mass effucked

@jane-shepard

• vivien • call me calico •

3,740 posts

i cant explain it but do you remember how during baby's first gender discourse there was a lot of spotlight shined on genderswap aus because it was like the number one example of how it almost Always involved turning a big buff hairy guy into a thin dainty woman and vice versa. and how it not only blatantly promoted the binary gender roles but how it was also often rooted in misogyny. like the idea of "if literally nothing about this character is different other than their gender then why does their appearance change so drastically to fit a beauty standard that wasn't present before." and nowadays we've reached more of a nuance in that this trope can and often is used for boring reductive purposes but also has a lot of potential to be a fun exercise in gender exploration it just entirely depends on the person using it.

anyways so what the hell was going on with those default designs for hawke and shepard.

yes legends keep pushing this narrative that the major difference between cis men and women is one is strong and rugged and badass and the other is cute and sexy and covered in makeup woohoo

every day my brain makes up a word or phrase to play on loop in my head during work. today this was it

KABOOM. Somewhere Rana Thanoptis runs in the background.

Commander (Jane) Shepard from Mass Effect.

Click for better quality.

Happy birthday Commander Shepard！🎂🎂🎂

hiii what are your thoughts on ashley? cause i feel like you’re the kind of person who has correct mass effect opinions 👀

first off, thank you for the ask! i love sharing my mass effect opinions, even if some of them might get me pelted with tomatoes

i've been thinking about ash a lot lately. i just finished me1, so forgive me if my memory of the later games isn't fresh.

i was going to put this under a cut, but i don't think anyone will read it if i do. ashley meta gets glossed over all the time, but this is MY blog and you're going to listen to me talk ashley fucking williams!!!

too long; not gonna read: i enjoy ashley, especially as a companion to femshep. like miranda, i think she's unfairly hated. honestly, i think she's more compelling than kaidan, but most people condemn her before they see her true potential.

originally, i sacrificed ashley on virmire. i was 17 and had my doubts about alien fucking, so i went for kaidan. (i regretted this immediately.)

i'll admit that i DIDN'T like her initially. she seemed like the Strong human female love interest, just there to contrast liara's sexy, demure blue coochie. her personality is strong, she's religious, and she's a born-and-bred soldier.

like many other humans on board, she's suspicious of the aliens. this seems to be the last straw for a lot of people. i understand why -- wrex and tali and garrus are some of the most beloved companions -- but what i admire about ashley is that she's honest and willing to change.

ashley comes from a strong family, with strong beliefs and a strong reputation. but she's not hateful, she's just ignorant. she says some really shady shit in me1, but i think that's the point of her character.

she's stagnant. she's had no room to grow. she's stuck at the bottom of the totem pole because of her grandfather's actions during the first contact war. ashley is someone who has lived in the same, shallow pool her entire life, and then shepard drops her into the ocean.

but ashley isn't doomed to stay this way forever -- quite the opposite! she's open minded and compassionate, and those are her greatest strengths.

i think this is best portrayed in how she discusses her beliefs with shepard. if you accept her religion, she thanks you for being open minded. and ashley is no hypocrite! when you tell her that the aliens aboard the normandy are her crewmates, she takes it in stride.

and then most people kill her.

i get it. she's a strong personality, and kaidan is more appealing to many people -- especially female players.

but ashley is a fine fucking wine; she just gets better!!

after the events of ME1, she sees so much more of the galaxy. she's finally allowed to swim, and she realizes that sentient life is the same in many ways. she's given awards by the salarian and turian governments -- the first human to receive those honors.

but that's not all there is to ashley. people tend to focus on her MILD xenophobia because as players, we know the aliens are going to be our friends (and lovers). whether you defend her or hate her, that's usually the first topic that comes up.

but i'd actually like to touch on her relationship with (fem)shep, because it's compelling to me. shepard has no siblings, but i interpret she and ash's relationship as a sisterhood. they're both female marines, and i like to think they're close in me1. (i smile every time i hear shep's fond little "dismissed, chief.")

this makes horizon harder for me. if you romanced ashley or kaidan, horizon feels like a bitter betrayal by a lover. but... thinking of ashley as my little sister made this conflict so much more meaningful to me.

shepard saved ashley in more ways than one. she saved her from the geth, she saved her from a monotonous career, she saved her from a life of ignorance. shepard took ashley's hand and helped her up. she saw how the alliance squandered ashley's potential, and said "i'll give you a chance to do better."

ashley doesn't like herself in me1. she's so excited to talk to shepard, tell her stories, and prove herself, but there's so many moments where she backtracks, waves her hands, and apologizes for expressing herself.

she's upset when kaidan dies on virmire, because she believes it should have been her.

i think ashley thought that noble sacrifice was the only way to redeem her family's reputation. she wanted to die on virmire, because that's a fitting end for a soldier like her: she's overlooked her entire life, but she proves herself in the last minute and becomes a hero.

but shepard forces her to live. shepard forces her to examine her view of the world and become a better person. and then shepard dies, and ash has to find her way alone.

i'm proud of the person ashley becomes in the later games, and i think shepard is too.

i hope more people use Mass Effect Legendary as a chance to make different decisions and save ashley... because just like the alliance, we overlook ashley's potential every time we leave her on virmire to die.

wilddragonflying

@jane-shepard hope you don't mind me jumping in with some commentary from the later games since I just finished the whole trilogy 😁

First off, YES to everything you've already said - this is an EXCELLENT breakdown of Ashley's character in ME1, and the basis of her character as a whole. I've only ever played as femshep, but I *adore* the conversations with her in ME1, bc I actually feel like I'm getting to know her, versus Kaidan just telling me his life story, without any truly compelling parts, or even places where Shepard can actually *participate* in the story, instead of just prompt him for the next bit.

In ME2, I always love and hate the scene on Horizon where you see Ashley, and SERIOUS props to her VA, bc when she comes around the corner, you can hear her conflicting emotions as she lists Shepard's achievements. She is clearly torn about Shepard being alive - because on the one hand, like she says, "You were *more* than our commander." But here Shepard is, working with Cerberus, regardless of if you denounce them or not. Ashley rightfully says she can't trust you, because she knows what they did during ME1, and there's too much uncertainty now. She's removing herself from the equation by saying that she's Alliance, through and through, and she'll make her report- but she is a bit judge-y, but given Cerberus' reputation, the Collectir attack she just lived through, and the mind/emotional whammy that she just got in the form of Shepard coming back to life? I'm not going to blame her for reacting defensively, especially if you had a really good relationship with her in ME1. Hell, I'D feel betrayed, in her place.

At the beginning of 3, Ashley is still distant, but she explains herself, saying that it's because she wasn't sure what to believe. She *wanted* to believe Shepard meant it, that she'd cut ties with Cerberus, but she couldn't bring herself to trust that on just Shepard's word. Which, again - considering her history, the way she's been treated by superior officers in the past. She *wants* to trust Shepard, but she's wary of getting burned.

(I can never make myself do paragon responses to every doubt of hers, bc tbh my own patience doesn't extend to how much she beats the dead horse of 'I want to trust you but Cerberus', but throwing in one or two renegade responses just makes the whole thing feel more like arguing/trying to reconcile with a sibling imo)

After she's attacked by the android, I am always torn to shreds by how *visceral* femshep's reaction is - and that eerie echo of Virmire, where femshep had to fireman carry Ashley from the bomb, and now she does the same thing again, carrying Ashley from another near-death experience. And the scene at the hospital the first time, before you go tell the Council about the Crucible, how soft and *desperate* it is, Shepard telling Ashley to rest up, telling the doctor if he needs anything to tell her?

I've never saved Kaidan at Virmire, so i don't know what it's like with his recovery, but if you go see Ashley at every opportunity, the careful, but *honest* way that Ashley and femshep rebuild their relationship in the lead-up to the Cerberus attack, is so damn good, I don't have words for it

And you're rewarded for that, for checking on Ashley and rebuilding your relationship, because you can *see* the conflict on her face at the penultimate moment - and then she says, "I'm going to regret this," and finally, fully trusts Shepard again. And when you accept her onto the Normandy, you don't get much chances to talk to her like the old days, but you can still talk to her, and things are good.

And through the rest of the game, Ashley is there, steady and sure and capable, right at Shepard's side.

I've never saved Kaidan, because I can never bear to kill Ashley, because I agree, if you kill her, you cut her arc off too soon, just when she's ready to come into her own. And the relationship you can build with her, the way you can watch her grow as a person, how she can impact you/Shepard, is just so incredibly rewarding from the very first moment you meet her.

#real as fuck. come here and kiss me #ashley defenders til the end

Let all time slow / let all light go I'd block the sun / if you want it done

#the scifi ship to end scifi ships. to me.

if kaidan came out during ME1 it would’ve gone something like this

you were born to do this

happy N7 Day!

[find prints here!]

strawberrykidneystone

“i’m a top” “im a bottom” okay??? i’m commander shepard??? and this is my favorite store on the citadel????

graciescribbles-archived-deacti

my one and only Commander Shepard.

Mass Effect Legendary Edition: ME3 (dev. Bioware)

MASS EFFECT 2: LEGENDARY EDITION (2021) dev. BioWare ↳ Garrus: Eye for an Eye

MELE: Mass Effect 2 (dev. Bioware) ↳ Commander Jane Shepard

#do i want her or want to be her...

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