#idiot ball

[shallowseeker]

headcanon: cas plays dumb sometimes about metaphor bc he knows dean likes explaining stuff and also sometimes when he plays dumb it makes dean giggle

What was that fic, I think it was Put up Your Dukes, by saltyfeathers that said Cas keeps the idiot-ball in his pocket at all times?

Ah yes. It was:

Dean knows Cas is more aware of the situation than he lets on. Since becoming a full time human (no take backsies this time), Cas has developed a keen sense of selective comprehension. Basically, he keeps the idiot ball in his pocket at all times, in case he thinks letting on that he understands something isn’t going to play to his advantage.

Season 6 script that dropped today hints at that too. I love it, because it colors Dean's somtimes-annoyance with Cas in about ten extra shades of hilarious.

Dean sometimes responds to Ca's weird one-liners with a shade of "Are you fuckin' with me, Cas?" And sometimes Dean's exactly right: Cas IS fuckin' with him.

//

That is the grumble of an angel who knows what he's doing (sometimes).

6x03 The Third Man (TVWriting source)

///

BONUS: even when he's closer to human-ish, Cas only pretends to be drunk and loopy in 9x09... and Dean both recognizes and joins in on the ruse:

CASTIEL: Nah. I'll get it. [CASTIEL hops off his bar stool, then returns.] Mm. (swigging the last of his old beer, and setting the bottle on the table.) You know, I've never done this before. DEAN: (sighs) One beer, he's hammered.

Of course, as soon as Sam is out of the scene, Cas drops the act, and he and Dean have a Serious conversation, then gaze excruciatingly at one another as they discuss their "temporary" separation.

CASTIEL: (clears throat, dropping the act) I, um, I noticed you look... kind of uncomfortable whenever Sam mentions my leaving. Doesn't he know that you told me to leave? DEAN: Here's the deal. When Sam was doing the trials to seal up Hell, it messed him up. Okay? The third one nearly killed him. If I'd let him finish, it would have. He's still messed up, bad. CASTIEL: You said the angel, Ezekiel, helped heal him. DEAN: (looks down, avoiding the question) Look, I got to do anything I can to get him back. Now, if that means that we keep our distance from you for a little while, then... Then I don't have a choice. I don't feel good about it, but I don't have a choice. It's great to have your help, Cas. Okay, but we just can't work together. CAS looks sad.

The most hilarious part about this conversation is that it slips that the distance they're keeping is for what? A LITTLE WHILE.

Good God, you two. It's a little while, not forever, and in retrospect, it LOOKS LIKE YOU TWO ARE AWARE/HAVE DISCUSSED THAT. Suck it up, saplings!

Anywaaaaay TLDR; I love when Cas pretends to be an idiot almost as much as when he is being an actual idiot.

[matt0044]

I appreciate the audacity Miraculous had with "Risk" where Shadow Moth created an in-universe Idiot Ball.

Like I can't help but know how transparent it is in getting Season 4 to make way into Season 5 but the Moth's powers made it work.

[jcw3-protectorate-enthusiast]

Spoilers for Kamen Rider 555 below.

Kamen Rider 555/Faiz broke my heart with episodes 29-32. Really opened up the Idiot Ball/Conflict Ball when it very much did not have to. There's this overarching plot where Yuji and Takumi struggle to trust each other, through a string of (largely) understandable misunderstandings, character traumas and established flaws.

But there's this moment, where Kusaka, consummate liar, manipulator, and self-absorbed scumbag, sets the two against each other. All fine, he stages it well and takes advantage of their mutual distrust.

But Yuji, rather than arranging a meeting with Takumi, instead asks Naoya to deliver a message. Naoya, the fucking idiot. Naoya, the self-absorbed dumbass. Naoya. Who's Naoya. Yuji asks him this while he's dancing like a moron and barely paying attention, and expects this to go well.

What's insane is that he's sitting across from someone responsible and respectable when he does this. Yuka is right there! Yuka is responsible and hard working to her own detriment at times, and is perfectly capable of delivering a message to Takumi - WITH WHOM SHE ALREADY HAS A RAPPORT, and while it's difficult to keep track of who knows what in this show, she seems like an obvious choice if you want to play this stupid ass game of telephone.

But no, Yuji asks Naoya, and obviously it goes bad. Obviously! What gets me is that Yuji looked at Yuka, and then LOOKED PAST HER to look at Naoya to ask this fucking question. It's so ridiculous - it's not something any believable character would do, and in a lesser show like OOO or Agito, I would have just rolled my eyes and moved on, but bro it pissed me off here.

The show also does this dumb Meruem thing with Sawada, where we're supposed to believe he's redeemable, or that anyone could think he was redeemable, after he killed dozens of people while absent mindedly listening to music. No one even brings up the dozens of dust piles he left in his wake, it's peak protagonist centered morality. He was nice to Mari once, so that must mean he can change.

On a lighter note - they should invite Takumi's bike mecha out more, I like that guy. More Riders should have a dumb transforming mecha sidekick.

[pepsi-maxwell]

"we have to leave naruto here alone because he's a liability" yamato, does "he is a jinchuuriki and akatsuki are actively hunting him down to rip the tailed beast out of him" mean nothing to you

[sketchyfletch]

Does anybody else get like - idiocy clusters?

Most of the time an engaged, functional human being, but then has several incidents in a row of brain cells being replaced by brain farts, and forgetting things/not hearing things correctly/being spectacularly clumsy

It is immensely frustrating while in the pocket of it, especially when you know you're capable most of the time

[lets-steal-an-archive]

Ross Douthat: My Sunday column: Do Liberals Care If Books Disappear? | John Rogers: thread

1) A quick thread on what we, in TV writing, call the Idiot Ball. This is a term used to describe when one character, in order to make the show work, has to behave, uncharacteristically, like a complete idiot. It is usually a different character each week.

2) This term was coined, I heard, by actor Hank Azaria, who was complaining about a show he was on and asked "who's carrying the idiot ball this week?" The modern conservative intellectual movement is now reduced to passing around the idiot ball.

3) Dr. Seuss is this week's idiot ball, and in order to be part of the show, you have to carry it. You have to make bad faith or stupid arguments to be part of the show. The difference is, now, *everybody* has to pass the idiot ball around, all episode.

4) Freedom Fries. Antifa. Dr. Seuss. Millions of missing ballots. Neanderthals. Ordinarily smart people have to pretend to be earnestly dumb and make idiotic arguments about each of these, or be tossed from the show.

5) Ross absolutely knows that this was a decision by the rights holder to pull books with illustrations which are racist by even lax standards. This is their right, and is actually just smart capitalism. But he has to carry the Idiot Ball.

6) So now, you have the shorthand. Whenever you hear some ridiculous fake scandal or outrage, you can just chalk it up to "Oh, it's this week's Idiot Ball" and it says everything you need to know about both the subject, and the person carrying it.

7) But remember, the ball's just the ball. The person carrying it's the idiot.

[cryptid-crawly]

https://archiveofourown.org/works/39706863

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Shouto overhears Izuku deal psychic damage to Aizawa and all he takes from it is that Izuku = All Might’s secret love child = rival. Things do not work out the way he expects.

Part of that one AU where Izuku gets close to Toshi during his training, adopts the man as his dad, and then embarks on an awkward and mentally traumatizing (for the adults) quest to get Aizawa to marry All Might.

[caithyra]

Tube ‘em up, Jimmy?

So... Why aren’t the transport tubes prepped for human use as a matter of standard procedure when it comes to evacuating people to and from Atlas when there is a looming, literal deadline? Since, you know, they can transport people so quickly between Mantle and Atlas.

Because those tubes just made the whole Abandoning Mantle’s People plot (aka the main conflict despite the fact that the Big Bad has arrived and doesn’t care about it) into something that shouldn’t exist. Also, if only Weiss knew about this use of them, WTF was she doing in Vol 7 during the evac?! She should have brought it up then!

This is sooo RWBY; introduce something that can blatantly solve most of the problems/conflicts/struggles, and then conveniently not use it. Because then the writers would have to think of a plot that should actually exist.