Latest Posts by cakeiscoolsblogthing - Page 8

RIP Lucas. You would've loved cat cafes

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Rip Axel. You'd love ice cream cake.

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I have to reblog this because it's funny. Funny because it's true

For a fandom surrounding a story about friendship and forgiveness, we sure have an issue with those concepts sometimes.

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AITA?

I (25 m, author and adventurer) was betrayed by my best friend (24 m, terrorist) not too long ago. We had grown up together and were friends and part of this building group, but he started taking things too far.

He decided to mess with my friends and steal some stuff, and that lead to a chain reaction of a city being blown up.

When they were arresting him, I said some hurtful things about surrounding him in lava and burying him in a hole.

I feel kind of bad about it because he apologized.

AITA?

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I forgot one of the best ones . . .

My sister after I tell her about people blaming Mabel: "I can see why, but she's also a twelve year old. She made a very reasonable decision for a twelve year old."

Watching Gravity Falls with siblings is great.

"I didn't think it was possible to be a worse guardian than Stan, but at least he has some idea of child endangerment." - my sister when Ford brought Dipper to the alien ship.

"That's not up to him, that's up to his parents." - my sister on Ford's apprenticeship offer.

"Is she about to get Bill'd?" - my brother when Mabel is in the forest.

"This show took a turn." - my sister in the episode thats name is like Xqthfqx or something.

"It takes a special kind of brain to come up with this." - my brother on the same episode as the previous quote.

Mabel's perspective in Sock Opera is equally, if not more sympathetic than Dipper's: An Essay

Most people generally wouldn't consider Mabel to have a terribly sympathetic plotline in Sock Opera, even those of us who don't necessarily feel that she's horribly selfish. I think that's because, from a narrative perspective, her plotline is (as it so often is) shafted in favour of Dipper's, and from a viewer's perspective, Dipper's makes more sense. We, as viewers want to know who the author is. We, as viewers, know that Gabe is inevitably going to turn out to be some variety of impossible, and we know that the Author of the Journals is a major mystery. However, from Mabel's perspective, none of this is true, because she doesn't have the luxury of knowing she is in a TV show. Even if you take out Gabe, her perspective still makes perfect sense.

At the beginning of summer, Dipper found this journal, and Mabel has generally been pretty happy to go along with his adventures as the journal has led them, but it's clear she doesn't have the same degree of fascination with it. Maybe she may have been a little intrigued by who the Author is, she's probably a bit curious, but not to the same extent. By the time of Sock Opera, she's probably reasonably ready for the Journal fixation to be over, considering that they nearly all got killed by a shapeshifter trying to find the author. She knows that trying to investigate the author is dangerous--Stan warned them away from the supernatural, they've all nearly died multiple times, but Dipper cannot be stopped. And now Dipper has decided to spend hours and hours and hours, forgoing sleep, sitting in front of a screen, typing in passwords. The fact that Mabel tries to drag him away from it is a good thing--anyone with a relative who spends excessive amounts of time in front of a computer can tell you that. Generally, having someone close to you become deeply fixated to the point of obsession with anything can be challenging, however in Mabel's case, Dipper has become obsessed to the point of prioritising getting into the laptop above anything, and this isn't just a regular hyperfixation: this is a hyperfixation that has nearly gotten them both (plus their loved ones) nearly killed multiple times in the last few weeks. It's absolutely the responsible, good thing for Mabel to do to not enable that behaviour.

And then if you add the puppet show back into the equation, then yes, it is kind of ridiculous of Mabel to put on a whole show of that kind of magnitude just for a boy (regardless of whether the boy deserves it), however, as viewers we must accept that this is, in fact, thoroughly within character for Mabel, who is kind of ridiculous. Any kind of production of that size is a huge commitment, especially if you've given yourself a week to work, and I'm not remotely bothered by the fact that Mabel has to get everyone involved on this. And to Mabel's credit, she does try to help Dipper as soon as he appears to her in puppet form, she just isn't immediately willing to stop the show. Back in high school, my drama class did a play that I mostly wrote, mostly managed and also had a small acting role in (yes, I was an overachiever in drama), and let me tell you, it would have taken a lot to have gotten me to call off the show halfway through, much less publicly sabotage it. A demon threatening the lives of one of my siblings? Probably yes. That probably would have done it. And Mabel does allow the thing that she poured blood, sweat and tears into to go literally up in flames in front of everyone, once she realises that's what she has to do (and personally, I don't think that there's anything wrong with not immediately being willing to drop everything for this. It's not like Dipper doesn't dig in his heels about doing what's best until the very last possible second). I don't know why people insist it's not 'technically a sacrifice', because while, yes, obviously Dipper's life was more important, and she 100% made the right choice, it's not easy to wreck something you worked hard on in front of people.

All this is to say that although it's easy to become irritated at Mabel during this episode because she's hindering Dipper's ability to figure out who the author is, it's also very easy not to realise that she has a thoroughly reasonable perspective, simply because the narrative puts greater emphasis and attention of Dipper's perspective.

Favorite friendship dynamic has got to be, “Villain grows to respect hero causing their worldview to change and eventually (probably as a result of hitting rock bottom) realize they were wrong and repent. Hero accepts this, offers their friendship, and helps the villain begin to grow as a person by directing them how to go about earning redemption and how to heal from whatever was making them do villain stuff before.”

This is how I see post season two Romeo and Jesse MCSM, Viggo Grimborn and Hiccup Haddock (if Viggo had lived) in How to Train Your Dragon: Race to the Edge, The Pines Twins and Pacifica from Gravity Falls, Zuko and the Gaang in ATLA, and my own two OCs, wish I knew more.

Thinking about how both Ford and Stan saw themselves in Dipper, and each other in Mabel

i’m unwell

One thing I don't really see anyone talking about with regards to Gravity Falls is the parallel's between Ford's apprenticeship and Mabeland. Many, many times, the question has been raised 'should Dipper have accepted Ford's apprenticeship', but no-one ever argues 'should Mabel have stayed in Mabeland', for obvious reasons, the show portrays one as a no-brainer and the other as a complex decision. But I think the two situations parallel one another nicely.

For Dipper, taking Ford's apprenticeship is definitely the more attractive option. He doesn't appear to have a lot of friends in Piedmont, has been historically bullied and may still be, and Dipper generally doesn't want to deal with the trials of growing up. Ford meanwhile, basically treats Dipper like an equal, not like a kid, encourages Dipper, and allows Dipper to pursue his interests to the fullest. However, to take the apprenticeship, Dipper will be cloistering himself in an environment in which he never has to do the things he's scared of, he avoids confronting the realities that he doesn't want to deal with, and he'll miss out on going through life with his sister.

For Mabel, staying in Mabeland is the more attractive option. There's an apocalypse raging outside, her brother is growing away from her, she's going to have to leave friends that it's implied are the best she's ever had, and we know that she too, has been bullied in the past, and may still be, and Wendy's well and truly terrified her about the concept of growing up. In Mabeland however, Mabel can continue to live in a charmed reality, surrounded by the things she's interested in and in an environment where she's constantly being enabled, and any dissenters are ejected. However, to remain in Mabeland, Mabel is cloistering herself in an environment where she never has to do the things she's scared of, she avoids confronting the realities she doesn't want to deal with, and she's pushed away one of the most important parts of her life: her brother.

During Dipper's trial, we as viewers see Mabel's change of heart as Dipper shows her that despite the trials the real world has thrown at both of them, that they've always had each others backs, and Dipper realises that too (there was a really good essay on this a while back by @cryoalliums ). Even though they're both scared, and both wanting to avoid the reality of adolescence and high school and unpredictability, they both realise through Dipper's trial that by burying themselves in their respective fantasies, they'll lose the one person who's always had their back: each other. Whether or not it's bullies or a giant robot, the twins have always had each other as a support system, and an ally, and they both realise during the trial that they'd rather fight by one another's side than hide from their problems.

So sure, Dipper could have taken the apprenticeship. He could have chosen to take the tailor-made, one-on-one advanced education that allowed him to pursue his interests to the fullest. But Mabel could also have chosen to stay in the world surrounded by her interests, where she was safe from the things she wanted to avoid. I think it's interesting that these two situations are so paralleled, and yet it's rarely discussed.

Pines Twins Parallelisms

I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one who thought about the parallelisms of the oh-so untouched dynamics of Ford and Mabel, and Stan and Dipper, but humor me.

In a previous post, I mentioned Mabel is a mini-Ford in Stan’s font and Dipper being a Stan Jr. in Ford’s flair so here’s my take.

Mabel is just like Ford because, other than being the sweater-loving older twin that would always add something to in their diary/scrapbook, her mind is the only other stand-out to the Bill Cipher other than Ford's. He took genuine interest to her mindscape.

As for Dipper, he's so much like Stan. No book? Left hook!

Both Dipper and Mabel mirror the different aspects of Ford's mind and Stan's heart. Let's start with the obvious:

Dipper has Ford's academic mind and craving for problem-solving adventure.

While Mabel has Stan's emotional capacity to know what to do to the things left unsaid.

And now for the other way around:

Mabel has Ford's mental fortitude to face the unknown with the optimistic belief that they'll survive it all just so that they can record it on paper.

And Dipper has Stan's immovable tenacity to protect the family he loves so dearly, no matter how dangerous or afraid he is. For them, he'll do it all.

I just love them so much how can I be normal about it.

the most important thing when i write dipper and mabel is to understand that they are not stan and ford.

that's not to say that there aren't similarities. obviously, the twins have dynamics that can be compared to each other in a myriad of ways, both separately and together.

but it's so very vital that dipper is NOT a 1:1 ford. and mabel is NOT a 1:1 stan.

dipper has ford's love of rationality and mysteries, but he has stan's love of stories and family. mabel has stan's pure chaos, but ford's pre-bill trust in people.

dipper and stan both approach the world with cynicism. young ford and mabel approach the world with wonder.

stan was the twin worried about being left behind, just like mabel. ford and dipper both wanted to carve a path for themselves and their future.

mabel was so scared of losing her brother that she accidentally caused weirdmaggedon, just like stan was worried about losing ford that he accidentally sabatoged ford's science project/collegiate future. but dipper was the one who fought like hell mostly by himself in the apocalypse for three days to get her back, just like stan worked for thirty years to save ford. there is nothing dipper wouldn't sacrifice for mabel.

in my humble opinion, this is why the pines family dynamic is so damn compelling. they aren't carbon copies because that's not how people work. there is a sincerity, an honesty, a relatability between all of these characters and their flaws.

mabel and dipper aren't just the younger version of their grunkles. they are a crazy mishmash of the best and worst traits swapped around and punted to the moon and back.

exploring each micro-dynamic is so fascinating. i love this weird little family.

Some sort of addendum to this post I made a month ago

Nearly every time I've rewatched Infinity Train Book 3 since I first saw it in February, I saw more parallels and narrative echos, and infodumping my friends about them isn't enough anymore

I figured I should do a post about this one because I don't think I've seen a post about that specific thing yet, and I love this show's writing, and. idk. I just need to praise it I guess

So, the most obvious part first:

Grace became everything she hated about her parents

When Grace mentions her mother in the Debutante Ball Car, it's made pretty clear she's trying to distance herself from her mother as much as possible, and at this point, we realise retrospectively that Grace's room in the Mall Car in episode one was full of sports clothes - it seems she tries to avoid things reminding her of her life before the train. And of her mother. And yet-

She tries to control everyone and everything around her, and makes people do what she doesn't want to do

And she decides what's cool and what isn't

She makes people kneel in her presence, like her mother towers over her in her mind's eye

Obviously she constantly lies to get what she wants, and her dad does that in her tape

When her younger self looks up, she looks right through adult Grace, and it's actually her parents she's looking at! Her younger self is metaphorically seeing her parents where her adult self is standing!! I still can't get over this shot

Also I feel the need to mention her mother has the same voice actor as her in her tape and even if it might be to cut corners in the budget, that feels significant (and to be fair, sometimes you can cut corners while making meaningful choices at the same time)

Now you might think I'd have nothing to say about Simon on that matter, since we don't see any flashback of his life before the Train, and we know next to nothing about his parents. But I think it's very telling that the only actual backstory we get for him is his backstory with The Cat.

Because-

Simon became everything he hated about The Cat

Ok I never see anyone mentioning this, but hear me out

First, we have no idea if Simon knew The Cat was routinely invading people's privacy through their memory tapes, but he sure has no issue doing the exact same thing

But that doesn't stop there. He also collects things obsessively

And makes kids collect things for him as well, by the way

He thinks he's above others, but he immediately switches to victim mode when it comes back to bite him

HE. ABANDONS. A CHILD. WHO WAS UNDER HIS CARE!!

And. Uh. They both dig their heels instead of trying to change, too

Don't get me wrong, on some level I would have liked to know what Simon's parents were like too. I would have liked that a lot. But there's a good chance it wouldn't change anything, because everything we need to know about his background to understand why he's Like That™ is already in the show

But yeah, Grace and Simon both pretend they found freedom on the Train, and both distance themselves from parental figures who are at the source of their trauma, claiming they're different and better than them - and yet they are both subconsciously repeating patterns that caused at least part of their problems and/or trauma in the first place

And since they decided that making numbers go up was good, as long as they stick to that idea, they are bound to never escape from that self-perpetuating loop of harm and trauma

And I love it

And I hate it

Dipper: It's dark. Like your soul.

Pacifica: My soul is glow in the dark, actually.

Trying to figure out how I want to draw Gravity Falls characters

Something silly I drew

50 posts!

It’s been like a week since I joined . . . should I be worried?

Somebody else probably did this already but whatever

Headcanon that Harper loves listening to Ivor’s rambles because she was isolated for so long and it’s comforting hearing someone else’s voice, like a constant reassurance that she isn’t alone anymore and accompanied by someone that adores her unconditionally.

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I made a Romeo cardboard cutout, and my parents and my sibling are scared of him which they call "the cardboard demon" and I have been placing him all over the house to scare people these past holidays. Just wanted to share that :)

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I personally saw Harpvor as Ivor fell first and Harper was like “hey I kinda like this freak” and then they get married. Also Ivor is such a teenage girl which is unrelated but true

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Watching Gravity Falls with siblings is great.

"I didn't think it was possible to be a worse guardian than Stan, but at least he has some idea of child endangerment." - my sister when Ford brought Dipper to the alien ship.

"That's not up to him, that's up to his parents." - my sister on Ford's apprenticeship offer.

"Is she about to get Bill'd?" - my brother when Mabel is in the forest.

"This show took a turn." - my sister in the episode thats name is like Xqthfqx or something.

"It takes a special kind of brain to come up with this." - my brother on the same episode as the previous quote.

We need to talk more about the redstone aunts. Get the redstone geniuses of their individual times, Ellegaard, Harper and Xara in a lab together (with Olivia shadowing and also spontaneously combusting from the fangirling) and there will be things invented no one has ever seen before in mcsm. Be prepared for a speedrun of multiple-back-to-back technological revolutions and also intergalactic space travel in like a month. That or the three of them would end up killing each other and the planet at large first (mad geniuses are notoriously bad at getting along with other self-proclaimed geniuses). It's a match made in either the Aether or the Nether.

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don't know much about enneagram but this is an interesting look at their personalities!

What Enneagram types are the main cast? I've been thinking about this for some time and here's my two cents. If anyone has ideas/corrections about any mistypes I'd love to hear them. This is mostly coming at it from the 'core fear' aspect rather than outward displays of personality, but I think it could inform potential character arcs.

*Jesse: 2, Helper. Fears being unwanted/unworthy of love. 2 empathetic, self-sacrificing type fits the optimistic protagonist role Jesse plays, and the fears can really be pushed in dire situations where her friends end up throwing in the towel and leaving. Potential backstories for this root fear include (as one anon mentioned a while ago) being an unmoored orphan.

Olivia: 5, Investigator. The fear of being useless/incapable adds depth to her self-worth issues over not being good enough in her abilities (building competition, redstone, etc.) and can be maximized for profit with Ellegaard's death, whereby Olivia can step into her shoes as a kind of successor.

Axel: 9, Peacemaker. Fears separation and conflict, which manifests as a passivity and resignation of the state of things. Axel is dissatisfied with their—the Treehouse Trio's—situation, but has convinced himself that it's just the way it is. Growth would be following his passion when the opportunity arises (finding Magnus and becoming the King of Boomtown)

Petra: 8, Challenger. Fears being harmed or controlled. This one may be a stretch but the rest of Petra's personality (self-reliance, resisting weakness and the need to stay in control (e.g. her conflict with Jesse in S1E7) seems to fit this. Could be explained by a really shitty childhood. Growth is learning to take a back-seat and show vulnerability (which is excellent fodder for a romantic subplot)

Lukas: 6, Loyalist. Fears not having stability. Very loyal and cooperative: Lukas is repeatedly loyal to his friends, shown when he goes back for the Ocelots or even Jesse in S2 if you ended things on bad terms earlier. Growth is abandoning his old post (The Ocelots), finding his own way and taking the risk to join Jesse's gang instead.

Bonus Aiden just for sillies: 3, Achiever. Shares a similar basic fear of worthlessness with Jesse, but manifests it outwardly with ladder-climbing and hunger for fame instead. Hangs around the negative levels of Type 3, with growth being accepting his inherent self-worth and actually doing some good instead of endlessly chasing Jesse's shadow.

*This is written with F!Jesse in mind, at least. I haven't seen an M!Jesse playthrough so I can't determine whether it's accurate or not.

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A lot of people have Pacifica want to become a lawyer, which makes sense because of all the times she threatens to sue . . . but I have a weird little headcanon that keeps popping up in my fics where she becomes a comic/cartoon artist, which she bonds with Stan over. When she's older she puts some of her own experiences growing up (like, being trained by a bell, what the heck) down in comic form, maybe in a direct way, maybe in more of an allegorical way.

I've had an Infinity Train story in my head for at least a year now. It's a post-canon story following Lake but there's also an "OC on the Train" second plot and the two plots intersect later. It'll be a series. I told myself that I should finish the whole first story before posting it, but when have I ever done that? Then I told myself to do it in chunks of 10 chapters (there will be roughly 40 total). Now I'm like, "Why not just do it in chunks of five?"

The first few chapters I wrote about a year ago, but I got stuck and then I was writing Mindscaperers and now I'm writing like 5 billion different stories. But I still think that this one is almost ready to be sent out into the world. (This is because I've almost finished the first five chapters. Yes, it took me over a year to get this far, but only because I was working on other stuff, which yes, I will still be doing, but I love this story and want to share it soon.)

Other Infinity Train characters will show up throughout the series (Hazel, Tulip, Grace, One-One and Samantha will both have minor but important roles in at least the first book, heck, I even have plans for Ryan and Min-Gi!) but Lake and Kaya (the OC) will probably be the main characters for the majority of it.

I have no idea what the rating is going to be, so I'll probably leave it at "not rated" for now. Reason being the story is going to deal pretty heavily with stuff like self-harm and anxiety. I'm not sure if it warrants an M rating, so for now . . . NR.

But there will be fluff! It is very much a Fluff and Angst, Angst with a Happy ending sort of thing!

I'm pretty excited for Lake's part of the story, because there really aren't a ton of stories about her like . . . trying to integrate into society as a literal metal person. How do you even do that?

Series name is A Place To Call Home, first book is called We Only Broke The Train A Little Bit (More Than You). It's gonna be fun! And angsty. And fun! And hurt-y. And fluff! And also some dark parts. But fluff!

I'm really excited about this.

Apparently MCSM is getting a bit of a resurgence bc people hated the Minecraft Movie trailer so bad. I've been into MCSM for several years and Gravity Falls for about one year, and the Book of Bill coming out made that fandom just explode.

Both my fandoms (well, two of them) are having a resurgence. At the same time.

Happy New Year's everybody!

“We need to apologize to mcsm” Minecraft storymode was never bad to begin with

yes some of the dialogue was awkward and there was a few plot holes but it was still GOOD, it had a unique animation style that stuck to the source material the story actually felt like it would fit in Minecraft!!!!

ma there's a weird snowman outside

Loooool