Prompt 209
Now Jason was planning on, well, a lot of things, when he came back to Gotham. He had a lot of plans, several of which had to do with the old man and even more that had to do with cleaning up Crime Alley, making it safer and all that.
What he was not planning on was to find some sort of lab in the basement of where he was planning on setting up a safehouse. Nor was he planning on finding several literal children in cages inside said lab. Oh and Lazarus Waters- but children! With muzzles! Being experimented on!
Now he’d like to say he had a plan in what happened next, but if he’s honest everything had gone Green and he didn’t remember what happened next, only that he’s back home with said children and covered in blood. Oh and everything smells of smoke.
… And apparently there’s more of these things dotted around Crime Alley with the rest of these kids, er, siblings? Family? Fright does mean family? Okay kids, he’s not turning into Bruce but you can stay here while he deals with this… however long that takes.
He better not be turning into Bruce he swears-
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There's a small moment in the Hunter x Hunter 2011 anime that I thought was pretty cute. It's close to the beginning, during the Hunter Exam, when they're looking for pigs in the forest. Gon slides down a hill, and Killua follows him, only for him to crash because Gon had stopped at the bottom of the hill. This scene!
It's one of those rare little bits added by an adaptation that really add to the characters - because yeah, this was not in the manga.
I find this anime is really good at adding little moments that either
are just cute or endearing
are fun extra interactions that show off the character dynamics more
actually highlight something about the characters in question
This one, I feel, does all three. First of all, I just love seeing Killua a bit more involved in their group before the eventual reveal of "he just wanted to be friends". It's really sweet.
But mostly, I think it's interesting that Killua assumed Gon was just messing around, when Gon was actually focusing his efforts on beating the challenge. Because, sure, Killua finds Gon somewhat intriguing, and he really wants to stick around him due to his desire for a friend - but Killua still sees himself as a class above pretty much everyone else there, and also as an assassin in a category so firmly removed from "regular kid".
So, Killua totally misreads Gon here. He assumes Gon is just doing a regular kid thing and attempts to mimic it so he can join in. It doesn't actually occur to him that Gon was tracking the pigs, or focusing on the task at hand.
It's a far cry from later on, where Killua and Gon are primarily a team effort - in sync, aware of the others' strengths, and taking each other quite seriously.
And part of it, of course, is that they just don't know each other very well at this point. But I think another thing is that Killua, during most of the Hunter Exam, is more invested in what Gon represents than who he is, necessarily.
His first friend represents rebellion against his family, childish enjoyment, and the desire for connection and understanding that he is not receiving. And even though, as time goes on, he grows more and more impressed with Gon, I really don't think it fully clicked that he wanted that friend he wished for to be specifically Gon until he was confronted by Illumi.
I also think Killua takes Gon a lot more seriously after the fight with Hanzo, and especially after Gon went all the way to the Zoldyck estate to save him. Before the Hanzo fight, Killua was outright irritated by Gon being ranked higher than him overall, and was even a little bitter at the beginning of the fight ("I could've dodged that easily" comes to mind).
By Heavens Arena, I feel they both have a much firmer grasp on, and appreciation for, who the other is as a person. Killua is more consciously aware of his investment in Gon as an individual rather than an abstract, and Gon is aware of Killua's crappy upbringing and is quick to be very supportive of him as he figures things out for himself.
During the Hunter Exam though, a lot of the interactions between them feel a lot like Killua is either mimicking or acting out "regular kid" behaviours, either because that's what he thinks Gon is already doing, or he wants to see if Gon will respond in kind.
Aaaaand... he does. :)
So, while they do not have what I feel is a true depth of bond here yet, the foundation is already being laid down for their powerful friendship - Gon and Killua both show an immediate willingness and enjoyment to go along with what the other wants to do and to try out what the other is good at, and they wind up having a whole lot of fun together right off the bat.
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re: jianghu as a queer space in mlc
here to answer @redemption-revenge !! in reply to this post
(also tagging @markiafc @ananeiah <3)
there are many definitions of jianghu, but this is specifically based on the framing of jianghu as the space people retreat to, away from the mainstream sphere governed by the imperial court. in that is a sense of rejection and defiance against the patriarchal, heteronormative values and norms, which had been enforced through a fixation on upkeeping order in the society. as such i guess it's not too much of a stretch to interpret jianghu as a queer space in a way that's characterised by a spirit of nonconformity to the norms. consequently, it makes sense for stories set in jianghu be used to illustrate and navigate queer identities/experiences/feelings - which I came to believe mlc had made really good use of.
there's always kind of a dichotomy between 江湖 jianghu and 庙堂 miaotang (ie. imperial court). like in mlc, there are two separate, distinct law enforcement bodies from the respective spheres - and jianghu strives to keep imperial court from interfering in their affairs. like how li xiangyi firmly stands against getting imperial court involved in jianghu matters. like how fang duobing is actively running away from the grip of the royal court on his life choices. the rejection of the mainstream (very conveniently and broadly put, confucian) norms in mlc also manifests in many of its key relationships being non-familial (in the sense of blood/marriage-based kinship) and there being little emphasis on the main characters' biological familial ties. (anyway this is for a whole different meta on its own... edit: it's here)
it's then actually a sort of irony that the imperial court's institution of law and order is what sigu sect/baichuan court had been formed to be a de facto counterpart to. so when li xiangyi becomes li lianhua, it triggered the process of deconstructing the meaning of installing such an institution and the need to maintain order to a fundamentally nonconforming space such as jianghu. mama fang's seemingly throwaway line of criticising li xiangyi and his mission is in fact the thesis statement in this particular reading of mlc's story: jianghu makes its own rules. nobody should dare to do it in its place.
now deprived of all means to fight like he used to, li xiangyi's new life as li lianhua is essentially a refresh of how he views jianghu. the death of li xiangyi the leader of sigu sect and top of wulin, meant taking apart the idea that jianghu is a lawless arena where the fittest fight to the top for power and control over wulin. and li lianhua then putting together lotus tower, living a life focusing on a domestic lifestyle this time for real far from the reach of the governance both from the imperial court and sigu sect/baichuan court, is him living the jianghu that's defined as a space away from any form of conformity.
with that, there's also a sense of queerness to this particular way of living as li lianhua, if you consider the chinese conceptualisation of gender being more social than biological. if femininity and masculinity were respectively characterised by inner/domestic sphere and external/any space outside of that, dare I say...it actually makes li lianhua's moving house mindblowingly smart as a metaphor for gender fluidity. lonely wanderers are common in wuxia but housed lonely wanderers? he carved for himself a domestic (ie. feminine) space in the wilderness - among a jianghu space that's still dominated by masculine values of aggression and competition. and being freely mobile makes this feminine space more fluid and less tied down than the more rigid, inert domestic, feminine spaces in traditional mainstream society. when you combine it with how his character has been fem-coded - even as li xiangyi (eg. yin-coded powers/energy) (also a whole other meta on its own... edit: it's here now), it speaks to a part of him that has always found appeal in qualities conventionally associated with femininity of stability, gentleness and non-aggression. and a rejection of expectations to fight and destroy. he is defining who he is in his own terms, in the true spirit of jianghu.
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Bro it's crazy because Tubbo will say stuff like "nobody listens to me" "it's not like anyone ever cares what I say" "no one ever believes me" ALL the time.
And Fit will reassure him and say that it's not true and then literally ten minutes later shoot down Tubbo's theories based on 'I've been here longer' and be vague and mysterious about details on whatever information he has that makes Tubbo so wrong, even when those details are mostly public knowledge. "There's so much you don't know, there's old lore, you barely know anything" 1) have you tried Informing Him and 2) mf why do you think he's so convinced no one cares what he thinks???
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do u have any navi thoughts from your oot replay
i've been waiting to answer this until I actually beat the game in my current playthrough because navi is another one of those characters that i think of in like a "set" with several other characters who serve relatively the same thematic purpose; in this case that purpose being the "mother" character, and i wanted to have all the characters in that set fresh in my mind. it's notable that while oot shows us very clear and consistent instances of the ways in which the adults of hyrule fail to protect their children, there ARE several adults who DO go out of their way to both oppose ganondorf and protect and nurture the children under their care. All of these characters are adult women, and all of them explicitly help the children out of some sort of parental responsibility or sense of duty towards them. in this group I include link's late mother, impa, nabooru, and navi.
all 4 mother characters, despite being adults or adult-coded, reject the inaction mentality which characterizes other adults in the game. they become either direct supports or shields to their children from the conflict the world has to offer them, and they are always explicitly punished for their interference--link's mother is killed trying to protect her son, impa's village is burned, nabooru is brainwashed. The mother's fatal flaw is that she will protect her child above all else, even in a world in which children cannot truly be protected. however, with the exception of link's mother, these characters manage to persist even in the face of her punishment, and this is where I think navi becomes the exemplary character.
Navi, after a lifetime of being link's only support system, the only adult in his life he could truly, consistently count on, receives her punishment at the hands of ganondorf--in the final battle, she is pushed out. she is unable to reach her child. she cannot protect him. However, BECAUSE link has grown up with her at his side, he is strong enough to take ganondorf down. and when ganon rises again, navi is there to support link, promising not to leave his side, and the intuitive targeting of that battle (a mechanic which navi is inherently tied to!!) makes it a cinch to win. Navi, and the other mothers we meet, are a reminder to the player that the world doesn't HAVE to be the way it is. Their persistence when punished, their insistence that their children ought to be protected, is a reminder that good adults do exist, and that good adults raise good children. link and zelda are able to win in spite of the adults who refused to help them, but also BECAUSE of the adults who DID. It's a reinforcement of the core theme of oot--that childlike idea that the world SHOULD be good and fair and if it isn't, it should be changed until it is. The mothers of oot are examples of what the world COULD be, reminders that it is possible to grow up without losing hope or growing bitter, and they are examples of the next step for the children they've raised to change the word--to continue fighting even in the face of punishment, to refuse inaction, and to foster that same hope and persistence in the generations to come.
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