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[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

Aurora k*lled an innocent girl and a whole family k*lled . Lala (as a fate) made a mistake as she was desperate and even did the mirror curse hoping it would stop Apollo .

Aurora was royalty and she had everything , the victim was a poor villaige girl . She is nothing but a spoiled b*tch .

Nasty Aurora is also the reason why Lala lost her family

Stop normalising disgusting women in some misunderstood meaning of feminism

I’m not normalising or excusing anything Aurora has done. I’m just holding LaLa to the same standards, she was playing pretty dangerous games with her friend’s life. And so was Jacks to be honest, but Eva has forgiven them.

I also don’t think being a Fate is an excuse because at this point the Fallen Star was dead. The Fates were like any other immortal (like Legend) and would become mortal if they fell in love, so if LaLa loved Dane (the reason she wanted the Valory Arch opened) she would be mortal. But she’s not, so she must know deep down that she is not in love with Dane and yet still risked her friend’s life for him. I can’t remember if this theory was confirmed or not but if we want evajacks to grow old together then we have to believe it!

Aurora was in an arranged engagement, the fox was free to be with whoever she wanted. The story curse messed with the curse Aurora placed on Jacks so this is something I would love to see someone clarify, did Aurora know the fox would die if Jacks kissed her? She believed his true love would be a fox because of her sister’s prophecy. Although she also put the archer’s curse on Jacks so she probably did expect it to end that way. Nevertheless, she is definitely to blame for the fox’s death, I never claimed otherwise.

However Jacks is to blame for every murder he committed after he discovered his kiss kills. Similarly, Vengeance Slaughterwood is to blame for the death of Castor and Lala’s family. And if Aurora is responsible for the fox’s death by placing a curse on her killer (Jacks), then LaLa would have been responsible for Eva’s death had Apollo killed her while under the archer’s curse. She is very lucky that didn’t happen, but let’s not forget how many injuries Eva sustained because of the mirror curse. Forgive, but never forget!

Aurora is a deeply flawed character, I’m not denying that. I just think men should be held accountable for their own actions and this applies to fictional men too, and also women. And I just don’t agree with calling her a “b*tch,” “nasty” and “disgusting” when she didn’t do anything anyone else didn’t, specifically the men. She’s not an irredeemable monster she’s just a flawed person, and she can work through her “pick-me” mentality.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

a girl d*ed because that b**ch Aurora can't handle that her crush was one sided crush . Lala lost her family because she wanted Jacks to be jealous of his best friend . Castor d*ed trying to save Lyric .

Eva was almost trapped in a tree because of Aurora . She lost her memories because of a vial Aurora gave Apollo .

love how you conveniently forget that . Readers like this are the reason why more pathetic dirty FMCs like Nesta Archeron and Aurora will appear mofe

Didn’t forget this at all.

Many girls died because Jacks kissed them. The fox was the only one he didn’t intend to kill as far as we know.

LaLa lost her family because Vengeance Slaughterwood killed them and Castor. While Chaos seems to believe Wolfric wouldn’t have forced Aurora to marry Vengeance, he is not a completely reliable source in this respect as only Wolfric and Aurora can understand their dynamic. Dating someone you don’t love to get rid of an unwanted fiancé and make your crush jealous isn’t an irredeemable sin.

Eva was sacrificed to the tree by Apollo. He is the one that held Eva down and stole her memories. And he did a lot of other things too.

But let’s not forget that LaLa sent Eva into a vampire den with her neck on full display, specifically to entice and taunt Chaos

My point wasn’t that Aurora is a good person. She is deeply flawed, but she isn’t more evil than any other character. I do think her and LaLa are very similar, and that what Aurora did led to terrible things happening to LaLa but it wasn’t Aurora herself that did those terrible things.

I think if they can both learn to de-centre men in their lives, and Aurora takes accountability for her part in the Merrywood tragedy they could actually be good friends.

As for your last paragraph, I don’t want to comment on Nesta’s character as I don’t care for SJM or her writing. However, the language you use to address women (b**ch, pathetic, dirty) is concerning, personally I would love to see more flawed fmcs in the fantasy genre. If you don’t like it you don’t have to read it.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

Y’all get so mad at Aurora for cursing Jacks (twice) as if LaLa didn’t do the exact same thing to Evangeline. At least Jacks wasn’t her best friend.

I don’t even hate LaLa or anything, I’m looking forward to whatever ChaosXLaLa storyline we get in the novella (although ngl I kinda wish Chaos was queer since the myth of the vampire is rooted in queer culture, but maybe he is bi or something idk).

I just wish people would stop treating Aurora like a one dimensional male centred mean girl, I really think Stephanie Garber is a better writer than that. I think a novel with a Castor/Aurora split pov would be good, I mean they are twins right?

I just don’t see a full length ChaosXLaLa novel happening without an Aurora redemption arc. Although I don’t even think she did anything all that bad. Apollo literally murdered a child on page and doesn’t get half as much hate sooo…

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I’m not an artist but I had a vision…

This is Evangeline if she was a supervillain.

(Rose gold is a shade of pink so stfu)

I cannot stress enough, I am bad at art…

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

The fact that people who support the fox reincarnating as Evangeline theory are panicking about how The Ballad of the Archer and the Fox might be too romantic is frying my brain…

Like isn’t this what you wanted? Isn’t this why that theory was crafted in the first place? Because how can anyone compete with a dead girl right?

My theory is that it will be written the way it’s told in the Magnificent North, like a fairytale, with the ambiguous ending. So don’t worry, we won’t be getting a “there’s nothing of equal value to me” fox girl edition. And I think it will be told from the perspective of the fox, and she might not have even loved Jacks. I mean he was trying to kill her for a while, and we have yet to see her pov.

But also, Evangeline knows the story, it’s her favourite fairytale. She knows the Archer is Jacks and it hasn’t bothered her once, which is really all that matters. It’s not like it’s being released as its own separate book. It’s not a spinoff, it’s just part of a special edition OUABH release.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I know that these books are primarily YA love stories but I’m incapable of just enjoying a cute story with a happy ending so here’s a short essay about social politics in the Magnificent North…

Wolfric Valor seems to think retaking his throne will be a walk in the park, but even if the Valors put themselves in the Valory Arch someone still lopped the heads off their statues. So I think it’s safe to say some people were unhappy with their reign.

It also seems like Wolfric is a bit of a warmongering misogynist, which I can’t imagine being a popular mind frame during times of peace and prosperity. However, we do see some xenophobic rhetoric from many unnamed Northern characters that interacted with Evangeline. If Wolfric were to make another grab for power, he might capitalise on the fear and encourage anti-immigrant sentiments while positioning himself as the solution to all the Northern people’s problems (sound familiar? 🧐).

But politics have changed significantly during the 1000 years he was in the arch, reputations are defined no longer by great deeds accomplished in war, but by what the scandal sheets write about you. And the Knightlingers, having family in both the North and South, and possibly worldwide, would not support this kind of propaganda. So if one were to oppose the Valors retaking the North, their best bet would be to convince the Knightlingers to dismantle Wolfric’s reputation by using their scandal sheets to launch a smear campaign.

Ngl, I think Aurora would be the perfect person to do this takedown. She could achieve both revenge and redemption by stopping a possible war and undermining her father.

I’m so sorry if I forced you to use your brain, I wish I could just turn it off and enjoy things for what they are without analysing them so much. Also, I’m pretty certain all of this is based on canon, unless I’m misremembering some things, so I think it’s pretty incredible that Stephanie Garber was able to create a story that has these things all possibly playing out in the background of such a beautiful fantasy world and epic love story.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

Controversial opinions but I don’t want Evangeline to be a reincarnation of the first fox. I think they should both be allowed to be their own people. And I think people need to stop projecting their own retrospective jealousy onto book characters. Like even if Jacks did genuinely love the fox it doesn’t mean he loves Evangeline any less.

And also, I do want Aurora to get some sort of redemption arc. Like literally all of the men were villainous until they weren’t, so if the fmcs and the fans can forgive them then they better keep that same energy for the female villains.

And don’t even try giving me that “but she started it” nonsense. Her father has very clearly been set up as a misogynist that doesn’t regard his daughters as people in their own right, but as property to be married off.

I’m not excusing her actions, she is obviously a villain, but so is everyone around her. And tbh the worst thing she did, as far as we know, was curse Jacks, while all of the men have literally murdered people.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I’m blending up a few different theories here but what if Ribbit was Pomni’s abusive ex in real life and they pulled the same abusive tactics with Jax in the circus.

Pomni was able to end the relationship on her own terms and seek therapy and that could be why she seems so emotionally intelligent and healthy.

But before Jax could end the relationship, Ribbit abstracted. Which could explain Jax’s unhealthy coping mechanisms.

Also the relationships don’t necessarily have to be romantic in nature. They could be platonic or even familial in Pomni’s case because of her and Ribbit’s similar character designs. It could be two different kind of relationships with the same toxic person.

I don’t know, I feel like most people have been headcannoning Ribbit as a good person and I just wanted to offer an alternative perspective that I haven’t seen as much. I guess this is kind of pessimistic of me but until I see a character in action I usually just assume they’re evil 😅.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I haven’t really thought this theory out but…

I don’t think they’ll all become gloinks but aren’t gloinks npcs?

But also…

Cain & Abel are biblical characters.

Bible Cain murdered his brother, Abel, out of jealousy…

So imagine an au where Cain, the one who brought jealousy, murder, and hatred into this world, is God.

It looks a lot like “I Have No Mouth, And I Must Scream.” Doesn’t it?

And given that that’s what “The Amazing Digital Circus” is based on, and also the increasingly violent Caine adventures, I think we can expect to see Caine causing the actual death of one of the circus members.

And that circus member, might come back as an npc.

I think Caine having a hand in the character’s death/abstraction will be an important distinction in terms of who can come back as an npc.

[bethanydelleman]

I don't know exactly how to articulate this but... if you repeatedly show historical fiction women rejecting traditionally female skills/duties and doing swords instead, because swords is obviously the Most Important Thing, you are kind of implying that all the work that has been traditionally done by female hands for millennia was useless all along and not, you know, keeping civilization going. Because it's usually rejected not as a personal preference but as This Is The Important Stuff (male work) and That is The Dumb Useless Stuff (women's work) and that kind of bothers me. The message was supposed to be Vital But Underpaid and Underappreciated, not women's work is insignificant so let's all go do swords.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

This goes all the way back to early medieval storytelling. Basically they believed women were deformed/mutilated men but if she picked up a sword her balls would drop because swords are manly. Likewise if a man didn’t fight they believed his balls would shrivel back up inside him.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

Here’s a pretty interesting parallel between Evangeline and Jacks…

At the start of OUABH, Evangeline makes her deal with Jacks to stop the wedding, but when she sees that led to the whole wedding party being turned to stone she takes responsibility for her actions and drinks the potion to take their place.

At the end of TBONA, Jacks takes responsibility for his actions that ultimately led Evangeline to her death and uses the stones to go back in time and save her.

Neither one of them are fully responsible for these consequences but they both took responsibility anyway. I think it really demonstrates how Evangeline changed Jacks for the better.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

Okay, so I think I might have figured it out but I didn’t reread the books to do so, so please correct me if I’m wrong.

I think we’re supposed to doubt that Tella’s grandmother ever met Legend because if they met at Caraval then it might not have been the actual Legend she met, but one of his actors pretending to be him.

I can’t remember his name but my money’s on the guy that pretended to be Scarlet’s fiancé. I don’t know he just gave “I dated your grandmother” vibes whenever he spoke to Scarlet and Tella. Like he was kind of smug about it you know?

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

Has anyone else noticed that with Tella he just took one bite then threw the whole apple away but Evangeline is seeing piles of apple cores?

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I saw a writer on TikTok explaining that her book was not picked up by publishers because her FMC wasn’t “stabby” enough and it reminded me of something I learned in Medieval Literature in university.

So apparently gender during these times was somewhat defined by military prowess. And women for quite some time, until more recently than you would think, were viewed as deformed / mutilated / incomplete men. So a woman taking up arms was essentially becoming a man, and maybe emasculating the men around her who would not fight.

Basically she became something better than a woman by acting like a man. So it deeply upsets me that this is the direction the publishing industry seems to be taking women in literature, at least in most High Fantasy books. I would like to believe that language has evolved enough that “strong” no longer means just physical strength.

And this isn’t me not believing that a woman would be able to fight. And I’m not trying to say women shouldn’t fight. I just don’t like that any other way of achieving victory is being swept away by publishers who are just looking to make money, and just want authors to essentially copy already successful books and never create anything new.

I won’t mention the particular “stabby fmc” books that inspired this tangent but I think some people will be able to connect the dots. Suffice to say I don’t think they deserved the popularity they got, they are objectively poorly written.

In a nutshell…

STOP DEMONISING AND ERASING FEMININITY!!! And stop upholding masculine traits as something a female character is worthless without.

(In the medieval literature class I mentioned we were studying “Beowulf” and “Judith” is anyone is interested)

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I have a theory. Or maybe it’s so obvious that no one thought to mention it and I’m just catching up now.

I think Jacks made a deal with the Fallen Star to break the Archer’s curse. And the unseen cost was that he would become a Fate, that he would become the Prince of Hearts. So he kissed the original Fox not knowing it would kill her.

Perhaps Castor and LaLa made similar deals with unforeseen consequences. The Fallen Star was the big villain of the Caraval series so it makes sense that his villainy would trickle into this new series and have lasting effects upon the characters of Once Upon A Broken Heart. In particular the Fates - The Prince of Hearts, The Unwed Bride and Chaos.

It draws an interesting parallel with the beginning of Evangeline’s story - making a deal with Jacks and it not working out as she had hoped.

And it leaves room to expand on all the Fates stories, The Assassin, The Maiden Death, The Lady Prisoner, Poison, etc. Why did they make a deal with Gavriel? What price did they pay beyond becoming a Fate? What are they doing now?

Again maybe this is common knowledge but that’s just my two cents on the issue. This is my first post so I really don’t know what I’m doing.

[ez-with-a-fez]

This would have been so much better. I still don't get how people become Fates, exactly. Especially since, like, Jacks had his power before he became a Fate because of Aurora. So other than immortality, is that it? And can anyone become a Fate? Like, what?

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I caught a glimpse of a new bonus chapter on TikTok (I don’t live in America or the U.K so I’ve no chance of getting it myself) and it looks like Honora Valor helped the Fallen Star after he fell from the sky. So I guess was still sort of right about the two series being connected in that way, like the OUABH characters had access to the Fallen Star to be turned into Fates.

I think Jacks had his curse (the ability to kill with his kiss) because of Aurora but his powers (how he controlled people’s emotions) is a result of the Fallen Star making him a Fate and therefore immortal.

But maybe Aurora sought some help with cursing Jacks, maybe from the Fallen Star??? I don’t know. I guess the whole “unforeseen consequences” plot line regarding the Fallen Star could be given to Honora, if it happens at all, since she is the one that healed him, enabling him to do all the terrible things he did.

Maybe all of this will be expanded on in the Chaos/LaLa book if it’s ever written, 🤞.

But I do wonder if the Valors had anything to do with putting the Fates in the cards. I’ll have to double check the books. This is a theme in Stephanie Garber’s work I really enjoy though, the idea of holding people that might have abused their power accountable and putting them away, be it in cards or an arch.

Sorry this is so long 😅

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

Just wanted to say that when Aang was struck by lightning he was letting go of his attachment to Katara and when Zuko was struck by lightning he was literally saving Katara’s life.

I suppose the argument could be made that by unblocking that last chakra and gaining control over the avatar state, Aang was trying to save Katara from everyone that was attacking them but Aang was in that room too. He was saving himself just as much as he was saving Katara, he didn’t know Azula was going to hit him with lightning. Also, the world needs its avatar.

Zuko, on the other hand, knowingly risked his life solely for Katara. He made the decision to be struck by lightning to save her. He knew that Katara had used up all her spirit water to heal Aang after he was hit by lightning and he still jumped in front of Katara. He knew that he could have died.

Like wtf happened? How does a show fuck up the romance this badly? Everything else played out so beautifully.

[mythoughtsregardingwhatever]

I enjoyed the ACOTAR books when I read them and love a lot of the characters but I definitely see where people are coming from with their criticisms.

I would say TOG is better though it comes with its own set of problems. And I was kind of enjoying the CC series until the ACOTAR crossover.

I think the main difference, for me anyway, is that TOG and CC felt like they had a lot more meaningful sacrifices. SJM wasn’t afraid of killing off characters.

But who died in ACOTAR? Feyre’s unnamed mother, Clare Beddor, and two unnamed fae. And in ACOMAF? A few unnamed citizens in Velaris, and a mortal queen.

And ACOWAR is perhaps the worst offender with thousands of unnamed civilians and soldiers of Prythian, the bone carver and the weaver who were literally introduced as antagonists, Brennan and Dagda who were also antagonists, three unnamed children of the blessed, Feyre’s unnamed father, the King of Hybern (is he unnamed or is his name literally Hybern?), and the Suriel (the only death that elicited any sort of emotional response from me).

[I’m on a train and don’t have my books to refer back to so forgive me if I got any names wrong, mixed up the books, or missed a death or two.]

Compare this to losing characters like Sam, Nehemia, Gavriel, the thirteen, even Ren (especially Ren) the impact just isn’t the same. And of course a lot of unnamed soldiers and civilians died too, so it just makes sense that with all the battles and bloodshed in all of SJM’s series that we would lose a main character or two, but in ACOTAR we didn’t. Also there’s characters that were already dead before the events of the prequel took place, specifically Aelin’s parents, that we still kind of feel a sense of loss over just because it affects some of the main characters so much and the events of the series as a whole so much.

And in CC there’s Danika, Connor and the rest of their pack, Lehabah, even Hunt’s friends Justinian and Victoria. I don’t recall any deaths in the second one except Cormac and Sophie but that’s where I lost hope for the series anyway, with the ACOTAR crossover.

But I would say my least favourite thing SJM does is try to convince me that her characters “sacrificed” their mortality. Aelin, Feyre, Nesta, Elain, Bryce. I understand that they didn’t necessarily want to be fae but I don’t think becoming one is much of a sacrifice because they were written as so ridiculously superior to humans in every way.

And Amren’s sacrifice could have been a beautifully heartbreaking moment in ACOWAR but was ruined by immediately bringing her back to life. And it also kind of ruined how Feysand came full circle, from Rhys convincing the High Lords to revive Feyre in book one to Feyre doing the same for Rhys in book three, to have another character also come back to life, it just felt overdone. (And of course Feyre died again in ACOSF and so did Nyx but I’m not going anywhere near that god awful book, it was so disappointing). I don’t think SJM even knows what to do with Amren’s character anymore, like oh god you’re slightly less immortal you’ve sacrificed so much for us 🙄.

So yeah, ultimately for me it comes down to how much a book can make me feel something, and TOG achieved this far better than ACOTAR ever could. But even with all that said I still like ACOTAR, I just think TOG is better in terms of what I want from a book.