Big Mama Is Quite A High Profile Person So When Four Sons Show Up From Seemingly Nowhere People Are Bound

kill 'character did nothing wrong'. nurture 'character did everything wrong and i was whooping and cheering the whole time'

Leo likes to talk, it’s part of being the face man & his role as a strategist that can manipulate situations to be in his favour but because he likes to talk there are certain words that can act as tells for his behaviour 

“Spill the beans Leo! Every time you say ‘indubitably’ I know you’re up to something”

In Bug Busters we learn that Leo says ‘indubitably’ when he’s trying to hide something but Leo also has another word that’s indicative to his true mood.

Ninjocity.

There are two prominent times where Leo uses the word Ninjocity.

Donnie: I don’t know how much longer we can keep this up, he’s crushing us!

Leo: Really? ‘Cause I thought my overall ninjocity was totally working

Raph: So what if I say he- that word a lot. It’s a good word. We need to be that word.

Leo: Relax Raph. We’ve got this hero thing wired. I mean, our ninjocity is off the charts

The two times Leo uses the word Ninjocity is in Many Unhappy Returns when he’s fighting the Shredder & at the start of the Movie.

Leo likes to make jokes when he’s stressed he admits to it in the very first episode saying it’s ‘how he copes’ & people have discussed that the reason Leo is making so many jokes at the start of the movie might be because he’s stressed about the idea of having just been made leader & is trying to make Raph take the role back. 

Leo using the word ‘ninjocity’ at the start of the movie is just proof of how stressed he was at the idea of being leader because the only other time he ever really uses that word is when his family is fighting a beast-like Shredder for the first time.

When people think of Leo in the episode Many Unhappy Returns they mostly think about how he was able to outmanoeuvre Big Mamma & how he knew his families strengths so well he was able to state exactly how they were able to hold off the Shredder while he & Splinter were at the Battle Nexus, but Leo’s attitude at the start of Many Unhappy Returns is perhaps the closest he’s ever acted in the show to how he acts at the start of the movie.

Meaning that at the start of Many Unhappy Returns his humour is cranked up to 11 & it appears like he isn’t taking anything seriously.

Leo: Thanks for doing the dirty work for us big up Shreddy!

Splinter: Not now Blue!

Leo: What? I thought a nickname might give us a nice repport.

Leo: One & Oh baby!

Leo: Going to need to make a two & Oh T-Shirt after this!

Leo: Oh Cheater! Don’t think we’re letting you keep those!

Raph: This is serious stuff Leo! Would you shore up our right flank already!

Leo: What? Mid-battle banter’s my thing like how your’s is saying words like flank

Leo likes to make quips in battle but the only times, he makes joke after joke, are the start of the movie & the start of the episode Many Unhappy Return or to put in other words the time he was trying to get out of being leader & the time his family was fighting Shredder for the first time.

People seem to think Leo had every thing under control the entirety Many Unhappy Returns because of how expertly he outmanoeuvred Big Mamma but he was only able to think of a plan involving Big Mamma /after/ Splinter suggested going to her. Before that he spends the start of the episode making joke after joke but whenever his families attention is off him

He’s terrified.

The fact that Leo’s actions at the start of the movie & the start of the episode Many Unhappy Returns are comparable means that the idea of being leader was as terrifying to Leo as fighting a beast-like Shredder.

And this is further evidenced by them being the only two real times Leo uses the word ‘ninjocity’, if Leo is stressed & scared he’s making joke after joke, appearing to not take anything seriously & the word ‘ninjocity’ makes an appearance in his vocabulary.

Leo likes to talk to try & distract others from his true feelings & intentions but he has tells.

If he says ‘indubitably’, he’s trying to hide something. If he says ‘ninjocity’ he’s stressed out & scared & is one bad event away from a panic attack.

flashfam is an interesting case study because of just how healthy and interconnected they are as a community. sooooo fascinating to me how wally (or anyone else) can’t ever truly hit rock bottom because no matter what happens he’ll have like nine family members showing up to help him through it. even when the worst case scenario did happen and linda died- when wally was actively suicidal and the literal grim reaper was coming after him- all the speedsters checked on him and helped him through it and in the end literally locked him in a room so that they could fight the black flash for him. there’s a reason the villains always neutralize the other speedsters first before trying to fight wally one on one. and it’s so interesting to think about how that’s different from other corners of dc

hello my hand is gonna fall off

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Part 7!

The effects of ninpo overuse are beginning to take their toll

So...this whole part wasn't in my plans at all when I was going to draw, but then the characters started talking on their own and I just sat there and traumatized myself.

I still have one more already finished part left, but I'll save that for later.

Part 1

WOOO YEAH GIVE IT UP FOR EMMA PROMISEDNEVERLAND

“But Emma is Emma, so if there’s a chance, I think that ‘amazing Emma’ will come out again." 

 - Shirai, from the exhibition interview (translated by 1000sunnygo)

Elden Ring, my reading on Marika

Having finished the DLC, I am thinking of this scene. The scene from Ranni's ending, where she replaces Marika as a Goddess and Marika vanishes, finally passing away.

And one of the biggest twists in the game, alongside one of the major unsolved mysteries in the story is the reveal that Marika herself shattered the Elden Ring for some purpose, with the most sympathetic reading being that this was the only way she had to escape from the control of The Greater Will and recover her freedom.

The DLC expands on Marika, giving us an origin for her.

That is, of the horrors her people suffered at the hands of the Hornsent, the same people she would command Messmer to wage War upon them and commit what seems to have been a brutal genocide.

Now, my personal reading is that, after what happened to her people, Marika did a metaphorical deal with the devil. Either The Elden Beast or Metyr arrived to The Lands Between near Marika's village, and she accepted to be a Goddess and a servant of The Greater Will in exchange for her vengeance. and to be perfectly fair to Marika, this was the closest to Justice her people would ever get.

Now, Count Ymir suggests Marika was influenced by flawed advice from Metyr, the Mother of Two-Fingers, who lost contact with The Greater Will. But he also believes the moons are just the closest celestial object to our planet, so he is full of Shit. Because that doesn't yet explain The Elden Beast.

In any case, Marika made that deal and became a Goddess and she got her vengeance. And she fulfilled her duty as accorded, Conquering and expanding and forcing everyone to bow to The Greater Will. Who knows what she felt during this time. If she lusted for power as her empire grew, or if she was horrified and felt trapped by learning what becoming a goddess meant.

Because everything about Marika is always specifically filtered through someone else. Even the closest we get, her very words spoken by her, are filtered through Melina.

The second closest we get is Marika's village, where we see the things she left behind, Specific actions she and she alone did for nobody else but the memory of her village. and I say this because This:

is the closest we ever, ever get to meeting Marika. a broken face of someone who has long stopped being human, he don't see her eyes, we don't hear her voice. Yet you know what I see here?

Marika's Tired. So, so, so, so... Tired.

Was that it? that at the very end, Marika simply grew tired? was she, in her last moments, thinking back and remembering The Grandmother by the tree, and wishing she could be there for one final slumber?

And so maybe, regardless of what The Age of Stars means, on whether it is the "good ending" or not, this is the ending Marika wanted. For someone, any of her children, to hopefully succeed her and let her rest at last.

And what we see is that in the last moments of the Shaman whose entire home village was cruelly massacred (and who delivered blood upon blood onto those responsible and unto the innocent, and whose entire life was now defined to the service of some greater power), she is being cuddled in the arms of her step-daughter (of whom she may be Ranni's biological father), a moment of peace and warm before the end of a long road.

Maybe one of the things the DLC was meant to show us wasn't why Marika did what she did. It was to show us that it was time for Marika to go back home at last

Red Robin (2009) #25

This is actually the reason you two are siblings WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU