Willy and Quackling

I'd end my days with you in a hail of bullets

I'll let you know just how much you mean to me

I think the coolest thing c!Crime did was create a platonic story where it's:

"I don't know how to care about anything. I used to care and I don't know how to even care for myself now."

"I remember the best parts of you. You should at least care for yourself because it's one of the things I care about the most."

"I can't promise that but I can try to care about you."

Like the I want to hate everything as much as I hate myself but I can't bring myself to hate you thing is just so seldom done as a brother story. It's that toxic element of we chose brotherhood and now we can't take that back. It's the whole neither of them can promise it gets better but they can promise to try and pull each other out of the abyss. It's the loving you as a brother doesn't mean I don't know how to avoid hurting you thing. It's just everything so many fucked up brother stories want to do and just don't get the dependency mixed with mutual assured destruction of it all.

Sorry for the random "wow they fucking went all out with that thing." But... they spent months watching people question every interaction Tommy and Wilbur had after Wilbur's death and came back with "actually they're more dependent and intertwined than you guys even guessed so deal with this fucking mess" and, after all the dust has settled, it's still the most satisfying thing anyone has done in a Minecraft RP.

Brought to you by a late night half bottle of wine and missing how much I used to scream at every dysfunctional thing they said.

as a person of color it’s so important to me that miles looked at hobie—rule-breaking, conflict-provoking, dark-humored hobie—and couldn’t help but call him cool, that pavitr and gwen see him as a reliable dude when adults call him a “piece of work”. we see him just fuck around and cause trouble and joke about capitalism and silently advise miles to be skeptical about authority.

idk like its easy to have another charming (usually white) rebel without a cause who stirs the pot for shits and giggles with a smug grin on his face to match his devil may care attitude, that the kind and humble protag shrugs off in his quest to seek approval from authority. but then instead we get teens from marginalized identities looking up to a young black man who challenges them to think about their actions carefully and question what they know, who jokes about things that other people would politely grimace at in response to, who makes adults uncomfortable. i can think of some people in my life like him—those older kids whom i was told were troublemakers, whom adults told me to ignore, to be scared of, to reject, yet were the ones who gave me wisdom and whom i ended up looking up to and whom i bitched about colony and homophobia and fascism with.

and it isn’t just hobie and his throwaway lines barbed with criticism and discontent, it’s also when gwen says “can you stop being a cop for once”, it’s also when pavitr says “this is where the british stole all our stuff”, it’s that level of awareness of unfairness and injustice in the world they live in and as kids they just have to passively accept the status quo and kick the dirt and angstily, cynically point at injustice with a half-cocked smile of irony. of course young vigilantes would say shit like that. of course young vigilantes would have blm pins and trans lives matter flags and jokes about colony and capitalism. of course kids like me would understand that. of course kids like me would look at hobie and say he’s one cool fucking dude.

!!!! SPOILERS FOR TDP S5 !!!!

I can’t really say I’m sad cause as an disabled person myself, having Claudia becoming an amputee is just really soothing to my heart. She’s a bit more like me to an extent 💞 I’ve actually had this headcanon for a while now.

Although I’m not the biggest fan of how she was treated this season, and have my personal strong opinions about the “main cast” (spoiler: not a fan) I really hope she can follow up as an amputee and doesn’t “heal” with dark magic. She’s an amazing dark mage and being now also and disabled character that’s even more amazing. Still so excited for her true villain arc and REALLY hoping she gets a cool carved snake prosthetic that maybe Terry can make for her ? I sketched this yesterday as I finished S5EP9 !

ugh. cquackity thinking cwilbur was after las nevadas and guarding it from him because las nevadas was the real, tangible thing he needed to feel secure and powerful. versus cwilbur not really giving a fuck about the country itself because cquackity was the real, tangible thing HE needed to feel human and alive… they make me SICK!!

Idk what to caption this - ENJOY

c!tntduo moodboard

Part of me almost hopes that Viren's story arc will end in a disproportionately cruel way, you know.

I'm just so tired of seeing a character doing one good thing before they die or trying to change before they die and instead of the audience taking that as purposeful ambiguity the discussion will center around if the character was "Redeemed".

But imagine if he was punished so harshly that even the Viren haters would feel bad for him. Now that would be interesting! I've seen some dark speculation around season 5 so I'm looking forward to seeing how the show will contextualise his arc.

I don't understand why "Redemption" is such a popular talking point when centering villains (ok I actually do. I'm looking at you, Zuko).

"Sin and Atonement" and "Redemption" are deeply Christian themes. I don't think those should be a universal frame of reference to all stories.

Yes, yes, this is more of a fandom problem, not a show problem. But if people want to see a bad character harshly punished for their crimes maybe they should get that for once. I don't really mind because I think Viren, while unlikeable, is a sympathetic character already. Of course I feel for a character even if they are "irredeemable". That's what stories are for.

I don't mean it's a completely useless way to look at art but it's just- I don't know- I'm bored? Especially YouTube commentators talk about redemption constantly instead of engaging with the themes that actually are there.

Sometimes villains can't even really make up for everything they have done, just like some people in real life. Viren has committed so many crimes- like how do you even fix that? However it'd still be interesting if he tried to change. That's what I'm here for. Like Viren and Claudia are not just an antagonistic counterforce to our heros but they have a lot of going on as unique characters.

Viren has his saviour complex and values domination over cooperation. Claudia is interesting because she's both the victim and the perpetrator. It's interesting how self-sufficient she is while being deeply emotionally codependent on Viren. She has a ton of agency as a physically (magically?) strong person but not a ton of agency as an independent, emotionally strong individual. Viren and Claudia love each other but it's isolating kind of love where they don't really have anyone else but each other (Terry is really trying to get in there. Like sorry Terry you don't know how fucked up these two are lmao).

No wonder it was so easy to Aaravos take Viren's place as an authority figure in Claudia's life after Viren died. Or at least that's what I took away from Lost Child short and TDP season 4 in general.

I still think about the first information we got outside Viren and Claudia's POV about Aaravos's mirror: Runaan's warning about "A Fate Worse Than Death".

This framing device sounds really important. I've been wondering how it'll play out eventually. Is it something about Viren losing his old life he worked so hard to build, or will he lose Claudia in some metaphorical or literal way? Is it something even more personal?

Personally, I'd love to see Viren live and change as a person. There are plenty of high-fantasy male characters like him who go through that kind of transformation: Guts from Berserk, Geralt of Rivia, Jaime from GoT, Ged the Wizard... You know, characters who realise that the things they value are unsustainable or even harmful to themselves and to people around them and even to the world as a whole. Or they realise that superficial things like status and power are unfulfilling and only serve status quo. There are some parallels to toxic masculinity/ hegemonic masculinity, too.

However, I think it'd be interesting if Viren's story will be a deeply tragic one. Anyway I'm here for this.

Growing up

that’s very homosexual of you aaravos

CHILD OF DIVORCE

Viren:

EVERYTIME AARAVOS OPENS HIS MOUTH SOMETHING WEIRD GOES OUT OF IT

LIKE, WHAT DID HE MEANT WITH “I swallowed her🥶😘🫢🫢❤️‍🔥” AND “Our child😩😩😍🫣”

Shots in tdp s5 that make me go 🤨😕☹️

(I am living in fear. Let's go!)