midnightella(mass)

my main blog! fandom posting with the occasional real life rant, MDNI

[midnightella-mass]

Stardew Valley lore is so crazy bc on the surface it’s marketed as a cozy farming game where you get to romance the townsfolk and become a beloved member of your community, but then you get about 10 hours into the game and suddenly it’s

- you’re magical, oh yeah also magic is real, a wizard told you to go learn all types of magic and you did

- there are ancient entities living in the mines and sewers beneath your feet, and they ARE fighting, just fyi

- there’s an ongoing war happening, that is probably why the economy is the way that it is btw

- animals can talk…just occasionally

- you’re haunted by the ghost of your grandfather, but rarely

- there are tiny creatures that will fix things for you in the night but only if you meet their hyper specific demands. also they’re scared of you

- Yoba is an alien (?)

- also the local shopkeeper’s daughter isn’t his she’s the wizard’s and a townswoman named Emily is a psychic, in case you were curious

- oh and there’s an omnipotent magic man who’s blue and committing a PLETHORA of crimes at any given moment. he’s scary

[midnightella-mass]

if you were to ask me what I consider to be ‘canon’ in OUAT the answer is actually just whatever I like minus the scenes that I don’t.

Snow and Charming’s meeting? Season one is canon, season three’s time travel episode was a fun little blip with no lasting consequences

Rumbelle’s toxic on again-off again marriage? WRONG, they’re in love and post season 3/4 nothing bad ever happens to them

Season 6b? What is that, never heard of her

Season 7? Nope everyone lived happily ever after as per the end of season 6

Everyone from Camelot and Sherwood Forest just leaving to go live in the real world? haha no silly they got to go home to fairytale land

Merlin dying? #notinmycanon

etc etc, because I have seen this show a minimum of 20 times and this is MY blog so canon can be whatever I want to be

[unseenacademic]

Midnight Mass + Text Posts (12/?)

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11

[smis-happens]

New meme:

type in “I’m” in the tags and use the first tag that appears

[midnightella-mass]

I was thinking a lot about the dark swan arc recently and how it was handled, and I think that the horror of that arc could have been explored in a different way tbh.

Because yeah, there’s something inherently terrifying about ‘this person that I know and love has been taken over by this dark force that I can’t control or protect them from, and I’m watching them slowly lose themselves to it while I fight a losing battle to bring them back’ and there’s also something horrifying about ‘one of the most powerful women that we know now has All Evil Magic and no way to control it and we don’t know what it will look like when her magic combines with itself’. But I think that the actual horror of that season was ‘we know what Rumple as the dark one is like, we know how he operates and how he thinks and what he does, and even when he’s at his most unpredictable he’s almost never genuinely dangerous to the rest of us. But now there’s a new dark one and we don’t know how they operate or how they think or the lengths they will go to to get what they want.’

Bc remember, even at his worst rumplestiltskin never hurt the charmings, he cared for certain people in his life, and he very rarely made a deal that actually hurt the person he was talking to, nor did he lie or actually behave unfairly (minus with hook, he hated that man). His power came from trades and deals, he was definitely evil but if you were important enough (eg the charmings) you were safe bc that was leverage. Emma and Killian were unpredictable, they obviously didn’t move under the same ‘rules’ that he did and they were very clearly willing to go very far to get what they wanted. Keep in mind that killian literally brought back all dark ones in order to destroy light magic forever, while losing all love for Emma, bc that’s just the type of dark one he became. Anyway yeah, I think that that was the most terrifying part of having a new dark one, not actually the fact that it was Emma/Killian themselves

[fayevalentinesgamblingchip]

Been reading howls moving castle lately and i do love how idgaf maxxing sophie is about. Everything. Learns her sisters swapped places bc one wanted to learn magic while the other wanted a family😐👍 gets turned into an old lady by the wicked witch of the waste😐👍 meets a fire demon and makes a contract w him before taking a nap on a cozy chair😐👍 learns shes a witch ans has been speaking magic into every hat she ever made😐👍 like i strive to give that little of a fuck. Which is contrasted to howl going on a neurotic spiral every two pages

[midnightella-mass]

thinking about Howl’s Moving Castle again and watching the movie after reading the book rlly made the book so much funnier bc the movie is like:

Howl, in Patrick Bateman’s voice: “Hello sweetheart, darling, love of my life, how are you on this fine day? I am going to take you to a beautiful field of flowers before we inevitably have to return to The Plot so that we may further develop our fated romance that you began years ago and just don’t know yet”

Sophie, internally monologuing: “Wow he is so Handsome and Noble, truly the perfect man. I am so glad that this horrible curse led me to be able to know him and his cool moving castle and sentient fire and apprentice, who are my best friends now <3”

Calcifer and Markl, nodding along: “yes we are the best friends and are also in the room”

And then the book is like:

Sophie, angrily hurling things at Howl: “YOU INSOLENT, FICKLE, HEARTLESS EXCUSE FOR A WIZARD DO YOU HAVE ANY IDEA HOW STUPID WHAT YOU JUST DID WAS?! WE COULD HAVE DIED!!”

Howl, dodging most of it: “WELL WE DIDNT!! BESIDES IF YOU WERENT SUCH A NOSEY, CHAOTIC OLD BOTHER I WOULDNT HAVE TO RUN OFF, NOW WOULD I?!”

Michael, petrified: “…should we stop them?”

Calcifer, eating logs like popcorn: “no, no, I wanna see who wins. Five bucks on Sophie”

[midnightella-mass]

thinking about the geography of OUAT and how it makes actually no sense

Like okay so all of the fairytale realms are connected, but they’re all on (presumably) different planets (or different levels? of the same planet), so you CAN get to them but it takes a lot of magic, preparation, and luck. Okay yeah sure, but all of the other realms (Wonderland, Oz, etc.) seem to be really small, bc almost EVERYTHING is in the enchanted forest’s realm. Once again okay yeah sure, but in that case, how large IS that place? Well Misthaven alone seems to be gigantic, because in no particular order it contains:

Avalon (? I think is the name), and correct me if I’m wrong but that’s the ONLY named kingdom in Misthaven (and presumably the smallest?) aka Belle’s kingdom

Snow and charming’s kingdom

Whatever corner of that Regina managed to keep after they took over

Midas’ kingdom

Sherwood Forest (presumably a separate bit of forest WITHIN the enchanted forest)

Rapunzel’s kingdom

Cinderella’s kingdom

Georges kingdom

Henry Sr’s father’s kingdom

Eric’s kingdom

And probably many many others, considering in the time travel episode Emma literally made up a royal title for herself and no one caught it

And that doesn’t even BEGIN to cover wherever Rumplestiltskin built his castle, the various villages that seem to belong to no kingdom in particular, and the hundreds of miles of empty forest in every direction at any given moment

Then, ofc, you have the kingdoms OUTSIDE of Misthaven, which all seem to spawn in the middle of nowhere and even though everyone knows of them no one has ever traveled to them at all, eg:

Arendelle, which we know is across the ocean but have no other inkling as to where it could be, and we know that it’s attached to other kingdoms, but once again don’t know anything of their location or royalty

Agrabah, which doesn’t even get formally introduced until season 6 (?) even though it’s mentioned in season one. All I can remember of it (bc it’s been a while since I’ve watched that far into the show) is that it was a desert kingdom (a climate we rarely see in OUAT) and Mulan was there

Then Merida was from some equivalent to the Scottish highlands, but it’s implied that her home was connected, in some way, to Camelot, at least implying that there are continents that at least somewhat rival in size to Misthaven

And then as far as my memory serves we don’t even GET an explanation as to where Mulan or Hercules (for example) are from, they’re two characters that are just introduced with little explanation for their origins (and I could make a whole separate post complaining about how OUAT made Greek mythology canon and how it ruins a lot of the world building but I’ll refrain for now)

Anyway that got away from me a bit but my point was that I’m rlly confused by the geography of OUAT bc nothing is actually connected to each other and yet everything is and no political figures know each other but somehow have alliances with kingdoms from across the ocean and I just don’t get it. How is wonderland a more explored area of this world than Agrabah when wonderland isn’t even ON their world??

[i-am-but-a-beta-fish]

eva: oh hey you're back early

simon: ocean's haunted

eva: what?

simon: *cocks radiation gun* ocean's haunted

[midnightella-mass]

this is what it feels like being on the internet tbh:

me: “oh yeah! I like <insert character> from <insert show>”

the fandom, for some reason: “you LIKE the war criminal?? you LIKE the war criminal from the show about war criminals?? oh! jail for viewer! jail for viewer for 100 years!!”

[midnightella-mass]

maybe this is an unpopular opinion but I’m so not on board with the redemption arc that OUAT tried to give Cora. Like she was so horrifically abusive to Regina for her ENTIRE LIFE and literally abandoned Zelena TWICE and I’m supposed to believe that her saying sorry was enough??? She literally supported Regina flying off of the deep end and then complained that Regina wasn’t happy??? She knew that Zelena’s adoptive father was abusive and yet sent her back to him anyway??? She literally just looked between her daughters (and her husband) and decided to be the worst possible person she could towards all of them and yet she gets forgiven bc she apologized???

[midnightella-mass]

sometimes I’m reminded that the OUAT musical episode exists which is so bizarre to me bc despite watching the show at minimum 10 times I have genuinely no memory of that episode. I have no clue what any of the songs sound like and I have no clue what the plot of that episode is, I literally only remember that rumple refused to sing the whole time

[hustlerose]

of course you have blood all over you. and pronouns

[hustlerose]

easy website

[cryptid-on-a-string]

^^^ me when I’m trying to calm down my horse named “Website”

[batcii]

weird horse

[validwarriorcatsnames]

"Websight" is a Valid Warrior Cat Name!

[locus-p0cus]

train wreck of a post. hit reblog

[guy-named-reblog]

oww :(

[midnightella-mass]

thinking of OUAT again but specifically thinking about how interesting the magic system in OUAT was and how bc it was an ABC drama it was never actually explored to its full potential

like the idea that the first ever incarnation of Any Magic resulted from Merlin drinking from the Holy Grail, and it just so happened to be light magic bc Merlin was a fundamentally good person. And that’s all that there was! for hundreds of years! And then dark magic was literally created because Merlin’s lover craved immortality and vengeance and betrayed him for it! And how light magic spread throughout their world naturally but dark magic was confined to one person! And how light magic is something inherent that you’re born with the ability to do while dark magic has to be consciously learned!

Not to even mention the fairies and their magic system and their seeming dependence on fairy dust (which is a mineral found underground, not something natural to them!) Or to mention the mermaids and their varying levels of civilization and humanity (the mermaids in neverland appear to be more mystical and inhuman, while the fairytale mermaids such as Ursula and Ariel seem to be very close to human)

Or the portal system, and how nearly all of the realms except for our own are seemingly connected and easily traversable by multiple means. Magic beans operate on willpower and wishes but only work once, while the hat doesn’t really need to do anything at all except grow but seems to operate on a finite loop of power. And how the sea apparently connects every realm (including our own) but the sky only leads to neverland. Not to mention that storms carrying portals aren’t all that uncommon, and it seems that any average object (e.g. the silver slippers) can become a portal if it’s imbedded with enough magic.

Or how magic literally changes a person’s appearance. In the case of dark magic it often makes you green or scaly or more animal looking, while with light magic it can freeze you in time entirely, keeping you young forever.

And don’t even get me started on how the different types of magic are used. How dark magic is more refined because it’s a practiced art where certain spells achieve certain things, while because light magic is an inherent skill it’s often a shapeless, aimless blast of energy. How even with training light magic appears to be more limited than dark magic, despite the fact that it’s more powerful.

And ripping out hearts??? That the staple move of dark magic was literally to take someone’s heart from them and either control it or crush it??? That the embodiment of evil was literally just someone else holding your heart in their hands, and you have no clue what they plan to do with it??

And then on the opposite side of it there was true love’s kiss?? That the most powerful, pure type of magic was sharing a heart instead of taking one?? That displays of love were literally the most powerful things to exist??

Basically I wish they would have locked in on the magic system bc I was SO cool.

[midnightella-mass]

Clearing out the OUAT drafts bc I strayed too far to a diff fandom and got hate for the first time :( so now I’m back to my roots

something something once upon a time couldn’t write morally ambiguous characters well because they wanted to tell gritty fairytales but were too scared of actually stepping on Disney or ABC’s toes to write any kind of moral dilemma that held weight something something

like so many things that the characters did should have had forever consequences, or at least changed them fundamentally, and yet most Bad Choices the Good Guys made were swept under the rug within ten episodes. Like Snow and Charming channeling all of Emma’s potential evil into Lily and then dumping her in a portal? that should have been borderline unforgivable! That should have permanently changed how the characters and the audience looked at them! and yet it was never brought up again after Lily was reunited with Maleficent.

Or what about Regina and Rumple’s redemption arcs? Their sliding from ‘good’ to ‘evil’ shouldn’t have been seen as so black and white when they were literally just showing the human range of emotions! (not to mention that half of the time when Regina was accused of being evil again she’d done literally nothing wrong)

Or Emma being the Dark One! Even though she was strong enough to resist the darkness (mostly) that should have permanently changed her the same way it did Rumple! Maybe not to the same scale, but after the curse was lifted she just…never seemed to face any long term consequences of being the literal embodiment of dark magic.

Basically my point was that ABC and Disney wanted The Good Guys and The Bad Guys and for that reason character development was a bad time

[midnightella-mass]

yknow I’ve never had to delete a post before because people were being mean over a joke about a show and yet! here we are!

[midnightella-mass]

y’know I could talk about the TikTok-ification of fandom all day but what really irks me is that the people who started engaging with fandom from TikTok and then moved to other social media platforms literally have no concept of fandom etiquette. Like I’m so tired of scrolling through tags and half of the top posts are just people going “I hate this thing in this fandom and if you like it you’re evil/boring/dumb and should never post again”

like sorry but this isn’t TikTok and your likes mean literally nothing here! No one cares if you got 1k likes on that hate post! Plus the first rule of fandom is that if you don’t like something you don’t engage with it. Don’t like that ship? Block the tag. Don’t like that character? Block the tag. Don’t like whatever media as a whole? Block the tag

now I’m not saying that people can’t critique media, but when people start hating on fan works is when things usually take a turn for the worse in fandoms. Because you are under no obligation to engage with fan-made media, like at all. Plus you gain literally nothing from being rude to a fandom that creates media you’ve been consuming for free. If you don’t like something that much then just start making your own stuff, it really is that easy.