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rongzhi · 1 year

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Ty for answering my q! (Am the guy who asked about lgbt being common in ancient china etc) since lgbt is more of a western concept what would be a chinese equivalent for it? Like how is the chinese homosexuality different from the west? (Sorry if my wording is off im not exactly sure how else to phrase it 😭😭)

I'm just talking about the cultural differences that shape what it means to be queer across the globe. Modern LGBT+ discourse was led and shaped by western academics so theories of gender and sexuality are based largely on the that of white thinkers. Although it's true that English LGBT terminology and the relevant standardised definitions have spread and been translated globally, and that Western ideals of masculinity and femininity remain dominant overall, similar concepts can't be understood 1:1 across all cultures. And there certainly existed something else before Western influence.

Also, picture this: you are watching a TV show from the Song Dynasty. You notice some of the male characters are always wearing flowers on their head/in their headwear 👀. You, proficient in imagery and symbolism, think to yourself, "💅🏼?"

But little did you know that this was a men's fashion trend at the time, practiced by young and old, rich and poor, hardly the indicator of queerness!

What I mean is, when it comes to looking at history, especially history of different cultures, basically you have to remember that there is a different context/historical framework to what is queer, what is gendered masculine and feminine, what is homoerotic/sapphic (and "queerplatonic" as we'd understand some of these instances and relationships), what is sexual, etc. So going back to my comment in the previous ask, based on all this, I personally feel that bringing terms like LGBT to such conversations is not appropriate because it also brings with it a modern framework which is not productive to understanding history as having its own frame of references.

If that makes any goddamn sense lmao.

#tldr i was being a pretentious and philosophical about the wording of your question #text #answered ask #but it's just like true in general that western views lead discussion on a lot of lgbt stuff #most people dont really realise it #but it really shows its ass when it comes to the intersection of gender expression and lgbt/queer theory readings of east asian figures #e.g characters not even pushing any literally not one gender binary norm within their contexts (e.g wuxia or period drama)#but getting queer theoried via perceived gender expression #or whatever you know. that thing that happens to idols #keeping this in the tags because i suspect it's irrelevant and i just wanted to be salty #every time i start thinking for more than 5 minutes i forget what the question was #also there will probably not be any videos tomorrow bc despite my yammering i have actually been busy this week #gay ask #look at me already forgetting new tags

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zhongrin · 19 days

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i feel like i'm failing so hard at keeping interactions up and answering asks i'm so sorry ;;;;

#rin rambles #i've been busy and so scatterbrained lately i promise i'm not ignoring anyone it's just. Ough. idk how to describe it.#i would just sit there trying to answer asks and i just can't → is the literal description but it's not very descriptive i know #idk why it's so hard to just. talk. ;;;;;;#tldr i want to answer them but i can't somehow. and replying to posts feels like i'm bothering someone.#i'm not sure where this fear came from and i don't like it 😞

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atthebell · 5 months

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No problem if you don't post this ask bc I know most people are trying not to bring any more public attention to the situation

But I remember not too long ago u were talking abt how most non-Brazilian fans didn't really understand how huge C is in Brazil

And it only really hit me now when I saw him trending on Twitter in Brazil with 50k tweets today, more than double the Jonas Brothere (20k) and almost as much as the Taylor Swift's birthday hashtag (60k), like holy shit he really is huge 😭 It's gotta be brutal to be under so much scrutiny. I hope the situation blows over soon because I honestly can't imagine facing so much criticism from such a big audience

yeah i mean he's been so famous for so much of his life and he has constant eyes on him, it's absolutely brutal like you said, and rn this situation is just awful and i wish it had never happened because it's not good for anyone and it especially sucks for him. i just finished reading through what he said earlier and im just like. gd this fucking sucks i wish people had an ounce of professionalism and that ordem fans weren't so hypercritical of everything he does

#asks #anons #if you dont know whats going on its really not even worth explaining #he disappointed a friend and they decided to put him on blast publicly instead of talking to him about it #thats the tldr like. he did not do anything that should've been made public business nor drama fodder #i like cannot fathom how awful he feels rn

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s0fter-sin · 25 days

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Thinking you shouldn't have to pay for Watcher content is you being entitled, actually.

did i ever say i shouldn’t have to pay for it? no, i said it’s disappointing that i would now have to after years of it being free. it would be easier to take if they were completely changing and upgrading their shows or established that the stream wouldn’t just have their current shows and maybe discontinued ones, that it would be different from their youtube channel and worth the sudden charge, but it’s hard not to feel like they’re throwing their audience under the bus

#from what weve seen the shows will still have the same number of episodes so we arent even getting more of the same content #just nebulous ‘better’ content which could mean anything and also nothing when the shows have gradually started to feel overproduced #it is my and anyone elses right to be disappointed by this #and its a personal choice #if you think its worth the money or if youre in a place where you can afford another service then thats wonderful and i hope you enjoy it #but that doesnt make it any less tone deaf to say we as a company need more money when people cant afford to eat #plenty of creators have successfully crowdfunded their own shows without putting all of it behind a paywall #critical role immediately comes to mind #they have literal thousands of hours of content for free and when it came time to ask for money people showed up for them #the answer didnt have to be put everything on a streaming service when there were plenty of other options #its also just a bad business decision but i dont have the expertise to talk about that #tldr people are allowed to feel however they want about this #also acting like its somehow more ‘authentic’ to get money from your audience #instead of advertisers and sponsors who can actually afford it is sus as hell im just saying #mailbox #coming out of my cage and ive been doing just fine.txt #watcher #shane madej #ryan bergara #steven lim

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todayisafridaynight · 1 month

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What do you think Mine’s reaction to Masato / Aoki be like?

tbh they'd probably be. amicable. at the very least.

#snap chats #like they have similar values its just that mine's more openly depressed about his belief system and doesn't take pride in it like aoki #i talked about this before omg thats so funny... but yeah no aoki's more proud of 'how the world is'. prob cause he's 'on top' of it #mine begrudges the fact he needs material goods to be useful to people #meanwhile aoki's happy to exploit others if it means he advances. for the most part anyway #he only really starts to show some regret when confronted by ichi. and get the shit kicked out of him for twenty minutes #wait i was rewatching the cutscene and started to throw up cause i got reminded of me in high school again aoki you're 42 stop this #Back On Track Though. mine and aoki had similar pursuits: attain power to be loved thats the core of it in simple terms #they went about it differently ofc: for mine money was power and for aoki popularity was power. Both Very True TBH but anyway #mine realized that even with money his person wasnt valued #and aoki realized that even with recognition people didn't value his character. sins the arakawas. fcukin dummy #i mean aokis a jackass so no wonder but thats not the point of this. fuckfest of tags #they wouldnt be friends. aoki's incapable of friendship and mine would probably quickly recognize aoki as being power hungry #i think mine's been in enough business meetings And Knows Enough About Politics to recognize Professional Fakerism when he sees it #actually do you think mine'd be swindled by any 'kindness' aoki expressed like when kanda left him and he thought he just went to get help.#that shit was wack LMAO BUT REGARDLESS idk i have to go to class soon so im not gonna spend too much time thinking of this #if they needed to they'd just use each other for whatever purpose they needed the other for. idk why mine would need aoki tho #TLDR mine probably wouldnt think too differently of aoki compared to any other power-hungry freak #we can revisit this topic when. im not learning about JP history vjERJALKJ

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whatinthefuckingninjaturtles · 10 months

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round 3 / part 1 -- voting information

(original round three information post)

theme: pastries date: july 16th (next sunday) at 1:00 PM MDT*

(other information, including this upcoming rounds' brackets can be found below the cut!)

first off, round three's theme will be: pastries

i don't even particularly like most pastries, and also find them hellish to try and create, so the heat is on!

we'll see if i can come up with something even more painful for round four (/lh)

(if you guys have any ideas as well, feel free to send 'em in!)

second order of business: date and time!

during the preliminaries, one of our creators mentioned that the polls went up while they were otherwise occupied. i knew that i should have got more info out about it beforehand, but i was in a rush so i just ran with it.

for this round, i'm planning on the date/time listed above (july 16th, 1:00 PM MDT). if this is a problem for any creators involved, feel free to shoot us as ask/message me or sun via tumblr (or sun on discord!) and we'll see what we can do.

third: iteration cover images

you may or may not have noticed the change in set-up for the poll image. while i can only do so much about the blur (it vexes me continually), i did put background colors behind the cover art.

if you are a creator and are in this upcoming poll, make sure sun or i have your preferred cover art, but along with that, feel free to send in the hex code of what color you want for your background.

this is by no means a necessary component. if you don't care, i'm happy just making them up. but if you do care, feel free to shoot me or sun a message or ask. @/ing sun or i on the discord will work as well.

(as a side note: if you are in a team, feel free to collaborate on your cover art/background color choices!)

i will only be accepting changes to art/hex codes up until saturday, july 15th. if you're redesigning anything and know you won't have it finished until the day of, please let me know so i can plan accordingly.

finally: the brackets.

(the moment you've all been waiting for...)

poll one: doublestep & sewer punks || @tomatoshapedstars @kettle-bird eon rewind & mirrored mutation || @rubberducky2pointoh @gayemeralds

poll two: ez's turtles || @ezgurple Mystic forest || @bluepeachstudios + @wondrous-art

the winner(s) will head off to round four. the losers will be disgraced from the pastry world... forever (/j /nsrs)

now, an important part of this: ties going forward.

while sun and i have agreed that two-way ties will still be allowed moving forward, three-way or four-way ties are messy and a little unfair. soo, in the event of three-way or four-way tie, a separate elimination round will take place.

if one of these ties occurs, i'll release the information about how it will all go down. for now, i won't make this post any longer than it needs to be.

if you have any questions, feel free to reach out to sun or myself either here or on discord. the ask box, as always, is open.

best of luck to all of our contestants, and we'll see you there!

˗ˏˋ ´ˎ˗

#''tldr'' version above the cut. more in-depth + brackets below the cut #the stars indicate other maybe important information that i elaborate on farther in the post #mod ˗ˏˋ ´ˎ˗#tmnt iteration bakeoff #round 3 / part 1 #long post #i did mean to post this earlier but i think sunday will work better for me than the day i had it planned on before #and i've been busy enough that the break was good for me #however we are back!#tag us send asks etc etc and i'll try and reply when i can

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shu-of-the-wind · 1 month

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there are a lot of things that i can't forgive disney for but one of them is quite genuinely i think that the deal to sell the muppets to disney contributed to jim henson's death and i stand by that

#tldr he died very suddenly of toxic shock after a streptococcal infection #and it was in the middle of the deal to sell the muppets (business side) to disney so that jim could go back to the creative side #because the creative side is all he ever wanted to do #and this is a man who like..fought...tooth and nail #to protect his IP not just of the muppets but of sesame street etc #having to give up any part of it must have been gutting #but he had to or he couldn't create anymore #something something disney's been killing creatives for decades #anyway #jim henson #the muppets

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colecassiidy · 1 month

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Runaway Turned Thief, His First Horse, and its Consequences.

Cole's first horse after the razing of his hometown is a dark bay no-spot appaloosa mare. She's built for long distance riding, and bursts of extreme speed for outrunning trouble. While she can go quite aways, there is definitely a lack of stamina in maintaining a sprint in comparison to a fully committed race horse.

He steals her from two drug mulers who had been camping out in the wilderness. This is where he ends up with most of his supplies that he keeps with him 'til Deadlock, including a second revolver to go with his first, a analog hunting rifle that he uses extensively for hunting and self-sustenance, and dressing knives. (Before then, he had a bed roll that was on its way out, carried in a ragged pack, a multi-tool, a foldable knife, and a water bladder; one extra set of clothes. Having a horse allowed him to pack greater inventory, travel further, and carry more quality of life items such as a wire set to cook over fires, rope, etc. Etc. In the case of meeting @/quick-drawn, she also allowed him to pack game to bring back home.)

He is on the verge of becoming 12, having left the orphanages some months prior (having been inducted into the system at 11 and spending time being tossed around for about 6-8 months). The whole debacle is a bit of a shit show with him waiting for the dark of night, pressed flat to the ground on his stomach amidst the cover of large rock and sage bush rooting between the crevices. He is, at this point, learning to be a little more clever with his thefts, scoping out the individuals, the layout of the camp (but fails at this time to consider escape plans, terrain.)

Sky turns indigo, then a void of black fractured by the salt-scatter of stars. Fire's died out to embers and the men retire to their tents. Cole scrapes himself up to his feet, scurries down the path tied between hasty and careful and rifles through their supplies like a shambling animal that's wandered someplace it don't belong. He ransacks ammunitions, the aforementioned firearms, some cans of food and a flask engorged with gin, amongst an assortment of other things; gathers and piles them up in the saddle bags on the Appaloosa.

Men start rousing as he's on the tail end of packing - the one stirring with a need to take a piss - and the little heist becomes a smash-and-grab operation where he's cutting the reins with a knife and blasting down the mountainside as they start yelling and searching for their firearms.

Later on, when it's deemably safe and he's lost them, he rummages through her saddle bags and finds papers reading Honeysuckle and his face scrunches up sour. Amber-brown eyes dart up from crinkled black print to the dark pits of the horse's. "Y'don't seem like a Honeysuckle."

He doesn't know why, but the name Maria falls off his tongue much easier. Fits her features more, he thinks. (It is, absolutely, a lapse back into his religious roots. Finding the name like a prayer, which he utters in both thanks and apology. Most of all, the significance just falls down to lyrics of Plastic Jesus: Goin' 90 I ain't scary, 'cos I got the Virgin Mary assurin' me I won't go to hell.)

She's a playful mare, likes to 'sneak up' on him while he's turned away despite the very obvious noise of her shoes hitting the ground. Likes to nuzzle her head into his neck, or knock into his back, set his hat off-kilter. Loves hoofing at creek/river/brook water - though that's a learned habit when he decided to splash at her on a non-eventful, idyllic day at a lakeside shore. Steady girl - he'll call her lady, sometimes. There are days where he'll share a beer with her, too.

He is somewhere in the throes of 13 when he unfortunately re-crosses paths with his victims. It's serendipity on their end, an accidental run-in out in the wilderness near an ol' gutted hunting lodge. The owners recognize Honeysuckle and they sneak up on him like he'd done with them, except instead of running off with a horse and materials, they put a gun to him and have him flag up his hands. They don't know what to do with him (there's an additional man to the original duo) and they murmur amongst themselves in Spanish after beating him to the ground and tying him up; they converse like this thinking the boy can't understand.

There's not a lot going for them to toss him towards a lawman; not a lot of pretty coin for a petty thief, not in these days where the economy and infrastructure's been starved out to a post-war drought. One of them suggests killing him out back. There's nothing really stopping them, and they could re-collect their stolen goods and continue on their way. They'd lost money because of the kid's stunt, lost out on 50% of what they could mule with only 1 horse instead of two.

Third man finally says, Sell him. Some place beyond the border where English is just a rumored language spoken only on tv sets. Labor camps need more hands. Sold men are cheaper than the free ones. He gets his reckoning, we make-up our money and then some.

In English, they tell him that in ancient times the law would have his hands severed from the wrists for theft and they knot up the binds on his hands aggressively tight to prove the point.

And then they'd travelled South, days piling into days. The ribbed rope would gnaw the skin raw, chafing towards bone like it's trying to eat him alive, and the entire thing leaves his wrists risking sepsis and scars; bloody, mangled.

they're stopped by in some post-war abandoned location along the way to rest that's filled with rusty tools and broken beer bottles. Some sort of logging warehouse. Cole finds a shitty piece of glass on a countertop and palms it; clenches his hands around it even when it threatens to nip cuts and draw blood. The men get ready for bed. Cole starts sawing at rope fibers. One of the men check up on him while he's just about free - the binds snapping loose as he realizes something isn't quite right.

Cole doesn't know where the guns are; his hands are in too much pain to aim straight anyway. First man goes down with Cole tackling him right into exposed pipes, gritty sawblades. Commotion brings the other two out: one tries to grab him from behind, while the other moves to sling a punch to the gut. Cole kicks wildly, butts his head into the nose of the man who's got hands on him. He's dropped to the floor. His knees ache from impact but it's his wrists that are screaming and he chokes out a strangled noise of pain, blearily grabbing at a slaughtered beer bottle that he's landed right next to.

Man in front of him's had enough, is going for his gun when Cole launches up into him with the bottle in hand. The serated glass punctures cheek flesh, into an eye socket. Man screams. Cole reels the glass back and keeps jamming it back down - and his face is soaked by the gore of it. The screams stop coming, and there's a thick hand that gloves around his shoulder. By some blind, desperate instinct, his other hand has found the handle of the dead man's gun when he is swung around with a fist cracking into his jaw. The glass bottle crashes into the floor. A gunshot spears the air. A third body cripples to the floor, blood guttering from the stomach. He spits on them, staggering to his feet: hablo español, hijo de puta - ir a la mierda.

He shambles out from the building, doused in blood, brain matter, and tries to put on a brave face, but he starts breaking down and ends up mumbling in a sort of low-key hysterics to maria "im sorry, im sorry, im sorry" -- doesn't know what he's apologizing for, that he stole her, that he killed her previous owners, that he's alive. Between the adrenaline and everything crashing in all at once, it's the first time he's reduced to tears since the times before the war.

Exhausted, he falls asleep outside. Leaves the men as is and weakly cuts their horses free (too tired by it all, he doesn't think to search their pockets for money, to rifle through saddle bags before releasing their mounts.) It's a mistake, because the news will later search for the horse owners, talk about a bloody horror scene found in the stomach of a logging complex. But, until then, the next few days are of travel, trying to find a main road while his wrists are pounding hellfire.

He ends up stumbling into a gas station in the middle of bumfuck nowhere looking like road kill. The attendant is startled right out of his seat as Cole walks up to him and shoves forward a fistful of ruddy-colored bills.

His voice rattles like pennies in a rusted gutter; tinny, scraping. He croaks, "I got some money for a band-aid and some rubbin' alcohol."

Man thinks this kid's been in a motor vehicle collision, says, "Kid you're going to need a lot more than just a band-aid" as he unlatches the medical kit from the wall. He seats Cole down on a plastic foldable chair, patches him up free-of-charge to the best of his ability the way a gas station attendant can offer. Man adds in a pair of gloves to make sure the gauze don't shift around too much. Man asks questions.

Where's your parents? What happened?

Cole says war got them. That he got into an accident.

Man tries to have Cole clean up in the bathroom, says there's snacks waiting outside while he phones for the police. Cole washes up, peels off his clothes for the last set he's got, and pockets the medical supplies the man had been using. He walks off, leaving the bathroom -- just does not come back inside -- and hitches back onto Maria and starts to ride off before anyone can come.

He leaves a few crumpled dollar bills on the sink.

#Hc: youth #hc: head up in the clouds;;#Hc: history #this too has been sitting in my drafts for a fat ass minute n only like 2 ppl know the contents of it SHKDHDIA #Tldr; cole's first horse after the war's named maria and he grows up with her til deadlock #she is a long-range mare with good sprint but it's a sprint not meant to be maintained for too long #impish personality - playful - likes to sneak up behind him despite not being very sneaky #He stole her; the owners find him - it does not bode well #He has rope burn scars on his wrist that he hides with gloves for the majority of his youth #Just because they're so damn noticeable and he's not in the business of entertaining the nosey and concerned #These days he doesn't really care due to the fact that he's mottled all over -- forgets that they're there for the most part #The memory of all this is also very far away for him tbh - like he's basically forgotten abt it unless u say smthing that just Unlocks it #This is also the cause of a few lines w a thread w quick drawn:#(You stagger out of this matted in blood and flesh and feel like Death's fucked up little butcher and #you have never wanted it to rain more in your life.#God did not answer this prayer.)

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tvrningout-a · 6 months

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i should've switched to writing original stuff ages ago bc i could've been overcoming writer's block if i did :' )

#connecting mine and vee's lore in written form is something i've wanted to do forever bc i love love love gaia and kaiya's relationship!!#but i had a mental block towards bio's for... man i dunno how long tbh #i always got really stuck with them which is why i started doing bullet points where i could jot down all my thoughts #but i should have just?? been unafraid to write lengthy bio's i think #and then i could've done fun stuff like this way earlier!! without feeling stuck and slow!!#like honestly i don't even care about the people who won't bother to read my bio's bc those probably aren't the people who will #end up writing with me #i always avoided lengthy bio's bc i didn't wanna inconvenience someone #but how is it inconveniencing if i'm trying to make something interesting and enjoyable to read?#how is it inconveniencing if i'm just?? writing about my muses?? it's silly to water down my creativity and i'm sorry i did it now #now pls know i can give you the tldr on any of my muses bio if you need it asdfgh but i'm gonna just!! do what's fun for me from now on #that's gonna be a very important rule i need to enforce for myself with this blog move #no more doing things that make it harder for myself bc i'm worried about other people #there needs to be a balance and that's what i'm gonna keep in mind going forward uvu #so sorry for the rant oh my gosh asdfgh i just got to thinking and truly my writer's block has not bothered me with dorverold stuff #like it has in the past for other things and i think it's how i've approached writing and world building aka not worrying about length #if i'm struggling it's because i'm tired or busy #ANYWAY ASDFG i promise i'm going to bed now :' ))) good night!!#get ready to ramble | ooc

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averlym · 3 months

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@remylong :

#newest broken telephone installment #the remy renaissance #or rather standard avvycc dms. broken telephone elements include ccsims designs of my old designs plus prev hp art plus the general sepia #of everything on fire. bonus to the chromatic aberration on hp it feels quite fitting (yknow bc the chorus behind his lines..) idk vibes #this colouring style is actl terribly fun i'm quite !!! about it. i'm also glad that I made reference sheets for them all long ago bc #otherwise i would have gone insane rrying to rmb them from scratch. lately despite the rainbow hp seems to overall be turquoise blue? which #is so fun compared to the more purple/ neutral blues and greys i have in mind for mark...#anyways doing well! getting back slowly into Making things again! having fun etc etc #have been in OC-land lately but nothing i'm ready to share yet haha #so occassional bit of fanart it is. i inexplicably want to draw hands now though i was walking back home #pondering my adamandi era (mad the most insane fanart i've ever made; no recollection of it now) and after enough mulling it over #it would be nice to return to it. don't think i'm as obsessed anymore but it's certainly not lacking in inspiration #ideas are there just havent reached the sweet spot where you get so taken by an idea you're compelled to turn it to reality #and i think itwould be fun. perhaps even gratifying to set wips to rest #so maybe. in the meantime px11 brokentelephone is sustaining my urge to make miscellaneous fanart haha #melliotverse so true. wonder why despite watching taopp i haven't been compelled to draw it but i get the inkling it's just that specific #aesthetic that doesn't do it for me. <blinks> it was very good and i enjoyed it immensely! i think i just surprised myself by being normal #about a musical for once. i think also bc irl i've been more Good Busy the drive to engage in fandom has dissipated somewhat..#so overall i think it's a good thing. just different. but then again this stretch of time is a transitory period for me so changing ought to #to be expected. ah well tldr don't overthink just do what sparks joy be happy? literally so lucky to be spoiled for choice wrt things #i want to do. so much to do and see and learn and time still to get to figure it all out!

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homielander · 2 years

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ik you said in your tags “don’t get me started on homelander” this season but 😭 def do get started. i’m honestly not sure how i feel about his development this season lmao, like he’s still my fave character, but some of these writing choices had me hm. also think ryan should’ve had way more scene time this season if this was the direction they were heading…

i feel you bestie!! i was thinking about writing a very lengthy post on why i didn't like season 3 sometime soon to get it out of my system once and for all (so that i don't keep annoying my followers and mutuals who liked this season.. sorry lol) but i actually have so many issues with homelander this season that it warrants its own post. so thank you for giving me the opportunity!!

anyway, most of my problems with s3 homelander can really be traced back to one thing

like... it's giving nothing

it doesn't make much sense considering their prior worldbuilding — just in terms of how homelander and supes at large have always been perceived by the public. homelander has been wholly unmarred by scandal up until very recently in the world of the boys (butcher says as much in the first episode). yes, some fringe groups idolize him, but homelander has been carefully crafted to be popular across both sides of the political aisle. and he was literally endorsing a democrat this season! he's never been a trump-like figure, but since the writers were hellbent on him becoming more like trump as the mask slips, let’s consider it for a moment.

the problem is you have to make vought profoundly inept to do it. i don't believe that vought wouldn't utilize every resource and PR trick in the book to restore his reputation. they're extremely image-conscious. so for them to not only reluctantly approve but actually encourage inevitable PR disasters such as homelight stretches the limits of the imagination. and they really didn't have a better CEO backup in place than ashley?? seriously? there were so many obvious plot contrivances that had to first occur in order for the trump-homelander comparisons to fully manifest and that just. irks me deeply. and it's not like they did it for groundbreaking commentary either — while this show has featured meaningful satire in the past, the trumpian homelander stuff offers nothing fresh or insightful and is really boring #tome.

i also feel like, in the last two seasons, they've been able to distinguish homelander as a symbol of american nationalism from homelander the person — so there's the obvious political commentary but running parallel to that is homelander himself with completely separate motivations. homelander as a symbol distributing a weapon of mass destruction (compound v) to terrorist cells around the globe checks the political commentary box. whereas homelander himself just wants to fix a bad situation for madelyn (and it's a similar scenario with stormfront in season 2). this season, those two things merged in a forced and unnatural way and it was extremely damaging to the character. (like, why did he offer supersonic mexican food?? there are exactly two scenarios where he’d care about race — if it could negatively impact vought’s ratings, or to make the distinction between regular humans and supes. we’ve been over this!)

one thing that made homelander feel like a fundamentally different person was how openly aggressive he was all of a sudden? he's always threatened people behind closed doors or operated with just enough subtlety that he has plausible deniability in case he's questioned about it later (unless, of course, he plans to kill the other person). think of the scene with the deep in the seven's conference room in 1.02, or him and stormfront on the film set in 2.06. well that went out the window this season! now he's making vulgar comments totally out of line with his wholesome christian image to a prospective member of the seven, or openly threatening milkshake-drinking a-train in plain view of vought employees, or having a meltdown and considering lasering someone when innocently questioned about EBITDA margins. (edit: this all would have been fine if only they'd built up to it, but we saw this behaviour right away! more on that in the next paragraph)

and you may say, "well that's to show he's losing his grip!" but the reason i didn't like it was because it's not really the direction his character was poised to take at the end of season 2. we saw him in an increasingly tightening leash while his ratings were slipping, which i'd say actually makes it much more likely for him to consistently be on his best behaviour. however, we don't get nearly enough of homelander being forced to cooperate except for one scene with stan where he’s already being pissy, or homelander going out of his way to boost his ratings, perhaps by saving people. (and you know, he does do that. that's why he was so popular once upon a time.) i think kripke said something about how each season, he wants to take something away from homelander until he snaps — this season, it seems like one of the things homelander lost was widespread public support, echoing stormfront's "you can't win the whole country anymore" from the last season. but he hated that idea, remember? he's always chased broad appeal, which is why i was a little confused when ashley expressed that he dropped in ratings in so many demographics and he.... brushed it off ?? i think this whole plot falls flat for me since we don't really get to see homelander trying to win the public back (and fail). we can't feel the extent of his loss (and seemingly, neither does he) or the full force of his relief when some nutjobs cheer him on anyway. it should have been a very straightforward arc but they skipped some key steps (it wouldn’t even have taken much time! all they really needed to do was indicate that there had been prior PR efforts) and it made the whole thing incoherent.

instead of seeing this process, we get #homelight, which we're told is a great PR strategy. i'm not so sure that the optics are favourable here — he's been said to be a mentor figure to her, there's a significant age gap, she visibly cringes when they're standing in close proximity of each other, and worst of all, dating a blonde white girl after his last scandal was due to his involvement with a nazi is..... a choice. i already have a lot of trouble buying it — i think vought would put forth a much safer option for a PR relationship. nevertheless, i suppose this sets up a potentially interesting dynamic... only for it to remain completely unexplored throughout the season.

think about it! the antithesis of a superhero interacting, non-contentiously, with the true superhero of the series!! both raised as products, but ending up wildly different. there's a lot to unpack there from a storytelling pov. i've also always thought that thematically, it would fit best for either hughie or annie (the most likely option based on this season) to take homelander down, so establishing a relationship (i don't mean a romantic one) between them now would have made that future so much more compelling. idk if there's an opportunity anymore given that annie has left the seven. it's incredibly clear that the purpose of that little plot thread was pure shock value to get more conversation going after the first three eps.

[that also highlights larger problems with the season imo. 1. a refusal to give us new, interesting character dynamics (though expanding on the MM/annie dynamic was delightful) 2. a lot of evolution randomly occurring during the time jump so that some characters start s3 super different from how they ended s2 — which is so jarring! 3. annie can have no flaws even though she was learning to embrace the "whatever it takes mentality" during all of s2 and 4. a bunch of scenes existing solely for shock value and nothing more]

in general, s3 homelander was super dumbed down (i wrote a bit more about it here) and imo, lacked the emotional depth of the prior two seasons. apparently antony starr himself asked kripke to tone it down and not write homelander as a bumbling fool, which is when you know the situation is dire😭😭

link to interview

even the one scene i've seen garner a lot of praise (and i liked it a lot too!) — the mirror scene — contributed nothing new to his character (which i really think it should have done if you're going to write something so direct, but that's just me). it only reiterated what we already know: he wants love, is sorely lacking parental figures, can rely on himself and nobody else, and so on. i'll retract this if they plan to do something interesting with mirror!homelander à la black noir in the comics, but that feels too creative for the writers who came up with this season and patted themselves on the back for it. a homelander alter-ego has also not been hinted at prior to that scene, nor after it, so i'm not sure i'd even want them to go there. the point is, if that's the highlight of the character's emotional arc all season then idk... that's not great

there were other opportunities to add some emotional weight, particularly with maeve or noir or soldier boy, but the way those scenes were framed didn't really give the audience any opportunity to feel for him.

when it came to black noir, everyone was obviously far more emotional about his death, and rightfully so. meanwhile there were no allusions to homelander's complicated history with noir, which is a baffling choice considering this is the last we'll see of their onscreen dynamic. based on the last episode of the boys: diabolical (said by show creators to be canon and even dubbed "required viewing" for s3 by kripke), noir was instrumental in turning homelander into one of vought's puppets who kills out of convenience. emphasizing this would have added more depth to their final scene (from homelander's pov) but instead it comes off as him throwing a hissy fit because he was lied to... which we've already seen! at this point it's just played out.

found a screencap of the ep! it was only 20 mins iirc but it was a neat bit of background

then we have homelander's confrontation with soldier boy. one of the core themes of the season has been the downfalls of toxic masculinity, yet we're supposed to cheer for soldier boy calling his son weak and emotional and a pussy (as highlighted by butcher and maeve's satisfied, triumphant smirks in the seconds following). it just made a lot of their prior commentary ring hollow, because there's no reproof of this attitude — it's fine if it's directed towards homelander, apparently. (tw sa i'm not sure this was their intention, but they've been having tonal issues of this nature since season 1. for instance, the creators have expressed amusement at the scene where the deep was sexually assaulted and that episode did not come with appropriate content warnings like 1.01 did — again reinforcing the idea that "this fucked up thing is actually okay if it happens to a fucked up person. you can cheer." and the audience did!)

the one that hurts me the most personally is maeve and homelander, because all of the complexity that made their scenes some of my favourites of the series was sucked away. i talked about it earlier here and here (linking because i don’t want to repeat things). it was most evident during their final fight scene, though, because it was literally just a brawl devoid of feelings on either end. it was supposed to be a moment of epic catharsis for maeve, but she didn't say anything impactful or even express emotions that i could latch on to beyond a couple of smirks. and i didn't get a sense of what homelander felt beyond mild annoyance at the start. the emotional emptiness of their fight sequence is especially glaring when contrasted with their showdown in the season 2 finale, which was so much shorter and yet was packed with soooo many more emotions.

the only other place they could have added some emotional beats is with ryan. unfortunately their reconciliation felt entirely unearned. ryan in the finale had me scratching my head. i agree with you — we should have had 2 full eps of homelander trying to win ryan back at minimum if that's where they were planning on taking him.

i guess my final complaint is a larger problem with the season, which is that the power-scaling has gone to shit. it was implied in s1 that homelander could take nukes, but maeve punched with enough power to halfway crack the floor or dent a cabinet and that was able to make him bleed. maeve's attacks should have been shown to be a lot more forceful if they were going to write the scene that way. the other problem is that maeve plus one more powerful supe (temp-v butcher, for instance) seems like enough to take homelander on, based on the way that fight was progressing. this destroys the notion they've been parroting all season of homelander being on an entirely different level than everyone else. (further, i feel like it negates the need for soldier boy and paints the main gang’s drastic actions as idiotic and callous.) most importantly, it takes away from the terror of homelander quite significantly, which was such a rich source of tension earlier on in the show.

all in all, i think homelander in s3 was pretty bad, and not in an entertaining way. a lot of people seem to like that he's becoming more batshit, which is cool and all, but that's never been the most captivating part of the character. the largest source of praise i saw for this show going into it was how they managed to revamp comic!homelander into a character that was terrifying in his competence and felt distressingly human despite being the most powerful man alive. at this point, i'm annoyed merely seeing him do progressively crazier things all while most of the elements of the character that drew fans to him in the first place are discarded for the sake of lazy political commentary.

#homelander #the boys #asks #also why did he milk a cow SJHSKHJS ?????#i mean i know why. i understand it in theory. i hate it though #and btw if this seems excessively nitpicky.. im aware that it is at some points!#but i kinda wanna cover all the bases so i never have to post abt this specific thing ever again #(unless i get an ask in which case idm of course)#ALSO SORRY this took like a month to answer but i have been so busy i needed a little time to sit down and just get all of this out #initially i was just gonna answer w the meme but then i couldn't shut up and i kept adding things and it became this #no tldr bc evidently im not capable of being succinct

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