Realizing I should probably make an intro post at some point-
Hey there! Honestly, I don't really care what you call me, but if you'd like something that's less of a mouthful than my username, Aly is great! I'm an aroace agender creature, so use any pronouns! I'm not a minor, but I'm not saying more than that <2
I don't have a DNI, just don't be a bitch. I am not afraid to exercise the block button; everyone just be nice and respect people. Fuck ICE though. And if you put my art in genai I'm going to put you in a blender.
And with that, anything about fandom or my art and writing is under the cut :]
I am into a ton of different fandoms, do not expect any consistency long term lol.
I tend to get very obsessed for a hot second and then kinda put it in my back pocket forever and remember it's there every three months. I wield my AuDHD like a weapon to reblog and write and draw like a madman for six months then get a new obsession.
Right now, it's bloodymary (and Grace/Simon/Engie, which does not have a ship name yet, still figuring that out) and stuntstar my beloved.
My ao3: I_defy_categorization | Archive of Our Own
I use #aly yaps for posts where I... y'know. Yap a lot. I tend to reblog a ton of stuff all the time, so if you just want my stuff, I've got a sideblog with just that: @sideblog-steven
I also use #Look Inside Of Me au for my monster!simon bloodymary au, and I've just started cowriting a Grace/Simon/Engie fic with @cannibal-walleye which is not out yet.
I also have some original characters, which I use #the rising storm for, and then character tags (like #trs crimson, #trs dove, #trs tempest, etc). Honestly I haven't posted a ton of art for them yet, but believe me it's coming. Eventually.
I also need to come up with a better au name, that's just the one I've used as a wip for like 5 years and now can't seem to leave behind lol.
Those are also the lovely dragons and drake you see in the art above. Here look at them again. My babiesssss :)
Some other fandoms include: The Magnus Archives, Minecraft (mostly Hermitcraft and the Life Series), Gravity Falls, Five Night's at Freddy's, Epic the Musical, The Amazing Digital Circus and I'm probably forgetting a couple but that's good enough for now.
Feel free to dm me OR use my ask box, I'd love to talk!!! If you've got cool thoughts about the characters and want someone to listen, I'm here hehe. Also if anyone wants to ask me about my stuntstar au I'm writing that'd be cool too ππ
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After spending 3+ years on the same ship Iβd imagine Grace would take pics of rocky like how someone takes pictures of their slightly weird off putting cat
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
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swap au Simon was coerced rather than physically forced on the mission. Also yes Simon was in a religious cult as a child and still struggles from it. while swap grace flat out denies the cult of eden.
I've been seeing so many cool as hell character analyses of Simon's character and his aggression, that I thought I'd take a crack at it! This post is greatly inspired by @ctrl-shift-alt-9 's blog, they have some really cool ideas to bring to the table, and they don't shy away from making Simon look bad.
Which, I wanna open up a paragraph to say, Simon looking bad is fucking important. If you're against the death penalty, you have to be against it for everyone, not just for people you pick and choose. If it is, you'll try to make the people who you don't think deserve it fit in the category of innocent person, which I think ended up being applied to Simon. To believe in restorative justice, you have to believe the not-innocent person has the means to get better. Which is exactly what I think is going on with Simon! And isn't that so much more compelling, anyway? That someone who was once terrible and terrifying decided to make the world a better place instead? Rather than being perfect from the start, or doubling down and insisting on what they did?
Many people are inclined to believe Simon has an aggression disorder. Maybe it's true! I've seen someone ( @lxcke ) point it might be intermittent explosive disorder, which, his behavior in the movie really matches what I've read up on, almost like it was tailor made. I wouldn't be surprised, Simon grew up with all kinds of trauma and that shit has lasting effect on the mind. But, this post here also points out that people get really weird when they're cornered and scared. Simon is in an extremely stressful, painful and scary situation, and he knows it.
That's what I wanna talk about. He knows it. He's bizarrely self-aware of his responses and reactions through the entire movie. One scene that comes to mind is, when chasing for the location of the skeleton, he apologizes to Ava for the radiation blast. Those are his words:
Like ctrl-shift-alt-9 pointed out, his past history implies aggression was likely encouraged and a safe emotion to feel. Someone like him, with his track record, being this self-aware of his emotions while in the Situation That Makes You Lose The Plot is fucking commendable. Not only that, he's admitting vulnerability and fear to his captors. He's confessing guilt and apologizing to people he knows might not want to pull him out of the blood ocean, might just execute him in there. Like, yeah he insists several times to Ava that he'll be free, but that's a normal response especially with his agreement with the COI. We're looking at what he's like when in touch with his emotions.
In several times in the movie, Simon lashes out, and then immediately feels bad about it and tries to ground himself. When he breaks the speaker and sobs afterwards, when he hits the panel and says sorry to it. When he tries to get the computer to work after finding the SM-8 the first time - he hits the mouse but moves on and says it's not his problem. Even when he's talking to the eel's speaker voice, he hits the panel again, then sighs tiredly and cries.
This man is extremely aware he's inside the Torment Nexus, and he's trying to remain focus and not crash out and lose his entire shit so he can survive. I'd say he's focused on beating his own aggression, has been deconstructing it for a while, in order to, like he said to Ava during the hangar scene, make amends. I think it's a fair assessment to say, based on such observations, he doesn't want to be violent, not anymore. Someone who automatically says sorry to an inanimate object is someone whose first intention is to be kind. At least, kinder. I always think your second thoughts on something (saying sorry) are your real ones, cause the first thoughts (hitting shit) are usually the ones conditioned into you.
Hell, I'd say Simon is way more in touch with his own emotions, way more aware of his own responses to pain and punishment, than anyone in the COI, definitely more than Ava. He's probably been dealing with his guilt and what he wants to do about it since Filament Station and prison.
And, why, why in the fuck is he so self-aware? How can he be so adjusted in the Makes You Crash Out And Lose Your Shit Death Box? It took until the end of the movie for him to unleash the Butcher again and hit every teeth in the submarine. Is this bad writing? Did Markiplier, in all his complexities for Simon, made someone who irrealistically reacts to life or death situations?
Nah. I honestly, genuinely believe it was that or dead. Simon needs to ground himself and focus on survival, and that's part of how he does it. From locking in and making his own map of the AT-5 tunnels, to apologizing and admitting out loud that he's scared, to try and make peace with his imminent death when he was down to the last light of his oxygen. If he didn't have those qualities, he wouldn't have survived long enough for us to see him in the movie. He died from circumstances outside of his control (aka GIANT FISH eating the submarine that was coming to get him), and until then, he survived on his own wits and by coping any way he could. Learning how to grow and recover from his violence.
He'd be dead long before the movie started if he didn't try, and the voices even try to use insecurities based on that against him. Half measured. Half commited. Never enough.
Well I think he was pretty damn committed. And that's how an eel eats shit.
Fucking preach it, brother. Simon is important because of his implied problems. He was a Butcher long before Filament Station. The dude was a criminal. A war criminal. He fucked up, but the people who are picking and choosing who lives and who dies down in the ocean are just as fucked up as him because of that very reason.
The COI is just as guilty. The system is guilty. The criminal is guilty, and yet they are the only one paying the price. Nobody wins when we are killing each other. Again, a very "Markiplier" message to send. Peace and love.
I think Simon was influenced by Eden. It made him worse. Peer pressure and "do or die" mindset will make you do insane shit, so when he "got out", when he got smacked with COI "live at all costs" propaganda, it changed him. I think he was genuinely down with it for a while, entertaining hope in a holding cell somewhere.
For however long it was between Filament and Iron Lung, Simon did an entire one-eighty on world view. It's a whole character arc that we do not get to see. It could be a book's worth of writing material (hence my extremely content-dense blog!)
But, we're watching the end of his arc by the time of this movie. This isn't Simon's story, it's his conclusion. This is the end of a really long and crazy space opera. Simon already deconstructed Eden's ideologies in his head. He was already in the process of getting his anger under control. He was doing self-soothing techniques that were clearly things he learned with time to manage. Trial and error. This expedition was supposed to be the last step in getting out, because Simon had already done all the other steps.
It's not that he's good. It's that he's bad and still trying.
"What is better? To be born good, or to overcome your evil nature through great effort?"
He trusted the COI at face-value and the system murdered him in return. I think that's a huge message in and of itself.
Simon spent his entire time alive attempting to make peace with the reality of his life, but when he was asked to make peace with his death, he couldn't. He just couldn't let go of his hope, even when the pendant (the symbol of that hope) shattered. Even when there was huge fucking monster coming for him, Simon was ramming the fucker back.
I think that's an important message to receive from this. To believe in restorative justice, you have to believe the guilty person has the means to get better. Simon believed he could get better. He fought down to the bitter end for the chance to get better.
He never once let go of the idea of a world out there with him in it as a reformed citizen. He never once, despite his grief and inner turmoil convincing him otherwise, let himself fully believe that the Quiet Rapture was truly the end of all things.
And he's a war criminal.
As much as I write "past-timeline Eden Simon" to be a complete cunt, it's only because I am exploring what made his arc into a better person so meaningful.
You cannot understand the ramifications of a character's ability to be better when you've never seen their underbelly. I'm trying to expose that!
Thanks for tagging me. I love reading other posts on this topic!!!
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So I might have gotten bored and made a full list of when the Magnus Archives episodes (is this the word for when it is a podcast? idk idc) statements happen in chronological order, as well as the dates on which the statements were given (this is what the chronological order is based on). Would anyone like the list?
Feel free to make a copy for yourself and share with your friends.
All dates are based off of the days on which the statements involved were given, any dashed lines represent unsurety in terms of exact date (for example, I might know it happened in March, but not whether it was the 8th or the 26th), and NO DATE represents episodes giving absolutely no data as to what time it could be (these are mostly at the end).
#my family does this thing#when we've majorly unfucked a room or done chore that we were putting off#or whatever. Any sort of household Improvement.#'Come brag on me.'#I means come look I cleaned/rearranged/did dishes/put away the laundry#and the scripted response is 'oh nice it looks SO much better in here now'#like my mom did this when we were kids.#'girls comr brag on the garage I finally organized it so I can get my car in there'#and we go and 'ooh' and 'aah' and tell her how nice it looked and how she did a good job#and we could have her 'come brag on' us for like doing the dishes or cleaning our rooms#I do it to my wife now too#it's a dialogue that means#'I did a chore and it feels like an Accomplishment even if it objectively wasn't a big thing. Please acknowledge this.'#and#'Wow you sure did do a thing. It has improved our material circumstance even if only in a small way. Thank you for doing it.'#like yeah scrubbing the pans is my Job and it's a Little Task but sometimes it feels like a Big Task#and it's nice to have an Accepted Script where I can just demand 'I have functioned as an independent adult praise me with great praise' - by @thepioden
Anya is live and ready to show you everything. Watch her strip, dance, and perform exclusive shows just for you. Interact in real-time and make your fantasies come true.
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idk I just think happy queer stories need to be properly labeled so I can be warned beforehand to not get invested in the main ship because there won't be a culminating catharsis of mutual corruption and self-betrayal crystalizing into an inevitable murder-suicide :/ . like I don't think happy endings in queer media shouldn't be "allowed" to exist or whatever I just think tbh honestly to be honest that those creators need to think and be more responsible and let me have my boundary of nottttt wanting to see that. this is because I feel it's really important for me to see myself represented and reflected positively on screen and the real truth of my lived experience is that I'm gay and evil and I'm not going to make it.
