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This Is Brilliant - Blog Posts
I can't remember exactly where I found it. But there was one concept for a class swap similar to that one I mentioned somewhere on this site. It was more focused on the Despair Class 78. But I was immediately interested when it had the idea to make Nagito the protagonist. Since in most other class swaps, it's typically either Chiaki or Hajime. I feel like you could do a really fun character arc with that premise.
I believe the other survivors were Mahiru, Gundham, Sonia, Kazuichi, Mikan, and Hiyoko. Could imagine lots of fun friendship/shipping stuff with that group. As well as some tragic potential with deceased classmates like Chiaki and Imposter.
I don't think the outline I saw had ironed out all the details of the THH scenario. So I adopted my own headcanons. Like Class 77 retaining memories of the first year, since they're older and it'd be harder to cover up the amnesia (especially with Hiyoko's growth spurt). As well as stuff like Imposter being the last one to die, and bonding scenes with them makes their death hit Nagito much harder. Also mused about the idea of Chiaki being the blackened in a similar way to Kaede. The mastermind realizing that the retained memories of the first year means Chiaki has to be eliminated and discredited early on, because Class 77 are a lot less willing to participate in the Killing Game in this AU.
MIKAN BEING A SURVIVOR WOULD BE AMAZING ( I know they all survived at the end of the anime but that's a long time later and this group would be adorable ) Mahiru would be so kind to them and take care of the others I love her so much, I think I heard that Hiyoko was originally supposed to be a survivor which would've also been cool, GUNDHAM TANAKA WE LOVE YOUUU, him and Sonia would get along well and Kazuichi would be like >:0 or something lol it's okay we still love you Souda, Mahiru and Hiyoko would also bond, and maybe Mahiru could help out Mikan a bit or a girls night with them or they can all have sleepovers and take care of one another and-
Hehehe I got a lil carried away, I just love survivor groups, they're so wholesome and a found family, but I think Gundham and Mikan could get along well because he's a softie deep down and we love Tanaka!! 💖💖 IMPOSTER BEING THE LAST TO DIE NOOOO WE LOVED YOU BRUH!! They deserve the world!! It would, so much angst and hurt HAHAHAHH I LOVE IT!! *evil laughter lol* >:)
OMG THAT'S GENIUS LIKE A SIMILAR SITUATION TO KAEDE NOT ACTUALLY BEING THE BLACKENED, The similarities!! :00 that's a genius idea, her dying earlier on when they retain their memories, this can work so well!!!! Chiaki you were amazing, and also she deserved better, she slayed so hard they decided to kill best girl twice, but I love the idea of her having a Kaede role <33
The Reluctant Victor, inspired by The Reluctant Bride by Auguste Toulmouche - I just thought that this painting was SO perfect for Katniss and I had to draw it!
– But do you even know him that well? Do you know what he’s like? – Your brother? He’s so picky.
divorce lawyer mu tianchi au where the divorce lawyer is jinxed to fix the relationships they work on, even crazy messed up situations. he's completely unsure if this makes him the best or worst divorce lawyer out there, but he can't deny he enjoys a happy ending
(secretly his pet magical fish thinks divorce is super sad and has been matchmaking his clients LOL)
moshang:
mobei jun and shang qinghua did not properly communicate their marriage. there were no confessions, no outward sign of romance, just a progression from friendship, to seemingly fuck-buddies, to married. mobei jun thought their relationship was going well, but shang qinghua srsly had no idea why he was in this 'loveless' marriage other than he was clearly a simp. however, shang qinghua hit his limit at the third wedding anniversary when mobei jun's uncle said a lot of hurtful crap (mainly "you still clinging to my nephews thighs? cute how you think anyone could like you" linguang jun is actually perfectly aware that mobei jun is head-over-heels in love with his husband, but he's also aware of his nephews inability to communicate that fact and he's a spiteful bitch). and so shang qinghua decided that enough was enough and he didn't need this crap. mobei jun, being a master of communication, responded to shang qinghua's ask for a divorce with "you cant divorce me! i'm divorcing you!" because he's just great with his emotions guys, just great. best believe he was pulling his own hair out in frustration after shang qinghua stormed out with "WHY THE FUCK DID I SAY THAT OMG" mobei jun hired mu tianchi, but constantly gave the lawyer conflicting instructions that were basically meant to slow the divorce process down to a crawl while he tried to figure out just how the hell to undo this mess shang qinghua, heart broken and PISSED, hired his own divorce lawyer and is deciding "oh it's spiteful bitch hours, i am going to take him for all he's worth, i'll have the house, the kids (there are no kids LOL), the cars, FUCK IT I'LL TAKE HIS DAMN PET HAMSTER" because shang qinghua is also just... fantastic with emotions li yu thinks the situation is very sad because he can tell that the two of them clearly still love each other and just don't know how to communicate. especially because when one or the other is left alone in the office where his fish tank is, they express as much. shang qinghua talking to himself and mobei jun just looking gutted and also sometimes on the phone. li yu decides that enough is enough! and he uses his limited time daily transformation (that he normally uses to try to steal snacks from mu tianchi LOL) to write moshang letters. he decides to write down their true feelings for one another as if they are writing to each other, the perfect solution! it winds up sort of effective lol, the pair of them wind up getting into a fight at the lawyers office over the mixed messages in the letters, realize the letters weren't written by the other person, but wind up confessing to the truth in the letters regardless and leave the office happily in love. mu tianchi really would like to know why they felt the need to do all those dramatics at his office and blacklisted them both as future clients lol
songxue
song lan and xue yang have, in the friendliest terms, a situationship. do they know how they wound up married? barely. closest either of them can communicate it, they married because of a scam (song lan's impression of xue yang's motivations) and because song lan is an easy mark (xue yang's impression of xue yang's motivations). feelings? what feelings! these two are e n e m i e s. and sure, the sex is good and yeah, they've been married for like, a few years now, and they live together and all that shit, but this is CLEARLY not because they love each other or anything crazy like that love? what love? xue yang is an absolute psycho and song lan is a stick in the mud! there's nothing between them! the straw that broke the camels back was apparently xue yang saying something precisely to this degree after coming home from, what looked and smelled to be, a lost bar fight and song lan had tried to patch him up. so the two of them fought and song lan demanded a divorce and xue yang scathingly replied with a "aww did it hurt your feelings to figure out i've never loved you one bit? go ahead! this marriage is a sham anyway!" and yeah, it just spiraled from there. (xue yang is not about to admit that he's deflecting, that he's hurt that song lan isn't denying how fake their marriage is, and that he's terrified over how weak song lan makes him feel) so song lan hires mu tianchi while looking haggard and heartbroken and li yu's heart breaks for the man, because a stoic guy with a warm heart? that reminds him of his tianchi and he is DETERMINED to help this poor man have a happy ending. although, after meeting xue yang, he's about 90% sure that no happy endings can be found with that guy. still, it's clear that song lan loved him and is feeling wretched about the divorce, so li yu opts to spy on xue yang to figure out if song lan's feelings are mutual! only li yu got caught almost immediately and now he has a switch-blade against his throat and wow, xue yang is TERRIFYING, li yu would like to go home now! in a desperate appeal for his life, li yu blurts out that he works for song lan's lawyer and he's here to deliver a message. which is not a very convincing lie and xue yang does not look convinced, but he's willing to listen so li yu spins a really unbelievable tale about delivering some paperwork that he forgot to bring with him and barely escapes and see, if li yu were the type to learn his lesson, it would end there, but nah, he tries to follow xue yang again with similar results and gets dragged back to mu tianchi's office by the scruff with a demand to "keep an eye on your stupid PI or i'll stab it in the face" and now mu tianchi has an arm full of li yu and no idea what the heck to do abt it. li yu also lies his way (badly) out of the situation with mu tianchi anyway on li yu's third attempt at stalking xue yang, he blurts out that he doesn't understand why xue yang is so desperate to dump someone as great as song lan and if he had a husband like that, he'd never let go (li yu is projecting and thinking of mu tianchi), but now he's accidentally presented himself to xue yang as a Love Rival and xue yang is COMPETATIVE, but the only way that song lan will take him back is like, emotional honesty and couples counseling and sincere apologies and a whole lot of shit that xue yang finds Terrifying. but he loses his shit when he sees li yu and song lan together (li yu has switched tactics and decided he should just convince song lan that he can do better) and he picks a fight with song lan and a few dramatic confessions later, the two of them are back together and li yu doesnt know wtf happened but uhhh they're happy i guess? mu tianchi is now very suspicious of the man named "li yu"
ranwan
mo ran and chu wanning sort of got married on accident and were never properly together. it was a drunken thing (on mo ran's end) and an inability to say no (on chu wanning's end) that made them wake up the next morning tangled in the sheets together with a wedding certificate still clenched in mo ran's greedy little hands. they left on awkwardly bad terms, vowing to never speak of it except now a few years later, mo ran has decided he needs a divorce so that he can marry someone new and better! (shi mei, altho he hasnt actually asked shi mei yet and doesnt know he'd get hella rejected LOL). chu wanning coldly accepts the divorce prospects which, for reasons beyond mo ran's comprehension, only makes him MORE pissed and he vows to make this divorce as miserable for chu wanning as possible! so mo ran hires mu tianchi and is searching for every single way he can make this process just grueling for chu wanning, who is still, frustratingly, accepting the situation without complaint. aside from general agitation over mo ran being a dick li yu sees through mo ran's incomprehensible stupidity and decides that he needs to teach him a lesson! for once, he's not here to match make, he's here purely out of the spite of "i NEED this idiot to know he's an idiot and realize he was wrong!" so li yu meets with mo ran, has a few uncomfortable encounters where he finds out that he's sorta mo ran's type, which is very ew in li yu's opinion, and pretends to be a secretary working at mu tianchi's office. he starts trying to wheedle out the reason that mo ran wants a divorce at all it takes an annoying amount of time to get mo ran to admit that he just wants chu wanning to care about him and an even more annoying amount of time to have him realize, that rather than a divorce, he'd like if their marriage was real. li yu feels like he should get paid for his services to society. serves mo ran right! now he's realized that he's an idiot long after it's too late! ok maybe it's a little sad, but it can't be helped! mo ran has to sleep in the bed he made! it comes as a surprise to li yu that chu wanning apparently was happy to stay married to that idiot??? no accounting for taste, but man, li yu can't say he would have made the same decision. at least they seem happy together. mu tianchi is actually pretty happy to lose this gig. mo ran was an awful client
caoxiang:
gu xiang and cao weining actually had a really romantic and lovely romance. the trouble is that gu xiang has a lot of trust issues due to her traumatic upbringing (her brother tried to protect her from the worst of it, but he wasn't in a good position to protect her either) and cao weining's father was apparently a two-faced scumbag who didn't think that gu xiang was worthy of his son. so, the scumbag ran a smear campaign against the couple while pretending to be supportive. he was unable to turn cao weining against gu xiang, but he was able to leave enough incriminating 'evidence' that cao weining was cheating on her and because of gu xiang's trust issues, she filed for divorce. cao weining would very much like NOT to divorce, but she won't meet with him outside of mediation meetings with lawyers. li yu, the useful lil demon fish that he is, found the evidence of cao weining's fathers actions and put it all in a neat file for gu xiang's terrifying older brother to find and exact his revenge. learning that she had been played, no vengeance was as fearsome as the revenge that gu xiang wrought. luckily, cao weining understood why she believed it, even though he was hurt, and accepted her apology. he also apologized profusely for his awful father. they went to 'fire' mu tianchi together as a happy couple. mu tianchi looked at his fish tank suspiciously.
li yu's least favorite people thus far: xue yang and mo ran. but so long as they remain good to their partners, li yu is more or less oki with them. his favorite one is song lan, bc he was reminded of mu tianchi LOL, and cao weining bc that man is a cinnamon roll. li yu's personal ratings of the ships are "moshang and caoxiang were just misunderstandings of otherwise loving couples, ranwan and songxue need couples counseling YESTERDAY and maybe a restraining order". but now he's committed. he's seen how even seemingly unfixable relationships can be helped! and he wants to help!
so he continues
liujiu
....li yu would like to let it be known, for the record, that he tried his best and he should not be held accountable for the shitshow that occurred. there were at least three broken bones, strangely all liu qingge's, two calls to emergency services, at least one poisoning attempt (courtesy of shen jiu), and at least one instance of child abuse. BUT, through ALL OF THAT, li yu can safely say that the two of them are.... happy?? probably???? mission successful?????? except now mu tianchi is hugging him possessively and refusing to let go and li yu now no longer has the brain energy for Other Peoples Problems, bc his problem is the most important one and that is that mu tianchi IS HOLDING HIM HOW DOES HE COPE AND HE'S GOING TO TRANSFORM SOON (liujiu were indeed successfully match-made. it's just that the chaos that is their relationship is difficult for li yu's fishy brain to comprehend, understandably so) mu tianchi eventually lets him escape, but he's starting to get the feeling that maybe mu tianchi is??? suspicious?? ohno
nieyao
...li yu is going to retire now, thankyou. HE'S NOT A MIRACLE WORKER DAMMIT (he is, he absolutely is, he manages it, he does, he.... does not get paid enough for this shit. WHY WERE THE LAST TWO CLIENTS LITERALLY TRYING TO KILL EACH OTHER, THAT IS ABOVE HIS PAY GRADE! he does not get paid at all actually. wait, is mu tianchi getting paid for this?!) ((mu tianchi thoroughly no longer cares, he'll just make nice with his dad to get inheritance if he needs money, his establishment is now firmly in business to let li yu do whatever the fuck he wants with the shitshow of absolutely unhinged couples who seek out his help))
(i did have more ideas for liujiu and nieyao LOL but i ran out of steam, so please use your imagination x'D THEIR RELATIONSHIPS WERE SAVED BY THE POWER OF OUR ALMIGHTY FISHY OVERLORD, thankgosh)
((feel free to suggest to me super dysfunctional danmei ships for li yu to play matchmaker over and i will share my thoughts!))
Oh, to be a woman at WinchesterCon 2006 writing gay incest smut in a bathroom stall in Tennessee...
X
...Oh Lapis.
Lapis makes a prank.
I spent my morning on this Bleach & The Emperor’s New Groove crossover joke because it lived rent free in my head for too long. Wish you knew how I giggled while drawing it :А
nobody move. i've just successfully articulated the sentiment that taylor's power turns her into a panopticon because she was living in one & explained her trigger in a way i feel satisfied with for the first time in my life
the concept of the panopticon is not just about surveillance, but about creating an environment where people cannot be sure whether or not they are being surveilled, and thus must constantly act under the assumption that they are. which is exactly what happened to taylor--we see from when we first meet her in the school that she's anticipating attack from every possible direction to avoid it, and the one time she lets her guard down a fraction and assumes she's found a safe spot to hide from abuse, she's targeted with the juice spills. and this is after her trigger event, but it's clear she behaves this way because it was beaten into her over the entire course of the bullying. it's what she describes when she recounts the trigger:
“I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop. But I made a friend, one of the girls who had sometimes joined in on the taunting came to me and apologized. ... Her approaching me and befriending me was one of the big reasons I could think the harassment was ending. I never really let my guard down around her, but she was pretty cool about it. “And for most of November and the two weeks of classes before Christmas break, nothing. They were leaving me alone. I was able to relax.” I sighed, “That ended the day I came back from the winter break. I knew, instinctually, that they were playing me, that they were waiting before they pulled their next stunt, so it had more impact. I didn’t think they’d be so patient about it. I went to my locker, and well, they’d obviously raided the bins from the girls bathrooms or something, because they’d piled used pads and tampons into my locker. Almost filled it.”
the precise moment when she stopped consciously anticipating and preparing to react to abuse--when she relaxed, when she stopped acting as if the lack of danger didn't mean that she couldn't still be hurt at any time--is when she was brutally reminded that she's never safe. she's still in the panopticon. she isn't literally being watched every second, she isn't literally in lifelong danger of having her vulnerabilities exploited, but it feels like she is. she can never ever be sure she's safe.
so she triggers, and she gets a power that turns her into a panopticon, and lets her watch everyone right back. it lets her regain control by turning her into a source of danger that could attack anywhere, from any direction, any time, fully unexpected.
& the reason her power enables her to watch Everyone--not just a single person, or a few people--but Everyone, is that the other major aspect of her trigger is the trauma of facts like this:
“It was pretty obvious that they had done it before the school closed for Christmas, by the smell alone. I bent over to throw up, right there in a crowded hallway, everyone watching. Before I could recover or stop losing my breakfast, someone grabbed me by the hair, hard enough it hurt, and shoved me into the locker.”
"All I could think was that someone had been willing to get their hands that dirty to fuck with me, but of all the students that had seen me get shoved in the locker, nobody was getting a janitor or teacher to let me out."
for months, for years, she was in a community where everyone regularly witnessed her humiliation and abuse, and everyone, dozens and dozens of kids and teachers, either contributed to it or was knowingly, silently complacent. this is what sticks with her: the idea that she is so universally reviled, so deserving of revile, that any crowd of witnesses would, without hesitation, consign her to the filth of the locker.
what else is she supposed to conclude, but that everyone she interacts with is a threat? that she can't drop her guard ever again, because no one will be coming to help her if she does? of course she has to become the panopticon. of course she has to watch everyone, all of the time, if she wants to stop it from happening again. of course she has to live among the teeming lowly and crawling things she has been taught via one firm shove that she is worth less than, and of course she has to use them to watch everyone back. and it would be inaccurate to say that doing this--monitoring everything with her bugs--makes her feel safe. all it does is allow her to remain in a constant state of paranoia and traumatized hyper-vigilance more efficiently.
