Hello, I Am Here

[secretlyafiveheadeddragon]

idc if the Half Upon A Time fandom is dead, I am GOING to post about it now. Whether you like it or not 😠

[secretlyafiveheadeddragon]

Here’s why Jack is one of the best YA heroes out there:

something about most YA heroes is that their arcs follow a journey of self-discovery. You get a kid with no self esteem, a sort of snarky and awkward sense of humor, you sweep them up on a magical quest with a couple of friends where they battle a big bad and get an inseparable bond and figure out who they are and what they want to be. Ain’t nothing wrong with that. It’s a good formula. HOWEVER

Jack is DRIPPING with self esteem. He knows exactly who he is and what he wants. It’s the how and the methods that he has a problem with. He’s actually very smart, and the narrative makes this clear. The humor with him comes from his wit, and making fun of his ego (ie: making a plan to outwit someone and then ruins it when may starts yelling at him in the heat of the moment) and his jealousy.

Jack is a huge cynic, which would get old really fast if the book wasn’t constantly proving him right. He’s aware of a lot of tropes that his world revolves around, and he uses those tropes to his advantage when he can, and uses expectations of other people that those tropes will be followed to outwit people. He doesn’t want to be a hero in the way that someone like Phillip is a hero because he is incapable of putting on that kind of effortlessly perfect and kind mask because if he did it it would be a farce. He doesn’t understand someone who can just do that. He thinks it’s stupid to just rush into battle with no plan. He can’t win on the purity of his heart, so he needs to do things differently.

Because he’s such a cynic he also can’t do huge gestures to express his big feelings, at least not overtly. He does self sacrifice a couple times, but he never does something like “this is for you, Princess!” Or even like express that kind thing in words at all. He tries to be vulnerable in the second book, but he never says the quiet part out loud. He is intensely loyal, but he shows that with actions rather than overt gestures. When he thought he had a chance with May, he reaches out more. When he is told she has a prince who will make her happier than he ever could, he leaves to try and build her a world she can be happy with that prince in.

He’s also kind of a bitch. He gets angry when he shouldn’t, he lashes out, he even loses it on Phillip in the third book (there was no reason for all of that in the sword fight). He pushes people away, he lies to people, he can’t really articulate feelings that aren’t anger or apathy. He’s not a bad person, he cares and he can support people and he does the kind thing a lot more than he doesn’t when it really matters, but I mean. He’s also a bit of a snarky bastard. And we love him for that. He’s not perfect. His biggest struggle is connection. He gets thrown into a Golden Trio and he doesn’t even like one of the guys or even make an effort to pretend like he does. This is instrumental to the feeling of isolation he needs to have. He doesn’t think anyone can understand him in the way he wants to be understood because he doesn’t understand people. So he self-isolates and makes like awful for himself and pushes people away instinctively. He’s such a problematic king!

anyway people should read the half upon a time trilogy, it’s really fucking good

[jesncin]

Superman and Martian Manhunter discuss alien fashion

[the-bedheaded-league]

Sherlock Holmes is the funniest case of “doomed by the narrative” ever. Doomed by the narrative and destined to die young bc the creator hated him, and then the fans literally bullied him into un-dooming the narrative, writing about him for another thirty years, and giving the character a canonical happy ending where he retires to the countryside and keeps bees. Funniest shit ever.

[laurenillustrated]

Mystery Inc. meet Holmes and Watson!

I am having a lot of fun with this Victorian Scooby Doo au!!

[senzywenzy]

what do you mean Echoes of Wisdom came out a year ago

[senzywenzy]

Linktober Day 1 - Knight

[c4rr0tzzz]

Left-handed problem

[memopmiff]

I bet on losing dogs

[frogdisco2021]

Zuko is canonically a sappy hopeless romantic who enjoys romance stories like Love Amongst The Dragons, we know this because his problem wasn't that his mom would take them to see a gushy romance play but that they did it badly. You don't care about something getting butchered unless you like that thing.

He has trouble expressing himself but tries to make thoughtful gestures and give little gifts to people he cares about to show affection.

Early on when Iroh and he are living in a cave and he's going through one of his Robbing People With Swords phases he steals a fancy tea set for Iroh in a misguided attempt at showing affection.

In another misguided attempt at affection he gives the Earth Kingdom boy his knife.

After struggling the entire night to bond with Jin because he's socially inept he does his cute little gesture of lighting the lanterns and risking outing himself as a firebender because he wants to make her happy. And then gives her a coupon for a free cup of tea when she clearly wants to kiss him, because he's clueless.

We see this style of showing affection come out with Mai as well except she sneers at it and shuts him down and hurts his feelings about it. He is the kind of sappy bastard whose first instinct on seeing something pretty is "I'm going to give this to my girlfriend :)" but it seems like this is supposed to be showing us that he and Mai aren't a good fit. He tries being sweet and vulnerable and makes little gestures, like seeing a beautiful perfectly intact conch shell and trying to give it to her, and she verbally rolls her eyes at him and hurts his feelings about it.

Later on when he's with the gaang and starting to feel safe being his true self, he's showing them affection in his typical way by making and serving everyone tea (and on a more subtextual level I think this is a way to demonstrate humility to them, since he comes from royalty he's trying to show that he sees them as equals).

He does other kind gestures to show his new affection for them in the forms of leading a prison break with Sokka and taking Katara on a trauma closure (but murder not NOT on the table if she wants) mission and waiting outside her tent all night like a wet dog on her doorstep.

Dude is a piner and a yearner. And you know what, you know who would LOVE IT if Zuko found that seashell and gave it to her and wouldn't turn up her nose at it? A certain waterbender who he acts more in love with than his canon gf.

[demiboydemon]

Convos had between BOTW and TOTK when Zelda tells Link he’s not bound to her anymore and he can go live his own life if he wants and he asks why would he want to live a life that doesn’t have her in it 🩵

[peri-dot-j]

BOTW's story works a lot better than TOTK's story because of the difference in their driving questions.

For BOTW, the main question you ask from the start is "Who am I?" and also "What happened to Hyrule?" You learn the answers to these questions over time as you journey across the land and remember things about your past. The answer to "who am I" is "I am the chosen hero," and the answer to "what happened" is "We failed to save everyone." When you learn that, the goal changes from "go and do the quests because the old lady said to" to "Do what you couldn't do back then and save everyone."

In TOTK, the question is "Where the heck is Zelda?" and it's not your question, it's everyone else's. All the NPCs want to know where she is and you're just kind of standing there while everyone discusses it. And then the game throws you an early game side quest where they tell you exactly what happened to Zelda, and then you just have to putter around for 99 years and watch everyone run blindly towards Fake Zelda while you just follow them without saying anything until the final hour.

And then they force you to listen to the exact same spiel about the Imprisoning War, 4 separate times, without changing a single word. Whereas in BOTW, you get to learn about the Champions and who they were and their relationship to you, and explain the Calamity to you in one cutscene.

Plus, they don't expand on anything from BOTW in TOTK. Link and Zelda are just living perfectly fine in society despite having basically been dead for a century. And instead of expanding on the Sheika mythos, they just try and pretend they never existed and put the Zonai in their place as the Ancient Precursor Race with all the Ancient Technology That's Been Lost To Time.

So yeah, I'm a little bit disappointed in the story of TOTK. BOTW had an interesting narrative that meshed well with the open world format and was executed perfectly. TOTK just had an excuse plot with no substance.

[thelegendofravio]

[humanpersonface]

I know that some British people take umbrage at Americans calling the Great British Bake Off relaxing, but it's just because GBBO is such a different kind of stressful from American baking shows.

American baking shows will be called something like "Cupcake Knife Fight", there's horror movie lighting everywhere and dramatic stings every 5 seconds. All of the contestants are shit talking each other and fist fighting over the one single deep fryer provided by production. It will show the judges all whispering to each other at their super villain table overlooking the whole kitchen, and one will be like, "Oh my god. Everyone look at Brenda right now. She's straight tanking it." And it will cut to Brenda, who is running around covered in flour and crying and also bleeding for some reason. Then you get a clip from an interview with one of the contestants, and they're like, "I really need to win this. Without this award money, I'm gonna need to close my restaurant, sell my dad, and live out of my car. AGAIN." Then the giant digital doomsday clock overhead lets out a horrid klaxon, the judges tell half of them that their cupcakes taste disgusting, and one of them gets eliminated and sent to walk down the dramatically-lit shame hallway never to be seen again.

Meanwhile GBBO is in a lovely, brightly colored tent, there are delightful and friendly hosts/jesters there to keep everyone entertained, and all of the B Roll is of like... a bumblebee going into a flower, or a lamb running in a field. And yes, there will be moments where someone will mess up their timing or something, and they'll be looking at their bake through the oven door like, "oh gosh I don't think this will rise in time!" Then they stand up to find Paul Hollywood directly behind them ominously. His creepy whitewalker eyes will glow white, and he'll say something like "the 12th of June. 2035. Drowning." And his eyes will go back to normal and he'll walk away. Then the baker gives a playful grimace to the camera and says "that didnt sound great, did it?". Cut to a sweet looking older woman sipping tea on a stool and she says "oo I do hope that Prue enjoys the taste of my sugary, sticky baps!". Then, at the end, someone gets a gold star for doing good, and the loser of the episode gets in the middle of a giant group hug. You see all of them at the end of the series at a giant carnival with their families and the post credits informs you that all of the contestants have become a Partridge Family-style traveling band and stayed friends forever.

[deadrobinsclub-est1988]

Agent Cody Banks: I’m a Cool Teenage Spy!!! I work for the CIA!! Sometimes I have to sneak off and go rogue because my handlers don’t trust a child to deal with grown up problems :((( But everything turns out alright in the end :). I get to kick ass, save the world, and run off into the sunset with Hillary Duff! SICK AF SPY GADGETS!!!

Alex Rider: MI6 has stolen my childhood. I’m an indentured servant to the government. Every single adult in my life has been complicit in my abuse, neglect, and reckless endangerment. I was groomed to be the perfect spy by the man who has raised me since infancy. I have survived torture and assassination attempts. Everyday I grapple with the blood that stains my hands as I try to hold on to the shreds of my innocence. Sick AF spy gadgets

[moon-reader01-blog]

Blunt: The experience is the payment. Besides he even gets international trips, hospital trip included.

[readingbythequire]

the plight of the siren

for the @morgwenmicrofic prompt 'mythology' | lyrics from "persephone" by daisy the great

[ficauthor]

Psych is such a weird show bc in a lot of ways it's constantly asking, "can you forgive your father? even tho he could never forgive you, can you forgive him?" and the thing he could never forgive you for was not meeting his exact very specific expectations. And the answer keeps being yes you can, because not doing so is worse. You tried and it hurt more. You tried and it made you more miserable. You forgive him because he's all you have most of the time, and its somehow less complicated than whatever you have going on with your mom. You can forgive him but you can't forget, and then one day he realizes that he was wrong and there was nothing he should have taken as a slight about you, but you both just never acknowledge this paradigm shift in your relationship bc it'd be more awkward then fighting again for the millionth time. So things get better but you never say why, you never acknowledge it unless forced and somehow you forgive him more than your mom who you were never even half as mad at.

But also it's about breaking and entering into sea world and making a janitor think you killed your best friend so you can escape, it's about gaslighting your coworkers into thinking you are the dumbest man alive, it's about only closing a mystery when it's as funnt as possible and making sure everyone else around you is as baffled as possible. It's about childhood and nostalgia and growing up in the most chaotic way you can. It's about people being killed with a t-rex skull, it's about slapstick and committing to the bit and being the silliest messiest bisexual on tv in 2006-2014.

It's about a son and his father and forgiveness and somehow also they are in a circus tent trying to find out why a corpse was launched from a cannon. And also there's an extended musical episode that makes it onto my personal Spotify year after year

[theartone]

I love this. Because yes. 💯

One of my favorite things about this show is Shawn and his mom. His mom is in *none* of his memories. And at first you’re like, yeah, he’s working through his dad issues. But then later you discover that his mom was just… not all that present? If that makes sense? Like, it’s super easy to blame the only parent that showed up for your issues and Henry wasn’t perfect, like, at all. But dude was dealing with extremely smart adhd kid before meds with a partner who checked out well before she left. He did his best.

Psych is so good