]

With the beauty stuff going on here- think Bakugo and Shoto (maybe Shinso?) would comfort their s/o in regards to not entering certain clothing stores? I can't go into a lot of them because all/the majority of their clothes are for skinny/petite women and I can't fit into it. Plus, with all the good looking girls who work in those stores I can't help but compare myself and see the trash I am. Sometimes I get physically sick if I walk into the stores because its so overwhelming. Sigh. Wish those boys would be a comfort, but they'd probably just be awkward or break up wif me. Especially explody boy.

Legend... the only thing that’s trash here is your garbage attitude! I wanna let you know that I’m on the tubbier side, too... so when you say you’re trash, you’re calling me trash, too... and I honestly don’t like that nor do I agree... (and trust me, I hate fitting rooms too... why do you think i only wear pajamas all the time?)

because the truth is...YOU’RE NOT! You just live in a world that favors conventionally attractive and skinny people over everyone else. Obviously it isn’t bad to be either of those things, but we all have a duty to work hard at rewiring our brains to reevaluate society’s sense of beauty (esp since its very eurocentric, too). 

it’s also funny you sent me this because I honestly believe that all the boys in bnha like chubby girls (but ofc they don’t discriminate)! im very genuine when i say that EVERYONE is their ideal type, and i could honestly talk for hours about how they’re too busy being heroes to give a crap about petty things such as looks and weight. 

the truth is, “real men” (and real partners, for that matter) don’t care if you’re heavy, have beauty marks, anything, so therefore... the bnha boys dont mind those things, either. 

plus lmfao... todo, bakugo, and shinso are all actually in my top list of chubby chasers soooo (although im biased and think every character is on that list tbh)... 

none of them would break up with you for your insecurities! They of all people understand what it’s like to be ashamed of things (as Bakugo faces feelings of inferiority, Shinso has his quirk, and Todo’s family is bananas), so they would only want to comfort you if you ever expressed your concerns. 

Not to mention, they all seem like the type to be in a relationship for the long haul... So if they’re already dating you, it means they’re in it FOR LIFE🤞🏻

Which is why, none of what you do could ever bother them... and as for comforting... 

I don’t think either Bakugo, Todo, or Shinso are really going to notice if you don’t want to or can’t go into certain clothing stores. They’re heroes (and boys for that matter💀) with a lot on their mind, so if you mention you don’t like shopping somewhere, they’re just going to assume that you either don’t feel like it or it’s not your style. 

Their heads don’t really connect your insecurities with your shopping preferences, simply because they assume you already know what you like to wear and where you like to shop.

In Shinso’s case, while I can see him picking up on some of your subtleties, such as avoiding certain stores and/or sections, he’s probably not really going to think it’s a serious issue or bring up the topic unless you initiate the conversation yourself, mostly because he (doesn’t want to be at the mall) assumes you already know that he likes your body and really doesn’t care what you wear. 

That being said, when you are in fitting rooms together, he gets pretty handsy even before you start getting frustrated by things. Definitely distracts you from doing anything by whistling at you or grabbing at your thighs and pulling you between his legs from where he sits on the tiny stool they’ve provided... Also probably puts in some effort beforehand too, helping you pick out things that he likes and are more likely to fit in the first place.  

Bakugo is pretty similar to this, as well. With his parents working in the design industry, he definitely has a good eye for sizing and can help you pick out the most accurate things for your body type. He’s actually really useful because you can hold up anything, and he’ll generally have a pretty good idea on whether the style will suit you or not, and if it’s in the right size. This makes trying things on a bit more bearable, as you honestly end up fitting everything you bring into the changing room. 

He’s also good to shop with because he’s probably not gonna let you go to any shitty clothing stores either... So wherever you end up going is probably gonna have better stuff that’s in every size, anyway (it’s literally like 2200 and people have quirks... you can’t tell me stores would have things for literally every shape). The nice thing about this too is that everything you end up getting is super comfortable for that exact reason. 

Definitely can stay pretty serious in the dressing rooms... but you have to be careful because the moment you guys get home he’s gonna be horn-nee. 

Todoroki, on the other side of all of this, is literally motherfucking useless. It’s not that he doesn’t want to be comforting, it’s just he really just doesn’t put the puzzle pieces of your insecurity together AND thinks you look good in everything, regardless... so even if you tried to explain why you hate shopping, he’s just like “but everyone has things they don’t fit?” 

HOWEVER..... the redeeming quality about him is.... HE IS RICH!!! And probably grew up with a tailor, and/or at least a family stylist, so once you’re in with him, he just adds you onto the bill for that, too. Say goodbye shopping, hello to having clothing that fits you shipped right to your door... (and Todo just loves staring at you while you get measured for outfits). 

SO.... sorry for my earlier harshness... it’s just because I love and care about you sooooo much!! as well as understand what it’s like to feel like a freak in forever 21... 

ANYWAY... here’s just some little things I wanted to include, too! 

-

I used to think that Bakugo wouldn’t have a preference for thick girls, but then I saw this tik tok that was like, “my attractive friends always ask me where all the hot and fit boys are.... in these guts bitch” and my perspective changed entirely... I just know a beefy boy like him who has a mean mommy LOVES curves... like you can’t tell me he doesn’t see your belly and absolutely melts... like that shit is straight FAXXXXXXXXXXX no printer... (i also saw a tik tok today that was like, “would you fuck me if i was skinny? and the person said “i would fuck you right now.” and tbh that’s big baku energy LOL) 

Todoroki also definitely gives me vibes where if you’re like, “but i look ugly in ____,” he’s just like, “doesn’t matter, it’s you.” AND YES TBH i cried

AND shinso... god tbh shinso is the guy that all your friends are jealous of bc he’s the one who’s like, “I like my women with meat on them” because he doesn’t believe in skinny culture or diets... he wants you chubby bc chubby just kinda looks more correct.... tbh king shit

#bakugo x reader #shinso x reader #shinsou x reader #todoroki x reader #todoroki #bakugo #shinso #shinso thoughts #bakugo thoughts #todoroki thoughts #sorry this took so long its hard to type with my nails #ask #anon #Anonymous #i went off sorry yall #and dont worry to my skinny queens bc they love u too

[thegayhimbo]

Top 10 Least Favorite True Blood Characters

Since I’ve finished my rewatch of True Blood, I’ve wanted to talk about the show and do several lists of my favorite and least favorite aspects of it. In this case, I am going to my top 10 least favorite characters on the show, and explain my reasons for why I hate them. This is just my opinion, and I’m doing this for fun, so don’t take it personally if a character you like is on this list.

With that being said, let’s get started! POTENTIAL SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!

10.) Felton Norris 

I can’t think of a single redeeming quality this guy had. He was racist, sexist, stupid, homophobic, violent, abusive, and a rapist. He was designed to be a truly reprehensible character, and the show accomplished that well. There’s still a part of me that loves that scene when Jason stakes him for a tree. It’s no less than he deserved, and it’s telling that even Crystal of all people doesn’t feel bad when he bites the dust.

9.) Macklyn Warlow

Whenever people talk about how a character only gets sympathy because they’re a conventionally attractive white guy with a sob story that the show exploits to get people to feel bad for them, Warlow is the first character that pops into my head. When I first saw this show, I felt “meh” about him. I thought it was pretty obvious he was suppose to be a villain and that the friendly face he put on for Sookie was simply a manipulative facade designed to make him look attractive to her. For the most part, fans seem to get this and are pretty dismissive towards the character, but there’s still a vocal minority out there that honestly believes Warlow was this tragically misunderstood character and that he was this great guy who loved Sookie and so on. I even had someone on Reddit try to argue with me that Jason was WRONG for wanting to kill Warlow and that it was bad writing that Warlow became a villain. Just based on that conversation, something tells me he identified with Warlow a little too much. 🙄 

Macklyn Warlow is an example of every entitled manipulative “Nice Guy” and creepy stalker who feels owed a relationship from a woman and expects said woman to be the one to “fix” them and make them into a better person. This is a guy who spent more than 5000 years developing a creepy fantasy about Sookie in his head that was NEVER going to match up with the real Sookie Stackhouse. This is a guy who tried to systematically isolate Sookie from everyone she loved just so he could have him all to himself. This is a guy who ruthlessly slaughtered all the faeries at the night club just so they wouldn’t interfere with his plans for Sookie. This is a guy who (regardless of what Sookie’s parents were going to do) intended to take Sookie as a little girl and groom her into becoming his faerie bride. This is a guy who turned into an attempted rapist the moment he felt that Sookie was slipping away from him.

Warlow was never a good person, and him revealing his true colors in the season 6 finale shouldn’t have been a surprise. If people missed the subtle cues to his manipulative behavior, that’s on them.

8.) Crystal Norris

Crystal was an awful character in the books, but the show somehow managed to make her worse. I really feel bad for what Jason was put through because of her. Regardless of his flaws, Jason genuinely wanted to help Crystal because he recognized she was in an abusive situation, and even kept his promise to look after the werepanther tribe for a year at her request. And how was he repaid for it? Not only did Crystal withhold information from Jason that he should have known about, but she proceeded to come back into Jason’s life after being gone for a year, capture him, tie him to a bed, bite him multiple times without his consent, force feed him Viagra, raped him, and then had the other women of Hotshot rape him. Just.............. 🤮 🤮 🤮 🤮 

This was one of the most disgusting scenes in the entire show, and what was even more rage-inducing were the reviewers out there who tried to make it seem like this was Jason’s karma/comeuppance. Case in point, look at what reviewer Billie Doux had to say about it in her review of “If You Love Me, Why Am I Dying:”

“You know, I bet the old Jason would have been turned on by the prospect of a line of nubile young things waiting to have sex with him. Instead, it was actually pretty creepy. Generation Jason in Hotshot. After all the sleeping around he did in the past, it’s sort of karmic. I bet he’s sorry now that he ever made a pass at Crystal, because like Debbie Pelt, I sure don’t have a lot of confidence in Crystal’s intentions.”

Yikes! The victim-blaming. The idea that someone’s rape is karmic and that he deserved it. The idea that Jason would be “turned on” by being raped. I get that Billie Doux hated Jason (and meanwhile was perfectly okay overlooking Bill’s absuive and rapey behavior towards Sookie and other women, or even Eric’s womanizing behavior), but what she’s saying here is vile. She should be ashamed of herself for writing something like this. Of course, she’ll never apologize and acknowledge she said anything wrong here (because she’s that stuck-up and nasty as a person), but I’m still calling her out for it. She is an awful reviewer, and her True Blood reviews have aged poorly and promote rape culture.

But getting back to Crystal.....................yeah, I hate her character. I wish she had been killed off the same way Felton was.

7.) Sophie Anne Leclerq

Something about the way Sophie Anne was presented on the show never worked for me. I can’t tell if it was the writing, the acting, the way Evan Rachel Wood delivered her lines, or if it was just the character herself, but instead of finding QSA to be an interesting villain, I found her to be obnoxious. I tolerated QSA for the sake of the story (because like it or not, she does play an important role), but I have never understood how she became popular. I get why the book version of QSA is popular, but not the TV show version.

The biggest problem was that there was a disconnect between how the show tried to present her and how she actually came off. She’s suppose to be this shrewd and intelligent woman hiding underneath this shallow Paris Hilton facade, and someone you didn’t want to underestimate. However, that’s not how it translated to the screen. Instead, she comes off as a pretentious big bad wannabe that gets outclassed and outmaneuvered by characters like Russell, Eric, and Bill. And the times they try to make QSA look intimidating fall flat. Case in point: When QSA gets angry with Eric, pins him against the wall, and grabs his crotch. This is suppose to establish her as a force to be reckoned with, but not only is ERW’s line delivery awkward during this scene (to say nothing about how they had to use a jump scare to make this work), it also makes QSA look like an idiot for antagonizing someone like Eric who not only is 500 years older than her (and has seen more kings and queens come and go than QSA has), but is also a survivor who is not going to let the Queen screw him over. Even her information about Maryann and maenads sounds like something she looked up on Wikipedia rather than intrinsic knowledge she’s gained over the centuries.

I know this is an unpopular opinion, but I didn’t find her character compelling or intelligent, and I was not sorry when she got killed off in season 4.

6.) Joe Lee and Melinda Mickens

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Out of all of the storylines in season 3, Sam’s association with his biological parents was probably one of the worst. Every time the show cut to the Mickens, it’s like everything would come to a screeching halt and the scenes would drag on and on. It doesn’t help that Joe and Melinda were unpleasant characters who were abusive, cruel, manipulative, and stupid. The result is I grew to hate them because of how much screen-time they ate up. To this day, whenever I go back and rewatch the show, I usually skip Sam’s story in season 3 because it was all over the place and I just didn’t care.

5.) Tommy Mickens

Remember what I said about Warlow getting sympathy because he’s a conventionally attractive white guy with a sob story that the show exploits to get people to feel bad for him? That also describes Tommy. I get that he was abused and that he’s had a rough life, but that doesn’t excuse him being a pathological asshole to every other person he came across. As Linkara once put it: “There's a difference between having a sympathetic backstory and actually being sympathetic.” Tommy may have had a sympathetic backstory, but that did not make him likable or interesting as a character. I deeply resent how much screen-time was given to him, especially since his character and story were not needed for a show that already had too many characters.

The one act Tommy committed that was truly unforgivable (and earned him a spot on this list) was his rape of Luna in season 4. I say rape because what he did in disguising himself as Sam and having sex with Luna without informing her about who he really was constitutes “Rape-By-Deception.” There was no way to come back from that, and it was hideously inappropriate that the show tried to make the audience feel bad for him right before he died at the expense of Luna. For all the complaining I’ve heard about how Jason’s gang-rape was glossed over in season 4, I find it ironic that barely anyone talks about how Luna’s rape was glossed over and how the show didn’t really explore her feelings about being violated in that manner.

To put this in the bluntest terms, I don’t feel bad for rapists, and neither should you.

4.) Hoyt Fortenberry

Let’s get something out of the way: I DO NOT LIKE ENTITLED “NICE GUYS.” AT ALL. Out of all the character archetypes out there, this is the one that gets me to hate a character instantly. Ross Geller from Friends. Xander Harris from BtVS. Dawson Leery from Dawson’s Creek. Ted Mosby from HIMYM. And now Hoyt Fortenberry. I am so done seeing these kind of characters, and I really wish future shows would retire them because they are irritating.

Hoyt has always been a character that made me uncomfortable. As someone who’s had to deal with Man-Children (i.e. Grown-Ass men who act like they’re 6 years old), I know for a fact that they can appear nice on the surface, but the moment things go wrong for them, or they’re forced to face hard truths, or they don’t get what they want, you get to see a nastier side come out to them, and it’s not pleasant. It’s why I wasn’t surprised when Hoyt’s story went the way it did in the later seasons. Even before his break-up with Jessica in season 4, I could already see signs that his character was immature and emotionally and mentally stunted. It doesn’t particularly help that he grew up under a mother who was racist, sexist, and bigoted in every sense of the word. You can’t be raised in that kind of environment and not expect it to impact you in a negative way.

But even with all of this in mind, the way he acted when Jessica broke up with him was AWFUL and there are no excuses for it. Plenty of guys go through bad break-ups. Most of them don’t stalk their exes at bars and expect them to take them back, or go join hate groups and debate about whether or not to kill their ex-girlfriend because they broke their heart. Hoyt’s behavior in the later seasons was not only creepy, it was borderline misogynistic. It bothers me to this day that the show never really held him accountable for how nasty he was, or had him go through any meaningful character development. It’s why his reunion with Jessica in the last season feels unearned and hollow. The Hoyt/Jessica relationship has aged poorly, and it’s one of those relationships where you can see the problems with it as far back as season 2. Too bad the writers never actually had the characters fix these problems, but instead proceeded to gloss over them. 😒

3.) Franklin Mott

I get that people liked Franklin as a character and thought he made for a great villain, but I’m sorry, I could barely stand him. He was too repugnant to enjoy as a villain. For all of his “funny one-liners” (which weren’t that funny to begin with),  this guy was a SERIAL RAPIST and a SERIAL KILLER. I hate what he put Tara through, and I hate that there were times it was played for comedy. The poor woman got kidnapped, taken to a plantation, put in a slave gown, and was raped repeatedly by Franklin. And if his comments are anything to go on, this isn’t the first time he’s done something like this. Even that scene where he holds the phone over Tara’s head and quickly texts, all I saw was a rapist holding the phone over his victim’s head and subtly taunting her while hiding it under a sick sense of humor. 🤬

There are only two scenes with Franklin that I enjoyed: The first was when Tara bashed his head in with a mace. The second is when Jason shot him and killed him for good. I hated Franklin’s character, and I maintain that the Franklin/Tara storyline in season 3 was one of the worst arcs on the show. I know that’s an unpopular opinion, but that’s how I feel about it.

2.) Violet Mazurski

What was the point of Violet’s character? Why did she get so much screen-time when other characters who have been with the show since season 1 were killed off because the writers claimed they didn’t know what to do with them? The only reason I can think of is that she was a plot device to cause conflict in season 7 and make Jason’s life miserable. That’s it. There was no reason she needed to exist, and she is one of the many, MANY reason I despise season 7.

What makes her character loathsome is how much the show invokes double standards regarding female-on-male abuse when it comes to her relationship with Jason. The show doesn’t ever call her relationship with Jason abusive, but it was. She claimed Jason in a prison when he was not in a position to refuse her, and told him she would feed on him and fuck him as much as she pleased, and the implication was that Jason didn’t have a choice in the matter. Her behavior towards Jason when they get out is creepy, possessive, jealous, controlling, and both emotionally and sexually abusive. Jason expresses multiple times that he’s scared of Violet and never gets taken seriously by anyone. When Jason expresses a desire to start a family, Violet belittles him and calls him a “girl” for it (cause that’s not misogynistic at all 🙄😒), which shows she doesn’t respect or care for Jason’s wants or needs. And to make matters worse, the show tries to victim-blame Jason for wanting out of this relationship and for Violet’s behavior towards the end.

And don’t even get me started on Violet’s stans. It’s scary that there are people in real life who don’t believe women can be abusive towards men, and who watched this show and didn’t see anything problematic with Violet’s treatment of Jason. Or maybe they did, and still tried to justify why Jason deserved it. Either way, those people either need therapy or they need to educate themselves about what constitutes abuse. Until them, I want nothing to do with them.

1.) Bill Compton

Bill will always get the top spot for me with True Blood characters that I loathe. All you have to do is look through the numerous “Anti Bill Compton” posts to understand why I can’t stand him. But to give the general run-through:

He’s a manipulative asshole and rapist that both the books and the show try to pass off as a decent person. He is condescending, pretentious, cruel, sadistic, and abusive, and is rarely called out for his behavior. He weaseled his way into a relationship with Sookie by allowing two psychopathic drug addicts to beat the shit out of her so he could pretend to play hero, drug her with his blood (which was a powerful aphrodisiac), manipulate her into falling in love with him, and tried to cover it up when he was in danger of being exposed. He was QSA’s personal procurer for 35 years where he brought her humans to feed on, rape, parade around as her pets, and dispose of once she was done with them. His treatment of Jessica was neglectful at best and abusive at worst. And to cap it all off, he sanctioned a human trafficking ring in season 5 and tried to start a war between vampires and humans and got off scot-free for his actions. No prison time. No accountability. Nothing. And the show still expected us to like him after that, and root for him to get back together with Sookie after betraying her multiple times.

Whenever people ask me what character I think of who’s a walking embodiment of rape culture and abusive men who get flimsy excuses made for their behavior, Bill Compton is the first person who comes to mind.

That’s my list! Stay tuned for my Top 10 Favorite True Blood Characters! :)

#true blood #tgh opinions #bill compton #anti bill compton #violet mazurski #franklin mott #hoyt fortenberry #joe lee mickens #melinda mickens #tommy mickens #sophie anne leclerq #crystal norris #macklyn warlow #felton norris #billie doux #doux reviews #true blood spoilers

[imagining-in-the-margins]

Hi! You often give alot of insight into anons like this and your my fave CM blog so that's why I'm here! So I'm finishing up the last seasons (and lord it is hard to get through) and they just introduced Max and I cannot stand her. She was just so rude and it felt like she had 2 different personalities the entire time she was on screen. And I worried that this meant I was like hating women because I don't like other female characters like Maeve, JJ, Hailey, and Seaver. But then I started thinking and I honestly think it's cause these Characters are women poorly written by men. But then I wondered how they created likeable Characters like Emily, Kristy, Blake, Tara, and Penelope (leaving out others like Savannah because they're under developed in my opinion) I don't know what's the difference in the writing for these Characters or of there isn't any at all and I'm just being hateful in a way. What are your thoughts?

Ah, I think about this a lot. Thank you for thinking I’m interesting enough to answer this, also!

I think you’ve really hit the nail on the head with the writers doing a poor job at most of their female characters. However, I think it’s possible (and very common in this fandom) for people to dislike any character Spencer showed an interest in, which is also problematic and rooted in internalized misogyny. To me, it all comes down to why you dislike the characters.

(A LOT More Below - Bit of a Rant)

The first step I took when reflecting to see if this was my problem was rewatching and seeing which female characters I loved. Along with the ones you listed, I also found a number of side characters I greatly enjoyed, including Lila, Austin, Dr. Linda Kamura (from Amplification, the anthrax episode), Einstein, Megan Kane, and a few other random case characters. So, right off the bat I found multiple characters who Spencer showed an affinity for. I also greatly enjoyed Cat’s character, although I found her to be underdeveloped in canon (Fanon has done a good job, IMO) and often contradictory in her character design.

If you didn’t like any of these women, and your reason is related purely to Spencer’s reactions to them, chances are you might be suffering from a bit of jealousy rather than improper character design - not that you need to like them all (or the ones that I like), but because they are all very different. You should, theoretically, find something to enjoy about at least one of them.

But the CM Writers have a TERRIBLE habit of writing women that are easy to hate.

There’s a bunch of controversy I see over Haley Hotchner, but the truth is that they wrote her to be hated. That was her sole purpose. Her character’s decisions were poorly thought out and she was shown to be malicious 80% of the time. This was intentional. She was written to personify the trope of the nagging housewife. If you dislike her, you have done nothing but follow the narrative.

That being said, you should also criticize why they wrote her this way. Because it didn’t make any sense. She married a prosecutor - a dangerous, time consuming job. She had Jack when she knew he was with the BAU. Why did she randomly change her tune? Why did she suddenly demand he gives up on his dreams that she was fully aware of for years? I’d argue they wrote it like this to further the narrative of “the wife who traps you with a child to force you to do what she wants” which is garbage writing. I wish people could look at the potential she had if they hadn’t written her like... that.

Maeve, I find, is problematic on multiple aspects and I’ve talked about it before. Her narrative was poorly thought out because as soon as they pitched the idea of a long-term love interest for Spencer, everyone (most notably Gubler) rejected it. They didn’t think it was necessary for his character, who already had a lot going on with the ignored plot lines of his drug addiction and mother.

There were multiple problems associated with her character that were never addressed. The fact she essentially just took advantage of a patient because she was bored, she seemed to “correct” his interests and show annoyance when he disagreed with her, she lied about having a fiance, she was shown to be considering breaking up with him... there’s a lot.

Her character is poorly written. It had a lot of potential, but they just kind of stopped caring once they decided to kill her off. She had more faults shown on screen than redeeming qualities. For many, they liked her because they see there was a potential that we’ll never see (fair). But for people like me, we interpret it as a idealized fantasy of what could have (but probably wouldn’t have) been, which is not healthy for Spencer.

JJ is an interesting character because you can feel the constant struggle between AJ Cook and the writers. They really sabotaged JJ at every step of the way. I’ll be honest and say that I think there are some reasons to hate JJ, but they aren’t the reasons I see most often. Almost all of the JJ hate I see is surrounding the idea that JJ is an evil, manipulative, jealous bitch. But.. she’s not. Even in Truth or Dare, when she pulls that asshole move that was wildly OOC for JJ (in my opinion), she isn’t shown to be jealous or cruel about it.

I think she’s the most likely target for people who’s hatred is driven from jealousy or disliking conventionally attractive women and assuming them to be bitchy by nature of looking “beautiful.” I think Lila Archer* also falls into this category.

But as I said, JJ was also written with a lot of flaws. I think it’s fair if you don’t like her character or the way she treats Spencer, but I also hope that you similarly criticize the whole team in the same way, and don’t just pity Spencer because he is smol uwu babie who needs protection.

(* Yet another reminder that I ask everyone to not message me about J Depp or Amber Heard. Reactive Abuse is an extreme trigger for me and I will block you if you try to get me to talk about it)

Seaver got a lot of hate based off one line of dialogue. I think it was a bad line. If they had left it out, there would be essentially no reason in my mind to dislike Seaver. I used to dislike her a lot, but the more I rewatch the show, the less she bothers me. She was just a young student who wanted to learn about her father/herself. She was MASSIVELY underdeveloped because they kicked her off just as quickly as they invited her in.

NO character was developed that quickly. Her scenes were a bit cringey and the plotlines were bad, and her character was mediocre. I don’t think she deserves the hate she gets. She is a lukewarm character.

I hate everything Max’s character represents. She was introduced to show that Spencer could be trained to be “normal” and it’s anti-autistic bullshit. She had no personality besides “I hate my low-brow job as a teacher and couldn’t be fucked to change it until a man told me I was smart.” She was cracking high-school-clique jokes while her family was about to be murdered. She immediately abandoned said family to make out with her boyfriend who just admitted to enjoying kissing the woman who tried to murder her family.

Her character makes absolutely zero sense. I do not understand how she is so liked. I really don’t (other than the fact that RLC is absolutely wonderful).

If they had left her character out, I think we would have been better off for it. We could have seen Spencer wrestle with defining himself by the women in his life and learning to love himself (without just replacing those women with... another... woman...)

That being said, those who cling to Max for hope of a happy ending for Spencer... I felt that. Fanon and fanfic can solve all character deficiencies. I believe in you.

So, yeah. I’d say if you’re worried about why you dislike women characters, you’re probably on the right path. I’d just reflect on why you dislike the characters you do and whether they are written as misogynistic stereotypes. It makes complete sense to reject characters written for the purpose of making you hate them, but we should all pour one out for the brilliant actresses that had characters with so much potential if not for men ruining it.

#Criminal Minds #anti-maxcer #anti-maeve #answer #answered

[scapular-dyskinesis]

How do you feel about them implying Candace has no issue with her sexuality and that she’s just embarrassed to be with Lilly? I assumed her problem would be that she didn’t want people to find out that she liked girls, but Tate knowing she was fluid and saying “she has no problem with her sexuality” makes it seem like she’s out and she doesn’t care, and that her only problem is that she doesn’t want people to find out she’s with Lilly specifically. It just makes the whole situation so much worse. Like being scared to come out is an understandable fear, but just being embarrassed to admit you like someone who isn’t conventionally attractive is really awful. I’m anxious to see what Candace will do in these last two episodes to redeem herself. I’m anticipating a grand gesture like asking Lilly to the soccer formal. Anyway, how do you feel about the whole situation?

I'm not sure Candace is out to anyone but Tate, like when I was in the closet, I was v comfortable with my sexuality. Now, potentially she is just out to everyone, including Christine, we don't know for sure... but I'm not sure, for Candace, that her embarrassment has anything to do with cultural conventions of attractiveness, either (Lilly is very pretty!) I'm thinking about how hard it was for Lilly to tell Astrid about Candace- it was more a matter of historically their relationship being a mess. Plus, we must remember that to learn what the "cool kids doooo at nightttt" they sat in a car and watched them through their windows and apparently everybody just knows about "Patrol," potentially its about that more than anything else...I'm also thinking about how Candace reacted to Lilly's nightmare scream, I think Candace is, like, pretty much a judgmental person.

Obviously this is like with the awareness that it's not only more common to see the issue being "the love interest is fatphobic," and we've seen characters like Tate show that they are fatphobic. I'm just not sure that the reason is how Lilly looks, rather than (and this kinda hurts more) the problem being how Lilly is (but hell, maybe it's a part of it.) Either way BOY was it hard to watch Lilly learn this.

Seems like they're due for more emotional talks (which I'm excited for, but it will be sad as hell.) I just want them all to be happy.

#asks #i will be at work but this is my fav topic of convo

[thebluelemontree]

I was just doing a AGOT re-read and I (though other people probably noticed it too) found something interesting. In Sansa I AGOT, she reveals what she likes in a husband: "... tall and handsome and strong, with hair like gold." In comparison, in ASOS it becomes: "tall and strong." There's no mention of "handsome." Is this Sansa merely growing and becoming less trustworthy about looks (something suggested in her TWOW preview chap. wrt Harry) or could this also be connected to Sandor? Thank you!

 She’s gradually maturing and developing a more complex view of appearance, attraction, and character.

Ser Harrold Hardyng looked every inch a lord-in-waiting; clean-limbed and handsome, straight as a lance, hard with muscle. Men old enough to have known Jon Arryn in his youth said Ser Harrold had his look, she knew. He had a mop of sandy blond hair, pale blue eyes, an aquiline nose. Joffrey was comely too, though, she reminded herself. A comely monster, that’s what he was. Little Lord Tyrion was kinder, twisted though he was. – Alayne I, TWOW.

It’s not as simple as her thinking a pretty face always conceals a rotten core.  Or that ugly people are more trustworthy.  What’s under the surface must be uncovered and looked at no matter who it is.  How could she know Tyrion was kinder than other Lannisters without seeing for herself his demonstrations of kindness?  In the misery of their forced marriage and everything that happened, Lannister promises rightfully meant dick to her.  It wasn’t his words, but his actions that gave Sansa more insight into his true character, as complicated as Tyrion is.  It’s no small feat because Sansa’s view of him is also sometimes colored by the ableist ideas she was brought up with, and they are terrible at communicating with each other.  She can see that there was a good man genuinely trying to do right by her inside the deeply troubled, misguided one who was also her enemy.  Tyrion has his noblest moments when he isn’t trying to get her to warm to him.  It’s when he’s standing up to Joffrey to protect her, which Sansa remembers most about him in hindsight.  I do kinda think she means “twisted” in more ways than just his physicality because she does seem to get that he’s carrying a lot of trauma without knowing all the details and the exact extent.  And how could she know Joffrey was a monster until the veil was torn from her eyes?  There’s a huge difference between seeing Joffrey as a 13-year-old spoiled brat with an ego and mean streak in AGOT, and then realizing it’s way more than that when he orders Ned’s execution.  No one saw the burgeoning sadist and murderer until it was all out there in the open.    

In the sample chapter, we do see her testing Harry’s honesty and prying him open with questions to find out what kind of man he is in regards to his past relationships and his bastard children.  That’s after their first meeting when he was rude to her.  She’s had enough experience with Sandor and Tyrion to know that under a prickly exterior can sometimes be a lot of pain, so she is giving him another shot despite the rocky start.  And Harry does sort of have legitimate reasons to be wary or resentful of this potential match with Littlefinger’s daughter.  She does end up getting to know some of the real Harry, such as he is.  The best she can say about him is that he has nice teeth.  He’s not an evil monster, but his looks are about the only thing to recommend him, which is saying Harry is very lacking in substance.  He’s actually a pretty typical overprivileged young man of his class, that includes being an irresponsible cad where women are concerned.  He’s got some traits in common with both Loras (his beauty) and Sandor (his bluntness), but none of their better qualities.  At least those two know how to be faithful.  Girls are brought up to look the other way with their husband’s infidelity, so as long as he doesn’t bring his mistresses or bastards home.  Wives are supposed to be satisfied with the stability and status of the marriage, and if all they have in common is the love of the children, well that’s a successful marriage in Westeros.  And what Sansa really wants is to go home, but if she’s got to suffer being married to this buffoon to do that, well, I don’t blame her for trying to find something, anything, about him she can get down with.  She doesn’t even seem to be that impressed with his looks either, and he does totally fit the bill of tall, strong, and blonde bridegroom.      

This is completely the opposite of how she first felt about Joffrey in early AGOT.  She admitted she didn’t know him, but she felt she was already in love with him.  He’s a handsome prince straight out of central casting, and the songs told her he was GoodTM.  Her main focus was bending over backward to conform to what Joffrey likes.  If Joffrey wants to go riding, suddenly she says she loves to ride when she very well doesn’t.  The difference in TWOW is that she isn’t blinded by Harry’s looks, and she wants to get to know him herself before deciding how she feels about him.  And no taking ANY shit from him either.  No free passes for pretty faces; however, she’s also gives Harry a fair chance to redeem himself from their first encounter.       

Sansa is allowed to take into consideration Harry’s attractiveness to her if there’s a possibility of spending the rest of her life with him.  It’s not a bad thing or shallow to want to be attracted to your partner.  A large part of her arc has been figuring out and accepting her evolving preferences in romantic partners.  Sandor is not the kind of guy a nice girl is supposed to like.  She’s also at that age of having feelings she’s not yet ready to deal with.  Having chemistry with someone can definitely increase their overall attractiveness, even if they aren’t conventionally handsome or beautiful.           

In Clash, she still thinks of Sandor as objectively ugly; however, when she really thinks about it, she realizes it’s his anger and harshness that she dislikes most.  But she also admits that she likes some of that ferocity in his personality.  Since she knows the origin of his disfigurement, there’s compassion for the trauma he suffered.  They have intimacy.  He’s a protector and an ally that she can rely on to be honest with her.  She can vent at him.  There’s a thing between them in spite of telling herself that he’s ugly or that he’s mean or that it’s Loras that is her ideal love interest.  How can she think about kissing Sandor in such florid detail when Ser Loras exists???  How does that make any sense?  It takes until Feast before she just accepts that Loras felt nothing for her and they had no real connection.  Her attraction to him is no longer enough to maintain the fantasy.  She can let that go without any sorrow or disappointment because she’s been growing up and moving past it before she’s even really conscious of it.  Her thoughts immediately turn to the kiss given by someone she knows had genuine feelings for her as a person.  She finally accepts that Sandor is attractive to her, they have chemistry, and that’s all there really is to it.  It doesn’t need to make any sense beyond people just wanting who they want.              

Could she still get the “tall and strong” cloaking she always wanted in the end?  Sure, but I think those qualities could be more incidental rather than something she’s going to be focused on.  It’s going to matter so much more if the guy cloaking her is someone she loves and who loves her for herself.  To even get to freely choose a marriage for love is an outcome that would be pretty hard earned by this point.  It’s not really about the ideal, it’s about what’s real.               

#sansan meta #sansa stark meta #harrold hardyng #sandor clegane #tyrion lannister #cloaking ceremony #sansan #character development in asoiaf #anonymous #my meta

[blood-and-poetry]

I hate this trend of making villains into misunderstood uwu main characters. Especially if it makes them younger or more conventionally attractive than their original version. Unpopular opinion but I already hated the Angelina Jolie Maleficent movie. Sure it was a sweet story but did it have to be THE Maleficent? It could have been literally anyone else and would have made much more sense. (Also "funny" how she has a big hooked nose and looks older when she's pure evil but the perfect tiny IG nose and cute face when we are supposed to like her. Don't get me started on Emma Stones Cruella either lmao).

And this Cruella mess is way worse. Why make a character like that into something they are clearly not ? Why not create a new character for the story you want to tell instead of ruining a perfectly good villain. If you want to tell a story about a woman becoming evil and "uwu misunderstood" because of some #girlpower stuff then do it. But for gods sake.. don't use an established character that's a capitalist rich evil white woman who skins and kills puppies and try to tell us she's secretly a misunderstood cool girlboss we should root for. That's only an inch away from writing a movie about how Frollo was so misunderstood, he deserved to sexually harrass and almost kill a woman actually. He did it to cope.

This reminds me of how I always already disliked fans writing evil characters as sweet misunderstood babies in their fanfiction. You can like a character for the dynamic they create, for their role in the story, for how bold and fun or interesting the character is. Heck, most gay kids identify with the villains because they are gay coded and it feels nice to imagine to not give a f about the bullying you experience.

You can do all that without having to say that "I like this character because they are secretly 100% innocent babies. Here is my essay on why I'm morally pure despite liking an evil abusive character". Like. Chill. You can like that evil abusive character if you still acknowledge that it's an evil abusive character. Don't be an asshole yourself and maybe don't defend that character when people hate them. That's literally all you have to do, even if twitter tells you otherwise with their purity cancel culture shit. It's not that deep.

This entire blog is about loving evil "problematic" characters. But I love them because the stories they are in would be boring without them. Because back when I was a gay and bullied teen they were fabulous and strong and something that helped me through my childhood and teens. Because I have a tiny fetish for evil middle aged female characters despite the problematic implications of that trope.

To admire villains is to like what they are and to recognize why they would be horrible real life people you wouldn't want to meet in real life. To change an iconic villain into something they are not is to cheapen them and the stories they were in. And it's downright disrespectful and tone deaf to "redeem" characters that just shouldn't be redeemed. Wether you love villains or you love to hate them: this shit is boring and unnecessary and lazy and it should stop.

#cruella #cruella de vil #cruella 2021 #disney #disney villains #maleficent #mp

[gender-chaotic]

Yknow i love me nasty, smelly, gross, asshole beej as well as him being redeemed, loving and being a big softie for his new found family, over all making him a big softer.

I want a nice healthy dose of both when it comes to beej and i wont deny when people clean him up and look him look thin and conventionally attractive/sexy it does really annoy me, but certain people in this fandom are acting like canon musical beej is this big weak baby who canonically woobified from the other versions of beej because people in the fandom are woobifying themselves. Yeah musical beej is still nicer, more sympathetic, softer in this canonically he still is disgusting, smells, looks gross, is a pervert constantly making dirty jokes flirting/harassing with adults, attempted to murder multiple people. If you dont like the musical fine, cool, you have a right to and im sure there are valid reasons to not like it, even as a fan i can see why people might now like it, but some of these takes of the musical and musical beej himself are pretty bad and some of the same people prefer cartoon and/or movie beej.

I dunno about you guys but cartoon beej is literally just the spooky version if the genie from Aladdin or cosmo and wanda i know people have compared musical beej so these things but cartoon beej is literally a children's version of beetlejuice. Of course in his universe He's still dangerous and a pretty bad/nasty guy i mean he's universally hated in the neitherworld but he just like musical beej he's clingy, emotional, soft for the few people he cares about, lonely, ect. The cartoon and cartoon beej himself are way more divorced from the movie canon than the musical is tbh.

Musical Beej is basically a fusion of movie and cartoon beej and you can boo me but im right and its strange to me how people complain about musical beej ruined beej or whatever because he's softer and a little more sympathetic despite the fact he literally shares quite a few traits with movie and cartoon beej. Obligatory not every verson of a character is going to be the sane and changing things up keeps things fresh. Sometimes its really really bad but musical beej seems like the best parts of movie and musical beej with a few new ideas to shake things up and as someone who is a abit older in the fandom and who grew up with both movie and cartoon beej and love them both as well as mucial beej i like what they did with the musical and how they portrayed him.

The fandom and younger fans maybe be woobifying and babying beej but actual canonical Musical beej is still a disgusting, nasty, asshole and making him a but nicer, softer,sweeter, ect. Wont ruin his completely as long as you can do it right and now infantilize and woobify him too much. I think some of these people have some actually good criticisms about musical beej and the musical and again if you don't like the musical fine but theres a difference between fanon and canon interpretation and i think some of these bad takes about musical beej comes from a place of bias.

Lastly just like you don't have to like the musical and musical beej people are allowed to dislike the movie and movie beej as well as the cartoon and cartoon beej. I want everyone to give all 3 canons and beej's love and appreciation including the older canons but people are allowed to dislike certain beej's or certain canons it doesn't make them some kind of "tourist" or "fake fan" its their preference i love all 3 but some people don't and thanks okay.

Edit: oops sorry one last thing. conventionally attractive, bishie, completely woobyfied does suck but stop acting like this is new I've seen people draw beej like this back in middle school back when i used to search deviant art for beetlejuice art. The musical is attracting more people so of course you're gonna see it more and condensed in one place since alot of the fandom hangs out in the same few sites. Not to mention acting like all new fans/musical fans are woobyfing beej or ok with doing this stuff is just wrong i see plenty of these fans making nasty, dirty, gross beej warts and all you just gotta find the right content .

#beetlejuice #beetlejuice the musical #beetlejuice the animated series #beetleguise #beetlejuice the cartoon #oops opinion time #sorry this is long.... #discourse #fandom discourse #beeltejuice discourse #discourse 2939929292 #its kinda obvious this is moatly about certain people im the fandom but im not even gonna say ut #mostly* #long post #long post 3939393929 #sorry for the length rambling and any mistakes in this #lets just say beej js a nasty disgusting dude but he sure as hell doesnt diddle kids #this goes for all canons #:)

[uncloseted]

In the early 2010s, characters like Michelle and Katie weren't as liked as their more quirky counterparts (Cassie & Effy) but looking at shows like Euphoria, it seems like conventionally attractive HBIC type characters gain the most popularity in irl. For example, most girls in the 2010s tried to be and act like Effy but now most girls are trying to be and act like Maddy Perez. Do you think there's an explanation behind this? Is it bc of the rise of social media or is it just society changing?

That’s a really interesting question.  My guess would be that from roughly 2005-2015, there was this cultural idea that the best girls are the ones who are “not like other girls”.  There were a lot of female characters in media at that time who were defined by things like not wearing makeup, being brunette, not caring about fashion/shopping, being “nice” (even when they’re actually not that nice), being “quirky”, hating pop culture, and other ways of generally setting them up in opposition to “normal girls”, who in this case are painted as being vain, popular, and bitchy.  Cassie and Effy are both very much “not like other girls”, and while Skins does a good job of fleshing Michelle and Katie out and giving them places where you can connect with them, I think the cultural conditioning of the time made a lot of people feel like they’re supposed to like Cassie and Effy more.  

I also think that Cassie and Effy are unusual in that for a lot of people, their characters were the first time that they saw themselves reflected on screen.  Cassie was a groundbreaking portrayal of anorexia in many ways, and she was socially awkward and kind of strange and had low self-esteem.  Effy was a similarly groundbreaking portrayal of psychotic depression, which doesn’t get talked a lot about, and what the ups and downs of having depression are actually like.  She’s a female character who gets to be (outwardly) unemotional and afraid of vulnerability, as well as very much in charge of her sex life and her sexual identity.  Up until that point, I think those traits had been mainly seen in male characters, and so people were attracted to the idea that a woman could be like that, too. 

As for what changed, I’d really love to read an essay on this from an actual scholar (so if anyone has seen something like this, please send it my way), but I think it was a couple of things.  First and foremost, we stopped praising people who insisted that they were “not like other girls” and started making fun of them instead.  Alongside that, you started getting portrayals of “popular girls” that were more nuanced and painted them as real people, with their own hopes and dreams and struggles. I think Michelle and Katie were at the very beginning of this wave, and we do see Katie get redeemed in the eyes of the fandom (”I’m Katie Fucking Fitch, who the fuck are you” is widely considered to be an iconic moment in Skins history).  

Mini is the first character who’s sort of free from that.  She gets to be a classic teen movie mean girl in a way that Michelle and Katie didn’t, set up in opposition to “not like other girls” Franky, and the entire first segment of their interactions is about that.  Mini wants Franky to be more like “other girls” (aka, her) because she’s threatened by Franky’s individuality and what that means about her own identity.  Franky wants Mini to let go of the idea that she needs to be a certain way, and she tries to get her to let go of her preconceived notions of who she “should” be so that she can just be herself.  In acknowledging the trope and then putting it to rest, Mini and Franky both get to break out of their respective molds the audience has put them in and be their own people.  As a result, Mini is one of the most popular characters from generation 3. 

Moving onto Euphoria, I think in the time between when Skins ended in 2012 and when Euphoria started in 2019, our cultural mores have changed a lot.  We’ve started seeing people as people, rather than as tropes (which is something Euphoria does really well, since it has a narrator to tell you exactly what’s going on in each character’s mind), we’ve decided that it’s not okay to body shame or slut shame people, and we’ve decided that part of feminism is unquestioningly accepting other women’s life choices, whether we agree with them or not.  I think a result of that has been that social media has embraced (for lack of a better term) the “ho aesthetic” that Maddy embodies. Her stated goal in the show is to “not do anything” on a rich man’s dime.  She doesn’t have aspirations or goals outside of being a trophy wife.  She’s reclaimed her sexuality in the sense that it’s now a tool for her to get what she wants.  And I think for a lot of people, that’s aspirational.  You can be a paragon of feminism without having to actually change any of your desires, beliefs, or actions. I have a lot of thoughts and feelings about that which are more than the scope of this ask, but I think that’s where Maddy’s popularity comes from.  She embodies a particular version of 2020s feminism that hasn’t been celebrated or really even been seen on TV before, and people who ascribe to that kind of feminism see her as an icon of that movement. 

[danyka-fendyr]

Trial by Fire

A Study of Draco Malfoy

This was heavily inspired by Ugly: In Defense of Pansy Parkinson by dirgewithoutmusic on AO3. You should go check it out because it’s an amazing piece and much better than this! Anyway, this is just some post-war, completely non-canon thoughts I had about Draco Malfoy.

Taglist: @dreamwritesimagines @rhabakoli

Wordcount: 1652

Warnings: Trauma. PTSD. Severe nightmares. Illusions to eating disorders. Abuse. Mentions of abuse. Mentions of torture. Self-harm. Somewhat graphic violence.

Let’s talk about Draco Malfoy. Draco Malfoy was not a good person. But we never wanted him to be, did we? Let’s imagine, for a moment, that we did. Or that we even thought he could be. Let’s imagine to ourselves again what it is like to be 11.

Imagine your hands are shaking and a boy you grew up hearing stories about is standing 5 feet away from you. He is going to be your savior. Everybody says so. Even your parents want you to like him, to befriend him. They would be so proud if you did. So, a handshake. A handshake feels right. A handshake feels good.

But he’s already with someone else. Some boy you hardly know but that your parents do. They talk about his family all the time at the dinner table. His father is always making life hard for yours, always trying to hurt your family, to bring you down. This boy, this savior, shouldn’t be near anyone like that.

It is an old feud. A tired, worn-out blood ritual of hating each other started somewhere in high school and carried onward from there. But you don’t know that. You are too little to understand all of that. You just know that one of these boys is bad and one of them is good and you should get him away from the bad one before everything is ruined and your parents will be so disappointed.

If you do things right, you don’t have to threaten violence to get someone to obey you. All you have to do is withhold love. They always say, in the movies, that love is more powerful than fear. So then if you can make someone fear the absence of love, if you can control both at the same time in the same moment, does that make you unstoppable?

You don’t even have to punish someone if cold, icy indifference is already the worst punishment they can imagine. How terrible and cruel a thing, to make someone so dependent on you that they don’t even have the small mercy of hating you for it. Just the fear of the words, “I can take it all away.”

No one ever once looked at Draco Malfoy in his life and said the words he had always, somewhere deep inside him, wanted to hear. Look what they did to you.

Of course, none of this excuses what he did. A mother who won’t speak to you at dinner because of what you both know father might do to her if she does doesn’t make up for racial slurs. A father who once locked you in the basement for 3 days doesn’t erase a 16-year-old girl lifeless in a hospital. The empty eyes and hollow laughter of a pale faced, powerful shadow torturing you over your dining room table for fun will never make the horrors of war or a painstakingly repaired cabinet go away. And maybe you can separate all of those things. But Draco Malfoy can’t.

Because in his head, they all happened at the same time, all blur together horribly until he wakes up at night hearing the screams of a bushy haired brunette that somehow sound just like his own when they branded him, and he can’t fall asleep again until he has taken the poker out of the fire and pressed it in until you can’t make out what the blur of ink on his arm is supposed to be around the scar tissue. He is still cold when he crawls back under the sheets. When he wakes up in the morning, he will realize it is his 19th birthday.

On his 21st birthday he dies his hair. He is tired of the white blond he has carried so proudly his whole life. This is not who he is. He realized some 3 odd years ago, it was never who he was. So he walks into a little beauty supply shop in the nearest muggle village and he buys a box of brown dye and he pretends he can reinvent himself, because if a Weasley isn’t a Weasley without red hair then maybe a Malfoy won’t be a Malfoy without that pale, icy blond, the last pure thing about him. It has to go, and so it does.

When he gets older, there is a girl. His mother chooses her and he lets her. He never had any illusions that it would be otherwise, even before everything that happened, even before a single word tore him to pieces in a Hogwart’s bathroom and he almost bled out in a pool of sink water. Potter is forgiven for that though, even by Draco, because the mistakes he made were different, and so were the sacrifices. There is a difference between being a sacrificial lamb and one day finding yourself tied to the altar, screaming. A difference Draco will never be allowed to forget, even if he wanted to.

He is surprised when he finds her pretty. Not so much in a conventionally attractive way, though she does have something of that, but more so in the sense that looking at her makes him want to smile. He hasn’t felt like that in a long time.

He finds traces of the war in her too. The dark circles that hide under her bright green eyes and the way she always needs to be in control betray her. She breathes too quickly and clenches her fists if he moves too fast.

They take things slow.

She is a perfectionist, and just like his mother, she always knows how to put on a show. She knows everyone’s name, is always smiling, and has a tiny waist. He doesn’t see her with a hair out of place until one night he forgets the time because he stopped being able to sleep after the nightmares and he goes to her house at 4 in the morning to return a scarf only to find her vomiting up nightmares of her own, shaking like a leaf in her nightgown, the sheets a mess as well. She is so small, so fragile like this, and he finds himself holding her as she confesses that the panic makes it impossible to keep anything down and she has to choose between food and sleep. He kisses her dark head of hair, still in shambles from sleep, and tells her the best lie he knows.

“Things will get better.”

They don’t. He gets a job working for the ministry because his mother still has some connections there, though less than his father’s. She tries to convince him to use them, to talk to him, but he refuses. He knows exactly where that will go and he cannot go back there.

When he walks through the ministry doors he has to hold back the terror, because the last time he was here he was testifying against his own father and he could barely get the words out. The last time he was here he was telling them everything he knew, every name of every Death Eater that had ever been in his house, not because he wanted them to show him mercy, but because he hoped they would refuse to give mercy to anyone who had walked through those doors. Take them all down. Dismantle it. Never let this happen to anyone again.

He is no one’s favorite coworker, and he is alright with that. He expected as much. There are too many Weasley’s here for anyone to be overly fond of him. A few of his father’s old friends try to make him deals or offers, but he turns them all away. He doesn’t even want to know their names.

He never apologizes to the Granger girl. Never sends her flowers and a card that says, “Sorry for all the terrible things I did to you or watched happen.” He just quietly makes sure that whatever ministry initiative she sends by his desk gets approved. Her work always makes its way into the hands of the right people, and she rises through the ranks so fast it shouldn’t be possible. He never gives her anything she hasn’t earned, but they don’t call her the brightest witch of her age for nothing.

Potter and Weasley he mostly just tries to avoid. There are some wounds too deep, some scars too painful still to heal. Sometimes the best thing you can do for someone is give them space.

And so he carries on like this. He finds though that he hates his work in the ministry, that he has no head for politics, and he is miserable. Miserable, exactly like he deserves to be. Still, when Minerva McGonagall comes over for dinner and offers him a job, he is not brave enough to refuse.

When he asks her why she did it, years later, her answer is simple. They needed a new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor, and he had always been a bright student. He suspects there was more to it though.

To his own surprise, though not to the headmistress’s, he makes an excellent teacher. He can recognize fear in a child’s eyes in seconds and knows exactly the right words to say to soothe it. He is a patient teacher, never yells, never insults. Above of all, he makes sure to pay attention to each of his students, to make sure they all know they are important to him, that this is a safe place for them. The angry letters from parents he receives at the beginning of his first year quickly began to be replaced by nothing, and then thank you notes or apologies from some.

Draco Malfoy has not redeemed himself. This much he knows. That was never his goal. But he can sleep through the night now, and sometimes, that is all you can ask for.

#draco malfoy #harry potter #tw eating disorder #tw self harm #tw ptsd #tw trauma #tw torture #tw abuse #tw violence #tw death #tw nightmares

[snapedefender]

I'm so fCUKING OFFENDED Snape is scorching hot!! But Hes not "Pretty"and that's what fandumb likes

not to disagree with you, but honestly???? i’ve always appreciated ugly!snape. that’s how i visualized him when i was reading the books. alan rickman was actually something of a shock.... he’s not “conventionally” attractive, but he’s definitely not an ugly man. 

i was very much not conventionally attractive as a kid and i’m not as an adult. ugly!snape was something of a comfort for me... this character that i related to and liked and looked up to wasn’t good-looking either and that helped me a lot when my own relationship with my looks and their effect on my personhood and moral goodness was very rocky. 

so i kind of WANT the snape with the big nose and bad skin and stringy hair and yellow teeth.... snape never seems to give one whit about people calling him greasy or sneering at his appearance (his weak points are more tied to how people perceive his personality/reputation, not his appearance). as a kid i really needed an ugly character who didn’t give a shit about people thinking they were ugly and succeeding and being brave and good regardless of their beauty.

that’s probably why i’m more interested in snape than malfoy, regardless of how far i think they’ve actually worked to redeem themselves. malfoy looks and acts like the people who largely bullied and ostracized me as a kid - good-looking (tho tbf harry does consistently refer to malfoy as pointy) and rich, malfoy is never going to be someone i can empathize with. and even tho i do think harry exaggerates snape’s ugliness, i haven’t ever seen snape as a “hot” character. 

also, i’m really hesitant about this urge to make characters we like “hot” even when they’re not. characters don’t have to be attractive to be likable. they don’t need to be “hot” to be in ships, either. ugly characters should be allowed to be ugly in fandom too, and celebrated for that instead of their ugliness being erased so fandom can feel more comfortable liking them.

sorry this is a really long and serious answer, but i feel like fandom really does try to make its faves beautiful, even when they’re really not. and it’s an instinct i kind of don’t like when it comes to snape, because he means more to me as an ugly character than a hot one. and it’s an instinct that makes me kind of hugely uncomfortable as an ugly person myself because like... it really begins to read as if people can’t be liked or loved if they aren’t remotely conventionally attractive and that’s an uncomfortable thought when you’re not conventionally attractive. 

(note: i use “ugly” a lot here as a shorthand for “not conventionally beautiful or attractive.” sorry! it’s just easier to type ugly even when i actually mean “people who don’t fit beauty norms our society has imposed on us through years of conditioning”)

#nonnie i get your enthusiasm!!! i really do!!! this isn't mean to be a smack-down #i just.... ugly!snape means so MUCH to me that i can't even really headcanon him as hot #Anonymous

[cynically-optimistic]

With a week to sit back and think “what the fuck did I just watch,” I thought I would now do a review of American Horror Story: Apocalypse.

As we know (and may or may not agree upon) ahs8 had its various strengths and weaknesses. Many aspects of this season I found riveting but unfortunately by the end of episode 10, the season is left chalked full of plot holes and continuity errors that effectively make so much of this particular story obsolete. This season had all of the components we have loved for years and the potential to be the most amazing season yet, however it fell flat either in the writers room or the editing room. They cultivated this story for 8 years but with the vast underdevelopment of this season and it’s protagonists, they have effectively caused us to ask more questions like what was the entire point of season 8 of American Horror Story?

So here are some notable plot holes and criticisms I have for AHS: Apocalypse.

First and foremost, my biggest problem with this season is that we have almost no information about Mallory at all and they never spend time developing her character. And what the actual fuck is she? There is no way she is a witch, and this season was drastically underwhelming in this regard. I think we were all expecting an epic, biblical battle for the end of days to be fought between the Antichrist and the second coming of Christ or even an Archangel, but no such luck. It is only ever said that Mallory is just a witch...just a witch who got on my fucking nerves. We spent the whole season in flashbacks pertaining to Michael and never developing Mallory any further beyond “oh well her powers are cool,” and honestly, what gives? She has these amazing powers, never before seen by the witches, and we’re just supposed to believe that she isn’t some sort of celestial being? By the time she does defeat Michael, she is not a character we empathize with, she was basically an empty shell of the potentially badass character she was supposed to be. She has all of these powers and runs a 4 year old Michael Langdon over with an SUV...thrice….three times… Mallory could have been an amazing character and I would have completely rooted for her to defeat Michael with all the righteousness of Heaven, regardless of his tragic backstory that the writers spent too fucking long cultivating. But since we know practically nothing about her, all I can say is that she’s just ended up being a dick who murdered a child. Yeah, he was going to end the world, but he had the potential to be turned around, as depicted in his extensive backstory. Too many people wanted him to survive and just be allowed to end the world because Cody Fern is hot and Michael Langdon falls into the typical “tragic backstory, white, villain dude who is moderately conventionally attractive and therefore should be allowed to murder people without scrutiny.” He fits in that trope to a T and it works regardless of it being a tired trope fandom culture tends to fawn over. But no, I truly think, because of the amount of time they cultivated his character in both the light and dark, he could’ve been not such an evil son of a bitch. I cannot say the same for other examples of this trope like Tate Langdon, or Kylo Ren from Star Wars, or even Loki to some extents. This paragraph was supposed to be about Mallory but here again, I have veered into talking about Michael since he is her direct counterpart with way more backstory. I wish I had more to say about Mallory but she was such a blank slate. It’s sad that Coco of all people had more of a personality and backstory. We knew everything we needed to know about Coco and we knew literally NOTHING about Mallory. Ugh. In no way is this a criticism of Billie Lourd, I honestly think she just fell victim to bad writing this time around.

How did Emily and Timothy conceive the new antichrist when in season 1, Billie directly states that the antichrist, who would bring about the end of days, had to be conceived via human and spirit - like Michael. Furthermore, what is this “special DNA” Emily and Timothy have? We can surmise that it makes antichrists but HOW? And how did the Cooperative isolate and identify this DNA makeup to send these two individuals to Outpost 3 in the first place? And if the Cooperative knew that they could potentially make a new antichrist, did Michael know about it? My guess is no, but we will never know. Which begs the question, is the new anti christ going to be worse and if so, what was even the point of this season? Either way, in a few years, the entire world is fucked…again. The only redeemable aspect of that for Michael was that he craved to be loved and spent most of his time looking for someone to care about him rather than carrying out the Devil’s plans. Constance didn’t do this so he went searching for it and was systematically turned away which lead him right into the arms of his true father. This new kid is deeply loved by Emily and Timothy, and without the potential failsafe of him wishing to be loved and cared for, I believe this kid will be so much worse than Michael.

What is the Rubberman? The only new information we have gotten on this since season 1 is from Cody who says that Rubberman is not always Michael or Tate, but something else entirely. Like what? A demon? And it’s literally never addressed. Rubberman shows up unexpectedly (unexpectedly because you know, the world ended…) in Outpost 3, fucks Mr Gallant (why doesn’t he have a first name by the way? ) and is then the catalyst for Mr Gallant murdering his grandmother. So what exactly is this entity?

Also, what was the Sanctuary supposed to be? I don’t think it was just bullshit on Michael’s part to fuck with the desperate people in the Outposts. I do believe there was a sanctuary but we never see it and we never get any further information. I saw some interesting theories that maybe the Sanctuary is the Murder House, which would have been so interesting given that everyone in there rejected Michael, but he might still care about them, and potentially save the house in the nuclear blasts.

{Trigger Warning for sexual assault on this one regarding Tate Langdon} I think the theory Madison has about Murder House is a little off base. She tells Violet that the house made Tate evil but… here’s the thing: yes, we have watched the house and it’s resident ghosts interfere and influence people’s actions, but ultimately they all make their own choices, like Lorraine who set the house on fire which killed herself and her two daughters, and then influences Ben’s sleepwalking and fabricating his obsession with fire, but nothing drastic ever comes from this. So, I honestly don’t believe the house forced Tate to set Larry on fire (as revenge for Larry killing Beau) and shoot up his high school, killing 15 people, because those atrocities did NOT take place in the house. I don’t even know if I can believe that the house possessed and forced him to r*pe Viven and impregnate her with Michael but that seems to be the only horrific thing he did that could even begin to be blamed on the house. The house is a Hellmouth but doesn’t affect those who leave it’s property lines apart from encouraging them to return, almost like an addiction, but one that you can dismiss by just not going back to the house. So while Return to Murder House is a lovely nostalgic experience, I call bullshit. Ultimately though, I do think Madison was just trying to help and give the souls trapped there a little peace which was nice of her, but I’m not fully convinced she was right about Tate.

What happened to Kyle? This season was a crossover between Murder House and Coven but he is never mentioned by Madison or Zoe and is never shown at Miss Robichaux’s Academy. So where is our favorite unproblematic zombie Evan Peters at?

One huge problem I had with this season was Cordelia. She spent this entire season fighting her own fear of decay and death, while trying not to be like Fiona, and ultimately bringing them all to their doom. She sees a vision of the future apocalypse and every single step she takes thereafter to avoid it is a contributing factor that leads them all directly to it. Michael only fully set his sights on murdering all of the witches after Cordelia burnt Ms. Mead at the stake. Mead wasn’t even a witch, so how was that acceptable under witch law? Cordelia wasn’t even allowed to light the fire to burn the warlocks, so how was she allowed to murder a normal human? Mead may have been a ruthless spy and a satanist, but she was human all the same. Then Cordelia tells Michael, as he is devastated to find the charred corpse of Ms. Mead, that he can still choose to be good. Let’s be real, anyone of us would tell her to fuck off and set our sights on revenge if she did that to one of our loved ones. By having another maternal figure taken away from Michael, the only one who accepted and loved him (in her own way) Cordelia put the nails in her own coffin and that of the world. She is among the notable figures that push him along the darkest path, such as Constance, Ben, Tate, Viven, the Warlocks, Ms. Mead (even though she loved him, she loved Lucifer more), the Satanists, The Cooperative, and Mutt & Jeff. He is manipulated at every turn to bring about a future of mass destruction that other people want, and Cordelia was a definite contributor, but let it be known that Michael’s actions are ultimately his own.

The fact that Madison never met Charles, Nora, or Thaddeus while she was at the Murder House is a travesty. That would have been SOOOO interesting.

What the fuck was Ms. Venable’s issue? She was such an asshole to everyone and we never really figure out why other than she works for a bunch of idiots.

I enjoyed the culture around the warlocks because it was so ridiculous, they were the whiniest bunch of assholes, but I also hated this because they were the whiniest bunch of asshole. They were so desperate to overthrow Cordelia, even though none of them even come close to being able to do so (sorry not sorry boys) that they basically invite the apocalypse into their school. The only one who was like “nah, this is probably a bad idea,” was John Henry Moore, played by the incomparable Cheyenne Jackson, who I wish had bigger role to play in this storyline. He was the only warlock worth a damn, but ultimately they were all murdered. Or wait, no they weren’t. Time travel..

Some of the things changed by Mallory’s time traveling:

The warlocks are never murdered but they are still a bunch of whiny assholes

Tate and Violet don’t get back together (good)

Michael never destroys those nice lesbians’ souls, or anyone souls, which is good but who knows what this new Antichrist is capable of and when he will begin to tap into those powers

Constance (as far as we know) doesn’t commit suicide in the Murder House

Moira never finds peace in the light with her mom

Viven and Ben never reconcile

Which also means that Ben is still spending all of his time with Tate and crying while he masturbates out the window so…

Michael never lives in the Murder House

Ben never connects with Michael, Tate never screams at him in disgust, and Viven never tries to kill him

Queenie is never murdered in the Hotel Cortez by Ramona Royale and James Patrick March

Cordelia never has to bring Myrtle back from the dead, so she is still gone

Madison is still trapped in her own personal hell and Mallory doesn’t feel the need to bring her back even though Madison was way more useful this season than Mallory was. We knew Madison, we cared about her, we watched her grow into being a caring person this season, and Mallory is the self righteous ass that thinks Madison doesn’t deserve to leave hell

Michael is never taken in by Ms Mead. He never attends Black Mass and he never eats that poor girl’s heart (all of this was encouraged and initiated by the Satanists - not Michael)

Marie Laveau is still in hell with Papa Legba. She was anyway because Michael ripped her heart out of her chest 2 seconds after she got back but she never returned at all thanks to Mallory

Dinah obviously never gets her talkshow but she is still out here being shady as fuck and will inevitably betray the witches and voodoo queens again, probably for a fucking talkshow, when the new antichrist is running around burning the world down

The end of days doesn’t come, but again, we don’t know that for sure. At best, Mallory only bought the world and the witches a few extra years. So we can only really say that the apocalypse might not happen the exact way Michael (the Cooperative) makes it happen

Some of the thing I actually liked about this season:

THE ENTIRE FIRST HALF WAS INCREDIBLE and it’s really the lack of development throughout the final 4 or 5 episodes I had an issue with

Cody Fern is undeniably a spectacular performer and I very much enjoyed all of the layer and nuance that he brought to the character of Michael Langdon even though in the end it didn’t amount to much. Still, I can’t wait to see what he does next.

I have always loved Cordelia, and even though I very much expected her to be an influence of growth for Mallory and she never really got there, she was still a lovely presence and she spoke some of my favorite lines in this season being “Satan has one son, but my sisters are a legion, motherfucker,” and “I only knew you for a short time, but I missed you forever.”

DayFoxx or MistyXCordelia. You cannot convince me they are not in love, you just can’t. Their interactions were nothing short of magic.

Other than DayFoxx interactions, hands down the best line was, “the stew is Stu!”

Return to Murder House was arguably one of the best episodes of the entire series, directed by one of our high queens, Sarah Paulson in her directorial debut. It had everything we loved about season 1 and I would have loved to watch 5 hours of Madison walking through Murder House, meeting all the ghosts, instead of the last 5 hours of the season we got.

As much as I grew to hate Constance this season, it was still so lovely to have our Queen Jessica Lange back.

Sign me up anytime to see Angela Bassett as Marie Laveau like holy hell yes

I absolutely LOVED the idea of Zoe being a teacher at the Academy.

We could have all benefited from seeing more of Bubbles. Joan Collins was a fantastic addition to the AHS family.

FRANCIS CONROY. Need I say more? I don’t but I will, Myrtle dragging the patriarchy cleansed my soul

It was actually really lovely to see Connie Britton as Viven again. I have always had a soft spot in my heart for Viven and I feel terrible for everything she has been through. She never gets closure because of Mallory’s new timeline but I just hope she does find peace at some point.

With this rich of a storyline, I think we can all agree that 10 episodes was simply not enough to fully deliver this story after a build up of 8 years. Other seasons of AHS range from 11 to 13 episodes, with the exception of Roanoke which was also only 10 episodes. But with those extra hours, Apocalypse could have been incredible. There simply wasn’t enough time, and what time they did have and utilize was almost entirely spent on Michael which we find didn’t matter at all by the end.

Leave your thoughts in the comments if you have anything you’d like to add.

#ahs8 #ahs spoilers #american horror story #ahs apocalypse #michael langdon #mallory #cordelia goode #cordelia foxx #cordelia x misty #viven harmon #ben harmon #madison montgomery #queenie #hotel cortez #miss robichauxs academy for exceptional young ladies #the hawthore school #ms mead #outpost 3 #ahs murder house #ahs coven

[tumblunni]

I hate that oddly specific feeling of like you wanna complain about a transphobic bad thing but then it's like hard to do it without sounding like you're defending a genuinely reprehensible character?

It's just that..like...

Excellus is a BAD PERSON

But the game does not want you to hate them because they're a BAD PERSON

It wants you to hate them because they're a trans woman/gay man/non-binary person/ambigiuos melting pot of every single queer stereotype simultaneously somehow

The game is constantly fuckin going on and onnnnn about how repulsive and ugly and Not Gender Correct this person is, and somehow this is a more important factor in wanting to stab them than the fact they killed a main character's brother

Also the whole fact that they have such a horrid personality with NO humanity or even a MOTIVE for what they're doing = kinda also part of the trans stereotype. This character only exists to be a lazy shorthand for "instantly hateable", you're meant to just accept all this bullshit simply because they're "hideous and wrong"

Also seriously I can't believe the dub made it EVEN WORSE! Cos Excellus (Excelli in Japanese) originally just speaks with a feminine speech pattern and adds lil hearts and ~ symbols in their speech boxes and stuff to indicate "hey I am a stereotype of someone DMAB who is somewhere on the queer spectrum and this is supposed to be bad". Similar to the (ugh) creepy incest gay brothers in that one sidequest. But in the dub they kinda added a goddamn flourish of this character talking like a friggin sex criminal! And even MORE mentions of "hey he is totally a man and can never be anything but a man, let's all talk way too much about how repugnant it is to be non gender conforming". While also friggin attempting to canonize that this character actually IS a cis straight man and (some fucking how) only acts trans because he's a eunuch????? Getting genital surgery changes your fuckin personality now????? Also seriously why did you have to have an invasive conversation about a dead person's testicles and why was it played as somehow a funny joke.

None of that was in Japanese but honestly with the rest of Japanese Excellus's general portrayal it seems INCREDIBLY likely that she was intended to be a trans woman. I kinda laughed at how the Tokyo Mirage Sessions version of Excellus straight up has giant plastic robot boobies yet the dub is still like We Will Just Say Man And Deny All Trans, While Also Simultaneously Saying Trans Is Bad, Somehow.

So yeah all of that just makes me hate Aversa even more for saying that shit, cos if that line actually existed in the Japanese version the context would seem more like.. well, trans woman who had the closest medieval equivelant of transition surgery and is being mocked for it. At least the knowledge that the Single Worst Moment Of The Whole Thing wasn't canon to the original makes me hate her a little less. Though I still hate her because she acts EXACTLY AS FLIRTY AS EXCELLUS and commits EVEN MORE CRIMES, yet she doesnt get nearly as much hate and even gets a redemption just because she acts like a sex criminal while being cis and conventionally attractive...

Auuugh I don't wanna hate the redeemed lady and be sympathetic to the asshole! But just the context of the game's writing and attitudes surrounding them really taints the characters...

Also I'm sad that there was brief hope that Loki in Heroes might actually be a respectful portrayal of a trans or genderfluid character, but nah it's just one of those boring overly-cisnormative-ideas-of-gender type "genderflip" things for mythological characters. Which is depressing cos mythological Loki literally ACTUALLY WAS a genderfluid pansexual shapeshifter who could be both god and goddess. Something that's so often censored in modern adaptations, and god it's so weird to have that happen again even though this adaptation is literally using the female Loki?? Just wiping off the whole "and also this character can be a man too" aspect... Nah just incredibly lazy fanservice cis woman time, I guess...

I mean cmon man, Fates made tiny tiny baby steps towards more LGBT representation, can we please step it up a little... Awakening already started with being behind the times, and all they changed was literally adding ONE gay character per game so you had to buy a certain version to date a gay man or lesbian woman...and it STILL contained homophobia at the same time... God just fuckin...TRY A LITTLE, PLEASE...

So uhh yeah that's what all the new news about the Three Houses game made me remember, and I'm trying to not get my hopes up. If it does have a big change to more inclusive writing then I'd be pleasantly surprised! But honestly I'm not gonna buy it unless I'm 100% sure I'm not gonna trip and fall into an eternal quicksand of self hate again

Tfw I literally look like Excellus in real life... (minus the comically overdetailed caricature face, of course...well, at least I hope so...)

Also can I just give another shout-out to Tabitha from Pokémon ORAS, a game I played in the same year that rekindled my faith in people like me being actually non hideous and genuinely liked by the fanbase. Srsly him and Excellus are just the same character drawn in bigoted and non bigoted art styles, I swear!

All of that heck happened back when I was first coming to terms with my gender identity so I'm glad that bloody fire emblem didn't kick me down back into the closet

[deeeepsteep]

Tbh like...I’ve been on such a true crime bender lately and while I find crime and criminal psychology fascinating subjects to study, I still can’t wrap my head around the people who actually idolize or are attracted to serial killers

Like...y’all do realize that these people are severely unhinged and possess absolutely no remorse or empathy right?? They’ve done horrible, unspeakable things to other living beings and they either don’t care or they absolutely love it. They either don’t care or they’re enthralled with the idea of hurting somebody, with taking someone’s life away. There’s this huge disconnect between them and the rest of humanity - and people..........like that????

Some women have been lusting after Ted Bundy’s gross ass for decades, long after he was executed. They weeped when he died. Some of them actually thought he was going to marry them - and they dead ass were 100 percent aware of what this man was capable of. They followed his case. They knew what he did to all of those poor women. They knew he was a monster - and yet, they’d boink him in a heartbeat and tbh that fucking boggles my goddamn mind

It kind of reminds me of when girls were fawning over Dylann Roof. This dude dead ass shot up a fucking church and was openly racist and all around terrible...and y’all are making posts about how hot he is and how you want him to be your boyfriend. There’s this......HUGE disconnect here, and it’s so obvious that I don’t even think it’s worth diving into. How can they feel this way about a person, knowing what they did to other people????? I just, idk man I don’t understand it at all

Is it a saviour complex??? Do some of these girls think that their love can redeem or rescue them?? That’s the only explanation I can think of - aside from the fact that these people have a handful of unaddressed issues of their own - but yeah man idk, like there’s something seriously wrong with this

I’ve been listening to the podcast “My Favorite Murder” lately - and while it’s a great podcast, there was an episode where they covered Richard Chase aka The Vampire of Sacramento (If you’re squeamish, don’t look him up, the shit he did was downright disgusting) and at the end they were like “Oh but after looking at his pictures, not gonna lie, he probably was hot in high school” or some dumb shit like that and I was like ok I know this was said in jest but there are probably some weirdos out there who actually, legitimately believe that...plus it’s just all around disrespectful to the victims so you probably shouldn’t say those things lmao

And it’s one of the reasons why I’m super against Zac Efron’s Ted Bundy movie. When the trailer dropped even MORE girls started talking about how hot he was, and all I could think about was how he probably would’ve wanted this. If Instagram existed when Ted Bundy was on his killing spree you know he would’ve grammed each murder with pride and top each post off with a slew of emojis and hashtags - because he liked the notoriety it gave him, he liked the attention he got. And having this Hollywood movie with a conventionally attractive white dude play him......I feel like he would’ve loved that. It’s only giving him more of the spotlight. I know one of his victims came forward and said she was okay with the movie so long as people viewed it critically and understood that this man was vile and a monster...but let’s be real that’s not gonna happen lmao, at least for some people

Someone on Twitter tweeted something along the lines of “We all know Ted Bundy’s name but I can guarantee you the majority of us don’t know the names of his victims” and that fucking shook me to the core - because they were absolutely right. Ted Bundy has been given the spotlight all these years for all the wrong reasons and tbh it’s about time he dissolved into history, this bitch has been irrelevant for decades now

ok I’m done lmao

#rant #sorry I just..........I've just been into true crime so much lately #And every once in awhile I'll stumble across some edgelord who glorifies the crimes these people have committed and I'm just like #Okay dude stfu and crawl back into the Hot Topic whence you came #That's not what true crime is about lmao #We study crime to understand why people do these things so we can find a way to prevent them #long post