Yess

MAYA ANGELOU ‘Phenomenal Woman’

OH MY GOOOD

You just combined my two favorite things! Your art and Champagnia's fanfics<3

EreHisu Day 2: Devil and Girl

inspired from one my favorite passages of champagnia's fanfic "gods and monsters" link

The comments under the new HBO podcast episode with Ryan Condal can’t be fit in one post but here are some of them to give you the idea of what’s going on:

In a nutshell, this fandom learned not to hold back from GRRM himself.

So... don't think about Flapjack...

Don't think about a palisman coming to life into a vast world of colors, seeing first a cowlick of blonde hair, a wide enthusiastic smile and eyes so very proud and so very full of love. The immediate connection, the will to learn about each other, how it was suddenly a duo where there was nothing before.

Don't think about how it was the carver and the palisman, then it became Caleb and Flapjack, two souls facing a world with so much to discover and so much to see. Their adventures, their experiences, their dangers and their joys, never leaving one's side as it was a bond meant to last beyond the magic.

Don't think about Flapjack singing Caleb, Caleb feeding Flapjack. Flapjack pulling Caleb's cowlick when the man was really tired but was begging for another chapter from that new book of magic. Last one Flapjack.

Don't think about Flapjack noticing that only his Caleb has round ears. He doesn't care why, he likes that Caleb is unique.

Don't think about people being wary of Caleb because of his appearance, but eventually growing fond of him, because that was simply how Caleb was. Looking in control of it all... while being as lonely as it could get

Don't think about Caleb telling Flapjack stories about a different world, one never seen by the palisman, where the rain was cold and people had round ears. How he used to belong to a place, but never felt a purpose, and eventually realized it wasn't the life he wanted. How he missed only his brother, but that he left him with their village to watch over him and he was to grow up into a man just fine.

Don't think about just another day, only to turn out into that meeting, when the girl with the brown mane came into the picture. And Flapjack couldn't stand her at first.

Don't think about when he started to like her. How she was nice, fun. And how she made Caleb so incredibly happy.

Don't think about the years passing, a couple united, Flapjack watching over them. Love in the house, a baby on the way, another one Flapjack could pull the hair of. The eternity of two lives to enjoy the beauty of it all.

...

Don't think about another round eared person coming in. How Caleb was so happy to see.

Don't think about Flapjack feeling something wrong into such person, perhaps because he felt nothing like Caleb, perhaps because he kept glaring in his direction. But, again, it made Caleb happy. So it was fine. It was.

Don't think about when it wasn't.

Don't think about the fight, when Caleb tried to use Flapjack but got scarred instead so was pushed away. It never felt like he was an object, a bare magical staff to him. It felt like he was being cherished, protected, as a friend.

Don't think about how it was the last of Caleb. The last of his immaculate skin, the last of his gentle smiles. The last of his curious eyes, opened for the world around, because he had fallen for this world and everything in it.

Don't think about the pain, the loneliness, the guilt. How it was too inbearable to stay with the grieving mane woman and her child.

Don't think about how from then on, all Flapjack wanted was to forget.

Don't think about how guilty it made him feel.

...

Don't think about his new life, being protected by the Bat Queen with so many other palismans. A time when things hurt less, but the world doesn't have much colors, and Flapjack prefers not doing what's been told just to feel something less spent.

Don't think about a day like others, where he remembers Caleb, but not all. His face, his figure, his gesture are gone. All that is left is how he used to make him feel.

Don't think about how Flapjack still sings in the morning for him.

Don't think about adoption day, something Flapjack sees as another way to be a bit of a rascal just for the taste of it. He doesn't dislike other witches. There's even one with round ears like Caleb, she seems fun. But the Bat Queen says that there needs to be a click to truly find yourself a witch partner. Flapjack knows that, he felt that a long time ago.

Don't think about the palismans being taken, the fear, and how the round eared girl is calming them down. Flapjack likes her.

Don't think about the crash, don't think about the forest, the uncertanty.

Don't think about the confusion.

Don't think... about the meeting. How at first Flapjack is so very wary of the boy. He stole the palismans, his friends at the end, and round eared girl seems to believe he is evil and Flapjack trusts her enough. He is very rude, very annoying, very not likeable.

Don't think of the chase in the city.

Don't think of the top of the building, the plan, the forced alliance.

Don't think of that talk. One that sparks something so far it is foreign in Flapjack. Because the boy feels different in a world made of magic, he feels purposeless in a time of responsibilities, and yet there is a spark in his eyes when he talks about what a single spell can offer. It's absurd, because it's all pushed back behind a wall of rigor and harshness and yet Flapjack can see it all so clearly.

Don't think about how Flapjack wondered if he was seeing right, because this boy betrayed, lied, he did bad things.

Don't think about how Flapjack knows. My name is Hunter. This boy is much more than what he shows, what his exterior wood might show. Maybe this time it will be the palisman to carve out the best of it.

...

Don't think about how this is not Caleb.

Don't think about how Flapjack knows they are similar in some ways, but this is not him. As they go from witch and "subject of his observations", as he used to call him, to witch and palisman, to actually Hunter and Flapjack, he realizes there are several differences from Caleb and Hunter.

Don't think about how Caleb was older, free, so ready to take onto the world and experience every moment. Hunter is young, bitter and trapped into a cage made of duties and hopes for the future. Caleb was calm and serene very often, an aura of serenity and joy all around him. Hunter seems lost at times, constantly battling what he feels, what he wants and what he needs, losing every single time. Caleb was a carver. Hunter is a guard.

Don't think about the biggest difference, that makes sense to it all to Flapjack. Caleb has been nurturing him for so long, never needing his help. This boy, his new witch, he needed his help. This time, Flapjack was going to be the one taking care of someone.

Don't think about how he already knows how, as he has been taken very good care of in the past. He knows what to do, and wants to be there on every step of the way.

Don't think that Flapjack is ready to protect Hunter no matters what's to come.

And he is not going to lose another friend

Literally this

People are very fond of saying that Alicent is the one who put her family's lives in danger because she made the decision to press Aegon's claim to the throne. According to them, Rhaenyra would never have done anything to her brothers if they simply never challenged her rule.

I just don't think that holds up for a number of reasons but one is in fact Ser Laenor.

Let's consider that from Alicent and the Greens perspective, this guy was enabling Rhaenyra's lies. It wasn't a matter of just being uncertain over whenever he fathered those children and just choosing to believe in the end that he did, it was a matter of being fully aware those boys weren't biologically his.

And I have played my part here, faithfully… for 10 years.

The part Laenor is talking about here is "faithfully" maintaining that he is the boys' biological father for a decade. That's a long time to lie for someone. But he does it.

And yet despite this, he ends up being "murdered". And who does Rhaenyra marry very soon after despite the suspicions about her being guilty that surround her for years after? Daemon.

As Alicent obviously isn't all knowing, with what she is given, Rhaenyra & Daemon chose to get rid of someone who never once put the claims of her children in danger.

How then do people expect Alicent to think "well, as long as I don't do anything we should be fine." As if Laenor wouldn't be an example to her of that obviously not being the case.

This fandom's romanticization of abusive relationships will never not infuriate me.

It's quite ironic when you think about it. People here always claim to be hardcore feminists who want Rhaenyra on the throne cause fuck the patriarchy, but at the same time they cheer her relationship with Daemon who groomed her since she was little, took her to a brothel when she was still a teenager and aimed to ruin her reputation to marry her and claim the iron throne through her. Like you can't tell me he didn't do it out of spite cause Viserys named her heir, and that was the only way he could get the power he always wanted. All of this is not even the worst part, since he physically abuses her and neglects her after a miscarriage.

The fandom also loves Viserys/Aemma, as if he didn't sleep with her when she was thirteen, got her pregnant repeatedly, ruining her health in the process, and finally butchered her like a lamb at the slaughter for a son.

Lmao honestly I get that a lot of ships in hotd are problematic, and it's super hard to find something pure and sweet, but the fandom really chose to stan the worst of the worst wtf

#Tag yourself

I wish you a happy new year 2024!!!

Something striking about the relationship between Rhaenyra and Alicent that the show tries to awkwardly scoot past is that time and time again, Alicent sacrifices her own interests and desires for Rhaenyra's benefit, while Rhaenyra never does the reverse. Alicent teaches Rhaenyra history, dresses and crowns her for her investment ceremony, comforts her after her mother's death, advises Viserys *against* naming Aegon heir, supports reconciliation between Rhaenyra and Viserys that ultimately gets her father and sole supporter fired, seriously considers switching sides to her despite the severe risk to her own children, and goes against her father to try and save her life. The most Rhaenyra gives Alicent is a few hollow words of praise in episode 8.

Though the show doesn't seem to realize it, their relationship isn't one of equals, but of master and servant. Otto and Alicent are parallels in this sense - both are in a sense, servants of the Targaryens who do not wish to merely serve. But the show buys into the expectation of their service and Targaryen masterdom uncritically: the great crime of Otto and Alicent is their attempt to subvert the natural order of things rather than meekly serving their Targaryen masters. It's why Alicent is most sympathetic when she is loyal to Rhaenyra, but the reverse isn't true, because why would Rhaenyra be expected to do anything for a mere servant like Alicent?

Which really just goes to show the big class blind spot the show has. By presenting "goodness" as solely a function of how closely one can follow Viserys' orders, they're regurgitating one aspect of medieval social customs to oppose another. With this context, Rhaenyra and Alicent's relationship feels less healthy and a lot more like a premonition of Alicent's relationship to Viserys, with similar power imbalances. Rhaenyra and Alicent love each other, but Rhaenyra sees Alicent as a sidekick at best, doesn't take her seriously as someone with her own inner life and desires, and is sensitive to Alicent's perceived disobedience ("questioning my virtue is an act of treason.")

I think it also gives context to Criston and Alicent's relationship, given that Criston is *also* relatively low nobility, and a servant to the Targaryens, who feels taken advantage of by them, and whose great crime is trying to be something other than a servant, to *make* kings, not just to serve them.

no one’s here for me