Something Like ‘time Won’t Make You Someone. It’ll Kill You First’

a broadly applicable extended metaphor for the kageyama brothers: 

mob is round and ritsu is sharp. 

this applies to LOTS of things about both of them– least of all, but most noticeably, their hair.

mob is round. he’s blunt, socially dull, tangential to the lives of his peers. he’s like a firm ball of clay rolled between two hands. when he learns new things, it’s like, first he has to make them stick, then he has to re-roll himself back into shape without them falling out. ideally, the things he learns become a part of him. overall, it’s a clumsy process, so he’s not the best learner, but neither is he the worst. and he’s good when it comes to learning about (and improving) himself, because he can reshape himself, being clay. he is also relatively easily influenced by others, who may try to shape him to their own liking. still, roundness is the most comfortable shape for him, so he always returns to it. 

ritsu is sharp. sharp-tongued, sharp-eyed, sharp-witted. he’s like a mass of thorns or shards of glass. when he learns new things, they stick easily, becoming impaled on his jagged surface, and he understands them intimately, though they remain separate from his self. ritsu is a very good learner. but he’s not very good at learning about himself, because when he tries to delve deeper, he gets poked by his own spikes. he is also more brittle than mob, so it’s harder to improve himself; things need to break before they can change shape. likewise, ritsu is less easily influenced, being more solid and thus less permeable. he wishes he was a more organic shape, like his brother, despite the many clear advantages afforded to him by his sharpness.

mob’s psychic power is also based on roundness– his aura in the anime consists of overlapping circles. his power, tied directly to his emotions, is round like a coiled spring. as his explosion meter slowly ticks up, the spring is compressed bit by bit. when he hits 100%, it releases all that potential energy at once, then slowly collapses back to normal. 

ritsu’s psychic power is also based on sharpness– his aura in the anime looks like jagged shreds. where mob’s aura flows like ripples in a pond, ritsu’s cracks and crinkles along fault lines, like paper or tin foil that’s been folded before. the uneven structure means he can’t store emotions as psychic energy in the same way as his brother; emotions just create more faults and fissures, making it harder to direct his power anywhere else.

ritsu is certainly sharp by nature, but much of his jaggedness is a result of having parts of him shattered by trauma. i can’t help but wonder how different he would be had he never met ???%.

hey ! any tips on how to draw ritsus emo ass hair? u dont have to tho

here are my tips n tricks + general assumed structure

i dont draw his hair consistently but tbh you dont have to. just give him bangs and spikes that sprout from the whorl and ur good

Thoughts on Reigens self-worth after REIGEN chapter 7

Whoa, its been a wonderful ride reading the REIGEN manga from start to finish. Thanks so much to the team of @reigenscans that worked really hard and did an amazing job <3

Ive been following the discussion on reddit about the last chapter of the Reigen manga. While many here on tumblr and reddit liked the chapter, some people thought it felt a bit off. On reddit, treehouseclimber_ made an interesting post about how Reigens character arc felt unresolved in the end. I replied, going by “framedarcanes” on reddit, but thought I could post a more elaborated reply here too.

So, where does Reigen find himself at the end of chapter 7? I thought id share my view on it. 

  Long analysis under the cut ! 😊  (my first one too .___.)

Keep reading

I love it when teru goes :D

On The Subject of Change

A Mob Psycho 100 Fancomic

Based on the works of ONE

Lead Artist: @rustnut

Assistant: @fireflysummers

Summary: A snapshot into the new life of Minori Asagiri, who has sworn against the odds to change.

Content Warnings: Canon-typical violence (flashback)

COMPLETE

[Chrono]

Previous: [14-16]

Riza misquotes Shakespeare at one point in the manga and it got me thinking about what kind of plays they’d like

Roy and Riza vs defeated idealism.

Roy and Riza's journey in Fullmetal Alchemist is the struggle of the naive idealism of youth against the cynical realism of adulthood. At the core of their characters there is a tenet: that Alchemy — or rather power — should be used for the benefit of the people. Like many things in FMA there is an irony in this. This belief that's so crucial to their characters is something they inherited from someone who, in a way, represents the antithesis of this idea.

Berthold Hawkeye.

The Manga goes out of its way to tell us this is something Behold believed in and passed on to them. First when Roy uses it to justify why he joined the military, and then when Riza admits that she believed in her father's words.

The thing is that there is a dissonance between Berthold's teachings and his character's actions. Berthold is a recluse living away from the people his hoarded knowledge is supposed to help. Roy and Riza know this, and they call him out on it.

They both fervently believe in Berthold's teaching, and they don't understand why he's so adamantly against putting it to practice. When they join the military they don't do so to spite him, they do so because they believe in what he preaches, so much so that they want to prove his cynicism wrong.

The problem is that Berthold is right.

He's sooo freaking right.

Their government is corrupt. All that talk about protecting their people is pure propaganda. His cynicism is the pain of someone who was burned too much by the world's cruelty. Berthold is an idealist that has given up, much like Hohenheim before Trisha. He is someone that once wished to help people, and probably came to the same painful realization that Roy and Riza eventually had in Ishval. The path to hell can be paved with good intentions, and sometimes you're completely powerless to do anything about it.

Now, what makes Riza and Roy such great characters, is the fact that instead of falling into despair and secluding themselves like Berthold did, they decide to fight back and continue clawing at the world with their own — no longer so naive — idealism. They have seen where defeat leads to, and they refuse to walk that path.

My favorite example of Roy's acceptance of both Berthold's teaching, as well as his rejection of Berthold's character, is his conversation with Hughes in Ishval.

This conversation is such a beautiful call back to Berthold telling Roy that alchemists die when they cease to think. This is Roy doubling down, acknowledging that yes he was naive — the world is a much more complicated and painful place than he realized — but still he refuses to give up on the face of reality like Berthold did. Where Berthold accepted his fate, as a man who was already dead inside, Roy and Riza continue to struggle to survive.

Berthold might have taught Roy and Riza that power should be used for good, but his biggest lesson to them was perhaps serving as an example of what happens when you allow your dreams and hope to die.

Ps. This thematic of children following on their parent/mentor footsteps and surpassing them is constant on FMA. Winry being a mechanic like her grandma and deciding to be like her parents by forgiving Scar. Ed and Al becoming alchemist like Hohenheim, but also embracing their familiar bonds and continue to help people despite their trauma. Ling Yao becoming emperor and dismantling the infighting his father had promoted. Scar embracing his brother's alchemy and dream. It is then fitting that Roy and Riza also inherited something from Berthold and then surpassed him.

Heart to heart

I’ve seen comments elsewhere complaining about Reigen yet again lying to Mob and regressing but I really didnt see this scene that way.

a) Reigen didn’t pull a “I am your master and my powers tell me they’re fine”. He said he thought they were safe and told Mob a legitimate reason to assume so. The only ‘lie’ would be his utter calm and certainty as he said it, since he isn’t sure. But he had to act like that so Mob could calm down in turn. But ultimately, he didn’t lie or trick Mob into it, he made no certain statement and gave him an explanation;

b) Despite the fact that he didnt lie, if his supposition turns out wrong, Mob is likely not going to react well anyway. Reigen knows this. He said to Dimple Mob might hate him forever, and that’s something Reigen is also risking. Considering the face he made after Mob passed out, his gamble wasn’t to make his own life easier by not dealing with angry Mob, but a gamble for Mob’s sake. And he knows what he’s risking for it.

a mask of my own face (i’d wear that)