#they're deep! they're well written! they feel very real! it's not 'anti' to think a character who burns people alive is a villain tho!!

[atopvisenyashill]

I don’t get how you’re a Rhaenyra fan but a Dany hater 🤨 like Rhaenyra committed a lot of atrocities in the end.

I don’t hate Dany! She’s smart, she’s funny, she’s got some of the best magical scenes in the series - she’s got some of the best scenes in the series, period, her last dragon fever dream in agot is like top 10 for me easy - and she’s a character that is conceptually similar to like, theon or ned or cersei in that she is really firmly rooted and informed by her past traumas, and I love characters like that from a writing standpoint. I have definitely talked more negatively about her bc it’s basically impossible to not be constantly inundated with takes i feel are just the most vapid or deranged or whatever takes in the world, but you can say that for anyone who feels anything at all about dany bc she is a very polarizing character! i think some of her narrative is frustratingly written, i do not mesh well with a large section of her fanbase, and i actively hate her show counterpart, but show dany is a vastly different character than book dany is (i mean just age alone, like with robb and jon, some of your sympathy evaporates bc they are too damn old to be acting this stupid). ultimately, a lot of the "hate" people think i feel for her is directed at what i feel are stupid opinions on her character or her show counter part's place in pop culture, or just like, normal analysis and critique that i do of every character in this series.

i will acknowledge that i tend to describe myself as "pro stark, pro blacks, pro smallfolk" so people know the general gist of what they're signing up for when they start interacting with me, but that is such a simple way of diluting all of my feelings for all of these characters. like "pro stark" in the sense that they are the most rational of the leaders we get in the main series, and have a connection to the land, people, and culture that is important, but i've pointed out plenty of times that robb's war is harmful to the people of the riverlands, regardless of whether he's justified or not, and i've been posting about how ned and cat fail to properly prepare their children (and the north in general) for Real World Politics, to the detriment of their kids. "pro stark" in the sense that i thought show dany wasn't just deranged from season 1 she was also wildly unlikable and nauseatingly stupid, you could see her "dark dany" turn coming from a mile away because these were not subtle writers interested in exploring why dany would decide "dragons plant no trees" and instead focused on her looking hot while she set shit on fire (same way they were less interested in looking at why jon failed as lord commander and had him be the action hero fighting at hardhome). definitely most of my aggravation at "dany" is at the show version, and while i do get why people feel that if you're a proponent of the "dark dany" theory that you're "anti" dany, but I am not anti book dany! i just think like rickon stark, shireen baratheon, jojen reed, aegon vi, etc she is very much doomed to die a very tragic death.

and i do not like characters based on how little atrocities they commit lmao, like, if i were to list my top 10 favorites, probably half of them have committed some extreme war crime. theon is a rapist! jaime is a shitty ass partner to cersei, a deadbeat dad despite living in the same building as his kids, and a failed child murderer! bran is mind raping hodor, understands on some level that what he's doing is morally repugnant, and keeps doing it anyway! pretty much every targaryen i like has committed some sex crime heinous enough to get them life + 25!! bobby b raised joffrey!!! i know i facetiously say shit like "rhaenyra did nothing wrong" but i'm well aware she's out here torturing people, same as like 75% of the characters we interact with in the whole series. so "rhaenyra commits atrocities" or "dany commits atrocities" is just not how i look at these characters (and not to get into stan wars here, but good lord, "rhaenyra commits atrocities" she is not the only or even the worst person in the dance! like 85% of these people suck and the ones who don't - which is limited to like, helaena, jace, nettles, and addam almost exclusively - either die or disappear because That's The Point. also, i was raised SDA alright, you gotta be a really compelling character for me to get past being super catholic, it's in my dna to be a spiteful hater of catholics!! catelyn stark is my one exception to this rule folks!!!!).

as to why i like rhaenyra - for one thing, saying that emma d'arcy is a better actor than emilia clarke is like saying cillian murphy is better than bradley cooper. they are just not on the same level lol. i definitely have my critiques of show!rhaenyra's writing but i also think she's miles better written than show!dany and her story is also more interesting because her writing is much less nonsensical. for another, i think book rhaenyra and book dany are wildly similar characters (for a reason!) meant to be in conversation with each other, and i very much enjoy what that conversation is saying about power, nobility, gender, sex, war, and identity. on a more technical level, while fire and blood is a mess writing and world building wise, the one thing it does better than the essos chapters (because it doesn't take place in essos, it takes place in westeros, and george struggles much less fleshing out "western poc" than he does "eastern poc" ya know) is that rhaenyra is not the only insight we get into the conflict. the people she loves, the people she rules, the people she harms, they all have a pov and a voice in a way that missandei, irri, jhiqui, rakharo, jhogo, grey worm, on and on, do not, the way that basically every single character that isn't westerosi except mmd (who was killed in book one) is not afforded. it's just a lot easier (as of right now) to talk about rhaenyra as a character because we have her beginning, middle, and end and the povs of people who hated her vs dany, we have the beginning and middle, a lot of arguing over what her end will be, and no one in the narrative as of yet who has even the barest criticism of her decisions besides cardboard cut out villainous slavers.

so like...no i do not hate dany, and i don't feel it's necessary to asterisk every post about rhaenyra with "i know putting a hit out on nettles and addam, locking the smallfolk into KL without easing their burdens of the war, positing herself as an exception to male line primogeniture instead of pushing for absolute primogeniture, and using torture on tyland and vaemond's family was fucked up, i acknowledge that she's flawed" when i talk about her, nor do i feel the need to defend my position on dany on the off chance one of her more annoying stans finds my posts and decides i hate women because i said i didn't like her sexual relationship with irri.

#asks #anons #anti daenerys targaryen #i tag 'anti x' so people can filter the posts out. like i have 'anti x' tags blocked bc some of the opinions of my moots annoy me alkjdfs #but i otherwise love and cherish those moots ya know!! with very few exceptions i don't actually hate any of the characters. #they're deep! they're well written! they feel very real! it's not 'anti' to think a character who burns people alive is a villain tho!! #grrm critical #fire and blood critical #f&b critical #i can't remember what i tag that as #i hope this rant makes sense #anti game of thrones

[distort-opia]

you know i often see people throwing around the claim "joker r*ped/sa'd barbara in tkj" (mainly to shame people for liking the joker or batjokes) even though alan moore has dedunked it at some point. like the only piece of media i can think of with joker as a rapist is the azzarello graphic novel which is shit and doesn't need to be accepted as canon. i know it's kinda of a touchy subject but i'd be interested to hear your thoughts

Well. You've pretty much said it, to be honest.

Even a cursory Google search will reveal that Azzarello's Joker (2008) is a one-off, non-canon story. The just as much stand-alone sequel, Batman: Damned has a grieving Harley Quinn almost force herself on Bruce, and yet I haven't heard people say Harley is a rapist. Hell, didn't Batman and Harley Quinn (2017) have Harley and Nightwing sleep together... with pretty dubious consent on Dick's side? And yet fans are able to acknowledge that these are not canon storylines and that the writer matters a lot-- in the case of the latter, it's co-written by Bruce Timm, who is infamous for his shitty portrayal of female characters (also see the animation Batman: The Killing Joke, in which Barbara very assertively has sex with Batman, because that's of course the only way a woman can exercise power). Actually, Barbara's character has suffered so much... there's even Batman Beyond 2.0 #28, in which Bruce apparently got Barbara pregnant, Dick's girlfriend at the time.

But we all dismiss these storytelling choices because we know they're idiotic. They go against the core of the characters, simple as that. Why is Joker not allowed the same? While what he canonically did to Barbara in TKJ was horrible, rape did not happen, and that's a fact. Any other implications of sexual assault can only be connected to Frank Miller's writing in the TDKR series (not canon), or that horrible (and again, not canon) book adaptation of TKJ by Christa Faust and Gary Phillips. Unfortunately, there are always some writers who think that it's just darker and grittier and cooler, more shocking to have Joker attempt rape or resort to sexual means of intimidation; though it's funny how it happens that these are also generally controversial writers for their sexist depictions of women.

But we do know why Joker is not afforded the same kind of treatment as other characters who got butchered by out-of-character stories, canon or otherwise. He's become the punching bag of the DC fandom; it's so easy to proclaim loud and proud these days how much you hate the Joker and want him dead. If you're an anti and looking to feel morally righteous and signal to your echo chamber how good and pure you are, it's a low hanging fruit to latch onto Joker and criticize him for all he's done. The problem, of course, is when these people start attacking actual, real-life fans over their fictional preferences, shipping or otherwise.

But to give a more general conclusion, and my actual opinion on the matter: Joker is a master manipulator. His main schtick is literally getting Batman to kill him by orchestrating all manner of situations; he manipulates his doctors, his henchmen, he manipulates Gotham itself through the media on countless occasions. The very reason why he did what he did to Barbara in TKJ was to manipulate her father into having a mental breakdown. Joker picks people to break and then breaks them psychologically, that is his MO. What he wants is to expose the people around him, he wants to show that deep down, everyone is rotten.

It probably becomes obvious why rape is inconsistent with this mindset. Joker isn't the kind of monster to make things happen by brute force, he's the kind of monster to manipulate people into the worst versions of themselves and then laugh at them as they hate themselves for it. He'll murder and torture and imply any manner of atrocity to make that happen, but the source of his glee is seeing people fall into the same dark pit, devoid of humanity, he's chosen to live in. (And don't even get me started on the fact that Joker was canonically shown to have been a victim of sexual assault himself as a child, in Batman: Streets of Gotham. As an adult, he's depicted as gruesomely taking revenge on the man who did it. Something tells me there's more than one reason why Joker would not resort to rape, and it goes beyond MOs or agendas.)

#I got a bit long but alas #this was prompted by whatever twitter meltdown is currently happening wasn't it #heard about it and heaved a long sigh. this is why I stay away from that hell hole #asks #long post #joker #rape mention #discussion of rape #fandom negativity

[sophieinwonderland]

Dealing With More Anti-Endos Invading Endogenic Spaces! This Time With a Dash of r/Systemscringe

This is just a straight-up lie.

While @thelunastusco did identify as endogenic at one point, that was a VERY long time ago.

I won't go into too much detail about this. You can see their response here:

Wait... are endogenic systems faking or not? 🤔

You seem like you're having a really hard time deciding.

If endogenic systems don't say they have a disorder, they literally can't be faking it.

If endogenic systems do think they have a disorder, then how would they be groomed into thinking they don't?

In the future, try your best to make a rationally coherent point.

Because you've clearly failed here.

Also, not what grooming is. Anti-endos, stop comparing endogenic systems to abusers.

Now, normally, I would go into the whole spiel of how actually endogenic systems are recognized by the majority of psychiatrists who have researched the subjects, by the World Health Organization, etc. But @cambriancrew already tried that, pointing to studies that have been done, and this was how @problematicpooch responded:

So essentially, don't trust the many, many professionals telling you endogenic plurality is real because some studies are wrong! 🙄

And WHAT RESEARCH HAVE YOU DONE?

Have you managed to find even one paper by a psychiatrist or psychologist anywhere stating it's impossible to be plural without trauma? Anywhere?

Because I think it's safe to say that our research is more valid than yours. Ours comes from respected doctors in the field. Yours comes from r/systemscringe. (Don't worry. I'm getting there.)

By the way, the Crew didn't say all studies need to be true if they're published. They said a book specifically peer reviewed and published by the American Psychiatric Association wouldn't have been published if the reviewers felt it contained untrue information.

Why are anti-endos always wanting to traumatize a bunch of children?

Why not just try testing alternative hypotheses for the formation of plurality?

Does anyone else get the feeling that anti-endos attack research into endogenic systems because they're scared?

"Research into endogenic systems is taking away from research into DID" is a pretty silly argument. A lot of research into DID and OSDD has been conducted by trauma specialists. Very little of the research into endogenic systems have been. Doctors who have traditionally focused on traumagenic plurality still are focused on that.

There's zero merit to the idea that this is taking away from research into DID in any way.

And again, the ICD-11, written by World Health Organization, is clear that you can experience multiple distinct identity states without a disorder.

The Hearing Voices Network has been fighting for the 80s to normalize that voice hearing isn't inherently pathological.

Just because someone has experiences similar to a mental illness doesn't mean they have a mental illness. Especially if the don't meet criteria for distress or impairment.

Okay... you know what... I AM going to whip out the ICD-11 here because I want to zero in on another part of this. In the criteria, for DID, you need to experience impairment in areas of functioning due to the disorder.

The DSM-5 has a similar criterion, worded as a requirement of "clinically significant distress or impairment" in important areas of functioning.

The ICD-11 contrasts this with non-aversive distinct personality states that aren't associated with impairment.

No, it's not ableist to say that DID is harmfull.

And the criterion I mentioned in the DSM is literally called the harm criterion, and establishes that a disorder can't be a disorder if it doesn't harm the person in some way.

Referring to dissociative disorders as being harmful isn't ableism. If they weren't harmful, they wouldn't be disorders. That's how disorders work!

Having other people in your head isn't inherently a disorder if it doesn't come with distress or impairment.

This doesn't mean that people with dissociative disorders are monsters. It just means they have a disorder that causes some for of distress or impairment.

Though maybe you, specifically, are.

r/systemscringe

After being torn apart, Problematicpooch ran to r/systemscringe where xe goes by u/Mikeyboi3000

Now, xe tried pulling this in the discussion with Cambrian too, who addressed it here:

Obviously, no correction from u/mikeyboi3000.

That would require a shred of intellectual honesty xe doesn't possess.

Anyway, while we're here, let's take a deeper look at the comments.

Casually accusing someone you don't of being an abuser while you have THAT as your flair is absolutely wild!

Also, they described symptoms the OP says are OSDD-1. At no point did the Crew actually claim OSDD isn't a disorder.

I think most people should have a general code of conduct for themselves. At least basic moral principles.

I would think it's weird that this person doesn't, but then I remembered that this is on r/systemscringe. Of course they wouldn't have any moral principles.

I don't think I've ever seen the Crew use that word for themselves. u/Mikeyboi3000 just stuck that in quotations for some reason.

By the way, if anyone's forgotten who u/sleep-bread-dough is, I debunked their r/systemscringe posts last week.

This is the user who makes system-friendly-sonas to pretend to be supportive of their system friends, and doesn't think DID systems should be allowed to work.

The problem isn't about consciousnesses.

While it may not be fair, if you're unable to hold a single member of the system accountable, then society's laws quickly break down.

Imagine if ghosts were real and could permanently possess someone. Ghosts start possessing people, and permanently are locked into those bodies. The ghosts then commit crimes. If you say, "well, we can't hold this person accountable because they're possessed," then they can commit more crimes without penalty.

If punishing a group is the only way to hold an individual accountable, then the whole group needs to be held accountable.

For example, if anti-endos routinely invade endogenic tags, crosstagging into our spaces, and they refuse to change and stay in their own corners when they're asked, then I have no choice but to crosstag my responses into their tags with the hope the rest of the anti-endo community can rein them in, punishing the entire group for the actions of an individual.

Maybe it doesn't seem fair, but sometimes things that seem unfair are necessary for maintaining order.

I think system responsibility is one of those things, where even if a system were made up of completely 100% separate people, all would need to be held accountable for the actions of one or nobody would be held accountable.

This wasn't the only post u/Mikeyboi300 made either after Tumblr arguments in the past few days. Xe also did one after being corrected by LunastusCo on their origins.

To anyone who may engage with this user, please be warned that doing so may result in them posting you to r/systemscringe in retaliation.

If you're worried about being posted on r/systemscringe, the best thing you can do is to block @problematicpooch.

#syscourse #pro endo #pro endogenic #anti endo #anti endogenic #sysblr #psychology #psychiatry #multiplicity #systemscringe #r/systemscringe #reddit #system stuff #systems #system discourse #actually plural #actually a system

[fruitsofhell]

People shit on Elemental for its race/culture allegory looking even more reductive and rigid than Zootopia's on the service, but I think it actually used it super well. It feels a lot more like a very broad and fable-ish metaphor than the sort of hard world-building with direct racial parallels found in Zootopia. Zootopia aged poorly cause it was so fucking direct in its parallel imagery to real world oppression with the police angle, whereas Elemental is just generally about the experience of being an immigrant. The way it uses the infrastructure of the city being actively built for some and harmful to others is really clever, I adored how they used that.

It also helps greatly that Elemental was written by a POC from the perspective of the marginalized because it helps make the metaphors feel more cohesive. The choice to make Judy the main focus as a perpetrator of the systemic predator oppression that greatly mirrors real world anti-blackness aged like milk to me, it screams white guilt complex. And the fact it spends a lot of time not engaging with forms of prejudice besides the bunny oppression until it gets to that feels very flat. Elemental immedietly explains its main allegory very strongly and from the perspective of those it affects, so there's no fluff or time spent ignoring the issues from the privileged perspective.

Literally the thing that will instantly kill your fantasy oppression metaphor is being white guilty about it or not thinking super hard about what you're paralleling if you're going to be as blunt as Zootopia. Stuff like accidentally giving the oppressed group a reason to be oppressed as you do with the predator-prey dynamic. It's just the biggest fucking red flag and shows little understanding of why these systems exist irl. In Elemental the metaphor obviously uses a lot of imagery to show that the fire people are meant to be east asian-coded, but beyond that its content just being a story about class and immigrant families. About being from different worlds and feeling like they're impossible to combine, because of experiences and backgrounds, which is expressed as being fire and water.

Unlike being a bunny and fox, that imagery is a bit less loaded and can be turned into a sort of mutual harm as it is in the film with Wade being at risk of evaporating as muxh as Ember is at risk of being put out. And, in the end, it's found that water can just bubble a bit as the metaphor for a compromise. Which is fine enough and where the more fable-ish approach to the allegory became clear to me.

It's also used very cutely for their personalities too in a way that comes back to the background divide - Ember being fiery, anxious, and high-strung from pressures of supporting her community, and Wade being all blubbery and emotional but mellower because he lives in a supportive upper-class family. Its just a lot cleverer on a couple of levels than the bumbling between 'predators are black and brown people but also their oppression is bad but also they are dangerous but also its cause of a conspiracy, and also small prey are kinda like white woman and theres intersectionality but its shown horribly'.

Despite Ember's racial coding, no matter how you code Wade's family it doesn't matter because it is simply about - 'you live in a city that has integrated for you, and I don't' - which could apply to an upper-class family of any background, cause it's more of a class thing now. Even if he was black-coded (which Ive seen from fans likely because of his VA, I dont remember if he was in the films text), it still works cause their ARE affluent black families whom by nature of having been here and integrated are in that privileged role over a poorer immigrant family of any other race.

Allegories for class or upbringing usually age better, the systems that create those are a lot more basic and less loaded to parallel on a surface level than racism or misogyny. Not that they CANT go really deep, but it's easier to not come off as blatantly offensive as long as you're not like a eugenicist about it.

#shut the heck up #elemental #film and animation #media analysis #i didnt pay attebtion to all of elemental but from what i did it worked good #people clown on it too hard #its still kinda basic and whatever but it deserves some props

[doktorpeace]

🖊 please introduce us to Erato, I know they're in a masks campaign but I have no idea what else

Oh, gosh, I feel like I talk about them too much as is but I can’t say I’m not glad to have the excuse. This is gonna be really long cause tbh I’m just gonna dump like, a bunch of their lore lmao.

Erato is my Masks: A New Generation character in a campaign being played alongside @twerkyvulture (As Amanda ‘Megafauna’ Ghorbani, The Transformed) @draayder (as Josephine ‘Rattlesnake’ Short, The Reformed) @spitblaze (as Les ‘Void’ Hawking, The Doomed) @heedra (as Enid ‘Frag Beetle’ Day, The Scion) and @skarchomp (as Parker ‘Cobalt’ Andrews, The Legacy) with @dykeceratops as our GM. The current arc features @mechanicalriddle as Zoe, The Nova as a guest member. Here’s a group shot done by @tredlocity. Clockwise from the top left: Cobalt in blue, Erato in the track suit, Les in the cloak, Zoe with the mismatched eyes, Enid’s the big robot, Amanda’s got the scales and claws, and Josephine’s got the mask and tonfa.

To get back to Erato specifically though they’re an Anti Metahuman/Metahuman Suppression Weapon created by the in universe tech group Wright Industries, founded by Ingrid Day, Enid’s mom. They’re generally stronger, faster, and more durable than humans and can copy the superpowers of others for 5-10 minutes by touching them thanks to what is basically a meta-stem cell transplant interacting with other parts of their systems. (Also, I 100% swear to god that I did not consider ‘Robot Hero Who Copies The Powers Of Others’ is literally fucking Mega Man despite loving Mega Man a ton until after I had hashed out the concept with my GM’s assistance. Only once Abby said ‘oh like mega man’ I was like ‘wait, shit’.) I’ll tell you some about them as a person before unloading their history onto you, lol. Being an android built for combat and kept in an underground research lab, kept on a rigid schedule, constantly taking tests, physical, mental, written, oral, ethical, etc. etc. etc. and under constant supervision Erato lacked for real interactive experience before the campaign started only really ever getting to takl with authority figures and their sisters. They were very passive and observational, owing in part to their power set requiring a lot of adaptation to make the most of. They’re naive and very bad at exercising discretion in decision making, sometimes they overstep boundaries when talking with people without meaning to, and they’re really emotional! They have trouble dealing with strong emotions cause they haven’t managed to discover coping mechanisms that work well for them, they tend to get angry kind of easily and need time to blow off steam. But they’re also very genuine, honest, and well meaning. They are almost never mean, rude, or snippy, they do their best to do well by others, and have a strong sense of justice paired with a deep distrust and dislike of the current legal system in universe. This is in part due to the conditions of their creation (and in part because the intent behind it was kind of right!) and in part due to Enid’s life being threatened by a representative of the state while they and their teammates were in jail after being arrested following a huge brawl with an anti-methuman terrorist group. They’re also very willing to put forth the effort to improve as a person and to mend relationship wounds, almost always apologizing first to Enid when they fight and genuinely trying to work in advice and feedback they get from others, which they often get from Les and Parker. They’re also relatively educated, from the tests of their creators, from home and public schooling, from personal research, but that doesn’t undo their naivety. They also just straight up lack some very basic and/or common sense knowledge. Like, they don’t know what a bear is. Why would you teach a battle android working in a densely populated, extremely built up city about wild animals? All in all they’re kind of inexperienced and immature and make mistakes a lot but they’re (usually) very willing to admit their mistakes and to try and improve and get better. They genuinely and truly want what’s best for others and are learning to value them self as much as their teammates. They’ve also taken it upon them self to start doing humanitarian work in their free time over the summer. In a fight Erato is adaptive and quick witted but tends to put themself in more danger than is necessary. They also sometimes use more extreme force than the others believe is called for, but after the first time they did they and Parker had a real heart to heart about it, Les helped Erato learn and practice some coping, centering, behaviors they could do even under pressure and Erato did their best to adapt. That said they Fucking Hate The Keeper So God Damned Much Because Of How Much Suffering He’s Caused Their Friends And How Much Danger He Presents And Would Kill Him With No Remorse. So they don’t intend to apologize for ripping his arms off whatsoever. They and their sisters, collectively known as The Muse Units, were made to work as a group and as a proof of concept that atomized units could replace traditional police for use against metahuman criminals and to slowly phase out The Registry, the legal department which handles general metahuman based laws. If successful the units could be mass produced and improved upon, rapidly replacing current, error prone, law enforcement. At the time of their development, between late 1999 for blueprint drafting and until mid 2002 when the project was shut down, they were the cutting edge for AI development aided in no small part by Ingrid’s technokinetic powers allowing her to make advancements few others could. (As a note Erato’s body was finished being built in early 2001 but their unique personhood didn’t really come to fruition until February 18th, 2002, so that’s what I consider their ‘birthday’.) Ultimately, however, while a few of the Muses excelled some did not perform to expectations, the project fell behind schedule, investors lost interest, and a minor scandal involving a casualty happened, resulting in the project being shut down. The Muses were placed in indefinite storage, the data gained from their short existence used on other projects such and some of the tech advancements used to inform future decisions by the company. And it would have stayed that way, if not for the fact that in 2018 Ingrid Day was revealed to be The Locust in a conflict where Enid tried to defend her against a militia group who had been hired to take her down, being shot and presumably killed in the process. As The Locust she had been terrorizing Boston for over a decade trying to take it over and being involved in the deaths of over 70 people. (Which irl btw would make her like, the 8th most prolific confirmed serial killer of all time, Yikes!) Wright Industries, desperately needing to prove their hard stance against metahuman criminals and needing a PR stunt to deflect from their connection to their former CEO re-awakened Erato. They weren’t the most powerful or best performing of the Muses, but they were above average, obedient, and had an easy enough to monitor and control power set with little risk for property damage to boot, the perfect choice. Erato then took to the streets of Boston acting basically as a vigilante, following orders, stopping minor crimes, and sometimes working alongside the police. They attracted the attention of The Viceroy, a semi-retired 56 year old hero who never registered in spite of it being compulsory legally. They both have the ability to copy the powers of others, though he can just by sight, and he has body elasticity too. These make him durable and extremely adaptable, add to that his detective skills and he’s something of a local Boston legend. He took them in as his Protégé. Though they remained distant for quite some time with Erato still coming and going between his place and Wright Industries, having promised not to reveal his assistance to the doctors who Erato reported their work to. It was this way for about a year and a half before the campaign started and Erato began living with Viceroy full time, no longer wanting to go back to Wright Industries as they began to think more independently and consider what they wanted for them self more. During this time Erato had chance encounters with each of the other characters a few times as they also did minor vigilante work, peaking with a villain who is a member of Superhuman, an extremist pro-metahuman group, attacked the school that Josephine, Les, and Amanda all attend. After that incident Erato was prompted by Viceroy to contact each of these other young potential heroes to form a team, The Upstarts. Additionally during this time Viceroy took in Enid who had been abandoned by her biological father and had been getting bounced around foster care. Over time the three of them have become kind of a weird family, living in a warehouse full of cats with a couple of bedrooms grafted on and an ultra secret basement lair underneath full of advanced stuff Viceroy makes. Though Erato and Enid have definitely had their ups and down, more recently in the story (and we’ve been doing this campaign for well over a year now) they’ve been putting in serious effort to better their relationship and be good adoptive siblings to one another. I love their relationship a lot, they’re good kids.

That gets us up to the start of the campaign but hoo boy, I’ve been writing for like, an hour now. Since then Erato’s helped take down a nazi-aligned terrorist organization, they’ve got a boyfriend in their teammate, Les, and they’ve made friends outside of their core group of teammates. They’ve also enrolled in school doing well on some classes and poorly in others, namely learning how to Code and Woodworking. Currently they’re at a sleep away summer camp for superpowered kids called Camp Justice, about 10 miles outside of Boston. They really, really hate it there. Constant supervision, being made to do tests, things scheduled out against their will, inability to leave the area? Yeah that certainly reminds them of something. The difference between it and school, which does share these features, is they wanted to go to school. They very much Did Not want to go to camp. As a result they’re finally going to have to start facing the trauma they’ve got from their origin and also actually tell the others other than Les and Amanda about their sisters. Whiiiiich...Enid saw one of them disassembled and showed off in parts at a school science fair display set up by Wright Industries to gauge interest in students. And she hasn’t mentioned this to Erato...for 4 months Uh Oh! Lastly, here’s my tag I use mostly for art I make of them, it includes some texts posts and picrew dumps too though, lol. Feel free to look!

#cubecubed #erato #masks

[frustratedcastingdirector]

The Times (UK) 10/16/2003

Alex O'Connell goes weak-kneed in the presence of Mark Ruffalo, the anti Hollywood star of In the Cut If there was such a thing as a textbook outsider, Mark Ruffalo would be one. Like Dostoevsky's Raskolnikov, Rilke's Malte Laurids Brigge and, well, Buffy, he is in a netherworld all of his own. Metaphorically speaking, Ruffalo sits on a park bench in the middle of an LA traffic island staring into the smog while most of Tinseltown is vrooming down the highways talking about their Japanese advertising campaigns and what happens if you smoke right after Pilates while on the Atkins. We meet in a hotel in Park Lane, in a suite which has more chintz than a Chelsea draper's. Still, Ruffalo cuts through the frills and fancy, like a pair of industrial shears. To be frank, the furnishings don't get a look-in. His face is soft and crumpled like a baby boxer, his hair is a pile of Italianate curls tousled to unstyled perfection, his eyes are the same lazy, deep brown as his pinstripes. On the soulless hotel interview circuit, Ruffalo is as refreshing as the cold shower I should be having. He doesn't try, he hasn't rehearsed answers, he doesn't care if he says something that might make his agent twitch. Give the man a part in one of the films of the year! (Oh, he's already got one.) A respected theatre actor and director in America but relatively unknown here, barring a star role in the playwright Kenneth Lonergan's film debut You Can Count on Me (2000), Ruffalo is about to ease into the mainstream. The Wisconsin boy has two movies out in the next few months, both in The Times bfi London Film Festival. The first, My Life Without Me, is a drama about a woman with a terminal illness, in which he stars alongside the Canadian actress Sarah Polley. The second, and the biggie, is Jane Campion's cop thriller, In the Cut, the festival's Opening Night Gala. Adapted from the novel by Susanna Moore, the film features Ruffalo as Malloy, a hard nut homicide detective who begins an affair with Frannie, an ethereal New York academic (Meg Ryan). While Malloy is out chasing killers, she's sticking Post-it Notes scrawled with her favourite words on the wall. Ryan is good. Ruffalo is even better as the cop whose incestuous cityscape consists of dives, crime scenes and the odd sweaty mattress. At 35, Ruffalo has taken long enough to get where he is. Partly it was bad luck, he says. Three years ago he was diagnosed with a brain tumour after he finished filming The Last Castle with Robert Redford. "It naturally slowed everything down," he says, in his old-world drawl. "It was taken out immediately and it was benign, but it was a year of being out of work and reassessing. When you're young and you start getting on as the 'hot new thing', you can lose sight of what you are doing it for, and I was starting to get a little disappointed with acting. It made me reassess. Also, they go in there and tinker and you feel like you'll never be the same and, quite frankly, I didn't know if I still had my talent after that." The script for In the Cut arrived eight months after his illness. Campion asked him to lunch and she gave him the good news between courses. Initially, he was concerned about how to make what could easily have been "just another cop role" his own. "We've seen this a thousand times, more, probably," he says, "and it's been done very well by many people." Eventually he located his point of real interest. "There is some part of Malloy that wants more from his class than just where he is at in life. There is some curiosity for fineness and beauty." Research involved trailing Manhattan's cop bars and knocking back whiskey with the guys. "It took a lot of bourbon and cigarettes to get to the point where people were actually being truthful." One of the most talked about elements in the film is the nude sex scene between him and Ryan, her first in a long career. It's erotic and integral. But, boy, wasn't that, well, a pressure? "It was never comfortable," he says, shifting in his chair. "When we had known each other for three months, it was still uncomfortable, people standing around all the time...I'm married ... "I mean, I was really nervous," he laughs, "and when you're nervous it's hard to affect, erm, confidence." Did you have a thing that you did? "A technique? Well, Jane gave me The Woman's Orgasm and a bunch of books and videotapes. At one point she tried to give me an anatomy lesson on the vagina, which frankly brings up all kinds of defensive feelings in a man: 'I know what I'm doing! Why are you telling me that? Let me show you!' And that was funny, seeing myself react like that." Did he read them? "Yes, I did read them. I definitely learnt." He admits that the film's unbalanced relationship dynamic (cop/academic) probably would not work in real life. Luckily Ruffalo has no such personal concerns, as he is married to an actress, Sunrise Coigney. It's fairytale stuff: he saw her in the street, knew she was The One, and had to figure out how to meet her. She has a small part in In the Cut. Ruffalo is unusual in that he is a Hollywood actor with a very definite life outside Hollywood. It has a lot to do with his background in theatre. After moving to San Diego at 13 he uprooted to LA at 18 to study at the Stella Adler theatre school. His big break was in Betrayed by Everyone, a chunk of This is Our Youth which was made into a one-act play at a festival in LA in 1995. There began his great friendship with its writer, Kenneth Lonergan, who later invited him to audition for This is Our Youth, his play about indulged youth in the 1980s. "Since then we've been close friends," Ruffalo says. "We were both struggling in the theatre and then we both did the film You Can Count on Me and it launched our careers." These days he runs an LA theatre company, Page 97, and has written a play and a film of his own. In fact he even turned down a bunch of big studio films, including a part in The Core, because, well, it just didn't suit. And of his considerable freezer of turkeys (he's been in 28 movies, most of them poor to dreadful) he is charmingly self-mocking. Houdini -the biopic? "That is good compared to some of them," he laughs. "I don't network, I see it as kind of crass. There is just this cliquey scene in LA. I don't think that casting directors ever discover anybody, they are just told about somebody by somebody else. I'm sure there are 1,000 people like me out there who have worked really hard and done the plays and the work that really counts, but there is a lot of hyperbole in LA and the focus is in getting to places where you can be seen and get 'famous' and then all the work follows." In fact recently he's even been working on a novel, called Him, which sounds like self-parody or The Outsider Pt 2. "It's about a man who doesn't fit into the modern world," he says with a smirk. Stage, screen, plays, novels, what's it going to be? Unless he makes his mind up, doesn't he risk turning into Ethan Hawke? He sighs, a deep Ruffalo sigh. "They're gonna throw dirt on you at the end of this game, man," he says. "And I don't think you can be too careful at the cost of your life. At the end what do you have but the life you lived?" Quite. CV: MARK RUFFALO AMERICAN HISTORY Born in Wisconsin in Nov, 1967. He moved to San Diego at 18, then to LA where he studied at Stella Adler. NEW BEST FRIEND Playwright Kenneth Lonergan. Ruffalo was in This is Our Youth. MY FAVOURITE WIFE Actress Sunrise Coigney, whom he fell for in the street. UNBEARABLE LIKENESS OF BEING Compared to Marlon Brando and James Dean -"But he had no work ethic," says Ruffalo of the latter. TOPSY TURKEYS Windtalkers (2002); A Fish in the Bathtub (1999); There Goes My Baby (1994).

Article corrections: Ruffalo’s family moved to Virginia Beach, VA when he was 13;Lonergan did not invite Ruffalo to audition for “This is Our Youth,” Ruffalo had to nag him into letting him audition for it; The LA theatre company is called Page 93 not 97; and it was Marlon Brando with no work ethic.

#mark ruffalo #in the cut #the avengers #age of ultron #thor ragnarok #infinity war #bruce banner #the hulk #now you see me #dylan rhodes #my life without me

[shitstrawhatssay]

The reason I think Zoro is abusive to Sanji is because he treats him like he isn't even a human. It's gone BEYOND bickering. I get that friends argue, but friends don't treat friends as if they mean nothing. Zoro reminds me so much of so many of my childhood bullies; the things he does, says, and just the way he hold himself. They do have normal arguments, but they usually start or end with Zoro saying something awful. FRIENDS DON'T TREAT FRIENDS LIKE THEY'RE WORTHLESS

Also, I noticed that in the tags to that post you said that you weren’t sure if you had changed my mind or just spit in my face; do you really think THAT changed my mind? Maybe you would have, if you hadn’t been so mean and aggressive about it. I’m always open to changing my opinion if there is proper information to support it, but because you decided that my question warranted aggression I probably won’t. Personally I would have answered any ask more politely but that might just be me. 

First up, I would like to acknowledge two things: I was passive aggressive.  I was very frustrated at the time because I like to talk. I like to express myself in the written form and that frustration bled into my language. I apologise if my words read hatefully towards you. I also should have been conscious that I had no idea what sort of context you were speaking from but I would like to state given the information on you I had available at the time, I wrongfully assumed you were going to be speaking from sort of puritanical, anti-problematic anything stance. If that is not the case, I doubly apologise and I hope you feel as though this is coming from the bottom of my heart because I am genuinely apologising.

Secondly, I would like to acknowledge that I am definitely projecting onto canon for where i’m going to pull my interpretations on hence, why I included that reply - not because I think the person who left said reply is the same person has asked for an explanation as to how I perceive the canon dynamics and relationships of Sanji between the two Strawhats in question.

I one hundred percent wholly believe in the True Companions and Found Family tropes the Strawhats are built on. Are made of. I realise there is a lot of bias because I have an embarassingly deep desire to have a friendship group that emulates the Strawhats due to my own experiences in real life friendships. Perhaps I’ve been socialised to accept what goes beyond the boundaries of “normal friendships” and this is completely screwed bias talking but….

I refuse to let anyone slander their canon relationships of friendships, of nakama, of familial bonds.

Sanji and Zoro are built on the comical trope of bickering. One Piece is a comedy. Their friction is played for laughs because it is shown time and time again that when the going gets tough, well they stick it out together. That is the formula their platonic relationship works on. 

However, fanon is a completely different issue. Seeing your childhood bullies in Zoro is fanon. Seeing romantic relationships between most of the characters is fanon. Seeing abusive or hateful relationships between the Strawhats is most definitely fanon since time and time again, the Strawhats have proven they would go through Hell for each other. Each and everyone one of them would. Every single combination of them would because they love each other: they’re what I could consider platonic soul mates. Including Sanji and Zoro.

Unfortunately Anon, the best advice I can give to you to this ridiculous discourse to an end is that you have to learn to cherry pick your fanon better. Blacklist characters you don’t like. Blacklist ships and buzz words you hate. Avoid the stripes of artists and writers who don’t cut it for you. That’s okay. 

Everyone brings their personal context to a piece of media first and foremost and that affects how they will react and interpret. 

My next piece of advice is that if you think you’ll dislike something, don’t bother asking those who like it why they like it. Even if you have the intention of wanting to be open minded and wanting to change your own mind, it never ends well.

You’re allowed to have the most popular ships in fandom as your NOTPs and you’re allowed to say that. I have. On this very blog. I have mentioned time and time again that I dislike LawLu/most Luffy ships in general. So, I just avoid and blacklist whilst maintaining a belief of “ship and let ship” because I accept and acknowledge people will have differing perceptions of media. I love the diversity. Sometimes, it leads to conflict but sometimes, it can lead to something beautiful.

TLDR: blacklist, unfollow, block and avoid because we all have different experiences and those experiences will affect perceptions of media and surround yourself with fanon you agree with.

And please don’t try and find my main. I don’t want this there either.

So, to conclude: have a nice day, Anon.

- Mod Strawhat

#mod stuff #not quote #discourse / #edit: I didn't like some phrasing in places but whatever

[sulietsexual]

Oh, okay! I mostly wanted to hear what you thought of the Connor scenes (in PO) since they're so vital to his arc in s4. And I agree with you on Beauty and the Beasts, the way abuse victims are treated in the Buffyverse is so genuinely appalling, it's undescribable. Disrespecting them so awfully is one thing, but continuing to shove the actual abuse under the rug and show the abusers in a positive light is so gross and gives such harmful messages. Anyways - how about Redefinition? Or Lullaby?

Sorry I couldn’t offer any Connor meta re Peace Out, but I’ve written you some nice, long meta for both Redefinition and Lullaby, so hopefully this makes up for it!

Redefinition

ShortOpinion: Asomewhat erratic, but ultimately satisfying ep

LongOpinion: Redefinitionis really the final episode in the initial Darla arc (when Darla resurfaceslater, it is to set up her next arc on the show, with little to do with thisinitial storyline). I find this episode to be a bit all over the place, as itmoves between Angel preparing to take out Darla and Drusilla, to Wes, Gunn and Cordydrinking and singing at Caritas, to Darla and Drusilla’s plans for power andterror. The transitions between scenes are not as smooth as they could be, andthe episode doesn’t really feel that cohesive, instead coming across as threestorylines presented separately, with nothing really sewing them together untilthe end of the ep. That being said, the three storylines presented make forvery interesting viewing.

Angel continues down his path ofdarkness, his narration essentially confirming that he is going dark in orderto kill Darla, because he’s currently too close to her. He’s smelled her scent,felt her heartbeat, witnessed her with a soul, and now the only way he canmurder her is to access the darker parts of his personality, to cut himself offfrom all humanity so that he doesn’t feel the guilt and loss associated withkilling someone whom he loves.

What’s more interesting thanAngel’s plot and motivations is Darla’s storyline and the motivationsbehind it. After devouring the W&H lawyers, Darla and Drusilla pay a visitto Lindsey and Lilah at their offices, in a darkly amusing scene. They informLindsey and Lilah that the two of them have been spared so that Darla and Druhave a liaison to the Senior Partners, a access-window to the senior partners.Darla has obviously chosen Lindsey due to his easily-manipulated feelings forher, and my personal theory is that Lilah was Drusilla’s pick (Drusillaoutright states that she “likes the girl” because “she’s wicked”).

What’s interesting is Darla (andby extension Drusilla) pursuing this kind of power. Darla, much likeAngelus, has always been presented as an agent of chaos, even under theMaster’s rule. She has never much cared for organised or structured power,preferring instead to indulge in murder, blood, mayhem and terror on anuncharted scale, never much caring for ultimate power. My theory is thatDarla’s pursuit of power is once again tied to her being human so recently, notto mention W&H’s manipulations of her (again, this is seemingly confirmedwith Darla’s speech to Lilah and Lindsey about loathing being W&H’spuppet). But more than W&H using her, Darla hated being helpless full stop.Having memories of being so recently human, remembering the feeling of havingto rely on others, of being dependent and weak (physically and emotionally) iswhat pushes Darla in this new pursuit of power. Just as she tries to ridherself of the remnants of emotion she has left towards Angel, Darla is alsotrying to rid herself of any and all perceived weakness, making sure thateveryone in her way knows that she is no longer that same helpless creature whoneeded Angel to rescue her.

That being said, it is clearlyshown that Angel is still on her mind and in her heart, more so than henormally would be, again because she has so recently been human. Darla was avampire for four hundred years, she pretty much forgot what it was liketo be human, to have a soul, to be vulnerable and to care for someonewith real, true, deep emotions. Now, being a newly born vampire so close tothese emotions, completely throws her off her game. She can remember caring forAngel in a way she never did without a soul. The remnants of her feelings forhim are still within her being, and when he appears in the crowd and Drusillasenses him, Darla’s feelings for him come rushing to the surface, and sheclearly falters, confused and disoriented by the leftover emotions from hersoul.

The climax of this episode feelslike it was supposed to set up a new storyline, but didn’t. Angel sets Darlaand Drusilla on fire (in a fairly horrifying scene, Drusilla’s cries for helpare particularly jarring) and as Darla sits on the sidewalk in the aftermath,she says “That wasn’t Angelus. That wasn’t Angel either. Who was that?” whichto me indicated that maybe the writers were intending to explore this darknessto Angel further than they did, but abandoned that storyline in favour ofsending Angel after W&H.

The B storyline to this episodedoesn’t quite mesh well with the A storyline, but does provide most of thehumour, as well as a turning point for the other three main characters. Despondentand unsure of their futures in the wake of Angel firing them, Cordy, Wes andGunn find themselves at Caritas, searching for direction. Cordy and Wes’ appearanceat Caritas is hardly a surprise, both are characters who have found their pathsand stuck to them, so the sudden upheaval in their lives would naturally leavethem quite disoriented and searching for guidance. Gunn, however, is a bit of asurprise, as up until this point he had kept himself apart from AngelInvestigations, unclear as to his path. This episode shows that he’s obviouslybeen thinking more about his future and that he’s searching for somewhere to belong(and probably has been since Allana’s death). This episode, this arc really, isa turning point for Gunn, as he transitions from an outsider on the fringes ofAI, to a fully-fledged member whom Wes would take a bullet for.

The scenes with Cordy, Wes andGunn getting drunk and passing the blame around are hilarious and fullof classic lines (“My ass is not pansy!”) and of course there is that gloriousrendition of We Are The Champions. But beyond this, Redefinition marks newdirection for all three characters, as Cordelia gets a vision and, withoutAngel’s help, they take down a demon and save an innocent girl. This episodeproves to the three that they can and should continue on without Angel, andtheir friendship is bonded through this and the subsequent episodes where theyestablish their new business and grow closer in Angel’s absence.

As said before, Redefinition is asomewhat shaky episode, with the scenes not really flowing all that well andthe storylines feeling separate instead of interconnected, but it does containsome great meta and some terrific characterisation. Ultimately, despite its’messiness, Redefinition is an entertaining and endearing episode, whichsatisfies the viewer and closes the first part of Darla’s arc nicely.

Lullaby

Shortopinion: PoorDarla.

Longopinion: Lullabyis one of my favourite AtS episodes, bringing Darla’s character arc tocompletion and opening up Holtz’ revenge storyline nicely. This episode ischock-full of emotional moments which I love, but I also find myselfincreasingly angry every time I watch this episode, due to everything Darlaendures, and the way her agency is taken away via her mystical pregnancy.

Darla’s pregnancy is, quitefrankly, horrifying. First, there’s the fact that it’s not something she everwanted. Then there’s the fact that once she realises that she’s pregnant,she is unable to get rid of it. Darla mentions trying everything to terminatethe pregnancy, to which Fred reacts with mild horror, but it’s understandablethat Darla would do everything in her power to avoid carrying and birthing ababy she never asked for. The fact that mystical forces are literallypreventing her from aborting or killing the baby is actually quite horrifying,as Darla is forced to endure nine months of hell, her body changing andundergoing a physical toll which as a vampire she can withstand, but as a womanshe never wanted (I feel like there’s some sort of anti-abortion allegory goingon here).

As if this wasn’t bad enough,Darla is then forced to experience feelings and emotions she, once again, neverasked for and was not prepared for. As sweet as the scene with Angel on theroof is, with Darla talking about how much she loves her unborn child, it’sactually somewhat a case of fridge horror, given that these feelings aren’t hers.She doesn’t love her child because she’s bonded with it, or fallen in love overthe course of her pregnancy, or had a sudden realisation of love. She lovesConnor because she’s being forced to, through the soul which resideswithin her. Darla even acknowledges this, as she heartbreakingly cries abouthow she doesn’t want to birth Connor, because it will mean that the soul willbe gone and she will no longer love him once that happens. Darla is not onlyforced to carry a pregnancy she never wanted, she is forced to shoulder andfeel emotions that are not actually hers. Her mind, as well as her body, isinvaded and violated by this pregnancy.

Darla’s pregnancy was the secondof a mystical nature on the show, and when watching the first time around, doesnot come across as a fridged woman trope, due to the fact that Darla stakingherself to save Connor plays out as a natural conclusion to her arc. Watchingit in retrospect and with the deaths or Fred and Cordy in mind, it actually comesacross as horrifying, violating and the first of many fridged women on AtS.Despite it being my favourite show, I truly hate the way AtS treats its’ femalecharacters, and Darla was the first one thrown under a bus. She, as with everyfemale on this show, deserved better.

Ignoring these unfortunateimplications, Lullaby is a great episode. Angel finally comes face-to-face withHoltz, discovering who’s been chasing him for the past few episodes. I havealways loved Angel’s attitude regarding Holtz – he never begrudges him for hispursuit of revenge, never blames Holtz and fully acknowledges that Holtz isdeserving of his vengeance (compare this with Spike’s self-righteous and grossattitude towards Wood in Lies My Parents Told Me). Darla too, courtesy of Connor’ssoul, realises that Holtz has a right to his revenge, that what they did to himwas too terrible to ever atone for. The flashbacks showing the horror thatAngelus and Darla put Holtz through only compounds this.

Of course the most heartbreakingand beautiful part of this episode is Connor’s birth, as Darla tearfully tellsAngel that they can’t atone for their horrifying crimes, can’t make up foranything they did, but that through Connor they might have finally donesomething right. Angel’s tenderness towards Darla in this scene is sobittersweet to watch, as he kisses her fingers with more affection than he’sprobably ever shown her before. Her eventual staking and Connor’s appearancewas a heart wrenching twist, and the final shot of Holtz ominously watchingAngel walk away with baby Connor in his arms promises more to come, leavingthis episode with a shadow hanging over it. All up, just a beautiful 

#answered #Anonymous #angel the series #ats meta #angel #meta