#this episode has so many important quotes

[squish--squash]

I'm rewatching Good Omens, and noticed something in the first episode that has left me spiraling into a theory.

It's in the scene when Hastur and Ligur are handing Adam over to Crowley. Hastur asks Crowley to sign something beforehand, and:

I thought it was a scribble the first time I watched it bc I was trying to figure out what was going on. But it's not a scribble.

It's not a 'C' either, for 'Crowley' It's not a 'A' or 'J' either, for the rest of his name.

It's an 'L'. It gets hard to see as he's finishing it, but it's the letter 'L'

This is how you write a capital 'L' in cursive:

you swoop up and to the right, drop down, swoop left, and finish on the right.

and Crowley does this with his signature:

here's him beginning the letter, swooping up and to the right

Then he moves down,

loops to the left,

And finishes it as he moves back towards the right (and at this point, the complete letter is hard to make out. It's why I thought it was a scribble the first time I watched this episode)

Crowley's signature on the document Hastur makes him sign before delivering the Antichrist to start Armageddon, something that is arguably one of the most important things hell wants to document, is an 'L'.

WHY?

Why not a 'C', for Crowley, the name he currently goes by? Hastur and Ligur confirm the name itself earlier in the same scene ("What's he calling himself up here these days?"/"Crowley.")

Well, if going by what he claims in a later s1 episode that "Crowley" is his last name (Anthony J. Crowley), it would make sense for one of his initials to be put there.

Except it doesn't, because "Crowley" is not his real name. it's not the name he began with, the one he had as an angel.

So then, what would this name be? What would be a name for an angel, who is now a demon? A demon who was there to tempt eve, as a snake, into eating the forbidden fruit. Someone that brought the stars, and light, to the universe. A name that begins with the letter 'L'.

There's one I can think of that matches, and that name is Lucifer.

"But Squish!" I know some of y'all will comment, "What about that line Crowley said in episode 5? He mentions Lucifer, so it can't be him!"

In episode 5, Crowley says the following: "I never asked to be a demon. I was just minding my own business one day and then...oh, lookie here, it's Lucifer and the guys! Oh, hey, the food hadn't been that good lately. I didn't have anything on for the rest of that afternoon. Next thing, I'm doing a million-light-year dive into a pool of boiling sulphur."

Crowley also says in the second episode: "I didn't mean to fall. I just hung out with the wrong people."

A lot of people believe that it's implied that when Crowley said this, it meant he met Lucifer and hung out with him. But when he says it, it sounds like he's mockingly quoting someone else, talking to him.

The "Lucifer and the guys!" might've been directed to Crowley, using his name. This would match that line from a previous episode, "hung out with the wrong people."

"But Squish!" I know some of y'all will comment after reading that, "What about Satan? Lucifer is Satan, and Crowley isn't Satan!"

And neither is Beelzebub. Fun fact, by the way: One of the many names for The Devil, Satan himself, is Beelzebub. But Beelzebub is a whole different character. So why can't Lucifer be a whole different character too? After all, many people still argue to this day that Lucifer and Satan aren't one and the same...

Also, here's something interesting:

Crowley is the only character in the tv series that has mentioned Lucifer, and it was in that line I mentioned earlier. Lucifer is also mentioned once, in the book, but by Shadwell, mishearing Newt's last name as "Lucifer" instead of "Pulsifer". And Satan? In both the book and the tv show, he is never called another name other than "Satan", usually followed by his fancy and long title. His description in the book's "DRAMATIS PERSONAE" is literally "fallen angel; the adversary". No Lucifer.

And how about this:

Crowley was the one who started the universe, we see that at the beginning of season 2. He was the first one, to our knowledge, to say "let there be light." "Lucifer" means "light-bringer" Crowley was the snake that tempted eve into eating the apple in the garden of eve. We see this in the beginning of episode one. Many claim Lucifer was the one who did that. Crowley fell because he asked questions about how the universe should be run, after seeing its creation and being so proud of it. Many claim Lucifer's big sin that sent him falling was his pride stemming from his beauty causing him to revolt; eerily similar to Crowley asking questions after watching the beautiful universe he helped plan be born and growing protective after learning it was going to get shut down so early in its lifetime, isn't it? Crowley was a powerful angel. This is heavily implied in season 2, with the tiny joint-miracle he and Aziraphale made being as powerful as an archangel's. He has the ability to mask his presence powerful enough to fool Uriel, Michael, and Gabriel (the only other character we've seen have that kind of masking power was the Metatron, who Crowley was also the first to recognize). When going through records with Muriel, they claim only very high-ranking angels have clearance to look through the records of Gabriel, an archangel so powerful he single-handedly had the power to stop "Armageddon 2" from being put into plan; Crowley is able to access them. And Lucifer? Often described as having been a very powerful angel.

Lucifer is such an important name, such an important character, in the theologies surrounding Good Omens. So, where is he? Why has he only been mentioned seriously once, by Crowley?

The answer could be this, simple and short: Because he is Crowley.

EDIT:

I dug up the book. It's been a while since I read it (I honestly don't remember much from the book) and here's what it has to say about Crowley's signature...

"Your real name."

.........

HELLO?

EDIT 2:

I found this post from Neil Gaiman's blog. The wording is confusing me, and I can't tell if this debunks or supports the theory..

What Neil Gaiman says is "That was the angel Lucifer. He doesn't exist any more. Now there's just Satan, the adversary." which might throw this entire thing out of the window, but the thing is: he never said Satan used to be Lucifer. He just said Lucifer doesn't exist anymore, but Satan does.

Furthermore, the person who first asked a question asks more questions, two of them: 1. Is Satan what's left of Lucifer after he fell and stopped existing, and 2. If so, does that mean there was an angel that existed that then fell and turned into crowley?

Neil Gaiman's answer is "As far as Crowley is concerned, the Angel that he was no longer exists. (And his name as an Angel wasn’t Crawley or Crowley.)"

He doesn't confirm or deny anything about Satan in that. All he said was "the Angel that he was no longer exists" and that Crowley's angel name wasn't his demon name.

Huh. Funny. He's saying angel!crowley no longer exists, when he just revealed that Lucifer "doesn't exist any more." Either there's a connection here, or I'm going insane.

#good omens #good omens 2 #spoilers #good omens 2 spoilers #good omens spoilers #crowley was lucifer theory

[noneorother]

By far the dumbest movie reference no one caught in Good Omens is : The League of Gentlemen's Apocalypse

I'm working on a theory that requires many hours of movie watching, so here we are. Many people have already mentioned that the nazi zombies/Furfur is a The League of Gentlemen comedy troupe shoutout. But I'm taking it one step crazier. Remember the opening scene from the 1941 minisode of S2E4, the one with the london bombing and the Angel statue in the bottom right corner ?

Haha sorry my bad. That's the climax intro scene of the movie The League of Gentlemen's Apocalypse. Here's the opening scene of the 1941 minisode:

You can excuse the confusion after seeing both, with how they look pretty much identical (yes this is giving me The Tales of Hoffmann PTSD, thanks for asking) And it's not very coincidental when you know who helped write the minisode.

You know, just the fourth member of The League of Gentlemen and writer of the movie LG Apocalypse. So shall we tease out all the (I'm warning you) EXTREMELY dumb quotes and story beats this terrible movie has lent to the 1941 episode? There are quite a few. But there's also a potential story arc that isn't so dumb... (TW offensive comedy, including mild gore)

In order to understand this you probably have to know a bit of background on British show The League of Gentlemen. "[A] surreal British comedy horror sitcom... follows the lives of bizarre characters, most of whom are played by three of the show's four writers – Mark Gatiss, Steve Pemberton, and Reece Shearsmith – who, along with Jeremy Dyson, formed the League of Gentlemen comedy troupe in 1995." You don't need to know all of the characters or backstory of the show, just that it's a fictional town with many fictional characters played by the same three writers (and an invisible fourth).

(Also known as all these people right here) Want to know who they plays a stand-in for Jeremy Dyson in LG Apocalypse and gets murdered first with black marker on his face?

Say hello, baby Sheen!

So we've seen the bombing scene, what about the car driving through fire and Aziraphale's suggestive line at the beginning?

Yup.

Do the characters make a deal with a Reece Shearsmith character to enter the real world through a church?

HECK YEAH. Bonus points for the green background.

A gag about fake lips with Steve? Sure.

Steve Pemberton seen here as a nazi zombie, and also here playing "Herr Lipp" (also known in the actual script as "the worst pun in the world" in the movie. Groan). What about Mark Gatiss Stealing binoculars from Steve to spy on two important characters? But of course.

Surely not the arm falling off too?

Oh dang. It's a big plot point in LG Apocalypse you say? Then, in the climax, does someone in dark sunglasses who doesn't know how a rifle works fire it at a main character, and the other character who he misses says fuck? Now you're pulling off my arm..

Well I'll be damned. The only difference here being Steve's head exploding, naturally.

I'll admit, I have trouble seeing where a giant 3 headed chimera beast that destroys a bunch of characters fits in at the end of the 1941 miniode, but I don't think 1941 is meant to be a stand in for the whole movie, because at that point in the movie the role of the main characters shifts to become the real versions of Shearsmith and Gatiss, not the characters. But even though the end of the movie doesn't track with 1941, I think the moral at the end is interesting : "In the church, Lipp says he will kill Gatiss. The other characters try to dissuade him, saying that once all the writers are dead, Royston Vasey will cease to exist and they will die. Lipp claims that they will in fact be better off, because as long as they're controlled by someone else they have no free will and can never change for the better. Tipps tells Lipp that because he saved the day and can therefore change, Lipp need not kill Gatiss. He persuades Lipp to hand him the gun, only for Tipps to accidentally fire it and kill Gatiss.

With all the writers now apparently dead, the residents of Royston Vasey prepare for the worst. Instead, everything calms down and The Apocalypse is averted. The characters realise they now have free will. Herr Lipp adopts some orphaned children, the vet, Mr Chinnery, finds a rabbit and is able to take care of it without killing it, and Bernice and Pauline become romantically involved. Tipps leaves the church, waving goodbye to Edward, Tubbs and Papa Lazarou. It appears that Royston Vasey can continue to exist independently of its dead creators." This struggle for free will outside of the plan originally set out by their creators, especially in the context of said creators not really caring about them anymore, really starts sending red flags up for me. Crowley's existential crisis at the beginning of S2E1 seems to be mulling over similar themes. The lack of any God narrator as in season 1 might be a change in storytelling technique, but might also point the the creator being absent, or having moved on without really letting her original creation know it gets to exist on it's own now. Funnily enough, this is the second movie with shot for shot quotes throughout, that places a specific set of characters at the center of their own deeper plot that has a meta level to the storytelling. I'm starting to think there's a pattern here...

_______________________________________ Here's my series on the Tales of Hoffmann, another movie hidden within the series.

#good omens meta #good omens 2 #good omens season two #art director talks good omens #go season 2 #go meta #good omens season 2 #good omens s2 #go2

[bamf-jaskier]

Cavill is not a martyr

I have been seeing so many posts and comments along the lines of “Henry Cavill left the Witcher because they were inaccurate to the books and he had enough of all the changes”

And this thought process, especially if you mention the recent DeMayo writer’s interview, is just a flawed thought process.

Just a quick blurb on DeMayo, as I said here his comments are probably a cry for attention from a fanbase he knows how to rile up and I would take what he says with a grain of truth salt. And Cavill has already filmed season 3 and I can assure you that a random writer he probably has already met making these comments didn’t send Cavill over the edge and have him march into the office an rage quit. Recasting and deciding on a new actor and getting out of contract is a lengthy process that has likely been going on for months. If anything it’s more likely DeMayo knew about Cavill leaving and then made his comments than the other way around.

So Henry Cavill announced he was leaving the Witcher just a few days after announcing he was returning to Superman.

In fact, he was quoted as saying this about his recent cameo as Superman in the new Black Adam movie:

"It was a very powerful moment for me. I wasn't sure how I would feel… whether it would be something very emotionally connective because I put the Man of Steel suit back on," Cavill said. "I chose that one in particular because of the nostalgia attached to the suit. It was important for me to be standing there and enjoying that moment. That is one of the top moments in my career. It feels great to have the opportunity to wear it again."

"The character means so much to me. It's been five years now. I never gave up hope," Cavill said of the half-decade he spent waiting for news about playing Superman again. "It's amazing to be here now talking about it again. There is such a bright future ahead for the character. I'm so excited to tell a story with an enormously joyful Superman."

And that 5 year mark is important. Because it is no coincidence that on September in 2018 it was reported that Cavill will no longer be playing Superman in the DCEU just days after it was announced he would be taking on the role of Geralt in The Witcher.

In fact, it was stated:

the Witcher commitment came after the Warners impasse, suggesting a change in the studio’s strategy.

Meaning he signed onto the Witcher because he stopped being Superman. So what we are seeing right now with Cavill announcing he is returning as Superman and then announcing he is leaving The Witcher is an exact reverse of the situation in 2018.

Cavill loves playing Superman and not only is it a project he is passionate about, but he also nets in a massive paycheck.

Even back in 2018 when Cavill left the role of Superman there was talk that he left because of contract disputes:

Cavill's original contract was for four movies, so a contract extension would naturally need to be arranged before Warner Bros. could move ahead with another standalone Superman movie. According to Revenge of the Fans, Cavill's team wanted to leverage a better deal out of the contract extension - including more movies, more money, and possibly even a producer role. From Warner Bros.' perspective, however, there isn't exactly a burning need to get another Superman movie made.

Then in August of 2022 reports began to come out from comi-con that Henry Cavill was looking to return to the role of Superman but wanted more money for the role.

And considering Cavill was paid a truly insane amount for 2013′s Man of Steel -- an estimated $14 million and a $20 million for 2017′s Justice League I have to wonder what wildly high amount he will be paid to return as Superman now in 2022 when he is a bigger star than ever before.

And his Witcher paycheck does not compare to that Superman money -- with him making 500k an episode in season 1 and $1 million an episode in season 2. Even if he was just making as much money as Justice League, and he is likely making much more to return, that is still well over double the amount of money to play Superman vs playing Geralt.

And at the end of the day, The Witcher is a show with very specific scheduling requirements and set locations. Blood Origin and Season 2 lost actors because of the scheduling conflicts. And that is not at all unusual for the industry.

And for set locations The Witcher is mostly filmed in Mafan Film Studio in Hungary as well as various locations around the country as well as Arborfield Film Studios in the UK and other locations there such as North Yorkshire & The Lake District. And with fewer COVID restrictions the production team is likely to want to go around Europe again for S4 and S5.

Meanwhile it’s hard to know where the new DCEU movies will be filmed but Man of Steel was filmed around Vancouver, British Columbia and Illinois in the US. Justice League was filmed around Scotland and London. Black Adam was filmed in Atlanta Georgia in the US. 

All this to say filming DCEU movies and The Witcher are two very time intensive processes that require film locations that could be on opposite sides of the world. And in addition Cavill is starring in the new Highlander Reboot and in the Enola Holmes movies. Being a TV actor takes a lot of time for not as much money and acclaim. Cavill is seemingly going back to just being a film actor instead of a tv actor which considering his busy schedule makes a lot of sense.

So it’s pretty clear why he would leave The Witcher to return to Superman and his other films roles:

1) Far higher paycheck to play Superman

2) He loves both the characters but Superman is very meaningful for his career and he has stated he has always wanted to return to the role

3) Scheduling conflicts and very different filming locations and the prestige of film vs tv

Trying to spread the narrative of “Cavill is a martyr in the battle against the inaccuracies of the tv show” is based on nothing but your own confirmation bias. And it honestly says a lot about the type of person you are that you jump to find a symbol to represent the victimization of your hatred of the show.

You can dislike the show but the tinhatting and conspiracy theories I have seen flying around are quite frankly embarrassing and this is a needed reality check.

At the end of the day Henry Cavill is a high-level movie star who makes choices based on his career and what he wants to do. Your parasocial relationship with the man is entirely in your own head and I recommend trying to get out. 

#and there's my thoughts on all the people commenting under my other post #the witcher #henry cavill #twn #liam hemsworth #discourse #superman #dceu #long post #myposts

[theodysseyofhomer]

when i insist on odysseus as a rape victim i'm not trying to absolve him of patriarchy. he is, in many ways, a hero of patriarchy. even if i think some of the people who use him that way rhetorically have probably not read the odyssey, let alone understood its nuances, the cultural world of the poem and the narrative itself are patriarchal, and odysseus is both a product and perpetrator of that. but when i read about calypso forcing odysseus to have sex with her, i will still call it rape, not because i like him as a character, although i do, but because i think to not do so reveals a very troubling attitude toward rape and patriarchy in the ancient context and now.

i've tried and tried but i don't know how to have this conversation with someone who is determined not to accept the premise that, in the text of the odyssey, odysseus has no choice in the matter. if they've read the text, it's right there. from what i can read of the greek, it's there (ἀνάγκη, force, constraint). i've never read a translation where it wasn't there. if they just don't care, that pretty much kills the discussion.* but sometimes they'll try to sidestep it, bringing up that the text implies he slept with calypso willingly at some point, or arguing that she doesn't explicitly compel him on the last night they spend together before he leaves ogygia forever.** to be frank, that's not the point. i'm not trying to absolve him even of the accusation of cheating on penelope. i'm not saying he was faithful to penelope. i'm saying he was still, at the point that we meet him in the odyssey, raped. period. i'm saying that's important in some way. i'm saying that using that word is important.

odysseus has power, as a man in a patriarchal society, but that power is not absolute. power is never absolute. i've heard it suggested that in the ancient context, the rape of odysseus is comic, in the sense of affirming life even in its indignities, and in the sense that humiliation is amusing (i have a lot of disagreements with the article, but it has given me endless food for thought). i'm quoting at length here, but bear with me:

Athena leaves Odysseus lingering on Calypso’s island in what is certainly the most unheroic, most challenging of all the trials that befall him on his return home. The narrator describes Odysseus as desperately wanting to leave Ogygia, crying in homesickness, but having to stay and, more to the point, share Calypso’s bed. I mentioned much earlier that an audience of that period would not expect celibacy from a married male away from home. Yet the situation must produce, it seems to me, quite another reaction in the males in the audience when the narrator emphasizes Odysseus’ profound unhappiness with the arrangements. In a patriarchal society of that time, where marriages were arranged and wedding nights were more likely than not sanctioned rape scenes, households teemed with female slaves, the highways and byways with prostitutes, men were no doubt accustomed from puberty to have their way easily with women, and on their own terms. Nothing in their experience would prepare them for enforced sexual servitude to a woman. [...] With this episode, the narrator has introduced a comic counterpart to the ubiquitous comments on the faithful Penelope’s celibacy, that is, the image of her husband manfully performing his nightly duties in the home of the insatiable Calypso. It is comic, yes, but also every man’s deepest fear.

why is it comic? because it's a reversal of expectation, of roles, of fortune. why is it unexpected? because it exploits the fear that a man could be treated by a woman the way he treats a woman; because a woman becomes monstrous by acting like a man. these are misogynistic ideas and fears, and they sound strikingly modern.

which means that: i understand the impulse to salvage calypso's image. i understand how it could be interesting or productive or empowering maybe, for some women, because homer is so concerned with any fault in penelope's sex life (reinforced by clytemnestra’s, and those of the slave women that odysseus and penelope own) and seemingly not at all with odysseus’. but calypso is arguing for the right of female gods to treat human beings however they want to, not for the rights of human women.

it also means that: the rape of odysseus becomes remarkable, when the rape of countless others is not, because of who he is. it's humiliating for him to be treated like a sex slave because he's a man and a king; other slaves are just slaves. similar logic is found elsewhere in the odyssey (it's humiliating for him to be treated like a beggar, but the other beggar in the house is just a beggar). this is not a text that believes in equal rights of any kind. but i think we have to ask the question, is it not rape because of that? should we not call it rape because he's a man, because he's a man who perpetrates specific evils, because other people have it worse? and why do i keep arguing that his situation is important to remark on?

god. i don't know. sometimes? just because we don't.

i've lost count of posts like this, comments like this, attitudes like this, of how many times i mention the odyssey and immediately hear about calypso, of how at best odysseus weeping on ogygia becomes the butt of the joke. and i'm not sorry that i don't find it more progressive than treating calypso as a shrill misogynistic stereotype. i do not find it interesting or original to take a man who is not in the position of power in a sexual encounter and say that he's being either disingenuous, ungrateful, or mystifying.

when we refuse to name what calypso does to odysseus as rape, absolutely regardless of what we feel for him, just that it happened, that that's what's going on, i think we do something sinister, potentially to real people. especially because this exists in a text where slavery is also often unnamed in translation and discussion, and other forms of rape and captivity and human suffering, and i think we need to name them all, without being afraid that naming one will take away from the others. saying odysseus was raped doesn't mean we excuse the intense misogyny penelope is subjected to, the enslaved lives of melantho and the other hanged women. it all matters. it's all important.

*as does the suggestion that odysseus could be lying and actually had a great time. but odysseus isn't the one telling us what's going down on ogygia; the narrator is. when given the opportunity, odysseus himself says very little, only maintaining that his heart wasn't in it. of course odysseus could be lying. he could always be lying. but calypso is the most relevant counter-perspective we have, and even she doesn't claim that odysseus wants her, just that she thinks he ought to be happy with her. it's to her obvious frustration that he isn't. without another authority in the text, saying "it could be straight lies" is a conversational dead-end.

and if, by the way, there's a lost version of the odyssey in which odysseus was philandering, and the version we have was written to clear him of those charges... it's still the version we have. how we deal with it says something about us.

**if i say "calypso raped odysseus" and a hypothetical person (actually several real people i have encountered) makes this counterargument, that implies that the threat of force is, then, what? not real? if 'at some point' being willing means that the harm of whatever came after that point is negated, it casts him as someone who mopes around out of boredom with an equal partner, when the text seems much clearer on the point that he's in this position against his will than under what circumstances and for how long he might have slept with her willingly. they are clearly not equals by the mere fact that she is a goddess; his mortality is, in calypso's eyes, the barrier between them. rip to everyone who finds the decision to leave ogygia a "surprising choice" but i am never less surprised by odysseus than when he's handling calypso as delicately as possible, in order to leave her as fast as he can.

#anna.txt #a tag for bitching #rape tw / #slavery tw / #one day i'll exhaust everything i have to say on this subject. and then you'll be sorry

[mazzystar24]

Don’t mind me just thinking about how for the first time buck and Eddie are both in a good place mentally at the same time which would be the perfect time to make buddie canon

Like just from the first episode and all the interviews we already can see how Eddie has healed and grown so much and is in a much better place mentally, and buck breaking up with Natalia and going after what makes him feel good and rejecting things that don’t is something so huge for him because in the past he’s always been the one clinging onto anyone who shows him the slightest bit of love or attention no matter how many issues there are (and we know that this season he deals with his traumas and stuff too)

So if they do go canon this would be perfect because they’d have done the healing and growth separately so they can be secure and stable in themselves as individuals before they come together

S2- buck had just been ghosted by Abby and Eddie had all his stuff with Shannon and moving to LA

S3- ladder truck aftermath, lawsuit, fighting, Shannon’s death aftermath, tsunami, legit take your pick this season was ROUGH for these guys

S4- buck finding about Daniel and then eddie getting shot

S5- aftermath of the shooting, Eddie’s breakdown

S6- buck not being happy or secure in himself still, year of yes,sperm donor, lightening strike and coma dream (and all the undertones of suicidal ideation that comes with that)

Also I’m not at all saying the "You can't love anyone until you love yourself" cliche because I honestly do not believe it (actually my thoughts on it are more complicated but that’s a long explanation I’ll spare you the yapping ) but I will say that individual healing is very important to a good relationship, especially in quite extreme examples like this, I do also feel the need to mention that they did in fact love eachother through these things (platonic or romantic you decide) so that quote suck ass

#my fever brain just says stuff so literally just ignore me #I don’t even know if these are actual sentences anymore #pretty sure none of that made sense #911 #buddie #evan buckley #eddie diaz #evan buck buckley #911 fox #911onfox #911 abc #buckley diaz family #911 spoilers #oliver stark #ryan guzman

[socialist-microwave-laser]

the main thing that "leftist" goyim need to understand is that there isn't one definition of the word "zionism." "zionist" is not an insult, and it does not beget genocide or colonialism, because zionism for jews has many different meanings, each with their own interpretations of the state of israel and action points regarding palestine, with only a tiny portion of those advocating for any sort of violence against palestinians. if i had to boil everything down to brass tacks, i'd say zionism is the feeling that jews have a connection with eretz israel.* but there's so much that falls under that umbrella. there's christian zionism (which jewitches just did a wonderful episode discussing it and its genocidal roots with a very good bibliography [link here]), there's theodore herzl's definition that's like "yes i love colonialism let's do that!!!" (but also he was also toying with the idea of all the jews moving to argentina?). there's some (very few of whom are jewish) zionists who are uncritical of the israeli govt, there are some that want to see it dismantled immediately, and obviously there are many that lie somewhere in between the two. there are some jewish zionists who see medinas israel* as a miracle, and there are others who see it as blasphemy (either because of the belief that am israel* should not return from diaspora until the arrival of the moshiach (messiah), or because medinas israel has been doing a lot of monstrous, heinous, honestly un-jewish shit supposedly in the name of jews and judaism)

it is impossible to quickly sum up the wide scope of zionisms that exist today within judaism, not to mention those outside of it. however, it is important to note that for many jews, zionism is a word that merely describes longing, or even a longing for the ability to long. to quote my rabbi: "for me, zionism means i wish eretz israel was a place i longed to live." (the reasons why it isn't are the same reasons why any one of us critiques medinas israel—it is a horrid state doing horrifying, unspeakable things. to my rabbi and to many others, zionism means the eradication of medinas israel as it exists.)

there is currently a problem of people talking past each other, where some say anti-zionism is antisemitism and others say all zionists have blood on their hands. many of those in the camp of the former are often so broad in their definition of anti-zionism that that phrase is rendered nothing but unhelpful (at best), and many of those in the camp of the latter have such a narrow understanding of what zionism is that it completely turns off anybody who does have a more complete understanding of that word

this post is not intended to even scratch the surface of describing the meanings of all the different zionist movements and beliefs that haven't coalesced into any movement on any wikipedia page. rather, this post is to show non-jews who identify as leftists that are still open to learning about jewish experiences that zionism is not what the snappy, tens of thousands of note posts will lead you to believe. to those who say "death to zionists" please know that jews will not trust you, because you're calling for the deaths of a lot more jews than you think

eretz israel = the land of israel

medinas/medinat israel = the state of israel

am israel = the people of israel (jews)

these are all terms that are frequently used in jewish spaces and liturgy, especially the first and third. i have made the personal decision to use them in my daily conversations, because in liturgy that i interact with daily, "israel" means the third one, and i am very conscious to delineate the three, and especially to draw a distinction between the state of israel, the land that is so central to jewish liturgy, and the jewish people

#i made important text colorful bc i know big blocks of text can be hard for some people #also for the last time there are more zionist christians in the united states than there are jews on this planet #christians are using jews and muslims as pawns in their little game to summon the second coming of jesus #result in the complete eradication of all jews and muslims. we are their cannon fodder #and jews who have decided to side with them need to stop voting for the fucking leopards eating peoples' faces party #medinas israel #jumblr #zionism #anarchist #anti zionism #palestine #christian zionism #jewish zionism #jewish diaspora #tsiyyonus definition

[the-unaligned]

Bravern episode 8 spoilers

EP 8 Analysis

This is going to be super incoherent and is mostly just going to be me rambling but idc, I need to post this somewhere so it’s not ruminating in my head until I assault some random human with word vomit

So this is mostly going to be focus on episode 8 but I will touch back on previous episodes for references.

Anyways Episode 8 basically just confirmed the “Bravern is Smith” theory and I am so hype

What is the “Bravern is Smith” theory?

So the Bravern is Smith theory is a theory that.. well.. Bravern and Lewis Smith are the same person.

I’m not sure who started it but (I think) it started when the opening showed for the first time and we got to the scene of Smith’s arm becoming Bravern’s. From there it spiraled, more and more evidence pointing towards it, such as: Bravern knowing A LOT about Smith, Bravern making a lot of human pop culture references and speaking English interchangeably with Japanese (Smith does this too), Bravern being a super robot (Smith is a massive Super robot nerd) and a ton of other things

Episode 8:

Now we get into why I’m finally making a post about this, I’ve been following along with this theory since episode 2 and have been taking my notes on it but I never bothered posting about it anywhere

Why now?

Because episode 8 might’ve just confirmed it.

Let’s start with the opening:

So this right here is the catalyst that started this all, Smith’s arm turning into Bravern’s. Now, we knew all that, but the one thing we never knew until now was “who tf is glowy bitch”

Well,

I think is Knuth

“But why her? She looks nothing like the silhouette”

Look here, she has plates of armor that highly resemble two pairs of wings. Who else has two pairs of wings? The silhouette. Same placement and everything. I think the silhouette is meant to be vague, as to not tip the viewer off right away that the silhouette is a deathdrive.

We’ll come back to this later, I need to talk about Bravern’s lines during this episode.

I’m not entirely sure how to explain it but this line will be important later, for now it’s just more Super Robot inspirational speech

Right here is the important line, the title of the episode (which is what tipped me and a lot of other people off to Smith dying) and the last thing Bravern says to him. Now normally when entering a battlefield, you’d tell your comrade “Good luck”, “Until we meet again” makes it seem like someone will die, this is a line usually used when you’re not sure when you’ll see someone again. Bravern used this because he knew what was going to happen to Smith, and either he can’t stop it, or he doesn’t want to.

Bravern knows because he has gone through this before, as Smith.

That is likely why he told Smith to “save as many people as he can”, likely because when he went through this, a lot of people died

(This ties into my own branch of the theory where Bravern has already gone through all of this before and went back in time to change the outcome)

Now during the fight, Bravern isn’t really focused, he’s taking hits he’d normally be able to dodge and isn’t really rushing like he usually does. I think it’s because he’s trying to stall, trying to keep Isami away from Knuth and Smith so their fight can happen, either that or he’s distracted due to knowing what’s happening not that far away (or it could be both)

Before we get to this next part I wanna point out a quote I noticed during the episode from Knuth. I can’t find it just by scrolling and I’d rewatch the full episode to find it but Tumblr is lagging like hell and burning through my battery so I can’t

At one point Knuth mentioned something about fusing with Smith, this might mean that Knuth’s body ends up being the base for Bravern, but im still not 100% sure about that, just thought I’d add that. If she is the base and Bravern did in fact go back in time, this would make sense as Knuth had mentioned that she had gone back in time a few times

Now we get to focus on the important part of the episode, Smith’s death. Let’s just start listing off things to pay attention to.

(I reached the photo limit oops)

- Smith is humming his own theme song as he charges Knuth, Bravern sings his own theme song and blasts it whenever he fights

- He straight up says “Brave Slash” as he strikes Knuth

-Smith talks DIRECTLY INTO ISAMI’S MIND and says the following quote: “Isami. Isami. Brave. Brave… Bang.” And we all know why that’s important, the title of the show is literally “Bang Brave Bang Bravern”

There are still some questions, like “how was Smith able to use telepathy?” “How exactly is Bravern created?” “Is Bravern truly a fusion between Smith and Knuth?”

I know this probably makes zero sense but I need to get this out somewhere

Thanks for coming to my TedTalk (holy shit it’s so laggy)

Edit: I forgot to mention it but the foreshadowing for Smith’s death was so obvious, legit in his introduction Isami legit goes “You’re dead, the dead don’t talk” so uhh called it lmao

#bang brave bang bravern #bravern spoilers #Bravern #idk how to tag this

[naazaif327]

I was thinking, last week’s episode and the ever-widening gap between Suvi and Ame’s ideologies reminded me of a quote from a different show:

This is a scene from Doctor Who where the Doctor is trying to rehabilitate one of his closest and oldest rivals after centuries of her evil, and her response to his attempts. Now, Suvi is Not evil, and Ame is not fundamentally all of the things listed in that quote above, but I really think there are some poignant parallels here in regards to the way the two friends see the world and their place in it.

Ame is a good person, and she wants to do good in the world. She is wise, and she has a strong intuition about things, leading her to make choices through feeling a lot of the time. And that’s wonderful, but there are flaws in going through the world that way. She feels trapped inside the Citadel, feels the walls closing in, and so following her intuition she disregards Suvi and Steel’s pleas for her to stay, to gather more information, she reaches for the fastest escape route to home, no matter how violent the consequences might be for wizards whose lives are (to her) expendable in this moment.

What might’ve happened to those workers if Eursulon hadn’t brought them back? How might the war be affected by the loss of this precious teleportation sand that was wasted because Ame had to use it to get to Toma? What if that sand was needed to turn the tide in a battle and Silver dies as a result? Does it matter? Does it matter to Ame? It certainly matters to Suvi.

After doing this, how do we think things will go in the future between the two of them? The Empire will likely see this as a terrorist attack. Even Steel might not be able to smooth this over, and I don’t even know that she’d want to at this point. Steel was a trusted friend of Grandma Ren’s, there were so many contacts and important people within the Citadel that are now cut off from Ame, relationships and favours and information networks that were decades in the making. How can you be the Witch of the World’s Heart, the arbiter of affairs between humans and spirits, if you don’t have a way in to the capital of one of the most powerful factions in Umora? Ame will need to act as a representative for humans in the future, the way she fought for the people of Port Talon in her conversation with Orima. She can’t be that arbiter if she loses all her connections to these places. She certainly can’t be that arbiter if she is violently attacked by another Rhuvian like Captain Emliss and doesn’t have the backing of the Empire behind her this time.

Ten or fifty episodes from now, if Ame asked Suvi to stand with her against the Empire, I could imagine that conversation going the same way as the scene from above, because right now from Suvi’s eyes, that’s probably exactly what Ame’s actions look like: vain, arrogant, naive. Suvi knows Ame didn’t just intentionally commit a terror attack against the Citadel this episode, she knows that Ame is a good person who wants to do good. But the alternative is just as troubling: that Ame knows exactly how this all looks, that she knows exactly how bad this is going to be for Suvi and the people she holds dear, and she did it anyways because she thinks she knows better.

#absolutely no hate towards any cast members btw #this is my opinion on the narrative alone #lol #worlds beyond number #wbn pod #wbn spoilers #twtwatwo #suvirin kedberiket #suvi the wizard #the wizard the witch and the wild one #the wizard sky #ame the witch #witch of Toma

[1moreff-creator]

Everything We Know About Mai Akasaki + So Many Theories

AKA, me going insane over a character with exactly nine seconds of main series screen time so far. I checked.

At this point, it's probably fair to say that Mai Akasaki is by far the most mysterious aspect of DRDT. A character we only learn about in short, cryptic bouts of information, yet one which seems intrinsically linked with the series' plot and characters. We know extremely little about her, and what we do know, it's usually speculative.

However, it's still really interesting to talk about this funky little woman, and try to figure out what exactly her deal is. Join me in insanity land, as I compile everything I could find about her, and speculate on her story! I can practically guarantee that you'll learn something new.

WARNING: Insanely long post. I reached the 30 image limit, to give you an idea of how crazy this is.

Wait, Who?

Her! <3

(A lot of what I'm about to say come from this post by despairing-disaster and this one by akemiai, huge shout out to them!)

For the uninitiated, Mai Akasaki is the secret seventeenth student of the DRDT cast, hidden somehwere in this school wait no that's Mukuro. Her name can be found in the hidden quote in MonoTV's character profile, which itself is found by doing "inspect element" on said page.

Her name is Mai Akasaki

(I am such a hacker)

Typing in https://danganronpadespairtime.tumblr.com/maiakasaki (or clicking there) takes you to a pretty empty page, with this text:

All you have to do is ask for my hand, and I'll give it to you. Ask for my life, and I'll give it to you as well. Don't apologize for asking, I'll give you my forgiveness too.

As you'll see later, this quote is probably something Mai would say.

And this hidden quote:

"Are you still searching for a secret? For some explanation that will satisfy you? There's no answer I can give you that will make you happy. Maybe I should have lied instead. I'm sorry."

Note the quotes, which as far as I can tell, aren't in any of the other hidden phrases. That said, spoilers, I don’t have any idea what this means.

You may aso have noticed some highlighted letters in that first quote. Typing those in, https://danganronpadespairtime.tumblr.com/aoaviepkro, takes you to the most important page for our purposes:

(Also, you can just look it up on google nowadays)

Mai Akasaki's character profile. And yes, it's the girl Teruko remembers after being stabbed by Xander, in episode 6 of chapter 1. After that memory, Teruko thinks:

It's strange I would remember her now, of all times. What was her name again? It's on the tip of my tongue, but I can't remember. Xander always reminded me of that girl. Perhaps that's why I'm thinking about her now. They looked similar, with that same red hair and smile. And... they both wanted to help, didn't they?

Teruko and her clearly have something going on, but we'll get to it later (take a shot every time I say something like that). For now, we have to dive into the profile.

Profile of Someone Dearly Loved

Basic Info

She's listed as the "Ultimate ???", likes phone charms and dislikes silence. She's 5'8'' tall, weighing 124 lbs and with a chest sie of 30 in. I doubt anyone cares about the latter. Her birthday is February first, which you may want to keep in mind for later.

The Subtitle Quote

As every character does, Mai has a quote right under her name. In her case, "There's a way for you to be happy". Keep in mind these quotes are usually things the characters would say, and as you'll see in a moment, that fits.

However, what's interesting is that this quote was not the one originally there when Mai's page was first found. It changed. It used to be, apparently, "Anything, anything at all..."

What I don't know is when it changed, or why. The earliest reference I can find to the change is this post by stfu-sage, the 20th of March, 2023. This is just three days after the release of Ch 2 Ep 8, but that feels like quite a strange time for it to change, especially since we don’t know how many days passed without anyone checking the profile. I feel it makes more sense if it had changed either with the release of Ch 2 or with the BDA on chapter 7. Regardless, the exact time doesn’t matter much.

What do these lines mean, though? Well, starting with “Anything, anything at all”, I believe it’s related to line from the Mai Akasaki URL. You know, “All you have to do is ask for my hand, and I’ll give it to you…”, that one. When you read them together, it makes sense:

All you have to do is ask for my hand, and I'll give it to you. Ask for my life, and I’ll give it to you as well. […] [You can ask for] Anything, anything at all.

Considering the code for Mai’s profile is in the “ask for my hand” line, I think it makes sense.

Then, the changed quote, “There’s a way for you to be happy”. Considering the general time for the change, is it possible this is something Mai said to Arei, during their time at Hope's Peak? It's the best I have for now, but I feel we may need more context to know what this is about.

In any case, I can't gather much more from the subtitle quote. Although I do feel like pointing out, Mai’s quote is somewhat unique in that none of the words are highlighted. All the other characters have one or a few words highlighted (eg: Arei - secret, Teruko - no matter what), except MonoTV and Mai. Don’t think it means anything, but it’s there.

Hidden Quotes

And here we have it. The most important part of Mai theorizing. Whenever you refresh the page, a new body of text appears, which is related to a specific character via the code of the website. You can see in the screenshot I took, it says “A girl with many friends”. But here’s a full list of all the possibilities:

Teruko: Some years ago, she was searching for someone named ‘Teruko Tawaki.’ Charles: A girl who loves her family. Rose: She remembers everything that is important to others. Arturo: A girl who sees the beauty in everyone. Levi: A girl with a floral tattoo on her arm. Whit: A girl with many friends. Eden: She kept calling the number, even though no one picked it up. J: She kept it a secret, and told no one. Hu: A girl who wanted to keep everyone safe. Nico: Everyone confided in her. Ace: A girl who had a bright future. Arei: She doesn’t like it when her friends fight. Min: An average girl with nothing special at all about her. Xander: She couldn’t stand to do nothing. Veronika: A girl who didn’t foresee the consequences. David: She forgives everyone. MonoTV: It’s all your fault.

You may notice the order is somewhat peculiar, and it's for a good reason. It's the order the "bios" (name of the variable in the source code... I think that's how that works) are laid out in the source code of Mai's page.

... I know you can barely see and not all of them are on frame, but just trust me. If you want to check for yourself, you can go to the profile's source code (Ctrl U), and either scroll to almost the bottom, or just search (Ctrl F) for a word like "average" or "confided" which only shows up in the "bios". There's probably easier ways to go about it, but this is how I got there. I'm telling you this because it took me like an hour to find out where the hell the order came from. I am not good at computers.

However, for now, let's just ignore the order (and the tenses of the sentences, I swear I'll get there) and focus on the main points for now.

+Mai is extremely well-liked by the other members of the cast. In particular, some of the quotes compliment her based on faults the character attached to them has.

>Arturo is extremely judgemental based on ugliness, but Mai "sees the beauty in everyone".

>Charles forgot his dead brother, but Mai "loves her family".

>Rose is absentminded and often forgets things if she doesn't see them, but Mai "remembers everything that is important to others".

>The hidden quote on Ace's page has him saying "I don't know what to do with myself anymore", suggesting a lack of control over his future, but Mai "had a bright future".

>Arei constantly causes altercations between the cast, but Mai "doesn't like it when her friends fight".

However, plenty of quotes are simply good qualities, such as Hu's "A girl who wanted to keep everyone safe". The point is, everyone seemingly adored this girl.

+Mai is good at keeping secrets, as implied by J's and Nico's quotes ("She kept it a secret, and told no one" and "Everyone confided in her", respectively). Those same quotes actually seem to imply Mai likely knew those two's secrets, and possibly a lot of the others.

+Among other things, Mai is compassionate, forgiving, friendly, and generally a positive presence.

+Mai and Teruko have a particularly strange relationship. We'll come back to this.

+Mai seemingly did... something, and it brought consequences. This is implied by the quotes of Xander ("she couldn't stand to do nothing") and Veronika ("A girl who didn't foresee the consequences"). But, what was it? Well, to get a better idea, we need to take a look at... the Bonus Episodes.

A Not-So-Unnamed-Classmate

Technically-a-Theory: Mai is the Unnamed Classmate

I say "technically" because I'm pretty sure no one actually disagrees with this. Yes, technically it's never been confirmed, but it seems likely Mai is the Unnamed Classmate who shows up in both of the Bonus Episodes we have so far. The PoV character in both of those episodes has the same voice, which sounds like a girl's, and their personality seems to fit with the very little we know of Mai.

Additionally, as you’ll see, the text boxes in the Bonus Episodes are surrounded by flowers which look very similar to the ones in Mai’s tattoo, further connecting them.

It's not much, but since we don't know anyone else who could be Unnamed Classmate, they and Mai are likely the same person.

With this clarified, let's talk about Unnamed Classmate.

Bonus Episode #1

This episode is mostly focused on Min and the history of Hope's Peak, but we can still start to grasp a bit of Mai's personality. She seems generally upbeat and somewhat bubbly, and we can see glimpses of her kind and caring qualities when she comforts Min near the end of the episode.

There's also a few lines which actually tell us a few more concrete things about her, though. I won't post them in chronological order, btw.

Min: Hey! Put your textbook away! Don’t cheat!

Seemingly an insignificant joke, but it does help establish Mai as slightly mischievous/cheeky, which will be expanded upon later. Other indications of this cheekiness include Mai comlimenting Min and trying to distract her by talking about the sky and her backstory, presumably to procrastinate. I may be reading too much into it, but I really don't think Mai is as easily distracted as she makes herself out to be.

Mai: Auughh, the test is too soon, there’s no way I’ll have enough time! I’m totally going to fail!

Mai: I'm sorry. I shouldn't have bothered you to help me study--

Mai: I see. That's how you got your talent. I'm ashamed that I'm only now learning something so important. I'm sorry.

(Yes, I had to bunch a few of these images together because I ran into the Tumblr 30 image limit)

A few lines which seem innocuous at first, but when paired together, they hint at something. Essentially, I believe this implies Mai doubts her abilities and actions, and may even have a self-deprecating streak. She's at the very least much harsher on herself than she is on others. It sounds like a stretch, but I swear it's not as farfetched as it seems.

Mai: You're somebody who buys fish-shaped pastries and saves the chocolate-filled ones for me, because you know that those are my favorite.

Mai likes chocolate-filled pastries. Hey, when I said “everything we know about Mai”, I meant everything (that I could find).

Min: I suppose for someone like you who doesn't care too much about Hope's Peak and who, no offense, would never be eligible for the [Ultimate Contest for Eminent Students] with such average grades...

Min: You might not do very well in school, but you're quite sharp.

Put simply, Mai has average grades, but is still considered smart by Min. Her intelligence is visible throughout the episodes, mainly in the form of emotional intelligence and a hint of deception (that's where the mischieviousness comes in).

However, perhaps it’s the first phrase which is most interesting. Mai “doesn’t care too much about Hope’s Peak”. Which is only reiterated by the following lines.

Min: Maybe someone like you who never cared about Hope’s Peak Academy wouldn’t understand. But it’s everyone else’s dream to be an Ultimate.

Mai: Ultimates aren’t everything. As if I’m only friends with you because of your talent. There’s more to you than that.

Mai seems to have a much more laissez-faire approach to the concept of Hope’s Peak and Ultimates than what Min considers normal. By itself, this isn’t too strange, as we know there’s other people not too attached to their status as Ultimates. However, this actually may have something to do with the incident implied in Xander’s and Veronika’s quotes. I’ll get to it later (overused phrase of the day), but for now, keep this in mind.

Nevertheless, there is one more theory affected by this nonchalance towards Hope’s Peak. Except, it’s a theory I believe is actually harmed by this attitude.

Good Theory I Don’t Believe: Mai is a Reserve Course Student

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a cool theory! I just don’t think it works all the way.

Essentially, this theory is what it says in the tin. Mai is the Ultimate ??? because she’s actually a Reserve Course student, a la Hajime Hinata. There are many good posts on this theory, like this one by delightfullydiscordant, and I recommend you read them since they’re well put together! Some of the main points of this theory include:

>Min’s quote for Mai is “An average girl with nothing special at all about her.”, which could imply she doesn’t have a talent. However, there are other interpretations for this line, so it’s far from conclusive.

>Mai seems to be wearing a Japanese Hope’s Peak uniform (check out this post by laly-481), but the jacket around Mai’s waist is darker than the one worn by Ultimates in DR 3. Instead, it seems closer to a Reserve Course jacket. The issue I have with this is that… well, we know very little about what the Japanese Hope’s Peak in the DRDT universe looks like, so this feels a bit vague.

>

Mai: You’re not nobody. Even if I pretend that you’re not an Ultimate and that we’re not both students in Hope’s Peak Academy, you’re still somebody to me.

I’ll ask you to ignore the lesbians for a moment and focus on the beginning of the quote. If you look at it closely, it seems to imply both Mai and Min are Hope’s Peak alumni, but they’re not both Ultimates. Thereby, Mai must be a Reserve Course student.

However, I actually have a different interpretation of that quote, one which, you guessed it, I’ll get to later. But for now, if we’re going to get involved in semantics, we also have to look at this line:

Mai: The US Hope's Peak Academy takes in college-age students, and there's two of them, and we have this really weird curriculum, and there's a bunch of other things, and...

Min: Remember that we’re East Class 27, so that means that Hope’s Peak is how many years old?

Min: Look at what our classmates are doing now. They're Ultimates too. They're all doing things relevant to their career, if not actually out working.

Min saying “we're class 27" could be interpreted as her simply referring to herself and the other Ultimates, but even then, referring to "our classmates" while talking to Mai implies they're in the same class. Also, Mai saying "we have" a weird curriculum feels odd unless both she and Min have the same curriculum, meaning both of them likely attend the same classes, thus again, both are Ultimates.

But that’s only a minor problem. In truth, there are other reasons I believe Mai has a talent, and I even have a guess of what that talent may be. But the main one is what we just established: Mai never really cared about Hope’s Peak.

I admittedly may be missing some context, since I’ve never watched DR 3, but from what I know, Reserve Course students are usually characterized as people who desperately want to be Ultimates and are obsessed with Hope’s Peak, which doesn’t fit Mai at all. You could argue maybe she went to Hope's Peak to search for Teruko as Teruko's quote implies, but the problem with that is that Teruko remembers Mai, at least a little bit (see: dream sequence), which means they should have reunited before Hope's Peak, since the last thing Teruko remembers before the "amnesia zone" is going to Hope's Peak's entrance ceremony.

Not to mention, we… can’t even be sure the Reserve Course exists. For as much info as we got from the Bonus Episode #1, that course was never even mentioned. And seeing this is a post-Tragedy world, the Reserve Course may not even exist. Especially when Min also says that actually being an Ultimate is considered more important than going to Hope’s Peak in the US.

So, final verdict on this theory? While it’s quite interesting and I definitely think it’s more plausible than many of the other things I’ll bring up, I don’t find it to be the most likely, again because Mai’s disinterest in Hope’s Peak pushes her away from the standard Reserve Course student, and because I prefer a different theory about her talent.

And with that, we’re done with the first Bonus Episode for now! Let’s see what the second one brings.

Bonus Episode #2

This one, surprisingly, has fewer lines which gives us info about Mai. However, what it does give us is arguably some of the most important intel we have so far.

Mai: No, it’s fine. Don’t think you’re making me come with you. I'm here because I want to be here.

Mai: [Xander reimbursing her for the trip]'s silly. I can pay for it myself. Besides, you're letting me stay at your place for a week, so if anything, you're doing me a favor.

The first just reiterates that Mai is compassionate and wants to help whenever she can. As for the second, it seems to imply Mai doesn't struggle too much with money, which is info I guess. However, she also says Xander is doing her a favor by letting her stay over. I think that just means the expenses of living wherever she's living for a week exceed the expenses of the trips? I don't see any other reason that would be considered a favor in that aspect. I considered maybe Mai could have a bad home life, but in the secret quotes:

Charles: A girl who loves her family

So, I don't think that's the case. I think it really is just a money thing, and we don't have to overthink it too much.

Mai: 'Oh, speaking of Hope's Peak. I need to ask Xander if he found that document I asked him to look for.'

Mai: 'I didn't want to unload the work on him, but he's much better at digging up stuff than I am.'

Mai: 'But it's definitely not something I should bring up in a public place. I'll remember to ask him later'.

And here we are. The single biggest Mai-related reveal in the Bonus Episodes. Her and Xander were involved in some sort of secretive operation related to Hope's Peak. In particular, seemingly during their trip to visit the graves of Xander's family, Mai asked Xander to retrieve a document related to the Academy, a document they shouldn't discuss in public. In fact, right after this, Mai changes the subject to Xander's eyes so as to not talk about it, again showing she can be somewhat deceptive when she needs to.

This might be related to Teruko's claim that "[Xander and Mai] both wanted to help", but it seems impossible for her to remember anything which happened during HPA (Hope's Peak Academy, got tired of writing it out) time, so I still don't know what she actually meant by that.

Nevertheless, it's pretty obvious that whatever this is, it would be bad news for HPA. I mean, if Xander's involved, there's no way it's good for an institution. But it also ties back to Mai's critical view of HPA and the Ultimate title.

However, messing with something as powerful as HPA could be pretty dangerous. Thus, I believe this little operation is likely what's being referred to in Xander's and Veronika's quotes.

Xander: She couldn’t stand to do nothing. Veronika: A girl who didn’t foresee the consequences.

(By the way, Xander's quote in particular is why I don't quite believe the theory that the document mentioned here is only to get Teruko into HPA somehow. It's a cool theory, but Xander's quote feels a bit too dramatic for that to be the end goal of Mai's plans)

I mean, for one, it's Xander saying Mai did something, and messing with HPA could have quite drastic consequences, from what we know. Thus, from now on, I will henceforth call this vague action against HPA "the HPA Operation", because saying "that thing Mai did which Xander's and Veronika's quotes allude to" is gonna get tiring.

What exactly the HP Operation was, I obviously don't know, we're on chapter 2 of the series and this is quite clearly a mystery which may last until chapter 6 (assuming a standard DR formula).

However, I can tell you one thing. It may not fully be Mai's idea.

Mai: If you set out to do something, then never give up on that, no matter what obstacles may stand in your way. Even if it's risky or against the rules, as long as it's for a good cause...

Mai: I'll trust that you know to do the right thing.

Xander: Yeah, of course (NOT PICTURED)

Xander: That's why I've come to Hope's Peak, isn't it?

The lines about the HPA document appear right after this, although Mai does seem confused at first by Xander's claim that "that's why [he's come] to Hope's Peak". So although Mai is the one who asked Xander to find the document, it's possible the basic idea to go against HPA came from Xander. After all, remember. Mai never cared much about HPA, so it seems unlikely she paid enough attention to it to notice its flaws as quickly as Xander would. Ultimate Rebel, and all that.

However, even if Xander was the one who planted the idea of revolution in Mai's head, she's clearly invested in it. She tells Xander to never give up on anything he sets out to do, even if it's risky or against the rules.

So, there it is. So far, what we know about the HPA Operation is:

>Mai and Xander were heavily involved.

>It may have originally been Xander's idea, but Mai seems to have taken the role of tactician at some point.

>HPA likely wasn't too happy with it.

>It likely had horrible consequences for Mai.

And that's all we had for a while, as Chapter 2 Part 1 didn't add anything to the conversation. Well, except maybe a thought Teruko has when Arei starts crying after her breakdown in the playground:

That pitiful crying... It reminds me of... Of...

That could be about Mai, but I really don't know what it could mean, so I'm sorta ignoring it for now.

So, yeah. Nothing new.

Until it came out.

Going (Literature Girl) Insane

Yeah, the David MV. Mai is listed in the cast list as a secondary character, though her name is crossed out. This likely refers to the portrait of her seen in the background.

The portrait of Mai is labeled "portrait of someone dearly loved", while Teruko's is labeled "portrait of someone dearly unloved", the words flipped. This is one of many things which seem to imply Teruko and Mai are meant to be opposites of each other.

There is also that one image of a girl whose identity is unclear.

It doesn't look like Mai, but maybe that's my prosopagnosiac ass assuming different hair = different person. Generally, people assume this is "Diana Chiem", if she even exists, though I somewhat lean on it possibly being the mysterious name out of frame in the cast list. You know, the name which vaguely looks like "Ms Naegi". However, I'm showing you the image to get a second opinion on something.

You see the hand Mystery Girl is holding? Doesn't it look like it's wearing a glove? Because of the white line in the wrist. Maybe I'm going insane, that could just be a bend of the wrist, but... I kinda don't see it? It makes a bit more sense to me as a glove. And since it doesn't seem to be cut off at the fingers like Xander's, it would have to be Mai's. Other characters also wear this type of glove, but they’re not on the cast list.

The counterpoint is that it looks like you can see the nail of the PoV person's thumb, but I'm not sure that's the case? That part of the sprite is really strange and seems to be different in all three of the Mystery Girl images, so I can't tell. Anywyas, if any of you have ideas, tell me. Again, it's most likely I'm overthinking and that's just a bend of the wrist.

Anyways, enough dillydally, let's get to the big stuff.

The Roman numeral

As you may or may not know, during the MV we’re shown a crossword puzzle which is solved with the characters’ names, and this assigns each character with a different Roman numeral. This numeral later shows up attached to some kind of phrase, which in turn relates that character back to the phrase. I made a post talking about all of them, but I'll go more in detail about Mai's in this post than I did in that post.

Solution by raspbeyes

In the crosswords, Mai intersects Arei and Levi. I don't think this means much by itself, since the way the names intersect doesn't seem to be too important in general. Like, yes, if you squint you can see things like Whit only intersecting Charles, but there's also things like Min only intersecting Arei, Eden only intersecting Rose, Veronika intersecting everyone and their morther... My point is, the exact position in the crosswords doesn't tend to matter much.

What's more important are the numerals. Mai's is XI (11), a number which, from my research, is related to leadership and bringing out the best in others, as well as nobility or higher conciousness and spirituality and knowledge and new beginnings- Okay, the point is, I found mostly inconclusive stuff, but a lot of this sort of relates back to Mai, so we take it.

And the phrase itself:

XI. God is dead

What could this mean? Well, in philosophy, the phrase "God is dead" refers to the breakdown of ethical and sociocultural structures as christianity and religion in general became less universal. So, loss in faith in an institution leads to changes in the status quo. One way to interpret this in the context of this numeral is that Hope's Peak is the "God", and Mai's actions involved a loss on faith on HPA, and everything which comes with it. This could even be related to the phrase which directly follows this numeral in the song, "become brainwashed: go do it!". If HPA's propaganda which makes everyone love Ultimates can be considered brainwashing, anyways.

...

But that's not what any of us first thought when we read that, is it?

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Is Mai Dead?

Yeah, we gotta talk about the elephant in the room.

You'll have noticed, lots of the hidden quotes on Mai's profile speak about her in the past tense. This already had people thinking she was dead since it was first found, but the MV really drove the point home. Considering how the characters think about Mai, it's not impossible to imagine Mai is the "God" here, and "God is dead" has a far more literal meaning.

But, let's hold our horses here, no need to kill her so quickly. There is a chance she's alive.

Coping With the Quotes

Like I said, some of these quotes speak about her as if she's dead, but some of them actually talk about Mai in the present tense. Here, I sorted them out.

Referring to a past event:

Teruko: Some years ago, she was searching for someone named ‘Teruko Tawaki.’ Eden: She kept calling the number, even though no one picked it up. J: She kept it a secret, and told no one. Xander: She couldn’t stand to do nothing. Veronika: A girl who didn’t foresee the consequences.

These are phrases which can't be used to determine Mai's status, since they talk about a specific thing which she did. Even if she's alive, these would still be in the past tense. Teruko's is explicitly talking about years ago; J and Eden are talking about things Mai probably did during her time at HP; and Xander's and Veronika's talk about the HPA Operation. These are inconclusive.

Miscellaneously inconclusive

Whit: A girl with many friends. MonoTV: It’s all your fault.

MonoTV's line doesn't refer to Mai at all, so it's not useful here. And I put Whit here because... frankly, I wouldn't trust him to tell us even if Mai really is dead. "[His] mother is dead, [he] omit[s] this truth", and all that. Though his quote does seem to imply she's alive, for what it's worth.

Present Tense

Charles: A girl who loves her family. Rose: She remembers everything that is important to others. Arturo: A girl who sees the beauty in everyone. Levi: A girl with a floral tattoo on her arm. Arei: She doesn’t like it when her friends fight. Min: An average girl with nothing special at all about her. David: She forgives everyone.

Admittedly, some of these don't actually have verbs, so putting them in "present tense" is a bit of a misnomer. Still, all of these seem to imply Mai's alive. Notably, David's line is right after Xander's and Veronika's in the code, so he might be saying this after the HPA Operation fell through? Take that as you will.

Past Tense

Hu: A girl who wanted to keep everyone safe. Nico: Everyone confided in her. Ace: A girl who had a bright future.

I was surprised by how few of these lines actually speak of Mai strictly as if she's died. They are all together, too, and separated from Xander's and Veronika's by Arei's and Min's in the code. But what's even more important is that these are still inconclusive.

When Hu says Mai "wanted to keep everyone safe", she could be talking specifically about the HPA Operation, and the phrase would be in the past tense even if Mai survived that.

When Nico says "everyone confided in her", that could mean everyone at one point or another told her their secrets, and again, it would be in the past tense even if Mai is alive.

And although Ace says Mai "had a bright future", we don't know why she no longer has one. It's possible the consequences Veronika speaks of only ruined Mai's future, but didn't get her killed.

With all this in mind, it actually seems like the quotes lean on the side of Mai being alive! That's still inconclusive, and MonoTV's quote is a bit too ominous for me to say they definitively confirm her status.

Especially because... well, the quotes aren't the only part of this discussion.

The MV Killed the Hope's Peak Star

Let's start with the biggest issue, the flowers of an unknown species.

As pointed out by delightfullydiscordant in this post, those flowers appear to be the same ones on Mai’s tattoo and Unnamed Classmate’s text boxes. And as the comments point out, they seem to be camellias.

The issue is that the MV confirms they’re white. And white camellias, in Japan, are popular funeral flowers and are associated with death. Yeah.

Now, let’s not bury the girl yet. White camellias also represent adoration and respect in a more platonic way than, say, red camellias, for example. They can also represent purity, beauty, and even hope. Yeah, we’re dropping the H word.

I also tried looking for literary references with white camellias, in the spirit of the MV. However, the only thing I found was that they show up in “To Kill A Mockingbird”, a book which if I recall correctly is never mentioned in the MV. And it’s a good thing, too, since they apparently represent racism in that book. I don’t think that’s related to Mai, frankly.

So, good news! It’s still not conclusive! Well, but there’s more. In particular, take a look at footnote 20.

This shows up directly after Mai's numeral and the brainwashed phrase I mentioned earlier. It’s a definition of the model of the five stages of grief, with the footnote itself simply claiming it is considered by many to be outdated. Also, there’s an emoticon of someone sticking out their tongue. Don’t know what else that would be, and I don’t know what to make of it.

But the fact it’s a model of how people deal with grief, usually related to death, and that it shows up directly after Mai’s numeral, seems to imply Mai’s dead.

And then there’s the problem of her numeral! Mai has one of the only ones numerals which is colored, in this case gray. The others are mostly just white, with the only other exceptions being Xander's (translucid, "(the world of abnormal sentiment dances)") and Min's (pink, stylised as the X of a death portrait, "democratic-ly" and the rules of class trials). It doesn't bode too well for Mai to have something in common with 2/3 of all confirmed dead people, I have to say.

However, it being gray specifically could be a direct reference to her death as well. Color theory (don’t question it for now) connects gray with the depressed persona of David, though, so this isn’t very conclusive.

And finally, edging into more “confirmation bias-y” territory, you remember how I said the position in the crosswords doesn’t really matter? Well, yeah, but. Mai’s name, as it goes over the A in Arei, also happens to cross the Roman numeral IV (4), a number related to death as per footnote four. In fact, I’m pretty sure that’s why Arei has it. You know, the third dead person. Nevertheless, again, crosswords positioning is usually not important, so take that with a massive grain of salt.

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So, what’s the conclusion? I think it’s still up for debate, but I lean more on the idea of Mai being dead. The flowers and the model of stages of grief are pretty damning, and I don’t think most of the quotes being in present tense can really be trusted.

Anyways, let me continue a bit with the idea of her being dead.

Sub-Theory: Shot Through the Heart, Xander’s to Blame

You remember how the MV claims there’s six bullets around? But it also tells you it’s impossible to find them all? I made a post about it, where I found the five bullets which I think are the only ones which i can be found.

My conclusion in that post, which I sort of stand by, is that if there’s six bullets, but only five are visible, the last one is likely loaded in the gun. It’s labeled “(not) a prop gun”, so it’s apparently real, but still connected to Xander.

The issue? That gun is sorta pointed directly at Mai’s portrait.

This kinda fits with the pieces I’ve been putting together. Mai (possibly) died because of the HPA Operation, but Xander may have been the one who originally planted that idea in her head. Or at least enabled her plans by finding documents. In that sense, one could argue it’s Xander’s fault Mai died. So, it kinda fits! I’m going with that.

The question now would be who blames Xander for Mai’s death. After all, I sorta doubt he’s the one who actually killed her. My original instinct was David, since that’s the guy the MV is about, but that doesn’t quite fit. David idolizes Xander a fair bit, so it feels odd to think he’d blame him for this.

Instead, if this theory is true, I think it makes more sense for Xander to blame himself for Mai’s death. Survivor’s guilt is a huge part of his character (see: the Bonus Episode and the quote on his page), so if he survived the fallout of the HPA Operation when Mai didn’t, he’d be quite heartbroken by it. And thus, he may end up blaming himself for dragging her into the whole mess.

So, that's about it for what we know about Mai's status. But would you believe it if I told you we're not done with the MV yet?

Color Theory

Color theory in the context of the MV refers to this post and reblog by accirax, where she went over every colored lyric in the MV and assigned each color a character based on the characters' color scheme and the lines themselves. I recommend checking out her whole post, it's really good and I won't talk about everything she brought up.

For our purposes, the important color is Mai's. And I agree with accirax that Mai is likely black (the color, not the skin tone). Although the color doesn't show up much in her color scheme, she's a generally cryptic character with a generally cryptic color. But the lines work with Mai better than practically anyone else:

>"You" x3: As pointed out by accirax, everyone is obssessed with Mai, so it sorta fits.

>"The track to the ideal country ->" The arrow points to a passage from "Utopia", btw. This makes sense with the HPA Operation. It's a vaguely revolutionary operation which seeks to improve the world, so you could consider that "the track to the ideal country."

However, we have to talk about the elephant in the room. Her color scheme would still set her up to be red. Maybe yellow if you count her eyes, but red is an important color for her. It wouldn't be unheard of for an important character to have two colors, since David has two. But red is a special color for color theory... because it's completely nonsensical.

Red is by far the most overrepresented color in the MV, having practically double the amount of lines any other colors do. And considering the color, you'd imagine it would either go to Mai, Xander or Veronika. However, no character fits all the lines that well, as explained by accirax in her posts. I explained in this reblog what I believe about this in detail, but essentially, I believe red is intentionally ambiguos, and any given red line can belong to any of the three characters I mentioned.

I'll quickly go over the way I would assign the red lines, but I'll only explain the Mai lines, since I already went into detail on the other ones in that reblog I linked to before. Keep in mind some may apply to multiple characters.

Unassignable: Aa, ah, isn't it?!

Veronika: whatever; go mad x3; broken; go insane?; won't change; original; you've killed so many; medicine; self-denial confessions; self-delusion.

Xander: are all just idiots (final verdict); Bye x2; Goodbye; escape!; together; are all just idiots!; ignorant; great applause!!!; won't change; original; and disappear!; 1; medicine; revolutionary; idiot; self-delusion

Mai: Bye x2; Goodbye; broken; God; and disappear!; medicine; revolutionary, self-denial confessions

I will mention, you can also give her all the "idiot" lines Xander has, as well as "won't change; self-delusion" and all that, since David (the guy presumably "singing") may be somewhat skeptical about Mai and her revolutionary ideas.

>Bye x2, Goodbye, broken, and disappear!: She's probably dead, so. I also inexplicably think "broken" works with her death, but not Xander's. I have no idea why.

>God: The biggest reason why Mai has to be included, the others just aren't as God-ish as Mai (hey, it's like that song!). Not much to say; it's connected to Mai via numeral XI, and I already explained why she could be "God" here.

>Medicine; revolutionary: She's a revolutionary thanks to the HPA Operation, and you could argue that means she's the "medicine" of society.

>Self-denial confessions: Mai works better with this line's original context (revolutionaries being coerced into going back on their ideals) than Veronika, but it still leaves behind the question of what exactly she's denying. Maybe denying the ideals of Ultimates, when she herself is (probably) an Ultimate? Something like that. I guess that could also work with Xander in hindsight.

So, there we go! Full interpretation of Color Theory as it relates to Mai. Wow, that was a lot for very little new info!

We're almost done with the MV, but first, we have to talk about the man himself.

David's Relation to Mai, and his Potential Involvement in the HPA Operation

But first, a side note.

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Does David remember Mai?

There's a theory floating around that David might remember parts of his time at HPA, including Mai's existence. Check out this post by anderscim and reblog by xmicrophonyx if you want a full explanation, but I'll cover the main points here. It's a really good theory, and it's not any less plausible than some of the other theories I'll mention later in the post, but I don't quite believe it.

See, the main evidence for this theory is that the Literature Girl MV includes Mai's face in the portrait and an image of Xander with two eyes, as well as things like the morse code and possibly tally 5 which seem to reference David and Xander's relationship during HPA time. And that's my first issue with the theory, I just don't think the MV can be used for this.

Of course, it comes down to interpretation, but the way I see the MV is as an abstract form of storytelling, not a completely 1:1 view of David’s mind. Essentially, while a lot of it is spoken from the perspective of David, it’s not actually a reflection of his real mental state, but rather a representation for us the audience. It’s hard to describe :v

The main thing that I want to bring up in support of my interpretation is the youtube comments scene, I hope you know what I’m talking about. There’s no way David would be aware of these comments, such as the one referencing the J and Arei swap theory. In particular, the comment talking about (presumably, the names aren’t explicitly written) Teruko as a protagonist is impossible for David to conceive, since there’s no way he would know we see her as the protag; and the ones that namedrop Byakuya, Nagito and Kokichi are practically impossible as well, as Veronika has claimed not to remember any other killing games before the one in DRDT. Kokichi in particular would be problematic depending on your interpretation of V3.

What does this mean? This means that the MV isn’t beyond showing us the audience things outside of David’s own mind, for the sake of storytelling. It’s not hard to imagine, then, that the scene with Xander having two eyes is meant to show us that they had a good relationship in HPA, even if David doesn’t remember it. Same with calling Mai “someone dearly loved.”

There’s also a few things about other characters which don’t quite match what David would know about them in the killing game. For example, Rose’s numeral: II. Ego cogito ergo (turbatus) sum. (I think therefore I am disturbed). This only really makes sense in the context of Rose’s conversation with Teruko and Nico, where she admits to having trouble separating reality from her memory and her dreams. But David wasn’t there for that. Another example is Teruko’s: XIII. or not to be? Which seems to reference her suicidal tendencies, implied in that one thing she said to Arei. Again, that’s not something David would be aware of during the killing game. 

Either David remembers way more about HPA than implied in the theory, or those are also examples of the MV going beyond David’s mind to continue telling us things about the story.

In xmicrophonyx’s reblog, she also brings up the pre-chapter dialogue as possibly being David’s. I… don’t see it, frankly. The pre-chapter 1 dialogue seems to fit Teruko more, imo.

“Half-remembering is worse than forgetting. Her name, his face…”

We know Teruko doesn’t remember Mai’s name based on the CH 1 EP 6 dream sequence from before, and the “he” could be her brother. Prosopagnosia, and all that. 

And while the chapter 2 dialogue could fit David and his feelings towards Xander  better, there’s nothing which explicitly implies he remembers anything about HPA before the killing game.

I still miss you. I miss you so much that I wish you had never been part of my life. The worst part is, even though you left me like this, there’s nothing I can blame you for.

Also I think that’s Eden but that’s besides the point.

And finally, now that you understand why I don’t think the evidence for isn’t very good, we have to address the evidence against. Mainly, the fact that David doesn’t seem to recognize Xander during his introduction. At all. He even explicitly says, “... I don’t believe we’ve met before”, and calls Xander “sir”. There was no indication at that point that they’d be missing memories, so David has no reason to pretend he doesn’t know who Xander is. In fact, I imagine that if he did remember Xander as having two eyes, and he sees him with an eyepatch, he would react to it in some way, right?

In conclusion, although I like the theory, I don’t think it’s very likely that David’s kept any memories from HPA time.

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Anyways, back to my speculation. There is relatively little reference to Mai in the MV, so it's not like we can get much here, but there is still one thing I want to talk about. And that's the morse code at the end of the MV. As translated by dav-suburbiia:

“YOU STILL BELIEVED IN ME DESPITE EVERYTHING I’VE DONE.” “BUT THAT’S JUST FANTASY, ISN’T IT?” “I SIMPLY CHOSE TO BELIEVE THAT YOU DID.” “AFTER ALL, I’M INCAPABLE OF BEING SOMEONE WITHOUT YOU.”

Now, most people assume this is about Xander, which is perfectly understandable seeing the context of the MV. However, I think there's an argument to be made that this is actually about Mai.

The main thing here is the apparent contradiction which rises if we assume this is about Xander. The "you" in this code knows what David "has done", but they also seemingly aren't around anymore. If we assume the first is referring to David's "manipulation" thing, then this would have to be about HPA Xanvid, since we've never heard of David confessing his issues to killing game Xander. However, if the "you" really isn't around anymore, this would have to be for killing game Xanvid, since Xander only died in the killing game. Am I making sense?

This isn't conclusive, mind you. You could say the code never explicitly says the "you" is actually gone, just that David can't be someone without them. Or, alternatively, that David did reveal "everything [he's] done" during the killing gmae. But it's still an odd way to phrase all this.

So, is there any evidence this is actually about Mai instead? Well, if you squint. The code is directly followed by footnote 22: "The rest is silence". Silence is the dislike stated in Mai's profile. Word association coming in clutch.

But perhaps more interesting is the phrase "You still believed in me despite everything I've done", combined with:

David: She forgives everyone.

The "you" in the code forgave David, and Mai evidently forgave him as well. It's not conclusive either, but it could be a connection.

Under the interpretation that this is about Mai, it would be related to HPA time. Mai still believed in David, or at least, at one point David believed Mai believed in him, and apparently gave him a purpose in life.

The worrying part about this code is actually the middle. "But that's just fantasy, isn't it? I simply chose to believe that you did". Apparently, it's possible Mai never actually trusted or forgave David, another reason I believe it's possible this isn't actually talking about Xander. As established, Mai can be deceptive when she wants, so it could work. We're missing a lot of information, so what exactly this all would mean is up in the air.

But in any case, it's possible that if David was given purpose by Mai or Xander, he would be involved in the HPA Operation, though how exactly is obviously impossible to know. I know this is really weak, but...

Okay, can we talk about Tally 5 yet? I kinda have to talk about Tally 5. Don't worry, I won't actually post the image.

!!!TALLY 5 SPOILERS (NO IMAGE)!!! SCROLL IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ ABOUT THE CONTENTS OF TALLY 5!!!

If you've been living under a rock under the past month or so, Tally 5 refers to an image you get to by solving a code related to the "correct/incorrect" code in the David MV and inputting it into a webpage accessed via the QR Code in the MV's books. I won't talk about the puzzle itself here, so if you want to solve it, maybe go do that or just scroll past this part of the post.

Anyways, as I imagine you know by now, Tally 5 shows David holding Xander's jacket with the following quotes under it:

I became a villain in pursuit of your dream.

I threw away my humanity for an ideal that I couldn't understand.

But I don't regret it. To "regret" is to imply that I could have done anything else.

I never told you, but the truth is, I wasn't capable of ever becoming human in the first place.

So in the end, you're always-

Listen, I'm not gonna pretend I have some sort of infallible exaplanation of what this means. I have several theories about it, and to give you an idea of how insane it is, one of my theories involves quote 3, the one about regret, being said by MonoTV. Don't ask. I might have to do a completely different post about all this, but I'm sorta waiting until I can read some other peoples' thoughts about it.

But for the purposes of this post, this, to me, heavily implies David was involved in the HPA Operation. He's probably talking about Xander here, and Xander's dream would be the HPA Operation, since as I said, it may have been his idea in the first place. That's the ideal David can't understand: an ideal to change a world David sees as immutable.

Now, the lone jacket would imply this isn't the case. It would seem David is saying this in the killing game, after Xander's death, as holding his jacket seems to imply he's gone. However, I don't know what the dream would be in that case. Killing Teruko? It's possible, but I find that unlikely.

So, yeah. Combined with the morse code, here's a full interpretation of what this could mean in relation to Mai:

Mai or Xander somehow learnt of David's true feelings and the way he sees his own actions. She/he forgave him, or at least pretended to forgive him, and this gave David hope. Mai/Xander then introduced David to the HPA Operation, and asked him to do something which would turn him into a villain, asking him to throw away his humanity for an ideal he couldn't understand. What exactly that would be is obviously impossible to know. David accepts, and even when the plan fell through, he doesn't regret doing what he did, because he feels he couldn't have done anything else.

Am I confident in this interpretation? Not really, but it's a plausible interpretation which is related to Mai and the HPA Operation, so I wanted to bring it up. There's a lot there which is probably wrong, but it's what I have for now.

!!!TALLY 5 SPOILERS OVER!!! YOU CAN START READING AGAIN IF YOU WERE AVOIDING THEM!!!

And with that, we’re officially done with the MV! I mean, I may reference it later, but now the bulk of it is gone. Surely this means we can get to some lighter theorizing and-

Teruko Tawaki

Yeah, we gotta talk about the other elephant in the room. Mai and Teruko are clearly connected in an important way.

The first thing to note with them is that they’re generally set up as opposites. Of course, the most straightforward thing is the “dearly loved/dearly unloved” portraits in the MV, but it goes much deeper. Also in the MV, Teruko’s numeral appears right after Mai’s, if that counts for anything.

Another thing is their color scheme. Teruko is mainly associated with green, while Mai is mainly associated with red. And these colors are complimentary; they’re opposite in the color wheel. Not to mention, taking Teruko’s redesign into account, one could associate her with black and Mai, thanks to her uniform and the white camellias, to white. In particular, it’s notable white camellias actually have a white flower, but a black stem. They’re even the same height, at 5’8”! It’s so they can kiss each other in the lips more easily

Additionally, their attitudes from what we’re seeing are also opposite. Mai “forgives everyone”, which means she’s really trusting, while Teruko is (for now) very distrustful. That one’s a bit looser, but eh. May I even go so far, as to say that right now, Teruko represents despair while Mai represents hope? Alright, now I’m reaching, but it fits. Teruko is someone resigned to her horrible fate (luck), while Mai constantly fought for a better world. In fact, Xander, someone Teruko associates with Mai, calls our protag out on her hopeless view of fate… right before stabbing her.

Hell, practically all good things said about Mai? Not true of Teruko (at the moment).

Charles: A girl who loves her family.

Teruko’s an orphan, and doesn’t remember her brother.

Rose: She remembers everything that is important to others.

Well, you could consider people’s faces something important to them, but Teruko has prosopagnosia.

Arturo: A girl who sees the beauty in everyone.

If you watched chapter 2, you know this isn’t true of Teruko.

Honestly, I could keep going like this, but I feel you get the point. There’s no reason for me to dwell on this further when you can just read the quotes and figure out how Teruko isn’t described by most of them.

Well, one possible exception is Levi.

Levi: A girl with a floral tattoo on her arm.

Yeah, time to talk about this theory.

Theory I Absolutely Believe: Teruko and Mai are Tattoo ‘Bud’dies

(Get it? Because flowers and buds- Yeah, no)

So shoutout to cider-est for first pointing this out in this post, but it’s true. Teruko’s left arm is always fully covered, either by bandages or by her jacket sleeve. Which is especially odd, considering her right jacket sleeve is always rolled up.

And it’s especially odd, because her left arm is covered even in the jacket-off reference picture.

And yes, there is a suspicious question mark next to Teruko’s left arm. It ain’t even subtle.

But if there’s still any doubt left in your mind, let skulemojee dispel it in this post, where they point out this image from Ch 2 Ep 2:

Yep, you’re seeing that right. Those black lines on Teruko’s left arm look a suspicious lot like the stems of Mai’s tattoo. It's not perfect, since we can't see any flowers and that may just be scars, but we never get a good enough look at the back of Mai's left arm to know if the flowers are tattooed on the forearm, or if only the stems reach that far.

(Also, Teruko in this scene says she doesn’t remember that scar in her back. Part of me thinks it’s related to Mai and the time of the missing memories, but the more rational side of me tells me I need to chill and stop seeing Mai everywhere)

It's also worth noting this would explain the choice of camellias for the tattoo. Remember, although they represent death in Japan, they mainly represent platonic adoration and respect. A very pretty thing to get matching tattoos with your bestie. But since they're not colored they could be interpreted as red and thus romantic for the shippers

So, yeah. I believe they share a tattoo. Which gives a whole lot of context to the quote.

Teruko: Some years ago, she was looking for someone named 'Teruko Tawaki'

In case it wasn’t clear before with the way Mai smiled at Teruko in that dream sequence, or the way Teruko associated Xander with Mai before she got stabbed by him, the fact they possibly share a tattoo implies they knew each other for a while and had a good relationship with each other. Another indication is that Teruko's favorite color, in the latest Q&A, is stated to be red by association. Sorry Xanruko shippers, that's clearly about Mai, since Teruko associates Xander with Mai in the first place.

What exactly the timeline of this mess is, is... complicated if the tattoo thing is true. Because that would require Teruko and Mai to have gotten the tattoo when at least Teruko was 18, both in Japan and the US. In some states of the US, she would be able to get it at a younger age if she got parental consent, but... what parents? She's an orphan.

In fact, when does that dream sequence take place? Is it Hope's Peak time? Can't be, because Teruko wouldn't remember it. Actually, why doesn't Teruko remember Mai's name is Mai had been searching for her for a while?

Yeah, I can't pin down anything specific about their relationship. Obviously I can't, this is a big mystery and we're only in Chapter 2. The best I can give you is that their relationship was clearly very positive, even before HPA.

...

Which is what makes this line so weird.

Mai: Hang on, "real Ultimate talent?" You're the Ultimate Student! I mean, it's not like you're a "Lucky Student" who was picked by lottery.

This line is really odd, isn't it? It seems uncharacteristically mean for Mai, to dismiss someone else's talent so readily. And Teruko's in particular, when again, they clearly liked each other well enough before HPA. This almost reads more like something Mai would say about herself rather than someone else...

Huh.

Theory: Mai, the Second Ultimate Lucky Student

As established before, Mai has a slight self-depricative streak, where she says things about herself she would never say about one of her friends. So, the fact she's so quick to dismiss the Ultimate Lucky Student as a concept could imply she is the Ultimate Lucky Student. (ULS)

Of course, the first question is how this would work with Teruko. A HPA class only has one ULS, and Teruko's there. I've seen others suggest perhaps Mai was the ULS at Japan's HPA, which is apparently still a high school, so it's possible for her to go there and then go to US HPA, which is more like college.

However, I actually think there's an easier explanation. Mai and Teruko both went to US' HPA at the same time. They just went to different ones.

Mai: The US Hope's Peak Academy takes in college-age students, and there's two of them, and we have this really weird curriculum, and there's a bunch of other things, and...

Yeah! Did you forget there's two HPAs in the US?! Because I sure did! I swear, I rewatched that Bonus Episode like 5 times before I caught that. How does this thing keep spawning in information?

I believe this is why Min specifically calls their class East Class 27. Seeing as this is in the US, I imagine there's likely an East Coast HPA and a West Coast HPA. But what would be the point of splitting the school like this? There's no reason the dev couldn't just keep them as just one HPA... unless there's a reason.

Because with two classes of the same age, there has to be two ULS of the same age.

Now, of course, it's possible West Class 27 is completely irrelevant to the story, but if you assume Mai is East Class 27's ULS and Teruko went to west coast HPA, a lot of things start to make sense. Have you ever wondered how Mai could have been in the same class as everyone else, when HPA usually only have 16 students? Well, it's because one (or more, possibly) just went to another class.

This also explains why we have to get this particular detail from a Bonus Episode. Although all the characters have talked about going to HPA, no one ever mentions which HPA they were invited to. It seems like a weirdly specific detail to omit, unless there’s a reason for it. Because if most of them were part of East Coast HPA, and one of them wasn’t, it would immediately stand out as strange to the cast.

And Mai does have some connections to luck. I mean, of course she does, her story is closelly intertwined with Teruko. For example, remember her birthday? February 1st? I told it'd be relevant, right? Well, as pointed out by fuji-iri in this post, on that day, there's 333 days left of the year. 3 is a number associated with bad luck, but there's also associations to "parting ways" and the three stages of life (birth-marriage apparently-death), again explained in the post I linked. That works with Mai and Teruko splitting up... whenever that happened, as well as Mai possbly dying, but the luck thing in particular is notable.

Now, the main reason I believed this before was just that "it's not like you're a 'Lucky Student' line", but as I researched this, I may have found something else? Except, it may just be me being horrible at code and getting really confused. If anyone can confirm or deny this, it'd be great.

Here's what happened. I noticed that when you look up Mai's name in Google, the text under the link to her page had Teruko's hidden quote: "It is an equal failing to trust everybody, and to trust no one at all." So I went into the code again.

First, I right-clicked on the title (Mai's name) and clicked "inspect". I expanded the "<head>" section (God I'm bad at this), and found this under <meta name>.

meta name="descripttion" content="Mai Akasaki Ultimate ??? "There's a way for you to be happy." It is an equal failing to trust everybody, and to trust no one at all. The protagonist. Despite having the Ultimate title of "Lucky..."

Now, at first, I assumed this was just a coding quirk where for some reason, I was seeing the text of the next character or something.

But, I checked some the other characters, and none of the ones I checked have the same style of text. Look, I'll transcribe some.

Teruko:

meta name="descripttion" content="Teruko Tawaki Ultimate Lucky Student “I will survive this, no matter what!” The protagonist. Despite having the Ultimate title of “Lucky Student,” it seems like the only luck Teruko has is bad luck..."

Xander:

meta name="descripttion" content="Xander Matthews Ultimate Rebel “Screw the rules!” Loud in both voice and personality, Alexander “Xander” Matthews earned the title of Ultimate Rebel through his consistent tendency to go against the..."

MonoTV:

meta name="descripttion" content="MonoTV “Ultimate TV Show Host” “I’m the most beloved character in the cast!” A strange robot with a television for a head. MonoTV claims to be the “Ultimate TV Show Host” who is in charge of an..."

I also checked Veronika, Whit and Nico, but didn't check any more since the pattern's easy to see.

As you can see, usually this section of the code just has the name, the subtitle quote, and part of the body text. None of them have the secret quote, unlike Mai's, which has the quote which is supposed to be Teruko's. But Teruko's name or subtitle quote is never brought up in Mai's "meta name" thing.

Again, maybe I'm missing something, but it really looks like that is meant to be some kind of description of Mai.

It sort of fits. Teruko's quote about trust can fit Mai, hell, is completed by Mai. Teruko usually shows the failing of trusting no one, but Mai may be meant to show the failing of trusting everybody. Mai is also important enough that calling her "the protagonist" is fitting enough.

And, if that really is about Mai, then the final portion is confirmation. "Despite having the Ultimate title of "Lucky..." If this is about Mai, then Mai is unequivocally an ULS.

Again, I don't consider this conclusive because I am an idiot and could very easily be wrong. The wording is exactly the same's as Teruko's, so again, it may be a coding oddity. But with all the other stuff I mentioned, I can at least say this is the theory for Mai's talent I believe the most: She's East Class 27's ULS, while Teruko went to West Coast HPA as their ULS.

Anyways, anything else about Teruko? Oh, yeah, a final sub-theory on her.

Sub-Theory: Shot Through the Heart, Teruko's to Blame

Take a look at the 2nd Anniversary picture.

[The three frames of the 2 year anniversary "video"]

Okay, I know you can't see shit here, but I'm running out of the 30 image limit. Check out lacunasweven's post where she discovered this (to my knowledge), and stfu-sage's reblog where he solved the code.

When solved, that code translates to “It’s all your fault”, which you may remember as MonoTV’s line about Mai.

So, Teruko reaches out for Mai, then “it’s all your fault” appears for a frame or two, and then suddenly Mai’s gone. It’s not exactly hard to imagine that this means Teruko is at fault for Mai’s death, or at least whatever consequences the HPA Operation had. How exactly is impossible to know, because again, it’s a mystery we’re not meant to solve yet. I have a gut feeling it’s probably related to Teruko’s luck, but that’s all it is, a gut feeling.

This doesn’t conflict the “Xander’s at fault” idea, if you’re curious. It’s possible for multiple people to consider themselves at fault for Mai’s death. Xander for bringing her into the HPA Operation, Teruko for her luck or whatever else happened.

Although… yeah, we gotta talk about that right? The scene before the prologue.

I can’t say anything definitive, because again, not something we’re meant to figure out at the moment. But I can tell you what I think.

First, the PoV character is probably Xander. There’s a bloody fork there, and while I’m not the one who came up with the idea, (see: anderscim's post about this) that’s likely the weapon which was used to take out his eye. His wounds do look suspiciously fork-like, though I struggle to explain it without images, and I’m already stretching thin to make the image limit. I’ll have to ask you to look it up yourself.

Anyways, that may be Xander, and this may be the incident where Xander lost his eye. The reason I’m bringing it up is that, since Xander is involved, there’s a chance this is somehow related to the HPA Operation. Here’s a full transcript of what’s said:

... Fuck!! Fuck, fuck, fuck, this really hurts... Ouch... I really wasn't expecting her to attack me like that. I made a massive mistake to trust them. I can't rely on anyone. All by myself... I have to end the killing game. And even if I can't do that... I have to kill Teruko Tawaki. No matter what.

So, a woman attacked Xander unexpectedly, managed to overpower him and stab his eyes out with a fork, then presumably ran away. And this all seemingly happened in some form of killing game. And Xander already wanted to kill Teruko.

I doubt Teruko was the one who attacked Xander. Because Xander calls her out by name at the end, and also because, how would Teruko be able to overpower Xander? Unless you “divine luck” your way into an explanation, I just don’t see it. In any case, it’s probably a different woman. Without knowing anything about the previous killing game, we can’t know much about this situation.

However, the fact that Xander already wanted to kill Teruko here is notable because it seems to imply this killing game happened after Mai's death. After all, Mai and Teruko had a good relationship, right? So Xander wouldn't have a grudge against her until after the HPA Operation fell through. The final conclusion here is that Teruko somehow caused Mai's death, which somehow led to the pre-series killing game. I think? Obviously, it's impossible to say anything conclusive here, and I don't even know what exactly the connection would be between Mai's death and the previous killing game.

And with that, we finish discussion of Teruko.

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Quick Side Note: The Mai-stermind Theory

I’m not funny.

So, in case it isn’t clear yet by the fact I keep assuming she's dead, I don’t think Mai is the mastermind of the killing game. I’m aware it’s a possibility, seeing as she’s very mysterious and all that, but frankly, I just have never seen anyone seriously bring up this possibility, since there’s essentially no evidence. It’s also important to note, even if she is a mastermind, she can’t be the only mastermind, since we know one of the participants of the killing game is a mastermind as well.

To be fair, I did notice some connections to MonoTV while researching. Like I mentioned at one point, they’re the only characters without any highlighted words in their subtitle quotes. And the secret quote in MonoTV’s page is “Her name is Mai Akasaki”, but frankly that feels a bit too… unsubtle. Also... no, actually that’s kinda it.

I’ve also seen some people attribute the “teacher” speech to Mai, but I really don’t think that’s her. If you don’t know what I’m talking about, it’s the text in the code of the About page for DRDT on Tumblr. Here’s a post about it by delightfullydiscordant. I won't go into their theory on it, since it's unrelated to Mai. As you'll see, there’s nothing intrinsically relating the speech to our girl, and nothing in the text suggest she’s the one speaking, so I don’t think it’s related.

With what we know of Mai, I don’t think it makes sense to call her the mastermind. I’m only bringing it up now to be thorough, and because I didn’t know where else to put it :v

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Other Characters, Miscellaneous Connections

Essentially just me talking about all the characters I haven’t covered yet, to see if any of them could have a connection to Mai or the HPA Operation than what may seem at first.

Already talked about: Xander, Teruko, David

No Evidence of Connection Beyond ‘Classmates’: Rose, Arturo, Levi, Hu, Nico, Ace, Arei, Min

What this means is that while it’s technically possible these characters are related to Mai and the HPA Operation, right now we don’t have any indication of it. Sorry. That doesn’t mean I don’t have things to say about them.

Arturo is usually so mean that, honestly, the fact he says anything positive about Mai at all makes me wonder if he may actually be related. Reminds me a bit of David’s quote, I guess. But maybe I’m just biased because I want this guy to be plot-relevant.

I guess Levi mentioning the tattoo in his line could be important, but unless he has the tattoo too (which is possible I guess, but I don’t quite see it), I don’t know what it could mean.

I could actually see Hu’s and Ace’s lines implying a connection to the HPA Operation, honestly. Seeing as they’re some of the only people who actually talk about her in the past tense, I think it’s possible they were involved. Hu would want to help Mai if she felt she “wanted to keep everyone safe”, for what it’s worth. I sorta hope Hu is plot-relevant too.

Even if Mai is talking to Arei in her current subtitle quote, I don’t see much evidence Arei would be involved in the HPA Operation.

You may be wondering about my old theory about the Sleepy MV and how it could tie back to Mai, and while I still think it's a possibility, I frankly don't believe it anymore. It requires a very specific reading of the song which I don't think is entirely accurate, and there isn't actually much connecting the MV to Mai. I still think Min's line being so overly insistent on Mai being "an average girl with nothing special at all about her" could imply their relationship may have broken down because of the HPA Operation, which makes sense. If Xander engineered the plan, obviously Min will dislike it on principle. But that's probably me trying to make Min more plot relevant than she actually is.

Only Connected via “Original Killing Game” Theory: Charles, J, possibly Ace and Arei

What the hell am I talking about? In the Color Theory reblog I mentioned earlier, I described a wild theory that quite a few of the characters we know were actually involved in that pre-prologue killing game, and we can learn who those characters are thanks to the word "original". Sound insane? It is. I won't go over the reasoning here, I'll ask you check the reblog I linked.

This is the "Original Killing Game" Theory, and it's one of the most far-fetched theories I've ever enginereed. But since it's sorta connected, I thought I'd mention it. The characters involved are Charles, Veronika or Ace, David, Teruko, J/Arei, Xander, MonoTV, Whit. I’ve already talked about some of these, and don’t think MonoTV is worth talking about, frankly.

So, why am I only bringing up Charles and J for now, as well as potentially Ace and Arei since they could actually be part of the theory depending on how you interpret the colors? Well, these are the only ones in the “original killing game” theory who I don’t think have any evidence of being connected with Mai any further. Since that theory is already insane to start with, and it’s possible Mai was already dead when that killing game started, I don’t think it tells us anything.

Although sometimes I wonder if J’s quote is talking about something other than Mariabella, but at the moment, I have no clue what that would be. So that’s still the likeliest possibility.

Eden: Eden

Eden, huh? In case you haven’t noticed, I’ve been sorta dancing around Eden’s line a bit, because… like, what in the actual fuck does it mean.

Eden: She kept calling the number, even though no one picked it up.

It’s such an odd line. It’s nothing like the other ones, which you’d think would make it significant, but it’s just… cryptic. I’m sorry, but while I think this probably means something, I don’t have a good answer of what it could be.

… Well, there is the one thing.

——————————————————————————————————

Crack Theory: Mai the Girl Kisser

This theory states that Mai is the girl mentioned in Eden’s secret, the one the Clockmaker kissed.

See? Theorizing’s easy! Just grab a random character we don’t know anything about, and slap Mai on top of it like a bandaid!

I’m aware the dev has sorta poked fun at people like me who see an unknown face and instantly jump on Mai, but at least this one has a bit more reasoning. Mainly, that I just don’t know what else Eden’s quote could be referring to.

Consider this concept: Eden and Mai kiss at some indeterminate point before HP, and Eden freaks out. She gets extremely worried about how Mai’s going to react, and she runs away. Mai tries to contact her afterwards, but Eden was avoiding her. Still, “[Mai] kept calling the number, even though no one picked it up”.

Is this essentially just fanfiction at this point? Practically, yeah, but I have nothing else.

On the insane off-chance this is true, it would come with certain implications. It would mean Eden and Mai had met before going to HPA, which is… uh, something. If it helps, that would mean their relationship would have a “new beginning” at HPA, and Eden’s character has some themes of new beginnings. Her birthday is on December 31st, so New Years, and her favorite color is daffodil yellow, when daffodils represent new beginnings. It’s small, but it’s there.

(And if you know who I am, you know I believe Eden killed Arei to reunite with the girl of her secret (long story). Mai helps here because of course she would have enough rizz to make a good girl go bad, have you seen how everyone talks about her? She would get all the bitches!)

Anyways, again, this is extremely silly, but it’s sort of the only thing I can think of for Eden’s line, so for now, have it. If anyone’s got better ideas, I’m more than open to hear them.

——————————————————————————————————

A Connection is More Plausible: Veronika, Whit

In no particular order, these are the characters, apart from Xander and Teruko and David, which I think have an actual chance of being involved with Mai and the HPA based on what we know so far. Let’s go a bit more in depth.

Veronika’s Peculiar Problem of Popping Up Fucking Everywhere

It is insane how many times I’ve brought up Veronika in this post without being able to pinpoint why exactly she keeps appearing. She shares the color red with Xander and Mai in my version of Color Theory, though admittedly that may just be her hair. She’s in the “original killing game” under that theory. Hell, she’ll show up again when I talk about Whit.

But by far, the most concerning thing about her is her line in the Mai page.

Veronika: A girl who didn’t foresee the consequences.

I’ve mentioned this line before, of course, because it’s clearly related to the HPA Operation’s fallout. In fact, it’s the only line apart from Xander’s and MonoTV’s which explicitly reference it. This could easily imply she was involved somehow, either as someone helping Mai and Xander, or actually going against them in some way. Whatever is more entertaining for her, I imagine.

There are two issues with this. One, I cannot discount the possibility that Veronika got that creepy and ominous line because she’s the creepy and ominous character, and it doesn’t actually mean anything for Veronika herself. It’s a very real possibility.

Two, even if she is involved, there’s nothing we have which could help narrow down what she did. Again, she’s too unpredictable.

In other words, while I’m putting Veronika here with the vague idea that she could be connected to it all, I don’t have any concrete theories.

Though maybe I should address the one Veronika-Mai theory which exists, for the sake of completion.

——————————————————————————————————

Crack Theory: Veronika Is Mai

To be clear, I don’t believe this. It’s pretty clear to me that Veronika is her own character with her own backstory. But I still want to point out some connections to show you how insane I’m going writing this.

+They’re both the same height (5’8”) and have long red hair. This is enough for my prosopagnosic ass to confuse them if they change hairstyle. Their weights and birthdays are different, but weight can change and birthdays can be lied about. Their chest sizes are different, though, so I’m pretty sure that rules out this theory already.

+Speaking of birthdays, August 7th, Veronika’s birthday, happens to be 7 months away from Teruko’s birthday on January 7th. 7? Lucky number. Lucky Student. Word association -> Mai.

+Veronika covers both her arms, so no tattoo would be visible.

+Veronika asks Teruko if she would recognize her were she to wear contacts, a wig and different clothes. This could imply she is, and would therefore be Mai.

+Her pose in the character profiles is vaguely similar to Mai’s, but flipped. This is interesting because no other character’s pose is even close.

+She wears a small earring given to her by someone named “Alyssa Belyaeva”. This by itself means nothing, but the earring is a small green triangle she considers a good luck charm. Luck?! And triangles have three sides. 3?! That number we said was unlucky and related to Mai before? And green. Green?! Teruko! Auasfruryg- <- short-circuiting from thinking too much.

+Veronika has plain brown eyes. Come on, have you seen this cast’s eyes? Those are absolutely contacts.

+Her hidden quote about people being broken could refer to the hopeful Mai being broken into Veronika as a result of the HPA Operation’s consequences.

Yeah, most of this is pretty silly, but again, I don’t think this theory is very likely, so I’m just poking fun at how suspicious Veronika can be at times.

——————————————————————————————————

Whit and Tetraphobia

At first, it doesn't really seem like Whit is too involved in this. I mean, his quote is pretty inoffensive:

Whit: A girl with many friends.

And sure, he is the Original Killing Game Theory, but even if that's somehow true, it's no guarantee he's involved in the HPA Operation or anything. Nothing really seems to connect him to Mai...

Except the one thing.

XV. Remaining ignorant, isn't that "happiness"¹⁵?

XV is Whit's Roman numeral, and again it isn't too strange on its own. Other than being the only numeral to ever show up alongside another numeral, in this case Veronika's because of course it's Veronika's.

The issue is the background text. It's hard to see, but there's faint pink text saying "subtract 4, due to tetraphobia⁴". Footnote 4 simply defines tetraphobia, which is the practice of avoiding the number 4, as it's considered a number related to death, and is seen as unlucky. Of course, the fours themselves are colored green for Teruko, presumably.

But the important part is, what does this mean? The most straightforward idea is to subtract four from the numerals on screen, or perhaps the footnote?

For the footnote: Subtracting 15 - 4 = 11, quick math, and that's the footnote which talks about being an only child and that (presumably) Diana Chiem never existed. I... don't think that makes too much sense for this scene, frankly.

For Veronika's numeral, subtracting XIV (14) - 4 = 10. That's Min's numeral, which shows up in the part of the MV most directly tied to class trials. This could simply imply she enjoys the trials and the bloodshed, and it also looks somewhat mastermind-y, but that's not really new for Veronika. You could also do this one more literally, taking out 4 from 14 and ending up with 1, connecting her to Xander, and at this point I'm not surprised.

But, of course. The tetraphobia line only shows up when Whit's numeral does, and it's colored in the pink associated to him via Color Theory, though of course, being background text, the tetraphobia line isn't actually included in that theory. That would seem to imply it's about him, right?

Well, in the same vein as before, if you subtract XV (15) - 4 = 11 (XI). And... that's Mai's numeral, attached to the line "God is dead". So, uh-

Sub-Theory: Shot Through the Heart, Whit's to Blame

The idea that maybe Whit was somehow involved in Mai's death. By the end of the series, I'm gonna end up blaming half the cast for this, apparently.

So, the tetraphobia thing is the most straightforward piece of evidence towards this possibility, but there's a bit more. For one, in the recent Q&A, it was stated that Whit's least favorite color is gray because it's boring, and that's the color of Mai's numeral. Remember how I pointed out it's actually one of the only numerals to be colored? Yeah.

Furthermore, Whit's numeral appears right before Mai's, but that may just be the way the song works out, since LGI wasn't made for DRDT. However, remember that "become brainwashed: go do it!" line I said was directly after Mai's numeral? Yeah, the word brainwashed is color coded pink, connecting it to Whit via Color Theory. And, if that wasn't enough, in the section for footnote five, the one with the Japanese characters? The word blood shows up, in pink, as the song speaks about revolutionaries. Yes, DR blood is pink usually, but there is red blood in the MV (near the snake), and the characters canonically see it as dark red (since that's the stated reason why dark red is Xander's and Charles' least favorite color). My point is, the dev could have made the blood red there, and/or just written the symbol for blood in red, but since it's pink, Color Theory ends up connecting it to Whit.

All of this could point to Whit as another culprit of Mai's death, but don't jump to conclusions. For one, since we have no clue about the circumstances, perhaps he only accidentally caused the death. We've seen that Teruko is also likely to blame in some way, probably in a similar fashion. And because it may have been accidental, this also doesn't mean Whit has to be the mastermind. It makes him look oddly suspicious, sure, but nothing too damning.

And of course, there's a huge chance I'm reading too much into things. There are other explanations for brainwashed and blood, and it's still totally possible that the tetraphobia thing refers to Veronika or even the footnote.

A Summary of Her Story, So Far

To end things off, I'll go over everything I've concluded with what we know so far, though of course I know we're missing a lot, and that a ton of this is also probably wrong. Here's how this is going to work.

Regular text means this is something we pretty much know for sure.

Italics means it's a theory I'm quite convinced of.

[Brackets mean I'm relatively unsure about something]

*Asterisks mean the theory is insanely unlikely, and it can probably just be assumed false*

{Braces are for flavor text, you can ignore this for theorizing purposes}

Closing Argument

>Mai was born February 1st, 20--, to a nice family she loved. We know little about her childhood, but [it's possible she was friends with or somehow got interested in a girl named Teruko Tawaki. However, fate kept them apart for years]. But Mai was not easily deterred, she would search for and find Teruko, no matter what.

>*As she searched for Teruko Tawaki, she met a girl named Eden Tobisa. They kissed, but Eden freaked out and ran away. Mai tried contacting her, she kept calling the number, even though no one picked it up.*

>At some point before Hope's Peak, her and Teruko reunited. *Even when Teruko couldn't recognize her and even struggled to remember her name*, Mai still remembered everything that was important for Teruko, as she always did.

>Mai and Teruko, loving each other so much, decided to get matching floral tattos on their arms. White camellias, a symbol of adoration and respect.

>{But fate really didn't like to see them together.} Soon, Teruko received a letter, teling her she was chosen as the Ultimate Lucky Student of Hope's Peak's [West Class 27]. This was uncharacteristically good luck for Teruko, who before had to hop around schools, always stealing uniforms, just to get an education.

>{The problem?} At the same time, Mai received a letter that she was invited to join Hope's Peak's East Class 27 as their Ultimate Lucky Student, on the other side of the country. Mai never really cared much about Ultimates or Hope's Peak, {but Teruko insisted it was too good of an opportunity for either of them to pass up. They decided to keep in contact,} as Mai headed to East Coast Hope's Peak.

>Alexander Matthews is scouted as the Ultimate Rebel. David Chiem is scouted as the Ultimate Inspirational Speaker.

>At Hope's Peak, despite being an average girl with nothing special at all about her, she quickly became a girl with many friends. She saw the beauty in everyone, and everyone agreed she had a bright future. Everyone confided in her, J even telling her about her mother, something which Mai kept secret, and told no one.

(Okay, maybe fitting in all the quotes isn't as easy as I hoped it'd be)

>*She even reunited with Eden, and they decided their relationship would have a new beginning*.

>However, she also met a very interesting boy: Xander Matthews. He had gone to Hope's Peak with one goal in mind: revolution. He confided in her, as they all did, his issues with Hope's Peak and the system it was built upon. Mai was revolted by the truth, and asked what she could do to help. She couldn't stand to do nothing. She wanted to keep everyone safe.

>With that, the HPA Operation started.

>They started small; stealing a few documents here and there. [But their plans grew bolder over time.]

>[Along the way, they discovered something shocking]. David, who always spoke of change and hope, was hiding his true feelings. He didn't see himself as human, not being able to relate to his peers as the others did. He saw himself as a manipulative bastard for lying to all the people he gave speeches to. He hated himself, and expected Mai and Xander to hate him, too.

>[But they didn't. Xander still saw the best in him, and Mai? Well, Mai forgives everyone. And to make him see the good in himself, they asked him to help in the HPA Operation]

>He didn't understand it, not really. The world wouldn't change, no matter what Mai and Xander told him. But even though he didn't understand, he still wanted to help them.

>As the popular Ultimate Inspirational Speaker, David had more connections and influence than a simple Rebel or Lucky Student. That meant he could offer things to the Operation the other two couldn't, even if it was through... less than moral means. But to David, that was no object. He would become a villain in pursuit of their dream, throw away his humanity for this ideal. It's not like he could have ever been human, anyways.

>*Not everyone was as receptive, though. Min in particular, after finding out about the plan somehow, got quite angry with Xander and Mai. It wasn't unusual for the Student and the Rebel to disagree, but Mai still didn't like it when her friends fought*

>Mai knew it was risky, she really did. But nothing could prepare her for what was about to happen. She didn't foresee the consequences.

>[When Teruko was visiting], the HPA Operation faced a huge issue. A plan gone wrong, a variable miscalculated. And, with Teruko to blame, [and possibly Whit] *and Veronika, who got dragged into this mess at some point*, Mai died.

>{Chaos ensued. Mai's death broke the class, reverberating through the students like the rumbling of a fallen god's corpse. "It's all your fault!" Xander screamed at Teruko,} hiding that he felt responsible for her death as well. After all, he was the one who had dragged her along. And now, he was once again left alive to mourn a death he himself narrowly avoided. Talk about survivor's guilt.

>[One thing led to another, and a killing game was set up]. Xander and Teruko got stuck in it, with Xander losing his eye as he tried everything he could to end the game, or at least kill Teruko. *Charles, Veronika/Ace, David, J/Arei and Whit might have also present in this killing game, ran by MonoTV.*

>More stuff happened, and finally, the students all lost their memories and wound up in the killing game we follow throuhout the series.

>A shattered dream, a tragic fate, a broken hope. Though mystery continues to shroud her existence and her role in the story, for now, this is my final conclusion on the story of: Mai Akasaki, the Ultimate ???

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Holy hell this was pain to write. I don't want to make another post this complicated for a while. Jesus. This broke my soul.

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed my insane ramblings, if you really were strong enough to put up with my madness for this long. I still want to hear any thoughts you may have, since this character is really interesting and cool and fun to theorize about.

But for now, I leave. Thanks for reading! If you made it this far, then just know, Mai would be proud of you! And you should know, because you should practically be a scholar on her by now. Take care!

#drdt #danganronpa despair time #fanganronpa #mai akasaki #drdt theory #xander matthews #drdt xander #david chiem #drdt mv #teruko tawaki #i am so tired

[mythserene]

AKOM “Fine Tuning,” Episode 6: A prolonged jealousy

Another really excellent episode that I will have to listen to at least two more times to fully ingest, despite having lots of diffuse, unconnected notes where I ranted about most of the same text. They really backed up and gave it context and meaning, including adding a lot of things that I didn’t have and making sense of some of the extras that I did. It was both satisfying and frustrating: more satisfying than I expected, and my frustration feels more coherent and focused now.

I definitely think it’s one of the most important episodes.

There is only one point I would add, and that is just that when you listen to the episode it’s important to realize that Paul’s “jealousy” is the most egregiously non-sourced. There are basically two quotes that Mark Lewisohn uses to support this entire theme. The theme which he so beats into the ground that even if you don’t look at the footnotes it feels excessive.

I’ve mentioned before that when I read “Tune In” I was still very, very new to Beatles’ history. A newborn without any of the historiographical context, no understanding of the long, strange, John-deifying background, and therefore I wasn’t on the lookout for it. And that’s important because I went into the book with implicit trust, loved the writing, and still it was evident to me, fairly quickly, that I was reading an opinion column.

It was the cigarettes that did it

Paul’s care with money was noted—Pete says that while they all passed their ciggies around, Paul would “sneak one of his own to himself”—and he was still needling everyone about the Bambi sleeping arrangements, made all the worse now because he was jealous of Pete getting the best girls.

The second time I read the book I remember thinking, “Surely not that many people spontaneously bitched about Paul being stingy with cigarettes.” And that was my tipoff.

There are two quotes in the book about Paul and cigarettes that appear to be organic—one being Pete’s “sneak one of his own” quote in this episode—but you’d think that half the people Lewisohn talked to about their memories of some of the most famous people ever, and certainly the most famous from Liverpool, just magically thought that one of the most important things about these four guys was that Paul was stingy with cigarettes. And there is just no way that that is true.

But I also know how this works, inside out. You get “an angle” as a reporter. You have a story you want to tell, and then you interview people with that story—that angle—in mind. You ask questions that you think will elicit the responses that back up your thesis. And then, on the other side of the process, you filter the quotes you choose (and don’t choose) that tell the story you want to tell. And to be fair, every reporter and historian does this to some extent. It may just be to organize ideas in a coherent way, or it may be to focus on a theme. But it has also notoriously been used by historians to warp the truth and further a broader historical lie. (A very good example of this and the one closest to me is “the Dunning School” of the US Civil War and Reconstruction, the first real and condensed story of that conflict that injected into US historiography many complete lies, including the especially insane one that after the Civil War the “Radical Republicans” inflicted pain and humiliation on the South, which despite being the exact opposite of the truth is still the story most Americans “know.”)

Mark Lewisohn had a story he wanted to tell, and I believe that story is most obvious in his “jealous Paul” theme because it’s based on nearly thin air and even then is so ludicrously overblown. But I think it was just too tempting a canvas for Lewisohn. Setting up a dead, pretty kid as a sort of saint that Paul persecuted does so much work for everything else he wants to say about Paul, especially in the upcoming books. Hamburg becomes a pressure cooker where Paul’s true colors come out, and if Lewisohn can use Stu—a sort of perfect near-blank slate who never had time to put any of his memories into context—as a foil to Paul and to paint Paul as petty and jealous and seething, then all the rest of his work is easy. Stu is a layup that paves the way to seeing Paul as a bad guy. The concrete dries and everything else falls into place.

And look, there just is no way to see this theme as organic, because it’s not. It just isn’t. It’s not based on quotes or stories. There are a few completely disconnected quotes stretched to breaking that he uses to try to prop all this nonsense up with, but there is simply no defense for even 90% of the primary usage of them, and certainly not of the whole, big-picture story he creates with them.

I’m going to give one example—and there are many—but I admit to liking this one best because it’s all there in one passage based on one quote that doesn’t say any of this.

Passage:

But, as much as Paul liked exhibiting versatility, he was unhappy—he felt he’d been lumbered, that his multi-instrumental ability was tying him down. Who looked at the drummer? By rights, his place was out front, especially with his new guitar. Here he was, paying off the Solid 7 at ten bob a week and hardly getting to play it. Jealousy of Stu was stoked: Paul was in the back line while he remained out front (even if he was hiding and in dark glasses). One thing was for certain: Paul wasn’t going to abandon singing.

The only citation for all that Maca-inhabited resentment is the brief Paul quote already in the text, (FN35) and the next footnote—FN36—is from George on a new topid. There is no citation whatsoever to support any of Lewisohn’s finely-sketched fantasies of Paul’s vanity and jealousy.

FOOTNOTE 35: “I was drumming with my hands, playing the hi-hat and bass drum with my feet and I had a broomstick stuck between my thighs on the end of which was a little microphone, and I’m singing ‘Tell me what’d I say …’ It wasn’t easy!”

*Note: This quote is also in the text right under the ‘lumbered Paul wanted to be out front’ passage, so in some ways it’s an even thinner spread, if that’s possible.

So, according to Lewisohn:

Paul liked “exhibiting versatility” (a whole lot because of the modifier “as much as”)

Paul was unhappy because he felt “lumbered”

He felt he was being punished because he was TOO TALENTED

BY RIGHTS his place was out FRONT

He wanted to be LOOKED AT!

Jealousy of Stu is grabbed from thin air, based on nothing, and “stoked” by Lewisohn.

because, again, Stu was out FRONT

Did you catch the point that Paul is CHEAP?

Again, all of that is cited to this:

“I was drumming with my hands, playing the hi-hat and bass drum with my feet and I had a broomstick stuck between my thighs on the end of which was a little microphone, and I’m singing ‘Tell me what’d I say …’ It wasn’t easy!”

There are at least two more things that I want to say but this is long enough so I will put them off. (Hopefully not for long.) ✌🏻

#the beatles #akom #beatles #fine tuning #tune in #paul mccartney #john lennon #lewisohn #jealous paul #cherry picking #mark lewisohn #Spotify

[komorezuki]

The statue as a CLUE and The Resurrectionist

Lets take a sip of cocoa again and rewatch the episode 3 again. I will not draw more attention to the suitcase and Bentley and so on, there are many metas about it. Lets talk about visitors and locations.

At first, what do we know about the graveyard:

Crowley knows this place (may be a fluke). Maybe he was going to tell Azi more if they weren't interrupted by Elspeth. And he insisted on a midnight that wasn't neccessary for staring at the statue.

Gabriel knows this place (which is expected but anyway)

This is the place where plot about sin and poverty and especially afterlife happened (still seems legit)

The only time Crowley fell down into earth. We don't know if Hell did it or someone else, but it still is the only time, even though doing good is a base of their Arrangement.

Cross on the statue is removable

What do we know about the pub:

Brielzebub's date was here (but they haven't been here before - Gab didn't see a jukebox and they both dont know how to behave)

A highy suspicious "mason lodge" next door.

...and Beelzebub is looking like a lodge member.

Pub owners somehow know how that surgeon looked - they have put his picture on a sign.

This is Azi cosplaying a newspaperman. His first question after the barman recognizes Gab is "Was he alone"? Not a "tell me more" or "When did that happen?". He asks about one particular detail. Okay. Gab was with "just another mason". And look at the Azi's reaction:

He has definitely realized something.

"We often get them in here. There's a lodge next door". We all know WHO did barman mistook for a mason. And he is saying that often gets them in there?? Also note that barman sees masons regularly, he definitely should know how human masons must look. Beelzebub really looks similar, but not the same. Barman should have noticed a difference, but he doesn't. Well, the non-human being who is similar to a mason accidentally visits a pub next door a "lodge"? Lmao.

Remember the quote on the matchbox. "Out of his mouth go burning temps, and sparks of fire leap out"

Wait....

GIF от tampire

And I have got a good idea from @drconstellation after her reblog. Her point is that trip to Edinburgh is a mirror of the Crowley's trip to Heaven. But I am disagreeing a bit with a part "both involved Gabriel..." Let's mirror more. Demon goes to Heaven and this trip is related to Gabriel. Angel goes to Edinburgh and this trip is related to...other side. He knows something about mason-like beings, and perhaps he realized who that mason friend really was.

Demon Crowley deals with the angel Gabriel. Angel Aziraphale deals with the demon Beelzebub.

Demon Crowley goes to Heaven. Angel Aziraphale goes to ???????????????

Deads leaving their graves are the red thread running through the entire season. The Resurrectionist (Jesus or Dalrymple), 25 lazarii ("how many times it could have brought someone back from the dead"), a bodysnatching, the "resurrection" of Job's children, zombie nazis (god why), the Second Coming. And these dates on the cemetery.

My suggestion is that cemetery is a kinda strategically important object related to deads. Maybe a starting point where "zombie apocalypse" the Second Coming begins. Then some archons should take care of them. What if the lodge of "masons" is a demonic nest who kinda guard the place? And Azi knows all of that. That's why he needs to go to Edinburgh in person. That's why he goes to the cemetery. There must be a reason why he calls from here...

#good omens 2 #good omens #crowley #what if #ineffable husbands #good omens demons #aziraphale #good omens meta #good omens hell #aziracrow #azicrow #chiastic structure #the second coming #go2 meta #good omens analysis #good omens theories #25 lazarii #archangel gabriel #archangel fucking gabriel #lord beelzebub #beelzebub good omens #good omens beelzebub #beelzebub

[chloreen]

✨caution! Izzy rant ahead✨ Every time I see posts villainizing Izzy I'm kind of baffled. I know i should have gotten over it by now but making Izzy the villain is kind of missing the heart of the whole story? "Oh no, Gentlebeard is the heart of the story-" It's a story about found family. About dysfunctional people. People who err and fail and make horrible decisions and overcome their traumas. I know that's not lost on the fandom when it comes to Ed, not one little bit. He's all cute and bored when we meet him, right? Not the man who sets ships alight anymore, with all the people in them? Not a psychopat, just a tired little boo who's ready to shake off Blackbeard's mantle? And it's great that he's ready. People get there. But what I get from many posts is that it's fine for Ed to get there when he's ready but Izzy had to follow him straight away into the land of the mentally healthy or fucking die. Only Izzy is just as dysfunctional as good old Ed if not more, and he's not ready, and nobody is asking him to be ready when they board the Revenge. The only person he feels close to in the world ignores him, Stede (understandably) offers him none of the talk-it-through treatment and the crew mocks him. All within reason, but when you have severe mental issues and trust issues and defense mechanisms your first instinct is not to open yourself up. It's to lock yourself down. Bite back at those who mock you. Attack those who disdain you. Destroy your chances of happiness, because you think you dont deserve it. Wrong approach? yes, god, yes, of course it is, but "wrong approach" is basically the title of every other episode in this show.

Now I know that many of you see maiming (not a one time thing either. continuous maiming) as a suitable payback for Izzy's deal with the English. (Maybe you don't even see what baffles me in that statement) "I fed your darkness. Blackbeard" has been quoted as a closing statement more times than I can count. Everybody can read into "I fed your darkness" as they please; I know how I read into it. I've been in love with people who's darkness I fed and they fed mine in return. And I'm not even going to point any fingers here, regardless of how disproportionally abusive that relationship was. It's a we thing, it's always a we thing. Darkness feeds on darkness. Izzy didn't create Blackbeard. Izzy didn't burn that fucking ship with all the people in it. We don't even know if Izzy met Ed before he was Blackbeard or not. It was most likely a "we" thing, where they built together upon an existing structure, a joint tower of darkness. Feeding the myth, throwing all of their insecurities in it, creating a monster. Forging a bond not with the touch of silk and gentle fingers but with whatever nightmares you can imagine. So Izzy playing doctor Frankenstein to Ed's Kraken is…it's wrong, it's simply wrong. Ed was not a corpse when they met. He was not a blank slate. He was probably already a mess of his own when the darkness-feeding started.

That turned out to be quite the rant but it's important for me to voice it. Izzy is far from blameless. Ed is far from blameless. A lot of other people in this show are technically far from blameless. But making a person who's a member of (the ofmd) family your villain? There are some straightforward villains in this show and then there are those who want to, crave to, strive to belong but have a hard time because they're so genuinely flawed.

#ofmd #ofmd gifs #our flag means death #izzy hands #con o'neill #as you can see I'm an Izzy apologist #I'll be frank for a long time I didnt even know I had to apologize for Izzy #that's how oblivious I can be #but also my reasoning was “why would he need to apologize with that face”

[cemeterything]

your terror tma au combines my absolute two favorite pieces of media ever so i am very very very interested to hear more about your crozier ideas…..

what other entities have touched him? addiction + how he came to be on the expedition seems like web to me but maybe he’s also got some vast going on

how did he pull himself out of the lonely? does he ever get a little foggy and someone helps him out of it? ouch. quote unintended

and very important: how does the flesh fit into the whole cannibalism deal?

yeah i agree that crozier's definitely susceptible to the web (considering how he was convinced to sign up for the expedition, his alcoholism since addiction has web associations in tma, his initially being taken in by hickey's false persona which is blatantly intended to flatter him, and the way his alcoholism causes him to unintentionally set up a lot of the later tragedies that befall the expedition due to poor decision making), although after he quits drinking i think he'd be more resistant to its manipulations (that being said, his rejection of the lonely and acceptance of the mantle of leadership could push him further into the web's arms as an avatar instead of a victim, especially considering how many lies he tells in an attempt to preserve morale). as for the lonely thing, i think he mostly pulls himself out during his rehabilitation from alcoholism, but having jopson taking care of him and his sense of duty towards the men that motivated him to go cold turkey in the first place would function as an anchor that helps him to find his way back. people definitely also notice his lack of presence as time goes on, which is what culminates in the intervention talk he has with blanky and fitzjames with episode 5.

regarding the flesh, i think that it plays a major influence on the entire expedition through the body horror (in conjunction with the corruption) that the men start to experience as they're poisoned by their food, and in driving people to resort to cannibalism out of desperation. hickey in particular courts the flesh despite being aligned more closely with the stranger, and several of the mutineers start to edge towards being its acolytes (hodgson especially develops strong flesh associations, founded in his childhood religious trauma).

#terror tma au #considering web avatar crozier now. i like it a lot actually. #bad (worse) ending

[zilabee]

I listened to the final ep of @anotherkindofmindpod's Fine Tuning, yesterday. I'm so sad it's ended. I loved every.single.second. I don't think I've posted about it at all, but it's only because everyone was already saying it better, and my posts end up in drafts half finished and confused and full of runaway sentences of little import.

I'm really grateful for the whole thing. Grateful the way I was when I watched Understanding Lennon McCartney the first time, like being given a genuine gift of fandom making sense of itself. I don't know. It's just lovely to have. And it's done so well.

When, in the first ep, they casually mentioned that there were going to be ELEVEN episodes I knew it was going to be amazing. Proper genuine "we have a lot to say and we're going to say it all so you don't think we didn't think it through" you know? I love that they didn't start making eleven episodes and then decide that was too many and cut 40% of it out, it's more like they wanted to make twenty episodes and then cut out about 40% of that. Making eleven episodes and then being like 'we didn't even have time to talk about anything that we LIKED about this book' is a real move. A perfect shiny move.

The fact they made a spreadsheet sends me into fits. I love it.

Cards on the table I have not read Tune In properly, I have skimmed and picked at it, and obviously I've seen loads of it quoted on tumblr, but EVERY quote you read from it (and everything he says in interviews) makes it so fucking OBVIOUS that he doesn't understand basic things, I've never been able to face it full on. And the frustration that people (men) can't see how bad it is. So having it put out there like this, bit by bit, oh the joy of it.

And then it's also so much worse than I knew, because I'd never really worked out that he was just MAKING UP QUOTES and mushing them together to say new things, and oh my god the stuff that's NOT in there, is insane. The bit in episode 3 where AKOM quickly list off about five or six really interesting things about Paul's art in his schooldays and then you find out that Tune In didn't even MENTION that he liked to paintklsjdofihoijsodijfohwoisjdf OH MY GOD.

I'm blown away by the work of it, and the scale of it, and how well put together it was. I love the *feel* of it. I love its tone when they let the sarcasm ride high. The voices of "sincere surprise" are just my favourite thing. "Oh, so he mentions that Paul did x and y right?" "Actually, weirdly he doesn't!" "Oh, HOW STRANGE. But does he say he was interested in z???" "Oddly no." I love the sense of giddy anticipation in the intro ep, it must have been killing them to have made so much of it and not be able to talk about it.

I'm so fully aware that all of what they're saying will move into other podcasts, and become things that men sort of talk about as if obviously everyone kind of sees the bias in Tune In, even though they've always talked about it as if it's a great work of truth until now. It kills me softly. And they'll claim it's only POSSIBLE to see that now, ten years later when it's spelled out to them, as if it's aged badly or something, when actually female fandom has been fucked off with Tune In for fucking years. But that's FINE. WHATEVER.

Also glorious have been all the posts people posted around it, and how the conversation grew, and especially the fact that @mythserene had clearly been doing a lot of the same work. Her posts in tandem with the show are so wonderful, and make it even more special, the depth of fandom for the love of fandom <3333333

#akom #<33333

[asklilmissrarity]

Progress Update on Melodi

Hello, everyone!

Happy New Year!

On December 15th 2023, I made the public announcement that Lil Miss Rarity will receive no further comic updates from me, finally confirming a common theory that I had lost the will to continue creating it. Lil Miss Rarity, just to confirm here, is now public domain and I encourage fan-blogs and will proverbially pass the torch to anyone who would like to take up the mantle.

It wasn't an easy decision to make because of how many times I'd promised I would never stop updating it, and I did in fact have future plans for it (I will be making a video on YouTube describing how I'd planned to continue the story, and how I would have ended it if I ever did).

But in its wake came Melodi, a spiritual successor to Lil Miss Rarity, and I've decided that a story-driven video game with ongoing updates would be the smartest decision, at least for the introduction to the series.

And so along came this twiggy elf. (Important note: Her booby size on her sprite is exaggerated, same as her head size. The in-game art for cutscenes will show more proper body proportions.)

Melodi is now just four directional (diagonal movement) sprite animations away from being a complete character sprite, which means creating a proof of concept will be just a matter of time.

As of today, I have completed:

The intro cutscene for the game, leading to the introduction of Melodi and her teacher, Eliah Sterium (Multiple full color images accompany that cutscene)

Seven unique songs entirely composed by myself (Literally learned how to make music a week ago just for this project)

Four directional movement sprites consisting of 6 frames of pixel animation each direction (Including separating each part to make them usable for other characters' sprites)

Four directional idle animations consisting of 6 frames of animation each direction (Again, making paperdolls to use later for other characters)

A discord server for the ongoing production of Melodi RPG where I'll be answering questions, including answering as the characters from the game similar to the LMR ask-blog

27 (just counted) preliminary sketches to flesh out character designs and have reference for myself

Eliah Sterium's design, making the ladies go gaga

Mountains of lore (a lot of which can be found in the Discord's lore channels)

Personalities for the primary cast of deadbeat magic school students

Art for the title screen

The entire storyboard for Episode 1 and Episode 2

The pricing model for the game (Episode 1 will be a free demo, and all remaining episodes will be bundled together in a $10 purchase)

The "Pet Cwow" option on the Quit Game menu and what happens when you pet him (You'll see)

The entire intro in-engine (Screencapped above with Eliah there)

Many new fans/friends who've introduced themselves in the Discord

And, I have received (on December 31st) my very first negative review of the game, which I will cherish. Someone who knew nothing other than "It's a game about an elf who goes psychotic" and saw the title art said that the game was basically doomed to fail because Melodi has large breasts, to which I replied "Imagine being this fucking butthurt over tits existing" which set him off into an obnoxious and insulting rage that ended with "Enjoy nothing but horny virgins playing your game and ignoring the dog water, generic ass story." A quote that I will never, ever, ever forget, and if I someday make a physical release of the game, I promise you, that quote will be on the back of the box.

There's even more than just all this, I've already sunk tons of hours of time and effort into the production of Melodi and I am super excited to continue.

I want to thank everyone for the support of the game so far, and I hope once people know more about the story and characters, the game sees the same kind of fandom that Lil Miss Rarity once had.

Luv you all

~Jay Tonique

#Melodi #Melodi RPG #Sprite Art #Animated #Game Dev #Melodi Ravenian #Eliah Sterium

[telvess]

Record of Ragnarok: Jack SFW+NSFW headcanons 🔞

@uwuitsjustme I waited so long because I was planning to write a shot for you, but unfortunately I haven't come up with any interesting idea yet 😕. Instead I got some headcanons.

SFW

He would definitely share his love for Darjeeling tea and cheddar cheesecake with you. If you can bake, now that’s the skill he’s always secretly wanted to learn. Please, teach him.

I don’t think it’s important to Jack that you know Shakespeare’s work. He knows that other people aren’t as committed as he is, so you wouldn’t lose any points, BUT you can gain few if you do know more than average John Doe or if you show great interest in the topic.

Expect many romantic Shakespeare quotes though, Jack will smuggle them in. It doesn’t matter if both of you do the most basic household chores or you are in the middle of a fight, if something remains Jack of Shakespeare, he can’t help himself.

Jack was looking after himself his whole life. Sure he had his episodes of unexpected kindness from strangers, but mostly he was a lone wolf. That’s why it always surprises him whenever you put him above yourself. It’s strange yet so nice, Jack’s heart melts over your sweet soul.

Depending on the circumstances, being Jack’s life partner can be easy or difficult, because he always knows how you feel. If you’re sad, he is immediately next to you and comforts you. If you feel lonely, he will cancel all his plans and spends a day with you. But if you’re angry and need space to calm down, Jack may make things worse by trying to help you.

Jack is a gentleman, which means he always lets you walk through the door first, buys flowers, carries your groceries - just a whole etiquette. But he doesn’t mind at all if you aren’t exactly „lady like”.

Jack writes the best love letters! Nobody will convince me otherwise. He’s so smooth with words, he uses the most poetic and sweetest phases. But if you beg him to read it out loud to you later, he would be such a mess: red-cheeked, nervous and a bit sweaty.

NSFW

Jack doesn’t have much experience, but he’s fast learner. He always makes sure you’re alright with anything he does. He would never force you, so as long as you aren’t ready for something, it’s out of the list.

Jack likes a lingerie, especially with a corset - he finds it pretty and classy. It’s a big turn on for him and best way to set things into motion.

I see Jack as a bottom. Occasionally he can take the initiative, but mostly he hands you over all control and enjoys watching you and beautiful colours you emanate.

If he has any kinks, I would say it’s praising. Hearing complements is not something he is familiar with, and hearing them constantly from you opens up a whole new world of happiness for him. Of course he loves to return the favour and mostly likely he will make them very poetic.

Jack prefers slow and sensual pace, there’s no need for a rush. It is time just for you two, and the more intimate the better. However, Jack may lost himself in the moment and gets a bit rougher.

Aftercare always includes hugs, kisses on the forehead, back rubs and small talks until you both fall asleep.

#record of ragnarok #shuumatsu no valkyrie #ror x reader #snv x reader #ror jack the ripper x reader #ror jack the ripper #snv jack the ripper #udj