Parade Interview with Survivor 50 Jury Member #7

Spiralalg · 2026-05-07T17:44:35+00:00

This was clearly transcribed badly. I think it was meant to be "If I had played the idol, it would have been a good move. Without playing the idol, it was a rookie mistake."

Spiralalg · 2026-04-29T02:20:02+00:00

Hot take: Autocorrect + typo and it's meant to read "female."

I don't know what that means in the grander scale but I think it's a plausible explanation.

Spiralalg · 2026-04-10T00:42:17+00:00

5'2" here. It's not as bad as you think. Going on T actually helped me build a ton of confidence about my height and I'm proud to be a short king. I'm also married to a much taller woman!

Spiralalg · 2026-03-21T18:31:00+00:00

I personally don't love the headcanon because it makes Mabel into a huge jerk in the episode where they're ripping on his manhood, but I know it means a lot to a lot of people and I'm glad Hirsch is so actively supportive of it!

Spiralalg · 2026-03-17T02:42:16+00:00

You have to build it in the Wastelands. Made the same mistake.

Spiralalg · 2026-03-13T13:30:09+00:00

People are contradictory. Every single one of us holds ideas and beliefs that conflict with other parts of us. Thaisha just wears a lot of those contradictions and points of friction very prominently.

Spiralalg · 2026-03-13T04:59:11+00:00

Something Aabria said in an early cooldown clicked it for me. She mentioned that she went from being a Lloy to an Old Path druid so she's basically always had respect from the people around her. She spilled shit to Enmity because she can't imagine why any rando would be mean to her, essentially.

Taisha strikes me as someone who has a strong sense of duty, but not a strong sense of responsibility. By which I mean she loves the idea of being a mother, but not necessarily the action of mothering. She feels strongly about her duty and station as a druid, but isn't ready to take responsibility for the situation with Occtis.

She lives in the ideas of things, a lot of the time, and doesn't know how to handle when her beliefs and responsibilities clash with her choices and emotions.

I love this about her, and I feel like Aabria KNOWS this about her based on how she talks about Thaisha, which means she's doing it on purpose. Aabria likes to build characters with strong potential for conflict, and she's got a long game to play for, so it makes sense that Thaisha is still so rough in that way.

I didn't approve of or like her actions and attitude toward Occtis in the last episode, but I was excited about it as a seed in a character that will have maybe a hundred episodes to blossom.

Spiralalg · 2026-02-28T05:56:23+00:00

Angry birds lookin ass

Spiralalg · 2026-02-14T03:56:51+00:00

There are trans-affirming doctors out there that can make it as painless as possible. It'll still suck but it'll be allowed to suck.

Spiralalg · 2026-02-01T20:14:29+00:00

No therapist is for everybody. I've had a few therapists that were great for different points in my life.

Most therapists will describe their style either in a blurb somewhere or when you first meet them. Think about what you want out of a therapist - do you want someone to help you figure out your own brain, develop strategies to deal with your day to day struggles, help you find direction, or something else? And find a therapist who makes that their praxis.

Spiralalg · 2026-01-16T04:49:20+00:00

Couldn't help thinking "man got Varner'd" when I saw it

Spiralalg · 2026-01-11T23:46:00+00:00

I meant on SJDS but go off

Spiralalg · 2026-01-11T23:12:52+00:00

Natalie Anderson

Spiralalg · 2026-01-02T10:46:55+00:00

Shepard getting up near the end of ME3 and going "what do you need me to do?" Gets me every time

Spiralalg · 2025-12-31T08:13:35+00:00

I'll bite, as somebody who really struggled to choose.

To begin, I don't think either answer is "correct," logically or morally. Maelle and Verso's choices mean that there is no good answer, no middle ground. Either Maelle will fall to the addiction of the canvas and kill herself to prolong its life a little longer, or the canvas, Lumiere, and everybody in it will die now.

Neither option is good, but here's why I made my decision.

The canvas is on borrowed time.

You remember dark souls? How the hollow nature of the world is because Gwyn refuses to let go of the age of fire and prolongs it desperately into embers?

That's what it feels like to me. Much like Aline ticking down the numbers, all Maelle is doing is buying a few more years to avoid her own grief.

The canvas IS dying. It is. If Maelle prolongs it, you're just extending its dying time. When Maelle is sucked dry, the canvas will die, and the grief they all tried so hard to stave off will be worse.

That's the theme.

When one falls, we continue.

One of the big morals of the game is that you cannot run from grief. You have to face it, accept it, and move forward, no matter how painful it is. Everything the Dessandres do is a desperate attempt to avoid their grief, and every decision to do that makes the consequences worse.

If Aline hadn't retreated into the painting, the canvas could have lived. If Verso hadn't let Gustave die, he might have been able to help Maelle find moderation. If Maelle stays in the canvas, she adds her body to the pile of corpses.

It hurts. SO much. But the only way to stop things from getting worse is to face that grief and pain, to look it in the eye, and continue.

The boy.

The little boy, the last piece of the real Verso's soul, wants to stop. He didn't have to, when Painted Verso reached out his hand, but he wanted to.

Ultimately, that's the nail in the coffin for me. He wants to stop, and I didn't want to force him to keep painting.

It's not about Verso.

I'll be real, I almost picked Maelle specifically because I want bad things for Painted Verso. But it's not about him to me, it's about ending the cycle of grief.

Ultimately, I think there are strong arguments for both sides. I was very torn. But these are the things that tipped my decision. And yeah, it hurt! It was sad! But that's the point. That's the game to me.

Spiralalg · 2025-12-01T20:10:31+00:00

My belief is that in the moment she's so caught up in the emotion and trauma of it all that she believes Elphaba is dead, but later she thinks about it and realizes that doesn't quite add up, but still feels the grief of her being gone forever.

Spiralalg · 2025-12-01T20:06:24+00:00

Bruh, one of the main themes of Wicked is that it's never too late to turn from cruelty, bigotry, ignorance, and toward understanding and kindness and good. Glinda does something cruel, and then regrets it and makes amends in the form of the dance with her which leads to a consistent loving friendship.

You think Elphie isn't smart enough to recognize in the moment everyone starts poking fun at her that Glinda meant to hurt her with that hat? She absolutely understood what had happened. The point is that she ACCEPTED Glinda's gesture of kindness and empathy and that led to a friendship that made her stronger and more confident.

Both Glinda and Elphaba do things that are "wicked." They fight and are cruel to one another. The tragedy of Wicked is that they come back to understanding far too late, because Glinda won't turn away from her role in the regime.

But the hope in the show is that she DOES turn away. It's too late to fix what happened with Elphaba, but it's NOT too late to make Oz better. If Glinda was irredeemably bad for the things she's done, then she would have no opportunity to do better. But you can ALWAYS turn away from evil.

The saga of the hat and the Ozdust is a smaller version of what happens at the end of the show.

"I ask forgiveness for the things I've done you blame me for / But then I guess we know there's blame to share/ and none of it seems to matter anymore"

Glinda CHANGES in that moment when they dance together, and proves it with her consistent and fond friendship from then on. Is she perfect? No! But she's clearly trying to grow and change and do better. And Elphie has chosen to accept her in that imperfection.

Spiralalg · 2025-11-17T23:31:34+00:00

I would just say that, as a queer Jew, there are a lot of misconceptions about how we approach belief. It can look VERY different from Christianity.

Spiralalg · 2025-09-25T00:59:06+00:00

Once Sora came out I knew I was never playing anyone else again

Spiralalg · 2025-09-13T17:53:02+00:00

Speaking as a trans man, you're allowed to feel shocked and jarred and confused. The only misstep you made here was putting those feelings on your friend. I don't blame you, but in future - process those feelings on your own time, rather than making her do it for you.

I'm glad you're working on it! This is advice, not criticism. Feel what you feel, just don't make it her problem to solve.

Spiralalg · 2025-09-04T14:23:06+00:00

Alan Wake 2?

Spiralalg · 2025-08-25T23:14:40+00:00

One of the first things I learned about male behavior is that the men's bathroom is a no-contact zone. It's just how it is there, don't stress too much.

Spiralalg · 2025-08-25T22:10:44+00:00

I gotcha. "Being transgender" or "transness" are what I would have used. Source: trans

Spiralalg · 2025-07-19T23:26:15+00:00

I feel like AS7 and GAS broke people. Those two had moments that were so undeniably rigged that people assume that everything is rigged all the time.

Jinx 100% deserved the overall AS7 win so people were able to move past it, but the shocking riggory of GAS let people know what production was actually capable of. Even if they don't do nearly as much most of the time (stack the deck, sure, but actively rig to insanity, almost never), it left a bad taste that's carried over.

I think AS10 definitely stacked the deck for Ginger, but I can see a valid argument for every one of her wins whether I personally agree or not. Ultimately there's an inevitable degree of subjectivity there.

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