yesterday I was explaining the intricacies of lok to my friend who has only seen atla, and he (like the rest of us) just couldn’t get over the fact that they made toph a cop. he was trying to figure out what about toph’s personality (you know, considering that it’s entirely antithetical to becoming someone who acts as an agent of the state to enforce systemic violence) would lead the writers to this conclusion. and it occurred to me that I do think many people, even those who vehemently denounce toph’s copness, do sort of assume that toph loves violence for the sake of violence. she is introduced as saying “I love fighting, and im really really good at it,” and she is shown committing various acts of violence against others (including her friends) with a grin on her face. but I still wouldn’t characterize toph as someone who employs violence for violence’s sake.
toph is, externally, defined by her limits. she is small, she is blind, she is young, she is a girl; she was raised to be soft and delicate and helpless. toph’s first true expression of freedom is when she learns to use her disability as a boon and uses her earthbending not as a weapon, but as an extension of herself. to toph, earthbending is a form of self-expression. it is an artform. I think people tend to forget that when toph says that she loves fighting, she’s not just saying that she loves the thrill of beating arrogant, gigantic, muscled men thrice her size (although of course there is also that), but she’s also saying that she loves practicing a martial art for artistry’s sake.
unlike the boulder, who only listens to his big muscles, toph waits, listens, innovates, creates, hones her craft. and while her earthbending is indeed a martial art, it is also a site of innovation, a visual art, and most importantly, a disability aid. the earth is an extension of herself; it is her artistic medium. yes, of course toph does love being able to exert power over others as a ragefilled tiny twelve year old blind girl who has been denied agency her entire life, but power is not her primary motivation when honing her earthbending. she cares about craft, about innovation, about being one with the earth. unlike all the other earth rumblers and dai li agents and earth kingdom soldiers, toph is a deliberate, thoughtful, considerate earthbender. fighting is an art, and toph is an artist.
Grian is a danger to have on your team not because he'll kill with no problems (well, he will probably do that) but because he has a way of subtly convincing people to do the stupidest thing imaginable. Things that normally you'd think "What?? That's stupid! I'm gonna die!" but Grian is like "let's play a game!" And everyone is always like "alright," And he'll say "Let's all get eachother with a fishing rod and I'll push you of this high pillar" in Double Life or, in the first Limited Life episode "Let's dig straight down!" or "Let's set fire to the building and who lasts longer wins ;)" and the people, who should know he's the person with most kill counts on the whole series, still go “that sounds like a perfectly reasonable and fun game. I'm in!"
The "Sansa reminds Sandor of his sister" motive that some people try to hitch to his character really just flies in the face of his actual attachments to her, doesn't it? Sansa reminds Sandor of himself. He sees the little boy who used to love knights in this girl who's been swept up by the same romanticism. He sees his abuser in her abusers, the much larger knight(s) beating on the helpless child. He sees how she is betrayed by every level of authority that should have saved her and remembers his father's neglect and Tywin and Robert's apathy for Gregor's crimes. He's protective of Sansa because he was Sansa.
And GRRM's design, that one of the strongest warriors in the series, a fearsome and cynical 6'8" guy who's "muscled like a bull" and has the face of death itself, sees himself in this soft and effeminate teen girl, and empathizes with her because he was an abuse victim too, is INFINITELY more compelling than "Oh yeah I bet she just reminds him of his sister," who he's never mentioned and who we know literally nothing about. Way to unnecessarily water down a character, you couldn't have ignored the black and white text more efficiently if you tried.
It’s part of how I accidentally screwed up act 1 to an insane degree, but I’ve never had Gale in my party to where I’ve had to use him in combat. This unintentionally made him the funniest bitch in the game. He’s some bum that just hangs out in my camp lamenting about his ex, talking about how much he loves his cat, and asking for very expensive items with no material benefit to the team. World’s most unemployed man.
Y'know I always smirk when I see your transformers art. Bc well- an 'Etho account' getting into transformers when it's Etho's favourite game franchise. On brand.
Hahaha very true 🤣 It was fate I suppose!
One of my favorite Etho clips is him freaking out over a call he got, letting him know the Transformers Fall of Cybertron game released a demo ( which this meme is referencing 😂) Here's the clip ⬇️ LOUD ETHO WARNING
This is from OOGE Vinyl Fantasy ep 19 Here at 6:23 roughly :3