So, that lady FH episode was amazing and all, but...

Hoo boy, I already see the discourse around the Ratgrinders' fates forming and it is going to be painful. Be careful around the fandom space.

(I mean, resurrection is still on the table for them, but that's based on if the players feel like it and right now, we're looking at 50/50 odds at bests)

Yeah, don't worry about me. This isn't my first rodeo and also I post a lot about D20 and respond to asks I get but I don't actually personally engage with any of The Discourse (tm).

And I'm not really surprised at the reaction. I know people have been opinionated all season in two main camps (that have a lot of overlap): people dissatisfied with the narrative direction and people deeply sympathetic to the Rat Grinders to the point of being mad at the Bad Kids.

The first camp I mostly understand. I get wishing the cast would explore a certain storyline more. For example, I've been on the Aelwyn redemption arc train since literally the first episode of Fantasy High so I was a little disappointed that when that finally came to a head in Freshman Year, it was a big fight and then very little aftermath/unpacking because Aelwyn was sent to jail right after. And Sophomore Year hadn't been announced so I had no idea that she was gonna get another shot. But I wasn't upset or anything. Adaine at that point still hated her sister. She had no reason to want to reach out. And at the end of the day this is other people playing a game. Brennan presented them all the possible plot threads and they were most interested in self discovery, hanging out with each other, doing Shenanigans, and playing Tomb Raider re: Ankarna. Those are all options they were presented and it's not like they were doing crazy off-roading. It's well within the parameters of what D&D is. If you're gonna watch a show like this (or honestly any show), you have to accept that what's most interesting to you isn't always going to be the most interesting thing to the people in the driver's seat.

So yeah, I feel like this side of things I get (even though I'm fine with how things turned out).

The other camp--people being legit mad at the Bad Kids (and in some cases the actual cast) for treating the Rat Grinders like antagonists instead of victims that they were responsible for empathizing with and redeeming--I find kind of wild.

Like…you're mad at the kids who go to Child Murder School for killing kids who want to end the world and kill them specifically? Literally the first day of school the principal of the school says that adventurers are violent wanderers who engage in shenanigans and enact violence. This is the exact assignment they were given and that's what they're doing.

I think it's wild to at the same time believe that the Rat Grinders (who have killed people) are not responsible for their actions and deserve to be talked down while in the process of causing an apocalypse because they're just kids who were manipulated while at the same time calling the Bad Kids evil lunatics for trying to stop them by killing them (in a world where Revivify and Resurrection exist) even though they are ALSO kids who are doing what they've learned at Child Murder School. The Bad Kids have to be mature enough to thoroughly investigate the situation and have nuance about it but the Rat Grinders don't have any responsibility to not join a shady evil murder plan*? And do the Bad Kids really hate the Rat Grinders to the point where they're doing some overkill in this fight? Absolutely. But it's not like they're killing them because they hate them. They're killing them because they're trying to end the world--and they also happen to hate them. Are we forgetting that Kipperlilly killed Buddy--her own teammate--with a gleeful smile on her face? That was so out of pocket.

They're adventurers! Not guidance counselors! If Jawbone was like, "We need to kill these kids," yeah that would be weird but why would the Bad Kids extend an olive branch to the kids who (1) famously hate them, (2) killed at least one maybe 2 of their own party members, (3) endangered the entire student body population an hour ago, (4) are currently trying to end the world. Hell, Adaine was ready to be mean to her own sister in elf jail literally up until the point Brennan described how rough she looked from the torture and that's when she changed her mind. The Power of Love and Empathy is on the menu but it's a special item you only can get if you know the chef. Everyone else is getting a serving of These Hands. Just because you can find a vegan solution to a problem it doesn't mean you're obligated to.

This all comes down to, "Maybe teenagers shouldn't have godlike powers and the ability to play judge, jury, and executioner" but that's literally the premise of the entire show so you can't get around it without rejecting the show's entire premise. If they were like, "Hmm the systems that underpin our world are questionable and we should change the power structures" instead of, "Let's kill some bad guys!" then that's a totally different thing we're doing here!

And, idk man, this show has always had a Who Framed Roger Rabbit style morality where the normal rules of ethics stop applying when it's funny. They beat the crud out of Ragh and then lied to him that he shit his pants just for the bit. A pirate was rude/kinda racist to Riz so they scared him into killing himself. Riz ate the remains of the sentient (albiet evil) dragon he killed. That's all unhinged behavior but none of that is meant to be serious. Getting upset about Fig sending Ruben to hell to me feels like getting mad that Jerry hit Tom with a cartoonishly large mallet.

None of this is new so I have to assume that people are having a big reaction because they relate to the Rat Grinders or just really like them so it feels bad that the Bad Kids are treating them like fodder rather than beloved NPCs.

But again, this is a world where you can bring people back from the dead and the Rat Grinders have showed intent that is grievously neglectful at best and insanely murderous at worst so I can't muster a lot of sympathy for the fact that the Bad Kids are just taking them down without remorse. I don't think you have to try to empathize with the people who are trying to harm you if you don't want to especially while they are in the process of harming you.

(*And we still don't know how voluntarily they joined this plan. We don't know if they were killed and basically forced into resurrecting with rage or if they just leapt at the chance to join a plan that would let them get one over on their rivals. It literally could be either. We've had kid villains on this show strong armed into being party to evil plans by threat of harm (Aelwyn) as well was kid villains who just had their own selfish motivations and weren't tricked at all (Penelope and Biz). We actually don't have any clear answer on how culpable they are. We don't know if they all have rage crystals (except for Buddy). And we don't know how much having a Rage Crystal effects your actions. The best indicator we got is in this latest ep when Brennan said that there was a mechanic where Porter was going to call anyone with a rage crystal to fight for him but that says to me that he's only directly puppeting them when he uses that action and otherwise they have free will and are just angrier. The Bad Kids don't have a reason to believe definitively that the Rat Grinders are just unwilling puppets even if that is the case so of course they're treating them like enemies. Anyway, this is a whole lot of "I don't knows" but that's only because I've seen a lot of people talking like the Rat Grinders literally aren't in control of their actions but that's not info that we have. It could be true but we don't actually know that so it's not a good argument.)

Person: "OMG, XY is sooooo hot!"

Me: "Mmh, yeah, they are."

Person: "Ha! See?? You do want to sleep with them!"

Me: "What? No! I'm

It is genius to use toothbrushes with characters on it to show how silly top/bottom discourse is.

not to be a hater but all these "verna is the devil" "verna is death" "verna is a demon" no verna is the raven, the hot hot raven

My autistic ass is going wild right now istg

In scream when Billy goes "what's the matter Sid? Looks like you've seen a ghost" and when he goes "What's up? looks like you've seen a ghost" to Jughead in Riverdale made me start stimming like mad? Like I know it may not have been intended to be a reference but my psyched fanboy mind starting going wild-

Heads up folks! Before you think anything you should know that apparently this scene is actually manipulative! Recent study finds that this kinda shit is why we can't have nice things! More at 11!

If the situation had been reversed and sainz had to compromise even one race , these fans would have honored him as the savior for Ferrari, but now that the team principal has come out and said they had to sacrifice one driver 3 times so that the other could get better results obviously , he's evil , that man that everyone is currently talking shit about has brought an actual change in the team for the better , even if isn't perfect yet , we are finally heading in the right direction but some of y'all are too delusional to get that . People are mad at fred because he basically implied that the driver everyone is citing as the next Schumacher has won the last 2 races and a podium because they sacrificed the other driver

IS THAT THE ASTRAL EXPRESS????

days, weeks, months from today I hope twats who shit on gabbie continue to be haunted by her– all the while she is happily perusing her masters in occupational therapy

Something I don't understand is people's thought process when they call Harrow femme. Yes she has earrings but those are bone earrings. Weapons of Convenience. That's the necromancers version of having daggers in your boots and hidden axes in your coat.

She's shown to hate being put in a dress in HtN and she only cares about her appearance when she is being a GOTH NUN. But being a GOTH doesn't make you femme automatically. She keeps her hair short if she has the power to do so and she isn't THAT focused on being prestine. Has dirt under her nails from digging all night, and gets covered in fat and blood sweat so often. She is not afraid to be a gross little weirdo. I wouldn't necessarily call her butch either. She's a secret third thing but if I had to pick between butch or femme, it would not be femme.

[Disclaimer: this is not to hate people who call Harrow femme. I just think it's a little odd and worth putting my two] cents in

I think i'd interact with the smosh fandom so mutch more if it just....didn't feel so icky? Like, i think it's fine in a lot of ways, it's nothing intense, but shipping real people will always rub me the wrong way

It's this weird little parasocialness that always gets to me

A Lyrical breakdown of Hozier's Too Sweet

I'd rather take my whiskey neat

He likes whiskey

My coffee black

He likes black coffee

And my bed at three

He's a bit of a night owl

You're too sweet for me

She does not enjoy those things, so they do not ❌️ make a good partnership.

Woah, revolutionary! Call up the Nobel Prize committee! This man needs to go down in history for his lyrical genius on this specific song!

people need to stopppp putting rules on fandom. if you don't like what someone writes block them and move on. it is literally futile trying to argue or change their mind or tell them to stop. fandom is meant to be fun - and may i remind you it's fictional, just let people enjoy putting their silly little guys into silly little scenarios, please.

oh my god does that trans woman have a kink she participates in with other consenting adults? should we tell everyone? should we invite senator mccarthy

bcs i'm aware of how i automatically percieve people, i earnestly try to give the benefit of the doubt a lot. i tend to believe people are Actually Just That Dumb™ when they're joking about something, so i try to get ahead of that & tell myself people are joking when they say something stupid, so that i don't look stupid

all i've learnt in doing that, is most of the time, people aren't joking. they actually did mean what they say, & i made the situation 10× worse by laughing at what they said.

not only does it reinforce the idea in my head that people are Dumb so i need to take the reins on literally Everything, but it also leads people to believe i'm making fun of them for saying something silly & talking to me less, when, if i knew it were a genuine thing they thought, i would have gladly explained it without judgement

but i don't really know how to stop treating them as jokes, because what if they ARE joking so they laugh at me for how Stupid i am for taking the bait? i can't handle being made a fool of, i think i'd rather die