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LET'S FUCKING GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

sampo koski, snake in the grass...?

so, sampo koski is supposed to be a snake/directly associated with snakes, right? if that's a head-scratching statement, i think the implication should be something gathered from that exceptionally weird-looking pauldron he has on his right arm, because its something so blatantly in your face and yet almost TOO obvious. his pauldron, if you squint, and see it from a certain angle, absolutely mimics a snake's head, with fangs outstretched (thank u @ricochetlovebombs for the nice shot of his pauldron as seen on the left!!)

if that wasn't even enough, there's even more visual clues from the strange knives he wields, which as far as i know, have never been addressed or acknowledged in story. "oh, the guy's got cool knives! they boomerang into his enemies somehow! neat!" and then you look at it and its like "wait a second, they're colored the same shade of purple as the "fangs" on the gauntlet and curved the same way. they ARE his fangs, in weapon form"

and then last (but not least) is the key art. its absolutely something people have noticed (as well as the strange unknown city backdrop, but that's an exploration for the other time). i've seen more than one hypothesis of it being some kind of grappling hook - but regardless of what it actually is, the fact is that the attachment of it does seem to be from the "head" pauldron itself (as seen on his video game model) which lends the fact that this is maybe the actual "body" of the "snake" in question

now, as far as what it means? its a bit unclear at the moment. of course "snake in the grass" as a phrase comes to mind - "someone who appears friendly and likable on the surface, but has hidden agendas and will do anything to get what they want" - but this has never been stated about sampo word for word as far as we know! it could also be a hint for his masked fools persona and the aesthetic it possibly takes - could we see a more reptilian/snake-like sampo in some point in the future when he reveals more of the man behind the mask, or the mask behind the man? who knows, but its absolutely something to keep in mind for now

#(CONFETTI) (CHILDREN CHEERING) #SERIOUSLY THOUGH I'M SO GLAD!!!!! I WAS RIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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mutuals, non-mutuals, ops of years old posts, you can all catch these paws

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Fate/Grand Order COMIC à la carte PLUS! SP Showdown!

Ashiya Douman VS Dioscuri

TL & Typeset by yours truly.

#REQUIRED ASHIYA DOUMAN ACADEMIC READING NOT EVEN KIDDING #THIS IS PARAMOUNT TO UNDERSTANDING DOUMAN #and yes this was officially published #ashiya douman

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(cagliostro voice) douman, my dear fellow, what is that weird hackerman glove you're putting on

#ordeal call 2 #ordeal call 2 spoilers #ashiya douman #count cagliostro #i am LOSING it over cags being a literal douman kinnie YOU CAN'T MAKE THIS UP!!!!!

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a very random thing, but it feels like such a Possibly Right Under Your Nose sort of thing that the coat that sampo wears might literally be intentionally modeled after a ringmaster' outfit's coat. you know, the guy who actually runs the circus act. take a gander at how a ringmaster is prescribed - and then think about what sampo's role is throughout the belobog arc!

(also a bit randomly, but the last part about essentially using hyperbole to "enhance the expectations of the audience" is definitely in line with what sampo does in his grand exaggerations and dramatic turns of phrase - like his line about march 7th comes to mind)

#sampo koski #honkai star rail #THIS MAY BE A FLUKE but the way the coat is cut in front....the tail ends....very Reminscent #my guy who is a dead snake skeleton and a clown and a ringmaster and a scamlord and your best friend ever

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TODAY IS A GOOD GOOD FUCKING DAY

#sorry op will insert thoughts here #sampo koski #i do love the attention to detail with the chibis in these shorts. there IS a difference between their body language and how they sit #sampo with legs crossed and hands slid into pockets is very much the vision of someone much more casual #not prim or proper like screwllum sitting but obviously very laidback #still a lot of these big demonstration gestures like an actor on stage! the hand on the heart #also notable is that even when he gets annoyed/angry during the skit his eyebrows never shift downwards #the emoji says hes angry but hes never VISIBLY angry which is intriguing #he always wants to keep on a pleasant nice almost vaguely concerned face...its interesting #also randomly but love the penny pinching gesture he does....mister loving money....loves his moolah

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you have to understand how unprecedented the journey of ashiya douman fate/grand order has been in the public eye. this character used to be a heavily maligned npc, a viciously hated figure in fandom who barely had any fanart except for a select handful of devout fans wanting to catch glimpses of the true personality behind the circus act. the design for this npc was so stunning, however, that even the overall director and writer of the series, nasu, decided to elevate their status in the story, and even created their own focused storyline that culminated in a whole chapter where they finally got the boss battle of their dreams. and that chapter and their release as a playable character changed everything. practically overnight, the man who was so loathed had people turning out fanart by the gazillions. timelines were filled with nothing but clown. people looked at them with new eyes, passionately making in-depth comics on their intricacies. this horrible evil wizard was more than they seemed. this character had layers. this heroic spirit was tragic, through and through, in a way that resonated like nothing else. the beautiful carnivore, made to be hated, desperate to be loved.

and if you thought that was it, if you thought it was over in a brief rushed fad, well, that popularity never ended. ashiya douman, the figure that even in history was considered a lowly villain to fight a grand beloved hero, was celebrated time and time again. they got into events, they got a summer costume, they got beautiful illustrations for CEs, they were given merch, they even were selected out of a few servants to have a voiced one-on-one skit that fans could experience at the f/go festival. it's been Literal Years since douman has been released, and the wave of love has never faltered for a second. and now, their writer and artist created a wonderfully crafted one-shot comic for the f/go magazine that was regarded with such high praise and popularity that the artist just announced that they have been greenlit for a semi-regular manga on the living douman's exploits, to continue on from that one-shot, because people want more of this clown

ashiya douman has had a world of adoration that one could've never predicted from their early time. once considered a shallow side villain cackling evilly, now one of the most well-known most beloved characters in the entirety of the fate/ franchise.

this evil wizard jester is more Loved than you can even imagine

#ashiya douman #fate/grand order #caster limbo #seriously though it floors me every time because i was THERE i was RIGHT THERE FROM THE BEGINNING #THE TURN-AROUND IS SOMETHING I HAVE LITERALLY NEVER SEEN FOR A CHARACTER IN ANY CANON BEFORE #douman the one the only the character of all time the writing for them is so impeccable it makes me weep #may they continue to be loved forevermore

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panels from the new ashiya douman manga by hasendow sensei that i am DEEPLY obsessed with

NOT comprehensive. i love all of these so much.

#you all are going to look at this clown and enjoy this clown #ashiya douman #yes this is my ramble blog yes i do what i want

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THE CREATOR OF ASHIYA DOUMAN GETTING THE GREENLIGHT FOR A WHOLE SEMI-REGULAR ASHIYA DOUMAN MANGA SERIES BY FATE/GO BECAUSE OF HOW POWERFUL AND WELL-RECEIVED THE ONE-SHOT LAST YEAR WAS IS THE BEST NEWS I WILL GET ALL YEAR LET'S GO CLOWN POWERRRRRRR

#ashiya douman #fate/grand order #sorry not sorry THIS CLOWN IS EVERYTHING TO ME POINTS HEAVILY TO MY ICON #THE CHARACTER EVER!!!!!!!!!! #THEY DESERVE ALL THE MUSHISHI ADVENTURES THEY DESERVE

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spoilers for penacony completely out of context but please for the love of god listen to how this line is said because i almost choked with how fed UP he is

#sampo koski #honkai star rail spoilers #honkai star rail #seriously though roger rose your performance is everything 2 me #his voice is clownish its annoying its dumb its cartoonish its so damn funny #it brings so much vibrant character to a guy who could have been just another pretty face #i'm glad his voice is not quote unquote attractive. it doesn't need to be. he's got Layers but above all he's a jester and a half

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it's Happening.jpg

feeling nuts. feeling bonkers. might actually write a self-indulgent fic of sampo koski developing a one-sided monika ddlc-esque relationship with the player behind the screen. make it meta. lean on the tragedy and horror of it all. i'll do it for Me

#me in my own self-indulgence era #!!!!!!!!!!!!! #ME SLAPPING MY HANDS DOWN THE META OF IT ALL!!!!! #how did that extra s get in there idk i'll fix it later

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feeling nuts. feeling bonkers. might actually write a self-indulgent fic of sampo koski developing a one-sided monika ddlc-esque relationship with the player behind the screen. make it meta. lean on the tragedy and horror of it all. i'll do it for Me

#i don't know why i just have the Bug #love it when a character leans through the fourth wall and makes it a problem for everyone else involved

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sampo koski is implied to walk on water as he doesn't produce any splashes when going through it unlike every other character you play.jpg

#honkai star rail #sampo koski #I MEAN TECHNICALLY THIS ISN'T SPOILERS ITS JUST THERE'S A WATERY PART OF THE NEW AREA #AND HE IS IMPLIED TO BE WALKING ON IT IF YOU USE HIM TO WALK THROUGH IT #WHAT THE FUCK IS HIS PROBLEM

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much to think about.jpg

#sampo koski #honkai star rail #seriously this trailer was So Much WHY IS HE TRASH CAN GODZILLA #so excited for my man to cause problems #also laughing at how hsr's version of childe is omnipresent trickster bugs bunny pathetic saul goodman Guy #love me a clown. love me a overly powerful clown

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this is such an important and very correct point about The Boy and The Heron that deserves more chewing on. what's EXTREMELY evident is the repetition of "malice" and the very concept and idea of mahito calling the great uncle's offered blocks "gravestones". how everything is foreshadowed in the beginning when the old ladies are talking about how the great uncle made workers build his mansion for him and some literally died - for his vision! for his world! and he still made them do it regardless of the consequences! he populated his own world with birds and still imposed resource scarcity and power struggles on them, forcing them into these horrific conflicts, and in the case of the pelicans, having to eat the equivalent of children/the unborn to survive. it's a world based on the one he knew, and it's a world of "malice" no matter how hard he tries to make it idyllic.

it's a beautiful world, but in the end, it's still a world of the dead, after all

While I recognise that the boy and the heron is making deeply nuanced and complex statements I personally refuse to be sympathetic towards the greatuncle because he did that to the pelicans and I am on the side of the pelicans.

#the boy and the heron #the boy and the heron spoilers #SORRY FOR ADDING MY INPUT i just love thinking about this film #honestly the more i think about it the more i love it #it works on so many allegorical and symbolical levels...it really does

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(me shaking my partner in bed) WAKE UP DEAR THEY RELEASED A PICTURE OF SAMPO FUCKING KOSKI IN A MASK AND SUIT IT'S SO OVER (POSITIVE)

#sampo koski #honkai star rail spoilers #THE ROLAND LIBRARY OF RUINA VIBES ARE OFF THE CHARTS!!!!!!!! I'M DOOMED #seriously though how can anyone look at this and think its giovanni the hair is 1000% sampo #love a woman doing wrongs with a pathetic man (i am talking about sparkle) #get his ass

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hey, isn't there something OFF about sampo's appearance in the stellar shadowseeker event?

as our lovable trailblazer runs around taking pictures to help march 7th out, they come across familiar characters that they chat with. as the scenes go, there's nothing special about them, focusing on both characters standing across from each other discussing the photos

so why, exactly, is trailblazer's sudden encounter with sampo in first-person perspective?

aside from the occasional event, the typical way scenes play out in honkai star rail is as shown above, with the camera playing a third person perspective to the mc and any character(s) they talk to. sampo's sudden perspective change isn't some gameplay/logistical location issue with the video game camera, either, since third person perspective plays out just fine in the same area with other characters

so, why the sudden camera shift? of course, it could be a whole lot of nothingburgers and the game just wanted you to have a nice one-to-one chat with everyone's favorite scamlord. but at the same time, this is a character who has already faced the camera once before in such a way - the infamous fourth wall breaking scene from the end of belobog, of course - so now the deliberate nature of suddenly having sampo face you - maybe not just the trailblazer, you behind the screen - and teasing about being caught on camera when he's "working" might take on an intentional extra layer of metaphysical meaning

the debate about how far the fourth wall break goes is something that might likely not be resolved anytime soon. is sampo simply aware of being dreamt of by the trailblazer, but has no understanding of being in a game? or is he actually fully aware he's an npc in a video game, and is directly looking at the player and wanting to talk to them, form a relationship with them, directly joking with them? is him teasing about taking photos a way to refer to how players will take photos of their favorite characters in a video game with them 100% unaware of it, as they're nothing but lifeless code?

who knows! either way....sampo koski, what's your DEAL

#sampo koski #honkai star rail #honkai star rail spoilers #i have said it before and i will say it again i think it would be sexy if sampo had a ddlc monika-esque relationship with the player #SHAKES A GUY PLEASE MISTER CLOWN I NEED TO UNDERSTANDDD