Discover Top Posts Tagged with #tpn violet

Such a fun group yet so much wasted potential

#the promised neverland #tpn #tpn manga #yakusoku no neverland #tpn emma #tpn violet #tpn ray #tpn don #tpn zack #The seven walls squad #I love this group very much #even though all their time together was time skipped #I need to draw them more

Season 2 sucks.

Goldy Pond Questionnaire

You have to kill off six of the surviving named kids introduced during the Goldy Pond arc. Who do you axe?

Can be for any reason (e.g., I feel they should have died based on their injuries, I feel these characters can be nixed with the least amount of impact to the story, I don't really care much about this character, their design doesn't do much for me, I can't bear to sacrifice any of the others, etc.), but six of these kids have to go:

(Chapter 69 & Chapter 70 Bonus Pages)

Ranked from 1 being the easiest choice to 6 being the hardest.

My list:

TOH and TPN: Thematic Parallels

The Owl House and The Promised Neverland are both series that hold a deep place in my heart. TOH is often compared to Little Witch Academia, another series I am very fond of but there are also a lot of parallels to be found between TOH and TPN with similar characters and themes. Both are empowering stories that contain themes of liberation and ask the question of how does one stay true to themselves while maturing as a person?

Right off the bat, one could point to the protagonists themselves, Emma and Luz, both of whom are energetic and optimistic. Yet there’s a double sided aspect to that optimism that can lead to recklessness. Both are hit with that “Mary Sue” label by critics who view them as selfish, Luz for being too wrapped up in her fantasy world and Emma for wanting to liberate her family without further bloodshed. I actually disliked Luz for a period of several months and it was Emma that started making me warm up to her again.

I have a complicated relationship with The Owl House. I was a casual enjoyer and had a shirt I’d wear to queer youth meetings. Over time, I came to feel negative towards it especially when I got involved in #toh critical community on tumblr, making anti TOH and anti Lumity posts. People really love to call her a terrorist over the snakes, fireworks and spiders incidents. I kind of viewed Luz as a spoiled brat who got to live out a wish fulfillment escapist fantasy and wanted to be enabled, not understood. Now I have a better appreciation of Luz’s character and have thought about why I hated her. She reminded me of the parts I disliked about myself. I had a therapist who told me I was the problem in my relationship with my parents and I was being ungrateful and projected that onto her. Yet now I find both her and Emma’s stories as both equally empowering despite some viewing Luz’s as self serving and indulgent.

Despite Luz’s longing for self acceptance and to be understood being seen as more selfish than Emma’s desire to liberate all humans, both are empowering for young girls beaten down by a cruel society that demands conformity and is built on institutional abuse. How many queer, brown, neurodivergent women are accused of being selfish for wanting a more affirming world where no one has to suffer like what they did again? How often are people, especially the youth silenced and told they are selfish or weak for wanting an end to societal injustice and violence? I’ve seen some negative takes about TOH from conservatives that it encourages selfishness and following the heart as opposed to good Christian self sacrifice but Luz is very self sacrificial for those she loves. It’s just not always treated as a positive quality.

Something else TOH and TPN have in common is the way a character’s qualities can be positive or negative depending on the circumstances. I saw it in this Reddit thread on Luz’s character. Emma’s refusal to leave anyone behind and desire to save everyone are noble but bringing the youngest children with them would weigh them down which is why she promises to return to Grace Field for Phil. She’s reminded repeatedly that she cannot save everyone especially those who are unwilling to change. Luz’s optimism and creativity are good qualities but she needed to find a balance as her ways of expressing herself were unsafe for her peers. Her self sacrificial nature is noble but it can be harmful as well like when she falls into self loathing over accidentally helping Philip.

There’s some other small parallels I’ve noticed. Luz meeting with the Titan is a bit like Emma making a new promise with the Demon god. Some of the characters of both series fulfill similar roles. Others have pointed out that Don and Gilda are a bit like Gus and Willow especially Gilda and Willow’s role on their respective teams and friendships with Luz and Emma. I think Violet complements and contrasts Amity well in terms of design and character. Despite Camila being far better as a person and mother, both her and Isabella are persuaded to continue a cycle of cruelty, believing it’s what’s best. Camila eventually embraces Luz and Isabella redeems herself while helping the children and dying in the process. There’s a strong theme of Found Family in both series as well as breaking rigid gender expectations with Luz, Emma, Violet and the Goldy Pond kids.

One other parallel I picked up on was the similarities between Queen Legravalima, Peter Ratri and Belos. All are stuck in a prison of their own making and a perpetual immaturity. Luz is able to grow beyond Belos’ level and appreciate the Boiling Isles and its people while Belos never grows out of his ambition for genocide and hero complex. Emma finds a balance between being herself and maturity as well as ensuring that all the other children are able to grow up without fear of being eaten. Ratri and Legravalima never grow out of their toxic worldview and strangled in a web of their own repression. Ratri’s suicide implies a level of guilt but he believed himself too far gone to be saved by Emma. Belos and Legravalima are both turned into eldritch abominations as they are dying in a sea of their own self delusion. It’s quite fitting that Ratri was named after the character of Peter Pan and the series’s title is a reference to the fairy tale Neverland where everyone stays in a perpetual childhood. All these villains destroyed themselves because they imprisoned themselves in a toxic, rigid and immature mindset while the children they wanted to drag down with them were able to grow up and live freely.

I think people don’t pick up on the parallels between TOH and TPN because the latter is not an explicitly magic and witch focused story like LWA but those who are fans of TPN may very much enjoy TOH and vice versa. Themes of redemption, found family, maturity and self discovery are present in both and the villains serve as cautionary warnings against the toxic mindsets of perpetual childhood and the obsession with being the “chosen one” that Belos had. Not everyone may have been satisfied with the manga’s ending or Watching and Dreaming but there’s a “dreams come true” element in both that’s emotionally satisfying for many readers/viewers. The philosophies of both are empowering when beaten down by a cruel society, don’t give up hope for a better world, love yourself even if others won’t and you are not defined by your mistakes but rather how you react to them.