#the battles really makes it feel like it. especially whenever he “revives” for the sake of protecting another person. i.e. him getting | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

pokesplendor · 3 years

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carmela’s team from my pokemon shield playthrough! not as happy with this bunch... info beneath the cut!

Graves - Inteleon - she/he - lesbian White - cis woman - age 30

Graves came from a very unconventional background prior to entering into the League circuit. Having raised since she was young by Interpol for undercover operations, she was there and experienced things a child shouldn’t for the sake of ‘justice.’ Who’s justice is really to question in this situation, as she never had a say. It’s only once she reached legal age did she take a ‘vacation’ and decide to try the league. That’s where she re-encountered Ella, who she had met on the job in the Champion’s guard. She uses her combat skills she gained from her rigorous upbringing, which you’d think would cause her to dominate the field, but that isn’t the case. She’s actually fairly bad at it.

She has a bit of a problem interacting with others. She was trained in how to act natural, friendly, and unassuming, but she doesn’t know how to not act. What’s Graves’ personality? Well, she’s a crybaby whenever she’s alone. Little things upset her, her anxiety ramps up her paranoia, and she keeps it all saved beneath the surface until she’s alone and then she cries. Other than crying in her off time, she’s a voracious reader, and particularly likes poetry.

If Graves could ever be honest with herself, she’d admit she’s fallen for Ella quite hard. That bright ball of sunshine brought a smile to her face in a way she hadn’t experienced before. But she wasn’t able to voice her feelings, and Ella is now sadly taken. She’s also a poor leader, along with a poor battler, and she doesn’t garner much respect from her team. She’s often spoken over by Crusher.

Crusher - Sirfetch’d - she/her - lesbian White - cis woman - age 34

Crusher likes to think she’s a gallant, chivalrous knight that leaves women quaking with soaked undies are her arrival and her deep, rusty voice sends shivers up their spine when she announces herself, and she’d like to think that everyone wants her around, but she’s wrong. She butted her way into Graves’ team, seeing its lack of, well, many things, leadership, power, attractiveness… They obviously would benefit from her accompaniment. She didn’t care what they had to say, she was going to be on their team and they were going to worship her for what she brings to the table. She’d like to think she’s wanted, but honestly, not very much so.

As if it wasn’t evidence enough, Crusher is extremely up her own ass, overconfident, and unfortunately, with enough power to back up her words. She’s a demon on the field, knocking enemies out with a single sweep sometimes. She works out on the regular, and doesn’t wear armor to show off her many (sexy) battle scars. Otherwise, she’s into collecting antique tea sets and little glass kittens to display back home. Her house is full of them.

Crusher likes to think (man she likes to think a lot of things) that everyone on the team is slightly in love with her, when she is tolerated at best. Goliath likes her, but Goliath likes everyone. He spots for her when they’re working out together, and she respects him for his strength. She’s especially hard on Thrasher and Maverick for not pulling their weight until they evolved, citing them as a weakness.

Goliath - Grimmsnarl - he/they - gay Japanese - nonbinary - age 21

Goliath hails from the Glimmwood Tangle, from quite a large and loving family, but he got it in his head that he had to see the world beyond the forest clearing, he wanted to see where all the people braving its endless maze to reach the gym were about, he wanted to know! A regular yearning princess wishing to see what’s beyond her tower she’s been trapped in. And this is the family business Matilda had to leave her swamp for, bringing his ass home. She got there a little too late, however, already picked up by Graves’ group and registered into gym fights. He couldn’t leave! He made a promise to help! And look at his cool new friends.

When not spent daydreaming about adventures he could be having, he likes to keep in shape. His family home requires constant upkeep, lest the magical wood overgrows anything manmade within a few days. He likes to read, despite struggling with it due to his dyslexia, and he hopes to write his own book one day about what he’s experienced, he wants to have an adventure worth filling a book with. He’s a very positive lad, a happy one, who tries to share the happiness with those around him.

Goliath is still young, but he’s pretty sure about who he is as a person, he knows where he stands on morals, and her own identity as well. He’s chivalrous and kind, always trying to get the team to work together and get along. It has varying results. Grievous loves to mother him, and he likes to think he’s pals with Graves. Despite being younger, he tries to protect Thrasher and Maverick.

Blitz - Centiscorch - she/her - queer White - cis woman - age 33

Blitz, like Graves, was raised by Interpol for infiltration and undercover work. Unlike Graves, however, while the Inteleon was sanded down to being a weak, anxiety-ridden mess, it only strengthened Blitz’ nerves of steel, causing her to become cold and calculating. She only joined the League circuit because she had a mandated vacation following losing her leg from the knee down, and she didn’t want to get rusty on her skills. Not to mention she saw Graves attempting to lead and failing at it and thought she’d stick around to demean her for her lack of anything worthy of use for Interpol’s workings.

She doesn’t have many hobbies, she likes working out, staying fit, and occasionally cooking some ultra healthy superfood, but it’s not like cooking is her passion. She doesn’t understand why people think you need to have a life outside of your work, she’s perfectly happy to just always be on the job and do as it demands. She smokes, but only the occasional cigarette so as to not negatively affect her health. She’s a woman of few loves, few words, and she thinks that’s just fine.

Blitz scoffs when the team tries to have any sort of ‘get to know each other’ exercise. It’s never in good faith, and just ends in disaster so she tries to avoid it. Grevious tries to mother her on occasion, for whatever reason, she never had a mother and she doesn’t want one, so she doesn’t understand why her face gets flushed and hands get sweaty when the dragon’s around.

Maverick - Corviknight - she/her - lesbian White - trans woman - age 32

Maverick is a failed knight from olden times; she was sealed in a tomb in the slumbering weld with her previous king as a way to protect him in the next life, only to be revived by Graves and Ella exploring the area. Being awoken in modern times, she had a lot to learn and get used to, part of it being her king is no more. The body is gone, and the tomb ransacked. She failed, and this weighs heavy on her shoulders through the journey. She agreed to follow Graves, sensing a nobility to her, Ella already having Thomasin by her side while Graves had no one. She is skilled in battle, if not unsure of herself due to her failings during both in the past, and while she was asleep.

She holds herself to high standards, almost impossible for her to meet, but no one else. She does not expect others to keep up her strict training regime, it is for her alone to shoulder the burden of being known as a failure. Despite that statement, Crusher constantly challenges her, and they’re often sparring with one another. In her off time, she enjoys weaving and is learning the modern trades of ‘sewing’ and ‘crochet.’ She enjoys making clothes for herself and others.

Her strict lifestyle doesn’t give her many moments to herself or to consider her feelings for others. She dedicates herself to a cause and thinks of little else. However she enjoys Grevious’ company. She does notice the occasional stares from others, such as Thomasin from Ella’s team, and she wonders what it could mean. Does she resent her for not joining Ella? It seemed only fair at the time.

Grevious - Dragapult - she/her - bi Vietnamese - trans woman - age 45

The ghost of a test pilot that went down during a new dirigible’s trial run over Galar. Her body was never found, believed to be incinerated by the blast, and her spirit has hung on to the area as she never got a proper burial. Graves, hearing her plight, followed her to her remains, giving her the burial she deserved. Freed from her prison, she was free to pass on, but she denied doing so, she had to repay Graves for her service. And so, she was conscripted to the gym challenge, one she had seen many travelers pass by speaking of such a thing and she was always curious just what exactly it was. She had heard things of course, but nothing is better than first hand experience.

Grievous is a very noble person, but not too stuffy either. She loves a good joke, she loves puns, and she loves giving people a good fright with her ghostly status. It’s all in good fun, she’d never do anything malicious or something that would genuinely harm others! She loves to fly, she had always loved to fly, and dying didn’t exactly rob her of that love. Now she can do it without a plane! She spent so long as spirit, she kind of forgot what having hobbies is like, and she’s trying new things!

She’s a very motherly person, and, being the oldest of the group, feels very maternal towards all the young little ones around her. She’s particularly concerned for Graves and Blitz upon hearing around their upbringing. That’s no way to treat a child! She does her best to tend to the others of the group. Though she would be lying if she didn’t say that Crusher pushed her buttons more than once.

Thrasher - Obstagoon - they/them - lesbian Black - transmasc nonbinary - age 24

Thrasher comes from a foster home full of wayward kids who grew up on the downward spiral of life, and they themselves weren’t an exception. Originally from Spikemuth, they never knew their parents and their foster home travels were rough. No one seemed to want to keep them, and at one point they got sick of it and ran away from home. They ran and ran and never looked back, and found a job working in the professor’s lab in Postwick. They didn’t ask them where they were from, nor tried to contact anyone else, so it was good for them. They met Graves early into their gym circuit and decided to join her to perform some field work for the professor.

They’re quite down on themselves, never feeling like they’ll accomplish anything of worth. They couldn’t be a good child, they’re not a good battler, it took them a while to come into their own, and Crusher needling them constantly didn’t help. In their spare time, they play guitar and sing covers of existing songs. They don’t have a knack for writing, just another thing they fail at. It’s been a tough life, and they stumble along the way constantly trying to get to a better tomorrow.

Thrasher is a shy sort when it comes to their feelings, they haven’t been engendered into showing their vulnerable side to others. And Graves’ group isn’t exactly what you’d call family. But it’s a nice change of pace and they almost feel… wanted. And Grevious is a nice addition to their life. To have such a motherly person doting on them is, well, a dream come true.

#pokemon gijinka #pokemon humanization #inteleon #sirfetch'd #grimmsnarl #centiskorch #corviknight #dragapult #obstagoon #graves #crusher #goliath #blitz #maverick #grevious #thrasher

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madlymiho · 4 years

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Not sure if I'm getting this in on time, but can you do an angst thing for Eustass kid like how he reacted to losing his arm?

I love this request so much!!! 🥺

I wanted to create a scenario, but I'm way too busy right now, so this would be a good headcanon anyway! 🥰

I hope you'll enjoy it, thank you for your request! 💕

Kid:

• We’re digging in probably the most important event in Kid’s life, perhaps the same level of importance than the day he sets sails with Killer to become a pirate. Losing an arm has been an emotional journey he wasn’t prepared to handle, and honestly, it could have destroyed everything within him

• He has been so confident about the outcome of the fight against Shanks that Kid never truly prepared himself to suffer from an atrocious defeat. Of course he has been warned and adviced by Killer, but Kid is stubborn, fearless and obviously reckless, and he thought that Killer’s doubts were just an insult to his power

• Because since Kid is among the Worst Generation, he feels himself in the need to challenge the world, and prove that he earns his place as the leader of those stupid pirates, lurking at the crown with a certain interest, forgetting that there are numerous monsters on the seas... And even if Shanks looks like the less dangerous Yonko in the world, he remains an emperor of the ocean, and would prove his supremacy through his intelligence and his combat skills...

• The second Kid loses his arm, through his anger and his shame, he didn’t really realize that it was a life change. He didn’t care about his limb, barking at everyone that he wouldn’t need any kind of special treatment ; it’s badass after all, to lose something in a battle, there’s no time to dwell on negative feelings, and he would be a “pussy” to actually pay attention to this detail

• Fact is, he doesn’t want to face the reality ; his defeat has been total and painful, Shanks proving him that he couldn’t match with an emperor yet. And this cruel reminder only pushed Kid to refuse any kind of treatment during his long recovery. He doesn’t want any sort of help! He doesn’t need to put bandages, he doesn’t need to have someone looking after him, he’s a captain, for fuck’s sake!

• Many times Killer found him with blood dripping out of his wound, soiling his clothes, bandage obviously uncleaned and reeking because he didn’t want to change it for a while. Many times he has developed fevers and other infections, because it was easier for him to deny his pain rather than facing it, his stump completely infected. Kid can’t admit that he has failed his crew mates, and all of them already know that it would take some time for him to change his mind

• Obviously, the loss of his arm leads him to wrathful situations where he forgot that he couldn’t do the same things with a missing limb. He has awful break downs whenever he tries to put a coat on, to open a door, yelling and slamming his other fist in every piece of furniture until there would be blood on his knuckles, his eyes gleaming with a certain pain his crew didn’t see before. He’s like a raging animal, cornered and hurt, and they don’t really know how to reach him for a long time, despite their will to try

• Slowly, this period of denial would change when nightmares and other night terrors would harass him. Because if he tries his best to avoid all those negative emotions when he’s awaken, Kid can’t forever escape them. At night, he often revives the same scenario, feeling the pain once more, the fear, the desperation, his mind sending him waves of intense memories he can’t barely handle, until he wakes up as a mess. He often toddles to the kitchen, pouring one, two, three, more and more large glasses of whiskey, trying to drown and muffle what made him shiver at night

• But it’s so hard to reach for help when ego dictates the way he thinks and acts. Everyone knows on board that Kid is depressed, angry, carrying the weight of his own sort of mourning, as he doesn’t know how to put his pride aside and sits down with his crewmates to reveal that he’s broken inside, defeated. He believes that he’s useless, a poor captain who can’t protect his crew, and those thoughts would never leave him for a while

• Step by step, though, he begins to accept the loss of his arm, and all that burden coming with it. Step by step, he feels that his crew mates wouldn’t leave his side, Killer always checking on him, forcing him to take care of his stump, joking around to ease the tension. It’s hard for him to open up, because even a “thank you” could scratch his mouth, as he only spits some venom and insults whenever Killer is rolling fresh and clean badage around his limb, even if he feels thankful to have such a loyal first mate

• With time, anger turns into shame, and shame into acceptation, Kid finally even making awkward jokes about his arm, already designing some new mechanical objects to replace what he lost. He can feel that the atmosphere is changing among his crew, the general worry feeling disappearing into something more friendly, carnal as always, but revealing the deep bond of those sea dogs who sail together

• Through the loyalty of his crewmates, and his own work on himself, Kid discovers something different in the piracy... Perhaps they are scumbags, violent, miserable and despicable... but they are also a family, and he can’t thank them enough for never leaving his side, especially when he reaches the bottom of his life. Of course, he would never express those emotions, only offering some harsh insults and dark side looks, his own way to tell them that they are the entire world to him

#one piece headcanons #one piece imagines #eustass kid #kid one piece #eustass captain kid #one piece hcs #one piece imagine #one piece headcanon #one piece hc #angst headcanon #angsty #anon request #queued

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darkpoisonouslove · 3 years

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Ranking the Winx Club Finales

I recently finished my rewatch (and first watch of a season and a half) of Winx Club and wrote out my thoughts on all of it. However, to send off a year that was in experience a lot like watching this series - meaning, generally frustrating and downright disappointing whenever I got excited over a thing with a few highlights that actually stuck the landing - and to get out any remaining feelings over the series, I have decided to rank the finales from least to most favorite. I just have a lot of rage to spare over season 8′s finale and needed an excuse to do so. Plus, I am being thematic here goddammit! Here we go:

8. Season 8

Yeah, I really spoiled that already. To sum it up:

But let me elaborate. Like I already said, this finale enraged the living fuck out of me. I just cannot comprehend whatever possessed them to write a finale so, so... excruciatingly devastating... to a season that started out with a lot of promise and had some extremely solid decisions (except for the art style, which is just NOT IT). This finale is an absolute disaster in every way. First, there is a new plot point introduced mere minutes before the finale and it is never tied into the overall narrative of the season which doesn’t do it any favors, especially after the two halves of the season already have trouble connecting together into one overarching story. The reason they brought in the creatures from the Dark Dimension was to distract Valtor while Winx make their attempt at stealing the stars which could have very well been a role filled by Arken confronting Valtor in an opportunity to clear up all the muddy details around their partnership and bring together the two halves of the season. The Winx’ plan had potential that was completely wasted by their own interruption instead of seeing each girl (provided Layla was playing Icy, Stella - Darcy and Musa/Tecna - Stormy) doing her best to pretend to be the Trix she’s posing as to give the Trix the due role they should have had in this finale. Instead, we get an Icy that is a complete opposite of the character we’ve known her to be for seven seasons all for the sake of a wish she doesn’t even get fulfilled despite her decision to help. Her motivation is a direct contradiction to the original plan of the Trix and disrespects her character from all previous instances of her being on the show for absolutely no reason as she is left with nothing in the end and the whole backstory they invented for her out of nowhere and couldn’t fit in any way with anything previously known about her was in vain because it was never resolved. Winx essentially manage to defeat Valtor once they wish for their own power-up and are gifted powers they haven’t really earned only to be pronounced great heroes who even get their own constellation in the sky. Come again? There was no narrative tension in this episode, no big climax to resolve what is supposedly the biggest threat in the universe at the moment, and no actual emotional conclusion to the season. It can’t even be called a messy wrap when so many threads were left hanging in there. A true disaster on every front.

7. Season 6

Even if you count both 6x25 and 6x26 as the finale of season 6, the structure is still lacking big time. Acheron who is the main drive of the entire season is defeated before the end of 6x25 and the Trix who are the other main villains were also more or less neutralized at that point to leave absolutely no stakes for the last episode so they had to pull some bullshit to fill it. The Winx are useless for the entire episode, including Bloom whose battle with the Trix is an absolute joke. Like, they can’t even think of syncing their attacks so that she can’t protect herself from all three of them with her ridiculously small shield and Bloom couldn’t even bother to actually buy herself enough time to leave the Legendarium. The only saving grace of that fight is the little emotional moment it causes for Bloom but that was also not really set up at any point of the season so it was just out of the blue. Selina changing her affiliations permanently even after the imminent threat for her life was neutralized made about as much sense as her turning evil in the first place and the fact that they needed her to lock the Legendarium made everything 1000% shittier because of how convenient it was that she just decided to turn good again without any justification for her course of actions. That coupled with the lack of consequences for any of her actions (she nearly killed Flora for heaven’s sake and no one even brought that up?) plus the dreadful info dump monologue they gave her just brought the whole thing down. The wrap-up of the season was also underwhelming after they had an entire episode that was mainly free of villains in order to close the other storylines... but, of course, there were no other storylines. Pretty disastrous.

6. Season 7

Just like in season 6, Winx were pretty useless here as they really didn’t do all that much for the plot. Luckily, the fact that the Trix were brought in allowed for the villains to have a battle that was more intriguing and provided some action as for a finale. The other key elements of the season (fairy animals, Trix, wild magic, Kalshara and Brafilius and the time travel) were actually woven together pretty well to make for a pretty satisfying finish to a season that really lacked any solid plot. The mini worlds and the Tynix transformation did not have use in the last episode but that wasn’t too catastrophic. There was actually a pretty emotional moment between the fairy animals and Winx that would have been even better if their relationships had been better developed throughout the season... You’d really think that since fairy animals were the main point of the season and there was no solid plot to account for, they would have taken the time to pay attention to Winx bonding with their fairy animals but nah. I am still impressed with how touching their goodbye was given the fact that they didn’t really have all that much time to actually become close so bonus points for that. The very last scene is a little generic but what else to expect from a season that has sung all its songs already (thank god that there were no musical numbers in this because I have a feeling it would have been even worse)?

5. Season 5

Season 5 could at least pat itself on the back for dealing with the main villain of the season even if there were a couple iffy things about the whole deal. I’m taking away consistency points for a) the fact that the Throne was supposed to be activated with the seals from the Pillars of the Infinite Ocean, yet suddenly stealing a random Sirenix would do, b) Tritannus being defeated by simply having his trident taken away even though he literally grew in body mass implying that the power of the Emperor’s Throne had seeped inside of him (also confirmed by Mystery of the Abyss) and c) the mutants inexplicably turning back into people once Tritannus lost his powers even though they never turned back during his times of relapsing back into a human thanks to running out of pollution. His defeat was just ridiculously easy and Bloom got to do it even though Layla was the one with the personal connection to Tritannus and the one most directly impacted by his actions as her family fell prey to him. Instead of getting to shine in a season that focused heavily not just on her home world but on the environment from which her powers come, she got benched in favor of Bloom getting to do everything again with only mild assist from Layla’s cousin. They should have kept it in the family and left Layla and Nereus deal with Tritannus. The Trix were blasted out of the narrative extremely conveniently and the rest of Winx were saved twice by the mutants just turning their back on them instead of destroying them right then and there and then being turned back into their original form as well. There wasn’t the usual teamwork of the whole Winx unit which I am still salty about despite being sick of all the time they reached for convergence in that season. Theredor fighting alongside Winx (different from his own daughter) was a nice touch but the king and queen of Andros coming off as so helpless (and apparently the only people in the castle unless you admit that everyone else drowned) was frustrating. Where was the Andros army? We only got Tressa, Roy, four of Winx and a handful of mermaids. Is that the whole population of the Heart of All Oceans? Additionally, the finale left no time for any emotional resolution of the season’s events, especially considering the big deal that Daphne’s revival was. Instead they opted for a musical number at the end. Not the best form.

4. Season 3

Season 3 had a finale and then another finale. Granted, better than season 6 that had a finale and then filler but there was not a lot of glory to the ending of a story with such a strong opening and emotional moments that send you bursting into tears. The spell of the four elements was pretty decent in its first appearance in 3x25 but the way Valtor lost it all was a real let down after the climatic confrontations between him and the Winx girls throughout the rest of the season. His return was more or less a desperate last attempt at personal revenge against Winx as his goal was mostly out of reach at this point. The spell of the elements was brought down in both its use to create clones of Winx’ boyfriends and in its power as it was much easier to undo in its reappearance. The saving graces of this season’s finale are the couple emotional moments sprinkled through both 3x25 and 3x26. Bloom’s willingness to sacrifice herself for her friends and the world was the thread that the finale hangs on as she is mostly the one resolving the whole conflict which was a bit dissatisfying after the emotional damage Valtor inflicted on all of them directly or indirectly. There is a few moments left to recover from the emotional intensity of their battles against Valtor but nothing that really addresses the seriousness of the trauma they had to survive because of him. The Trix didn’t even get to have a last stand of their own in either of the last two episodes despite the position in which they started the season but that was more or less unnecessary anyway since we’d already seen they can’t hold their ground against Enchantix Winx even with a boost from Valtor. Overall, the finale is pretty weak, especially as a follow-up of the dynamic and strong experiences that the season put them all through. It was the first finale that was confined to a single episode (or rather two separate battles spanning over an episode to end the season) and there wasn’t enough tension building in the confined storyline an episode told.

3. Season 4

The season 4 finale is overall a solid conclusion that delivers both a final battle with the Wizards and enough time left to address all the other storylines left unfinished. The final battle was pretty short but there was enough intensity in the previous couple episodes to have covered the action demand that the season had already set up and it also provided the opportunity to have Winx come back together as a team after Layla split up. Not only that, but Nebula and Roxy also get to play their part while the Wizards make their last desperate attempt to regain the upper hand. It’s pretty climatic for something that length that also left about 15 minutes of the episode still to fill. Everything that had to do with the closure of the Earth fairies storyline was emotional beyond belief and gave more depth to all of them and Layla’s decision to join them. Winx had to face all of the separate responsibilities they have on their shoulders and find a way to balance them all so that they can pursue their dreams. There was a plethora of emotional moments and a deserved spotlight shined on Layla’s situation and how she’s dealing with it, plus the others’ feelings. It was a really touching finale and also an inspiring one to see Winx stand behind their dreams while still balancing their responsibilities. It seemed to achieve the initial goal of the season to have them adapting to the adult life they were shifting into.

2. Season 2

I’m gonna be honest, I had a very hard time deciding whether this would be number one or two because the season 2 finale had a lot more character moments that were very moving. It really corresponds to the season since it was more character driven than the first one and the finale suited that. However, ultimately I decided that it would take silver because of a couple minor things that bring it down. To get that out of the way, the second portal to Realix that led Winx there was imo a copout that destroyed pretty much all of the tension that the entire season spent building around the search for the Codex. It just felt so wrong for there to be another way to enter that dimension and to me it was a big disappointment. Especially since the key to activating the copy of the Codex was the color riddle that was a ridiculous panicked attempt on the writers’ part to show that Stella isn’t useless and has what to give the team but it only made her look worse in my eyes. Also, minor gripe for the fact that there wasn’t that much of a final battle since everything ended with a single convergence. Of course, there were several battles across the episode between different sides that made for good action and tension and there was magic involved in more ways than simply the convergence in order to defeat Darkar but it was still a bit of a letdown to never truly see him put his everything in battle. And the fact that Griffin and Faragonda held him off for as long as they did on their own actually hurt his credibility as a threat as well. But hey, on the plus side, remember when the teachers actually helped and did not leave the fate of the whole universe in the hands of 16-year-olds? Good times! The MegaTrix and her? their? battle with Darkar was epic. 20/10 on that concept alone, plus it really brought a great feeling of vindication after the number Darkar did on them and felt so satisfying even if they were also part of the villain team of the season. They were portrayed as three-dimensional and weren’t cast out of the narrative without care just because they were villains and that was actually probably the most solid moment that the Trix have ever had on the show (just minor gripe for the fact that they were supposed to be trapped in Realix when the dimension was sealed forever but they were later somehow brought out of there which was never explained). Sky’s speech to Bloom was actually a pretty emotional moment and the payoff from it felt earned and allowed for Bloom’s victory against the darkness to feel natural and in place. It was probably one of their best moments as a couple. Plus, the cute little interactions that we got during the celebration party to send off the season on its merry way made for a great finale. (And a shoutout to the Musa x Riven scenes both in 2x25 and 2x26 because that was some good shit and some cute shit and it was exactly what we deserved).

1. Season 1

Season 1 reigns supreme with its finale. There is just no other finale that can rise to the level of the first one that was built for about one third of the season so that the last episode could dive right into the action without wasting time on setup. This is also the only place where we truly and fully get to see each of the Winx and the Trix (well, minus Layla who hasn’t been introduced yet) showcase their powers but especially Bloom and Icy. It is the longest battle we have seen and it builds a lot of tension on top of what was already there to leave you on the edge of your seat. The exploration of magic in this episode makes it so iconic and such a great watch even on the 300th time. There isn’t really much more to say than simply “It is epic”. What makes it even better though is the fact that there is enough time left in the episode to wrap up everything else and not in a rushed way. The battleground is extended to the locations that have already suffered the previous battles to show the full extension of the action and to setup the wrap-up that comes at the end. They even find the time to let some of the minor characters have distinct and touching moments as well and thus expand the universe of Winx further than just the main characters. Speaking off, they all get their moments, too, and the Specialists aren’t left out of that (you will never catch me not fangirling over Sky and Riven fighting back to back). The finale also doesn’t forget about the overarching story about Bloom’s origin which is commendable considering the constant lack of consistency the show suffers. This is really the only finale that isn’t lacking in any of the departments and manages to provide a truly fascinating story that keeps you entertained and in suspense while at the same time does not discard the emotional payoff or the logical continuation of events. It just excels in every way.

Well, this is my analysis on the finales of Winx Club. What started out as a bitch fest actually left on on a positive and uplifting note to make for a great ending to a harsh year. Let’s see what beginnings 2021 will bring! ;)

#winx club #winx club meta #winx meta #winx analysis #analysis #winx club season 1 #winx club season 2 #winx club season 3 #winx club season 4 #winx club season 5 #winx club season 6 #winx club season 7 #winx club season 8

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peachy-inserts · 4 years

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Ok well if angst is ok then heres the thing, fem reader has a healing quirk but every time she heals someone she can feel the pain of the injuries 10x more than the original until shes done healing. Her secret move tho is that she can also revive the dead in exchange is her own life. Now reader and Aizawa are coworkers, shes an assistant nurse/teacher, they like each other but never confessed yet. While protecting his students in a fight with villains, Aizawa dies, reader saw this and did what

-only she can do in that situation. After she did it, she was able to confess to Aizawa before she dies. So there, sorry if its long and if its too much I understand but thank you so much and I absolutely love all of your works!! Looking forward to see your blog grow 😊😊😊

Oh boy, we thrive off of angst in this house. I did change it slightly, i hope you like it! the only difference is that he doesn’t die, but the reader does, so that its more dramatic

Aizawa x Reader, who dies to save him during an attack(angst!): TW: blood and death. Word count: 2,000

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The city was on fire with rumors and suspicions of a possible villain attack on UA High School. After the first, by the League of Villains, the school had no other choice but to resort to extreme precautionary measures; therefore, the local police station had the authority to monitor the security system, and was immediately notified of any triggered alarms. With this many people having access to such vital information it was no shock that:

1. Private matters would soon become public affairs

2. A smart enough criminal could infiltrate the system if they were desperate enough

So, unfortunately, these rumors were true. Amidst all the chaos and confusion of reporters trying to make their way past the gates and interview heroes on active duty, you ran about the grounds helplessly, scouting for stragglers and injured students. You push a camera out of your face, its owner spinning around on his heels, and shout at him for being reckless and inconsiderate; how could you keep people out of danger if they willingly (not to mention ignorantly) threw themselves into it headfirst?

The cafeteria was being used as a safe point, where All Might was stationed, too weak to actively engage in combat, but strong enough to hold off one to two villains in order to protect those inside in the unlikely event that the less powerful students were targeted. It was those in the hero course that they were after. Since those at the point had been deemed safe for the moment being, you were sent to search for any more that would need to be sent there, unable to fend for themselves, as well as those that could but had been injured.

“My God…” you said out loud, as you threw an unconscious teen from the support course over your shoulder. “-they’re just kids”. You yourself, in all your years of being a pro had never had to endure these many attacks in the span of a year.

Once under the security of the cafeteria, you gently placed their limp body onto a nearby table and began the healing process, gently cradling his head you assumed, due to the lack of visible injury, that they may have been knocked out by pure blunt force. In the matter of only a few seconds, he sprung upwards, nearly headbutting you, and thanked you profusely, knowing the effects of your healing.

Because of your incredibly useful quirk, you were immediately recruited onto the UA staff whenever you earned a name for yourself. You liked it better this way, as you were unable to adapt to offense due especially to the pain you were forced to endure during healing. Over the years that you had been working at the prestigious school as an emergency nurse and support teacher, you had gotten considerably close with your colleague, Shouta Aizawa. He admired your resourcefulness and readiness to assist, and found that your quirk was as strong as it was because of your selfless and caring personality. The two of you frequently met up in the teacher’s lounge before class to complain about specific students, discuss possible lesson plans, or just simply catch up on your personal lives over a piping hot cup of instant coffee, courtesy of whoever forgot to bring the box of it home. Around maybe a year or so ago, you began to accept that you were in love with the scruffy, careless man. Nights upon nights of tossing and turning, crying and laughing, and contemplating had led you to the conclusion that admitting this to him, or anyone else, would be detrimental to his career and the safety of the students. You found it depressing that you were so hopelessly in love, and wasn’t able to do a single thing about it; all you could do was occasionally buy him lunch, sub for him during your free period, and make an exaggerated point to welcome him to work every morning.

Back to the matter at hand. You shook yourself out of a daydream about what could be if it weren’t for your professions, and scolded yourself under your breath for being so easily distracted in the middle of a crisis in which lives were at stake. What if he was hurt, though?

Suddenly, you felt a strong grip on your shoulder, and turned around to see All Might before you, looking worn and battered from years of battle, as well as the current stress the staff collectively shared due to the intrusion.

“Toshinori? What’s wrong? Where am I needed?” you sputtered out, worried about what he may say and something tugging at the back of your head that screamed at you to go out into the battle and help the other heroes, instead of waiting around here where there was nothing to be done. However, you knew you were needed here. You two were the only ones watching over the safety point.

“Its okay- I was just here to tell you that everyone here is accounted for. They need you out on the grounds to help the ones fighting”.

With no more than a determined nod, you stormed out of the main building and out into the combat, where you were quick to notice that there were considerably fewer heroes present than you had intended to see… The integrity of the surrounding buildings was no longer, most of them having had their walls knocked down and windows busted out. You quietly hoped that the glass had been broken from the impact of a villain being thrown against it, but with the amount of wounds you had healed in the past hour, you knew better than to assume that was the case. In reality, it was an absolute disaster.

“Eraser! You can’t hold them back on your own for much longer, just let Mirio intervene!” you heard someone distant shout, and quickly hastily began to search for Aizawa; your gut instinct was right, he needed help.

“I fucking told you, now stop distracting me! There’s no need for the students to get any more involved…” he trailed off, having been struck in the face.

“Shouta!” you called out to him, sprinting as hard as you could in the direction of his voice, finding him engaged in battle with a large, hideous figure, whose skin was a deep, unnerving green embellished with huge, swelling boyles. He had a grip on Aizawa’s neck, and you could see… blood gushing from his eyes. He couldn’t see to use his quirk. You could feel your heart sink into your stomach; there was no way that he could make it out of this on his own. What if you hadn’t showed up? Having been trained to think rationally in these situations, you quickly called out for another hero to take the lead. One look and you knew that you, without any offensive capabilities, wouldn’t be able to take this monster out. Besides, you had to help Aizawa.

Mirio was on call in an instant; his cape had been torn off and his costume torn in spots, but nothing could ever touch his strikingly faithful spirit. He was quick to pry his teacher from the grip of the beast, knowing your intentions of using your quirk to help Aizawa and thus baiting the villain into a different area, so that you had enough time and security to go through with the process.

He was in terrible condition. There he lay, desolate and helpless, blood oozing out from his wounded eyes and his appendages bent every which way. His scarves were long gone, having been stripped from him to make overtaking him an easier task. He was targeted, and you knew it.

“Shouta! Shouta - i-it’s me! Can you hear me?” he was clearly in worse condition than when you had first heard him only moments ago, before you had located him. Seeing him in so much pain, it was… the worst thing that you ever had to go through. Before you knew it, tears spilled out from your eyes and cascaded the bumps in your swollen cheeks, down your chin and dripping onto his chest. Without giving him time to answer, you threw yourself on top of him in a protective manner and drained all the love from your body into him.

“Huh?” he coughed a few times, and then wiped the blood off of his face with the arm that was broken only moments ago. You had never been known to be able to heal so many serious injuries at once, at such a speed, and this immediately alarmed him once he was steady enough to have a firm grasp on his consciousness. “No, w-wait, stop!” he pushed himself away from you, sliding out from under your body, subsequently collapsing from the energy that it took.

Already, you were shaking from the pain. You began to shake as it overtook you, but you didn’t lose sight of your goal. You never did, never wavered. He loved how stubborn you were, adored how determined you were, but in this moment all he wanted to do was grab you by the shoulders and scream some sense into you.

Desperate, you pinned his arms down and looked over him, sobbing. It broke his heart.

“Please, stop, please!” he begged you. “I’m fine now, I really am, you don’t need to do this. It’s unnecessary!” he ditched his stoic demeanor in turn for a plead. He was in excruciating pain, and didn’t want to begin to imagine how bad it was for you; all he wanted was for you to stay out of harm’s way, and yet here you were suffering for his sake.

“No!” you practically screamed in his face, causing him to wince. “I can’t- I can’t let you die! I can’t let you be hurt like this…” You stuttered through choked sobs, partly from emotions, partly because of the extremity that your body was subject to.

“I won’t die- you’ve already done enough - I can make it to the hospital just fine, so why are you putting yourself through this?” he was lying, and he knew it; if he wasn’t then he would have simply pushed you off of him by now.

“Because I love you!”

You weren’t even aware of what you had just said, or rather, it didn’t register that you hadn’t developed the sort of relationship with him that it was a normal thing to say. What did it matter anyways?

“I- I love you, too…” Aizawa said, feeling a huge weight leave his chest. Feeling more at ease, he flipped you over onto your back, causing you to cough up blood. Shaken, he sat you up so you wouldn’t choke and made a point not to touch you, as badly as you just wanted to hold you tight, so that you couldn’t use your quirk.

“I love you” he choked out, feeling immense shame and guilt for your wellbeing. No response. You fell over, limp the pain having been too overwhelming for your body to handle at once.

You were dead.

And it was all because of him

-mod jo

#bnha #bnha angst #scenario #bnha imagine #aizawa x reader #shouta aizawa #eraserhead #eraser head #eraser x reader #bnha fanfic #mha #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #aizawa angst #mod josie

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okaynicolette · 3 years

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Lunch Between Friends - Liam x Jacob

Jacob pulled up to the lunch restaurant, unsure if he had the right place or not. It seemed rather crowded and also rather pink. After he found parking, which was not an easy task due to the Saturday brunch crowd of locals and tourists alike, he checked his messages from Liam again. Yep, this was indeed the right place. Jacob sighed, why couldn’t Liam be happy with just meeting up at a more adult restaurant, rather than something he read about in some food blog, he thought rather discontentedly. Walking to the front of the restaurant, which had bright pink umbrellas shading the sidewalk tables, he saw Liam leaning up against the gold and black painted wall (which was no doubt intended to be a tourist photo op). Jacob gave a light wave to his friend as he walked up, hoping that Liam was actually looking at him behind the dark aviator sunglasses he donned.

Liam arrived early to put his name down, knowing that this restaurant would be crowded at this time of day. It was a popular brunch and burger spot in Venice Beach and it was constantly full of trendy LA millennials– so of course, Liam loved it. Though it was a Saturday, he couldn’t help but check his work email while he waited for Jacob to arrive. He didn’t become one of the most sought after CFPs at his firm by taking weekends off, after all. Just as he sent one final email, he looked up and noticed Jacob walking towards him. Liam gave a head nod of greetings and said, “I put our name in with the host about 20 minutes ago, should be any time now.”

Jacob was thankful that Liam arrived early to put their name in– neither of them were very patient people, but Liam tended to be the more proactive one. Jacob would likely just suffer and complain. The two of them were roommates at USC for the last two years of school, so they knew each other very well. Nowadays, they tried to hang out as often as they could, but things got difficult since Jacob got his girlfriend pregnant right after his graduation. Liam was finishing school then climbing the corporate ladder at his job, while Jacob was learning how to be a father. Liam did his best to be a good uncle though, and Jacob was glad for that as an only child himself– his son, Isaiah, loved his Uncle Liam. From the time Isaiah was born until he was around six, Jacob and Isaiah’s mom, Aidy, lived together and had a fairly normal life. That was until about a year ago. Out of the blue, Aidy decided that she was disappointed she missed out on so much of her life and needed to “experience more”, which was apparently code for “sleep with other people”. They did their best, tried counseling for a few months, but eventually decided to go their separate ways. Jacob originally thought it would be easy because they weren’t married, but they both wanted full custody of Isaiah. The custody battle dragged on for months, when finally, in January, the court decided that they would have joint custody, with Isaiah going back and forth every two weeks. Jacob wasn’t taking it very well, though he tried to put on a good face for his son. He was grateful when Liam called to invite him on a spur of the moment trip, because it felt a little bit like old times.

Moments later, the host called to seat them and they headed into the restaurant. The inside carried the same millennial aesthetic as the outside with mismatched colorful vintage furniture and gold mirrors and picture frames lining the walls. Jacob found quiet solace in the fact that Liam had good taste in food, which meant this whole Instagram-trap might be worth it. Once they were seated, Liam asked, “So did you book your flights?” He rarely beat around the bush, especially when he was nervous or eager. Something in his tone told Jacob that it was a bit of both.

“Yeah, I got them for the dates you told me and let Aidy know– not that she cared very much since it doesn’t affect her or Isaiah,” Jacob replied, unintentionally sounding bitter at the end of the statement. He was bitter, but he didn’t like showing it, even if it was just to Liam. “So, are we wedding crashing?” He asked before picking up the menu to try and find a decent lunch.

Liam laughed, idly skimming the offerings, even though he had already checked and double checked the menu before even deciding that this was the place they would be eating at. “I don’t know yet. I told you, it’s going to be a surprise for Nik– she doesn’t know I’m coming at all,” he replied, with a facade of excitement. Inside, he was beginning to worry about whether or not this was a good idea. Hoping that Jacob would have good advice, he asked, “Do you think I should tell her? I mean, I’m trying to be romantic and all that.”

Jacob was trying to read through the very long burger menu and make a decision about lunch, but everything sounded amazing since he accidentally skipped breakfast. “I mean if you want to be romantic, then showing up to surprise her at her best friend’s wedding is definitely that. It sounds like a fucking rom-com, for god’s sake,” he said, barely looking up. In all honesty, Jacob felt like the last person who should be giving advice on that sort of thing. He had been with one woman seriously for the last seven years and she had all but shattered his heart.

Liam sighed, setting down his menu. It was rare for him to let his guard down, but Jacob had seen him at his worst, so there was no image to uphold. “My friend from work, Riley, said that Maids of Honor usually have a lot of responsibilities. Do you think I’ll just be distracting her? Oh, and also the bride thinks I’m a dick, so that’s not great either,” he said, rather frustratedly.

Jacob decided on his food and set down his menu to face his friend. “Well I don’t know very much about weddings,” he began, again subtly playing the sad-heartbroken card, “but, like I said– it sounds like a rom-com. I’m sure she’ll appreciate the grand gesture and it’ll be fine. Also, you didn’t tell me Nikki’s best friend doesn’t like you!” He laughed a little bit, giving Liam a hard time. His attitude did rub people the wrong way sometimes, but that usually just meant they hadn’t taken the time to get to know him well.

Liam rolled his eyes as the waitress arrived to take their orders. Once she took their menus and left, he began, “She thinks I’m too showy or something. I get it, but like– she hated me from the jump, so what am I supposed to do?” He shrugged.

Jacob smirked, “Lease a Subaru, move to Arcadia, and become a high school guidance counselor, obviously.” The sarcastic response elicited a genuine laugh from both men. “Kidding, but who knows– This trip might show her friend that you’re serious about the relationship and she’ll get off your back,” he nodded, optimistically as the waitress dropped off their drinks.

“Damn, I never even thought of that,” said Liam pensively, realizing that Jacob had made a very good point. He was now somewhat reassured in his plan to go on the trip. “So how are you doing, man? I know these past few months have been shit,” he said somberly, genuinely feeling for his friend. Though Liam didn’t have any desires to be a father in the near future, he did love Isaiah like a real nephew, and was really disappointed to see how things turned out. He had even helped Jacob get a lawyer through his parents, but it was no use.

Jacob raised his eyebrows and sighed before responding. “It’s fucking lonely, dude. Like how do people our age even meet other people? I’ve gone out a few times with people from work, but bars and clubs… I’m just so not used to that scene anymore,” he shook his head and took a sip of his drink.

“Have you tried dating apps?” Liam asked, unsure of what to say to his grieving friend. Emotions weren’t his strong suit, but he was trying his best.

“If one more person asks me that, I think I’ll explode on the spot.” Liam said sharply. Just that morning, his mother had asked the same thing over the phone. Apparently it was time for him to get back out there again, or something.

Liam raised his hands up in mock defeat. “Alright, so no dating apps,” he resigned. “Well, weddings are a great place to meet people. Who knows– maybe we do score some invites and you meet someone there!” He said, trying to cheer his friend up. Just then, the waitress brought by their meals and topped up their drinks. “And if you don’t meet anyone, then I can always take you out. If you want to, that is,” he nodded, unfolding his napkin and setting it on his lap.

“I don’t feel a particular need to meet anyone, has anyone ever considered that?” Jacob muttered, following Liam’s lead and placing his napkin on his lap.

“You just said you were lonely, J. Even if it’s just a friend you meet, that would help! I know you have me, but it would be nice to have other people you can lean on right now and whenever, you know?” Liam explained before beginning to eat.

“I have friends!” Jacob said incredulously. “I have… Aidy?” He offered sheepishly, realizing that his social circle had been pretty nonexistent these days.

“Your baby-mama who you just got out of a five-month-long custody battle with? That’s your other friend? You might need this trip more than me, dude.” He chuckled and shook his head as he took another bite.

“Ew, God. Don’t call her that.” Jacob rolled his eyes, “But fine. I guess I do need to get out more. This trip will be good for that. And even if Nikki is super busy, the two of us can still go out and stuff, right?”

“Yeah, of course! It’ll be like a revival of the good old days– an Apartment 121 Renaissance!” Liam said excitedly, lifting his glass as if making a toast. Jacob laughed and lifted his glass to touch his friend’s. Their glasses clinked and Jacob felt slightly less hopeless than he had while he was driving in.

#para #liam x jacob

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ice-cream-nekogirl · 4 years

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Amy Martinez (Character Sheet TV Tropes Style) A-E

Amy Martinez is my BNHA/AHS OC!!

She is a young girl from New Orleans and a witch from Miss. Robichaux’s Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies who transfers into UA and earned a spot in the Hero Course. She currently resides in a very lavish mansion that belonged to the former Supreme Fiona Goode, and as it turns out, Amy originally lived in Japan but her parents were murdered by witch hunters who infiltrated Japan in search of her mother. The pro-heroes, unable (and unwilling) to take care of a young witch, had her transferred and placed under the care of Fiona and the New Orleans coven, where she was later taken in by the current Supreme and her godmother Cordelia Goode. Despite her appearance, Amy is very hyperactive, eccentric and mischievous by nature, isn’t above doing immoral and wicked things and has an offbeat sense of humor that tends to be off-putting to her new classmates. However, that doesn’t mean Amy is all bad, and in fact does have a compassionate and empathetic side that comes out when she’s with friends, especially her childhood friend Shinsou Hitoshi, ally Midoriya Izuku and later, her new best friend Ashlen Kyanse.

Speaking of which! Ashlen Kyanse is NOT mine, she’s my best friend @ashleigh-luvs-14cats‘s OC! :D :3

TV Tropes About Amy:

A Girl and Her Dog: She adopts a Northern Inuit Puppy that she and Ashlen name Dakota and he becomes her loyal animal companion and emotional support dog.

A God Am I: Not really, but her words to Midoriya during her rampage resembled something of a god complex (at the time at least).

Amy: You can’t beat me Izuku... One For All couldn’t defeat Fiona Goode, the reigning supreme at the time, you can’t beat me now, even with One For All, you can’t beat me either! None of you heroes can! I’m a goddamn witch!

Accidental Murder: She accidentally kills Aizawa by giving him an apple she didn’t know was poisoned and charmed to look perfectly normal by Madison. Which resulted in Madison having to bring him back to life with Vitalum Vitalis.

Action Girl: Amy is always ready for a fight, and knows HOW to fight as well as she’s proven to be a very valuable and proficient student in the Hero Course.

Adoring The Pests: A tanuki once got into the dorm building, because Amy let it in since she found it ‘adorable’ and even named him ‘Shadow’. And although Iida told her to stop feeding the tanuki’s, Amy continues to do so because she thinks they’re too cute to not feed.

Amy also states that she would feed the possums in America because she thought they were adorable.

Adorkable: Despite her many eccentricities Amy’s a dork at heart a shown through her love of singing, dancing and making silly puns, and then there’s her girlish excitement when she’s around animals and toys as well as her oddly endearing fangirl reactions to Brendon Urie, Melanie Martinez and Stevie Nicks. Further displayed whenever she dances and sings with Shinsou and Ashlen.

Affectionate Nickname: “Ames” by Kaminari, Shinsou, Ashlen and a majority of her classmates. As well as “Witch Bitch” by Bakugo, it was initially used as an insult but became his term of endearment for her.

Her ex-boyfriend Damien called her “Amzy”, albeit as a means to manipulate her.

Ashlen also fondly calls her “Witchy”.

Fiona tends to call her “Sweet Amy”

Marie Laveau also affectionately refers to her as “Baby Witch”.

All of the Other Reindeer: Much like Midoriya, Amy was picked on and teased by other kids because she and they believed that she was quirkless and mocked her for it to the point of calling her ‘Powerless/Quirkless Amy’. It backfires tremendously when Amy supposedly gains a quirk, but has to pretend it’s only a Telekinesis quirk. The kids didn’t stop picking on her, but she really didn’t bother making any other friends other than Shinsou because of the bullying.

And this even extends to other witches, while Amy found a new family in her sisters Zoe and Queenie (after Misty, Nan and Madison died) Robichaux opened up to hundreds of other witches around the country. Amy was initially ecstatic and eager to make new friends just like her, only to realize that being a witch didn’t stop other witches from bullying her and thinking she’s weird even for their standards, which just added to Amy’s evergrowing sense of loneliness.

Ambiguous Disorder: Has a crippling fear of being abandoned, extreme overreactions and outbursts (taking All-Might and Aizawa’s criticisms of her powers very strongly, screams at Midoriya over a disagreement), indulges in risky behaviors (drugs, shop-lifting, partying at college parties despise being underage), is highly impulsive (Iida has to stop her when she performs in combat too recklessly), prone to emotional meltdowns, shows can occasional lack of empathy and has unstable relationships (Bakugo, Midoriya, Aizawa, etc.). All of which are signs of Borderline Personality disorder or Bipolar Disorder, two of these Iida speculates she may have. However, some of her these behaviorisms also resemble Complex Post-traumatic Stress Disorder due to her inability to control her emotions, feelings of emptiness and worthlessness, and moments of hostility towards her peers to the point of avoiding her friends and relationships. And then Shachath also mentions that she tends to have regular ‘songs’ of suicide which act as a further indication that Amy might have CPTSD.

Anguished Declaration of Love: During a fit of pure rage, she fights with Midoriya but when he pins her down, her psychotic exterior breaks a little bit as she breaks down crying and tells him that she loves him. However, because of Midoriya’s insecurities and familiarity with Amy’s mischievous nature, he doesn’t believe her and yells at her to stop playing around. Needless to say, it goes all downhill for him from there...

Animal Motifs: It’s subtle but she has a fox motif as her handle online is ‘KitsuneGirl’ and she has black tips on her blonde hair, a mischievous and sneaky personality, her tendency to act as a trickster both during and out of combat, and her witchcraft and magic also alludes to the kitsune and their various magical abilities in Japanese culture.

Anti-Hero: She’s self-centered, obnoxious, aggressive and occasionally breaks every rule she wants as she believes she can make her own rules due to her powers, but this is her being a troublemaker at best as she tends to take a radical approach as a means of standing up for what she believes in: Love.

Anti-Villain: At her worst she outright sides against her class and does immoral things whether it’s stealing, murder or even attacking allies, although she has no plans to become a villain and merely indulges in her worst impulses when she’s in a bad mood and isn’t above being cruel to her own classmates should they cross her.

Arc Villain: In a way, and relatively minor. As the Culture Festival arc comes to an end, Amy’s overwhelmed by the realization of how the pro-heroes could have taken care of her but didn’t, along with being kidnapped by the villains and her and Midoriya’s dissipating relationship. It becomes too much for her to bear that she flies into an ultra-tantrum and attacks Aizawa, the other teachers and puts her classmates into a slumber (to spare them her wrath) and destroys some of UA’s property and Midoriya has to stop her. But in the end he doesn’t win, instead, Shinsou has to talk her down.

Arch Enemy: Amy has made several enemies, but of all the foes she feels a tremendous hatred towards and desire to destroy once and for all is Scathach, the wicked witch of the Roanoke forest who she aspires to kill and free all the souls she trapped in the forest.

Attention Deficit Oooh Shiny!: Amy is very, very easily distracted by things, especially if there’s a cute animal involved, music she likes is playing or if there’s food. She CAN learn to focus but it’s… a challenge.

Attention Whore: Almost always desperate for attention regardless of whether it’s positive or negative and always performs outlandish things or says bizarre things if it means having other people’s attention on HER.

She even goes so far as to sometimes wear Madison’s inappropriate undergarments in hopes that someone will flip her skirt all for the sake of attention.

The Atoner: After her brush with the apocalypse which allowed her and Mallory to go back in time to stop it, Amy realizes how cruel she was to her classmates and resolves to apologize and become a better classmate and friend to everyone. And she felt horrible when she needed to repeat history (including acting like a jerk) in the new timeline as a means to keep time flowing the way it needed to be but still lived up to promising to be better to her friends. It only gets better when Ashlen comes into her life and inspires Amy to keep living up to this promise.

Ax-Crazy: Shows a disturbingly homicidal excitement when annihilating her opponents in battle, gleefully murders when given the chance and is a little too happy when talking about horror stories that include serial killers such as the Axe Man or Twisty The Clown.

And then she goes off the deep-end once the Culture Festival ends by attacking her teacher, classmate (Midoriya), beating her other teachers with little effort and causing destruction around UA, until she’s eventually subdued by her own merit and Shinsou’s influence.

The Baby of The Bunch: She’s the youngest witch of the original coven of Miss Robichaux’s Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies consisting of Cordelia, Zoe, Queenie, Madison, Nan and Misty, with Cordelia being in her late 20′s at the time while the other girls were at least 17-24 while Amy was only 11. Even as she’s gotten older, her witch sisters still look after her as the ‘little sister’ of the coven.

Back From The Dead: Amy is momentarily killed and impaled by witch hunters in her first year at UA, but is revived by Misty and returns to her distraught and relieved classmates.

She dies again in her second year but by her ex-boyfriend Damien who made a deal with Papa Legba by trading her life for his own life and drowned her in a bathtub. Only to be revived by Madison.

The Bad Guy Wins: Sort of. She takes on a more villainous role after the Culture festival ends and all the stress, realizations and Midoriya’s growing impatience with her makes her go berserk. And so, Amy attacks her teacher, other teachers, causes mayhem and destruction around UA (although she does spare all of the students), knocks out her classmates so she doesn’t hurt them and then partakes in a big fight with Midoriya. However, while he manages to pin her down, Amy gets the upper hand and beats him to a bloody pulp when he ignites more fuel to her raging Sentio Compassios and although her rampage was put to an end, it’s only because she stopped herself and Shinsou (and later All-Might and Cordelia) managed to talk her down. Ultimately, Amy still defeated Midoriya and UA faced some damage from her rage, and in the end, she faced no real consequences as Cordelia urged the school to pardon her while giving them a The Reason You Suck Speech. While Amy was pardoned of the damage she caused, she ended up withdrawing with UA for several months.

Badass Adorable: Cute in appearance, generally endearing and funny with her classmates but also hella strong in combat with amazing powers that she knows how to use very well and make her opponents fear her. This is showcased during her fight with Todoroki in which she gets him to realize just how strong she is.

Badass Boast: Can’t help but go on about how awesome and powerful she is at times in battle, but at times it can also be scary when she’s angry.

Amy: You think you can control me? Is that what this is? That’s how Hero Society works doesn’t it? (bursts into laughter) You... really think you can control me? Wow... you know... this is why witch hunters emerged... they were afraid of witches and their power... you might not be a witch hunter... but the fact that you think you can control me? Is priceless... (suddenly screaming) NO ONE CAN CONTROL ME! NO ONE CAN DEFEAT ME! NO ONE CAN KILL ME, NO ONE!!!

Bad Powers, Good People: It varies on her fluctuating morality but Amy is usually a good person who has the ability to control people not unlike Shinsou’s Brainwashing, except she can actually harm them by frying their brains should they attempt to resist her.

Balloon Belly: Always has one after eating too much, which is every day. Especially when she went to Pizza Hut with Shinsou and Ashlen, much to Shinsou’s disgust and Ashlen’s amusement.

Because You Were Nice To Me: She and Shinsou became friends for this very simple but pure reason in daycare. She was just coloring and when he wanted crayons she happily gave them to him, and when he called her coloring ‘pretty’, she started following him around and vice-versa.

Similarly, her reasoning for becoming best friends with Ashlen is also simple but pure as they met online during the period where Amy stopped attending UA and isolated herself in her mansion. Amy is just as opinionated online as she is in real life, although she also loads up her feed with silly things that she likes along with stories and drawings, but Ashlen genuinely liked her content and complimented her and started talking to her. Which drew Amy closer to her until they meet up in real life and Amy is overly friendly to her, but it’s all because Ashlen was kind to her and listened to her whenever she vented.

Belligerent Sexual Tension: She and Bakugo have been bickering and fighting with each other since they first met as children and never stopped when they met again in high school, but they’re very passionately in love with each other as Amy says that he’s the one she’s truly in love with and Bakugo can’t easily let her go even if she gets on his nerves, he’s clearly in love with her.

Berserk Button: She has quite a few…

Any sexist remark is bound to set her off into a tirade but if it’s directed towards her or God forbid her female friends, she WILL hurt you.

Taking her hat (if she’s wearing it) off is a quick way to piss her off.

Taking her food, whether accidentally or intentionally, WILL provoke her into violence, if you’re a child she’ll hurt you emotionally, but if you’re her age or an adult, it’s fair game as Izuku learned the hard way.

Tampering with her possessions is a VERY fast way to piss her off into a tranquil rage as she maimed a group of college boys (that she didn’t invite) when they trashed the bottom floor of her mansion at a party.

Don’t say anything bad about Brendon Urie. She shares this with Shinsou, who both call it ‘blasphemy’.

Don’t tell her to “Shut Up”.

And don’t yell at her for that matter, although she gets more emotional and upset when yelled at rather than angry.

Frozen. Let it Go. That is all.

Not being appreciated, remembered or neglected is probably her biggest one with her least comical reaction as she’ll grow from irritated to enraged in seconds should she feel that someone is unappreciative of her, has forgotten her or neglecting her for someone else.

Don’t call her ‘stupid’, but never, ever call her ‘selfish’ or ‘crazy’, mostly because she’s self-aware plenty and hates being reminded of it.

Hurting ANY of her friends is the fastest way to get on her bad side as she will BURN you alive if you hurt her friends. If you’re lucky though, she’ll just hit you with an empty Dr. Pepper liter.

Beta Bitch: When she and Madison are together, Amy essentially becomes her right hand bitch.

Beware The Nice Ones: She’s not always sweet but is occasionally kind-hearted... until you piss her off that is... and then you’ll wish you didn’t.

Beware The Silly Ones: Very comical and extremely silly and fun-loving, but her classmates don’t underestimate her abilities or her temper as Amy becomes a force to be reckoned with in combat or when properly provoked.

Big Bad Duumvirate: She and Madison aren’t evil per se, but considered two of the nastier girls who use their magic for pranks and are even dubbed ‘The Sin Sisters’ by 1-A.

Big Sister Mentor: Despite her being older than her, Amy (17) is quite sisterly with her witch friend Coco (25), as she teaches her how to do laundry and other household chores with the help of Iida.

Big Brother Worship: In a way, Shinsou’s only eight days older than her, but Amy still regards him as like her brother and she adores him very much and believes in him the most in his quest to become a pro-hero. And was heartbroken when she had to leave him for his and her own protection to Robichaux.

She absolutely adores her adoptive witch sisters Zoe, Misty and Mallory. Zoe especially because she was the first that she instantly became closest too when they met at Robichaux, and then she became very fast friends with Misty and wanted her to come to Robichaux, so she was overjoyed when she started to live with them. Finally, she and Mallory hit it off quickly due to being close enough in age but Amy still acknowledges Mallory as her senior and looks up to her like a big sister.

Downplayed with Madison. As Amy notes that Madison was a bitch to her as well as a horrible example in New Orleans and still is, but it doesn’t stop Amy from following her bad example from time to time, as well as still showing respect to Madison because of her undeniable power and occasional acts of kindness towards her and her friends at UA.

Big Damn Heroes: During the Stain Arc, she shows up just in time to hold off Stain off to keep him from seriously harming Todoroki, Midoriya and Iida and even distracts him for a brief moment.

Big Fancy House: Amy lives in a rather large mansion, while it’s not as big as Yaoyorozu’s it’s still pretty large, spacious and glamourous. It actually belonged to Fiona, but when she died Cordelia gave it all to Amy so she could have a house upon returning to Japan.

The Big Girl: Of 2-A, despite being one of the shortest girls, she’s certainly the strongest one due to her array of powerful abilities.

Big Eater: Amy loves to eat and can clear a whole table due to her voracious appetite as she ate all the desserts in the dorm-rooms the first night, can eat a whole pizza as well as she cleared out the entire table during her’s, Shinsou’s and Ashlen’s first outing as friends and then ate dessert afterwards.

Big Sister Instinct: She took this attitude towards Kota. She wanted to bash Muscular’s head in once Midoriya knocked him out but the latter stopped her and Amy only reconsidered when she realized that Kota shouldn’t have to witness death a second time.

She’s also somewhat protective of Midoriya despite everything as she once dumped Bakugo for 2 months when she found out that he told the former to commit suicide in middle school.

She also displays this attitude towards some of her female friends especially Yaoyorozu, Ashido, Hagakure and Asui. And extends this towards classmates such as Kouda, Aoyama and Kaminari.

Likewise, she’s extremely protective of Shinsou, who she regards as like a brother to her, and Ashlen, her best friend who she also regards as like a sister to her.

Big Stupid Doodoo-head: Since Amy isn’t very mature, her insults can easily delve from vulgar to very childish such as ‘stupid-head’, ‘dum-dum’ ‘fartface’ and ‘butt-head’. Her arguments with Shinsou tend to delve into this very quickly.

Amy: I would have had him if you actually covered me stupid!

Shinsou: It’s not my fault dum-dum, you should have paid more attention. Instead of waving your magic around all over the damn place.

Amy: Yes it is! You know what? Instead of brainwashing you should wash your dumb face and your stupid mouth because stupid words keep coming out!

Shinsou: Your face is dumb and your insults are even dumber you jabbering bat.

Amy: No YOUR face is dumb and your hair looks like a rat’s butt!

Bi The Way: Amy shamelessly expresses her attraction to the same sex, is very much enamored with Yaoyorozu and goes on about how ‘beautiful’ and ‘smart’ she is. Likewise, she’s very attracted to some of her fellow witches in her coven such as Mallory and even Madison as she calls Mallory a ‘fairy goddess’ and Madison a ‘sexy bitch’. And as she received a love letter from Monoma, she believed it was from a girl and seemed pretty excited by the thought of it.

Birds Of A Feather: She and Shinsou became fast friends in their childhood due to similar senses of humor and then when Amy discovers her witch powers and she found out she could control people just like Shinsou. Even as they grew up and reunited they still share things in common such as witty, sly and clever personalities and tastes in music.

She and Bakugo of all people discover that they have a lot more in common than they thought once they started bonding and it shows through their fierce tempers, desire to prove themselves, unwillingness to show weaknesses and somewhat abrasive tendencies for that matter. This is despite Amy and Bakugo trying to claim that they’re ‘night and day’, nobody buys it.

This is also how and why she became fast friends with Ashlen via internet, while they didn’t meet each other face-to-face yet, they bonded over similar tastes in music, movies and penchant for puns. Although their personalities are drastically different when they DO meet face-to-face their friendship doesn’t deteriorate as they still get along and still share those things in common and indulge in their pillow talk just like any best friends.

Blackmail: Not at first, but when she gets angry at Aizawa she starts making constant threats to tell Cordelia on him for menial things as a means to get him to buckle due to his fear of the Supreme.

Blessed With Suck: Sort of. Amy loves having all of her powers, but Sentio Compassios, her unique power, tends to leave her emotionally exhausted whenever she uses it too much, and she can feel everyone’s pain and feelings if they are strong enough and Amy becomes instantly affected by them, which she says is not always pleasant since it’s something she can’t quite turn off.

Blood Knight: Amy is VERY eager to fight and spar with her friends because it gives her free reign to use her magic and overall just enjoys the thrill of it all.

Blue and Orange Morality: In a way, due to being a witch and coming from a more neutral side rather than the Heroes or Villains side as Amy would rather be supportive of others’ impulses and desires than operate on a normal morality the heroes follow. For example, she’s fine with Madison wanting to kill Aizawa, but is offended by Mineta’s perverted antics, and she was also perfectly okay with Shinsou talking smack about Tokoyami (their own classmate and her friend) but crossed the line at Bakugo dissing Brendon Urie.

Book Dumb: She’s not the best student, but managed to score relatively high in exams as she ranked 11th out of the 21 students at the time. However, Amy is obviously not stupid despite showing some naivete and is in fact quite crafty, just not motivated in school or homework as she frequently needs her friends such as Shinsou, Midoriya, Ashlen and Bakugo to help her.

Boomerang Bigot: Despite occasionally boasting about how witches are superior to normal humans with quirks, at the same time even she’s exasperated by other witches as she often says “other witches are bitches”, although is partially due to the fact that she’s had the misfortune of meeting other witches her age who are just as exclusive and snobbish as the kids she grew up with who picked on her for her lack of a quirk. And then it increases when she meets two other witches (Blair and Laura) in Japan who are somehow WORSE than her as they mock her friends and Amy quickly fights them off.

Bratty Teenage Daughter: Certainly, acts the part at times whether she’s putting up a whining fuss or showing an apathy towards things, especially towards Aizawa and Iida, the former who acts somewhat fatherly towards her and the latter who acts like an older brother towards her. It helps that she’s Cordelia’s goddaughter and she treats her with respect but has little towards the former two.

Amy: Oh Ms. Cordelia I love you! Mr. Aizawa I hate you! Hitoshi I need you! Katsuki, hey fuck you!

Brilliant But Lazy: She’s a powerful witch, knows many spells, potions and is very talented with magic and knows how to creatively use it in combat but has zero motivation in working and academics and would rather rely on her magic to do all the work for her or simply use it to cheat off of her more academically inclined classmates.

Broken Bird: Watching her mother being burnt to the stake, her father being lynched and finding her puppy killed by the witch hunters shattered her innocence. And then her experience in New Orleans added to the tragedies as she still felt hunted and hated by the same witch hunters as she was forced her to watch even more people get killed, including new friends and family such as Nan, Misty, Madison, Zoe and Myrtle. Although some of them got better, Amy was still traumatized by watching her new family all get killed, and then Fiona’s intention to kill her and every other one of her new sisters and her new godmother completely broke her. While the coven was able to restore itself and Amy emerged as a strong young witch, the events still broke her and she follows her sister’s example to avoid looking like she’s broken and instead forces herself to maintain an excitable and cheerful façade as a means to convince herself that the events didn’t break her and instead made her stronger.

Brooding Boy Gentle Girl: She’s the Gentle Girl to Todoroki’s Brooding Boy despite not being together, but they are good friends as Amy’s oddly sweet nature can encourage Todoroki to be a little more outgoing.

Likewise with her and Bakugo as she’s often gentler than he is when it comes to expressing affection and sympathy while Bakugo just angrily broods. However, they can reverse the roles at times where Amy is bitterly sulking and Bakugo shows his softer side by attempting to comfort her.

Brutal Honesty: Amy is outspoken by nature and won’t hesitate to tell someone how it is or how she’s feeling, however she’s fully aware of how it can hurt people’s feelings, she just doesn’t care if it does. However, she CAN and WILL hold her tongue depending on who it is she’s talking to and depending on the situation she does know when to be more sensitive and delicate.

Bully Hunter: While not the nicest girl in the world, Amy really doesn’t care for bullies as she defended Shinsou from bullies when they were growing up and even first met Bakugo by pantsing and pushing him to the ground when he was bullying Midoriya, and also tells off bitchier witches whenever they taunt Coco for her naivete.

In fact, she hates bullies so much that she dumped Bakugo for several months when Madison told her that he told Midoriya to jump off the school roof in middle school and said that she couldn’t be with a bully.

Amy also attacks some nastier girls at the mall when they look at Ashlen funny.

Bunny-Ears Lawyer: She’s an oddball, by and far, but she’s a very skilled witch in and out of combat, shows a cunning side and is very knowledgeable in politics, sociology and human relationships.

Shinsou even imagined her as his lawyer during a nightmare he had.

Burn The Witch!: Nearly suffers this fate as a child right after watching her mother get burnt until All-Might and the pro-heroes save her just before they can light her up.

Calling The Old Man Out: Despite not being her father, she calls out Aizawa for being an unfair teacher to his past students and for not taking her in when he could have after her parents died since nothing stopped him and the other UA staff teachers from adopting Eri, but allowed Amy to be shipped off to America with people who ended up indirectly exposing her to even more bloodshed that further traumatized her. She also chides him by saying that he’s not good at even looking after his other students and calls him ‘the wrong person’ to look over anyone.

Cannot Keep a Secret: While she CAN keep an important secret, she deliberately at times tells some secrets as she freely blabs whatever secret she’s supposed to be keeping or should keep a secret for the sake of not embarrassing her friends.

Amy: Sorry I woulda arrived earlier but Hitoshi had some really bad jock itch so I made sure he was feeling okay after.

Can’t Take Criticism: Amy CAN take some criticism, but at the same time she can’t take certain criticism, particularly about her character and actions.Any criticism or disapproval she gets, often irritates her because she takes it all very harshly.

The Caretaker: Shinsou and Ashlen are normally the ones looking after her, but Amy can easily return the favor when they’re upset. As whenever Shinsou is depressed and feeling low, Amy opts to take care and look after him by giving him space, a “Happiness” kit of junk food and caffeine, and a playlist for sadness and anxiety. Likewise, Amy is more than happy to take care of Ashlen whenever she is distraught as she stays with her the entire day, gives her tender, love and care and also gives her ice-cream to add to the comfort while also showing her some of her favorite movies or shows like Friends, The Office and Brooklyn 99.

Catchphrase: Has a habit of cheerfully saying “Oh Mylanta~!” and asking “So what’s the T Christine?”

And her favorite way of describing something unappealing is calling it “a bag of dicks”.

Character Development: During her first year at UA she had no true intention of becoming the hero Japan’s society would have wanted her to be and had no real desire to be a team-player with her classmates and only wanted to return to Shinsou, however, she grew to really like her new friends and changed her attitude and became a lot friendlier to the point of opening up and sharing her wealth with everyone and going out of her way to provide them laughter and entertainment. She did relapse into insanity for a while and had to quit UA for a short time, but still managed to slowly overcome this because of her friend’s influence. And by the beginning of her second year, she’s on better terms with her classmates and becomes increasingly kinder when her new best friend Ashlen enters the picture and inspires Amy to be more compassionate, sympathetic and helpful towards her class.

Child Hater: Downplayed, while she’s annoyed by anything centered around children and when people talk about children, she’s actually more jealous of the attention children get and doesn’t genuinely hate children themselves as she was actually pretty fond of Kota and bonded with him over the loss of their parents.

Played straight though in her case with Eri, who she disliked, but later warmed up to her.

However, ultimately her aversion to children stems more from the fear that she won’t know how to properly care for them but she claims that she DOES hate only children who are “nasty little shits”.

Chevalier vs. Rogue: She’s the Rogue to Ashlen’s Chevalier as Amy uses her magic to fight dirty and play tricks on her opponents while Ashlen relies primarily on her stealth and combat skills while maintaining a noble, honorable approach in battle.

Chivalrous Pervert: Amy is an unabashed pervert (but nowhere near Mineta’s level) as she likes to stare at her male classmates’ butts and tends to be a flirt, but she’s a good person at heart and never does anything without consent.

Clingy Jealous Girl: Amy is a VERY jealous person by nature, but especially towards the people she’s in love with, as she grew to dislike Uraraka when she realized the latter also had a crush on Midoriya, dismissing her as a basic, boring girl with nothing going on. And then she displays this same jealousy towards Camie after hearing that she had to take a remedial course with Bakugo, Todoroki and Yoarashi as Amy referred to her as a “skintight slut”.

Cloudcuckoolander: She’s clearly off her rocker, has an odd way of thinking, randomly breaks out into song and dance and seems to be pretty much be in her own world.

Combat Pragmatist: A dirty fighter by nature, Amy uses whatever she can get her hands on if it means success, often through the use of telekinesis to make people lose their footing.

She used a stone to bash Midoriya’s face while using her telekinesis for speed, knowing her own physical strength won’t do much damage, and used a piece of heavy debris as a blunt weapon during a battle to stun him and swat him away from her and then into the ground.

Once again, she uses her telekinesis beforehand to steal sweat from Bakugo to use his own explosions against him in a battle.

When in a bad mood and ready to lash out, she surprises Aizawa by blinding him with a potion to give her the chance to attack him, as well as attacking him from behind and using his capture weapon to cover his eyes and entrap him.

Likewise, she always uses Shinsou’s capture weapon against him to trap him or cover his mouth so she can get the upperhand.

Comedic Sociopathy: Downplayed but it’s clear she finds it hilarious to see other people get hurt whether physically or if a joke’s made at their expense. Even though deep down she doesn’t truly like to see them actually hurt.

Comic Trio: With her witch sisters she’s this with Mallory and Coco, with her UA classmates she’s this with Shinsou and Kaminari.

However it’s downplayed with her, Shinsou and Ashlen. Amy is always taking the lead by getting her friends to do something wild and fun, and although Shinsou is far from stupid, he does nothing to stop her and simply follows her lead, while Ashlen is always trying to reign Amy in when she’s going out of control.

Companion Cube: She’s rather fond of her broomstick ‘Brooke’ to the point of talking to it like it was an actual person, and Shinsou even jokes that it might as well be her lover.

Amy: Ahhh I love you so much baby... I’m going to take you to my room and stroke your bristles...

Conditioned to Accept Horror: Due to seeing her parents die before her eyes AND every other horror she witnessed in New Orleans with the witches, voodoo witches and witch hunters, she’s able to go through every horrific thing that occurs at UA without being fazed much. She even tells Bakugo that when enough horrible things happen to you, you’re bound to get used to it.

Cool Big Sis: Takes up this role wherever Kota is concerned as she frequently takes him out for ice-cream, lets him ride with her on her broomstick and took him to an amusement park.

And when she got over her initial dislike of Eri (but retains her jealousy sometimes), she somewhat became this to her, stating that Eri “needs a woman in her life” and becomes that “woman” in an odd, albeit irresponsible way as she lets her play with her dog Dakota, also gives her her favorite Disney movies to watch, taught her how to sing and let her bake cookies with her, but she also let her have her first soda, gave her candy and chocolate and let her buy any clothes and toys that she wanted while also encouraging her to be sassy.

Corrupt The Cutie: Already broken from seeing her parents die, when 11 year old Am is taken to America and attends Robichaux, guardians like Fiona, Madison and Zoe (to a lesser extent) slowly corrupt her into a morally ambiguous young witch who’s not above murdering and deception if it means achieving a goal.

Creepy Child: Her experiences at New Orleans with her witch sisters turned her into one as she began making much more morbid jokes about death, ghosts and demons, and then smiling at inappropriate times and generally making adults feel uncomfortable. She was only 10 at the time.

Creepy Shadowed Undereyes: Not visible but that’s because she hides them with make-up. They’re not nearly as bad as Shinsou’s, but when she’s angry, going crazy or depressed they’re much more prominent.

Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: She’s very much a comedic girl, but also very much a dangerous girl with a LOT of powers that she’s very skilled with in combat and WILL use them to rip someone a new one.

Cry Cute: When Amy drops her guard and sheds tears, she’s surprisingly more sympathetic and endearing even though she claims to be an “ugly crier”.

Cuddle Bug: Amy is a very affectionate girl who craves the affection in return and loves to hug her friends, especially Shinsou, Ashlen, Midoriya, Mallory and Todoroki.

Curbstomp Battle: Played Straight in her fights at some of the thugs at the USJ and her two fights with Kaminari and Iida at the Sports Festival. As Kaminari attempts to flirt with her, Amy is flattered but quickly pushes him out of the ring with her telekinesis within a matter of 10 seconds. Similarly, she taunts Iida with her teleportation and pretends to give him an opening to get her out of the ring, only to teleport right at the last second and then push HIM out of the ring again with her telekinesis.

Downplayed in her fight with Midoriya. She picks a fight with him after the Culture Festival when he provokes her, and while he doesn’t want to fight her he still gains the upperhand and pins her down. However, it’s Played Straight when he tries to get her to calm down and instead pushes her buttons with a poor choice of words, which reinvigorates Amy’s rage and awakens the full extent of her Sentio Compassios as she gets big and utterly dominates him.

Also played straight during her fight with Aizawa, although she cheated by blinding him with a potion, she still beat the hell out of him with her telekinesis and Sentio Compassios and only stopped when Cordelia intervened.

Curtains Match The Windows: Sort of. She has blonde hair and amber eyes.

Cute and Psycho: Amy’s endearing and sweet but also straight-up insane and cheerfully talks about murder and death while expressing an excitement when the opportunity to kill shows up.

Cute Witch: Eccentric as she may be, Amy is fairly cute for a powerful witch.

Cuteness Proximity: Amy ALWAYS gushes whenever she’s with adorable animals, especially if it’s puppies, kittens, foxes and ferrets. It’s one of the few times we see her acting like a normal teenage girl.

Daddy’s Girl: She was one to her father Hiroshi, and despite the way she occasionally abuses and disrespects him, it’s clear she has a strong attachment to Aizawa as he is the only fatherly figure she knows after her real father died.

Dark Is Not Evil: While she has a mean streak and a wicked side, Amy is truly not a bad person at heart as she decides to remain on the hero’s side so she can protect the people she loves and had no true intention of going to the villain’s side.

Deadpan Snarker: She might be flighty, but she’s very quick-witted and knows how to make clever insults and puns towards others, but especially at Shinsou, Madison, Bakugo, Iida and Aizawa.

Then again, two of her closest friends are Shinsou and Madison, and then FIONA was the one looking after her so she picked up some snark.

Death Glare: Since she’s often seen smiling, she can give one hell of an effective death glare. It’s so intimidating that the minute Shinsou sees it, he encourages whoever is in the vicinity (whether his classmates OR teacher) to leave as fast as possible or apologize if they angered her.

Death Seeker: Shachath occasionally comes to her as she says that Amy tends to ‘sing’ to her which implies that she’s contemplating suicide often.

Defrosting Ice Queen: Towards her classmates as she goes from insulting and pranking them, to more buddy-buddy with them, particularly with Iida and Bakugo. Also, while she freezes Midoriya out for a while, his kindness and patience with her allows her to defrost back to him.

Later, because of her friend Ashlen’s encouragement, she defrosts towards Eri as well.

Determinator: Sure Amy’s a slacker, but when she’s determined to do something, she gets down to it and won’t stop until she gets what she wants. To the point of even sacrificing dignity and being her most stubborn self if it means achieving a goal.

Dissonant Laughter: When Aizawa is scolding the class for knowing of the plan to rescue her and Bakugo, she bursts into sudden, uncontrollable and mad laughter, BEFORE Bakugo even made Kaminari use his quirk to get a laugh out of everyone...

Disproportionate Retribution: Midoriya drinks her lemonade and eats her fruit sandwich, not knowing it was her’s, and she flies into a rage and even goes so far as to get a plastic plate and start beating him with it and chasing him out of the room.

And then again, she nearly crushes Midoriya in her Giant Sentio Compassios form because he called selfish and cruel.

Iida tells Aizawa that Shinsou (during a depression) drew a line into the wall with a sharpie which got him in trouble, and Amy ralles a group of students to protest against him to the point where he broke down and cried according to Midoriya.

Aizawa gives her a bad grade on an essay and tells Cordelia about how she’s misbehaved in class, and Amy quickly retaliates by threatening to burn his sleeping bag. She didn’t actually do it, but she nearly did.

Distracted By The Sexy: She utilizes this tactic against some of her opponents and wears Madison’s crotchless panties and ‘accidentally’ flashes them to Shishikura during the Provisional Hero License arc to get him to back off. It works..

Double Standard: Very fond of finding these and pointing them especially when it comes to gender and topics involving humans and witches.

Drama Queen: Whenever Amy gets excited she tends to break out into song and dance, and when she’s upset she tends to go into a ‘woe is me’ mode and exaggerate her misery.

The Dreaded: Shinsou knows better than to provoke and/or push Amy’s buttons and is quick to warn people when he can tell she’s in a bad mood and even goes so far as to alert others from doing or saying certain things that WILL anger her or simply tell them to quickly apologize should they provoke her by accident. And it becomes more apparent to the rest of her class the more they learn of her unpredictable temper, mood swings and array of powers and begin to go to great lengths to avoid provoking her.

Even after their fight and even after Amy starts to become a better, saner person, Midoriya is still terrified of her.

Dreadful Musician: Loves to sing but tends to go off-key at times, and is an absolutely horrible violin player to the point were even Present Mic and Bakugo can’t stand it.

Drowning My Sorrows: Non-alcoholic example as she drowns in soda (Dr. Pepper or Big Red) whenever she’s really sad or lamenting after a failed test.

Drunk On The Dark Side: Spending time with the witches of New Orleans has encouraged her to embrace her darker impulses and be willing to do anything to get what you want and need. And by the time she goes to UA, Amy’s very self-indulgent and not above doing immoral things. However, she does start to stray away from this for the sake of her new friends.

Dude Magnet: Despite her quirky nature, she’s got Bakugo, Todoroki and Monoma all holding some kind of torch for her.

Dumb Blonde: Subverted. Amy seems and acts like a flake and can lack common sense, but she’s actually very sly, crafty and manipulative several times and has shown to be able to really think ahead before she springs into an action plan.

Easily Forgiven: Shinsou will ALWAYS forgive her for anything she does no matter how amoral or messed up it may be, and that includes murder, manipulation and deception or even going on a rampage throughout his school. And he tends to quickly comes to her defense and excuse her actions by saying that she’s been through enough and that she shouldn’t be judged for what she does.

Midoriya also forgives her pretty quickly even after she attempted to crush him with her Sentio Compassios form and destroyed his apology gift (but fixed it later). Aizawa also forgave her fast despite the fact that she blinded him and attacked him.

Shinsou: (to Aizawa, after Amy’s rage) Okay... look... I now you’re not happy with her now, but here’s the truth sensei, Amy is not bad at all, she just grew up in an environment that showed her a lot of bad things. She never wanted that life, she was forced into it, it’s not her fault...

Emotionless Girl: Amy becomes withdrawn, surly and apathetic after she leaves UA, and it’s much more prominent when she interns with Endeavor alongside Midoriya, Bakugo and Todoroki, all of whom are unnerved by her new demeanor.

The Empath: Her father had a quirk called “Feelings” that allowed him to feel what others felt, which Amy is revealed to have inherited from him when his quirk manifested in her unique power “Sentio Compassios”, an extremely powerful form of divination that allows Amy to feel and see what others are feeling, as well as their auras. As such Amy can empathize with the people around her and it makes her feel the need to help them out with anything they may need any help with.

Enfant Terrible: Upon going to New Orleans and entering Robichaux, being exposed to all the bloodshed and betrayal with her fellow witches turns her into this as she easily gets corrupted by the new lifestyle and doesn’t hesitate to help her sisters kill their enemies brutally as she happily joined them in stabbing the Axe Man to death. She just turned 11 at the time.

Even Bad Women Love Their Mamas: She’s a trouble-maker at best and a sadistic bitch at worst, but no matter what, she never loses her love for deceased parents and loves her godmother Cordelia dearly. In fact, Cordelia is currently the only adult she hasn’t insulted or disrespected.

Even Evil Can Be Loved: Amy’s not truly evil by nature, but even when she’s at her most psychotic, her friends still love her regardless of the madness. Shinsou in particular still holds a lot of platonic love for her even when she’s lost her mind, and her new best friend Ashlen has embraced even Amy’s less than savory qualities because she still loves her deeply and regards her as her best friend. And then her coven still loves her deeply, especially Cordelia, Madison and Zoe.

Even Evil Has Standards: Amy’s an anarchist who loves the wicked side of things and has no issues killing people, manipulating them for her own gain and stealing, but even she’s appalled by things or other villains have done.

She was quite unnerved in the presence of All For One and claimed that she’s never been that afraid since Fiona.

She also turned down the offer from the League of Villains because she didn’t want to abandon her friends at UA as she realized that the students there are good people that she doesn’t want to harm.

She sympathized with the League of Villains stating that she understood them and stated that Society is messed up because she would never ostracize someone for being different.

Despite her (occasionally) rocky friendship with Midoriya, she dumped Bakugo for 2 whole months when Madison tells him that he told Midoriya to kill himself in middle school and Amy was absolutely disgusted by such cruelty.

Amy will not hurt anyone innocent, even when she becomes homicidal she only attacks people who are attacking her, and even if it’s her classmates (such as Iida, Tokoyami, Jirou who attempted to stop her) she merely knocks them out via telling them to ‘sleep’ and does nothing to hurt them or the rest of 1-A.

She respected Fiona but disapproved of how she treated Cordelia, and likewise, despises Endeavor for what he did to Todoroki and the rest of his family.

Amy’s all for dirty tricks and humiliating others for fun, but will stop when she sees someone getting legitimately hurt.

Even The Girls Want Her: Her witch friend Darcy has an obsessive, mad crush on her.

Everyone Has Standards: Amy’s something of an airhead and not all there but even there are things that bewilder her or ‘ick’ her out.

She’s a pervert but even she was appalled by Mineta’s lack of shame in his perversion.

Even when she hated Eri at the time, she still tossed Mineta into the stratosphere via telekinesis for making an inappropriate comment to her.

For all that she and Iida despise each other’s contrasting quirks, Amy sees from his point of view when frat brothers trash her mansion and act very uncouth even for her liking.

She finds it amusing to point out things she knows about people while they freak out and wonder how she knew that, but crosses the line at stalking and obsession because that ‘icks’ her out.

Despite her childish nature, even Amy is baffled by her older witch sister Coco’s inability to take care of herself and perform simple tasks such as laundry and cleaning.

Evil Laugh: Gives off one hell of an effective one akin to the Wicked Witch of The West, it’s so wicked sounding it genuinely disturbs her classmates and even Aizawa.

#tv tropes #amy martinez #bnha ocs #mha ocs #my hero academia #boku no hero academia #bnha original character #mha original character #american horror story #american horror story coven #ahs coven #AHS #ahs crossover #bnha crossover

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marginalgloss · 5 years

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different and worse

‘…There were so many ways in which the vast army of the dead could be drilled, classified, inspected, and made to present their ghostly arms. No end to the institutions, civilian and military, busy drawing up their sombre balance sheet and recording it in wood, stone or metal. But if there was no end to the institutions there was no end to the dead men either. In truth, there were more than enough to go round several times over…’

Troubles was not the first novel by J.G. Farrell, but it was the first to achieve really significant literary success. Farrell wrote three novels set in a loosely connected trilogy set in the twilight of the British empire — I read The Singapore Grip last year, and I’ve been meaning to revisit this one, which I first read many years ago. It might be the best thing Farrell ever wrote, though I now find myself wanting to reread The Siege of Krishnapur as well.

Troubles is set in Ireland, in the immediate aftermath of the First World War. Having been freshly discharged from the army, Brendan Archer (mostly known as ‘the Major’) travels there to visit Angela Spencer; Brendan is more or less convinced that he and Angela are engaged, having met previously while he was on leave from the front lines. They have exchanged letters since, but on arriving at her home — the Majestic hotel — he finds her distant. Her father, Edward, is a model of English strength and reserve. And then there is the hotel itself: a gothic revival falling apart at the seams, overrun by potted plants and cats, populated by a skeleton crew of staff and flocks of elderly women.

The hotel is labyrinthine and seemingly fathomless, like something out of Ballard or Borges. It is an unmappable confection of turrets and towers, sewn up with catwalks, stairwells, secret corridors. The tennis courts are thick with weeds; the glass ceiling of the ballroom is on the verge of collapse; there are strange things swimming in the murky remnants of the swimming pool. Here, at the end of a lonely peninsula, the residents are cut off from the outside world. The only reminder that the Irish exist at all comes from the figures glimpsed at the roadside, sometime seen standing in the fields, or rummaging in the bins at the house. (Many of them are starving.)

We soon realise that the Major lives in a state of post-traumatic myopia. Everything around him seems to take place in a sort of dreamlike haze. Like a typical man of his class he makes a point of not seeing things about how the world is operating, but his experiences in the war place him at a further remove from the rest of society. He is typically English; he adopts an attitude of perpetual befuddlement, leaning heavily on privilege and impatience to get himself through the day. He is inflexible and uncommunicative. But he is also deeply traumatised. His memories are shot full of holes:

‘Although he was sure that he had never actually proposed to Angela during the few days of their acquaintance, it was beyond doubt that they were engaged: a certainty fostered by the fact that from the very beginning she had signed her letters ‘Your loving fiancée, Angela’. This had surprised him at first. But, with the odour of death drifting into the dug-out in which he scratched out his replies by the light of a candle, it would have been trivial and discourteous beyond words to split hairs about such purely social distinctions.’

Ireland is riven by violence. Rumours of killings are rife around the hotel. People are shot in ones and twos every day, apparently at random. Interspersed throughout the book are newspaper clippings, many of which seem absurd. It seems a bleak, purposeless cycle of assault and recrimination. But in spite of the resident paranoia, next to nothing actually happens on the grounds of the Majestic. No republican ‘shinners’ appear intent on massacring the residents in their beds. But regardless, the English are determined to make a stand — even if it is only in the bar of the local pub.

This novel was first published in 1970, at a time when Northern Ireland was seeing some of the worst violence in the latter half of the twentieth century. By comparison the level of strife depicted here seems almost parochial by comparison. But this is because the whole text of the novel is sunk within the consciousness of an observer who is too broken himself to see what’s really happening. After all, this is 1919: in historical terms we are in the thick of the Irish war of independence. The country would finally become its own nation state a few years later. But none of it feels that way to the characters in the book.

Perhaps there’s something about it that approximates the feeling of watching the news in the late sixties or early seventies— while living in England, of course. It is a constant drip-feed of appalling atrocity, delivered with the benefit of distance so that the expected response from the audience is to feel exactly as the Major does: ‘An old man is gunned down in the street and within a couple of days this senseless act is both normal and inevitable,’ reflects the Major. For him these killings might as well be happening in a vacuum. Names like De Valera float through the air, but they might as well belong to legendary beings. There’s no awareness of history or context. There is barely a line in this book which affords a glimpse of the world from an Irish perspective. We don’t know how they might feel about it because we aren’t told.

‘The Major only glanced at the newspaper these days, tired of trying to comprehend a situation which defied comprehension, a war without battles or trenches. Why should one bother with the details: the raids for arms, the shootings of policemen, the intimidations? What could one learn from the details of chaos? Every now and then, however, he would become aware with a feeling of shock that, for all its lack of pattern, the situation was different, and always a little worse.’

We are stuck in the belly of the beast, and the beast is dying. The Major is trapped in ‘the country’s vast and narcotic inertia’. The hotel is falling apart. Angela vanishes not long after the Major arrives, and then she dies. Somehow this is not a cause for much regret. From then on, he has no reason to stay in Ireland, but the place has a strange gravity that seems to draw him back. And there is Sarah, a local woman who seems to have taken an interest in him. She is fiery, direct and open — far more than he — and initially she is mostly confined to a wheelchair. There are shades of Stefan Zweig’s Beware of Pity in their relationship: the Major is a model of polite restraint, while Sarah is openly flirtatious, at times frantic with emotion:

‘One day when he had been speaking, though impersonally, about marriage and its place in the modern world, she interrupted him brutally by saying: ‘It’s not a wife you’re looking for, Brendan. It’s a mother!’ The Major was upset because he had not, in fact, been saying he was looking for either. ‘Why are you so polite the whole time?’ she would ask derisively, while the Major, appalled, wondered what was wrong with being polite. ‘Why are you always fussing around those infernal old women? Can’t you smell how awful they are?’ she would demand, making a disgusted face, and when the Major said nothing she would burst out: ‘Because you’re an old woman yourself, that’s why.’ And since the Major maintained his hurt and dignified silence: ‘And for Jesus’ sake stop looking at me like a stuffed squirrel!’’

It’s a very funny book. Farrell was a masterful stylist, and he wields irony here like a weapon. There is humour to be had at the expense of the English in a way that recalls P. G. Wodehouse. But with Jeeves and Wooster there is the pleasure of retreating inside a world which is entirely its own — for the most part, nothing really awful can happen there. Whereas here, we are never allowed to forget that something awful is perpetually happening only just outside of that friendly bubble. And it isn’t so cosy inside the bubble either.

Either way, we cannot forget that the characters of the novel are all implicated, if only through their vast unthinking ignorance. There is something very dark crouching at the heart of this book, something made all the more tragic by the Major’s essential simplicity, by his constant air of strained incomprehension. We know that he will never learn, that he will never grow. Somehow he is both entirely innocent and fully responsible for everything that goes wrong.

He is not the only pathetic creature here. The author reserves a special combination of pathos and threat for the animals that reside at the Majestic. They are vehicles for fables in this story. There are the countless stray cats, which ride the dumb-waiters, climb through the chimneys and nest inside the wrecked sofas. (The biggest cat has orange fur and bright green eyes; a noteworthy colouring, perhaps.) And there’s Edward’s old dog, Rover, who has an especially hard time of it:

‘By degrees he was going blind; his eyes had turned to milky blue and he sometimes collided with the furniture. The smells he emitted while sitting at the feet of the whist-players became steadily more redolent of putrefaction. Like the Major, Rover had always enjoyed trotting from one room to another, prowling the corridors on this floor or that. But now, whenever he ventured up the stairs to nose around the upper storeys, as likely as not he would be set upon by an implacable horde of cats and chased up and down the corridors to the brink of exhaustion. More than once the Major found him, wheezing and spent, tumbling in terror down a flight of stairs from some shadowy menace on the landing above. Soon he got into the habit of growling whenever he saw a shadow. Then, as the shadows gathered with his progressively failing sight, he would rouse himself and bark fearfully even in the broadest of daylight, gripped by remorseless nightmares. Day by day, no matter how wide he opened his eyes, the cat-filled darkness continued to creep a little closer.’

There’s another elderly dog in Farrell’s later novel The Singapore Grip — an elderly spaniel who is nicknamed ‘The Human Condition’. The irony there is a bit less subtle, but the implication is equally bleak. By the end of this novel Edward and the Major will both be reduced to growling at shadows, each in their own way. But perhaps the Major has more in common with the deserted pet rabbit who has been left to fend for himself in the grounds of the hotel:

‘…Old and fat, it had been partly tamed by the twins when they were small children. They had lost interest, of course, as they grew older, and no longer remembered to feed it. The rabbit, however, had not forgotten the halcyon days of carrots and dandelion leaves. Thinner and thinner as time went by, it had nevertheless continued to haunt the fringes of the wood like a forsaken lover…’

Of course the rabbit ends up riddled with bullets. He is shot to death by British soldiers for fun. But the twins are not as upset as the Major expects them to be. They only want to know if they can eat him.

#books #j.g. farrell #troubles

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yo-namine · 5 years

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Okay, I’m not done with this idea, so...

To start off, Riku and Kairi's relationship post-KH3 is a little, uh.... strained. After everything that happened in the Graveyard, Riku really doesn't trust Kairi to hold her own at all. They both want to go search for a way to revive Sora, but Riku's pretty dead-set on Kairi staying safe at home while he does all the actual work. He's already lost one friend, and he's not risking losing another. Kairi argues that if he's going to go chasing the Lich, he needs someone like her who can bring him back, but her argument kind of falls flat because her PoH abilities have been pretty shaky ever since Sora died because, well, her heart's broken. So Riku doesn't budge, and Kairi's left feeling useless and powerless to help her friends. Again. Also, Kairi can tell that Riku does sort of lowkey resent her for being a liability back in the Graveyard. Riku knows it's unfair of him, but he can't help how he feels. And while Riku really does want to keep her safe, Kairi feels that he's also shutting her out as a way to penalize her for costing them Sora's life. Angst ensues. Basically, instead of working together on a way to bring back Sora, Riku and Kairi end up pushing each other away and doubtlessly making things harder than they need to be. 🎉🎉🎉

Obviously, Kairi isn't going to just stay home. She thinks that if she can fully regain her powers, she may be able to restore Sora like she did in KH1, or get some kind of tether on him from the Realm of Light like she did in KH3. So she decides to sneak off on her own to first go find the other former Princesses of Heart to see if they can teach her more about her abilities, and then hopefully get her powers back and use them to revive Sora or at least help Riku. And admittedly, there’s a small, petty part of her that just wants to prove to Riku that she's not useless.

Naminé catches on to what Kairi's planning and wants to come with her to help however she can. Kairi kept her alive for the last couple of years, so Naminé is basically RIDE OR DIE for this girl at this point. If Kairi wants to go save Sora, then dammit, they’re gonna go save Sora. That said, she probably feels guilty enough to leave Riku a note or something just telling him that she and Kairi left together and everything's fine and to please not freak out. Riku reads it and is like "for fuck's sake," decides to go look for them (on top of everything else he's doing).

I'm... not really sure how Xion gets involved tbh. Maybe she initially wants to help Riku find Kairi and bring her home, but then switches sides once she realizes that Kairi's just trying to prove herself? Anyway, Xion is a total badass and (in this story, at least) has some of her Days boss battle abilities still in her arsenal, so after she joins the other girls, they're able to venture into more worlds that they'd had to avoid before because the combat level was too high they were too dangerous. During their journey, Xion gives Kairi lots of pointers that do her way more good as a keyblade wielder than whatever Merlin had her and Axel doing in that time chamber.

There's initially some tension between Kairi and Xion because Xion is supposed to be "Kairi as Sora remembers her," and in this story, Xion's clearly much stronger and (now that she's free of the Organization) cheerier than the real Kairi. So Kairi feels like she's hanging around a better version of herself all the time, and it takes effort to not let her bitterness over it show. It also doesn't help that Kairi's spending most of her time with two people who are like embodiments of Sora's love for her (Naminé being the Nobody that was created from Sora housing Kairi's heart in his, Xion being made up of Sora's memories of Kairi). Theoretically, that knowledge should be comforting, but it really just ends up rubbing some extra salt in that "Sora's dead and it's all my fault" wound.

While they're off on their journey, Riku tries to call Kairi almost every day, but she never picks up because she knows he'll just try to talk her into going home. Eventually Axel calls her, and it's fine until she realizes he's trying to weasel her whereabouts out of her so he can pass the info along to Riku. After that, she keeps her phone off.

Kairi, Naminé, and Xion start to work really well together after a while both because of their skill sets (Xion being the powerhouse, Naminé the healer, Kairi the warrior-still-in-training), but also because they have a lot in common. Xion can empathize pretty strongly with Kairi feeling like she's just a liability. Naminé knows how it feels to be used by people more powerful than you to hurt someone you care about. The trio develops a pretty deep understanding of one another, and they help each other rationalize and work through their problems/insecurities (like Xion has a tendency to get irritated/overly defensive when her judgment's questioned because, well, she also isn't sure if she can trust her own mind sometimes thanks to the Org reprogramming her in the past. Naminé has some pretty deep-rooted abandonment issues that are part of the reason she clings to Kairi as much as she does. Kairi has survivor's guilt in spades.). Character development ensues.

Naminé does Not like combat or just hurting things in general, hence why she sticks to healing. She does still have her heart-shattering ability from CoM, but she never wants to use it again (especially considering whose replica vessel she’s inhabiting these days).

Meanwhile, Riku thinks the other masters will help him with figuring out how to either find the Lich or contact Sora somehow, but nope. Yen Sid and Mickey don't want him going after the Lich or "chasing hearts," potentially costing them another valuable wielder getting himself killed. Aqua's more inclined to let him do what he thinks is right, but she's also doubtful that Sora's heart is even salvageable at this point. She tells Riku what she knows from her own training just because she feels he has the right to that information as a master, but that's about it. Beyond that, Riku's basically on his own. Without any real leads, Riku decides to visit different worlds to learn more about their differing concepts of death/the afterlife (so like the Underworld in Olympus, the Locker in the Caribbean, etc.). A lot of worlds have legends of creatures similar to the Lich that ferry the dead and all that cool stuff, so he makes note of that while also scouting the place for Kairi. He might also run into Maleficent at some point and learn something from her (since idk, she commanded the Heartless for a while, so maybe she knows something about the Lich)? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

The trio runs into Riku once early on, and it... doesn't go that well. Riku's still not keen on Kairi running off (plus he's probably kind of annoyed that Naminé and Xion sided with her over him despite them both being his friends for way longer, oop), and Kairi's still frustrated that Riku has 0 faith in her and won't let her help him. They basically have the same argument they did back home, only now there's been more time for resentment to build. On top of that, they're both grieving over Sora without really knowing that they are (because neither's willing to even consider the idea that he may not be savable), and both feel like the other's abandoned them when they need them the most. Anyway, their fight doesn't accomplish anything other than hurting each other further. They split up again after Riku tells Kairi to just answer her damn phone every once and a while. She doesn't.

So Kairi meets up with the former PoHs as she travels worlds. She's lucky that Riku's on bad terms with half of these ladies and is gonna steer clear of Wonderland, Agrabah, and Beast's Castle. Kairi gets advice and some training from each of the princesses on how to tune out her own self-doubts and focus her magic on what she wants to accomplish. Her biggest help is probably Belle just because that lady spent SO MUCH TIME in Hollow Bastion's library in KH1 probably reading everything about light/darkness. That, and I think Belle kind of uses a tethering ability in KH1 to bring the Beast to Hollow Bastion (or at least, the Beast says he got there just by ~believing~, so maybe it's a two-way connection or something), so she may have a better understanding of her (former) powers than the others. Anyway, Kairi slowly starts regaining her powers, and they only get better as her confidence/faith in herself improves. Eventually, she starts working Faith/Holy into her combat moves and "tethering" to the other girls just to see if she can. She's able to use the latter ability to sense out where exactly Naminé and Xion are whenever they're separated from one another. Connecting with people in the same world is easy enough, but doing it across worlds/realms is trickier, so she practices reaching out to Riku occasionally with mixed results. She gets to where she can figure out where he is, but she can't communicate with him, and she's not sure if that's due to her abilities being too weak or if it's because she and Riku have been shutting each other out (spoilers: It's mostly the latter.).

The trio has another run-in with Riku later on. He and Kairi have another argument, but it's more constructive this time around. Riku starts to call her out on leaving him to go on this journey (because unlike her, he's been going it alone this whole time, and it's really starting to get to him), but she points out that she only left him before he could leave her. Everything kind of starts to click after that. Riku eventually apologizes for trying to leave her behind, Kairi apologizes for shutting him out for so long. There's still some tension between them, but it starts to ebb once they finally start working together on a plan to bring Sora back.

Kairi finally turns her phone back on to find approximately 34978593487 missed calls from Riku. She also sees that he left her a few voicemails, and while Riku says she can just delete them, she keeps them to listen to later when he's not around.

....I'm not sure how this ends? Part of me likes the idea of Sora just... staying dead and everyone moving forward with their lives because that's all you can do, really. But another part of me really likes the idea of Riku and Kairi finding the Lich and figuring out a way to split the price for Sora between them. Maybe they have to give up a fraction of their hearts or cut time off their lifespans to give to Sora's. And they both agree to just not tell Sora about that once he's back.

I realize I'm leaving a TON of characters out of this story lmao. I don't know what everyone else would be up to. tbh Ven could probably save Riku and Kairi a lot of trouble just by introducing them to his magic cat that apparently knows all about the afterlife, but.......................... whatever.

#my posts #kh3 bloggin #kh3 spoilers #fic ideas #dream trio

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thorsdiana · 5 years

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Tell me aaaaaall about Sofya, Helena, Valerie, and Kiara. Put it under a cut if you have to!! I want all the tea!!!

ahhh i love you so much jen!!! you really came through for me 💖💖 okay this is gonna get hella long so i’m gonna put my answers under the cut bc there’s just so much i gotta say!!

SOFYA VOLKOVA

so here’s the tea on sofya volkova! her story is called “budapest” she’s paired up with my queen, natasha romanoff. and her story is full of sadness lol. on new years day in 1937 (aka her 9th birthday), her parents who were well respected scientists for the soviet union were killed in her home and she witnessed their death. she was later taken in by a name named viktor grankin, who encouraged her to join the red room academy under the idea that she could one day get revenge for her parents’ death. it’s during this time that she meets natalia romanova, and the two often clashed that lasted nearly a decade. but they eventually came to respect one another as assassins and eventually led to a relationship that remained hidden from their handlers.

viktor grankin was her handler during her time and he set her on missions that they believed would lead her to her parents’ killer. she would later earn the alias “sparrow” which was given to her by viktor himself. during one mission, she learned that the man behind her parents’ death was none other than viktor. she tried to take him out but failed, but she faked her death (also ending her relationship with natasha) and remained in hiding as she worked up a plan to ruin viktor and kill him.

she was inspired by the infamous line in the avengers where natasha and clint mention budapest. and since we don’t know what happens, i decided to make sofya and she’s the budapest mission lol. basically clint and natasha get word of a dangerous assassin that they’re meant to take out, and nat is SHOOK bc her old girlfriend is alive and well but also dead set on killing viktor (who basically was given something similar to natasha and sofya).

her story is so sad bc she’s lost so much and was used by viktor for 21 years. and in order to get her revenge, she had to leave the only person she’s loved since her parents??? and now she’s like a stranger in natasha’s eyes but natasha doesn’t want to lose her again?? i love angst lol!!

HELENA HARTLEY

here’s the tea on my mom, helena hartley! her story is called “second chances”. so’s a revived oc of mine from yeeears ago and i think i love her a lot more now than i did before lol. but she’s the ex-girlfriend of tony stark and the mother of the beautiful lauren stark. she met tony back in 1990 at a science convention and she honestly couldn’t stand him but he always flirted with her and it was cute as heck. they clashed a lot on ideas but they also really enjoyed the bickering?? and formed an interesting friendship. but after the death of tony’s parents, helena was always there for him and something more bloomed.

tony didn’t admit his feelings until like 1992. tony was always supportive of helena’s dreams of being an engineer and even got her a job at stark industries. their relationship resulted in the birth of their daughter in 2001, but they never got married. there were also a LOT of cute dad!tony moments like he spoiled lauren to the point where her only way to sleep was on someone’s chest and listening to their heartbeat. or he loved mentioning her whenever he could during an interview bc he was so proud!!

but tony was prone to self-desctruction and it put a strain on their relationship that eventually ended in 2005. but despite their breakup, they always made sure lauren wasn’t too negatively affected and remained coordial for her sake. helena left stark industries and became an engineer at northrop grumman. but when tony needs help making the jericho missile, the first person he wants on his team is helena (but honestly it’s partially bc he misses her and is still in love with her).

their story is gonna be filled with angst (especially during the iron man movies) bc helena is trying to date other men but tony keeps finding his way back into her life, then tony goes missing and it messes up helena AND lauren (who’s like really young during this time so OW) and then when tony becomes iron man and how lauren is constantly worried about her dad.

i’ve also planned to have helena being an inhuman but it doesn’t get found out until later. and her power was going to be technology manipulation bc i didn’t want her to be a full on hero but have something a little different.

VALERIE BYERS

um so i really love my time traveling bby girl!! she’s one of the three main characters of my fic, “timeless,” and the other main characters are my cyborg bby boy jai graham (who was created by the queen shuri herself) and sarah wilson, who’s the younger sister of sam wilson. so valerie is the only child of tony stark and her mother was an old girlfriend of his named susan byers. their relationship was never liked among susan’s parents and though it ended, susan found out that she was pregnant but never told tony. in fact, valerie never found out about tony being her father until she was 15.

valerie would try to find ways to meet tony, such as going to different conventions he held or was a guest at. but after the battle of new york, she realized how much she needed her father. her mom was paralyzed during the event and it wasn’t until valerie was 20 when susan finally passed. valerie then made it her business to get a job at stark industries, which she luckily did. she would work under tony, but never tell him the fact that she was his daughter.

but due to the events of infinity war, and tony is believed to have died after last being seen going into space, and the avengers fail to save the world from thanos, valerie’s life goes to shit.

since “timeless” is basically one big au and my own spin on infinity war, thanos actually takes control of earth after the big snap and the chitauri still roam earth. it’s kinda like an apocalyptic setting and humans aren’t as free to do much and the chitauri controls a lot of what happens???

but anyway, valerie meets jai and sarah when she’s out looking for scraps to build stuff and jai and sarah and they come up with the idea fo build a time machine and valerie is the perfect brain needed for the job to help create it. their plan is to go back to different points in time to assist the avengers and stop them from breaking up (bc they believe them being apart was a downfall) and try to find the infinity stones and destroy them so thanos can’t get his hands on them.

and they all lost something in the war; valerie lost her father, jai lost his creator/mother (he really never got to meet her bc she died and her last thing she did was setting him free), and sarah lost her brother who turned to ash. but one happy thing is that valerie is paired up with jai but they’re gonna be hella cute and make s.carlet.vision look like nothing compared to them lmaoo.

KIARA WILLIAMS

finally, we have my pretty bird kiara! her story is “icarus” and i created her maybe a year or two ago??? she was inspired by the line where sam mentions wanting to impress the lady who worked at the va, and kiara is that lady!! she’s got a younger sister named layla and kiara is also an inhuman (the mcu has ignored them and i love them so i gotta include them lol). her father, raymond, is also an inhuman and he brought her to afterlife where she got the help after going through terrigenesis in her early teen years and gained the power of wing manifestation. when she finally returned to society, her relationship with layla was strained, but they’ve been working hard on fixing it.

she tried her best to live a normal life, getting a job as a receptionist at the va in washington dc and eventually meeting sam wilson (who she’d admire from a distance lol). but when steve rogers comes in and plays a wingman for sam, they start to become friends that eventually leads to something more.

kiara eventually becomes an avenger and gains the alias “icarus” thanks to a cute interaction she had with sam years prior. basically when it was believed that shield attacked afterlife (which kiara just so happened to be at the moment) kiara was hit in the line of fire and barely made it out with her life and it’s that day when sam finds out about her being an inhuman and her powers. he’s really sweet and helps her heal and he makes a joke saying “i guess icarus flew too close to the sun” and it’s just been her nickname ever since.

#sent a raven #valerie byers #sofya volkova #kiara williams #helena hartley #bless u for coming thru with this ask!!!#i love gushing about my ocs so much!!#jen tag

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littlemisssquiggles · 6 years

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RWBY Squiggle Scripts #002: A-Dork-You!

It’s been a long time since we’ve had some lighthearted fun in combat in RWBY. So I propose for a rematch between Team RWBY and Team JNPR.

…Only this time, Oscar Pine has officially joined the revived team as their youngest member.

The designated battlefield is a snow-covered courtyard on the compound of Atlas Academy. The game: Snowball Wars!

This idea would be made even better if it was parodied after Captain America: Civil War where either opposing teams are lined up, squared off against each other. Then simultaneously all eight huntsman start advancing towards each other, slowly at first before building momentum and going into a full battle charge.

We can even have Oscar being the adolescent Peter Parker/ Spiderman of the group (because let’s just face it, he would totally be the Spidey boy in this) look to Jaune, their team leader, and be all like “…Umm Jaune, they’re not stopping.”

Only for Jaune to reply with a serious anime smirk “And neither are we”.

The two teams then clash and it’s a snowball war of epic proportions. I’ve been itching for a rematch between these two teams since the original Food Fight from V2. There needs to be a rematch snowball showdown if the group are heading towards Atlas.

I can totally see the CRWBY team doing something like this if possible especially if it’s a spoof of Civil War. I’m even picturing a cute Hawkeye and Black Widow moment between our young Rosebuds where Ruby and Oscar end up clashing at some point during the snowball fight.

Picture the two younglings sizing each other up, snowballs in hand, ready to aim. Picture Oscar looking at Ruby cheekily and saying humorously, “You wouldn’t hit a guy with two souls, right Rhubarb?”

Or…perhaps he’d imitate Black Widow and be all like, “We’re still totally best rosebuds, right?”

Smirking, Ruby imitates Hawkeye and boldly responds “Depends on how hard you hit me, pipsqueak.”

Or…perhaps Ruby’s response to Oscar goes like, “Duh. Rosebuds forever whatever, right?”

This remark makes Oscar smile. “Movie later?” he suggests.

“Sure,” Ruby complies, “but loser of this fight has to feed the other cookies and give them a foot massage.”

“Oooh bad idea Rhubarb. You’re going to regret those words later when I beat you.” Oscar says mischievously.

“Ahaha! You’ll have to catch me first, pipsqueak.” Ruby retorts playfully, bopping Oscar on the nose before speeding off using her semblance.

That’s the general idea. In the end, the snowball fight is declared a draw as the ruckus caused by the combating huntsmen alerted the attention of one of the adults on the Atlesian school grounds. For the sake of this example, let’s say the adult is Winter Schnee.

In a similar fashion to Glynda Goodwitch from in V2, Winter marches onto the courtyard scolding everyone (especially Weiss) and ceasing the battle before a victor could be crowned.

As a result, everyone is forced to retire inside. While their other team members decided to explore more of the Atlas school compound, Ruby and Oscar stayed behind in the common rooms to fulfill their promise to hang out together watching a movie. Since neither of their teams won the match, the two rosebuds decided to compromise on their earlier agreement. Oscar agreed to rub Ruby’s feet for her if she fed him cookies.

So imagine… Ruby and Oscar huddled together on the couch streaming a movie onto the TV via one of their Scrolls (probably an action-adventure or something cute as requested by Ruby).

Ruby is enjoying a nice warm foot massage courtesy of Oscar and his magical hands, every once in a while reaching over to pat his head and feed him as a chocolate chip cookie as tasty compensation for his services as her, quote, ‘Humble Masseur’ for the evening.

I can imagine that at this point in their friendship, Ruby and Oscar would’ve grown accustomed to each other’s company to the point where they’re absolutely comfortable around each other. So it feels natural and well-welcomed to spend time alone together doing stuff like enjoying a movie without the need for supervision. Not to mention that they’d also be contented to consent to making physical contact with one another without it becoming too inappropriate or weird.

Not to mention being close enough to crack cheeky jokes at the other’s expense without it coming across as offensive.

RWBY Squiggle Script #002: A-Dork-You!

Picture…Ruby, while enjoying the massage, saying to Oscar sarcastically in a mock snooty accent while holding a glass of milk pretending it was the finest champagne in all of Remnant. “I can really get used to these foot massages. Mr. Pine, might I say that your hands are as magical as your powers. The legends about your mighty skill speak truth.”

Snorting, Oscar chuckles before responding in a fake Southern accent of his own. “Why thank you mighty kindly Ms. Rose,” the farm boy says mockingly, “and might I say too, that your toes are as prickly as the lovely flower you get your name from.”

He is rewarded with a pillow directly to the face as Ruby playfully clobbers him with one of the couch cushions. “You jerk! I give you a compliment and you insult my delicate toes,” Ruby giggled as Oscar burst into fits of laughter himself.

Oscar: I’m sorry I couldn’t resist. You’re just too fun to tease.

Ruby: Oh yeah? Well y’know what? For that, you’re not getting the last cookie.”

Oscar: What! No! Nooo! I want a last cookie. Please! I promise I’ll be a good little humble masseur and won’t insult your thorny toes anymore.

Ruby: Nuh uh! You’ve been bad so no more cookies for you. Deal with it.

Oscar: *pouting as he slumps onto the other side of the couch* Great I get no more cookies and now my hands smell like your feet.

Ruby sticks her tongue out at Oscar and gives him the raspberry.

Oscar: *rolling his eyes* Mature.

He then gets an idea and he smirks looking from his hands to Ruby. As if reading his mind, Ruby realizes what he’s thinking of doing and instinctively slinks back on her side of the couch.

Ruby: Don’t even think about it Oscar Pine!

Oscar: *smirk widens as he nudges closer to Ruby’s side of the couch* Oh whatever do you mean Ms. Rose?

Ruby: You’re thinking of smothering me with your stinky feet hands, aren’t you?

Oscar: I was just going to tickle you till you give me the cookies because I know your secret tickle spot but that sounds like a much better plan.

Ruby: …No! Bad Oscar! Very bad!

Oscar: *playful smile intensifies* Give me the last cookie. *inches closer to Ruby*

Ruby: Never! I’ll tell Ozpin on you.

Oscar: *scoffs* Really? That the best you got?

Ruby: Yeah that was kinda dumb. Wait! I’ll tell Uncle Qrow on you.

Oscar: I’ve seen the way your uncle runs even when he’s sober, I think I have the advantage or at least a five minute head start. Ten if I get him drunk.

Ruby: …Good point. Fine. I’ll tell Yang on you.

Oscar: ….Ooof. Worthy threat. But y’know what, I’ll risk it. I like living on the edge. Boy with two souls here, bring it! I yield for no wo-man not even one with a metallic arm. Wanna know why? Cause I’m a rebel!

Oscar and Ruby then eyeball each other for a while after his last remark. Then, simultaneously, they both snorted and keeled over in fits of raucous laughter.

Ruby: *through fits of giggles* You…are…such…a…DORK!

Oscar: …Yeaaaaah but that’s why you like me. I’m your dork, right? *finger guns Ruby making her laugh more*

Ruby: *still giggling* You’re a-DORK-able!

Oscar: A-DORK-able enough to get a cooookie? *props himself in front of Ruby looking her square in the face, giving her his best Oscar puppy dog eyes while wigging his butt like a dog wagging his tail*

Ruby: *stifles another laugh* You are soooooo lucky you’re cute Oscar.

Smiling, Ruby breaks piece of the last cookie, popping one half into her mouth while feeding the other half to Oscar. Like a puppy, Oscar happily accepts the cookie, taking it with his mouth before plopping his head onto Ruby’s empty lap. Still imitating a puppy, Oscar rolls over onto his back and makes himself more cozy on Ruby’s lap. He then nudged closer to her so that he was looking directly up at her face again. Smiling, the freckled farm boy then proceeds to poke Ruby in the cheek; still being playful.

Ever had that one friend who would annoy you but in an irresistibly cute way just to get your attention? And you can’t even get too mad at them because they’re so adorable. Imagine Oscar like that with Ruby.

Oscar: Hey…Hey Red…Hey Redberry. Hey Ruberry. Hey Ruby-roo-berry.

Ruby: Why are you like this? Stop…being…so…adorkable! What do you want now?

Oscar: Gimme tummy rubs!

Ruby: No.

Oscar: *pouting* No fair. I gave you foot massages. C’mon rub my belly pleeeeease! *pretends to whimper like a puppy*

Ruby: You’re as bad as Zwei. If I rub your belly, will you stop being such a dork?

Oscar: …Maaaybe

Groaning, Ruby rubs Oscar’s belly and the former farm boy purrs in content. Ruby couldn’t help but roll her eyes at how much of complete dork he was being. A cute dork. But a dork nonetheless.

Ruby: *sarcastically* Wow, your stomach is as flat as a board, my sir.

Oscar: Hey! Don’t insult my rock hard abs, woman.

Ruby: *snorts* Rock hard abs? More like paper thin sheets.

Oscar: It’s a work in progress, thank you very much. Besides maybe you should work on your toes, thorn-bush.

Immediately Oscar regretted his last choice of words as Ruby started tickling his belly, making him laugh.

Ruby: *through tickling Oscar and his loud laughing while laughing herself* Or maybe you should try not insulting the hand of the person giving you belly rubs especially if they know you’re ticklish too!

Their amusement soon dissolved into a silence. Nothing awkward. Just a quiet contentment they’ve grown between themselves since the start of their friendship. It was a relaxed feeling that they both shared whenever they were alone together. As she looked down at his face, Ruby noticed a happy grin playing at Oscar’s lips as she absently smiled back up at her.

Ruby: What are you smiling about Mr. Rebel? Thinking of another adorkable way to bug me for favours?

Oscar: *chuckles softly* Nah. Not this time. I guess…I was just thinking about how much I’m really glad you’re my friend Rubes. You’ve been so nice to me and you’ve helped me grow so much. Sometimes I feel like I don’t really deserve a friend like you since you’re so great. I don’t know if you feel the same about me since I don’t think I’m all that great to begin with anyway. I guess, what I’m mostly trying to say is, thanks for being the best friend I could’ve wished for.

Oscar then looked away, a tiny blush playing at his cheeks at his last statement. For a moment, Ruby just stared at Oscar, stunned by his kind words. Her cheeks then flushed pink as she then beamed from cheek to cheek.

Ruby: Hey Oscar?

Oscar returned his gaze to look back up at Ruby. And as he did, Ruby put her two hands together, making a heart sign to Oscar’s face.

Ruby: *in a cutesy voice* I a-DORK you!

Now it was Oscar’s turn to stare back at Ruby in awe at her rather cute gesture. He then stifled a laugh before sheepishly bringing his hands up to covering his face, doing his best to hide the embarrassed blush and bright happy smile that threatened to take over face.

Oscar: *bashfully* Why are you…and you say I’m the adorkable one. You should…try looking at yourself in the mirror sometimes.

Shyly Oscar takes Ruby’s hand into his. He intertwines their fingers before bringing them together to form the same heart sign in response to Ruby’s. Timidly, Oscar flashed Ruby a warm smile.

Oscar: I a-DORK you too.

Ruby beamed. She then booped Oscar on the nose as the two shared another laugh before returning to their quiet cuddles on the couch; soon remembering that they were supposed to be watching a movie.

You can’t have a strong rose-budding RoseGarden friendship without our two smaller, more honest souls being adorable dorks with each other.

Especially Oscar. V4 hinted at Oscar having a somewhat joking and playful side to his personality so I’m hoping that a close friendship with Ruby would help bring out more of that side of him. I want the freckly farm boy to be as adorkable as I imagined him to be in this post.

I welcome any and all RG-friendship moments if it gives me these two being absolute cuties. Especially Oscar. We already know Ruby’s adorable. I now need to see more of Oscar being adorable too. He’s already got the face of a puppy. Let him be as cute as one and maybe one day act like one for funzies to score some cookies and/or tummy rubs/ head pats from Ruby.

Let these two be cute dorks with each other is what I’m saying.

More Squiggles’ RWBY Content

~LittleMissSquiggles (2018)

#rwby #oscar pine #ruby rose #ruby and oscar #rwby rosegarden #rwby theories #rwby remarks #squiggles scripts: rwby

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flauntpage · 7 years

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Why Is Casual Culture Still Relevant In Football and Fashion?

This article originally appeared on VICE Sports UK.

Spend any length of time on football Twitter, and one comes across whole accounts dedicated to casual culture. Whether the focus is on photography, history and nostalgia, fashion, music and tifos or scuffling fans and hooligan iconography, there is a considerable following out there for all things casual. Considering that the casual scene in Britain had its heyday in the seventies and eighties, the ongoing fascination with a movement often associated with violence – and long ago subjected to a suffocating mass of fictional biopics, critically excoriated sequels, pastiches, parodies and cynical memoirs – will be a source of bemusement to many outsiders. For those still invested in casual culture, however, it is as relevant now as it was in the days of derelict terracing, Adidas originals, The Jam and meticulously tracksuited firms.

The casual subculture began to emerge in the late seventies, and was considered by many to be a spiritual heir to the Mod movement of the previous decade. Both afforded working-class youngsters in Britain a social space to engage with fashion, this at a time when there was still much stigma born of the tension between traditional masculinity and having an interest in new styles and designer clothes. The casual aesthetic was a rebellion against the staid fashion of an older generation in this sense, but there was a degree of conformity to casuals which was lacking in the sartorial creativity of the Mods. Casual fashion was a uniform of sorts, and a way of identifying oneself with the tribalism and camaraderie of football.

READ MORE: My Double Life as a Hooligan Cost Me My Job, My Relationship and a Lot of Money

Often linked to the success of English clubs – especially Liverpool – in Europe during the seventies, the growing popularity of designer European labels saw football casuals become a recognisable group on the streets. Most often wearing overseas brands like CP Company, L'Alpina and Lacoste, not to mention their customary Adidas trainers, sporting certain logos on matchday was a way for young men to make a statement and attract attention to their status as football fans. This was not always a good thing, of course, with casual culture often going hand in hand with violent clashes between supporters. The word 'casual' is now semi-synonymous with 'football hooligan' in this country, and no sooner did brands like Stone Island, Fila and Diadora come to prevalence in the eighties than they gained an air of notoriety.

As with eighties hooliganism itself, elements of casual culture have been exaggerated and glorified retrospectively, with mid-noughties films like Green Street and The Football Factory especially culpable. While it was no doubt a minority of casuals who were habitually engaged in violence on matchday, there are many outsiders who now view the entire subculture through that particular lens. While this might be expedient for those who have adopted the casual style for the sake of reflected machismo, the majority of those who identify as casuals today seem far more concerned with football, fashion and music than street fighting, as well as the social side of the casual phenomenon. Just as the original casuals had links to the Mods, their successors are often devotees to some form of Mod revivalism, whether it be the various musical guises of Paul Weller or the casual stylings of Oasis and Cool Britannia, which helped to sustain the scene well into the nineties.

Elijah Wood at an actual West Ham match during the filming of Green Street. Note the Stone Island logos // PA Images

Though there was a brief revival in the aftermath of Green Street and its box office rivals, casual culture began to wane around the turn of the millennium. Whether owing to the spate of absurd and derivative hooligan flicks which followed Elijah Wood's unlikely outing as a West Ham diehard (see: Rise of the Footsoldier, Green Street Hooligans 2, and so on) or the shifting zeitgeist of British youth culture, the casual look lost even more cachet during the late noughties and faded further. That said, it persists in some regions of the country more than others, while there is still a specialist casual community on the fringes of both football and fashion. Much of this community seems to have migrated on to the internet, where fan forums, online clothing stores and social media allow casuals to share anecdotes, style tips and differing perspectives on the casual way of life.

One of the most interesting aspects of the casual scene on social media is that many accounts are run by football fans overseas, either in North America or Europe. The veneration of casuals on the continent is a textbook example of cultural exchange, with the young Brits who once admired European fashion now admired by young Europeans in turn. Take the Casual Ultra for instance, a Twitter account run by a supporter of Dutch Eerste Divisie side SC Cambuur. Based in the Netherlands, he agreed to talk anonymously to VICE Sports via email about his interest in casual culture, and why he spends a considerable amount of time promoting his take on the scene in 140 characters or less.

READ MORE: The Battle of Beverwijk – Dutch Football's Brutal Hooligan Nadir

"Being a casual is a way to separate yourself from regular supporters through your clothing and lifestyle," he says. "The casual style is getting more popular every day in Europe. I'm a casual myself and and the club I support, SC Cambuur, has many casuals as well. In my opinion, there are many casuals in the Dutch scene. After England we're for sure in second place." While the Casual Ultra account mainly tweets photos of pyro displays, away days and the usual fashion brands, there are also videos of pitchside brawls and menacing group shots of masked supporters. The spectre of genuine hooliganism haunts many of the casual accounts on Twitter and Facebook, and there's no avoiding the fact that the thrill of violence appeals to some of their following.

The man behind the Casual Ultra account admits that he's interested in "the hooligans, casuals and ultras scenes" and that his Twitter and Facebook accounts have previously been suspended for posting material deemed to be inappropriate. One wonders whether the availability of hooligan videos on social media has not contributed to the marginalisation of the casual scene, with the feeling that casual culture is a niche interest only furthered by the conspicuous link to matchday violence. This link is arguably overemphasised on social media, with accounts often generating engagement with violence which is unrepresentative of the scene more generally. Certainly in Britain, CCTV and the liberal use of banning orders have made football hooliganism much more difficult, while logic dictates that modern hooligans ought to avoid casual brands in order to make themselves less obvious to the police.

Casual culture means different things to different people, evidently, and may well have maintained more of an edge outside of Britain. What casuals across the world have in common is their continued dedication to the brands of the seventies and eighties, which the man behind the Casual Ultra account says can lead to "a very expensive lifestyle." Someone who would know all about the cost of the casual aesthetic is Daniel Wilson, who runs an independent clothing store called Casual Cultures in Derby. Dan is a lifelong Derby County fan, and credits both his club and his family with getting him into the casual scene.

"I would probably say I inherited my love for casual culture from my old man and family," Dan says. "He used to take me to the football from an early age and I instantly loved matchdays, and whenever he couldn't make a match my granddad would take me down to the old Baseball Ground. As well as the football, my old man was also into his clothes and music and I developed my own tastes from that. I remember listening to Oasis, Black Grape, The Charlatans and The Verve on the way to matches and also wearing brands like Stone Island, Henri Lloyd and CP Company from a really young age – at the time I didn't really think anything of it, but I was wearing a £100 Stone Island sweatshirt to school and none of my mates really knew what it was.

"I think I got my first season ticket for Derby County when I was about 14, and that's when I really got into the clothing side of things. I saw older lads wearing the Burberry caps and Aquascutum scarves and wanted to be like them. It helped that my old man was a bit of a dresser, as I started nicking his stuff to wear and it snowballed from that really. Whenever you went on an away day you would see different lads wearing different things and start taking influence from them, and that starts to form your identity."

For Dan, casual culture is about camaraderie, fashion and music, though he recognises that it's not the same for everyone. "I've never really been into the violence side of things," he says. "For me it's dressing well, listening to good music, following your team home and away and having good craic, but I know lads who get a buzz from fighting and being in a firm." While banning orders and intensive policing have made it near impossible to scrap regularly at Premier League matches, there is evidence to suggest that football violence still persists below the top flight where the risks are slightly less prohibitive. Nonetheless, as the owner of a clothing store, Dan is more concerned with identifying new brands and labels than matchday bravado. He has even set up his own brand, Lombes, with its gritty, post-industrial logo based on the old Derby Silk Mill.

As well as providing a sphere in which football fans can bond over fashion, it seems there is an element of competition and internecine rivalry to casual culture. This is reflected in Dan's mantra when it comes to selling clothes and pushing certain brands. "Starting off I used to sell some of the bigger brands that were having a mini revival, like Lyle & Scott, Fila et cetera. After a few months I realised that I was on to something, stopped selling the larger brands and decided only to sell independent labels, which goes back to the idea of one-upmanship and selling things which aren't mass produced. I started to stock brands like Casual Connoisseur, Basläger, The Beautiful North, Stand and so on. All these brands are made in the UK by football lads themselves, and I liked the idea of selling stuff which you couldn't get on a high street in Derby, for example."

With Lombes, Dan limits everything he produces to 50 items, meaning that buyers get something exclusive and which, in his words, they can be "dead proud of." This teases out an interesting theme in the world of casual fashion, in that the conformity and kinship of the casual dress code is qualified by touches of exclusivity. There is something innately fraternal about casual culture, which at its heart comprises both the one-for-all and all-for-one spirit of brotherhood and the almost comic competitiveness which comes with it. This no doubt limits the scene's appeal across the gender spectrum – along with the ingrained misogyny of some casuals – while there are many men for whom the all-pervasive Cain and Abel vibe will feel a bit daft in the cold light of day.

As for why he feels that casual culture is worth perpetuating, Dan says: "All youth need an identity to latch on to, and I suppose the casual movement is a type of identity that gets passed down from generation to generation... You've got people like Drake wearing Stone Island now and brands like Supreme and Engineered Garments have a cult following." In general agreement is Vaios, a spokesman for the Casual Factory, an online clothing store which also specialises in casual clothing. He told VICE Sports via email: "The meaning of casual culture is obviously something personal to each person, but I think there is always an element of wanting to be an outlaw, of respecting and emulating those living closer to the edge." The idea of 'respect' for other football fans, not least those with a reputation for violence, is another exaggeratedly macho element of casual culture. Tribalism among young men is something which transcends football, and there is something almost clannish about the casual lifestyle. "It's not just football fans, they style has moved way beyond that at this point," he adds, pointing out that one is as likely to see casual clothing on matchday as at a Stone Roses gig.

Image via Real Clobber Magazine // Tomod Photography

Some final perspective on the competitive nature of the casual scene comes from Luke Taylor, editor-in-chief of Real Clobber Magazine. Focused mainly on fashion and set up as a reaction to companies which "live in a fantasy world that has no connection whatsoever to the people who end up buying and wearing the gear," the magazine features big brands as well as independent labels. Speaking about the emergence of the scene, Luke says: "The casual subculture was built around fashion in the beginning, with designer sportswear becoming a big thing to avoid police detection whilst the police were still looking for a Dr. Martens, skinhead type. As time progressed the term 'casual snobbery' evolved, kind of similar to the whole bling thing associated with rap. 'My Stone Island jacket costs more than yours' and such. The look now associated with casuals… I think it's a way out of the weekday rut for everyday, working-class people – to get down the pub with your mates and your £500 jacket is a feelgood factor. It's escapism if you like, to let off some steam. Who looks the best, who's got the best gear on?"

While the idea of 'casual snobbery' might seem ironic in the context of a predominantly working-class movement, there is clearly a hierarchy even within the casual scene. The desire for young men to climb that hierarchy, to strive with each other for approval and dominance, is an aspect of casual culture which long predates Adidas, football, and most likely civilisation itself. One might argue that such machismo is a form of escapism, but there is also a sort of self-expression in casual culture which is about absconding from a mundane reality, something which most of us can relate to on some level. That is why, despite the ongoing association with violence and the more unsavoury elements of the scene, many feel that casual culture is as relevant as ever.

Where necessary, quotes have been lightly edited for clarity.

@W_F_Magee

Why Is Casual Culture Still Relevant In Football and Fashion? published first on http://ift.tt/2pLTmlv

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impurelight · 7 years

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Tales of Zestiria - Forget Not Your Duty But Be Not A Slave To It Either

I just beat Tales of Zestiria. And wow, it is unlike any game I’ve played before. The story is gripping. The music is amazing. There are fights in this game that are so intense that after beating them you just feel exhausted. Or maybe it was because I was mashing the left mouse button way too much. Maybe I should get a controller some time. Hmm…

So is Tales of Zestiria my favourite Tales game? Well that’s a tough question. If I just stripped Zestiria down to it’s highlights then yeah, I’d have to say it’s the best. But here’s the thing. Between those highlights there are long stretches of time that you’re not doing anything.

There’s tons of backtracking. You have to complete sidequests and get 15 of these random items. There are objectives that are counter intuitive and you’ll need to Google them or you will have no idea what to do. There are unanswered questions and the story just doesn’t feel well put together. And that final boss… From what I hear it’s basically impossible unless you spam Rose’s dream slasher arte whenever he’s going to use his cheap one shot move which violates the number one rule of ending video games: don’t make the final boss overpowered.

So let’s start with the most important part first. The camera. Everyone has to know about the camera. Honestly it’s fine. You’ll just be button mashing for most battles anyways. I don’t know why people complain. To be honest it’s more funny than annoying.

There was one time I found the camera to be annoying. In a boss fight early on. With a boss named ‘Dragonewt’. Basically this guy will kill you in like 2 or 3 hits and you do basically no damage against it so you have to keep dodging until a cutscene triggered. And it was in a small room which made it difficult to dodge.

This is sort of a once in a game sort of a boss. Most of the bosses are easier but the bosses are still pretty tough. You get an option to retry a boss if you fail without having to reload a save or anything which is cool. I think I beat every boss within 3 retries with most beating them on my first try. Died a lot though. There was even this giant elephant boss that killed everyone in my party in 1 hit so I had to come back later.

In fact there are a lot of hard ‘boss’ enemies on the map. I’m not sure if this is a new thing, it feels like it could be in a previous Tales game but it’s new to me. Basically they’re weirdly coloured sometimes, although not necessarily always, huge monsters on the map. There’s usually one per map with other monsters on it. They don’t respawn. Don’t battle them immediately as they’ll most likely tear apart your entire team. Wait until you’re over-leveled, go back, and kill them for massive grade.

Speaking of grade there’s this new mechanic called the Lord of the Land. It goes with the plot of the game that you’re supposed to clear malevolence from the world. The Lords of the Land… well I’m not really sure what they do but it definitely has something to do with malevolence. The first 2 are part of the main quest and the rest are side quests. Basically they give you boosts when you’re in their land once you gain enough grade while in their land. It’s a fun little mechanic that makes you actually want more grade before the inevitable grade shop at the end.

But of course the biggest change is the new combat system. You’ve probably heard how battles take place on a modified version of the minimap rather than on a separate screen. It means no loading at the expense of the camera angles. There’s also no surprise attacks however you can get multiple enemies attacking you at once in a ‘dangerous’ encounter.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to changes to the combat system. The biggest change are the seraphim. Your party will usually consist of 2 humans and 4 seraphim which is good because you need at least 1 human fighting for every seraphim. Don’t ask me why that’s just how it is.

The Seraphim come in 4 elemental types: water, fire, earth, and wind. And there’s also quite a focus on elements. You even unlock the ability to use each of these elemental types outside of battles to get to new areas. It’s not quite metroidvania but it’s nice.

Also the big thing about Seraphim is you can switch them out during battle and while they’re switched out they can actually heal. Plus there’s a new armitization feature. Basically a human, except Alicia for some reason, can combine with a seraph (seraphim is the plural of seraph; I beat the entire game without knowing that) to be more powerful. Some people think this is overpowered. I don’t think so because you basically lose one party member while you’re doing it which on the harder fights, the ones you actually want to be strong in, is incredibly important. But I use armitization because a dead human and a seraph can armitize which will revive the human saving a life bottle. This sort of makes seraphim feel disposable.

I feel bad saying that because the seraphim are the best characters. Especially Edna the sarcastic one. I thoroughly believe if she was not in this game the game would turn out completely different. She delivers some of the most memorable lines in the game. And her interactions with Michleo, which she gives various names to such as Meebo, are just priceless. Also she has a really good side-quest with her brother Eizen, who I’m told is making an appearance in Tales of Berseria. Definitely beat this one even though it’s right at the end of the game when you’d rather be beating the final boss. It’s a real tear jerker.

The other characters are great too, although they’re a bit stereotypical. Also there’s Alicia who everyone seems to be disappointed didn’t get a large role in the game. One of the big things in this game is that most humans can’t see Seraphim which is a really big deal in the beginning. And makes for quite some drama. But at the end it’s almost like a forgotten fact and not brought up at all.

There’s also a lot of dialogue in this game. When you fight new enemies you will get a little dialogue about them. And there’s a bit of dialogue when you’re walking around but not too much. And there’s a new skit style, but to be honest it feels a bit unnecessary and change for the sake of change when you realize to fit all the characters on screen at once some are always covering each other especially Edna and her umbrella. It actually reminds me of something a reviewer said about Dawn of the New World. See this is what happens when you listen to reviewers. Also many of the skits can only be played at save points which is weird to say the least.

Also this game must have been a pain to translate for. There’s puns and jokes everywhere. However I don’t really like the parts of the game where two people say the same thing at the same time. It just seems unnatural to me.

Back to battling. There is really a lot to the battle system here. I don’t think I can cover everything in this article because, well, I don’t know everything about the battle system. It’s really complicated. They try to explain it with the monoliths and skits but to be honest they’re not really well paced and most of the time I didn’t really care and just wanted to kill hellions.

But even if they were done better I don’t think I could have learned everything. There’s just too much stuff. But I can tell you the basics. There’s this new SC system which appears to be a replacement for MP, or whatever the Tales games called it. Now every attack uses it and it recharges really fast. You start with full SC at the beginning of a battle but as you battle more and more you start with less and less. Until you go to an inn.

By the way you now need to buy a food item from the inn to stay there. Which is weird, I had to Google it to find that out.

So anyways if you don’t go to the inn you’ll be guarding a lot during battles to up your SC. Which I guess is sort of realistic. There’s also BG but that’s just your energy for mystic artes and armitization.

Back on the inn thing. There are a few dungeons quite far from inns which is disappointing. You may want to fast travel but this takes quite a lot of gald (it’s actually % based).

Also the reason why there’s fast travel is there’s no world map. In most Tales games I’ve played there’s a world map and half way through the game you get a way of flying wherever. Not the case in Zestiria. You’re not a comically big giant next to a city anymore. The world is divided into a bunch of maps like what you’d find in other games. I really don’t like it. There’s just so much backtracking now. Don’t cheap out like me and not use the fast travel. It’ll make the game so much more bearable.

Zesteria is one of the first Tales games to be released on PC. So how is it on PC? Surprisingly good actually. I heard some people say this is a ‘poor PC port’. When I think ‘poor PC port’ I think no mouse input, having to use arrow keys for everything, and in general a terrible experience for anyone playing with a keyboard and mouse.

So by that definition Zestiria is definitely not a ‘poor PC port’. The mouse and keyboard feel just like how it would normally work. The only problem is some of the keybindings are a bit off and the right mouse button is sometimes used in place of the escape button. I think once you start moving the mouse it switches from keyboard only to keyboard and mouse controls. So for some things like adding accessories (which is separate from costumes in Zestiria), it’s better to avoid moving the mouse. Also the ‘reload’ option sometimes reloads the wrong save. But it’s not that much of a problem.

But other than that it’s a perfectly usable PC port. Although if you have a controller hanging around I’d still recommend using that. There’s too much clicking in this game. Made me feel like I was going to get RSI at some points.

But there’s a few other things that make this game not pass for a native PC game. For one the battle keybindings are on the main menu. Who does that, right?

Also apparently it’s capped to 30 FPS. I wouldn’t know, I played the whole game with a mod that ups the cap to 60. Although it’s a little weird when you get to cutscenes which are still at 30, actually they’re at 24.

Which brings me to the best thing about Zestiria. In many games there’s just that one feature you wish every game would copy. Well this is it. When you keep on trying to walk through a character you actually walk through them. This is genius and would have been so great in Fallout and Far Cry.

Also the side quests are much easier to find now. No longer do you need a wiki to find them. They’re now marked on the map. However sometimes I wish I had a quest log to keep track of all the random quests. Also quest objectives are marked on the map (only if you’re on the same map) which is sort of weird because they’re too frequent and when there’s no objective it’s really hard to tell where to go. But I guess it’s fine.

The map has also changed. A lot of locations have a lot of vertical height and the way the game chooses to handle this is now the map displays content based on your height and you can scroll to look at higher and lower locations. Also the only way to move the map is to use the WASD keys not clicking and dragging like any normal game. Oh well. The map is not quite intuitive. I wish they did it a bit better.

One thing I saw mentioned in this game are the locations look generic. Which is true. Some locations look cool but most of them fall in your generic temple, outdoors trenches location, indoor cave, and water temple. Actually I think the water temple is another case of people picking on something because it’s just fun to pick on. And it’s true, the water temple is pretty annoying. Although the wind temple is also pretty bad; it’s just so big.

So in conclusion I really liked Tales of Zestiria. Sure, it doesn’t have the trademark final-boss-that’s-really-only-the-half-way-boss and no one betrays you in this game. But it’s a really interesting and fun game which I really enjoyed playing after playing so many serious western games.

Reviewing Zestiria is hard because even though it does so much right it also does so much wrong. Especially the very mid-game that just feels like it’ll drag on forever. And the story isn’t particularly memorable. But you can’t overlook the fact that Zesteria has some really nice ideas, characters, and plot points.

OK, so maybe it’s not the best Tales game ever. But if you had a shortlist of most complicated Tales games ever Zestiria would definitely be on that list.

5.0/5.0 enjoyment + 3.0/5.0 quality -> 82% Overall.

How I calculate review scores.

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flauntpage · 7 years

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Why Is Casual Culture Still Relevant In Football and Fashion?

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