White People Go Like “is Anyone Going To Redesign This Nonhuman Evil Character As A Poc?” And Not

As a fandom, we have to acknowledge that Akaashi is weirder than Bokuto.

Lavi and Kanda the siblings ever

old movies, public domain, classics, other such things: the read-more edition

this is a carry over of my original post but under a read-more for more extensive and readily available editing. updated whenever possible

the purposes of this post continue to be “eclectic” but to be “brief”, is for people who enjoy consuming Media and want to have online resources on hand to find them, especially when they are non-contemporary, non-mainstream, and/or on the obscure side (but not always!). it has evolved far beyond what the title says basically

feel free to send your own resources!

Weiterlesen

Hey everyone, I know it's going to be a busy day for a lot of people, but Google enrolled everyone over 18 into their AI program automatically.

If you have a google account, first go to gemini.google.com/extensions and turn everything off.

Then you need to go to myactivity.google.com/product/gemini and turn off all Gemini activity tracking. You do have to do them in that order to make sure it works.

Honestly, I'm not sure how long this will last, but this should keep Gemini off your projects for a bit.

I saw this over on bluesky and figured it would be good to spread on here. It only takes a few minutes to do.

DGM 254: Allen's Helix (long post)

⚠️First of all, I’ll be tagging this under DGM spoilers so if you have somehow stumbled upon this even if you’re avoiding spoilers for Chapter 254 (or the most recent DGM talks as a whole), this is your warning to turn back now!

All images from translated chapters are courtesy of Kougeki Scans, Mangainn and Mangastream. The raws for Chapter 254 have been kindly provided by a friend of mine 😌

In the most recent chapter, we get a glimpse of a good number of people within Allen's Helix - which also counts as Lavi Sr's Helix, since they have been combined, merged into one.

But who are these people? Interestingly enough, we've already seen some of them before.

Let's take the obvious ones out of the way first:

There's a reason why "The Earl" is stated in quotation marks, more on that in a bit.

We see the group divide into two sides - Nea's side and Lavi Sr's side. This gives us an idea of their allegiance - which clan they belonged to or partnered with, Noah or Bookman.

Another thing that's important to note is that since the Helix of Life is fueled by, as described by Lavi Sr, lives touching lives, this doesn't inherently mean all of these people are dead. While death intrinsically results in returning to the Helix, some of these people might have had their life energy sucked back into the Helix but managed to survive (similarly to what happened to Allen).

Which is very interesting when we take into account the oddities that surround Cross' aging. It's also surprising to see Road in there, given that she's the eldest Noah alive who hasn't reincarnated unlike the others who were all slain by Nea 35 years ago. Mana, too, is currently alive as the Millennium Earl.

I'm not here to discuss these details, especially with how little we know about how the Helix of Life works exactly as of now, but it's something interesting to have in mind.

Bookman

The small person standing next to Lavi Sr could be none other than Bookman himself. Not only his adorably smol figure is very recognizable to us, he appears in the panel as he is remembered by Lavi Sr, his son.

(from The 253rd Night: If It Is Indeed Fate, We’ll Meet Again Someday, Part 1)

We've seen this appearance of Bookman many chapters ago, and while a lot of people theorized that was, indeed, a younger-looking Bookman, we had no canonical confirmation of his identity until recently.

(from The 218th Night: Searching for A. W - "D")

"The Earl"

It's curious that the Millennium Earl is seen here; because this isn't the Earl himself, but the golem suit. Thanks to an official DGM art exhibit, it's been known to us for a while now that this appearance of the Earl isn't his actual appearance but, rather, a suit that conceals his true body: Mana.

(from The 219th Night: Searching for A.W. - He Has Forgotten Love)

The suit and Mana are two separate entities, hence why it's important to note how both appear within the Helix as separate entities as well.

When empty, we usually see the suit and Mana separately (as in, Mana not being inside wearing it, as seen above).

Similarly to a puppet with no strings to control its limbs, the empty suit's most discerning feature is its long, dragging sleeves that omit its hands.

(from The 233rd Night: Saying Goodbye to A.W. - The way of the three)

Since Mana is there with his younger appearance, I can only assume this means Nea's side within this Helix has been affected by both Mana and the Millennium Earl, the suit representing the Earl whilst Mana represents himself the way Nea remembered him.

I've considered that golems can also have their energy sucked into the Helix since Timcanpy is there as well, but the Earl played a key role in Nea's death - it didn't happen out of Mana's own volition; it was the Millennium Earl's memory, Adam, that took over and killed (more like, consumed) Nea.

(from The 219th Night: Searching for A.W. - He Has Forgotten Love)

When we see it play from Mana's memories, he remembers the Earl as the empty suit even though the paneling suggests that the current Mana is inside, watching as his younger self holds a dying Nea in his arms, because he, Mana, and the Millennium Earl are one and the same even though their consciences are not.

Hoshino has consistently used the long, dragging sleeves omitting the hands as a visual, symbolic way to separate their consciences and identities apart: Mana, Nea's twin sibling and Mana, the Millennium Earl, host of Adam. Therefore, the suit being in the Helix together with Mana was to be expected - but it's still important to note that they represent two different entities in this context.

Other people in the Helix

There are two people who were very familiar to me in this ensemble. Firstly, the person who's standing next to Bookman:

We have seen this person before; their back was facing us, but the braid, the ring tied to its end, the clothes and more importantly, the staff, confirm it's very much the same person.

(from The 253rd Night: If It Is Indeed Fate, We’ll Meet Again Someday, Part 1)

They were grouped with Nea, Mana, Bookman and Past!Allen in this panel, hinting that this character holds great importance to the plot. The fact that they're holding the staff previously seen in Lavi Sr's possession is no small detail either - this staff has been sneakily shown in the background more than once, and we all know Hoshino loves showing important details as if they're small, unimportant things until their actual relevance is revealed.

(from The 253rd Night: If It Is Indeed Fate, We’ll Meet Again Someday, Part 1. Note the staff conveniently there but still partially hidden by speech bubbles.)

We still don't know what this staff is - if it's a weapon, a heirloom, or just something that folks from the Bookman clan own in general. I'm more inclined to think it's a heirloom because it doesn't feel like mere coincidence that this person is always depicted with the staff, and Hoshino made a point on showing (albeit a tad secretively) that Lavi Sr. also had this same staff.

Interestingly enough, in Vol 26's Discussion Room, when asked about his fighting skills and what he's most skilled with, Lavi mentions bōjutsu - a martial art that consists of fighting with a short staff (a bō); the term translates literally to "staff technique". In Viz Media's English release, this has been incorrectly translated as "cudgels".

This seems to imply the staff is a weapon, but it's also possibly a heirloom passed from one Bookman Jr to another. If that's confirmed to be true in the future, this person might be the one who was the previous Bookman Jr before Lavi Sr, or equally as important as an apprentice of sorts for Bookman.

Looking at their silhouette at first, I believed it to be a male (wide shoulders, rectangular body), but after talking to my friends and observing the silhouette on the panel below, I'm more inclined to think it's a woman (curvy, thin waist in comparison to the men's wider silhouettes).

Nothing is set in stone yet since we're unable to take a better look at them and they could still be a man, but it would be very interesting to have a former female Bookman Jr or something of the sort. And even though we still don't know who this person is, we can tell for sure that they're very important.

On to the next person. Needless to say, from this point on, everything I say is entirely speculative so please don't take it as the ultimate truth.

This man almost last in line, to me, holds a significant resemblance to a man who was present during current Lavi's birth (seen on The 253rd Night: If It Is Indeed Fate, We’ll Meet Again Someday, Part 1).

His face was conveniently omitted and it feels like a deliberate panel layout construction choice from Hoshino rather than it being accidental. It was briefly seen in another panel, albeit rather obscured:

We know it's the same man because like in the panel where his face is hidden, there's a child next to him, holding onto his clothes.

That being said, the man in the Helix also resembles this other man, who also was present during Lavi's birth and next to the man whose face was hidden:

We see his face in the next panel, as he's the one standing next to another, elderly-looking man:

And his face was shown previously in the same panel that showed the other man's face as well:

I'm at a loss for this one because the man seen in the Helix wears a bandana with long straps tied at the back of his head. While the second man shown above does wear a bandana, there are no long straps at the back, whilst the first one seemingly does not wear one and we never see his back to know for sure.

However, the choice of having his face hidden from us raises way too many suspicions for me to let him pass, and their overall features like hair style look similar enough to talk about both men.

On to the next person: the man next to Road and Timcanpy.

This is of course just speculation since we have never seen his appearance, but my folks seem to theorize this man could be Cyrus, Katerina's brother. He's briefly mentioned in The 214th Night: Searching For A.W. - Awakening.

Not much else is known about him.

And then, to wrap it up: the person next to whom we believe to be Cyrus and Timcanpy.

From the clothes and silhouette, we can safely assume it's a female. We don't know who this woman might be, but considering she's standing on the side of Nea (the Noah/Campbell Mansion group), she could either be Mother, Cross's former patron, or Dr. Joe, part of the Campbell staff in the present day.

Even though the hairstyle is different from her current one, I'm inclined to think it's Mother because of the shawl, albeit somewhat younger due to the time this event takes place; she would have been in her 50~60s or so by then.

(from The 249th Night: Saying Goodbye to A.W.)

Mother seems to be intrinsically involved with the whole thing, seeing how she not only helped Cross care for Allen when he first took Allen in, but she also knew Allen should head to the Zoogle Bookstore for answers, and carries immense guilt for what's to come, indicating that she knows very important things that took place in the past.

(This one is still, to me, one of the most impactful sequences in the entire manga: Mother, the usually unfazed one, begging for God's divine retribution to befall her just as it did for Cross for what's about to befall Allen. From The 249th Night: Saying Goodbye to A.W.)

That woman in the shawl from the Helix might not be Mother after all, but with how major her involvement is, it feels odd not to have her present there; so this assumption is worth a shot in my opinion.

As for the other people not covered in this post, they just didn't feel as familiar, may or may not be "placeholders" without enough distinguishing features, or aren't people we'll get to know in due time. Everything is possible.

As always, any and all additions to this post are welcome since I'm not infallible and may have missed something; just please keep it civil and lighthearted. And here's a reminder to take the second half of this post with a grain of salt since it's all speculation on my part!

A big thanks to the folks in my friend group who spark the most interesting of discussions and to you for reading until this point! 😊

Long time no see, and let's all look forward to the next chapter in July.

Now the ceasefire has been breached and there are a large number of martyrs and wounded. Blood is everywhere.

bro can you believe toboso yana really went out there and said 'hey let's turn the whole annoying clingy girl in love with genius boy thing into this story about this girl raised on the duty to be the protector of the underworld's guard dog and feeling the triple pressure of being sugar and spice and everything nice in line with social custom which ALSO is how she thinks her fiance wants to see her but ALSO she needs to be a master of the sword,,, which she naturally IS but she feels like she needs to hide just how much??? and then it always seems to her that she can't quite make him happy??? but actually he does care about her he just went through some horrible shit and doesn't know how to handle all things nice and maybe doesn't even believe he deserves it??? and she's stuck wondering what happened to this wonderful, sunshine boy she grew up with??'

and THEN yana STILL WASN'T DONE and was like 'oh also sike he's not actually her fiance he's his supposedly-dead twin brother who took his place cause he thought he couldn't come back as himself, the ill spare that nobody would be happy to see,,, and she finds out because his dead twin brother whom he's impersonating shows up and now she doesn't know what to think because maybe she wouldn't have been happy if she'd known it was him but also she didn't even care to see the truth that was staring her in the face the entire time and he literally told her he could never hate her at one point and maybe it's true both ways-'

and then she expected me to??? be normal about it??

Pet donation scams

For years now, scammers have took to stealing info from legit fundraising posts to steal funds from actual users. So what do they do? It's quite simple to explain the process as someone whose been tracking those I've seen or spotted while searching around. Scammers reuse and redo these so often you can usually find a pattern and catch it before you reblog their post. This post is quite long, but should be useful.

tl:dr - An ask to reblog a pinned post is generally a scam related to pets and the pictures used are stolen from other sites and any info the scam post uses was stolen too with only minor adjustments like the scammers own info that may use the name of someone real.

Scammers do as follows:

Saves a pfp from a blogger and copies the blog info from someone else by copy/pasting it and saving it

Turns off asks

Searches a tag to reblog random posts to look relevant, generally about 10

Hides their blog so it can't be seen outside of desktop and archives aren't easy to access

Searches Facebook for publicly accessible posts where pets need help and may seek it from other sites. They will save photos of a cat but also will copy any information from the post or a different post with minor adjustments if needed

Once they have followed those steps, the scammers will then start to find random blogs. Some blogs may be past targets who fell for the scam and as a result may fall for it again. Or in other cases, blogs that have been targeted before by them and answered the ask without finding out its a scam. Some asks sent go as follows.

Hello there! Just wondering if its okay for you to check the post i pinned and reblog/boost it? Im in desperate need of help im really sorry for coming across your inbox (pls answer this privately) only if its ok 😞 thank you and stay safe

Hi there, im sorry for this (if it bothers you) please see my pinned post as I need help for it. Please boost/share it for us, thank you so much. Really means a lot 🙏

Hello there! Just wondering if its okay for you to check the post i pinned and reblog/boost it? Im in desperate need of help im really sorry for coming across your inbox (pls answer this privately) only if its ok :( thank you and stay safe

Hello! Im sorry if I did bother you by coming across your inbox. Just asking for some help if you can share/boost my post or pinned post rather. It means a lot!

hello! can you pls boost my post about my dog? tysm if u do!

hi ♡ can you reblog the post about my cat? tysm!”

The scammer will send several asks at once to many different blogs and wait to see how many will answer and reblog their scam post. They rely on no one looking up the info the post has, because doing so would show that the post is not in good faith and has stolen it's contents from somewhere else. Those who have no searched the post will likely share it and their mutuals will also share it not knowing the post is actually a scam. Often, these scams do get found out fast but unfortunately some will fall for it. It is likely many have donated money before the scam is found out. If you get an ask or see someone reblog a post that looks suspicious, do the following in tumblr search.

Search the username to see if there's any warnings

Paste the ask and see if others got it

See if the listed paypal has pre-existing alerts for it

Checking the blog sending asks will likely show it is a few days old, though some cases may be an older blog that was broken into and reused and repurposed into a scam blog so the actual owner will never know of it happening since they likely abandoned the website.

Once you know a blog is a scam, please alert your followers by explaining it's a scam and detailing why it's a scam by showing blogs the scammer used that are gone now or linking to previous warnings. It's advised to then report the scam blog like so:

Report -> Something else -> Illegal Uses or Content -> Phishing

This is currently the only way to deal with scammers. I hope this info is detailed enough and useful to any who find it.

The heart of Blue Lock:

I'm gonna go on a long ass rant about Isagi, Bachira, and Rin. The whole idea of being "the heart of Blue Lock" was tossed around a couple of times in passing, but in the U20 match the title was given to Isagi. Isagi is the protag and has to be at the center of the story and the center of everything, so this title is appropriate in that obvious sense. But also Isagi is absolutely the heart of a lot of other characters' developments, both positive and negative. Isagi is definitely the heart of Blue Lock, the team. But as far as who the heart of the story as a whole is, it's Isagi, Bachira, and Rin. The relationship between these three, or rather the relationship Rin and Bachira each have with Isagi in their own respects, I think make up the entire emotional core of the manga.

Isagi is the driving force that pushes everything and everyone forward. Bachira and Rin exist within the story and are pushed forward by Isagi, but within the story they both have this mirror effect on Isagi that pushes both him and themselves forward. The bottom line though is that I think Rin's personal crisis is the core conflict and barrier in the manga, I think everything will come to fall back on his ability to change and heal or stay the same and drown. I think it's Isagi's barrier too, not in the sense that Isagi has to solve Rin's problems, or that he even has to actively help him solve his problems, but in the sense that because Rin has decided to make his obsession over Isagi his whole personality and make it Isagi's problem (on the soccer field), nothing will progress for the better on an emotional level until they both figure each other out---which involves Rin figuring himself out.

But starting from the beginning: Bachira

Isagi being the main character and all obviously has a ripple effect on everyone. Most of the characters use this effect to their benefit, like Chigiri who decides that worrying about his leg is pointless and he might as well play until he can't, or Barou who figured out how to play the way he wants while also maintaining some consideration for his team so he isn't the biggest loser on the field, or Nagi who was able to step away from Reo and actually figure out what it is about soccer that he likes so he can get better (and keep playing with Reo). And then there's Bachira.

Bachira and Isagi's relationship is the starting point to everything, it's Isagi's beginning in Blue Lock and his development as a soccer player. Their relationship is free of drama, it's the prime example of what supporting each other while also competing against each other is supposed to look like. It's a relationship full of love and care and independent admiration of each other. I think the way their relationship is portrayed is the ultimate goal of the Blue Lock project for every character.

It doesn't start off that way though, as Bachira does have some demons to fight off, but Isagi isn't aware of this because Bachira didn't spill his guts about how he felt about being with Isagi until after he'd already solved his own problems.

Bachira was kind of one-sidedly codependent on Isagi's presence on the soccer field. He grew up lonely because he was "weird" (boy is so neurodivergent coded lmao) and when he met Isagi he felt that he finally met someone who would play with him in a way that was fun for him. Granted he didn't really make this Isagi's problem (unlike some people), but it started to become a problem for Bachira when Rin came into the picture (more on that later). As a result Bachira had to be willing to accept that nobody may ever understand or play with him the way he wants in order to enjoy soccer, but that he'll be okay even if he's alone and has no friends.

BUT--

Love wins. Lol. In the panels before Bachira is explaining the conclusion he landed on.

This is the epitome of a healthy relationship. I can live without you, so I can safely say that I want you here with me. That's Bachira and where he landed, and ever since then they've been able to play together and compete against each other without their affection toward each other being impacted. Bachira undergoes his own salvation early on in the story, and it sets the tone for something that needs to occur later (that hasn't occurred yet). Bachira being able to problem solve on his own is the reason that he and Isagi can be the way they are and the reason Isagi can stay grounded (even when things are looking somewhat not great personality-wise in the current arc lol). They can play with and against each other, they can challenge and encourage each other and neither one of them spirals into despair or self-loathing. Now, I don't particularly care about fictional relationships being "healthy" as it usually doesn't make a difference imo, if relationships in media are toxic hellscapes it's usually for entertainment and angst purposes. But in the case of Blue Lock, Bachira's relationship with Isagi is directly compared to Isagi's relationship with Rin. Between Bachira and Rin, one is way better off than the other right now, so I do think the differences in positive relationship vs. negative relationship absolutely make a difference in this case.

In summary: Bachira fought off his inner monster and can now play soccer without craving someone else's acceptance/approval. But even with this realization, he decided that he wants Isagi in his world still. So Bachira is in a good spot, but he didn't get there without some help.

Which brings me to Rin and Isagi.

These two started off as pretty decent rivals, just competing to be the best. But someone had to go and ruin it.

In the U20 game they both are fixated on surpassing each other. It's normal, it's okay and acceptable because they're both trying to get better and they view the other as a way to improve. None of this is an issue. Although...

Rin has issues, unresolved issues that nobody can solve because it has nothing to do with anyone but himself and his brother. More on his brother later and back to him and Isagi.

During the U20 arc Rin enters a "flow" state and goes nuts on the soccer field, which is good for his soccer playing but bad for his wellbeing. What sends him into this state is so interesting though:

As I said, Rin has issues. His brother absolutely crushed and devastated him, and this is the main reason for why he's acting the way he is in the U20 arc and the NEL arc (current arc being written right now). During the U20 arc and therefore after, Rin diverts his attention from his brother to Isagi, and the normal rivalry dynamic he had with Isagi is no longer what it was in Rin's case. It's one-sided, kind of like it was with Bachira. However Rin lets it consume him and bring him to a really dark place in the NEL arc. Rin starts strongly associating Isagi's effect on him with his brother's effect on him:

**Which is just unfair to Isagi and inaccurate anyway, because objectively speaking Isagi has done nothing to Rin other than what everyone in Blue Lock is doing to each other--competing. But as shown in the U20 arc when Rin started to deteriorate, Isagi is a threat to Rin. Isagi can catch up to Rin's playstyle, Isagi can keep up with Rin on the soccer field. What Rin realized and what sent him over the edge, was that EVERYONE was keeping up with his play style because Isagi's own playstyle was giving everyone a pathway to do so. Again--this is not a bad thing and maybe could have continued being a somewhat normal rivalry after the U20 game, but Sae being a fucking asshole had to go and make everything ten times worse for Rin by going out of his way to crush his spirit and acknowledge Isagi (this had to have been done intentionally—he knew what he was doing).

**Kaiser does this too with Isagi, the common denominator being that both Kaiser and Rin made Isagi their whole personality because they both were already beyond fucked up before the story began

Now I can tie Rin and Bachira together and complete the triangle.

After this Rin wasn't the same, and Rin became a very dark version of Bachira, which is ironic because it was Rin's words that made Bachira realize that he needed to save himself from his codependency on Isagi:

In the current arc Rin is searching for someone with his soccer too, but he can't direct his own advice at himself. What's really good about this current arc is that Rin relives moments from both Isagi and Bachira earlier in the manga, further emphasizing the importance of these three relationships in the story's progression. But unfortunately for Rin these moments aren't as positively enlightening as they were for Bachira and Isagi.

Rin reenacts a moment from chapter 2, where Isagi decided that if he was going to improve he didn't need to go for the weakest link. Rin on the other hand reenacts this but rather than with a moment of mercy (like how Isagi didn't go for the one injured player in the room and spared him), Rin's moment is kind of bratty and entitled and negatively impacted his team:

There's a difference in the two situations. Isagi's development was positive, Rin's was not, simply because it was a shitty choice that only benefitted his ego. But also it's because of Rin's personal issues. Rin chose not to score because he's searching for someone with his soccer. His brother:

Sae is Rin’s “monster”. He's reliving Bachira's dilemma, and just like Bachira he's becoming desperate to find someone. They both even said they either let Isagi become their reason for existing or devoted their entire being to him:

TO BE CONTINUED--