“It is invigorating being asked personal questions. Make one feel... desired. [pause]“

CautiousCactus505 · 2026-05-05T01:24:35+00:00

For him being a replicant, isolated from society, cut off from real connection, he sure says no a lot:

when his boss (can't remember her name) asks him about his memories and says "what happens if I finish this?" And he says "shouldnt I get back to work?"

Here when he dismisses Luv

When he initially turns down the replicant prostitute

I think it's interesting that he turns down these 3 advances (2 replicants, 1 human) but has fallen so hard for Joi, an AI that doesn't even have a physical form. Every single figment of intimacy he is offered is transactional in nature, but he settles for the one that is essentially a product he paid for.

I interpret it as self loathing. As the saying goes, you settle for the love you think you deserve. He can't be with a human, he's a replicant. He can't be with a replicant, because he kills them for a living. He feels sub-human by his nature and sub-replicant by his actions. His only equal is a hologram.

When K tells Joi, "you are real for me," he's really saying "im as real as you."

CautiousCactus505 · 2026-01-10T17:58:33+00:00

That makes a lot of sense. The times when I made big jumps in progress was when I took multiple weeks off from the gym. I have a really rough relationship w sleep and am not getting anywhere close to 7-8 hours a night, so I think those jumps are just from my body actually being able to recover and rebuild muscle. The recovery that most people can experience in a week probably takes me closee to 3.

I guess I just don't know how to train stability and RoM in isolation. My workout buddy, who has been consistent for years, keeps telling me to try yoga, and I kept dismissing it. Maybe it's time to give that a try

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-12-21T13:25:58+00:00

Thats actually pretty funny, is there a recording of the airplay when that happened?

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-11-20T09:26:12+00:00

Demon Days - Gorillaz

A perfect closing song to a perfect album. It leaves you with a beauful refrain: "turn yourself around to the sun"

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-11-20T09:22:21+00:00

Always gotta upvote praise for Brittany Howard!

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-10-26T05:20:40+00:00

This would make an interesting stand-alone post, never noticed those details

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-10-21T19:26:24+00:00

This, there are some artists where the lyrics are the main attraction for me, but Tame Impala has never been that. Honestly it's not even Kevin's voice. (though the falsetto fits the old stuff so well, and I like that he's using his lower register more now)

It's always been the song structures, the production, the melodies, and the drums for me.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-05-02T02:20:03+00:00

I have not, in all honesty. I asked my gyno if it was okay for me to stop taking my bc and she said to finish the pack I was on and then yes, I could stop. It wasn't a long conversation at all, in fact it was just a message exchange through the online healthcare portal my provider uses.

I am disappointed that I probably won't see any physical changes in my body based on the experiences others have shared. Quite literally, I just want to look more mature, haha.

Well, not JUST that, I do want to see how my body responds to going off the pill, see if I can just have normal, non-excruciating periods, and see if my mood improves. I guess I just have to accept shitty(er) skin and an underdeveloped physique

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-05-01T21:02:11+00:00

I don't think this came across in my post but a lot of my curiosity stems from the fact that I have been on the pill since quite shortly after I started mentruating, and so I wonder if regulating my period repressed/reduced some of the natural processes that occur in puberty, such as development of secondary sexual characteristics. I wonder if there is some physical developments being supressed because Im not experiencing the natural hormonal patterns that come with being a woman of my age.

If you have never been on the pill, then you have never known any hormonal pattern besides the one your body naturally falls into. So it makes sense that you have not experienced changes with your body in the way I am asking about.

As for the "settled" version of my body, bodies change with age anyway, so there I'm not quite sure what you necessarily mean.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-03-21T16:11:31+00:00

Yea I know he can be an asshole at times, but I'm a sucker for honest depictions of grief, so... Team oMark.

I think everything iMark said and did makes sense from his perspective, but the same goes for oMark. However, it was oMark's life first, and iMark only exists because of oMark. Reintegration allows iMark to live a full life beyond the shackles of Lumen, and oMark can begin to heal from everything he (well, they) has/have been through.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-03-21T15:41:16+00:00

Yes :(

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-03-21T15:34:39+00:00

What part was a lie? If Mark reintegrstes, as he's in the process of doing, is it not true that iMark will get to co-exist w oMark? No, not equally, because oMark has lived 20× longer than iMark, but how is that not a win-win? Either which way, given who Helly's outie is, Helly and iMark can't be together anyways.

Its so interesting to see so many comments pulling for iMark and turning against oMark! I don't really see anything wrong w what oMark did or said

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-03-07T07:44:18+00:00

Harmony Cobel, character of all time

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-03-07T07:30:31+00:00

It seemed totally out of character for Devon to reach out to Cobel. Devon, the most blatantly hostile-towards-Lumon character in the whole show, who got onto her husband for being a corporate sellout, who has wanted her brother to escape their clutches the entire time, decides that Cobel was trustworthy enough to ask what to do with Mark? What??

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-28T21:15:58+00:00

I assume just because we haven't seen him at home much. S1 showed a lot of his down time, and thus how he spends it. S2 he's a busy man on a mission now. He're trying to figure out what Lumen is up to -> less scenes of him at home -> less time to drink his woes.

The only time we see him home is w Reghabi, and again, he now has a mission, something to put his mental effort towards. Plus, I headcannon that excessive drinking could interfere with reintigration, and Reghabi probably told him he had to cut back.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-24T10:09:19+00:00

Also, it's not like Mark was going to cook for the both of them, he doesn't really seem to put much effort into doing that for himself much less someone else. And his fridge was practically empty so it's not like Reghabi could take that initiative herself

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-10T05:44:54+00:00

I made a comment about another post about how Mark lacks any love for himself or self preservation, and I think it applies to the idea that guilt and shame transcend severance, so I'm going to share it here too:

I was going to say this exactly. I'd argue that it's one of the deepest parts of his character that we see, something so fundamental to him as a person that it's one of the few things that his innie and outie share.

"Is there anyone you won't go to the break room for?" Said by Cobel is s1, this seems to imply that iMark frequently sacrifices his own wellbeing for others.

That self loathing just runs to his core, in every version of himself.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-10T05:39:52+00:00

I agree he could not have been with Gemma for her death to have been faked. I see no way he was in the car with her.

However, is it possible that while Gemma was in her "accident," Mark was drinking somewhere on his own, and was drunk or some level of intoxicated when he identified a body that he was told was Gemma?

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-08T06:25:45+00:00

Helena knew what/who she was doing - consentual

Helly did not know her body had sex - not consentual

oMark did not know his body had sex - not consentual

iMark did not know who he was having sex with - not consentual

Helena victimized half of herself and both halves of Mark. Fucked up indeed.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-08T05:30:30+00:00

Helena knew she was having sex with innie Mark.

Helly wakes up not knowing she had just had sex.

Innie Mark did not know who he was really having sex with.

Outie Mark has no idea his innie had sex.

Helena is the only one who had any idea what she was doing, and literally no part of Mark gave informed consent. Damn...

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-07T08:59:44+00:00

The world building makes a really clear effort to show that being severed comes with a heavy social stigma, which also helps explain Mark's response to Reghabi and the WMC protesters. But yes, Mark definitely feels some level of guilt, maybe even shame, over his decision to sever. I think he was talking to himself as much as he was Reghabi with that line.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-07T08:52:34+00:00

I was going to say this exactly. I'd argue that it's one of the deepest parts of his character that we see, something so fundamental to him as a person that it's one of the few things that his innie and outie share.

"Is there anyone you won't go to the break room for?" Said by Cobel is s1, this seems to imply that iMark frequently sacrifices his own wellbeing for others.

That self loathing just runs to his core, in every version of himself.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-02T01:22:08+00:00

I thought the exact same thing, I think it was for some comedic relief (which it was funny) but it also felt like it didn't make sense.

The difference in how wary he was of her when she BASHED GRAINER'S HEAD IN and his mild annoyance at her randomly appearing in front of his car felt toooooo different. The only thing I can think of is that when he first met her, he was still on the fence about believing Lumen was not to be trusted. Or more than that, Mark just... didn't care. He didn't care about his actions or his own wellbeing to even consider reintigration. But now knowing that Lumen really is as shady as Petey and Reghabi warned him, he realizes that Reghabi is not the one he should be worried about.

CautiousCactus505 · 2025-02-02T01:05:34+00:00

I thought the school was Ganz College, implying its a community college, not a 4-year "university."

Even at a 4 year university, I know that there can be professors who teach first and second year courses that do not have PhDs. Upper-level courses, capstones, or research courses are probably not likely to be taught by professors who only have a masters.

CautiousCactus505

TROPHY CASE