hiccupmistress

[hiccupmistress]

PSA for former (or current) Twitter artists, photographers, et al.

A PSA for anyone on here still with an in/active Twitter account - from the middle of next month, all pictures posted to the site will be filtered in to feeding AI/Machine Learning image generation with no option to opt out. If you posted art or personal photos that you do not want being drawn from by the algorithm, delete your images and/or account before 15/11/2024.

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whats-his-name seems to have finally torpedoed twitter for good, so I guess I need to get more in the habit of checking and posting on here more.

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writers and artists everywhere all the time

[hiccupmistress]

PSA; autistic people have a tendency to take things quite literally. I saw a TikTok the other day (I'm afraid I didn't save it, sorry) where someone was talking about when neurotypical people will use a question as a veiled insult. I.e, "Why are you doing it that way?" is often meant to mean "You're doing it wrong", whereas neurodivergent people will take this at face value and answer why we find a method of doing a thing preferable, and vice-versa, we'll often ask "why are you doing it that way?" out of genuine curiosity to learn, and neurotypical people will interpret it in the veiled insult way.

I'd like to add to this with an experience I just had of taking something literally when a neurotypical person was being somehow non-literal. My Mum approached me with her laptop and said "I'm in no way telling you what to do, but this just popped up and I thought you should know". It was an advert for a new job vacancy at a local business. A local business that I have applied for numerous times in the past and not only have they rejected me, but their rejections have been rather condescending and inconsiderate. I simply said "They haven't exactly been encouraging in the past", and my Mum then shouted "WELL CAN'T YOU AT LEAST APPLY???", and I said "I thought you weren't telling me what to do?" and my Mum then silently stormed off, went out the front door and got in the car and drove off to have a sulk. For real though, why did you say you weren't telling me what to do if you were literally telling me what to do??

My Mum is always insisting she understands my autism and tries to accommodate it, but she is always doing things like this, no matter how many times or how carefully I explain it, and I'm apparently always the bad guy. Just say what you mean and its less of an issue, if you're about to tell me what to do, don't preface it with "I'm not about to tell you what to do". How do neurotypical people even function when nothing they say is what is meant??

I've heard of "reading between the lines", but should I just assume every day is opposite day?!

EDIT: I should clarify that I love my Mum dearly - she's the most supportive person in my life by a country mile, and she is just trying to help me get a job in this anecdote. No issue with any of that, I'm grateful. Just wish she was a little more receptive to me explaining my issues - its unfortunately a repeating pattern and I've done my very best to communicate it.

[hiccupmistress]

The Enterprise NCC-1701-F. I may be a bit disappointed that she had such a minor role in Star Trek: Picard, but I'm still so grateful she was made canon at all! The Odyssey becoming the canon Enterprise-F is the first step; hopefully one day, we'll see more of her in future shows, novels or comics.

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I am so excited for Star Trek Prodigy to come to Netflix so I can rewatch season 1. There are so many fantastic stories, ideas and concepts in that first season alone, and is a truly phenomenal example of Star Trek! Very interested to see what more they have up their sleeves for season 2.

Some choice episodes from season 1:

-"Kobayashi" (episode 6)

-"First Con-tact" (episode 7)

-"All the World's a Stage" (episode 13)

I also intend to get the Blu-Ray release at some point, but I have some other financial priorities to sort out first.

[hiccupmistress]

Even in Starfleet, there's no way to stop pets climbing all over the furniture...

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People are actually suggesting boycotting Prodigy over this? Yes, Robert Beltran has said and done some very problematic things of late, but that's not Star Trek: Prodigy's fault.

Whilst its kind of fun at times to poke fun at Beltran's expense and make jokes about ways in which he could be written-out, realistically speaking, the ideal way to handle it would be to simply recast Chakotay. Especially since this is an animated show we're talking about, where recasts are usually much less jarring than in live action (not that live action shows shouldn't also feel free to recast where necessary, but the point is, its more noticable for the audience).

They could easily solve these problems and even potentially give Chakotay a more prominent role if they A) recast, and B) hire an actual cultural consultant who might be able to undo some of the damage that was done in Voyager by their fraudulent cultural consultant, "Jamake Highwater". (if you don't know, the guy they hired to consult on Chakotay's background in Voyager was a con-artist who claimed to have native-American ancestry when he actually didn't, and this resulted in a lot of stereotypes being applied to the character).

You might argue that a boycott would send the message to the creators not to keep Beltran on, but given the circumstances, and given a genuinely great show almost didn't get its second season at all, maybe make your concerns about him heard whilst supporting the show in this case.

I was bummed Prodigy was taken off Paramount + until it became clear the second season was all about Chakotay and I felt like we dodged a bullet. It's going to Netflix which is a perfect home for a bigot like Robert Beltran.

[hiccupmistress]

We did it

[hiccupmistress]

I've often been quite a fan of Star Trek's fandom wiki, "Memory Alpha". At first glance, its a very well-kept wiki, where people are quick to add new information, and the occasional attempt to spam the wiki with false or inflammatory information is quickly struck down.

However, when you take a closer look, its a rather nasty and pompous place.

For starters, character pages used to list a character's gender in the main info box at the top of pages. However, when Star Trek: Discovery introduced the franchise's first properly non-binary character, Adira, a few wiki contributors threw a temper-tantrum and now character pages do not list gender in the info box, and instead its mentioned in the main body of text if its considered "necessary".

Then there's the problem of the Wiki's framing device. Yes, a wiki, a site for which the main purpose is to be a resource of information decided it needed a framing device. The idea is that "MA is written from a POV from the distant future." Why is this a problem? Well, recently, a contributor opened a discussion article, (for those who don't know, this is a special page for the benefit of contributors to discuss potential changes to the way the wiki is run), talking about the way pictures on character pages are organised.

Currently, Memory Alpha will include two images on the top info-box of prominent recurring characters. The latest-chronological image at the top, and the earliest-chronological image at the bottom. The user on this discussion page posited that since the current "Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" is a prequel show that is taking time to flesh out characters who had very little screen time in the original series, that certain characters, such as George-Samuel Kirk or Robert April should have images swapped around so that the "primary" or most prominent depiction of the character is at the top. They used the examples specifically because, GS Kirk's only appearance in the originals was as a dead body, and Robert April's only appearance was a single episode of the Animated Series, and he's a different ethnicity, they claimed that "Adrien Holmes is meant to be the definitive portrayal of April".

This was met with nothing but backlash, the first quote I put in this post about "MA is written from a POV from the distant future" was used to justify why the later chronological appearances are listed at the top. But frankly, that doesn't hold water with Sam Kirk, because why would a future archive of historical information use a picture of someone's rotting corpse to depict who they were? And more importantly, this is where the whole thing of Memory Alpha having a framing device becomes a problem. Its all very quaint that the wiki has its lore, but at the end of the day, Memory Alpha isn't the SCP Foundation, its not archiving its own special set of original worldbuilding or anything, its a wiki for a bunch of TV shows and movies! Its primary purpose is to be a resource so fans can find out information. As the OP of the Discussion Page pointed out, anyone coming in to Star Trek through SNW who comes to look at Sam's MA page will see a dead body, kind of a spoiler if they're not already familiar with TOS.

Now yes, wiki pages will always have spoilers on them, that's kind of the point, but given his TOS appearance is just Shatner in a fake moustache, playing a corpse, there's really no need to classify that as the "most recent" iteration of the character.

Then of course, there's the Robert April thing. Of course someone chimed in to whine that changing April's ethnicity is "motivated by a dislike of character's original race. For fans who respect continuity, Adrien Holmes will never be the definitive Robert April. I've got nothing against him but I wish he played a new character." which is eye rolling. Someone did point out that live-action shouldn't trump animation. I can agree with that. There are certain circles who would tout that live action film or TV is inherently better than any other media, be it animation, comics, books, games etc, which it really shouldn't be held as, all forms of artistic expression should be held with the same respect, but, its nothing but red flags to whine that SNW hates white people because they cast a black actor as a formerly white character who only appeared in one episode animated on a budget of debt. And considering most of SNW's cast is white or white-passing, its hardly "a dislike of the original race". And guess how many people called out this user for whining about Adrien Holmes? None at all!!! Over the years, I've seen more Star Trek fans boasting that they never bothered watching TAS than I've seen say anything nice about TAS, so pretending to care that Commodore April is now a person of colour comes across incredibly disingenuous. (Not to mention the writer of the original Animated Series episode in which April has appeared has gone on record praising the casting of Holmes as live-action April, so really what does it matter if some 1970s micro-budget animation cells are contradicted)

Even with that aside, people were still arguing that the one-off animated appearance of April should still be at the top of his wiki page because "We're a future historical archive"

The point and TL;DR is a fan wiki should be a resource for real life fans in the real world first and foremost and have any framing devices second. Memory Alpha and the majority of its contributors don't seem to understand this. Maintaining some stupid illusion of being an in-universe archive seems to be more important to a lot of those people. And, between stuff like the gender tag mentioned at the top of the post, and the attitudes towards things like ethnic diversity, I don't really feel comfortable continuing to even use the wiki, much less contribute to it, as I have done on occasion. The admin at that wiki could really do to crack down on the gender-critical and racist-dogwhilstle-y users and have a serious think about whether they want to be running an actual wiki or an ARG disguised as a wiki, because the framing device BS is unnecessary as it is quaint.

[hiccupmistress]

yesterday I was at gamestop and a man in full Data cosplay walked up to the front counter and I did a double take so hard I nearly broke my neck. So, he walks up and the cashier just casually smiles and goes “How’s it going, Data? What can I do for you?”  and Data goes, “I am doing quite well. I was just wondering when you guys would have Destiny 2 in stock.” This mans……literally did not smile or emote at all. He went all in. The cashier was totally non fazed. I, however, was completely shitting my pants cos ya’ll DO NOT understand how good this dude’s cosplay was. It really looked like fuckin data teleported into the middle of game stop in rural ohio to ask about motherfucking destiny 2.

The only time he broke character was when I was stealthily trying to stare at him and thinking about asking for a pic when he was walking out.This dude. Looked at me, completely expressionless. and WINKED at me. Someone collect ya mans he wildin lmfao

[hiccupmistress]

I wanted to give editing a shot on my new system (and I had to re-learn a lot of things in paint.net because I lost my old university Creative Cloud subscription)

Pleased with the result!

[hiccupmistress]

Trying to Make Peace With Strange New Worlds’ Controversial New Episode

Warning: This post will contain major spoilers for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, season 2 episode 8, “Under the Cloak of War”, and will refer to the episode with the assumption that readers have already watched it.

 This week’s episode of SNW has already proved very divisive. Some people are calling it the best episode yet, others are calling it the worst. It tackles a difficult subject and doesn’t pull its punches. I’ve seen people crying “character assassination”, and others suggesting that its “character development”. And in all honesty, both parties are right. We’re used to seeing main characters in Trek be virtuous paragons, especially medical practitioner characters, and we’ve had fifty-five years to build up our own headcanons and ideals about Dr. M’Benga. But at the same time, in terms of actual canon content, M’Benga got nothing substantial in his Original Series episode and only one aspect of his character was focused on in season 1 of Strange New Worlds; you can’t contradict a character that hasn’t been developed yet. And I’m saying this as someone who was on the “character assassination” side when I first watched the episode!

It reminds me of M*A*S*H, and bear with me, because its probably not for the reasons you’re thinking, although this episode of SNW has a lot of scenes set in a popup medical camp in a warzone, that’s not it; there’s a specific episode of M*A*S*H its reminding me of. For the uninitiated, M*A*S*H was a show that ran from 1972-1983, following up from a movie in 1970. Set in a Mobile Army Surgical Hospital during the Korean War, M*A*S*H started out as a sitcom. As the years passed though, it became a lot more sombre, dealing with heavier subjects, even though it never fully lost its comedic origins.

In season 7, there’s an episode (“Preventative Medicine”), where the hospital is flooded with tons of new patients, apparently a Colonel by the name of Lacy has been getting reckless and wilfully endangering his troops. Lacy even drops by the 4077 MASH unit to give his men purple hearts and hollow platitudes, neither of which his men want from him. The worst part is that Lacy isn’t even done. Once his men are recovered, he plans on sending them on a mission with a projected casualty rate of 30%, equating to one-hundred soldiers. And all for a hill with no strategic importance other than bragging rights. Nobody in the 4077 likes Lacy, but our main character, Captain “Hawkeye” Pierce decides to take it into his own hands. With the help of his buddy Captain BeeJay Hunnicut, he spikes Lacy’s drink to trick him into thinking he needs his appendix out, with the intention of actually removing his appendix so that he’d be unable to send his troops on that suicidal hill mission; he’d pulled a similar trick back in a season 3 episode (“White Gold”) with Hunnicut’s predecessor, Captain “Trapper” McIntyre. This time though, Trapper’s long gone, and Hunnicut’s having none of it. He lambasts Pierce, telling him:

“That man is crazy, but that doesn’t make this right. Some things are wrong and they’re always wrong.”

But Pierce can only see the troops he’ll be saving and goes ahead with deliberate malpractice anyway. Afterwards, wounded keep coming in. There’s a war on, after all. Colonel Lacy being out of the picture doesn’t stop the rest of the war.

The bottom line there is that Hawkeye did a very bad thing, and the episode doesn’t have any last-minute resolution or remedy for that. The audience are just left to contemplate that maybe the funny, charismatic Pierce isn’t the hero he makes himself out to be. And that’s kind of what “Under the Cloak of War” is doing for Strange New Worlds. Doctor M’Benga does a very bad thing, and the episode smartly ends on that note, leaving the audience to contemplate. The difference is, back in the M*A*S*H days, the landscape of TV was different - Continuity was rare. Whilst SNW isn’t as serialised as the other modern Star Trek shows, there’s still though-lines and ongoing stories for the main characters. Even if there were no immediate consequences at the end of this episode, that’s not to say M’Benga will never face consequences.

Its not a perfect episode. There’s certainly a number of things I’d do differently. And yes, that ending was absolutely a shock, one that makes us perceive one of the main characters differently, but that’s the point. You don’t have to like it, you don’t have to agree with what M’Benga did – on the contrary, if you you’re disgusted at what M’Benga seemingly got away with, the episode did its job. That’s not to say you have to like or agree with Ambassador Rah either. Like with “Preventative Medicine”, “Under the Cloak of War” is (in my opinion,) very much about the risk that in our attempts to stop heinous people, we can allow ourselves to sink to their levels. Colonel Lacy and Ambassador Rah were both very nasty people in their own ways. But that doesn’t mean medical malpractice or murder are okay, and sometimes, on rare occasions, we need to see heroes become villains for a story to send its message.

I hated “Under the Cloak of War” when I first watched it on Thursday. I watched it again in preparation for writing this. I still don’t “like” the episode, but I can make peace with what I think it was trying to do, and I look forward to seeing how it shapes M’Benga’s character arc going forward.

[hiccupmistress]

So you know how Twitter and PayPal are two completely different services and that trying to force one to become the other would be ridiculous and impractical?

The self-proclaimed “genius” who recently paid out several billion US Dollars to own one of those services doesn’t understand that. 

There are people who think that guy will get a manned space programme to Mars, on the basis that he claims to be a “genius”.

There’s sunk-cost-fallacy and then there’s continuing to have faith in that guy.

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They’re about to break so many laws it’s not even funny, I can feel it in my bones

[hiccupmistress]

The Crew of the USS Precept

My characters in Star Trek Online are all the crew of my story ship, the USS Precept, or their colleagues throughout Starfleet. I'm not an artist beyond the design work I can do around screenshots I take in-game (the LCARS frames for example, those are my work based on the Picard-era look), so it's fun to have the characters there and able to be posed and play as in-game.

So! As I wanted to get info on all my characters on Tumblr in a somewhat-readable format (it's all my my DeviantArt in fancier style), here's my lead character and the ship...

... and the rest of the ship's crew / main cast of my stories!

[hiccupmistress]

Some more Star Trek Online demorecord screenshots. This time of the Voyager-J (or "Joyager", if you will). Shaders used.