hi everyone, it's been a while 👀 i just wanted to say that i'm not dead 😅 i just can't really be here atm for a lot of reasons.
I'm very sorry for going silent so suddenly, especially only a few months after finishing chemo. i imagine that led to a lot of concern T_T to answer that concern, no, the cancer did not come back. post-chemo life just sucks. but either way, i should've done better at exiting than i did, and i'm sorry.
i'm thinking of coming back in a few months when things are different with my living situation and potentially job, but i'm not sure what all will happen yet. sorry for disappearing <3 i think of this place and the people here all the time, and i miss you :)
Oh ok so it turns out ive been borrowing grief from the future ! it turns out ive been preparing to lose the things i love rather than basking in the light of them while they last. Maybe i should nt do that
ROTS being in theaters yesterday apparently resulted in the best casual and super lazy analysis ive done in months lmao (shoutout to my bro for the question and for the laugh his typo gave me)
(if i remember, ill add image IDs later when im on a computer)
Do you have any prequel-era star wars fanfiction recommends? Love your comics!
Ayy, thank you, anon!! Okay, sounds funny but I actually tend to read much more about the OT era, but! -cracks knuckles- Here we go:
Cytokinesis and Star Birth by @tranakin-skywalker They're so good that I haven't progressed on reading them just because I need to nom them slowly and savour every single paragraph, top tier stuff for real.
A Rush of Blood to the Head , Antediluvian , Do not Stand at my grave and weep by asparagus writes angsty and very good, particularly love Padmé's characterization there!!
A vile hunger for your hammering heart by @wlwanakin because I swear this is the only acceptable 'Padmé with a knife on Mustafar' take ever and is also so sad it made me cry, good stuff goood stuff!
Now I want my letters white again, by @ozvezdja Masterclass writing right here and yet another case of 'I need to nom on this so slowly to taste it because that's how good it is' , Padmé and Anakin being...Well, them, in a world where Sheev actually died and now they have to live a much more normal life and all through the eyes of Sola Naberrie, who's a bit too normal for general SW crazyness.
Dust to dust by straight_up_gay I dunno if you have seen my ramblings and ideas for a daemon/familiars AU, but when I did moot charlie sent me this fic and oh boy is good.
The Top Left Drawer (linking specifically chapter 58 since is a collection of oneshots and drabbles, but I suggest checking they all because the writing is funny and really nice! Chapter 58 is a timetravel vaderdala AU and is wonderful ahaha) and Enemy Brothers by @batrachised
It's quickier and easier to eat your young by orojiratsu (timetravel AU where Vader's conscience returns to inhabit Little Ani's body and oh man)
Programed to dream by ghostwriterofthemachine (This one is SO VERY ANGSTY and messed up and good and sad and UHuhuhhhhhh i want to bite the walls. Anakin's suffering and dehumanization has me <3333)
A trick of the light by @jewishpadmenaberrie Vader managed to raise Padme from the dead, yayyy!! And now she wants to eat brains, he still loves her dearly, huh.
If you fancy rexanidala or more funky rarepairs and big canon divergences, I suggest to check @phoenixyfriend 's AO3 because she has SO MANY stories, for days.
Also if you like Sabé, you should absolutely check @bettyxrosex 's fics, Sabé and Anakin are so unwell lmao, is like the scary dog privilege, but both are the dogs, dog x dog dynamic or something
And for really, reaally heavy angst (and do mind the tigger warnings on this one because is really messed up) Five Peggats Each by @kenobster !! Anakin and Obi-Wan are trapped by slavers. Nothing good happens except that they -gasps- TALK. TO EACH OTHER.
hi! This going to be random, and goodness gracious I hope this is the right blog, but several years ago now I knew you on tumblr as loxxlay, I believe, and when I followed you, you were in a very rough spot with mental health the last I saw anything from you. I ended up leaving my old tumblr account and taking a long break from being on the internet, but I’ve thought about you often and hoped and prayed you were alright and alive, and today I decided to see if I could find you on tumblr and to my surprise, I managed it (with some assistance from AO3) and you had a very recent blog post, too. All that rambling to say, we never really knew each other, but I’m glad you’re still alive anyway.
holy shit anon this made me tear up 😭 thank you so very much
in case ur curious, i am doing much better these days!! i finally figured out what was wrong with me haha and i got the right therapy for it. and also, very recently actually, i started this med that (for the first time in my life) makes me naturally able do the things ive always learned in therapy without even having to think about it! so yeah, i feel chill and easygoing right now, and it makes me happy 🥰
im kinda on an internet detox atm, even in star wars land lol. but im planning to be back when im feeling more social. but ahhh i am so fond of the thor and loki dayssss and i think about them all the time. and even if we didnt know each other directly, im sure that ur username would bring me a fond nostalgia too :) ❤️
i hope ur doing okay (or better than okay hopefully xD), and thank you again for reaching out!! 😭😭😭❤️❤️❤️ it meant so much to me
Occasionally I find it mildly annoying when Palpatine is posited as the one Anakin had always trusted the most, tbh. There's a noticeable shift in how he interacts with Obi Wan and Palpatine in between aotc and rots, and there's an obvious reason why: the events of aotc themselves. He and Obi Wan had plenty of friction, but they were still close, and Anakin did in fact confide in him in his grumpy teenager way. About his feelings for Padme, about his worries for his mother. It's after his trip to Tatooine that he turns to Palpatine instead.
I used the phrase "he flattered him" myself and I agree that in the singular scene of them in aotc, telling him what he wants to hear is a fair description, since he does a lot of that. But maybe that's another thing that's shifted by the time rots rolls around. Palpatine still flatters him there, but he also negs him. I don't think Anakin wanted to hear that his peers don't trust or respect him, or that his wife and friend might be plotting against him (i think that's novel only), except maybe in a self-destructive affirming his insecurities kind of way. That probably made him feel like shit, rather than being things he wanted to hear.
regarding original post: huh, thats interesting! i never really thought about it that way. but now that i have, i def agree with it.
and expanding on my agreement especially in how it relates to your reblog ("self-destructive affirming insecurities" is absolutely right omg ❤️):
i think its less about how anakin feels about obiwan after the tusken massacre and more about anakin feels about himself. like based on his fall in ROTS and his general behavior during ROTS, i think he is super defeatist as a character. like, perfectionism is the goal. one mistake means the entire thing is over; it's pointless to keep bothering to try. so it makes sense that after AOTC, his state of mind is "ive already fallen, ive already failed at being a jedi. im secretly evil and just masquerading as a jedi now" (which is why being a jedi master becomes so important to him - because subconsciously it's his way of trying to fill that void of inadequacy.)
and in that state of mind, i can see him becoming distant from the council and from obiwan. their perceptions of him are that he *is* a jedi. and obiwan specifically always sees the best in him, not always to his face, but to others - as anakin's advocate and defender (especially in the ROTS novel). and anakin cant cope with that because deep down, he feels he is not meeting obiwan's good view of him. that's what creates the distance between them.
meanwhile, the chancellor is highlighting and/or inciting anakin's worst qualities, the things that make anakin feel the most "evil" (the killing dooku scene literally contains all of this). and whether consciously or subconsciously (i personally think its both at the same time in a doublethink 2+2=5 kind of way), anakin embraces that view of himself - the side of him who is "evil," a murderer, a sith perhaps - because deep down, he feels it's what he deserves.
and at first, it's probably a rush of adrenaline/dopamine. it feels good, even freeing, to not have to hide how he sees himself around the chancellor. but in the long term, it deepens the sense he has of what he sees as his "inevitable" worst qualities until he feels that they are all he is. which explains why, despite deeply trusting palpatine, he always looks so uncomfortable around him. and also, which ultimately explains why he falls.
so in a way, palpatine *does* tell anakin what he wants to hear. but what anakin wants to hear is anything that will bring out the worst in him.
And you know that scene where Obi Wan tells him he's proud of him and he's a great jedi and all that- the way Anakin looks down, suddenly can't meet his eyes? I think he already believes he irreparably broke them, Obi Wan just doesn't know it yet. That he doesn't know what to do about it except keep playing along until Obi Wan sees him for what he really is and rejects him. That in a way, Palpatine's insinuations and slander, though painful, are also soothing his guilt and heartache, because resentment and anger feels better than grief.
Occasionally I find it mildly annoying when Palpatine is posited as the one Anakin had always trusted the most, tbh. There's a noticeable shift in how he interacts with Obi Wan and Palpatine in between aotc and rots, and there's an obvious reason why: the events of aotc themselves. He and Obi Wan had plenty of friction, but they were still close, and Anakin did in fact confide in him in his grumpy teenager way. About his feelings for Padme, about his worries for his mother. It's after his trip to Tatooine that he turns to Palpatine instead.
I used the phrase "he flattered him" myself and I agree that in the singular scene of them in aotc, telling him what he wants to hear is a fair description, since he does a lot of that. But maybe that's another thing that's shifted by the time rots rolls around. Palpatine still flatters him there, but he also negs him. I don't think Anakin wanted to hear that his peers don't trust or respect him, or that his wife and friend might be plotting against him (i think that's novel only), except maybe in a self-destructive affirming his insecurities kind of way. That probably made him feel like shit, rather than being things he wanted to hear.
regarding original post: huh, thats interesting! i never really thought about it that way. but now that i have, i def agree with it.
and expanding on my agreement especially in how it relates to your reblog ("self-destructive affirming insecurities" is absolutely right omg ❤️):
i think its less about how anakin feels about obiwan after the tusken massacre and more about anakin feels about himself. like based on his fall in ROTS and his general behavior during ROTS, i think he is super defeatist as a character. like, perfectionism is the goal. one mistake means the entire thing is over; it's pointless to keep bothering to try. so it makes sense that after AOTC, his state of mind is "ive already fallen, ive already failed at being a jedi. im secretly evil and just masquerading as a jedi now" (which is why being a jedi master becomes so important to him - because subconsciously it's his way of trying to fill that void of inadequacy.)
and in that state of mind, i can see him becoming distant from the council and from obiwan. their perceptions of him are that he *is* a jedi. and obiwan specifically always sees the best in him, not always to his face, but to others - as anakin's advocate and defender (especially in the ROTS novel). and anakin cant cope with that because deep down, he feels he is not meeting obiwan's good view of him. that's what creates the distance between them.
meanwhile, the chancellor is highlighting and/or inciting anakin's worst qualities, the things that make anakin feel the most "evil" (the killing dooku scene literally contains all of this). and whether consciously or subconsciously (i personally think its both at the same time in a doublethink 2+2=5 kind of way), anakin embraces that view of himself - the side of him who is "evil," a murderer, a sith perhaps - because deep down, he feels it's what he deserves.
and at first, it's probably a rush of adrenaline/dopamine. it feels good, even freeing, to not have to hide how he sees himself around the chancellor. but in the long term, it deepens the sense he has of what he sees as his "inevitable" worst qualities until he feels that they are all he is. which explains why, despite deeply trusting palpatine, he always looks so uncomfortable around him. and also, which ultimately explains why he falls.
so in a way, palpatine *does* tell anakin what he wants to hear. but what anakin wants to hear is anything that will bring out the worst in him.
