I Was Reading The Extras And Was Graced With A Chapter, From Renee's POV, On Jean's Rescue From The Ravens

Hot Take

Burners should have the ability to fly. They just need to gobble down a couple of bowls of beans 🫘and rip an ungodly mighty fart as noisy as your neighbors at 2am, then off Cal goes, flying to Monfort to meet with his lovely 💜lightning girl.

I guess the foxes are gonna have to start to bet on how long Neil will take to encomend someone's death again

Jeremy: it really was such a stroke of good luck that Neil was visiting when he was because it gave Jean a great alibi for Grayson’s death!! :)

Kevin:

“I don’t want you to be like Zane…I don’t want Coach to be like the master. I don’t want to teach Tanner contrition when he continuously fails my drills or to break my racquet over Cat’s back if I think she should have performed better. I don’t ever want to go back to how things were. Maybe you are fools, and I am the biggest fool for indulging you, but better to be reckless fools than Ravens.”

David "This is way above my paygrade" Wymack

Neil not telling Kevin and Andrew that he flew to LA is so fucking in character for him but we also gotta remember that Wymack knew where Neil went, because Jean called him from the Thai restaurant, and apparently said nothing.

Kevin can be a queen all he wants, his dad still remains the King of Not My Business.

Azula in the Spirit Temple proves Azula is ready for a "redemption arc"

Was just rereading Azula in the Spirit Temple again last night, you know, as one does, and I was struck by the function Mai and Ty Lee serve throughout the narrative. Over and over, they serve to remind her that what she's seeing isn't real, even if what she's seeing is really nice and enjoyable. (There's definitely at least a hint at both Ty Zula and Maizula but I think at this point Repressed Lesbian Azula isn't so much subtext or text as a giant neon sign across everything Azula has ever done.)

However, as the comic progresses, both Ty Lee and Mai get harsher and harsher about delivering their reality check-ins. Azula of course is someone who at this point in time is going to be a seasoned pro at not taking reality at face value, anyway, though the spirit says something to the effect of, "Why not get lost in a dream if it's pleasant?" multiple times to her (a pretty good indicator early on to the reader that this is not a spirit to be trusted, particularly around Azula, and whatever reason it got called to her, it was not ultimately to offer redemption). Anyway, the turning point for when Mai and Ty Lee's check-ins go from mean to downright hostile occurs in the following two panels.

This is after Azula and Ty Lee are talking about "the old days" which, according to the Ty Lee Subconscious mouthpiece were stressful and anxiety inducing (like, literally S2 of the show) to which Azula verbally counters that they all "loved it" although she does note that then Mai had to go and "ruin it" for a "stupid boy" (emphasis hers, she doubles down on this and says, "stupid Zuzu" as well). How super duper straight of you to say, Azula. We're all buying it. Then Subconscious Mouthpiece Ty Lee says, "Maybe you should get help?" and that specifically is what sets Azula to attacking her.

So of course it's not the phrasing here that's harsh or over the top but the suggestion itself. It's notable that Azula's mind puts it in Ty Lee's mouth and not Mai’s (we'll get to that in a bit). But Azula has at this point been running from help and instead fomenting domestic terrorism for years for her own twisted and convoluted reasons and not because most of the comics are shit. And she's a noted liar. Of course, she's not the liar the show builds her up to be, or the liar she herself brags about being. We don't actually see Azula lie all that often in the show and when we do, there's usually a pretty decent explanation (like she's overthrowing an enemy city).

It's important to note that Zuko is being ridiculous in his flashback in Zuko Alone - that's my favorite episode but eight years olds developmentally cannot control when they lie or often even distinguish that they've done so (ten year olds can usually distinguish when they're lying better, but not by much). Zuko at ten and 16 gets a pass because he knows nothing about child development and I'm sure his little mantra didn't spontaneously generate; I suspect Iroh or Ursa handed it to him at some point. But we as viewers know better and cannot take, "Azula always lies," as any kind of proof of anything beyond the abusive nature of both of their childhoods. And given that the nature of these "lies" at the time probably mostly consisted of either ways to avoid punishment, or things she legitimately didn't even do but nobody believed, I think eight year old Azula gets a pass at the time. I had a childhood that was in many ways similar to Azula's. It creates a self-fulfilling prophecy. If the people around you decide you're lying all the time, you're like, "OK, bet."

But that really gets to why Ty Lee's words are so harsh in these panels. Because when you grow up like that, as Azula has, the person you end up lying to the most is yourself. And she's still not ready to face that even by the end of the comic. She's aware she needs help, but it's too scary to reach out for it when in reality nobody is there for her and she's all alone, by her own doing (another thing the comic drives home).

In fact, Azula's subconscious chooses to drive that fact home through Mai. And Subconscious Mai is a lot less nice in her phrasing than Subconscious Ty Lee. I don't think that's an accident. Irl, Azula probably looked to Mai as a gauge for when she was going too far. "Oh, Mai wouldn't go in the slurry... well, okay, fair. I can see by looking at Ty Lee that that was pretty disgusting... And she got stuck in it by that Water peasant anyway, so it was pointless too." "I hated that stupid bear too." Etc etc. Essentially, she could trust Mai to call her on her bs. Which is what Mai did at the Boiling Rock, and Azula's subconscious knows it (but who's our princess best at lying to? Say it with me! Herself!).

And there's nobody she hates more than herself, either. (Actually, given Mai and Ty Lee's roles in this comic I think it's pretty clear that at least on a subconscious level, Azula really wants to make amends with them, which hurts, because... they don't.) The whole thing made me really just want to give her a hug. She needs one. I've been there.

I'm curious to see if she'll make an appearance in Ashes of the Academy. I actually think, given what was presented in Azula in the Spirit Temple, that she wants to change and grow into a better, more healthy person. Obviously that's going to look very different from Zuko's arc. Villain to antihero is not the same arc as antihero to hero. I think she's ready now to start walking that path, though, if she is approached by the right person. (Ty Lee or Mai.) Mai seems to be the more likely of the two to be willing just in terms of how their relationship has always been, how she currently feels about Azula, and given that she's prominent in the upcoming comic. Fingers crossed for some good material!

i knowww wymack was DYINGGGG to get jeremy to the foxes after the scandal. i know he called rhemann like heyyy☺️☺️☺️ tell me about the freshman

I love Jean's POV because that mtf lies so much to himself that at some point, if you dont pay attention, even you start believing him

In the interview part, Kevin gets super mad because the interviewer suggests the Trojans made a mistake signing Jean, this is the first time ever he breaks his "public persona" and it is clearly because he got mad they were attacking Jean

Meanwhile Jean Moreau is out there thinking "Wonder if Kevin slipped like that because they talked badly of the Trojans or because of the alcohol"🤡

And it is not just with Kevin

EVERY TIME someone does something good to him or defends him, this mtf finds every possible reason for it under the Sun, except admitting this person cares and want him well

Jeremy is worried about him? Must be because Jeremy doesnt want him to be an obstacle to the team

Rhemann asks if he is okay? Must be because he is a terrible a player and is disappointing Rhemann on the Court

His other teammates want to spend time with him on the bus? Cant find the reason, but there nust be something

It is absolutely not his fault, and it in fact breaks my heart everytime

I just wish he could see how amazing he is and how much people actually care and like him

This would definitely be the type of gossip I tell absolutely everyone, like: "do you know Neil Josten? The exy player that is a son of a crime Lord? Yeah, I played with him in the last year of High School, let me tell yall, kid was weird"

y’all ever think about neil’s high school classmates? like this weird kid played with them for a year and then a few months later shows up playing for a shitty team and then the media coverage about him just gets progressively more unhinged. (kathy’s show, his press duty, his looks post-evermore, the coverage post-baltimore, etc)

and then a few years later he’s playing in the pros, is like the fastest starting striker in the history of exy, he’s gonna be on the olympic team, and it’s revealed he’s married to the angry blonde goalkeeper

real footage of what happened when they weren’t filming

Im gay af, so everyone is fine around here

quick reminder that my own lesbian-nonbinary-ass genuinely supports the hell outta each and every one of you. regardless if i know you or not, im happy to be living in this shithole of a life in the same world with you.

and im proud of you, i know in my heart just how beautiful, amazing, talented, smart, and worthy you are and i hope you can see that too🏳️‍🌈🌈