#yeah i’m rewatching sailor moon. don’t even ask | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

xofanfics · 3 years

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Without Warning - Part IV

Part I | Part II | Part III | Part IV | Part V

Genre: angst, slight fluff

Pairing: Reader x Mark ft. Doyoung

Word Count: 3k

Summary: You and Doyoung had the best summer you could. Now that he’s hundreds of miles away in college, you have to go through senior year alone. You meet Mark at a time when Doyoung is making you feel like you’re single.

Mark was completely taken aback by the events of the night. You’d kissed him and you held his hand and you brought him into your room. Mark could hardly contain his excitement about having kissed you, touched you, and having been close enough to pick up on your scent. For him it wasn’t sexual. It didn’t have to be and, to be honest, he didn’t want it to be. At least, not right now. For now, he was just enjoying this innocence with you.

You went in your drawers and pulled out pajamas, sending Mark into anxiety. Please don’t change in front of me, please don’t change in front of me, he thought. The last thing he needed was to get hard right now and to potentially scare you away. He definitely wasn’t ready for something like that. Thankfully, you excused yourself into the bathroom and returned a couple minutes later with a freshly washed face and pajamas on.

You looked beautiful as ever, even with no makeup on. He’d seen you a few times without makeup but on most days, he noticed, you’d at least be wearing eyeliner. But here you were, no eyeliner, no mascara, and none of your usual lipgloss with the slight pink tint to it.

Mark was lying across your bed, heart racing. He was nervous because he’d never seen you in this state and, of course, because he liked you a lot. “You feeling okay?”

You nodded. “Just a little tired. Do you wanna watch my show with me?”

“Yeah. What show?”

“I started rewatching Sailor Moon.”

“I’m down for whatever.”

You crawled into the bed with him and snuggled up to him, lying on his chest. He wasn’t sure if you could hear his heart racing but it was definitely racing. His heart pounded so hard he could hear it in his ears. He didn’t know if it was because he’d been drinking or what; he just knew that he was very aware of himself right now. Was he breathing too hard? Was he breathing at all? Did he still smell like alcohol? Did you actually like him, the same way he did? He had so many questions and most of them, he couldn’t answer at the moment.

One minute you were watching tv in silence and the next minute, you were asleep. Mark looked down at you and smiled at how cute you looked with your mouth slightly open. He wished he had this view all the time. With a sigh, he thought about all the things you could do if you were his. But for now, he caressed your hand as you slept. He stayed like that with you for the rest of the episode before he figured he shouldn’t overstay his welcome. He scooted from underneath you but before he could get out of the bed you reached out for him, grabbing onto his arm.

“Don’t go,” you mumbled.

“What?”

You opened your eyes and pouted. “Cuddle with me…”

Mark’s heart started racing again but he did what you asked. Plus, how could he resist when you made a face like that. He got under the blanket with you and pulled you closer. You snuggled up to him and said, “Goodnight.” Mark smiled and wrapped his arms around you. And with you in his arms, he fell asleep more quickly than he normally would.

“Y/N?”

Mark shot up, realizing that he probably should’ve asked you when and if your mom was coming back home. He looked down at you, still fast asleep. Should he hide under the bed? In the closet? He heard footsteps coming toward the closed door. Mark bolted into the closet, hoping that the door wasn’t the kind that would squeak as you opened it. Thankfully, it didn’t and he closed the door just enough. He took in a deep breath, praying that your mom had no reason to look in the closet.

“Y/N?” your mom said. She opened the door and Mark heard your mattress shift from outside the closet.

“Hey,” you said. He heard you yawn loudly. He couldn’t see you but he imagined it in his mind.

His heart raced while your mother spoke. Was he breathing too loud? Could your mom somehow sense his presence? Thankfully, he’d come over in his socks so there weren’t any shoes by the door to be evidence. He’d met your mom a couple times at this point but he was pretty sure your mom wouldn’t have been very happy to come home and find the two of you asleep in each other’s arms.

“Did you have fun with Mark and your friends?” She chuckled as Mark’s heart continued racing. “That’s good to hear. Anyway, it’s been a very long double shift so I think I’m going to take a bath with those bath salts you got me for my birthday. Get a little more sleep.”

“Okay,” you said, “See you later.”

Mark heard the door close and relief swept over him. A moment later, when he was sure your mom was gone, he whispered, “Y/N…”

“Mark?” You opened the closet door, surprised that Mark was there. You found him in between your jeans and your t-shirts. “Oh my God, I thought you left! I’m sorry, I forgot to set my alarm. I should’ve told you my mom was coming home in the morning. Unfortunately, she’s not on vacation in Mexico...”

“It’s all good,” he said, chuckling as he stepped out of the closet. “As long as she didn’t see us in the bed together, I think we’ll both survive.”

You laughed, too. “That was way too close.”

“Yeah, for sure. I should get out of here before your mom comes back...”

You nodded, moving out of his way. “Let me make sure she’s in the bathroom.” You left him in the room for a moment. Mark grabbed his phone from under your pillow. You came back and said, “The coast is clear.”

You waved him over and he followed you to the front door.

Mark turned to you. He needed to know before leaving here. “Can I ask you something?”

“Yeah,” you said, stretching.

“Do you remember anything from last night?”

You nodded. “I remember everything. I meant everything.”

That brought a wide smile to Mark’s face. He felt his cheeks get hot and he wasn’t sure if he was visibly blushing or not. Then again, he didn’t care. Hell, if you meant all the things you’d said, nothing else mattered. You wanted to kiss him, genuinely. He wasn’t sure if you liked him like that but you clearly felt something. And, for now, that was good enough for him.

You had something you wanted to say but you hesitated. Things had taken a turn since last night. “Um…”

Mark noticed your hesitation. He supposed things did get a little awkward. “What’s up?”

“Since we’re sober now, will you kiss me?” you asked, taking Mark by surprise. You’d been so forward for the last ten hours and he had no idea what to make of any of this. You didn’t know what had come over you the past few hours.

“Yeah.”

Mark leaned in slowly, pressing his lips to yours. Your lips felt the same, more or less. They weren’t as moist without lipgloss and they no longer tasted like cotton candy. But he enjoyed the kiss with you nevertheless. He pulled away a few seconds later with a smile. You looked into each other’s eyes for a moment and he kissed you again. “Is that what you wanted?”

“Yep.” You took his hand in yours and squeezed it. “Now get out of here before my mom catches you here.”

With a chuckle and a kiss on your cheek, Mark was gone with the wind.

Doyoung was annoyed and frustrated. He’d been trying to contact you for weeks on end to no avail. You’d dodged every obstacle. He’d hit you up on LINKEDIN, for God’s sake. He was putting in all that effort and you ignored him every time. He’d tried contacting you through your friends, on social media, and so on. But there was never any response.

And then the one opportunity he had to talk to you, you were drunk off your ass. Was it that bad that you couldn’t contact him sober? Was it that bad that you had to be drunk to speak to him?

He was frustrated because he fucked up. He fucked up and he didn’t mean to. New stressors in his life weren’t any excuse to treat you the way he did. He got caught up in this new life and he took you for granted. He assumed you’d stick around because you loved each other, even though he hadn’t been acting like it. College life became more important to him that managing the relationship. But he snapped that one time and that was all it took to destroy the relationship. He was so stupid not to realize what was going on, not to realize how distant he’d become. It didn’t look good on his part, as your boyfriend.

How could he have been so stupid? He missed you. Some days, you were all he thought about. Were you sleeping well at night? Were you having fun? Did you...miss him?

He was frustrated because he made a mistake, one that cost him even his friendship with you. He lost his girlfriend and his best friend, all at once. And he hated it. He missed being able to vent to you when he’d had a shitty day and he wished that he could call and tell you about it. But you took that option away from him and Amber and Phil weren’t much help either. He didn’t want to put them in the middle; it was an issue that he had with you and it wasn’t right to try to go through them.

Doyoung’s phone rang on his desk, disrupting him from his thoughts. It was his mother. She was the last person he wanted to speak to right now. He let it ring, hoping that she’d just leave it at that. The phone stopped ringing and he let out a sigh of relief. The relief only lasted for a few seconds and she started calling again. Doyoung rolled his eyes and sighed instead of hurling the phone across the room like he’d imagined in his head. He picked up the phone from off the desk and answered it.

“Hello?”

“Hey mom.”

“Just calling to check on you. How is everything?”

“It’s going okay. I’m working on a paper right now. I’m almost done. I got an B on my biology exam. I think I’m getting the hang of how I need to study for that class.”

“That’s good to hear. I’m sure you’ll do better for the next exam. Start preparing now so you can get a head start.” She cleared her throat. “Did you book your flight yet?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I’ve been so busy. I meant to tell you about it yesterday.”

“Good. The prices were getting more expensive.” She let out a deep sigh. “I can’t believe your brother is getting married in three weeks.”

“I can’t believe I’m going to have to come right back to school after.”

“Me either. But you know how event venues are. They got a good deal considering it’s a weekend.”

“It’s going to be a long weekend.”

It would be. But all he could think about was the possibility of seeing you while he was back home. He had so many things he wanted to say, so many things to make up for. He just wanted confirmation if things between you two were truly over. What would he find if he looked you in your eyes? Love, hate, or indifference?

Amber hit you in the arm with the copy of Romeo and Juliet that had been sitting on your desk. “You and Mark what?”

You shrugged and said, “We kissed...a few times. And he might’ve slept over last night...”

“Slept over? Did you guys do it?”

“No!” you said, probably a little more loudly than necessary. “It wasn’t like that. We just...cuddled and slept. But I forgot to set an alarm for when my mom came back so Mark must’ve heard her calling me and he hid in the closet.” You grabbed an oreo from the box sitting in the middle of the bed as Amber sat cross legged at the foot of the bed, waiting for the rest of the story. “At first I was sad because I thought he left in the middle of the night but he ended up in the closet because my mom came in to say hi.”

“Well this was definitely unexpected,” she said, “but Mark’s a pretty decent guy, being from the male species and all.”

“Yeah…”

“Why didn’t you tell me you liked Mark?”

“I didn’t know. I mean, I never thought about it.”

“So you’re not sure?”

“I think I do like him…I mean, I liked the kiss and the cuddling. And it’s not like he’s not attractive.”

“You’re not using him to get over Doyoung, right?”

You shook your head. Of course, getting over a two year relationship wouldn’t be easy but you had to move on eventually. And, with the way he treated you, it would be easier once you met someone who truly had your best interests in mind. Mark was a sweet guy and he was a good friend. Even though things had been platonic up until this point, Mark had become one of your closest friends. You could trust him with your life and you knew that, perhaps, you could trust him with your heart, too.

You weren’t sure what came over you that night but all you could think of at the time was “What if we kissed?” The alcohol gave you the nudge but you found yourself thinking of Mark constantly. And every time you did, you smiled. You remembered how you felt when things had gotten more romantic with Doyoung. You’d get butterflies when you heard his name and you were excited to see him everyday at school.

It was pretty early on but you knew that you were starting to like Mark, as more than just a friend.

Lucas jogged over toward Mark, sweaty and exhausted. He plopped down on the bench next to his friend and took a long swig from his water bottle. They’d been playing basketball for about an hour. “Ready to go?”

Mark nodded, standing up. “Yeah, let’s head back. I’m starving.”

Lucas stood too and they headed to the parking lot, in search of the car. Mark took out the keys to his parents’ car and got in. As Lucas got in the passenger, he said, “So what happened after we left last night? Did you tell her you like her?”

“Well we, uh, kissed...and I did tell her I like her.”

Lucas smirked. “So she likes you after all, huh?”

“I mean, I think so.”

“What do you mean, you think so? Did you ask her?”

“I mean I didn’t ask her directly.”

“So what the hell did you talk about then?”

“Well we actually didn’t do too much talking.”

As soon as the words left Mark’s mouth, he regretted them. He knew that it sounded a lot dirtier than he meant. And he knew that Lucas would take it the wrong way.

Lucas’ eyes widened as he took it the wrong way. “You fucked her?”

Mark turned in his seat. “No, no! We didn’t have sex or anything like that. I know it sounds kinda weird but she brought me over next door to hangout because she didn’t wanna be alone and then she kissed me and then she wanted me to stay over and cuddle with her. So we cuddled and we both fell asleep.”

“Cuddle, huh? We all know what cuddling leads to…”

“Hey, just because that’s what you and Marina do doesn’t mean it’s the same for me and Y/N! When are you going to start dating her anyway?”

“Hey! Don’t change the subject! We’re not talking about me and Rina. When are you going to take Y/N on a date?”

“Soon. I’m just not sure what we should do. Got any date ideas?”

“Y/N is a pretty simple girl. What about a picnic at the park? You could go around dinner and watch the sun set.”

Mark was feeling extra excited today. He got to the bus stop a few minutes early, so he could rehearse what he was going to say to you. He’d rehearsed it a million times last night into this morning. Initially, he thought about texting it to you but he decided against it; he figured that asking you in person would be better.

He’d been texting you all weekend but he hadn’t hung out with you. Part of him was hoping that the two of you could hang out at least once but you’d been out with your mom all day yesterday. And he understood because your mom hadn’t had a Sunday off in a while. He was satisfied with the kiss you promised him over text messages.

You snuck up on Mark without meaning to. He’d been so deep in his thoughts that he didn’t even see you coming in his peripheral vision. He jumped when you appeared in front of him, almost dropping his phone. “Shit!”

“Sorry,” you said, giggling, “I didn’t mean to scare you.”

“It’s okay.” He sighed. “Ready for school?”

“I’m never ready for school.”

Mark chuckled. “Are you busy this weekend?”

You shook your head. “Nope.”

“Would you wanna go on a date on Saturday?”

Your face lit up at his words. That made Mark happy. “I’d love that.” You hugged him, wrapping your arms around him tightly. And when you pulled away, you gave him that promised kiss.

That, of course, made Mark even happier.

***

TAG LIST: @wanlore

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doctorweebmd · 2 years

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Nobody asked but here’s a list of animes that gave me absolute batshit insane brainworms in no particular order since for some reason I was thinking about this today:

(literally just me ranting under the cut lmao)

1.) Sailor Moon - god, which little girl didn’t love Sailor Moon in the early 2000s? I was obsessed. Watched it like a religion. The manga. The art. The homoerotic overtones. The cute outfits. The princess that can fight. It still has a stranglehold on my heart. Although I tried to watch that Sailor Moon Crystal reboot and they just... bastardized it. It looks so bad lmao.

2.) Dragon Ball Z - I think Gohan specifically made me insane. Oh, you didn’t try to do kamehameha blasts? You didn’t try to do Fushion-Ha with your friends? You didn’t pretend you could fly just by sheer force of will like Videl? Get out of here. I may or may not have written some self-insert fanfics that were DBZ/Sailor Moon crossovers as a kiddo. Lmao.

3.) Yu Yu Hakusho - this is by far the worst offender on this list and probably still tops my favorite anime/mangas of all time. I’m talking obsessed. I can’t describe how many times I’ve seen it, collected all the manga volumes, collected the trading cards, bought and played every video game. Delinquent with a heart of gold? Second chances? Being alone and not seeing the point of your life but finding friends and a purpose and joy? Damn I sure wonder why this took over my entire teenage existence.... Also on a fandom note I think at this point I started being old enough to like, seek out fanfiction and get into slash. Fanfiction.net was a fuckin’ warzone lol. I was very weirdly into Yusuke/Kurama, too, and there wasn’t shit with that pairing anywhere. It holds up incredibly well. Spirit Gun?! Bad bitches only. Come on.

4.) Gravitation - this one I don’t really have an excuse for. It was like 15 episodes but it made me straight up crazy. I collected all the manga. The fact that it was a BL book didn’t even like, click in my teenage brain. But the mysterious writer with a dark past? The naive and sweet lead singer of a band that acts like an idiot but has pipes for days? Urgh. As a concept, its still like, the best band anime I’ve seen. Plus all the songs fucking SLAP. It does NOT hold up on rewatch lol. Shuuichi is frankly annoying and Erie is a fucking dick. Plus on re-read the author is... uh.... kind of obsessed with physically and violently raping Erie in her own doujinshi and painting gay men as predators. Leaves a bad taste in your mouth.

5.) My Hero Academia - *shows you around* yeah. here we are. Mind you, I haven’t been weird about anime in a solid like... 10 years but something about it activated my weeb sleeper cells and it has lived rent free in the my brain ever since. Everyone who shits on MHA is a hater lol. Story wise, character wise, design wise it tops my ‘greatest anime of all time’ list.

Speaking of the greatest animes of all time... the list above does not represent what I think about them in terms of quality, just that they scratched an itch that I can’t really put a finger on. Now in terms of objective quality, I’d definitely remove Gravitation, Sailor Moon and Dragon Ball and replace it with Fullmetal Alchemist and Hunter x Hunter.

Fullmetal Alchemist is the best, full stop. The power system is beautifully thought out and really interesting. The entire plot if heavily character driven. The ‘villains’ are engaging and you feel some degree of sympathy for them. Its probably the anime I would recommend to anyone who wanted to watch anime for the first time. Absolutely stupendous.

I think if I watched HxH at a younger age it would have probably had the same stranglehold on me as the above mentioned. Its so outlandish and weird, the characters are all memorable, the villains are fascinating, and its just driven so heavily by this perfect, pure friendship of Gon and Killua. There’s no other relationship in shonen that I can think of that is just that... good. They’re literally best friends. They would literally rip the world apart for each other. The fight between Kurapika and Uvogin will forever be one my favorite animated fights of all time. ALL TIME.

Honorable mentions that I’ve watched probably multiple times and enjoyed significantly:

Ouran High School Host Club - god its so campy. So cute. So character driven. Beautiful.

One Punch Man - really really enjoying it so far. Will continue to watch. Super hilarious.

Regarding some really popular animes right now (AKA me shitting on people’s faves... sorry. I’m just a hater) :

Jujutsu Kaisen - am watching right now. I like it enough to keep watching, but I will say their power system and character introduction has been a tad lackluster and I’m not super into it. The animation is beautiful, though.

Demon Slayer - am enjoying for sure. Will continue to watch. Same thing - the designs are beautiful, the art is breathtaking and it's an interesting concept, but I don’t really feel that invested in any of the characters. It just doesn’t have that emotional pull for me. What they built with Rengoku’s character and arc surpasses the emotional development of the rest of the characters in the series for me, easy.

Haikyuu! - y’all got me to watch a sports anime. How. Overall, I liked it. Will continue to watch it. But damn does it do, like, NOTHING for me. Hinata’s and Kageyama’s friendship/rivalry is really the anchor of this whole series. Plus I love a short king underdog upbeat protagonist, what can I say.

Jojo's Bizarre Adventure - I’ve seen most of it and... yeah, it's really just not for me. I sincerely do not get the hype. The outfits slap though.

Death Note - read it before it got animated and really liked it as a standalone, but wouldn’t reread. Amazing plot, engaging characters, unique in every way and the art is mesmerizing. But honestly I’ve tried to watch the anime multiple times and it's just... eh. Can’t get through it. There’s just some stories that aren’t as good when you animate them.

Attack on Titan - fascinating concept, cool outfit/power system design and super engaging. I’ve seen a lot of it, but they kinda lost me with the ‘twist’ of where Titans come from. It's like the author had this amazing concept and literally didn’t know how to execute it. Also like... Levi literally carries that show. Eren? Bitch. Armin? I wanted to like him so bad, but uh. Bitch. Mikasa? I think you know where I’m going with this lol. Stopped watching.

I’ve never seen Bleach, One Piece, Naruto, Inuyasha and never will lmao. I think next on the list will be Mob Psycho 100.

#wow am i just avoiding finishing the final chapter of zero sum?#yes #nobody asked anna #sorry if i said anything mean about your faves #not everything is for everyone to be fair

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kominum · 3 years

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rewatching old sailor moon and thought of like... disgruntled tuxedo mask!corpse but with unrequited love because i’m a glutton for angst

wc: ~2.2k

warnings: death of a minor character, implicit knowledge of sailor moon lore, modern twist, unedited

please send in ideas you might have that i could write short blurbs for! this was honestly fun to write.

It’s a scratch he can’t itch. It’s what has him waking up in cold sweats, confused and moderately annoyed that his hard-earned sleep has been so rudely interrupted. He hates the cape, he hates the itchy suit, he abhors the top hat – and the only things he doesn’t really hate are his baton and endless supply of darkened roses.

The first time he transformed, he was half-asleep and struggling to understand why he was speeding down the highway and parking two blocks away from some random back alley. His pain was relatively dulled, which was surprising, and his body suddenly possessed a world of fighting skills that felt foreign yet familiar. All he could recognize was a slightly disheveled woman cursing and just trying her best against some odd form of demon spawn, and before he knew it, he’d thrown down a dark purple rose and engaged in combat. Once said woman found an opening, she took off her headband/tiara, performed a throw that would put professional frisbee players to shame, and the monster disintegrated into dust.

“Jesus Christ,” he panted, body hunched over and hands on his knees. “What the fuck was that?”

“More like who the fuck are you?”

“Fuck if I know,” he muttered and dusted himself off.

“What’s with your get-up anyways?” She failed to hide her snickering. “You’re 3 decades behind.”

“Do I look like I want to fight in a suit? Plus, you’re fighting in some rendition of a schoolgirl uniform.” Her black thigh-high boots were killer, but he wasn’t about to give her the satisfaction.

“You should’ve seen what it was before, but I was able to make some changes. Good heads-up for you and—”

“Sailor Moon, are you okay?!”

Oh. So she’s got a talking cat, too. What in fresh hell was going on? Did he take something? But also—“Your name is Sailor Moon?”

“We’re working on the name change,” she grumbled, bending down to let said feline jump up her arm and settle on her shoulder. “Anyways, uh…thanks. I was kind of in a bind, but I’m usually not I swear. Good timing, I guess?”

“If that’s what you wanna call it.” But she was already in the wind, hopping from roof to roof with no inhibitions, and left him completely dumbfounded.

His silly attire dissolved back into his previous clothing as he ambled back towards his car, thought not exactly at his own will. But he shrugged, slid into the car seat, and dialed the only person he could think of who would readily pick up at this ungodly hour of…2:37AM. That was just the start, and he can’t tell if things went downhill from there.

He should backtrack.

He met you almost two years ago at a hospital.

You had been waiting anxiously for your boyfriend to come out of surgery after being in a bad car accident, biting your nails, occasionally pacing back and forth, smoothing your hands worriedly against your jeans, and gnawing your bottom lip to death. It was midday, sometime after lunch, and he’d come in for some routine checkup he can’t remember what for now, and sat a few seats away from you in the tiny hospital coffee shop. He’s no therapist or expert, but he highly doubted that any caffeine would alleviate your anxiety. Yet you sat there with two to-go cups and a granola bar wrapper, and something told him to stick around for now.

He’s never been one for a lot of small talk, but you looked to be about his age and no one else was with you. Tragedy tasted most bitter when alone, and some force of the universe told him to at least say something, anything. So he stuffed his hands into his hoodie and shuffled awkwardly to your table, tentatively asking a, “Hey, uh…is everything okay?”

You’d looked up at him with wild eyes on the verge of tears, heart battering against your chest, and the only intelligible thing that left your mouth was a “Huh?”

And he’d casted a gentle grin, eyes laced with a mixture of pity and concern, and asked again his first question. “My boyfriend’s in surgery. He got in a bad accident. There’s um…roughly two hours left, I think.”

“And you thought coffee would make it better?” He jutted his chin towards your large cups.

“Hot chocolate,” you chuckled. “I’m not keen on torturing myself like that, not now at least.”

“Well, I’ve got an appointment soon but I should be done before his surgery’s over…want me to come check up on you?”

Dumbfounded was the best way to describe your expression, and he was so close to retracting his offer before you gave him one of the most thankful smiles he’d seen in many years. “I’d really appreciate that.”

He nodded. “Sounds good then. Give me a sec.”

At the counter, he paid for another cup of hot chocolate and added in a chocolate chip cookie for good measure before bringing it back to you. “I hear chocolate helps.”

“Thank you, again. Go, don’t want to make you late.”

But an hour and a half later in the waiting area outside surgery, the doctor came out with a solemn expression, and you all but collapsed into the plastic chairs, tears leaking like waterfalls from your eyes. Part of him wanted to bail and go because there wasn’t much he could do, but it wouldn’t be right to leave you to drive home now. He wanted to make sure that you were calmed down, all cried out, and breathing properly so you could at least operate a vehicle safely.

The same unknown force had him offering you his number in case you needed anyone to talk to, yet the conversation sat empty for weeks until curiosity and guilt ate at him. He tapped out a message, deleting it, then another one, more deleting, before he settled on a plain, “It’s the guy from the hospital. I know it’s been a while but…how are you?”

Your reply was almost instantaneous, to which he worried if he’d accidentally woken you up at 4:13AM. First, it’s a casual, “hey, thanks for checking up on me! I’m doing okay,” but he knew better. And the other shoe dropped in the form of a simple, “I miss him.”

It’s a quiet, heartwarming friendship. You know nothing specific about him – he’s incredibly vague on any identifying information. Hell, you’d be willing to bet that the name at the hospital was a fake one. Nevertheless, he’s one of your closest friends. You know he mainly works online, has a lot of trouble sleeping, is chronically ill and has a number of medical conditions, his general disposition and feelings on things, but overall, just wonderfully easy to talk to.

Yet something just feels wrong about falling in love with him. It’s a horrid combination of guilt and disbelief. Are you rebounding? Are you subconsciously searching for your dead ex-boyfriend? Are you so desperate for romantic connections that you’ve twisted yourself into believing you love a man that you’ve seen fewer times than the number of fingers you have?

You come to peace with it when his custom ringtone chimes softly on your nightstand in the middle of the night. Rain or shine, stars or none, there’s nothing you wouldn’t do for him. Nothing has ever woken you up so quickly, not even alarms on interview days. “Hello?”

“Sorry, did I wake you up?”

“Kind of, but it’s fine. What’s up? Wait,” you interrupt yourself and listen carefully to your speaker. “Are you…driving?”

“…yeah.”

“Should I ask from or to where?”

“I…honestly don’t know. Something felt off, felt like I had to get out of my place and just fucking do something. So uh, I drove somewhere and just started driving back home.”

You curl up under your sheets on your side and plug your earbuds into the phone. “Well, did it get rid of whatever you were feeling?”

“I think so? Honestly couldn’t fucking tell you. Still really bizarre to me.”

“I’ll take your word for it,” you murmur. “Well, feel free to call me whenever you feel like that again.”

“I don’t wanna fuck up your sleep schedule though. Feel like it’ll happen more often than I’d like.”

“How about this – if I don’t pick up, it’ll just be my nice way of saying ‘fuck off, too busy sleeping right now’?”

A soft, deep chuckle warms your chest and cheeks. “Sounds good. So how’ve you been?”

“Well, you know…”

It’s the same night that you think you might have a chance at love again. You fall asleep with his voice weaving stories and tales in your ears and wake up to a message that says, “Wow, didn’t know I was so fucking boring that it made you snore so loud.” The hope that creeps through your veins is dangerous and thrums urgently whenever you get a call or message from him.

And as bright as a star, it all comes crashing down in a firey blaze.

You crash into a girl as mysterious and serenely beautiful as the moon with a talking black cat one afternoon. She exudes a gorgeous amount of confidence in her stance as she protects you from a creature that looks like it’s out of a horror video game, and you can only stare in awe. The cat from before yells instructions at you, throwing what looks like a pen with a red cap on it and you blindly follow them. Your subsequent red heels feel incredibly comfortable and you can’t remember the last time you wore a skirt – but there’s no time to ponder as you push the girl you were admiring out of harm’s way and somehow manage to direct fire at them from your fingertips.

The monster burns and screams in agony before getting hit with what looks like a glowing frisbee. Your savior wipes the dust off her outfit before extending a hand out to you, “Welcome to the club, Sailor Mars.”

Say what now?

“There’s gotta be a better name than that,” is the first thing you say as you get pulled up. She throws her head back and lets out a charmingly obnoxious laugh. “We’ll work on changing it. I can tell we’re gonna be good friends.”

“Her name ended up being a rip-off of my name,” the cat quips and receives a scowl from the supposed plagiarizer. “I’m Luna, and this is Sailor Moon, or Lunaria she says.”

“You gotta admit, that’s cutting it a little close,” you agree and Lunaria flips the bird. “How the fuck am I going to change Sailor Mars? Also, can I do anything about this outfit?”

“We can go shopping tomorrow for sure. Luna and I can fill you on everything and – oh, before I forget, there’s a guy—”

“So it looks like you don’t need my help?”

You freeze in your steps, startled by the familiar baritone approaching you two. He was involved in all this?

“I told you, I don’t need your help—”

“Is she new?”

“Yeah, which means, we really don’t need your help. She’s got actual fire power. Literal fire.”

“That’s pretty fucking cool,” he accepts. “Good to meet you.”

You spot a set of veiny fingers that appears in your peripheral and you tentatively turn in his direction, hoping that your hair will obstruct your face as much as possible. “Same,” your throat manages to squeak out as his warm hand engulfs yours in a firm handshake.

“Get out of here, Corpse,” Lunaria chides and lets go of you to push a finger to his chest.

“I’m only here because you fucking needed saving. Now you’ve got another person dragged in.”

“I told you, I’m not some fucking damsel in distress,” she hisses. The mirth in his visible eye only causes the infuriation to grow and swirl more vigorously in her gut.

You watch the exchange from the sidelines as Corpse’s teasing only increases and provokes Lunaria further, disheartened that you’ve never heard him laugh so much in one exchange before. Dread from deep within your veins begins to freeze around your heart, something so set and undeniable that causes your brain to realize that falling in love with him was a mistake. It was the kind of mistake that would strike you with pain for years and the intense foreshadowing has you spinning on your heel and bounding through an alleyway. Your outfit shifts back to what you’d been wearing before, the characteristic weight of your phone in your back pocket seeming heavier than ever.

You call him that night, holding in a deep breath when the dial tone breaks midway. A rustle, a breath, and then, “Hey what’s up?”

Oh god, you scream to yourself as your heart shatters at the bottom of your chest. His voice, again, cannot be misconstrued as anyone else’s – the inflection, the tone, the volume, everything belonged to him.

And the universe told you then and there that he, undoubtedly, belonged to her.

#corpse x reader #corpse x y/n #sailor moon!au #corpse husband x reader #corpse husband x y/n #corpse husband imagine #corpse husband angst #corpse angst

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miraculouscontent · 3 years

Text

Askplosion #12 4/4:

(I would like to state for future reference that, while I do not mind long/multi-part asks, if you’d like to engage in actual discussion with me over a non-Miraculous topic, my DMs - Tumblr Messenger - should be open; I lost pieces of three multi-part asks this time just due to Tumblr not sending the remaining part(s) so yeah, I just wanted to make that clear)

(like, this askplosion ended up being super long because of this section and that’s not really what I want to have going on since I’m supposed to be a primarily Miraculous blog; I don’t want to have to stop answering non-Miraculous related asks but I might have to if this keeps up:)

.:New non-Miraculous Asks:.

Anonymous said:

What are your experiences with some really rude anons?

It’s partly my fault when it happens. Like I’ve said before, I’m an aspie, and part of what that means is I struggle to understand situations emotionally. I can come off as insensitive or read the mood wrong which often leads to people misunderstanding my intentions or where I’m coming from.

More often than not, what I’m saying will make 100% sense to me but not the person/people reading it. I also stick a lot more firmly to my opinions than I should because people tell me I fold too easily, and I come off as more egotistical than I actually am to cover up my low self-esteem lol.

So yeah, can’t think of any experience in particular but sometimes it might be my fault? At least I suspect that it is?

Anonymous said:

“Killed by kindness” makes me think of an assassin who kills people by giving hugs and compliments to people and the occasion gift that isn’t tampered until thre target does like Conrad Birdie making women swoon into fainting by singing.

omg

yes

Anonymous said:

You're watching Yashahime right now? rip

MARINETTE TAKE 2 MOROHA DESERVES BETTER

SETSUNA HAS SO LITTLE REASON TO HANG OUT WITH THE OTHER TWO GIRLS

IF I SEE ANOTHER DEUS EX TOWA I’M GONNA KICK SOMETHING

(so yes, I’m watching Yashahime)

Anonymous said:

Since someone recommended Remarried Empress, I would like to recommend my own webcomic: Princess Love-Pon! It's about a young girl named Lia Sagamore who becomes the titular magical girl and purifies people's hearts when they're tainted by the Dark Queen! It's really cool due to its diversity, the main character is black and her best friend is Afro-Latina, the villain and her prince son are also black, and there's a Japanese girl, a black guy, and an Indian girl. Plus, loads of pink and frills!

Thank you very much, though I actually don’t take recommendations, even from close friends. The Remarried Empress anon wasn’t a recommendation; they were more pointing something out to me and then I went to confirm.

Anonymous said:

Unrelated to MLB: Which Pokémon are your favourites?

I used a “Favorite Pokemon Picker” because I prefer going by generations to pick favorites and that was the easiest way of going about it. I struggle picking super favorites so here’s what I got form each generation! (my only rule was “one Pokemon per evolution line” with an exception of the Eevee line since they’re different types, and also Alolan/Galarian forms)

(note: the blue-patterned Vivillon is my favorite and I honestly don’t like Charizard normally but the Y version actually slims him down and gives him the wings I feel he should have; it’s an improvement of the design so it gets my seal of approval, I don’t like the X version at all)

(lol I was looking through this after I was done and find it really funny how it’s like, 50% cute things and then the other 50% is just EDGY, there’s very little in-between with me I guess)

Anonymous said:

Bridgerton the Series: Yay or nay? Sorry if you haven’t seen it or it’s not your thing. I was just curious.

Never seen it, though when I brought up to someone, they didn’t recommend it to me at all ahaha.

Anonymous said:

I previously kept having this argument about The Bechdel Test with someone. She keeps insisting that the test is invalid because there's nothing wrong with talking about men and that it was created for lesbians only, and not for feminists, with the implication that being a lesbian somehow means that you dislike men or want them gone. And she also thinks the test is about NEVER talking about men, rather than merely occasionally talking about other things. I keep telling her otherwise, but...

jdfhkgdfhjgdfg “lesbians only”

now all I can imagine is “lesbians only” sections at restaurants and such

Anonymous said:

Have you ever played Akinator, with or without the Miraculous Ladybug characters? Because I played it with Ochaco from MHA and Marinette and he guessed them within a second(can your character control gravity? Is your character a protagonist?). I even played it with myself as the "character" and he guessed "your shadow" lol. How about you?

I’ve played Akinator before but I don’t specifically remember what I was searching for lol.

Anonymous said:

The cast for the newest Power Rangers series got revealed, and I hate that as soon as I saw the Pink Ranger's bio mentioned she was an internet journalist, I thought of Alya. I really hope she doesn't have the same problems as Alya in the series proper.

fhgdfkgd journalists have been ruined for us forever

Anonymous said:

Have you noticed that in many shows, especially shonen shows, people tend to hate the most "feminine" female character? Like, in Naruto it was Sakura, in Death Note it was Misa, in My Hero Academia it was Ochaco(although a lot of people like her so I'm not so sure about that last one?). The most hated character in one too many a shonen is almost always the "girliest" of the characters. They're always claimed to be useless or reliant on a man. And this is within the fandom who should know better!

It probably didn’t help with Sakura that she was decked out in pink hair; that’s an instant girl label for you (or lesbian label, depends on the person :P).

I don’t think I’ve been in enough fandoms to have such an experience but I definitely see where you’re coming from.

Anonymous said:

Rewatching Chat Blanc and Here To Help from Star vs. and hearing Adrien/Marco tell Marinette/Star that they always liked the girls from the beginning makes me so pissed. It's not that I don't ship Starco(I do! But I also like MarcoxJanna), although I don't ship the love square, but I'm so annoyed with writers finding the need to make the audience "know" that the main ship's characters "always" liked each other, as if that makes their love for each other more true, even if it's obvious they had other crushes? Like, what happened to Kagami Tsurugi? Jackie-Lynn Thomas?

News flash: Teenagers are allowed to have crushes on multiple other people before they find "the One". It doesn't mean their love for that "One" is any less valid. And if you still want to pull the "they always liked each other since they first met", at least make it actually TRUE!!! Don't have them have crushes on other people before moving on to the "official" crush and be all like "Oh, by the way, I liked you from the start," when it's dead obvious they didn't. You're doing a disservice to the romantic "false" leads.

I'm willing to forgive Star's crush on Oskar and Tom since she's not the one claiming she always liked Marco(even though she fell in love with him LONG before he fell in love with her, which is a nice turn of events), although her "love" for Oskar was merely an infatuation at most and I personally don't see why it was needed. Why don't they just say that their old crush didn't do it for them???

UGH, I remember watching that show and being so annoyed because I really liked Marco and Jackie and wanted them to be a thing but I knew that they’d pull Starco in the end because of course they would.

It also totally makes it seem as if love is the most powerful relationship there is (aros would like a word), which is so bizarre when there are so many “power of friendship” tropes. Like, a male and female lead have to get together because their relationship is the strongest.

The love square would hold so much more meaning to me without this love drama nonsense. It’s tiring.

Anonymous said:

Have you seen Yuki Yuna Is a Hero? If so, then what are your thoughts on it? I was thinking of watching it but it seems to be another "taking away the empowerment of the magical girl genre by making the girls suffer instead" type story. I read about it on TV Tropes and apparently it's a deconstruction that takes after Madoka Magica which already puts a bad taste in my mouth, but then I got to the examples and they're basically about how girls who get magical powers lose their body parts one by one and that the reason only girls can be heroes is because "young girls have always been sacrifices".

Not to mention it was written by a man and aimed towards a seinen(adult men ages 17-35) demographic, making it torture porn for adult men. Also, both the laconic page for Yuki Yuna and Madoka Magica say "Being a magical girl sucks."(though for Yuki Yuna it adds "Unless you have the power of friendship.") and to be honest that kills any desire in me to watch the show. Should I give it a chance?

Oof.

Yeah, after bringing it up to a friend of mine, it was instantly recommended of me not to watch it, so I’d say, “no.”

Anonymous said:

Let's make one thing perfectly clear. I, love, love, LOVE Sailor Moon. And I love the transformations, too. But if there's one thing I don't love, it's that their outfits all look pretty much the same but with different colors/different lengths of gloves and shoes and stuff like that, and that they all have the exact same body type save for the one fat girl who's made to look bad. I don't like Madoka Magica, but at least they all had unique/different costumes(but they still have similar bodies).

We’re not allowed diversity here. Take your different body types to a show that cares; we’re all about femininity here and how girls can be beautiful and powerful no matter wha--oh wait...

Yeah, I don’t care for the design in Sailor Moon, but that’s because skirts don’t interest me design-wise unless it’s really unique/interesting.

(note that there’s a lot of talk about tomboys, sexism, and TV tropes and such below, and then Madoka Magica after that; that’s basically the rest of this askplosion:)

Anonymous said:

I just saw the thumbnail for a video called "Why You Should Watch Princess Tutu(Yes, I Know The Name Is Stupid)". Umm, why is it stupid exactly? Because it's "girly"? What is with people thinking that in order for a girly show to be good they have to first separate the show from its girliness in order to enjoy it? It's like how men will say a show is good despite it being girly, or that since it's good it's no longer girly. Nobody does this for boy shows, because boy things are "never" stupid.

Princess = girly thing

Tutu = girly thing

girly things = bad

That’s the formula~ They should’ve called it something edgier and manly so that more people would be interested.

Anonymous said:

I'm wary of any woman or girl who says, "I'm a girl, but I'd rather read books about guys" or "I'm a female writer but I mostly write stories about male characters". I feel like those women are the "not like other girls/one of the guys" type who suffer from internalized misogyny and don't like female characters. I also feel like they're the type to not care about female representation, because in their minds, girls shouldn't care about female role models. We can enjoy males just as much! I do!

To be fair, they might also just be writing about shirtless men doing “handsome” things. ;P

But nah, I see your point. Me personally, I try to find a balance of writing both, but I do think there can be bias.

Anonymous said:

Do you think it's okay to like a ship but acknowledge that it wouldn't be safe or healthy or condonable in real life? Because I was just thinking of how a lot of people like some really "toxic" ships like Veronica/JD in Heathers, Yuno/Yukki in Future Diary, Madoka/Homura in Madoka Magica(although some people don't like it because of its toxicity/like it but don't realize it's toxic), almost any villain/hero ship, the list goes on. But they're aware of the fact that it's not a good standard for healthy relationships in real life.

An alternative I've seen is people having a crush on "dangerous" characters like JD and Yuno, or Karma from Assassination Classroom(there's not a single video on YouTube with him in it that DOESN'T have comments full of people saying they want Karma to father their children), but still being aware of the fact that the character is a) not real and b) wouldn't be a good partner if they were real(and that's assuming they even want to be with you. But sometimes there's a good reason for falling in love with a "toxic/dangerous" character.

Take Monika from Doki Doki Literature Club! She's obsessed with the player(not the player CHARACTER, the flesh and blood player themselves) to the point of killing off all the other girls and "trapping" you in a room with her where she talks endlessly about lots of things. But she's actually a lonely girl who's driven insane by the fact that nothing around her is real. She latches on to you because you're the only other person who's real and sapient and has got a mind of their own. You're literally her outlet to the outside world.

She's personally my favorite character in the game due to her actually being a more fleshed out, sympathetic(and not in the idealized "moemoe" way), and realistic take on the Yandere archetype(which, like many moe archetypes, is kinda misogynistic in nature in that it reinforces submissiveness; it's basically animes version of "woman scorned".). So it makes sense that people would sympathize with her and want her to become real, because all she's ever wanted was to be real and to talk to real people. Especially since she really did care about her friends and even returned them back to life because she saved their backup files, taking herself out of the picture.

I read a few "Monika becomes real and lives with you" fanfictions where she's really sweet and not at all crazy and cares for you a lot, and it's never felt the same as all those other "Yandere/psycho lives with you and is your girl/boyfriend" type stories precisely because those stories tend to just glorify possessive partners that kill your loved ones, drive your family members to commit suicide, and tear up your stuffed animals and dollies for the sake of it, rather than go into why they're so crazy for you, and often reinforce Stockholm Syndrome.

Plus, those "things" she talks about in the empty room? They're actually quite smart and make you think about the world for a bit. Not many "crazy" type characters actually get that. They're all about how "I'll slice your boyfriend open with an axe if you don't date me wa ha ha", and even if they're not, it's all the fandom will focus on, to the point of ignoring any and all other aspects to their character. Because that "crazy in love" aspect is the most appealing part of them. Maybe it's due to forbidden fruit/bad boy(or girl) appeal? Who knows? But I'm starting to wonder if it's still as bad if people recognize the problematic aspects of "crazy in love" characters or "dysfunctional" relationships.

Because if they recognize it's not real and don't really want it for themselves, then it's probably not much of a problem. But if they just go on wanting it to be real and never take a step back and go "wait a minute, this isn't real love; they're only together because he latches onto the first girl to show him any kindness and affection and she's a doormat who doesn't want something bad to happen if she leaves him", then that's bad.

Obviously it's not as bad as being in love with literal stalkers, killers, and rapists in real life(which is an actual thing, believe it or not, it's called hybristophilia), because fictional characters will never be real. Karma Akabane will never be real. Yuno Gasai will never be real. JD will never be real. But loving fictional characters who do those things and not realizing the problem with it may cause people to seek out real criminals, so it's best to separate fiction from reality.

I can’t help judging a little internally, but yeah, I think people can ship whatever as long as it has that “not in real life” scenario going for it. It’s ultimately fiction, so just because I don’t like it and/or think that it’s bad doesn’t mean other people can’t ship it.

Anonymous said:

I'm getting tired of all the racists on TV Tropes getting upset whenever a trope has a Japanese name. Whether it's Tsundere, Yandere, Meganekko, Genki Girl, Bokukko, or any Japanese anime name, people will complain that the trope exists beyond anime so it shouldn't have a "cute anime name", and that it should instead just be given a broader(read: English) name with the same meaning. Or that the site is too obsessed with anime. I'm just sick of people saying that anime names are bad.

The other thing is that we don’t actually have English words for certain things? I mean, the whole reason we say, “tsundere,” is because it says everything in one word. It’s easy.

(Also, people are aware the the English language isn’t some unique thing that takes no inspiration from other languages, right? It’s a mix of things, so accept that other languages exist because we literally wouldn’t have English without them.)

Anonymous said:

Have you seen the TV Tropes reviews for "My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic"? Holy crap, they are all a perfect example of the "Real Women Don't Wear Dresses" phenomenon that I have mentioned earlier and is so fucking present on this site. While some reviews praise the show for showing that "it's okay to be strong AND girly"(such as Hadles' review, which was really splendid), and that girl shows are no less good, others either insult the show by calling it "girly, saccharine, and stupid" as if "girly" is synonymous with anything bad about a show, or feel the need to distance it from its girliness in order to praise it as if a show can't be good if it's also girly.

Some people were saying things like "the show might seem girly at first, but it's actually a good, brilliant show with intricate plot twists, well-developed characters, and even some scary moments" and "the characters aren't just shallow girly-girls, they have depth!" So what, girliness is mutually exclusive to anything of value? One person even said that the Girl-Show Ghetto was the reason they couldn't get into the show or respect it. Just...wow.

And one review even said "Rarity's pretty tough for a girly girl!" Excuse me? Tough FOR a girly girl? So being a girly girl somehow automatically disqualifies you from being tough? Like "yeah, she's tough despite being a girly girl! Because girly girls aren't supposed to be tough."

It reminds me of the phrase "you're pretty for a black girl", which, while it's never been said to ME, I have heard other people complain about. It's sick and it hurts, just like this. And the few people who didn't say things like that still said that they couldn't get into the show at first because it looked "girly and vapid", before changing their minds and thinking that the show either proved their biases about girly shows wrong, no longer think it's girly since girly shows "can't" be good, or like it "despite" it's girliness.

And there were 70 reviews in all. 70 reviews full of this misogynistic "girly is bad" shit. So in conclusion nearly all the reviews on TV Tropes for My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic were along the lines of one of three things. 1) "This show is girly so I looked past it because girly shows are dumb." 2) "This show is good despite being girly/the characters are good despite being girly." and 3) "This show is not girly to me at all because it is well-written and captivating and girly shows aren't capable of such things."

Granted, some people there were able and willing to call out those who judged the show badly for being girly(or gave it the "not like other girls" treatment, but in show form), as well as people warning other potential viewers to get rid of any potential bias they may have against it due to it being girly. But there were still more people insulting its girliness as a reason they think it sucks or denying its girliness to justify their liking of it than the other way around.

I would've accepted it in the form of "If you think this show is bad because of its inherent girliness, then you are wrong!" or "This show is proof that a show being girly or aimed at girls doesn't and shouldn't take away from its value, as people seem to believe." or "A girl can be girly and be a strong female character.", but no, instead I got shit like this. It's especially insulting when TV Tropes is a site that devotes itself in part to critiquing sexist tropes found in media, only to turn right around and reinforce them.

I don’t read TV Tropes that frequently, so I fortunately missed out on all of these complete idiots who associate girly products with being bad.

(that “pretty for a black girl” comment makes me hate all aspects of “expectations of beauty” and it’s like--plz let these die)

I could maybe see an argument for criticizing a girls show for being “saccharine” if it were like, “girls’ shows written by men who clearly don’t know how to write girls are usually bad,” because then it’s not a criticism of girls’ shows exactly but rather who keeps being put in charge of writing them.

Anonymous said:

I get so annoyed when people get upset when confronted with the matter of female representation with "what's so wrong with one show having a male protagonist or mostly men and one/a few women? Why do we have to include women in everything?" These people clearly do not understand that one show doing it is one thing, but when multiple shows do it, it's an obvious problem. It's even worse when they turn around and diss shows with largely female casts for "not having enough men".

And as for people getting upset that "every show has to include women/come with a checkbox nowadays", as if it's bad to include women in your story...look around. Women make up 50% of the population. They're literally everywhere. What reason do you have to not include a substantial amount of women?

These people act like male is the default and women are a last resort. They see no problem with men dominating a cast because it's justified(despite that not reflecting real life), and yet having female characters, or, hell, a female-dominated cast(I know they also don't reflect real life, but there are still female-dominated spaces; most colleges are 2/3 female) is "unrealistic" trying to fulfill a quota, or a straw feminist agenda, as if characters can't be female for their own sake. You shouldn't have to be forced include women because their presence should be a given.

How many stories nowadays take place in the war front in Viking times or whatever? A lot of men just don't want to include female characters or see them represented(well) in media because those who are overrepresented tend to want to stay that way. They likely also have insecurities about their masculinity and are worried about female characters flooding their shows with estrogen and ruining the shows they love, because they can't relate to female characters or enjoy shows about them without negating their girliness(ie. This show seems girly, but it's actually good), since they're ashamed to associate themselves with anything feminine due to looking down on women or seeing them as bad.

Plus they want to be the center of everything so the second a show is about mostly women they get upset and claim it's "sexist against men" because it's not about them. Hence why bronies(bless their souls) are made fun of for the grave sin of enjoying a female-centric show with a female protagonist and largely female characters. Granted, there are some freaky fans, but there's still some sexism at play here.

This reminds me of a post I saw about a boy who actually looked up to female characters because you can pick a role model who doesn’t fit your gender. Crazy concept, I know. ;P

And yeah, that’s how it goes with equality. People who are best/most represented don’t want equality because they think it means less for them and they don’t want that, like a child who doesn’t want to share their cookies with everyone else.

Anonymous said:

I love TV Tropes, but if there's one problem I have with it, it's how often it associates femininity with weakness. The "Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy" trope is a good example of this, but the worst offender in my opinion is the Girly Girl With a Tomboy Streak, as most of the examples there are simply of girls who are strong-willed or fierce or can fight. Because you know, those traits are male. It's bad because there are ALREADY tropes for girly girls who can fight, Girly Bruiser and Lady of War (which TV Tropes even goes out of its way to SAY shouldn't be counted as a "Tomboy Streak" and yet does stuff like this), but it's also bad because ANY girly girl with these qualities, no matter how feminine they are otherwise, will be seen by TV Tropes as having to be at least somewhat tomboyish(read: masculine) in order to have those traits. Because regular girly girls are just weak and fragile and only want to be housewives.

It's even worse when you realize that much of these characters are created with the exact purpose of subverting the stereotype that girliness equals weak, and instead present a new and more empowering form of femininity: that femininity is strong and DOES NOT equal being a passive sex tool for men's pleasure. They're MEANT to show that being a tomboy is not the only way to be strong, and TV Tropes acknowledges that! But then they also go and claim these characters have "Tomboy Streaks" thus undermining the positive message by insinuating that you have to be tomboyish to be strong and that even girly girls have to have some level of masculinity to be deemed respectable and equal human beings, plus manipulating many impressionable folks into thinking strength and bravery is automatically tomboyish.

Worse yet, they often put a character here because "she's a big eater" or "she burps/farts a lot". Gee, I didn't know women had bodily functions? I didn't know women had digestive systems? So basically any time a girl shows that she is a human being and not a pretty, passive doll to be idealized, she is acting like a man. Because only men are fully-fledged human beings. Even outside of that, look at basically any masculinity-femininity contrast trope(Tomboy and Girly Girl, Sensitive Guy and Manly Man, Masculine Girl Feminine Boy, etc.). The "masculine" character will often be described as dominant, assertive, or outspoken, and the "feminine" character will often be called weak-willed, passive, emotional, and timid. It's fucking sickening.

The Tomboy With A Girly Streak trope is similar to its inverse in that a tomboyish girl will often be placed under this trope with their proclaimed "girly" streak being that she's tender or cries a lot or is soft spoken/a doormat. Because being girly is about not taking up too much space, not having any ambition or aspiration, and overall being a weak and shallow waste of space. For a site that claims to dismantle such sexist misconceptions, it sure does reinforce them just as much.

I almost want to stop using TV Tropes based on that and many other reasons, but it's a genuinely informative site that at least tries to avoid these stereotypes(plus it's edited by more than one person), it just doesn't do enough. For example, they made an awkward claim once that women can't fight while on their periods, and even have an Improbably Female Cast trope, as if it's abnormal that a cast could consist of mostly women and demands an explanation. To them, femininity=inferior.

And then in comes the “anti-girl tomboy” characters who basically do everything “girls don’t do;” glares at things like make-up and such, rolls eyes at the subject of “girl talk” or “romance,” drinks anything carbonated and spreads their legs wide open, etcetera.

Guys really don’t get the same version, at least not that I’m aware of? Like, at best, they don’t participate in “guy things” but that’s about it.

Having characters acknowledge it just makes everything more blatant, like if a woman comes by and the guys have to assure “DON’T WORRY, SHE’S LIKE ONE OF THE GUYS.”

It’s like a woman can only hang out and engage in “guy talk/time” (the concept of which I hate but that’s besides the point) if they can crush a beer can against their forehead.

Anonymous said:

OMG TV Tropes called Cirno the Ice Fairy from Touhou a "tomboy"? Why? Because she's boisterous and outspoken and not a "shy girly-girl" like Daiyousei! TV Tropes clearly believes that any girl or woman who is more than just a pretty face(which ALL women are, by the way), who takes up space, who has a dynamic personality and isn't just a weeping wallflower(which I'm not saying Daiyousei is) is a tomboy. Because she's acting like a man that way. Ugh, so over TV Tropes and their sexism.

And all the girls in Touhou(including Cirno) wear big frilly dresses anyway so it doesn't really make sense to see ANY of them as tomboys. But no, apparently any girl who is rowdy or tough or is active and not passive is a tomboy. You gotta be a tomboy to have attitude. You can tell they think so because they often say things like "strong, but still feminine" as if those things are opposites. They even described femininity as "weak and susceptible, vain and superficial". Like, ugh, kill me now.

I legitimately want to see a bullet point list here of what qualifies as a “tomboy.” Like, what, anyone who does one thing that isn’t “girly”?

Can we just throw out all of these terms; not even replace them, just throw them out?

(the below ask is incomplete - the first part is missing - but the asker clarified after I asked them, so clarification is below:)

Anonymous said:

Tropes is because I'm working on a story and I hope when it becomes famous that TV Tropes will write about it, but as it stands, I'm beginning to wonder that TV Tropes undermines most stories or plots to do with women one way or another. I mean, they constantly create tropes with the intent of calling out inherent biases, yet reinforce those biases themselves.

For example, they have a trope called Men Are Generic, Women Are Special, which points out the bias of male being the default, and yet on almost every other page on the wiki describing a trope, the default character will be a "he"(especially if it's a character trope), and whenever they mention "The Hero" or "The Big Bad" it's always a he unless it needs to be female(like if the heroine is in a romance story, or if the villain is a seductress). Female characters at best, can hope to be "The Heart" or "The Chick" of the group(which is often used in a demeaning way).

They even have a trope called "Improbably Female Cast" in which they point out all the instances of a story's setting having an "over-abundance" of women or girls with no men in sight, and claim that such stories have majority female characters when it is "unusual" "unlikely" or "lacks justification". Someone even suggested that the trope should be called "Where Are All The Men?" as if there's something inherently weird or wrong when a story is dominated by female characters, and like the story is in dire need of men, as if only men can be protagonists.

Even if the story has a justifiable reason for having mostly women, the fact that the writer made that choice at all is somehow deserving of mention. The mere fact that there's no "Improbably Male Cast" trope shows where the site's biases lay. They don't see anything wrong with a show being dominated by men with little to no female representation(ex. Death Note), and yet a show dominated by women(ex. MLPFIM) is somehow an anomaly and demands an explanation(even if the story does provide a reason for it, TV Tropes will still list it and presume it "improbable", as if to say "I mean, yeah, but there's no reason why you couldn't just make them mEn instead", as if writers who have mostly female characters are going out of their way to steer away from the "default" males.

In fact, they even admit that "Men Are Generic, Women Are Special" is their reason for having such a trope, but not the inverse. They even say that it's not the trope if the show revolves around a group of girlfriends with no indication of the gender ratio in the wider setting. So any time the females outnumber the males a story it's instantly labeled "improbable" because there's NO WAY any setting AT ALL could have more females than males. That's improbable! You see, this is why when women are 1/3 of the people in a given space men perceive it as "majority female" because they're uncomfortable with women having more of a presence than men.

We'll never have true equality if shows with majority female casts continue to be scrutinized under a microscope and assumed to be of inferior, lesser quality, just because there's no male characters around and it's women who are driving the plot. My problem isn't that they have a trope for majority female casts, it COULD be a testament to gender equality(ie., "there used to not be a lot of shows revolving around women, but now they're becoming increasingly common and well-known), but it's that they single out such stories as "unlikely" and thus discredit them.

And worse yet, they refuse to change the name, because they don't see a problem with it. So now every single show that doesn't have an equal number of males and females or more males than females is going to be called "improbable" by TV Tropes, because there's something(bad) to be said about shows that choose to make most of their characters women. Death Note and Naruto can slide by the radar of having loads of men, but Madoka Magica and Touhou are "improbable"? Because they have loads of women?

the clarification:

Anonymous said:

I started out complaining about how TV Tropes says that boys will watch Star Vs. The Forces of Evil only because of Marco(who's great, but it comes off like boys can only relate to boy characters) and that the show only looks girly but has a deep complex plot with scary moments(as if a show can't be dark and complex and still be girly; girly=shallow, watered down fluff), hence my complaint about TV Tropes undermining girly shows or anything "girly".

Yup, exactly like I said.

Good stuff in “girly” things is the exception. Good stuff in “manly” things is expected.

Which is funny when you consider stuff like “edgy” reboots of things. Like, Disney remakes their original movies and that usually means making them worse (like in Beauty and the Beast - god I hate that remake - where the objects are going to become complete objects when the last petal falls even though the enchantress is explicitly a good person and it comes off as super cruel and unnecessary), but that seems to just be its own breed of bad I guess.

Then there are terms like “chick flicks” and “soap operas” which are usually women-oriented and tend to be considered dumb/over-dramatic.

You know, not like MEN shows with their sexualization of women, guns and MEN things.

Anonymous said:

Remember what I said about TV Tropes being sexist? Well, they also have a trope called "Girly Run". Like, that's literally the name. Girly. Run. Thankfully the first example(which is under advertising due to the forms of media being in alphabetical order) is an aversion from the blessed Like A Girl campaign, but...just reading the page lets the casual-yet-bold-faced sexism speak for itself.

why can’t things just be like the Sims where characters can wear whatever the hell they want and have any personality without any judgment or criticism from other Sims?

(more Madoka Magica talk - and ONLY Madoka Magica talk - below because I’ve unleashed a monster apparently:)

Anonymous said:

I know you don't like Frozen but I saw a theory somewhere that Elsa's powers came from making a contract with Kyubey and her wish was to impress her sister and anyway I can't stop rolling my eyes. This isn't(just) because of my distaste for Madoka Magica compared to my love for Frozen, but if Elsa's a Puella Magi then why didn't she become a witch long ago? How did she make it to adulthood? How did she become emotionally stable? And why do her powers have to come from a negative source?

I think it might just be people looking for excuses to do their crossover fanfiction which--yeah, I’m not crazy about that.

Anonymous said:

Did you know that Cristina Vee voiced Homura Akemi in the English Dub? It's very noticeable, especially during the Cake Song, where I could've sworn she sounds exactly like Marinette. By the way, I'm still not sure what the hell was going on in that song. Could you please explain it to me(if you know)?

Nooooo don’t make me think of Homura when I think of Marinette!! fjkdgjnfdg

lol but seriously, I think the Cake Song is just meant to be one of those “weird but meant to be dEeP” things that shows do sometimes to be cool (not a criticism technically; depends on how it’s used).

I think the cake is the labyrinth and Homura saying that she’s the pumpkin makes her the odd one out since pumpkins are associated with scares and halloween, so it’s “foreshadowing” her being the witch. The things that they say they are... they’re like--ingredients for a meal, but not a cake, so the the cake is the labyrinth and they’re the things that would go inside it.

Homura and Madoka are the only ones who really get descriptions to go with them. Homura says that she’s “full of seeds” (despair?) and Madoka implies that it’ll bring sweet dreams once she’s sliced (which is either referring to the godly freedom given to magical girls before they turn into witches, or foreshadowing Madoka being “split” after Homura stops Madoka from purifying her, leading to Homura’s “sweet dream” of what it’s like when everything is “normal” after her reality twisting).

Anonymous said:

May I ask what you don't like about Kyoko's character? Is it because she was the stereotypical "jerk with a heart of gold"? Or because the writer made her flip from hating Sayaka and wanting her dead to suddenly dying for Sayaka even though she barely knows her compared to Madoka(because the writer doesn't understand how girls' relationships work)? For me it was a mixture of both(though I still don't mind KyoSaya!), but I still liked her enough, she just felt a tad stereotypical. Your thoughts?

It’s both. I just don’t like characters like her at all and the runtime of Madoka Magica can’t maintain all of these characters, “developing” them, and then killing them off. I don’t even have any time to get attached to them because they’re dead within a matter of a few episodes.

And it’s always like, “okay here’s this character’s backstory to make you feel emotionally attached--HA NOW THEY’RE DEAD. SEE??? WE TOTALLY GOT YOU.”

Like, no, you didn’t. I didn’t even have time to care about THEM, much less their actual death.

Anonymous said:

What about the girls in Madoka Magica? Do you think they're strong female characters? Now, obviously the show is not feminist, since it misses the whole point of Magical Girl, which is to empower girls and show them that girls can be powerful and feminine and can find strength in solidarity with each other by instead making them suffer and fight each other and have their power come from their emotions, which are exploited and turned against them because women can't be powerful, but still...

It’s the same way I feel about Marinette; there are some who I want to say are strong characters, but the writing is ready to just kill them off at any time and bully them for essentially having emotions.

Basically, imagine a male writer hands you a character sheet and is like, “AW YEAH CHECK OUT THIS sTrOng FEMALE CHARACTER I WROTE.”

Like, even if they were right, their ego and obnoxiousness about the whole thing, along with what they actually do to said character, makes you not want to give them any credit for it.

Anonymous said:

How do you think Puella Magi Madoka Magica would be different if they had magical boys as well(which can mean either gender-bending canon magical girls or introducing original magical boys)? Do you think the show would be better? Worse? Or would it be just about the same?

Personally I feel like having magical boys would be good and bad; good because there would be no more of the “teenage girls are hysterical” crap and it wouldn’t just be girls suffering because they can’t handle power, and bad because it would still be problematic(for stereotyping all teens as over emotional and deserving to be taken advantage of by the Incubators, and it would still be about kids suffering in a genre meant to empower girls, having some of them be boys wouldn’t help that much).

I also feel like Gen Urobuchi would still make the girls suffer more and have them be more emotionally and mentally unstable. Holy crap it feels like he read up on Aristotle’s views on women while making this show.

It would at least be more balanced I guess? Like, teenage years are a fragile time, so it would make sense for both girls and boys to be taken advantage of. I still wouldn’t like it but it would be nice to point out, “there are emotional boys as well as emotional girls.”

Anonymous said:

Literally all the problems with Treatment of Marinette, Chat's Entitlement(TM), and the sheer sexism in general(ex. all the teenage girls and even women villains being catty and bitchy, while the male villains are cool, suave, and calculating; female villains being irredeemable scum while male villains are "not as bad as they seem", etc.) could all be solved if the show just got some more female writers! You know a show isn't feminist like people claim if none of the writers are women.

That's what I love about Friendship is Magic; the show is written and directed by a woman and actually has a variety of both male and female writers! Plus, Lauren Faust explicitly identifies as a feminist and claims her works are meant to empower women and show them that there's no wrong way to be a girl. And the show reflects that! There's no "token girl" who checks all the boxes; the females have realistic flaws, diverse personalities, and let's not forget ARE THE HEROES!!! Not to mention that the cast is actually PREDOMINANTLY FEMALE. Do people have any idea how refreshing that is?!

And that's why whenever people claim that shows like Madoka Magica are feminist when it's written by men for men while also dismissing actually feminist shows written by women for women as "sexist" or "demeaning", I cringe inside. It's not just what the show looks like, it's what the people behind it say.

And Gen Urobuchi is not a feminist. At all. Just listen to the things he says about the girls, that they're terrorists who are full of hubris and destined to be alone, and that actual magical girl shows weren't his inspiration beyond the show's cosmetics, he just based it off of porn games. He only watched those shows after making Madoka Magica and admitted they were weird to him. Well, maybe they wouldn't be weird if you actually used them as inspiration! Why are you even making magical girl? So basically he admitted that all the suffering the girls go through is because it's his fetish.

I knew I wasn't imagining things when I saw all those weird shots and angles(ex. zooming in on Sayaka's thighs and breasts when she collapses to the floor, Madoka gripping the bed sheets between her legs when agitated, zooming in on Kyoko's ass when she takes her phone out of her shorts' back pocket, it's all for cheap titillation). And yet people keep saying the show is devoid of male gaze and sexism and why? Because apparently men know how to represent women better than women themselves.

you said “Madoka gripping the bed sheets between her thighs” and it gave me an immediate flashback, I hate it

I find that it’s a similar thing with gay anime/manga; I’m more likely to trust a F/F story if it’s written by a woman since they’re less likely to sexualize everything.

Anonymous said:

Homura in Puella Magi Madoka Magica: But Madoka, what's going to happen to you? You'll end up all alone here forever! You'll never be able to see your friends and family! Homura in Rebellion: Haha, screw Madoka's friends and family! Only I am worthy of Madoka's love! That girl belongs to me! MWAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!!!(I'm sorry for the over exaggeration, but this is how it felt for me.)

Apparently, it was better for Madoka to just have all of her memories and powers yoinked away.

Sayaka is Madoka’s right hand girl so idk why Homura has this idea that she needs to sAvE Madoka. The fact that this whole thing comes out of a misunderstanding (because Madoka doesn’t have her memories) is so irritating.

Anonymous said:

I actually love Madoka Magica, but I completely agree with you on the hysterical women thing. Why couldn’t they just have... both magical girls and magical boys? Like, just mention that magical boys are a thing? They don’t even have to change anything but that, they don’t even really have to show it, just be like “yeah there’s magical boys too but that’s not really what this story is about, it’s about our characters we have here”. I don’t know, feels like that would have at least helped stuff.

Yeah, they don’t have to bother having the magical boys around. Just to know they exist would be enough. I mean, the fact that the focus is on them would still be bothersome (they’d probably do a thing where each girl represents a different emotion that is easily manipulated/easy to control), but it’d be something.

Anonymous said:

One thing that weirds me out when people are talking about Madoka Magica is when people refer to the characters as "little girls". Like, excuse me? They are not "little girls". They are teenagers! All of them are at least 14 years old! I hate when people call them "little", it's just so condescending and infantilizing, especially when the show does enough of that to them already. After all, no one makes that mistake with the heroines of Lucky Star and Hidamari Sketch(who are also drawn by Aoki)!

I feel like it’s the equivalent of when people call women “girls,” y’know? Sort of a “treating females as younger than they really are,” which is probably what gives guys the feeling that they have control.

For a gender that claims to be so dominant, certain ones sure have to delude themselves a lot to make themselves feel better.

Anonymous said:

I was thinking about what you said about Puella Magi Madoka Magica passing the Bechdel Test, and if it counts if there's barely any men to talk about. And while I do agree that it counts, I also feel that it doesn't really matter much in shows such as Madoka. This isn't even about feminism, this is about the fact that if a show has next to no men in it at all then it's pretty much a given that they won't talk about them since it would be impractical to talk about something that doesn't exist.

So because of that, I think there should either be an alternative test which only applies to shows that have a significant or equal number of male characters and yet the ladies still pass the test(making it feel more "real" since the option to talk about men is there), or the test should be rewritten entirely so that it only applies to shows in which the cast is either equally gender-split, or has a majority male cast/significant amount of males even if the females still outnumber them.

Reminds me of how, on TV Tropes, someone suggested that there should be a "Weak" and "Strong" Bechdel Test, where "Weak" refers to the women talking about something other than men because it is literally what's relevant at the moment(such as two female police officers discussing how to catch a female killer), thus applying the Bechdel Test there seems semi-void, while "Strong" is when they could talk about men but choose not to(ie. two female students talking about their grades during lunch).

And just to clarify about the "Strong" one, when I say they could talk about men but choose not to, this isn't to imply that female characters should talk about men, or that something's wrong with them for not talking about men, just that there's nothing stopping them from doing so, but they choose to talk about something unrelated to men. I think this strategy is much better than the test we have because it makes conversations between female characters seem more real since they're discussing things other than men of their own volition, rather than the non-male-centered talk being because they have to talk about it in-universe. I say that because The Bechdel Test serves to show that women's lives don't and shouldn't revolve around men, and they can talk about other things if they want to, but if the conversation is because they have to(like the example I gave), that gives sexists the opportunity to go "Yeah, well, they're only talking about it because it's their job!"

But if the female characters talk about things other than men of their own free will(as in, when the option is still there), then it shows that women really do have their own free will to talk about their own things and that there is NO REASON to not pass the Bechdel Test in today's day and age(I keep hearing people claim the test is stupid and doesn't matter, but then it should be easy to pass). "Oh, but if they had the choice, they would talk about men." No, because men don't sit around and talk about the women in their lives all day so why should women talk about the men in their lives all day? And to the people saying these types of tests are getting in the way of their "creativity", well, now that we know that you think female representation is stupid and something you have to be forced to do, we don't have to listen to a word you say. ;)

I like the idea of adjusting the Bechdel Test for other circumstances and expanding it as such!

You could also extend it to things like sexualization, because--I mean, having two female characters who talk to each other probably doesn’t mean much if they’re half-dressed or the writer wanted to make them bisexual for “The Fanservice.”

Anonymous said:

To be honest deconstructions of Magical Girl confuse me. There are some good ones out there(such as Princess Tutu and Revolutionary Girl Utena, so I know they're not all just torture porn, my only gripe with Utena is the implication that girls who take on the feminine "Princess" role are weak), but at its heart Magical Girl has always dealt with death, gore and pain just as much as female empowerment.

It makes me feel like the people who write these stories haven't seen magical girl and think it's all just sunshine and rainbows and that just because it's "girly" it's vapid and has no substance, and since the only way to have substance apparently is to be "dark", they go "screw it with all this princessy magical shit! Let's make our show dark instead!" When in reality if they had just sat down and watched a magical girl anime, they would understand that this is not the case.

Not to mention that many of them tend to have fanservice and the idea that magical girls have to suffer, so instead of empowering young girls, they end up misrepresenting the genre and turning it into fetish fuel torture porn for adult men(Madoka Magica and Yuki Yuna are very good examples of this; the writer of Madoka says that the girls are terrorists and full of hubris and that he was inspired by porn games). It's not that you can't deconstruct the genre at all, but it's almost never done tastefully and the magical girl themes are just a cover used to explain the suffering the girls go through. :(

Another thing about magical girl deconstructions is that they often reinforce patriarchal themes, like that girls shouldn't want things for themselves and that genuinely doing something for someone while also having ulterior motives that help yourself are a BAD BAD BAD thing, no matter how ultimately harmless they are, even if they help everybody involved. They also tend to reinforce Tall Poppy Syndrome and portray the powers as harmful or a bad thing, implying that girls shouldn't have power.

Honestly, I think there can totally be even more substance in magical girl anime that doesn’t have to resort to “make it eDgY” (which I feel like is a slippery slope that can easily come off as lazy); for example, I’d really enjoy seeing something deeper to magical girl powers than something like, “oh, this magical girl happens to have the power that fits their personality,” such as a magical girl who has a power she feels she doesn’t fit but it’s a matter of perspective/seeing herself differently, or a magical girl who does have the powers that “fit” her personality - like a “fiery” girl with fire powers - and the weaknesses in her powers correlate to the weaknesses in her personality, so she has to either iron out those issues or find workarounds, as true “perfection” isn’t possible nor practical, which is something all the girls have to accept despite whatever pressure they’re under.

.I dunno, I like lore and powers revolving around metaphors. It’s fun.

Anonymous said:

About what you said in regards to "no pueri magi because it doesn't hit the shock value threshold enough", I remember this interesting comment I saw on an article called "The Problem With The Dark Magical Girl Genre"(which I would totally recommend checking out, by the way!) which said that shojo magical girl and seinen magical girl both embrace a different philosophy regarding strong female fighters. In shojo, they tend to embrace femininity as a strength and show girls that they have the power to do whatever they want and undergo dangerous professions. But in seinen, which conveniently enough is more likely to "deconstruct" the genre(ugh), rather than admiring the girls and supporting them in their endeavors, the girls are meant to be pitied(often to the point of infantilization) when bad things happen to them, with the fact that they are girls serving to make everything worse. It operates under the idea that girls are fragile, in need of protection, and shouldn't be fighting at all.

That's why deconstructions like Madoka Magica and Yuki Yuna don't sit right with me, and also why I don't consider them feminist series. People can say whatever they want about Sailor Moon and Pretty Cure, but ultimately they also had dark and dangerous themes(to the point where some kids had nightmares), but ultimately allowed the girls to rise above the hell they went through and find the strength in them to save the day. We feel bad for them when they die, not because they're moe girls, but because we were actually given the time to form a connection with them and want to see them succeed, rather than just be expected to pity them because they're cute manipulated girls. That way, when they ultimately save the day, it's all the more satisfying. Princess Tutu was a deconstruction that actually went about it in the right way, because the girls eventually found the courage to defeat their enemies in a way that made sense. Why the hell is it a "good" thing to subvert that?

No clue, but I basically agree with everything there. I mean, Madoka Magica’s entire stick is basically that all the girls are like “uwu” in terms of the style (with Madoka being the “cutest” of them all) and then being put in this dark and edgy plot+setting; it’s for both the shock value and the “contrast” of having “moe” characters be thrust into these situations to essentially die.

And the conclusion doesn’t end up being satisfying (at least to me) because the villain doesn’t have emotions so he’s just like “owo” (seriously, I wouldn’t hate on Rebellion so much if Kyubey had been given emotions rather than going crazy; Homura can basically do whatever she wants and it was SUCH A MISSED OPPORTUNITY) so it ends up being more about the journey getting there like wow look at all the sUbvErSiOnS and dEaTh we had along the way!

Because at the end of the day, it’s still like, “the girls give into their ‘hysterical emotions’ in the end basically no matter what,” even if they get saved by Madoka in the end.

Anonymous said:

Do you remember, in Madoka Magica, when Kyubey said that humans would still be living in caves if not for the Incubators? First of all, keep in mind what Incubators do. Their entire purpose on this earth is to feed off the emotions of young teenage girls as they spiral into despair as a result of their delusions of power. Like wow, let that sink in. Apparently humanity's advancement relies on the exploitation of women. We are literally the punching bags of the universe. Isn't it lovely?

No! You see--we’re so important to the world! If we weren’t emotionally exploited, the world wouldn’t be the way it is now! :D

(kill me)

Anonymous said:

I once saw a tag on tumblr that read "The only good magical girl anime is Madoka Magica because it's gay, and even it has problems." Like, ugh. Really? Has this person not watched ANY other magical girl anime? Such ignorance. So many things wrong with that statement that I can't--and WON'T--even begin to unravel here.

MADOKA MAGICA IS NOT GAY AND I’M SO TIRED OF PEOPLE CLAIMING IT IS

s T O P

I DON’T EVEN CONSIDER YURI ON ICE TO BE GAY. MADOKA MAGICA? NAH MAN.

Anonymous said:

Do the girls in Madoka Magica even have transformation phrases? You know, like how Marinette says "Tikki, spots on!" or how Sailor Moon says "Moon Prism Power! Make-up!" or how Iris in LoliRock says "Iris! Princess of Ephedia!" etc. But in Madoka Magica, there doesn't seem to be any of that. At least in Yuki Yuna they pressed a button on their phones. But how do the Puellae Magi even transform? Just goes to show you how Gen Urobuchi knows next to nothing about the genre he claims to deconstruct.

Transformation phrases are magical and cool and you can’t take that away from me.

Anonymous said:

I had a shower thought about Madoka randomly in bed last night: If a Magical Girl's Soul Gem loses control over its user when 100 metres or further away from it, that meant that when Homura got Sayaka's Soul Gem back for her, Sayaka should've regained consciousness once Homura was less than 100 metres away, even if she didn't have her Soul Gem yet. I also love to ponder why on Earth Homura would even bother retrieving Sayaka's Soul Gem if she only cares about Madoka and Madoka's well-being.

I think it’s just a complicated process of Homura trying to make sure Madoka doesn’t fall into despair herself (in a non-witch way) and is convinced to make a wish.

Anonymous said:

The more I think about it, the more I realize that Sayaka really got the worst deal out of the whole thing. While her story may seem more "mundane" compared to the others(she just wanted the token Ill Boy osananajimi to like her back), she's the only one who somehow isn't brought back when Madoka recreates the universe, loses her Soul Gem on more than one account(and on the second, she starts decomposing and her crush sees her and calls her a monster because he thinks she's pretending to be the REAL Sayaka), is supposedly the weakest Magical Girl, getting swiftly taken out by both Kyoko AND Homura(the latter of which doesn't even make sense, if her body can heal why was she taken out so quickly?), takes a long while to show up in Magia Record, and Gen somehow finds it suiting to single her out as the one who is "destined to die" every time she makes a contract. Apparently the series director wanted Sayaka to live/be brought back, but Gen refused because it just had to be edgy.

Of course, MEN are allowed to have wish fulfillment power fantasies and dream like the sky's no limit and aspire to be all they want to be, but the second WOMEN try to be the strong ones, the powerful ones, or dream of something for themselves and others, they have to learn a lesson about how unrealistic their fantasies are and how they'll never live out their dreams. Hence why Sayaka puts the blame all on herself, saying that she's not a hero and was stupid and selfish the whole time.

"token Ill Boy osananajimi“ dfhbgjhfdgdfg

It was a real shame because I liked Sayaka somewhat (not saying much but still) and she was such a predictable one to go. Like, “oh wow, an angst-y anime all about shock value? so basically the best friend is dead then with no chance of survival.”

I think I do remember being told/reading somewhere (so don’t quote me) that Sayaka is the one that’s hardest to keep alive in the games, so you have to work hard for it. It just sucks.

Anonymous said:

Yet another thing that bothers me about Puella Magi is how the show frames the young ladies as if everything is their fault even though they have no idea what they're getting into because the person who makes the deal doesn't even bother explaining shit to them and all the show's attempts at deconstructing is just taking lighthearted elements meant to empower girls and show them that they can be brave and strong as well as feminine and make them dark and morbid.

Like, I get the whole "having young girls fight is a little unrealistic" aspect, but most magical girl shows actually do touch on that! Only difference is that over time, they become stronger and better at fighting(which is only to be expected, whether you're a teenage girl or not) and become more competent along the way because the whole genre is about FEMALE EMPOWERMENT.

Not to mention how the show seems to forget that the Incubators are villains and even seems to put them in the right and the girls in the wrong, what with the claim that they rationalize with the girls they make contracts with like sentient human beings(yeah, because emotionally manipulating young girls and literally taking their souls out of their bodies and making them liches without their consent is definitely treating them like sentient human beings), and that they always follow up on their end of the deal whereas it's the girls' faults their wishes go sour because they never wish for what they truly want(I'm sorry, but I simply DO NOT buy that. Homura and Mami outright wished for what they wanted. Their wishes went sour because the plot "decided" that they should have wished in a different way; plus, you're telling me that if Sayaka had outright said she wished "for Kyousuke to love her back" that the show wouldn't just "make" him mind-controlled or have Sayaka "outgrow" her feelings by the time he falls in love with her, all the while making it out to be "her" fault he's so heartbroken because she was some kind of tease or whatever, further demonizing girls' sexualities?).

Plus they explicitly claim that every woman in history was a magical girl and that without them, humanity would still be in caves(as in, humanity wouldn't be able to progress without the oppression and exploitation of women, and women can't gain power without going insane because female power is some unhealthy, inhuman, infernal thing.). Even if we take this all as a reflection of patriarchal society(which I highly doubt it was, if anything, it reinforces it), all it does is imply that the oppression of women is the natural order of things, required even.

As for the girls themselves, they routinely beat themselves up and the show makes no effort to tell them they're wrong(up until the massive cop-out of an ending), like how Sayaka's last words before becoming a witch are literally her "admitting" that she was "stupid, so stupid" for wanting a boy to love her and be healed of his infirmity. It just seems like we're supposed to think "you know, maybe the Incubators aren't that bad!" while ignoring that the girls are being treated like the disposable trash bags of the universe. This show already does the magical girl genre dirty but treating it like everything the Incubators did was necessary and like it's all the girls' faults these things happened to them in the first place is the icing on the stale, sour cake. Nothing like a giant heap of sexism to help get you through your day. :/

I’ve noticed this a lot in Miraculous, but Madoka Magica somehow does it worse; this “one (supposed) mistake leads to all of these consequences you never saw coming.”

Like Ladybug calling Lila out. We know that Lila’s pettiness in “Chameleon” shows that it wouldn’t matter whether Ladybug yelled at her or not; the simple fact that Marinette opposes a liar led to Marinette getting expelled, even if only for a while. Then there’s “Miracle Queen” and all that garbage that came with it.

These two shows put their teenage girls through hell for having emotions and there’s no way to undo it.

Anonymous said:

Honestly, the Madoka Magica fandom is basically the magical girl equivalent of "not like other girls" type women. I can't say I'd be surprised if they didn't watch a single magical girl show other than Madoka because they're all "stupid and girly but this one is edgy and dark" just because those shows are written by women to inspire other girls and show femininity as a strength while Madoka Magica is written by men for men who want to see young girls suffer without any actual feminism.

Like, let's go through their arguments one-by-one to prove that they don't hold up. They love to say that Madoka Magica is better than other Magical Girl shows because "it's dark and edgy and shows the downsides to being a Magical Girl unlike other shows where it's all sunshine and lollipops". First of all, other Magical girl shows also got very dark. Princess Tutu and Utena are also "darker" takes on the genre, but even more lighthearted shows like Sailor Moon and Precure had scary moments.

The only difference is, with them, they still managed to critique problematic aspects of the genre and actually provided ways to improve it, while STILL managing to keep their target audience(FEMALES) in mind, without condescending to them and infantilizing them. And they still showed the girls being empowered and overcoming the darkness.

In Madoka, there's none of that, there's no actual critique of the genre because Gen didn't have the respect for it to do his research, it's aimed at men so it doesn't keep female viewers in mind by definition(which is also another reason why it can't be a deconstruction; deconstructions should be done FOR its target audience), and the girls are constantly put down and treated like Moe crybabies by the narrative even when they're not(cause, you know, teenage girls are "emotional"!). And it doesn't offer ways the genre could improve, it just takes a female-empowering genre and twists it to be this system of oppression that the genre is meant to avoid.

Magical Girls tend to have a very strong focus on girls empowering girls and all that awesome stuff, and yet when Madoka and Mami form a special bond and Madoka encourages Mami by telling her she's not alone? It makes her big-headed and overconfident and she gets devoured by Charlotte. See what happens when girls rely on each other? Madoka is Sayaka's best friend, but gets pushed aside in favor of Kyoko, who later dies for Sayaka because girls who want to help each other had better be prepared to suffer and die for their beliefs. Sayaka loses everything, which happens to include her best friend, over a guy. And the whole witch process means that any female solidarity that could be found in the show is thrown out the window since the core concept of the show is girls being forced to brutalize and kill and exploit each other.

People act like Madoka is Yuri when it's not, Gen was asked if Homura really was in love with Madoka and if Kyoko really was in love with Sayaka, and what did he do? He beat around the bush. Naoko Takeuchi and Kunihiko Ikuhara(the latter of whom also worked on Sailor Moon R; woah, what a surprise) both admitted that there was gay love in their stories, yet people act like Madoka is super progressive regarding homosexuality when it's just implied and those shows were MUCH more open! Doesn't stop people from claiming the show is "honorary yuri" and saying that the meaning of "yuri" should be broadened to include any close bonds between two female characters, whether or not it's actually romantic, AND favoring the show(and HomuMado) above actual yuri shows that are made to appeal to women. If all this were actually valid, Sailor Moon would be yuri as hell.

I hate seeing people fap over this show and act like it's so revolutionary for recycling things that the genre was ALREADY DOING, because I know full well that the ONLY reason it gets this wide acclaim is because Magical Girl shows have traditionally been written for women and this show is aimed at men. That's literally it. Because nothing a woman writes is good enough, especially when it dares to go against patriarchal constructs of femininity as weak and docile by portraying it as cool and awesome. It doesn't matter how cool and dark and diverse and inclusive and complex Sailor Moon and Precure and Princess Tutu and Utena are, they're written by/for women with the intention of empowering them so they're automatically invalid, cheap, happy-go-lucky crap where nothing bad ever happens and anything those shows try to do ought to be discredited because they don't appeal to men like they should so what's the point?

But the second a MAN comes in and intrudes on a female-dominated space by doing all of those things but with a very shallow understanding of how they ought to be executed, people are all over it because a MAN did it and now it's interesting and respectable! I have seen so many people say that they don't like Magical Girl because it's girly and shallow and stupid, but then they praise Madoka for things that the girly and "shallow" shows have already done! Men are always taking away things meant for women and distorting it to fit their patriarchal views and yet when they do it it's somehow better and anyone who complains is simply a whiny straw feminist!

The fandom does it all the time, someone complains about the show and why they don't like it and find it sexist, and the response is always "you're just not smart enough to understand it; you have no idea what you just watched". Because obviously since it's made by a man it's sooo much smarter then the traditional sappy stuff made by women. That's why it's so annoying when others praise it at the expense of other works in the genre: they know their reasons for liking it are, more often than not, rooted in sexism against female-aimed and female-empowering works, so the only way they can praise it is at the expense of said works, hence them being just like girls who claim they're "not like other girls" when there's nothing wrong with girls being feminine and in fact many of those girls may like the same things you do!

So while I'm not saying there's anything inherently WRONG with liking Madoka, I DO have a problem with people who act like it's better or more serious than other shows in the genre and simply discard them on the grounds that they're "for girls", since they obviously didn't watch them.

me when I initially watched Madoka Magica: I don’t get why this exists.

me when I learned it was written by a man: ohhh, now I get it.

I also take issue with people comparing things that are made for different demographics. Like look, I don’t care if you enjoy your angst display over here, but also maybe don’t compare it to the stuff not even made for you unless you’re willing to get into a fight over it?

It comes off wrong, like they have to trash on stuff because it wasn’t made for them, y’know?

Anonymous said:

Honestly, I am so sick of people saying that Magical Girl shows are sexist or anti-feminist, when all they do is portray girls being awesome and powerful while also being feminine at the same time, because "Well in Japan it's actually gender conformity because it's telling girls they can only be strong if they're feminine! You're just projecting your Western values onto an Eastern work!".

First of all these shows are made by women for women and often have explicit feminine messages that you literally cannot miss unless you are simply blind or trying not to see them. And they also tend to have a very strong focus on women supporting or empowering other women. Just think of Sailor Moon, which constantly gets this "criticism", and yet there's an episode where the girls explicitly protest against a villain who claims women are all shallow and useless and can't do anything without men's help. Would Naoko Takeuchi put that in the show if she weren't a feminist?

And then there's the fact that she has said that one message she wanted the female leads to convey was to value their relationships between other girls because girls are strong and don't need to waste time depending on men. There's also the fact that most Magical Girl shows tend to treat the powers as something special and awesome that's unique to women and girls, paired with the coming-of-age themes present in the show, and you get a magical equivalent of female puberty, with magic mixed in.

But no, all of that gets thrown out the window because they dare to be "feminine" while doing all of that stuff and the Japanese are forcing their girls to be girly through Magical Girl propaganda. And I just HATE when people act like anything feminine must be societally forced onto girls, rather than girls just happening to like them. In addition, stating that they are simply reinforcing gender roles by being feminine is such bullshit because the whole purpose isn't about conforming to patriarchal femininity, it's about reclaiming femininity.

Too often, femininity is associated with being weak, powerless, helpless, submissive, docile, vapid, catty, bitchy, petty, vain, stupid, the list goes on. Magical Girl saves femininity from a bad reputation. It shows femininity in a new light, as something strong and powerful and, hell, even admirable! It's about telling girls "Hey, you can be strong and powerful and smart, but you don't have to be a tomboy or act like a man to do so". Girls are always told they have to act masculine to be taken seriously because the only way to be respected is to be like a man, which is an indirect way of saying that only men deserve respect.

Magical Girl does away with all that in favor of showing the feminine as something innately powerful, and yet naysayers MISS the point and say that it's just stereotyping girls instead. To see people claim that Magical Girl forces girls to fit a feminine ideal to be respected is just disappointing. It's supposed to be a female power fantasy for young girls that shows them as the ones being powerful and empowering each other.

Take how in Sailor Moon the heroine often says something along the lines of "I won't let you take advantage of girls", which Wedding Peach went on to imitate. The purpose of the genre is for girls. To empower girls. So why on earth would they show them fitting into a "male" mould of power? Do these people think that any time women are shown acting distinct from men that they are doing something wrong?

And the hypocritical part is that nobody pisses on male-oriented anime for reinforcing a harmful narrative to boys that they have to be masculine to be valued and respected. Of course they don't! Because being "masculine" is never seen as a bad thing to be. It's assumed that masculinity is always strong and good and awesome and there's nothing wrong with boys being forced to be masculine because you're supposed to want to be masculine. You're not supposed to want to be feminine.

So of course people will shit all over Magical Girl for embracing, empowering, and reclaiming femininity, because it's not supposed to be that way! You're not supposed to be feminine and also be strong. You're supposed to deny your identity as a woman and assimilate into the boys' club because only boy things are worthwhile! And they cover it up by saying that Magical Girl forces girls to be feminine, when in actuality the WORLD forces girls to be MASCULINE. Magical Girl doesn't force girls to be feminine, It ALLOWS them to. Do you see the difference there?

Another thing I'd like to bring to the table is that the claim is racist and here's why: The claim that "Magical Girl shows are seen as feminist in the US for portraying femininity as a source of strength but not in Japan because it's telling girls they have to be feminine"...what does that mean? Japanese people can't be feminist? All Japanese people are sexists and think girls have to fit in a certain role? Do Japanese feminists HAVE to be anti-femininity? Are there literally no Japanese people who think you can be feminine AND strong(who also obviously identify as feminists?) Because it seems hella sexist to insinuate that Magical Girl shows are sexist because they're made in Japan and they don't believe you can be feminine AND strong there.

While there is some credibility to it since Japan IS, by and large, much more strict with gender roles, hasn't it ever occurred to these people that these types of shows exist to counter that belief? Not only that, but it implies that people aren't allowed to have opinions on works that aren't made in their culture, and that anyone who sees those shows as feminist are just projecting their Western beliefs onto an Eastern work. And even worse, when people say that, they don't have the same opinion of Western Magical Girl works.

Just look at LoliRock, Miraculous Ladybug, Winx, W.I.T.C.H., Star vs the Forces of Evil, and countless other European/Western Magical Girl works. Where are the people saying "They get their power from femininity and that is sexist!"? Nowhere! They're silent! Even though those are very much like Magical Girl works from Japan(although I don't think the genre originated from there), while still being original.

It's because people think that any media exported from Japan is automatically sexist and demeaning and so anything they create, no matter how empowering their intentions, gets twisted into something that's somehow toxic or unsafe for girls to watch. But when Europeans do the exact same thing nobody complains. Because Japan is not allowed to do anything empowering whatsoever; something's always wrong with it, apparently.

So that's why I have a problem with people who say those things; it's so problematic because they think they're being all open-minded and aware/respectful of other people's cultures, but all they're doing is reinforcing negative stereotypes further. It's kinda like what I said earlier(in another ask) about how people love to praise Madoka Magica for being a unique, dark, and interesting take on the genre when all it did was rehash elements of the genre that already existed, strip away the female empowerment, and gear it towards grown men, which is why people like it more. How about instead of speaking for Japanese people you let them speak for themselves?!

I would also like to add that there’s even a limit to women acting masculine because that’s still “not enough” for those kinda of men who would promote those beliefs. Women need to act more masculine to “be taken seriously” but then you have men who’ll tell them to “dress less” or whatever.

I think what it comes down to is that they want women to not be “emotionally taxing” with all those dAmN eMoTioNs of theirs (unless it’s for the sake of their angsty magical girl anime where the girls suffer for having emotions), but they also need to look pretty and be sexualized.

We can’t win.

#other: ask and answer #other: non ml talk

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splendidlyimperfect · 4 years

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I’ve never written for ATLA before but I rewatched it a while back and have a bunch of feelings about Zuko so here’s a bit of fluffy Sokka/Zuko angst. ^-^

Fandom: Avatar: The Last Airbender Rating: Teen And Up Audiences Relationships: Sokka/Zuko (Avatar) Additional Tags: Canon Universe, Fluff and Angst, Scars, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Stargazing, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Holding Hands, Enemies to Friends, Short & Sweet, Zuko's got baggage and Sokka wants to help, They're both adorable dorks

Summary: Sokka finds out how Zuko got his scar.

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Sokka can’t sleep.

It’s not like this is something new, but it’s getting really goddamn annoying to close his eyes every night and stare at the inside of his eyelids until eventually he gives up and goes to look at the stars. Every time he thinks he’s ready to fall asleep, his mind starts running in circles again – the war, his father, the failed attack, guilt, guilt, guilt.

At least the stars are pretty. He’s found a new place to watch them from – a little outcropping that hangs out over the vast expanse of the ocean. It’s tall and terrifying, and being up here makes Sokka feel significant, somehow.

He’s lying on his back, staring up at the constellations, when he hears rustling in the bushes behind him. He’s immediately on edge, boomerang in hand, crouched and ready to attack.

“It’s just me.” It’s Zuko’s voice, and Sokka relaxes. A month ago, he would have kept his guard up and reminded Zuko about what a jerk he was. But Zuko’s been nothing but kind (and honestly kind of adorably awkward) since he joined them, so Sokka’s pretty sure he’s not about to be pushed off the cliff.

Continue reading on AO3

“What are you doing up here?” Sokka asks. It’s meant to sound like a demand, but it comes across as curious.

“What are you doing up here?” Zuko replies. He crosses his arms over his chest, then drops them to his sides, then moves them in front of him like he’s not quite sure where they should go. “I come out here every night.”

“Oh.” Sokka scoots over and gestures to the ground next to him. “I didn’t know, sorry.”

Zuko shrugs, moving cautiously toward Sokka and settling down on the grass. Sokka studies the scar that covers half of his face – ridged and red, interrupting Zuko’s otherwise smooth, fair skin. Then he realizes he’s staring and quickly looks away, focusing on the starry sky instead.

“It’s okay,” Zuko says quietly, pulling his knees up to his chest and wrapping his arms around them. He glances at Sokka, then gestures to his face. “Everyone stares.”

“I didn’t—that’s not what...” Sokka puts his hands up defensively, then sighs and drops them. “Sorry.”

Zuko shrugs. “I know it’s ugly.”

“It isn’t,” Sokka says quickly. Zuko makes a face like he’s raising an eyebrow, except he doesn’t have an eyebrow on that side, just marred, red skin. “It’s badass.”

“Badass,” Zuko says slowly, then shakes his head and rests his chin on his knees.

“Yeah,” Sokka says, crossing his legs under him. “Scars are cool. I got a sweet one when I fought off a dolphin piranha that attacked our fishing boat one time. Check it out!”

By the time embarrassment catches up with him, he’s already pulled up his shirt to show Zuko the round, bite-shaped scar just below his ribs. He sits there for a second, cheeks pink as Zuko stares at him, then quickly tugs his shirt back down and crosses his arms over his stomach.

“I don’t like my scars,” Zuko says quietly. He doesn’t elaborate, just stares up at the stars.

Sokka’s brain takes too long to catch up to his mouth, so before he can think better of it, he asks, “How’d you get it?” Zuko’s shoulders tense and Sokka mentally smacks himself. “Sorry, that’s not my—”

“My dad,” Zuko says.

The words sink in slowly, like they’re filtering through water, or in another language.

“Your... what?”

“My dad,” Zuko repeats, voice flat.

“That... how...” Sokka stammers, hands moving uncertainly in front of him.

“I spoke out of turn and he challenged me to an Agni Kai – a firebending duel.” Zuko’s voice is flat and something uncomfortable twists in Sokka’s stomach. “I didn’t want to fight him, so he...” He gestures to his face.

“What?” Sokka says, and he knows it’s not the right thing to say, but his mind is stuck on my dad burned my face. “How old were—”

“Thirteen.”

The silence that hangs around them is thick and uncomfortable, and Sokka feels like he can’t quite breathe. He thinks of his own father, of him teaching Sokka to fish, of hugs and laughter and stories under the sky.

No wonder Zuko’s so angry all the time.

“I’m sorry,” Sokka says eventually, because there’s really nothing else to say. Zuko shrugs, and Sokka’s brain finally catches up to the earlier part of the conversation. “Wait, scars? Plural?”

“Mm.”

“From... your dad?”

Zuko tips his head noncommittally and suddenly Sokka feels way, way out of his depth. He’s never been good with emotional conversations – that's what Katara is for. Sokka’s just the funny one. But Katara isn’t here, and Sokka is, and Zuko’s trusting him.

“Do you... wanna talk about it?” Sokka says eventually. His voice feels out of place in the soft night air – there's nothing around them but trees and the stars and the dark.

“There’s nothing to talk about,” Zuko says, playing with a loose thread at the bottom of his pants. “It happened. He’s awful, and I’m...” He swallows. “I’m trying to be better than him. I know you don’t trust me, but—”

“I do.” The words surprise Sokka, but he quickly realizes that they’re true. Thinking about the pain Zuko’s gone through is enough to make everything slowly start to make sense. “You aren’t your dad.”

“I hurt people.”

“People hurt you.”

“That’s not an excuse.” Zuko says, and he somehow manages to sound grown up and like a small child at the same time. There’s a softness to his words that make it far too easy for Sokka to picture him as a scared little boy.

“Maybe not,” Sokka admits, and before he can stop himself, he shifts a bit closer to Zuko. “But you’re helping now. Doing the right thing, y’know?”

“Mm.” Zuko sighs, then flops onto his back, staring up at the stars. A strange sense of longing stirs in Sokka – a desire to somehow make this better even though he has no idea how.

He shuffles down next to Zuko, very conscious of how close they are. Zuko doesn’t move, so Sokka follows his gaze upward and searches the constellations until he finds the one he’s looking for.

“See those three in a row?” he says, pointing at a group of bright stars not far from the moon. The movement of his arm brushes his shoulder against Zuko’s. “That’s my favorite one – Nunki.”

Zuko frowns. “Uncle always...” He hesitates, shaking his head. “He said it was the Mulu-izi.”

“Huh.” Sokka drops his arm but doesn’t move awake from Zuko. He’s sure he’s imagining it, but it feels like Zuko’s leaning against him, just a little. “I guess everyone has different names for them. What does... Mulu...”

“Mulu-izi.”

“What does it mean?”

Zuko sighs, and this time Sokka’s sure he’s moved just a little bit closer. Their knees are touching now, and Zuko is so warm against him. “The lost child,” Zuko says quietly.

“Oh.” Sokka doesn’t say anything for a second, just listens to Zuko’s quiet breathing and the sound of the waves crashing against the cliff, hundreds of feet below them.

“What does ‘Nunki’ mean?” Zuko asks eventually.

“The Heart of the Ocean,” Sokka says. “My dad said it guides sailors away from danger. It shows them the...” He hesitates, trying to remember the way his dad had phrased it when he was little, sitting on his father’s lap in the middle of the night and staring up at the sky. “The true path,” he says. “Like... the way out of darkness, or something.”

“Very eloquent,” Zuko says, and Sokka can hear a tiny hint of a smile in his voice.

“Shut up,” Sokka grumbles, nudging Zuko with his shoulder. Zuko retaliates by kicking his ankle, and then they both move to shove at each other at the same time and their hands touch.

Sokka’s breath catches. He feels like he’s been shocked, and he’s immediately glad that it’s dark enough that Zuko can’t see the redness that rushes to his cheeks. He’s about to yank his hand away when he feels the tentative brush of Zuko’s knuckles against his – purposeful this time, not an accident in the dark.

For some reason, instead of pulling his hand away, he returns the touch, stomach twisting at Zuko’s soft exhale. They don’t move for a second, and then somehow their fingers slide together, and they both move until their joined hands are resting against Zuko’s bent leg.

A charged silence fills the air and Sokka isn’t sure what any of this means, but it feels right, somehow. He tips his head against Zuko’s and gestures up at the sky again with his other hand.

“What’s that one called?” he asks, voice surprisingly steady.

“Szak-khash,” Zuko replies, and before Sokka can ask him what it means, he squeezes Sokka’s hand and says, “A New Beginning.”

#avatar the last airbender #atla #zukka #sokka x zuko #sokka #zuko #fanfic #atla fanfic #angsty fluff #my fic

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persephone-damnedqueen · 4 years

Text

Rankin’ the Waifus

I feel like when you’re drunk with friends, you either have the best ideas ever, or the worst ideas. Which is this? Well, at first, I thought this was a fantastic idea, given that @fukae-flwr challenged Drunk Me to do this, until she gave me the rules. . . The rules made it even harder for Drunk Me to do, leaving Sober Me to rise to the challenge, just to prove her wrong. Now, I know what you’re thinking, “Persephone, you have too many Waifus, ranking them is like picking between them is impossible,” but I finally, after a lot of debate, reviewing, and “friendly” discussions, involving way to much cussing and slamming of hands with friends, I was finally able to settle on the list, so without further ado, here are the rules.

1) Only one character from the franchise.

2) They have to be Waifus, not favorite characters (this rule comes in to play a lot later on).

Let’s kick off this list now with the easiest thing, the honorable waifus.

Honorable Mentions:

Now, these are in no particular order, because even leaving them off the top 10 was hard enough.

Lucy Heartfillia: Fairy Tail

This one waifu per series is the only reason why Lucy had to be cut from the main list. Let’s clear something up here, Lucy is Top Tier Waifu, especially in a series with as many Waifus as there are. Lucy has everything, from a fantastic development, to a great personality, to a gorgeous character design, and she definitely deserves more praise in the series than she gets. Sadly, my waifu choice from this series, only barely beats Lucy, but not mentioning her would be a crime.

Rindo Kobayashi: Shokugeki no Souma

Rindo is the most obvious choice from this waifu heavy series. She’s spunky, entertaining, and a glutton to boot, but above all, she’s actually a terrifying opponent to go against, especially since she’s one of the best cooks in the series. I mean hell, she literally uses alligator in one battle simply because she just felt like it, and her being apart of Centrol and having access to as many resources as they do. From the moment she’s introduced, she stole every scene she was in, even if it was just for a panel or two, if that’s not a waifu, I don’t know what is.

Maika Sakuranomiya: Blend S

This is where that waifu rule plays in. Maika is my waifu of the series, not my favorite character; that title is held strong by Hidori, the trap idol who steals the series from the moment they are introduced in episode 8. Maika, and her non-intentional sadistic look, make her the best waifu choice. It’s endearing, and sweet to watch her try her hardest to not be sadistic, but fail making all of us fall in love with her more. Also, who doesn’t love a bit of sadism in their waifus?

C.C: Code Geass

Ah, the waifu who started this whole drunken debate. She’s the classic, Pizza Hut loving, immortal waifu, who is literally unforgetable. The latest addition of her to my massive figure collection only reminded me just how strong of a waifu choice she really is, despite being from one of the oldest series on this list.

Mayoi Hachikuji, Tsubasa Hanekawa, Hitagi Senjougahara: The Monogatari Franchise

Honestly, a solid argument could be made for any of these girls to be the second best waifu. You have Hanekawa, the lovely class president who only knows what she knows, Hitagi, the tsundere who has an unhealthy obsession with stationary, Mayoi, the dead snail ghost-turned-god girl who has literally the cutest bit with Araragi in the entire series, or even Karen and Tsukihi, the Fire Sisters of our main character. Every girl in this series is a valid choice; well all but Nadako. Fuck Nadako.

Now that those mentions are out of the way, let’s get to the truly hard part.

Top Ten Waifus:

10: Homura Akemi: Puella Magi Madoka Magica

Okay, she’s not really 10, but I’m still mad at her, and after a full hour of debate, I still couldn’t justify putting her above any of the 9 other waifus who I wasn’t eternally mad at, so that valid. Homura is such a bad ass, and honestly, one of the more deadlier choices of a waifu, adding on the massive magical girl obsession I have, I physically couldn’t leave her off the list.

9: Brandish μ: Fairy Tail

Ah, Brandish, the Nation Destroyer herself. She’s perfect, in every way, and I’ve loved her from the moment she was introduced in the final arc, and by far one of the standouts of Alvarez. She’s adorable with her unique design, a massive cat obsession, and a stupidly powerful magic. Also, she’s one of the few characters to actually get some development in the entire arc. Mashima didn’t do a lot of good things in that arc, but he did gift the world with Brandish, so I can’t be too upset.

8: Retsuko: Aggretsuko

One of the most relatable waifus anyone could ask for, but what more could I say that isn’t obvious? She’s a Sanrio Red Panda who works in an office, hates her boss, and sings Death Metal kareoke. I know she’s supposed to be an adorable mascot meant as a way to get us to spend money on her merchandise, but damnit Sanrio, did you have to make her this cute?! Ugh, just take all my money already.

7: Minako Aino (Sailor Venus): Sailor Moon

This is where the waifu of the series rule killed me. My favorite character is Hotaru (Saturn), but I wouldn’t consider her a waifu; she’s more of a badass senshi who can literally destroy an entire galaxy with one swoosh of her Silence Glaive. The only three I would consider waifu enough for this list are Seiya, Usagi, and Minako, but after breaking it down throughly with @fukae-flwr, we were finally able to come down to the decision that Seiya, while being fantastic in every way, is not a waifu, and Usagi, while being relatable as fuck and lovable to boot, is and can only be Seiya’s Waifu, leaving Minako, the winner of the debate, and for good reason too. She’s loveable, kind, caring, powerful and the leader of the inner senshi, and S Tier waifu material, so overall, I can’t be unhappy with the outcome of the debate.

6. Android 21: The Dragonball Franchise

Okay, this one was the hardest series for me to pick just one waifu from. With so many choices, from Bulma to Android 18 to even Launch, (remember her? no? It’s okay, even Toriyama doesn’t). I love all most of the Dragonball Waifus, so why did I ultimately settle for for the best Video Game Bae? Simple. She’s a badass who is hot as hell and literally eats people. . . .so a kink basically, but like, can you blame me?

5. Himako Toga: My Hero Academia

A knife wielding, psychopathic, serial killing yandere schoolgirl? There isn’t even a contest, Toga is best girl. Period. I will fight anyone who says otherwise.

4. Stocking Anarchy: Panty and Stocking With Garterbelt

Again, this is another obvious choice as far as waifus go. It was during yet another rewatch of this underrated show that I realized how much I genueinly love Stocking, and she’s clearly the better choice over Panty. Stocking is the sweets loving, emo fallen angel/demon who cusses like a sailor and is into bondage. Yes, I am aware, it’s another kink, but I don’t care, not even a little bit.

3: Shalltear Bloodfallen: Overlord

Yeah, I choose Shalltear over Albedo. Shalltear is best girl, and I’ll fight anyone who says otherwise. I will admit though, that while Albedo is gorgeous and a great choice, Shalltear is a vampire with lesbian tendencies, and that instantly puts her above the virgin succubus. Thank you Lord Peroroncino.

2. Shiro: No Game No Life

When making this list, and talking out all of the waifu ranking, there were two that didn’t budge on the list at all, Shiro, and the number one choice. Shiro is perfect, and even in a series with freaking fox people and Jibril, and that says something.

1. Shinobu Oshino ( Kiss-Shot Acerola-Orion Heart-Under-Blade): The Monogatari Franchise

Meet the Best Waifu in existence. Honestly, it doesn’t matter if she’s in her Shinobu form, or her fully powered vampire form. Shinobu/Kiss Shot is by far the best waifu anyone could have. She’s a freaking powerful vampire that’s gorgeous, and mysterious in her true form, and even in her weaker form still manages to be powerful, snarky, and adorable as hell. Also, her reaction to donuts will literally be the greatest thing in waifu history. Ugh, I love her.

And there you have it. 10 waifus ranked, and it only took three days, three people to rant to, and a shitton of headache pain killers later. @fukae-flwr told you I could do it. Next challenge. . . Husbandos. Oof.

So yeah. . . . Thoughts I guess?

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gffa · 5 years

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Name ten favourite characters from ten different things (books, tv, film, etc.) then tag ten people

Tagged by @thewillowbends. These lists are always hard, but that’s kind of the fun of them! And that’s why we cheat and sometimes have lots of ties because no you can’t make me choose. 1. Thor from Marvel’s Cinematic Universe - I am a sucker for a character who has their shit together but can still be human and face ridiculously traumatic experiences and come through them whole because they had a rock solid foundation to begin with. From being thrown out of Asgard, made mortal, and taking that chance to suck it up and make himself better that he did that himself to the loss of pretty much his entire family and most of his people and his sense of purpose, the thing I love about Thor is that he keeps getting back up. That kind of fortitude is even more appealing that the ridiculously hot lightning powers. 2. Tsukino Usagi from Sailor Moon - I always loved her in the ‘90s anime, but reading the manga skyrocketted her into this special untouchable place in my heart. The beginning of her journey is a girl who is so fragile that she would kill herself if she didn’t have the emotional support around her, who had to take step after step forward to find her inner strength, who wasn’t weak or terrible for her fragility, but instead her story was worth telling for it, that the point she started out as was just as valuable as the place she ended up, where she could be the one to stand up to save her friends and get them back herself, that journey was worth telling. I LOVE HER TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH. 3. Thranduil and Maedhros from Tolkien’s Legendarium - It was really hard to choose, because I love a lot of the characters (and I feel badly leaving Thingol and Maglor off the list and I will fight a bitch for Galadriel and Elrond and listen Glorfindel is pure joy and also the internet is too mean to Elwing and I kind of want alllll the Melkor and Manwe fic because sobs they’re brothers shut up you can’t make me not have feelings about that, but also trashbag Melkor/Sauron and--) but those are the two I usually wind up wanting to know their pov in a fic I’m reading or have them around when shit’s going down because I want to see what they’ll do or I just miss them the most when they’re not there. 4. Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi from Star Wars - If you asked me to pick between them, I don’t know that I could. Yeah, sure, I love Obi-Wan ridiculously, but if you give me five minutes, I’m pretty much always going to drift back to talking about Anakin and his issues instead. I’m not sure I can even boil them down into a nutshell about why I like them so much, they’re the kind of characters that I love so intensely and with such big, sweeping thoughts, that I’d have to write a whole essay. But my best attempt: Anakin’s being both dumbass and genius at the same time, being charming and magnetic while also being a bag of garbage at the same time, who had such good in him but was also an absolute monster, who I desperately want to be happy, but I also struggle to forgive him sometimes and that’s saying a lot for a fictional character, he’s brilliant enough to truly carry an entire Saga about him. And Obi-Wan is the bedrock of all goodness in that galaxy, he could be obnoxious at times and he didn’t always see Anakin clearly, but he always cared and he remained good and hopeful, he continued to serve the galaxy, no matter what it threw at him, and even forgave Anakin in the end, because he always rose above. That’s it, that’s my shit right there. 5. Inoue Orihime from Bleach - ORIHIME WAS MY GIRL FROM THE VERY BEGINNING, her unwavering kindness and care, her desire to be soft in a world (and, frankly, fandom) that wanted her to be hard and to fight everything, when she didn’t want to fight, she wanted to heal, she wanted to have fun and be weird, she wanted everyone to be happy, all of that made me love her. Her loopiness is an absolute delight, but what I loved so much about her is that Orihime had the powers/abilities to be quite possibly the most OG of the entire cast, she could reject reality itself, and she never once wanted to use it to beat anyone up or to destroy anything, she wanted to make friends with her fairies and she wanted to help people. That girl refused to let the world make her anything less than kind and caring and sweet. She was THE BEST. 6. Hara Akiha and Umeda Hokuto from Hanazakari no Kimitachi e/Hana-Kimi - Sometimes we all fall in love with those minor characters and they just fucking consume us. A lot of it came from that they were both hot, they were both hilarious, and so they were just really fun, but what really got me was that I genuinely loved everything Nakajo did with Umeda’s character. There weren’t a lot of gay characters in shoujo manga that weren’t complete comedic relief, where their sexuality was the joke. Yes, Umeda was often a humorous character (all of the cast was) but he firmly was completely uninterested in high school kids, he liked adult men, and his advice to Mizuki may have been crabby as hell, but it was genuine and good. His sexuality wasn’t the punchline of his character. Then there was Akiha, who was also comedic, but his bisexuality (another rare thing to find in manga!) had nothing to do with the humor of his character, all of it was in the way he chased after Umeda. He was a genuine suitor (and, reading the post-manga character interviews, apparently they got together, OMG MY HEART) and the kiss they shared was treated just as seriously as any straight kiss would have been. That meant a lot to me, even though I’d have loved the characters just because they were so interesting and Umeda’s struggle to get over the guy who never cared for him and to let himself be vulnerable with someone that he could actually care about, was so great. 7. Yuki Eiri from Gravitation - I can’t begrudge anyone for giving this show a lot of shit (and I definitely am going with anime!Yuki here, rather than manga!Yuki) or dismissing it as being god-awful, because it probably was pretty cringeworthy. But Yuki got under my skin because he was one of the first characters I resonated with where his depression was real and it was ugly. He could be cruel to people around him, he pushed them away, not just half-heartedly, but genuinely, and he couldn’t stand being vulnerable, because it touched on all the terrible places that had been damaged by what Kitazawa had done to him. And he couldn’t just be magically fixed by Tohma’s devotion or Shuuichi’s unwavering amounts of love poured into him. He couldn’t just be fixed with a hug or one good crying session. He was damaged and it was going to be a hell of a long hike back up to anything even a little bit normal. Especially back at that time, I felt like depression and trauma were never given any real weight, then along comes this ridiculous BL series that just refused to make Yuki anything less that genuinely damaged and it hit all these places in wee me that was struggling through my own depression that couldn’t just be cured with some hugs and people telling me they loved me.

8. Hashiba Touma from Yoroiden Samurai Troopers - I’m not sure I could even say why this character got under my skin the way he did, other than that there was definitely a group of us who were SUPER into the show and it was fun to make a playground for ourselves, and Touma just really got to me. The brilliant character who didn’t always know how to relate to others, but who cared very deeply about them, who gravitated to those who were better at social interaction than he was, who were better able to connect to people than he was, that he found this group where he really belonged, that just really touched wee me’s heart. 9. Tendou Souji from Kamen Rider Kabuto - THIS OBNOXIOUS HOT MESS I LOVE HIM SO MUCH. It was hard not to put Kagami on the list as well, because so much of what I love about Tendou is illustrated through his relationship with Kagami (whom I also love on his own), but I think I keep coming back to that I love his issues the most. He’s the best at everything and so it puts distance between him and everyone else, all the more so because he’s so obnoxious about it and doesn’t slow down for anyone else to catch up, but the thing is that there’s a very caring heart underneath all that. He loves his sisters, he loves Kagami, he even kind of tolerates the rest of their weird gang, and trying to find that difficult line of his superiority over the others versus that he wants them to catch up to him in his own way, all while being the most condescending dick ever, is absolute joy. 10. Relena Darlian from Gundam Wing - I had a difficult path to liking Relena, because so much of fandom boiled her down to either being a creepy stalker who got in the way of Heero/Duo or they only ever wrote her in romantic pairing stuff with Heero, neither of which really encouraged me to like her. But, as time went on and I rewatched the series a couple of times, I realized there’s so much more to her. She’s a character who has to walk an impossible line between both of the legacies that weigh on her, the birth family that she never knew but maybe she could help bring peace to the world by taking up that name, by trying to bring back the Sanq Kingdom that promoted absolute pacifism and peace. Yet, ultimately, for all that her relationship with Zechs is really important and she was the heir to that kingdom, she chose to be Relena Darlian. She choose to try to bring peace to the world by standing up on her own as a politician, not a figurehead queen of the world. The struggle to figure that out, who she wants to be and how she wants to achieve it, to go from a sheltered young girl at the start of the series to someone who has seen how terrible war is, is far more interesting than either of those first options for me! And I’ll tag @forcearama (and if I couldn’t put Obi-Wan as all ten entries, neither can you!) @belldreams @subskywalker @cacchieressa @bpdanakins @glompcat @writegowrite @fireflyfish @evaceratops @amarielah and anyone else who wants to do it that I’m not sure I feel quite like I’m able to try peer pressuring you into it. ♥ I love seeing these from anyone who wants to do them, I’m just never sure if I’m allowed to go HEY YOU DO THIS THING. orz

#i should have a personal tag around here somewhere

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firebirdsdaughter · 5 years

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Okay, so...

... Now that I have a clearer Raw I can pause...

LONG POST

Ryusoulger Episode 1 reactions! Aka, the episode that decided to come for my life.

In no particular order:

Okay, so maybe it’s a little ‘hm’ that Kou pilots the mech entirely on his own. But it’s not the first time anyone has piloted a mech alone--including non-Ranger allies. The first person who springs to mind is Commander Aya from Jetman. In GoGo V, the robot assistant Mint piloted the robot alone once. And besides, it’s only the first episode. We’ve got plenty of time for the others to get in there.

I’ll be honest. I knew the Masters were probably going to die. At the very least, I knew something bad was going to happen to them.

What I was NOT expecting was THAT.

Ryusoulger scores one for on-screen death and incineration.

First fight of the new Robo Suit Actor (I feel so bad I forget his name). Thank you for your service Kusaka Hideaki, I wish you all the best.

But let’s go back to the beginning!

Dramatic ceremony that apparently no one else is around to witness.

Wait, so if Mynasouls/Minusouls are already being made/Druidon already showing up, and just have never reached the tribe before... Does that mean Touwa and Banba have just been doing a really bang up job of fighting them off? I mean, I expect the stakes are raising sharply now, but... Could cause tension in the team if there’s a ‘the only reason you guys had a peaceful life for so long was us’ sort of thing.

Also, Kou having a little bit of prankster in him is super cute. Are you and Touwa going to get into prank wars that drive the others nuts?

Random fact I didn’t notice before? In the opening, when the others are flying all over the place and Banba is just sleeping? He’s holding two RyusoulKen. The boy is freaking holding his brother’s sword for him, that’s so cute.

I’ll see if I can’t use this video to get a shot of the pendant looking like it’s changing colours and put it at the bottom, okay?

It has since come to my attention by rewatching this that Mystery Scarf Person is standing next to a torch that looks similar to the ones used in the ceremony scene this episode, which could indicate that he is Gold. Or... Related to the tribe, at the very least.

But the most important question to ask as to whether he’s Gold... Does he has Chainsaw?

I am never going to get over that chainsaw thing.

Also looks like we may have Druidon we haven’t seen yet, which doesn’t surprise me. Tank dude is clearly going to be Kou’s rival, but maybe one of the other Druidon was responsible for what happened to Banba and/or Touwa’s Master? (assuming Touwa had one and wasn’t solely trained by his brother)

I’m loving that little shot where it’s Ui sitting alone and then the others come over to her and it looks like they’re encouraging her (well, Banba just stands in the back bc he’s a grump but also solidarity) and then they all look at the sky. I live for the implications that there’s going to be a theme of companionship in this series bc I LOVE FRIENDSHIP. I LOVE FOUND FAMILY. And given how they trio (and possibly the brothers, too) lost people so important to them at the start, I think they’re all gonna need it.

I like them cutting the logo free. I also like the way it looks like stained glass for a hot second before becoming the usual red and yellow.

Sentai mooks continue to be distracted by pretty lights and it remains their downfall.

Kou! Don’t break the camera!

Dan seems pretty fussed that Druidon showed up. But... If he knew that the other two had gone to fight them, shouldn’t he already know that?

Hey, look! There’re other people!

Aw! Kou is trying to be comforting!

And... Gets shoved into the mountain. I love these three.

Oh my gosh, he tries to tackle Ui, but she just bops away, I love her.

Well, we’ve found the source of the bananas.

I love Melt hiding the banana behind his back like it’s incriminating evidence...

I think Kou is looking to the other two for help here and they just abandon him. God, he’s so adorable, though, I just wanna pinch his cheeks.

Also that fraction of a second ‘I got myself into this’ face right before the cut to commercial. XD

WHY DOES HE HAVE A HAMMER? WHAT DOES THE HAMMER SAY?

The Masters are on a nature walk!

No, I’m kidding, they’re probably on patrol or something. But it looks like they’re on a nature walk.

Wouldn’t it be funny of one of the other Masters, if they exist, was played by the Ichimonji of the KR NEXT films? Is he even still acting?

Not the ankles!

Do the Masters have other names?

Why does Tank dude being in the temple cancel their transformations?

What I love about this fight is that Master Red and Kou are clearly worried about each other. Red yells for Kou when he’s thrown, and Kou tries to protect his mentor. It’s cute!

Until tragedy strikes.

Is Kou ever gonna be able to hear ‘Tata Soul’ again w/out thinking of this?

God... It was a gut punch when Red got hit by those slashes, but I was not expecting Pink and Blue to get fire breathed.

Also, yeah, there were better ways to do that, but that’s always true w/ diving saves. Maybe they didn’t thank they could pull them out of the way in time?

The complete silence was a good choice. IS this the same director responsible for that scene in Build where Misora tells the others Kazumi is dead? Bc this reminded me of that. If so... Man, you do ‘characters losing someone indescribably important to them’ very well.

I’m still not entirely convinced we’ve seen the last of them. Maybe only in flashbacks or as spirits, but you’re telling me you hired Sailor Moon, Tuxedo Mask/Kamen Rider Ibuki, and even an alternate version of Hongo Takeshi/some other dude from Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon (?) to kill them off in one episode? After those press announcements? Maybe they were trying to cover up what was gonna happen, but I’m not convinced. I mean, maybe their previous parts aren’t that big a deal, but it really seems like the went for a bit of name-recognition there... Are they gonna throw that away after one ep?

I will not deny I was emotionally encouraging Kou to get up and kick Tank dude’s ass right there. You can do it, sweetie!

Tank dude gives a speech while Mushroom creature is greatly distressed in the background.

See above for my feelings regarding Kou piloting the mech alone here.

Also the first time I watched I wasn’t thinking about that I was too busy crying.

Also I guess Tyramigo does talk, but... He seems fairly... Well, he doesn’t talk much. He’s got, like, two lines. I’d kind of like a serious, more ‘stern’ red rex. Hmm... Maybe the personalities of the Kishiryu reflect the predecessors’?

So here’s the jam. Doe you predecessor have to die for you to be the ‘true’ inheritor of the RyuSouls? Did Elder know this? If so... You dickwad.

Kou giving Tyramigo pets on the nose was super cute. I think I would kill for Tyramigo.

Also pretty sure I would kill for Kou, he’s very cute and now I love this actor.

Still very distracted by the way the Elder’s wig does not match his beard. What the hell, costuming?

So here’s my question. Do the special coloured Souls absorb the souls of the Ryusoulgers who die while tied to them? Are gonna have an ep where the team have to go ‘inside’ them or, like, summon the souls out of them, AtLA style? Are we gonna meet the original Ryusoulgers at some point?

Okay, but... The Elder uses the word ‘nakama’ when telling the trio about Touwa and Banba? At least, I think he does... Doesn’t that usually have ‘friendly’ connotations? Makes it seem like the two are less straight up ‘deserters’ and just... I dunno, went through the apparently necessary rite of passage of having your mentor/predecessor die before the others and were allowed to leave? I’m confused.

I don’t know why we needed to transform here, but I love the dancing mechs.

Also they did do a ‘three swords’ version of the ‘swords of justice’ thing. I am literally going to start crying--for very different reasons than this time--the first time all five of them do it together.

Still sad I didn’t get to see my boys in the preview, but at least I know they’re coming soon.

Also still can’t get a read on whether we’ll be hiding our identities this season. I kind of like it when they do do that, it adds another layer of tension to things, but it’s fine if they don’t, too.

Looks like Pink is gonna be yeeting her boys.

I’m liking this so far and I can’t wait for all my children to get together.

On the ED: I live for the dancing mechs. I could spend hours analysing everyone’s reaction to the cartoon Soul meteors. That was adorable. Still don’t know why Banba has different dance choreography, but it’s cute.

Digital french toast and pancakes for anyone who read all that.

All in all, I’m enjoying myself. I don’t usually cry at shows, but I just... I wasn’t expecting it to go that far. This is someone who directed some of Build, I suppose. I think we’re in for more agony.

And I love it. XD

Okay, so... (Ignore my boys screaming in the background please--not the most flattering picture of Banba I know, but leave him alone he’s sad DX)

So... It’s definitely just the way it disappears, but... The other three colour don’t do that? So either it was just a style choice bc there’s only two colours on this side and three on the other and I’m overanalysing, or...

Also. I. I just noticed the water bubbles. Or are those meant to be tears.

WHAT DOES ANY OF THIS MEAN BUILD MAN?

#Kishiryu Sentai Ryusoulger #Ryusoulger Spoilers #my precious Dino Children #wow what an opening #well I'm excited #ready to see where this goes #hope it keeps tearing my heart apart actually #I don't usually cry at tv shows #and I was expecting MOH (Mentor Occupational Hazard)#but...#I was not expecting it to be that rough #oof #...#......#.........#GIVE ME MORE #Birthday Sentai #Dino Dragon Knights And Their Cat #Long Post

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shibyn · 5 years

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and the wind sounds like the world’s sigh

persona 4 & 5 | shiho-centric, investigation team Near the end of May, Shiho transfers to a sleepy town called Inaba for a fresh start. However, Inaba isn’t the sleepy town her parents thought would be best for her— its on edge with unsolved mysteries, and Shiho finds that there’s a bit more behind what meets the eye regarding some of her classmates and a TV screen.

chapter 2 | 3.8k | ao3

Shiho smiles. She tries to force her grip on her phone to loosen up, even just a bit, so her knuckles don't creak against it. In the classroom beside her, Morooka shouts loud enough she's sure the whole school can hear him. It makes her tense up a bit-- he wasn't that pleasant of a teacher first impression wise. He had scoffed when she walked into the teacher's office, and he grumbled the whole way to the classroom. She just hopes today's an off day for him.

Shiho jerks awake as thunder cracks outside her window. The shutters rattle outside, and she can feel her bones vibrating with the resonance. Sheets of rain crash against her window, deafening, yet a mere white noise compared to the thunder. Sudden alarm hums in her veins, and she groans, knowing she won't sleep anytime soon. Her mom told her about this, hadn't she--? The neighbor warned there was going to be a storm tonight. There's been a lot of storms recently, her mom recalled the neighbor's words. She rolls on her side and tries burying her head in blankets and pillows so it could maybe muffle it all, but it's fruitless. The air still cracks with the thunder and her whole room is lit with a flash. A dread settles in her bones when she looks towards her closet door. The Yasogami uniform hangs on the door handle like a mourning flag. The yellow looks solemn in the dark, occasionally illuminated a sickly glow by the lightning outside. She hadn't tried it on, yet-- it felt like an acceptance of her fate if she did, but-- really? She's already here. Might as well deal with it. Yet-- and yet-- The buzz of her phone is sudden, even in the noise around her. She feels around for it-- her hand eventually brushes against the plastic case underneath her pillow, and she pulls it out. Clicking it on, the brightness nearly blinds her for a moment, even though it's on its lowest setting. Ann [1:42 A.M.] hhhhhhhhhh inui's gonna killl meeeee i dont care about the ancient olympics >:// can fail this test ,, pls,, i havent slept in days,,, Shiho snorts despite herself. The sky rumbles outside, and she keys out a response. Shiho [1:43 A.M.] idk... if you started earlier you could've had more time to sleep :// Ann [1:43 A.M.] what are u doing up young lady u better be going back to sleep and dont give me that!! u know my heart is dedicated to rewatching sailor moon Shiho [1:43 A.M.] says the one who messaged me sailor moon would want you to forgo watching her show and to study Ann [1:44 A.M.] have u even SEEN sailor moon? shed be in the same boat im in She's miles away, miles and miles away. It-- god, it's going to be awful, tomorrow-- Ann won't be there. She won't be there, she won't be there waiting at the metro, she won't greet her in the mornings with the smile that lights the days. She doesn't want to go, she can't go, she doesn't know anyone there, she doesn't want to go-- Shiho takes in a steadying breath. Her phone buzzes even though she hadn't responded. Ann [1:44 A.M.] ur first day is tomorrow, yeah? hows the uniform? Shiho [1:45 A.M.] [image attached] what are your words, oh fashion goddess Ann [1:45 A.M.] hm.... it'll look cute on u definitely one hell of a uniform... doesnt beat shujin plaid, tho ;)) have u gotten any sleep? Shiho [1:45 A.M.] I have, worry about yourself !! I dont wanna go The uniform looms in the corner of her eyes. She's tired, so tired, her knees ache, she wants to go home. But now this is home-- this house, in the middle of nowhere, Inaba, filled with moving boxes and tense silences and unspoken thoughts. It's been like that since she left the hospital, even at the old apartment back in Tokyo, and-- when has home felt like home? Ann [1:46 A.M.] i know im sorry ill be here for ya, yeah? just one year there you can do it!! Shiho squeezes her phone. She wishes she could have an ounce of the confidence Ann has for her. — Ann [8:14 A.M.] so?? first impressions?? Shiho [8:14 A.M.] its,, like any other school? maybe smaller than shujin? i might just be use to having the school smack dab in the center of the city, tho Ann [8:14 A.M.] isnt it just hills and hills out there?? god... its kinda spooky to think about that... no crazy tall buildings within miles... Shiho [8:15 A.M.] hey, i think it's pretty quant out here Shiho smiles. She tries to force her grip on her phone to loosen up, even just a bit, so her knuckles don't creak against it. In the classroom beside her, Morooka shouts loud enough she's sure the whole school can hear him. It makes her tense up a bit-- he wasn't that pleasant of a teacher first impression wise. He had scoffed when she walked into the teacher's office, and he grumbled the whole way to the classroom. She just hopes today's an off day for him. Ann [8:15 A.M.] sure, sure how does it feel?? being one with nature?? ahh the cool spring breeze, the pollutionless air--!! Shiho [8:15 A.M.] i think that pollution is finally messing with your head Ann [8:15 A.M.] HEY!!! The door slides open abruptly beside her, making her jump and nearly launch her phone down the hall. She shoves it quickly into her pocket, swiping at her skirt for dirt that wasn't there. Morooka sneers, which looks kinda strange with his overbite. "You kids these days and your damn phones..." he spits, and stalks back to the podium without another word. Her hands shake, so she clenches them to keep them still. She takes a deep breath, thinking, please let this be a woke-up-on-the-wrong-side-of-bed morning, and steps in after him. The first thing she notices is that the class is dead silent. They stare at her owlishly, and briefly, she thinks something's wrong. Is her uniform crooked? Backwards? Inside out--? Her hair weird? The humidity might've made it flick up in weird places-- She spent so long this morning making sure everything was alright, though it was more out of an anxious habit rather than to make a good impression-- Was-- was she walking weird? She straightens her back, eyes focused on her feet, right, left, right, left, one after the other-- she didn't think her limp was bad today-- Her fingernails bite into her palm and stands beside Morooka's podium. It's okay, it'll be okay, she thinks like a mantra, trying hard not to show her nerves. She won't--can't-- let something like being introduced to class let her stumble. They're looking because they're curious, she reasons, which does a significant amount to reducing the tension in her back, they're not looking because they're malicious. They're not looking because you walk weird. They're not. It's okay.

"Lets hurry an' get this over with before I waste any more of my time," Morooka says, scowling in her direction. The tension regrows along her spine from his scrutiny. Just as she opens her mouth to introduce herself, he cuts her off-- "Due to some trashy circumstances, this kid's been tossed to this dump not even a quarter through the stinkin' year. Couldn't even wait till the end of the semester, huh?" He looks towards her, as if actually asking her.

Her limbs suddenly feel like they're locking up under his mocking glare. Her mouth goes dry. Is this for real? she thinks, a bit astounded, because wouldn't the teachers here be warned of-- "I..." she starts, maybe to say something back, because he's looking at her like he wants an answer. But-- what is there to say? What answer can she give? She doesn't want to be here, he doesn't want her to be here, so-- Is this what it was like for Akira? Shiho thinks fleetingly, glancing towards her new classmates yet not at all-- none of them wear an expression, an indication, even a hint of what she should do-- he-- he had it so much worse, didn't he? People thought he was awful before he even stepped foot in the school-- "Well? Hurry an' tell them who ya are." He sounds agitated. He motions back towards the class like it's a dismissal. Shiho chews on the inside of her cheek and tries to steel her nerves. "I'm. I'm Suzui Shiho," she says, trying not to trip up with all the eyes on her, "It's nice to meet you." "You shits better not think about tryin' anything funny," Morooka says abruptly, his eyes darting from boy to boy with a nasty glare. "She's comin' straight from Tokyo, and while that place is a shithole and full of assholes, none of you baboons can measure up. I better not see any funny business goin' on later!" Are— are teachers allowed to curse this much? Shiho blinks, glancing towards him. She doesn't know whether or not to be grateful-- it's hard to tell with the mix of insults in his words. No one in the class looks put-off by his word choice, which doesn't exactly help. "You, you're gonna sit over there," he says, motioning vaguely in the direction of the second to last row of desks, near the door. She takes this as her leave, trying not to acknowledge the eyes following her as she sits down in her seat. The girl next to her is silent, staring openly, chin propped up in her hand, eyes half-closed. Some people towards the front of the class crane around in their seats, peering at her. She tries to ignore the stares, the whispers that quietly arise, and she twiddles her thumbs. This is awful, awful-- Soon enough, Morooka starts teaching (can she call it that? it's more aggressive than any teacher she's ever seen-- Ushimaru can’t even top it) and focus is shifted off her for a while. She slips her phone out of her pocket, trying to discreetly hide the fact that she's on it. Honestly-- she doesn't care. Her body's too tense and high strung and she really just wants to see Ann. Ann [8:16 A.M.] shiho? ya still there? Shiho [8:24 A.M.] I think my homeroom teacher beats ryuji in terms of how much he swears Ann [8:24 A.M.] oh!! did u just get introduced to your class!! how was it!! Shiho [8:24 A.M.] not. the best? i kinda just want the day to be over aren't you meant to be focusing on class Ann [8:25 A.M.] youre much more important than whatever ushimarus talking about :// besides!! u say that as if we didnt text each other during class time at all !! be sure to message me when your break and lunch is!! ill try to keep messages in those time so i dont get ya in trouble so early on so!! im gonna go radio silent for now so ya dont get scolded good luck!! ♥♥ message me if ya need anything!!! The corners of her mouth lift up ever so slightly. — Shiho's never been one for being the center of attention. It was just a guarantee, being quiet-natured and friends with a foreign-looking student that everyone seemed to have a vendetta against. Ann's always been the one to dispel unwanted attention previously, too. But she's not here-- so when a couple of students crowd around her desk after class ends, she can feel herself freezing up. "So, you're from Tokyo, too!" One peppy girl says, her hair pulled into a half pony tail. "What chance! It's so rare to get transfers here in the same year! And for them to be from Tokyo!" "I wonder if it's gonna be a trend, like more people from the city will come flooding in," the girl with glasses says. "How's the jump, huh?" The boy who sits in front of her asks, sitting backwards in his seat to face her. She bristles at the question, ice creeping in her veins. He grins innocently, to which she realizes of course they wouldn't know, don't worry, its just weird phrasing, "Seta-san didn't say much about it. What about you? From the city to the middle of nowhere?" Its quiet for a beat, and Shiho really wished they weren't looking at her. "It's... alright, I mean," Shiho says slowly, trying to choose words that aren't too strong in feeling. She had lived in Tokyo for her whole life, and the countryside is so, so different, but she doesn't know how to explain the feeling to these people. She doesn't think any of them will really understand what it's like to be plunged into silence after being surrounded by noise her whole life. "It's... kinda nice being able to see an actual hillside when I walk around, though?" The girl with glasses giggles at her response. "Nature over industry, right? Seta-san adjusted pretty quickly, so I don't think it should be a problem for you!" Well, sure. But that's also Seta-san. Seta-san probably wasn't booted from his home, his friends, his life, all because of the decisions that were outside of his reach, and then dumped off in a place so different, so far away from all he's known. She isn't Seta-san, and she doesn't want to be here. Shiho smiles instead and pinches the back of her hand. "Hopefully." "Have you had the chance to wonder around Inaba yet?" the boy in front of her asks idly. Shiho briefly wonders how long break is, so she doesn't have to sit through much longer of this. She wishes this could just end. She wishes the day would end. "I have," she says, trying to ward off the strain in her spine. "Um, I didn't get to see much, though. We only went to a noodle place, really, which wasn't far..." "Oh! You mean Shishio's Noodle Bar?" One of the girl chimes. Shiho can only nod yes, because she doesn't really know what place it was and it seemed like the proper thing to say. "I love that place! They just put the right amount of sauce on, and the perfect amount of meat in!" the girl gushes, "There's tons of independent restaurants around here, and all of them are incredible!! You really need to try them all, Suzui-san!" Shiho tries to say something back, maybe like the noodles were great or what are your favorite places or just ok, because that seems like the things to say, she can't just give up having an okay school year here just because she doesn't want to be here, right? Even if her skin is crawling at the prospect of conversation with strangers. Ann would want her to try, wouldn't she? And besides, these people-- they're trying to make the effort to talk to her, she has to at least respond. Maybe they want to be friends? But— she finds herself drowned out the second she opens her mouth. "Oh, have you been to the Steak House recently?" the glasses girl asks, unknowingly right over Shiho's quiet words, "they added a new flavor and a kebob option! It's super tasty!" "No way! I gotta try some now! You wanna come with me after school?" "Definitely! You wanna come, Asahi?" "Oh, hell yeah! I'd never pass up going to that place!" "We can go if it's not raining after school. I swear, all it's been doing is raining! Some spring it is..." "It's karma! We didn't get much snow, so now we have tons of rain." Ah. Suddenly, it's like a void has grown around her and the people lounging on the desks around her. She knows these people are trying, maybe, trying to welcome her here, to make her not feel lonely, maybe to be friends, but-- she doesn't feel there, not physically, with people talking all around her, and-- She squeezes her phone. It'd be rude to pull it out and text Ann, wouldn't it? These people seem nosey, they might ask her who-- "Ah, isn't the Steak House near where the police are hanging out, though?" The boy asks solemnly, arms crossed over the back of his chair. "The street might be blocked off, since they're investigating every corner of Inaba." The glasses girl grumbles aloud. "What a pain! I swear, they're just everywhere now-a-days, especially since Tatsumi went missing..." Tatsumi. Shiho remembers that name. She remembers the police officer asking her and her father, in the dark of night, if they knew where the kid was. Wasn't he a student at Yasogami? These-- these people don't seem particularly alarmed that he's missing. "I, uh--" Shiho starts, curiosity bubbling out of her. Should she even ask-- well-- it's a little late to recoil, with the curious expression on the boy's face and the two girls peering at her. She swallows, and starts again. "I-- who... who is Tatsumi Kanji?"

The reaction... isn't what she expected, if she's being truthful. The boy's mouth twists into a brief sneer, the girls scowling. It's like she spoke words of taboo, and not someone's name. "Tatsumi? He's just a punk." The boy waves it off, like he isn't someone missing. "All he knows how to do is pick a fight. Some first year asshole-- thought he was on top of the school..." "Don't worry about him, Suzui-san," one girl says politely, yet it's the furthest thing from it, "he's probably off with a gang doing who knows what-- drugs, getting drunk, whatever. He's total a creep." And. And it hits her like how it was with Akira. She remembers dimly, words of warning, pointing fingers, averted gazes, all regarding a transfer student with curly hair and dorky glasses, don't speak to him, he's a criminal, you know? Akira only wanted to live quietly, and yet-- his whole life in Tokyo, shattered, from day one. Yet-- yet he was nothing like what people said, he wasn't a bad person. Ann trusts him, trusts him wholeheartedly. She told Shiho that he's exactly the dork that he looks like, he loves Big Bang burger challenges, he loves cats, he's a prankster, he-- he didn't deserve to have everyone scorn him-- And she remembers the quiet confession of Mishima to her, his hands shaking violently, eyes glassed over, he told me to. He told me to ruin Kurusu's life, to share the criminal records. All because of Kamoshida-- Shiho doesn't know Tatsumi Kanji, doesn't know if he's actually a creep or a punk or an asshole, but he's still missing. Shouldn't-- shouldn't they in the least care--? "Hey, lay off." They all turn— there's a group of kids sitting in the middle section of the classroom, two of them glaring. The two glaring are both brunettes, and there's a black-haired girl trying to divert their attention, with quiet 'don't start a fight, you guys--' yet with a hard look in her eyes, and a gray-haired boy sitting down, a mix of a scowl and a simple frown on his face. His eyes are sharp, but he's not stand-offish as the other two. A girl scowls in front of her. "What are you talking about, Hanamura?" "Tatsumi isn't some creep or asshole. All of you just are judging him without knowing who he really is," the brunette girl says, fists clenched by her sides. "I don't know about that," the boy in front of her says languidly, "Don't you know the kind of deals he's been making with those biker gangs? He's a delinquent, through-and-through." The brunette boy looks ready to retaliate, but the bell cuts him off before he can start. The people around her disperse, her seat mate returns, and class starts. Shiho fiddles with her phone, and wants to leave. — Shiho resorts to fleeing from the classroom when lunch begins, hoping to avoid any curious classmates and to maybe figure her way around the building. She opted out for lunch, anyways-- she left the box on the counter, knowing that she might not be able to eat with her stomach roiling with nervous energy from being in this school. The halls are sparse with students. Some talking, some wandering, some staring. She bristles, knowing she’s like a sore thumb in this school-- in Inaba, really, which is apparently so countryside that a new family moving in was about the most intriguing thing around. That can’t possibly be true-- sure, Inaba wasn’t big, the high school even smaller, but there’s no way that this community was so tightly knit that everyone knew everyone so anyone outside of the goddamn place was the most interesting person around, with stories of places so far away. There’s a train station here, it can’t be like there’s no outsiders around. She just wishes Ann was responding so she could keep her attention off the lingering looks and curious glances. She heads up a flight of stairs, trying to scope a library she might be able to stake out lunch in for the rest of the school year. It’s always quiet in the library, and hopefully it’ll keep any students from trying to talk to her. Especially with just being there, in the classroom, surrounded but alone, included but only because of proximity-- she doesn’t think she has the guts to really talk with anyone today, anyways. She might not have the guts to talk in the next few weeks-- she’s never been the new kid, never been in a different house, never not been surrounded by busy streets, she’s only known her home in Tokyo. She can’t find the library or any club rooms, which is kinda strange. Maybe they’re on the first floor? There’s another set of stairs ahead of her; it’s either the rooftop, or another floor that might have them. She doesn’t see anyone else heading up, so it must be the roof? Ah. Well, she’s still got time to explore. The roof might be a place of solitude if the library isn’t. Kinda ironic, she thinks fleetingly, footsteps quiet as she goes up. The hallway is bright with light from a set of doors-- it’s the roof. There’s no signs or anything to keep students out, so Yasogami must be one of those schools where the roofs are open. Shujin wasn’t, but it’s not like anyone really cared. She briefly wonders how things would be if they did. She opens the door, and the wind immediately seems to pick up the second she does, sending her hair whipping around behind in her pony tail. The air’s weighty with rain soon to come, but it’s only fairly cloudy out. Ah, wow-- the roof is clean, free of abandoned desks and instead has an applaudable amount of solar panels set up. There’s a couple of students up here already, talking amongst themselves and picking at bento boxes resting on their laps. It’s a big, open space. It’s nearly strange not to see tall buildings blotting out the sky, or casting long shadows over the rooftop. It sets the roof as a whole different entity in her mind-- her knees ache, but not in the same crippling way they did on Shujin’s, when she stood up there with Ann and Akira and tried to keep face while looking down. It’s bright, clean, and she can see the sky. So. Maybe it is a kind of fresh start. She still hates Inaba and wants to be back in Tokyo, but hey, it’s something.

#persona 5 #p5 #persona 4 #p4 #persona #shiho suzui #ann takamaki

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takaraphoenix · 3 years

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random question but what's your favorite show genres and what's your favorite show in each?

Oh, I love random questions! Huh. Okay so full disclosure I do not know what really counts as "genres", so... let's go by the categories I use to distinguish between them! :D

1. Supernatural: Buffy the Vampire Slayer

Supernatural shows are my favorite genre - vampires, werewolves, witches, hunters, demons. There's so often found family in it, I love magic, I love supernatural creatures. And among them all, BtVS absolutely takes the crown, no other comes close.

2. Fantasy: Relic Hunter

Okay, so... don't ask me to explain the difference I draw between supernatural and fantasy as a genre, since they can greatly overlap - both have witches and werewolves in this case. But... there's a difference, for me? Supernatural shows are usually darker, often with a hunt or be hunted element, with a hefty focus on the supernatural creatures. Fantasy are slightly more whimsical with more focus on the magic and magic users - elves, witches/sorcerers; I'd sort a "Harry Potter" into fantasy because the supernatural elements like werewolves are more a side note and the focus is on witches and a magical world, while "Buffy" has the witch-part more on the sidelines and the focus on the creatures of the night.

I prefer low fantasy over high fantasy, because most high fantasy is just... medievial AU but with dragons... So if I can add dragons to things, I'd prefer to see how they'd affect modern times.

I love Relic Hunter and shows like it - searching for magical artifacts. Childhood favorite that still holds up.

3. SciFi: Stargate SG-1

Okay, this genre is actually tougher. For one, because technically I distinguish it into two categories like I split supernatural from fantasy too, because there's a vast difference between a time travel/alien scifi show and a dystopian future on Earth kind of scifi show. Not too big on the latter, more a fan of the first. And then there are many.

For the longest time, I would have said Doctor Who and while I still very much cherish the 10th era and am enjoying 13 right now, I think that on the overall, the bad outweights the good at this point and if I had to choose only one singular scifi show to watch for the rest of my life, I wouldn't go with this anymore.

It's honestly Stargate SG-1 and I'm kind of surprised by that. Back when I watched it for the first time in 2018, I honestly meant to just waste a bit of time and I wanted something scifi and remembered my parents watching this when I was growing up. I never expected it to be as good as it is and while the last two seasons were a slight overstaying their welcome, it's honestly already impressive that there are 8 thoroughly solid seasons?

4. Comedy: Community

There are so many comedies and I guess you can sub-genre them with all other genres too, but if I had to pick, on the overall of comedy shows, I would pick this one, especially now that I've just finished my rewatch earlier this year and it's still hilarious and holds up.

5. Doctor Drama: Grey's Anatomy

Drama is like the vaguest genre possible, so I always split it up into the different categories - doctor, police, lawyer, fire fighter, family. Among them, medical dramas are my favorite and the clear victor here is Grey's Anatomy, I fell hard in love with the show when I watched it last year.

6. Con Arists: Leverage

This is such a nieche little genre and I only know a handful of shows that even fit into it, but there is something very particularly enjoyable about con artists and Leverage is definitely the best of them all.

7. Lawyer Dramas: For the People

I am so mad they cancelled this show after two seasons already. But yeah I love lawyer shows. And I am hoooping the upcoming one with Dom Sherwood is going to be so good it'll take my number one spot for this genre. Until then, the unique look into the different sides of lawyers and the dynamic among the characters makes For the People my favorite.

8. Magical Girls: Sailor Moon

This just ain't a competition. There have been many magical girl anime, but this is like... the OG. The big one. I will always love Sailor Moon.

9. Sports Anime: Haikyuu!!

Though I still harbor very strong frustration about the way the manga ended, after Sailor Moon this might very well be my most rewatched anime.

10. Cartoon: Recess / DuckTales (2017)

Recess has been my favorite cartoon since I was a child and even on repeated rewatches as an adult it still held up (though it's been a while since I last rewatched it), so I can not dethrone it in good faith, but I'd be lying if I didn't put DuckTales onto the top spot, the love and talent that went into that reboot are insane, the story is so good, it is so much fun and so engaging. Though, as with comedy, you could apply all the genres onto cartoons and do their own whole list honestly, but I generally go by my mood, what I want to watch, and when it comes to that, I've never gone for a fantasy cartoon when I was in the mood for fantasy. I have a specific cartoon mood and that can be satisfied by pretty much all sub-genres.

#About Me #I guess #Buffy the Vampire Slayer #Relic Hunter #Stargate SG-1 #Community #Grey's Anatomy #Leverage #For the People #Sailor Moon #Haikyuu!!#Recess #DuckTales (2017)

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asophiewannabe · 6 years

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Still doing the asks?^^ What are you favorite moments in canon?

I’m ALWAYS doing asks!! But I gotta say you GOT ME WITH THIS ONE FLORA THIS IS HARD FOR ME. That being said I’ve decided to stick with Crystal, since that is where my heart lies in this fandom. This took me a while and it’s gonna be IN DEPTH. I will start from the beginning (might be slightly out of order)

• The moment they first meet. You know what I mean• When Usagi first meets Ami! I love when she first meets all the Senshi and I’ll explain why individually. When Usagi first meets Ami she immediately notices how shy and reserved she is and works to bring her out of her shell and I LOVE that!! She so willing to invite her to hang out even after just meeting her moments before.• “That Cat was talking to you just now wasn’t it”• When Usagi gets heart eyes the first time she’s sees Rei and FOLLOWS her because she thinks she’s THAT pretty• THE BUS SCENE I LOVE THE BUS SCENE TOP TEN USAGI/MAMO MOMENTS. Since Usagi has been shown to blush every time she meets Mamo-Chan early on, I think this is really the first time we see them interact normally. And I LOVE IT • “Are you in middle school too?” “No, I’m a high school student” *whips out ID* • When Usagi defends Rei after she gets accused of the disappearances• That moment when Jadeite can’t figure out why he’s so attracted to an unconscious Rei• The entirety of Masquerade Dance Party. 10/10 my favorite episode in Crystal AND the Original anime, this is the ep that solidified that I NEEDED to invest myself in this story. Literally pulled out of my fantasy dreams • That moment at the end of the same ep when we see Mako-Chan for the first time with her ADORABLE umbrella• When Usagi is stalking Mako-Chan from the tree and sneaks up behind her bench and sees her cute bento and decides she MUST be friends with her. She sees through this tough exterior that everyone talks about and promptly decides to befriend her • When Tuxedo Mask appears in Usagi’s bedroom window to get her to save the day• When Nephrite is like I’ve seen this look before right as he gets ATTACKED• When Usagi bumps into Mamoru on the street and he’s SO clearly attracted to her and Mako-Chan is like USAGI ARE YOU BLUSHING afterwards• When Usagi almost passes out in the street and Tuxedo Mask just HAPPENS to be there and gives her the most romantic pep talk ever• And proceeds to bring her back to his apartment after the battle• The whole reveal scene(which you rewrote amazingly in Ikigai I might add)• When Usagi is kissing the pocket watch and Mamoru is kissing the handkerchief • “I want you Usako” • VENUS VENUS VENUS• Usagi is SO star struck when she meets Sailor V and is even more thrilled that she’s her Princess!!!• And Usagi assures her that she doesn’t have to fight alone anymore• The moment in the park where Mamoru is so ashamed that he can’t even LOOK at Usagi and then winks at her, “Yeah, next time”• The kiss before Sailor Moon was 100% ready to give her life to save her friends(then you know what happened)• I’m ashamed to say I love to hate the moment where Sailor Moon just starts screaming painfully after Tuxedo Mask is DEAD I cry without fail every time• SERENITYS FIRST APPEARANCE •FLASHBACKS IM A SUCKER FOR THE FLASHBACKS• “I descended to that planet, time and time again, just hoping to catch glimpses of him”(officially my favorite quote in the series)•When the Shitennou can’t figure out why they recognize Tuxedo Mask• When Venus reminds the girls that they too, at one point, had been in love• When the Shitennou REMEMBER THEIR PASTS• The entire final battle with Queen Metallia, where Usagi uses all her power to defeat her with Mamo-Chan right behind her the whole time• The Senshi giving their lives so Usagi might save them all• The girls reunion on the bridge after the battle!!• The park scene where Usagi gives him back his pocket watch and Mamo-Chan gives her back her handkerchief • When Chibiusa tries to cheer up Usagi after some of the girls were kidnapped• Skipping ahead, PLUTOS FIRST APPEARANCE I LOVE PLUTO• The way you think Pluto is gonna be mad at Chibiusa for time traveling but is then just relieved to see her alive and well• Seeing Diana for the first time!! I love that kitten!!• The way Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask are so utterly CONFUSED to see future versions of themselves • That awkward moment when they realize Chibiusa is in fact their daughter • Skipping ahead again, FIRST APPEARANCE OF HARUKA AND MICHIRU(aka the Hot couple)• When Usagi and Mamo-Chan are kinda having relationship issues and don’t end up talking about it until Chibiusa makes them both stay at his apartment to help her with a project • When Chibiusa PRETENDS to be asleep Bc she KNOWS they need to talk• The three of them sleeping in the same bed • Pluto’s EPIC comeback “My name is Setsuna Meiou, nice to meet you” (no joke I SCREAMED when I first saw the end of that ep!!) And her just jumping into battle in the next ep• Usagi just wanting all the Sailor Guardians to fight together • SUPER SAILOR MOON• Usagi literally jumping into the abyss to save the world• At the end of Episode 39 when the girls are all excited for high school and there’s that REALLY pretty animation with the cherry blossoms

And I think that just about covers it! I love this show so dearly and I’m currently rewatching it AGAIN. I seriously cannot wait until we get the rest of this series so I may ADD to this list. Thanks for the ask Flora!

#asks #my asks #ask answered #sailor moon #sailor moon crystal

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koganphrancis · 6 years

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Ian Used To Do Better Stuff With Vans OR There’s Another Hour Of My Life I Won’t Get Back

This episode was dumb dumb dumb as fuck-and even more pointless than that. The ONLY redeeming quality in it was that it was completely Terror-free. Read on, if you dare. My recap of Season H8 Episode Dear God Why Isn’t It Over Yet-or 11, if you want to keep it short.

As usual, I’ll get the others out of the way as quickly as I possibly can.

Carl’s still illegally under-aged married, and this week he tells Kasammi, “I don’t think there’s any skin left on my dick.” Yeah, they made that point last year when they had to keep taking it off after his misguided circumcision. Not that the show is referring to THAT, of course. They refuse to acknowledge any plot point that has gone before. He and Kas take a wild tour through his before the show started past and I have no idea what the point is-is it to show us she’s truly insane because none of the horrors of life on the mean streets scare her? Or to show us that Generation Z doesn’t experience reality because their whole lives have been instantly posted on screens of electronic devices? I don’t know and I don’t care-quit trying to be fake deep, Shameless, if you even are. I can’t tell. The only (maybe) pertinent point of Carl’s story this week is he tells Kasammi after her hundredth shit fit on the subject that he won’t go back to military school and in the previews for next week it looks like the family (or at least Frank) will try to help him sneak away to do just that. Yawn.

Debbie loses three toes-Frank chops them off for her. Before that, Debbie is shown signing her 16 year old self out of the hospital-WHAT? She’d need a parent or guardian for that. Anyway, apparently Debbie’s not on any kind of welfare or insurance. And doesn’t know that Ian could’ve gotten the money for her expensive surgery to attempt to save the toes by going down on the old couple just twice. What is it with this show and cutting off toes? They’ve done this before with the body they got to stand in for Aunt Ginger. I’m so sick of the recycled plot points!

Speaking of which-Snore’s old man is out of prison so Lip gets him to fight him to violate his parole and send him back-did this new writer guy not see Yevgeny’s christening episode or is he just really into plagiarism? It was such a fizzle to a going nowhere story to begin with. I think the guy playing Snore’s version of Terry even had some of the same lines but I’m too lazy to rewatch and try to catch them. If we were supposed to hate this guy like we hate Terry, it didn’t work. And Lip was no Mickey showing up to defend people that mean something to him either-it was all a weak as fuck imitation. And it was odd that Lip chose to call the guy out for “beating women” when he lets himself get beaten when he has sex with Eddy. Who the fuck is he to judge? Maybe ten year old Snore didn’t get that her parents were having consensual rough sex that got too violent and ended in death-but the show’s not that deep.

Snore’s telling of her mother’s death once again played like someone complaining about not getting the last bottle of nail polish in their favorite shade at Walgreens or something. If she’s been so traumatized that she can’t put any emotion into the horrific memories that’s fine, but then I would argue that she wouldn’t be terrified of her dad coming after her either. Snore just can’t emote OR imagine what it would be like to be in that setting, I’m sorry.

And here’s what had me super pissed-Snore tells Lip she was 10 when her mom was killed in front of witnesses (Snore and her brother-she specifically says they both testified against him) and her dad’s already out on parole? We don’t know how old Snore is now, but surely no older than 25 (and probably not even that old, but whatever), so the show is saying her dad got out in 15 years max, which is the time Mickey was sentenced to for NOT killing Sammi? Fuck off.

Also, why would the cops not even consider the father’s side of the story that Lip instigated the fight? Lip has Eddy’s niece record the fight on his phone, and after it’s over he goes over to her and asks her how it looks or whatever, and she says Snore’s father threw the first punch. Wouldn’t the cops question why a little girl was filming two men on a porch BEFORE a fight started? Snore’s father must have Mickey’s public defender for a lawyer. Fucking show should’ve shocked us all by having Lip get locked up for premeditated assault.

Fiona meets with a lawyer (Janice from Friends, but she’s not as funny in this, sadly) and as soon as she said Fiona could lose both the apartment building and the Gallagher house I knew that storyline had jumped the shark and somehow next week all will be miraculously fixed-no way will the Gallaghers ever lose the house, that’s another plot point that’s been done to death. At first I was thinking they’ll either come up with some fortuitous traffic camera footage showing that the guy jumped off the roof intentionally, or that Hugh Laurie would show up in a cameo as Dr. House and say that if a man “fell” off a roof that high, he’d have a hell of a lot more damage than one broken ankle, but no, the show isn’t going to even get that clever-they’re just gonna have the family cave and be willing to settle with Fiona if they get custody of her dog that suddenly she’s so worried about in this week’s episode. She’s never shown that level of concern for any of her siblings.

Frank has a tedious, boring couple of scenes about his “retirement plan”-he has a baggie of 3 stolen Social Security cards and anyone can see a mile off that the cards would’ve just been replaced by their original owners-they’re not like a set of fingerprints and you only get one for life and if you lose it someone else has your entire identity. THEN they set up next week’s recycled/stolen plot to have Liam and Frank rip off Liam’s rich friend’s family just like Carl and Frank ripped off Liam and Carl’s gay foster dads-it didn’t work then, it won’t work now (and why didn’t Frank do hard time for that grand theft?).

Svetlana and Vee and Kevin have a scene at a fancy (but not as fancy as the show was trying to tell us it was) bar that was a pathetic echo of both Ian and Mickey’s hotel bar scam AND of how funny the show used to be able to be. Later Svet goes to humble herself to the other hand whore to find out how she snagged a rich fiance and discovers that the dude she’s about to marry is senile as fuck and Svet is going to step in to replace her, which is what I predicted the first time the hand whore showed up. I will give Shameless credit for making me laugh unintentionally-since I’ve been picturing the “old rich dude” Svet was going to wind up with as John Wells’ fantasy version of himself, seeing the old dude in an adult diaper and thinking he’s Wells was very satisfying.

Do I finally get to Ian now? Do I have to talk about his bullshit? There’s a scene of him in bed alone while the newlyweds are having sex in the same room, signalling that he’d rather be there than at Terror’s house, LOL. Then it’s the next morning and he goes down to breakfast with his Bible in hand, but no pills. Is that supposed to be significant? We may never know...

He gets to the “Church Of Gay Jesus” and there’s so many “fans” there it’s like Beatles or One Direction footage. The minister guy gets through the crowd to him with a big young guy and tells Ian the rando is “Bic” and he wants to help (I didn’t know the guy’s name till I saw it in the closing credits, I really thought his name was “Dick” and they were making a “big dick” joke, but no, I guess they were making a “Bic lighter” joke instead). Ian and Bic instantly have more chemistry than Ian and Terror but it’s unintentional I’m sure-the actor playing Bic probably has taken acting classes and knows to look an acting partner in the eye, instantly making him more engaged than Terror’s ever been in a scene.

The minister guy tells Ian, “Your life is no longer your own.” Which first of all, I’m just not buying that all these youths have just been waiting for a messiah to show up and they’ll follow him anywhere, and secondly why was being with Mickey not Ian anymore, but he’ll give away his entire life for strangers? Fuck you, Shameless. (and speaking of his entire life, does he never have to go to work anymore? Also, Fiona turned him down when he asked for a ride to the church-for once she had a good reason, that she had to pick up Debbie-but why is the show acting like Fi does things for him all of the sudden? She DID give him a ride last week, and that was very OOC of her.)

There’s a kid trying to get Ian’s attention-he needs help getting away from his parents who have hired men to get him back. At some point in the proceedings some guys jump out of a van and drag the kid into it. Ian runs to the front of the van before it can pull away and goes all Chris Pratt in Jurassic Park, holding up his arms and not letting it advance. The unintentional humor here amused me no end. Then Ian lays down in front of the van and I actually said aloud to my TV, “Just run him over.” I’m that done with this storyline and this show-just kill Ian off at this point, it’d be a mercy.

Ian’s there on the ground with his arms thrown up over his head (not that the driver could even see him down there, right in front of the van) and we see that this time Shameless didn’t bother covering up Cam’s real life Sailor Moon tattoo. SO LAZY. All the other kids lay down around the van too so it can’t go anywhere The 3 dudes in the van give up and let the kid get out.

The kid is 14 and the minister guy tries to talk sense into Ian, saying the parents have a legal right to their kid and they, more specifically Ian, can’t keep the kid. Ian agrees to talk to the kid’s dad who tells him the parents aren’t bigots, they don’t care that their son’s not heterosexual, but he’s been living on the streets, doing drugs, and prostituting himself. Then the father says, “We believe he may be mentally ill,” and Cameron (and yes, I mean Cameron, not Ian) makes a reaction face to that, but what it means, again, nobody knows.

Ian goes to talk to the kid where they have him hidden away in the Mickey Wedding Venue basement. Ian tells him what the father told him, and the kid says they keep bringing him to a church (is that Ian’s trigger? Churches? and if so, why?), plus they have him see shrinks who have put him on meds that knock him on his ass and he can’t get an erection. He adds, “That’s what they really want-so I can’t have sex with another boy, you know? Ever.” Ian says, “Well you can’t stay here. You have to find someplace where you can be safe, where you can be yourself.” WHAT? I don’t understand. For one thing, isn’t that LITERALLY TERROR’S JOB? To take runaways and provide them with a safe place to stay and a plan to get their lives back on terms that they can live with? I don’t ever want to have to side with Terror, but this episode is basically saying that Terror’s way is right and Ian’s way is oh so wrong and misguided. What the fuck? Secondly, isn’t that what Ian THINKS he’s doing? Why is he telling the kid HE has to find someplace safe? Ian has literally been in this kid’s shoes-he knows there’s no safe places for someone even younger than he was when he got back from the army, living on the streets. Anyway, after Ian’s lines the kid says, “Will you help me?” but Ian doesn’t answer one way or the other.

I totally didn’t get this scene-why the writer had Ian say nothing. I could see if it was to show Ian was getting more and more manic and now is on the downside of that and is becoming too depressed to speak to people-but then where’s his energy for doing anything coming from, plus the story isn’t SAYING he’s manic or depressed, and Cam and John Wells said Ian’s storyline is bold, audacious, great, etc and I don’t think either of them would’ve said those things if the payoff is just going to be that Ian needed his meds adjusted. And why does Ian maybe believe what the kid is saying and not the dad? Again, this IS Ian’s story! Mentally ill, unable to help himself, and unwilling to take his pills! I wondered why Ian didn’t at least give him a version of the Monica “you don’t have to change for them” speech, or his own “you don’t have to fix me because I’m not broken” speech or why in the name of all that’s holy didn’t he tell the kid, “I’ve been exactly where you are-on meds that were supposed to help but made me feel like crap plus I couldn’t get it up-but that’s because they take time-you need to take them to get stable and then you’ll find what works for you and have no problems having sex again (since apparently Ian’s never had an issue since beating Mickey up at the dugouts).” AND the kid’s only 14-does Ian maybe want to advise him that feeling like he needs to be having sex that young to the point where he’s willing to run away and do it with anyone might be part of his symptoms?

Ian COULD be so helpful here, but no. At this point he is literally putting at risk kids at even greater risk.

Later Rando Bic shows Ian that the van’s back behind the church. Ian says, “Get the kid,” like he’s The Penguin and Bic’s his trusty lieutenant. It was so dumb. The kid is used as bait, and when the 3 guys jump out of the van Ian pops up behind the group and starts yelling. “My god’s a faggot! My god’s a dyke! My god is trans, a junkie, a whore!’ Then the van blows up. “We will not be victims!”

What the hell is he on about? That’s a serious question. None of this is making sense. God isn’t human, so Ian giving the Christian god human attributes makes no sense. “We won’t be victims” of WHAT? Gay conversion? This kid’s dad said he isn’t trying to convert his gay son. What is all the yelling and the explosion about? And to get back to the explosion for a moment: That had to be Ian’s brilliant plan, and it just makes me miss Mickey talking him down from stupid shit like that all the more. Bic is the one that actually lights the fire (get it? BIC?) but how did they even know that all 3 guys would get out of the van this time? Based on the first failed attempt to drive off with the kid, wouldn’t it make more sense that one of the guys would stay at the wheel and keep the van running and they’d take off the minute they shoved the kid inside before all of Ian’s disciples could block it again? Before I rewatched the scene this morning I actually wondered if the story is going to be Ian is guilty of killing one of the guys, but then I saw it again and all 3 did get out-but I still don’t think Bic could’ve seen them from where he snuck around to light it up. And I bet we don’t see Bic again-he was randomly thrown in because of course Terror wouldn’t have helped Ian carry out any plan that wasn’t his own. But it’s funny that they couldn’t have him in the episode because everyone, even the shitty writers, know there’s no way Terror could talk Ian out of it like Mickey would be able to.

In the scenes for next week, Terror shows up and asks, “Is Ian around?” and Debbie answers, “He’s not here.” Terror says, “There’s a warrant out for his arrest.” Wouldn’t the cops have gone to Ian’s house FIRST? Where would they have even found Terror to be asking about Ian since Ian doesn’t officially work for the Youth Center or the Church of Gay Jesus. More lazy writing, can’t wait for the whimpering end to this crapfest of a season.

#Spoilers #Recap #Season H8 Episode 11 #Disco isn't dead but that van sure is #Ian had his first Mickey kiss in a van #Ian gave Mickey a Spiderman kiss in a van after a night of fucking fantastic sex #In a van #Ian should know to show a van respect

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