After much research I have constructed a Jose Carioca scoring system to judge how in character an appearance is.

yeah ok !

so in hunted and crystallized we see his psychosis delve into more severity considering the fact that he’s hallucinating (visually and audibly), his personality has changed, etcetera . i wouldn’t say that these seasons are great psychotic rep but that doesn’t change the fact that jay is still canonically psychotic and denying that part of his character because you dislike the way ninjago deals with characterization in the later seasons is silly to me

now this is just my own interpretation of the situation in skybound as someone with a psychotic disorder myself lol . TO CLARIFY!!! I AM NOT SAYING THIS IS LIKE. THE CANON THING THAT HAPPENS OR THE CANON REASON OR WHAAAATEVER . THIS IS JUST HOW I INTERPRETED IT BASED ON MY OWN EXPERIENCES . (clears throat)

aside from the scenes in hunted and crystallized i think skybound is a pretty good representation of jay’s mental state specifically with less bizarre delusions . i personally recognize the severe succumbing into a particular belief that jay bases his behavior around lol . his emotions become really unstable (“it’s because im from a junkyard, isn’t it?!”) and he starts bargaining and changing his behavior excessively in order to confide to this belief he has (where the only evidence is the fact that nya was standing next to him in his vision, which he sort of states?? “besides, even if it WERE true…”) . even when he gets the absolute fuck beat out of him and has to have an eyepatch to cover the wound, all he can think about is the fact that it’s justifying his beliefs (“just like the one in my future!”) . these are all things i myself have experienced while being delusional over a similar situation (platonic, not romantic, but still lol).

jay is also arguably pretty depressed at the start of the season so the sudden change in demeanor from sad and mopey and whiny to loud and frantic and snappy and paranoid was notable to me . just like how despite the fact that nya has frequently dismissed his affections, which he even KNOWS of and ADMITS to in the first episode with zane, jay quickly seems to “forget” this and just kind of . does whatever it takes to get with her . (not to claim his mental state makes his behavior okay . to me it seems like a delusional episode) . i know it’s a cartoon or whateva and jay obviously has a point to believe that he and nya are ending up together but like , from any character’s perspective and from jay’s own, i can understand why it seems so wonky

even before skybound jay just overall is incredibly impulsive , emotionally unstable , seemingly experiences racing thoughts and speech , and him having poor hygiene is (unfortunately) a running joke in the series . he lies for the sake of feeling secure and does incredibly dangerous things to himself (??throwing himself off of a building with a makeshift glider despite the fact that he failed 5 times previously) and is easily distracted , etcetera etcetera

of course ninjago won’t outright try to admit that a character is psychotic because of stigmatization and it’s not like jay’s experiences in skybound are CANONICALLY the result of an episode , and therefore, if you don’t agree with this interpretation then that is a-okay . it’s just me recognizing something in him that I experience and then trying to understand jay’s brain . my experience as a psychotic individual also won’t be the same as other people’s so there’s that too

headcanonsssss ? personally i hc jay is schizoaffective . i think that jay has more prolonged recovery periods / better prognosis than he would if he had schizophrenia . but i also know a really common one is borderline jay, which i also totally understand and agree with (especially because people with bpd also experience psychosis! fun) . there’s also the other bpd aka brief psychotic disorder which also could easily apply to him

I think that it wouldn’t be weird if the story were to be an enemies to lovers, as the building blocks would be there, but it wouldn’t be weird for it to be an enemies to siblings. It depends on where you choose to take it next.

I see it more as siblings mainly because I’ve always read the story with a large age gap between the two. Ambroise feels significantly older than Kit, an so I never saw it as lovers because of that perspective. But, I don’t think that was ever explicitly mentioned, nor I don’t know if that was ever your intention. So it could’ve been a personal interpretation.

I hoped this helped!

P. S. I really love your writing so much. You’re honestly an incredible writer and your style is so beautiful. I always look forward to reading your work :)

YESSSS @mossy-tables SIBLING RELATIONSHIP👏👏👏 HARD AGREEEEEEEE XD

I see the potential for enemies to lovers too, like it is such a valid direction for the story, esp with that chapter where Ambrose is using his tie to strangle Kit, but my dumbass honestly saw that as the *most* sibling-esque kind of fight [now in hindsight after reading over it again, I see the enemies to lovers thing too] — but debasing Kit like a dog, making him crawl and then going frenzied and just looking at Kit fighting back like: “are you actually this clinically stupid?! Like you have objectively no chance of winning” but does that stop siblings fighting? Never. But I am delighted that some kind of sibling energy shined through a little in the story :D

I also think the age gap between Ambrose and Kit is significant, though I don’t think I ever said it — actually I think I made their age gap quite small which doesn’t make sense because Ambrose has his entire career all sorted out and so does his friends which would make him actually, closer to Jude’s age, around his thirties while Kit is in his early twenties and still trying to figure life out.

P.S. thank you so much for sharing your insights and your too-kind words, I think I may just explode into confetti right now 🎊 genuinely thank you🫶 also!! I amended the age gap bc of you to make it make more sense so thank you🫰

P.P.S Personal familial anecdote — not at all important to the discussion — below cut 😏😏😏 just my personal exp of sibling energy

Thanks for asking!

There’s nothing in the manga or anime that indicates whether Kaiba designed more than one weapon for Gozaburo. I interpret it as likely that he did, however and tbh I find it something interesting to explore in fanfiction.

Here’s my train of thought on how Kaiba could have ended up designing multiple weapons for Kaiba Corporation. The use of Kaiba’s design for military application seems to have occurred at least a year before his takeover of Kaiba Corporation. In both the manga and the anime, Kaiba’s design was immensely profitable. I think that it’s plausible that once it was obvious that Kaiba’s designs added to Kaiba Corporation’s prestige and bottom line, Gozaburo would have exerted pressure on Kaiba to keep on designing things that had military applications. To go further out on this tree branch, given that Gozaburo had enormous leverage on Kaiba (Mokuba and the fact that he’s their legal guardians) it’s at least plausible that Kaiba did design further military applications for him.

I keep using the word “plausible,” because I recognize that this is my own interpretation, and it is at the end of the day, only one of many different equally plausible interpretations.

I tend to differentiate a little between interpretation and head canon. For me, interpretations are the inferences I make about the characters, their motivations and back stories, the events and how the characters are perceiving and experiencing them, based on what I’m watching in the anime or reading in the manga. I think of head canons as the extrapolations I make based on those interpretations primarily for writing fanfiction.

Random head canons about Kaiba designing weapons:

Kaiba wonders if Gozaburo had been more welcoming and decent to them, if he would have been as set against designing weapons, or whether he would have done it voluntarily as an act of loyalty to Gozaburo for giving them a loving home. He doesn’t know what he would have done and that bothers him, although it’s something he’s never discussed with anyone, especially Mokuba. (Link to a ficlet with Kaiba trying to sort this out.)

Kaiba has tried to hide the extent of his weapons design from Mokuba and how much it eats at him; it’s just another thing they never talk about.

One of the reasons Kaiba feels complicit is that he can’t bring himself to accept that he was a helpless, abused child. The other reason is that although he hates the loss of life that can be attributed to his designs, he also loved designing weapons. They made him feel powerful, and are an expression of his own hatred and anger.

https://archiveofourown.org/works/24615982

this is exactly why i love gigolas so much - that in lotr canon their relationship changes and with every step it is more complicated and entangled, and by no means is it romantic. 

it appears obvious that they love each other - care for each other deeply, want the best for each other and feel safe when together (“yet you comfort me”). depending on an interpretation, you can argue if in the narrative they ever reach the level of a purely romantic relationship, but the most of their being together is a stretch of gray spaces. i love them, because - both being extremely vivid, identifiable, skilled, distinct and heroic characters - together they are undefinable. 

the gray space that is explored in this fanfic is the very beginning of their time together - when the Fellowship is leaving from Rivendell; before they make the effort to trust each other and appear extremely weird for each other. 

Hi I’m Ashu and I want YOU to ask me about my Agent 3 / Agent 4 / Agent 8 headcanons

…Please?

Do not tag as kin/me.