Well, well, well! Back again? Or did you just happen to stumble upon my blog for the first time? Whatever the case, welcome! This is ModernDayTrickster and this is my third blog post.

Guys, as I mentioned in my first entry, Tricksters don't break rules. They also don't cheat nor do their tell lies. They just don't. It goes against their pride and insults their intelligence. What they do do is bend rules through loopholes and twisted words. As they say, 'the devil's in the details' and Tricksters take full advantage of that. If something isn't explicitly stated as a rule, it's not a rule. Implications don't matter to them; only the technical terms used. Even then, you have to be careful because words have multiple meanings and even stresses on different words can change the meaning of the entire sentence.

For example, in asking for a wish, Demona from Disney's animated series, Gargoyles, told Puck the Trickster Fairy, "If you cannot rid me of all the humans, then at least rid me of that human: Elisa Maza!"

To which Puck replied, "Did you say that human, or that human? Oh, never mind, I'll figure it out. This just might be fun after all." Which of course, meant he was happy and free to interpret Demona's wish as he chose. Naturally, it wasn't as Demona expected. Another example in which emphasis plays an important role is this sentence: 'I didn't say you stole my money'. No matter which single word you emphasize, the sentence takes on a whole different meaning. Try saying it aloud and you'll see what I mean.

Nothing disappoints me more, though, than a Trickster who turns out to be false when, with a little change in wording, they could have easily remained true.

Bill Cipher from Gravity Falls failed as a true Trickster because (aside from being immoral as opposed to amoral) he made a bargain with Dipper Pines and didn't uphold his end. He told him that he would give him the password to a laptop encryption he was trying to decode if he gave him a puppet to possess as a body. Dipper didn't expect the puppet Bill picked to be his own body, but Bill possessed it after they shook on the deal. However, after he took over Dipper's body, he smashed the laptop to pieces. How difficult would it have been to put in the password and then smash the laptop? That way he could upheld his end of the bargain and managed to keep Dipper from finding out the contents of the computer. Instead, he took a shortcut and ended up simply lying. What's there to be admired about that?

Another disappointment was Xibalba from The Book of Life. When he had his two-headed snake staff bite Maria, she fell into a deep sleep that made everyone think she had died. Xibalba then came to Manolo, who he knew loved Maria, and asked her, 'do you want to see Maria again?'. Manolo answered, 'with all my heart', and though Xibalba warned him, 'think about what you say, boy', Manolo repeated his answer. So Xibalba killed him with a bite from the other head of the two-headed snake.

While I liked his warning of 'think about what you say', as if he was trying to confirm that the decision was Manolo's choice, the deal struck was still worded wrong and Xibalba still ended up being a cheat. Since Maria wasn't dead, killing Manolo didn't allow him to see Maria again, so he didn't hold up his end of the deal. Sure, technically Xibalba didn't say he was going to let Manolo see Maria again, but he didn't technically say he was going to kill Manolo, either, so going by that logic, no deal was struck and Xibalba just had his competition killed off, which was still cheating. Also something that wouldn't earn him any respect among his fellow Tricksters.

This could have easily been amended if Xibalba said, 'would you like to join the souls of the dead in the Land of the Remembered?' to Manolo or something to that effect because since Manolo thought Maria was dead and her soul was in that land, he would have still eagerly agreed and Xibalba wouldn't have been at fault because it would have been Manolo's choice.

That's all for this post! Thanks for reading and I hope you stay tuned for more blog updates!

This is ModernDayTrickster signing off for now~