I’m Normal About This

Agency is important to Viktor as a character, as someone who not only rejects the fragility of the organic body on the basis of his personal hangups about labor and emotional turbulence, but also in that he is always willing to use his own body as a test subject.

In Arcane, canonically, the judgement cast upon him for being visibly disabled has been an obstacle in his career in a way that doesn't grant him the privilege or funds needed to work on projects geared towards improving the lives of those bearing the brunt of prolonged work in industrial labor. His body is a front that people are unwilling to see past.

In his masking there is of course a sense of hiding his true self in a very literal interpretation, but this mask can be seen as liberatory: He is the one choosing the version of himself people see, and it does not diminish whatever is behind it. In body-modding there is a choice of what to show, what to hide, what to keep and enhance, what to reject.

The hexcore arc has been described as him being used as a flesh puppet, and this is in direct contradiction with Viktor's defining characteristics circling around the concept of control (of one's image, of one's flesh, of one's living circumstances, of one's emotions). I imagine that possession of this sort is body horror to someone like him, the vulnerability of himself as an organic, fallible human a door to this loss.

Where the hexcore uses organic tissue to grow, the inorganic becomes a symbol for reclaiming one's agency. Viktor and Jayce are scientists, engineers - in times of hesitation and grief, they do what they do best. I imagine machinery to be an opposite to the arcane: Metal is reliable and human where the arcane is unpredictable and beyond the confines of humanity as a species.

To bring yourself back to the body you rejected, that rejected you, you must go back to being human, and what's more human than invention, creation, a product of the earth sculpted by human ingenuity?

In our factory, we made hammers. You always save yourself. There is always a choice.

okay quick wip at the animatic thing... im going crazy...

pondering and thinking about each other

Villains when the online article, How to be a successful villain, says “don’t develop any romantic feelings for your nemesis”

a vile seducer and a scoundrel who’s afraid of the noose.

:o)

CW: LOUD VIDEO

canon

some carl rendarsss im gouna sleep now

Ohh Burning Spice it is hopeless </3

wanted to do a little animation w them w this audio and it was funny weeee 😇 if u wanna interpret this deeper ig it would be like,,,something something their duties and desires don't match with each other or she is not the other half or smth like that!! Eternal Sugar ain't meant to be evil here btw just a friend telling the sad truth.

My Reiner animation 💛💛 I have not drawn scout Reiner in a long time 💛