BluePeach

Might I suggest the “internet”,“tik tok”, “positivity” tags? I’m 22yrs old, she/her, (add more later)

[crabsapple]

Kai my Shayla </3

Original meme:

[enavstars]

Titles

Here's a piece about an interesting parallel between Kai and Nya that I found: how they react to titles.

Nya:

She hates depending on other people and is always trying to be as independent as possible, so she firmly rejects any label or title she's given. And even if she doesn’t necessarily hate most of them, she still wants to be more than that. She refuses to fit into a box when she's actually so much more. She wants to be perceived as her full self and not only the parts of her that are convenient for other people.

Kai:

Kai's self-esteem is very fragile, so when he gets a title that tells him he's valuable, he latches onto it. He craves validation and a label marking him as "good enough" is perfect for that. I believe this is also one of the reasons he was so obsessed with the Green Ninja.

Kai also uses those titles as a shield, a façade to hide his true emotions. Even if they might not be entirely true, he will adapt to fit into each specific box. After all, if he shows people exactly what they believe, they won't bother looking deeper and so they won't notice the weakness and ugliness beneath the mask.

Although as a final note I have to mention that a lot of Nya's titles are demeaning because of misogyny while all of Kai's are empowering.

Both of them have issues with showing vulnerability but while Nya uses her "perfect" image and independence to push people away, Kai tricks them into believing a mask.

[blue-peach14]

This show is too deep for its own good

[kailverkami]

Type shit I did back then with my older sibling, stepping on their back like I'm doing something bc genuinely I felt proud doing that idk why

[jokodoesstuff]

💚 Lloyd variants doodles + accidental lighting study 💚

[yhwcomeback]

Lloyd and stuff

[adeleba]

Lloyd and Lloyder

[asieybarbie]

Jupiter from Milky Way and the Galaxy Girls 🪐✨☄️ Wish this concept became an animated series, all the designs are too cute!

[australet789]

Heartfixer was good, I need Marinette to be akumatized again, let my daughter go feral

[eenieweinerist]

New TMDLLA Mayura design!!

I really wasn't feeling my previous design, it wasn't giving the bridal look I was going for :P

She still has her fat fluffy cloak thingy, it's just something she wears when it's colder..

[forlorn-kumquat]

I found Janine and Gregory's fight so fascinating - and completely in character for them both.

Janine has always had issues with her relationship to money; her mom was almost certainly financially irresponsible and neglectful throughout her entire childhood, and now that Janine is an adult, her mom routinely uses money as a form of emotional manipulation. Then there's Tariq, her first (only?) relationship before Gregory, where Janine bore the entire financial burden of supporting him even as a grown man.

Gregory grew up in a very strict household where money was probably regarded as something not to be "wasted" on frivolous things.

It makes perfect sense that their first big fight, the one they can't easily reconcile, is over money.

They probably never even talked finances before they moved in. Because why would they? Everything else between them has been so easy, they've been in agreement about nearly everything, and the few things they haven't have been small things they've been able to talk about.

But this is so much bigger, and it's something they clearly can't talk about without both sides getting emotional. It's clear neither of them can see the other's side right now, and when they try to compromise, they fail.

Janine's version of compromise is "let me take on the burden without asking you" and Gregory's is "here are two options that I want, and if you don't want to do either, than we just won't do anything" - echoing both their childhoods, maybe?

It's obvious they're going to find their way back from this - they're the main couple of the show, how could they not? - and I'm excited to watch them grow as people.

[blue-peach14]

I think also they have to admit where they both went wrong.

I think it was wrong that Gregory made the compromise plan without Janine.

And I dont think it was respectful for Janine to buy the plane tickets without telling Gregory her true feelings about his "compromise plan"

[familyagrestefanblog]

Wh-what do you want me to say? What else CAN I say that isn't deliberately missing the forest for the trees?

Marinette is the bad guy here. She's a narrative tool and she is the one causing the moral problems in the conflict and ongoing plot, I don't have to pretend otherwise. Her justification story while ranting falls apart and contradicts itself from her previous lies in several ways when you actually look into ANYTHING, she's lying, twisting people's words, and using people left and right while making herself out to be a poor victim who needs to be taken care of and supported as Adrien's saintly girlfriend, so no one can or should stop her.

She literally can't be spoken to or properly confronted because she just shuts everything down and makes herself out to be a martyr who just needs this ONE "tiny" favour of you to disregard your moralities and agency for her cause and feelings

Alya literally TRIED confronting her about how Marinette making her speak the biggest lie (as illusion Ladybug) to Adrien about Gabriel's last moments made her feel and Marinette just went went "im sorry 🥺👉👈😔" without a fraction of willingness to in anyway acknowledge that she isn't justified in doing this to Alya, so Alya takes pity on her and tells her she isn't upset anymore. But Marinette will do it again in a heartbeat because Marinette is written to only beg and fish for validations and justifications for why she shouldn't be asked to behave any different.

Alya does not get to make an informed decision about the lies she's being used for to tell. The harm Alya will cause with this. Marinette just doesn't give a damn about anyone's boundaries and dignity the second she's uncomfortable. She's literally written to feel entitled to do this to people as long as she can keep them enough in the dark about what she's doing to them and play enough of a blameless poor little victim so her victims turn around and take care of her and her feelings instead.

I feel so unbelievably bad for Alya here. That girl is being used, manipulated, and straight up guilt tripped. 'Revelator Alya' officially made the wrong decision in putting her faith in Marinette to do the right thing and she gets said faith thrown back in her face by getting even more shamelessly used. Marinette doesn't even have the basic decency to put on her big girl pants and lie to Adrien as Ladybug herself. She literally manipulates and guilt trips the heck out of Alya to do it FOR HER:

Marinette to Alya on phone: "It's simple, Adrien can't grasp the idea that Gabriel, the mean father he knew, and Gabriel the hero are the same person. And I get it, cause it was a total surprise to us all, right? So all you have to do is tell him stuff that'll help him believe it! And feel better about it all!"

Alya: "But I don't know what happened exactly, YOU were there"

Marinette: "That doesn't matter, just come up with something nice, that's all!"

Alya: "What?? You want me to LIE? Are you out of your mind??"

Marinette: "I'm begging you, please, please, please, PLEASE, just ONE tini-tiny story to make my boyfriend finally happy, so your BFF is also happy 🥺🥹 besides, you won't be lying. Your Ladybug illusion will be!"

Alya: "*sighs* come ON! Why can't I make an illusion of Marinette instead and you go as Ladybug yourself? If you wanna feed him fibs, don't you think you should be the one taking responsibility?"

Marinette: "No! What if he feels so moved that at some point he tries to kiss the Marinette illusion? Poof! It'll all go up in smoke and my secret identity along with it! No, no, no! It HAS to be an illusion of Ladybug!"

Alya: "*groans* Girl!"

Marinette: "besides, Ladybug was unconscious when Gabriel defeated Monarque anyway! So I don't know the whole story either!"

Alya: "*sighs* fine... I'll make your illusion, just give me some time to get there..."

Like, Marinette stans will go on and on about how Gabriel not having taken Marinette's emptiest hand in cartoon history when he was already dying in the s5 finale and instead took the Miraculous from Marinette to make his wish to save Nathalie (which btw was never acknowledged in this episode, only Marinette's lie of having been half dead on the ground. Because of course that's all Marinette's writing acknowledges in the long run), and then having asked Marinette to help Adrien remember him for the times he tried to be a good father, is the greatest and most despicable display of manipulation in all of fiction

But this episode is 25 minutes of Marinette being straight up a liar, manipulator, gaslighter, and guilt tripper while using Adrien as excuse to serve her own cause and feelings above all else while refusing to take actual accountability for anything because she's begging for validation, excuses, free passes, and prioritisation instead.

Tomoe TRIED calling her out for being complicit in the villain's lies and Ladybug full-blown deflects any responsibility bc Marinette doesn't wanna hear it and she refuses to have anyone so much as remind her of the reality of her actions and role in this. It's never her fault and she will change her story and lies as many times as needed to get her result and prioritisation.

Yes, I fucking KNOW Marinette has feelings. You're not some secret genius for noticing that. Marinette is not some groundbreakingly complex character.

Nothing Marinette deals with makes her in any way unique from other main characters in fiction, much less kids media. She isn't just handling this badly because she's "uwu struggling, poor little real babygirl", she's a narrative tool and characterized and written as the problem and becoming more and more the bad guy. I'm holding her to basic standards of story-telling regarding the show's own plot, themes, and genre

I have been since s4 and you will never get me to stop standing my ground on this.

[blue-peach14]

Add one more thing to the Alya thing, she KNOWS Alya hates this whole thing of lying to Adrien before her mind got wiped., but if she found out she was being USED to keep up the lie? Idk about you but I'd be heated

[tadc-and-md-sideblog]

Ok everyone and their mothers are posting about Caine dying which is absolutely valid but I also really wanted to talk about this scene

I love how this is being handled. Even though he still hasn't opened up about his issues to anyone, Pomni knows enough.

You see the surprise on the others' faces when he's acting so vulnerable and nervous, with the stuttering and all and the clear attempts to get out of the room as soon as possible. It's entirely new to them.

And even though they never talked about Jax's close calls with abstraction... Pomni just knows. She knows he hasn't been doing well and she has the perfect balance of concern and firmness to keep a tight grip on him.

The silent communication here is JUST *chef's kiss* 😭

Jax says he's going to distract Caine. Pomni knows he just wants to be away from them. She starts asking if he's okay but catches herself, knowing he won't take that well, but while she's still trying to rephrase, Jax just looks her dead in the eye and says again, "Fill me in later."

Aka "I NEED to be out of here right now don't try to stop me."

She looks back at him, and says with a firm look, "BE here later." Aka "you can go have your alone time but don't you dare abstract on me."

And Jax, for the first time in the show (although he avoids eye contact), replies sincerely, "I will."

Just... UGH. The way Pomni is STILL sticking around for him is so sweet and how it's slowly but surely WORKING akdnfndmskjfdkdkdjskdkdkdkksksndnsk

Not to meNTION how later in the torture scenes, Pomni is right up there alongside Ribbit and Kaufmo as Jax's closest friends supposedly laughing at him in Caine's personally created nightmare world. 😭😭 Yeah we knew he cared about her but this episode really drove that home 🥹

[thats-not-helpful]

PLEASE I NEED MORE OF HIM IN THIS OUTFIT PLEASE THERE’S LIKE NO FANART PLEASE

I have 2 exams today wtf am I doing

[blue-peach14]

YESSSS CAINE LOOKS TOO FLY NOT TO DRAWWW

[axolartandfics]

I’ve seen quite a few people confused over Jax’s breakdown after finding out Kinger was the programmer, so I wanted to give my own two cents on it. I’ve heard both the takes that this scene means Jax was actually convinced everyone else was NPCs, and the take that he was overreacting to the lore. This is what I think was going through his head and why he responded the way he did, as well as a deeper analysis of Jax’s mental state.

The “this is real” scene is insanely important for Jax’s arc, and here’s why.

Jax’s Dissociation from Reality

The reason Jax says “this is real” when he hears Kinger become coherent and explain the creation of Caine isn’t because he’s shocked that this isn’t a video game afterall. Jax says himself in episode 5 that he only later convinced himself all they were is cartoon characters.

The key phrase being, “I thought we were [people] at first.” He knew the circus was real when he first showed up, but as he remained trapped there and time went on, he told himself that everyone was just archetypes, including himself, that no one was real at all. He was lying to himself, but this goes a lot deeper than just denial.

Jax is dissociating, to some agree, at all times.

We can see specific moments he blocks everything out when he physically shuts down— all those scenes where his eyes get huge and he mentally clocks out.

But deeper than these spells of blocking out the world, Jax is dissociating on a much larger scale. He’s not just in denial— he’s experiencing derealization and depersonalization.

Derealization: the perception that the world is not real. Depersonalization: the perception that the self is not real.

Jax isn’t just in a state of denial; his perception of reality is warped, not because he actually thought they were in a video game the whole time, but because his surroundings were so terrible he was unable to confront reality and he retreated into the back of his mind.

This is obvious with the way Jax reacts to Kinger telling them about the lore. The moment Kinger becomes coherant, Jax is immediately distressed.

In the last episode, Abel’s adventure wasn’t real. Even if Jax himself bought it in the end, once it was over, it was fairly obvious how Caine pulled the strings. But Kinger becoming stable and spilling insane secrets was something Jax never saw coming. And most importantly, it was a huge deviation from Kinger’s archetype.

Jax can’t deny the situation anymore. This is the moment the illusion starts to break, and he is pushed from the dissociation, pushed from his safe place, all at once.

He wasn’t overreacting— he had been living in a state of foggy emptiness for years, and he was forced to face real life all at once.

And for Jax, there is nothing more terrifying than reality.

To the extent that in episode 7, he would rather continue to play pretend in the circus than go back to the real world. Because this is easier. Shutting off his attachment to everything around him is easier than seeing himself as a person. In episode 8, when reality sets in, Jax is forced to face not just his actions, not just his life, not just the circus, but he is forced to confront that *he* is real. There are only ever so many layers of masks that can keep him safely hidden inside, and now they’ve all been peeled back.

Jax has been totally emotionally and mentally gutted. He is a Jax that, for the first time, is processing the fact that he and his pain actually exist in any way that means anything.

And how is Jax supposed to face himself?

That’s why the “this is real” scene is a major turning point for Jax’s arc.

[nikyu0]

[ You heal my tainted heart ]

[mintmatcha]

knight who is mournfully in love with his assigned bride vs the bride who wants to go back home

[mintmatcha]

neither of you asked for this.

he planned to die at war, but instead of staying with his brethren on foreign soil, he came home. they touted him as a hero, gave him a high title, a new home and a promise of a good life, all things he didnt deserve-

and then there was you. something he certainly never deserved, even before his hands were bloodied.

many men brought him their daughters, dressed in fineries like trophies on display, all young and pretty and untouched, with dowries much too high to accept. marrying him meant a safe life-- a stable one, with a proximity to royalty.

you were proposed to him by a fellow knight -- a man with no relation to you.

"she is not to your station, sir." the knight said. "but she has no other marriage prospects."

You didn't meet his eye, just sat there, tucked behind the man who brought you.

"why?" he said, softly.

"widowed by war. no father left to provide a dowry either." You shrunk at the knight's words. "twas a folly to even ask, sir."

You went to stand, but the hero cut you off.

"I'll have her," he said. "if she'll have me."

[blue-peach14]

Amazing

[thehmn]

It might simply be that I don’t frequent ADHD forums enough but I haven’t seen a whole lot of talk about learned social withdrawal.

As a child I made friends left and right but as we all turned into self-conscious teenagers it slowly became more and more difficult for me. Plain and simple, other people thought I was weird. For some reason I never got bullied which I think is related to something my teachers kept telling my parents “She’s such a sweet, bright child and we can tell she’s not malicious or trying to be disruptive on purpose but we can’t teach her anything”

Basically people couldn’t figure me out. I had good social skills with both children and adults, I had a good moral compass, i felt compassion and empathy for others and was willing to go against my friends if I felt they were being bullies, I taught myself English and my drawings showed good observation skills. Because of all that it was decided I should start school a year sooner than most kids and my parents were very proud. Unfortunately that’s probably one of the main reasons why I was never diagnosed with raging ADHD as a child. People soon realized I didn’t do well in a school setting but assumed it was because I “wasn’t done playing” and my ADHD symptoms were interpreted as childishness.

So as I got older my classmates started to distance themselves from me. They were always kind and friendly but they didn’t know how to deal with me and ever since then people have always been worryingly comfortable with calling me weird to my face. I get the impression it’s because they think it’s a choice on my part. To them I’m clearly of “normal intelligence” so I must be acting like this on purpose and my parents would repeatedly tell me to “just act normal” as a child when I told them I was struggling to make friends. I tried so damn hard but kept failing. I knew something had to be different about me and when I first heard about ADHD I thought “That’s me! That’s how I feel!” but my parents said that was impossible because I wasn’t hyperactive.

Because nobody wanted to help me I eventually learned to just stop trying to make friends and keep to myself. I was so tired of being told by friendly, well-meaning people that I was so weird and quirky and unique only for them to distance themselves once they realized it was permanent and not something I could turn on and off for parties. I always enjoyed being alone so it wasn’t a huge loss but it did feel incredibly lonely at times.

Things got a lot better when I became an adult, mostly because adults are generally more chill than teens so my ADHD behavior isn’t as embarrassing to them and ironically they’re often surprised to learn I don’t make friends easily. Unfortunately I learned to be withdrawn in my formative years so new friends are still a rarity. Before I really sat down and put my past into context I even started to wonder if I had autism despite not connecting with anything autistic people said about their experiences. I went as far as to be tested but wasn’t surprised when the diagnosis was negative because of course it was, I kinda already knew that. I was just looking for an explanation.

So while there can be overlap between ADHD and autism (I have just such a friend) my experience is also that oftentimes people with ADHD simply learn to stay away from social situations and entertain ourselves which ends up looking like autism to outsiders.