#...just..... going by the symbols present: approximately 8?

[blackwinged-soul]

I may have been an intergalactic ruler, the greatest necromancer of my generation, and cojoined with the source of all darkness, all in worlds wherein I had great magic of my own.

But this thing is still the most powerful symbol in my magic.

(re, post I put on my mystic blog.)

Copying here for context. (Reminded about this by realizing it was very-close-to-new moon when I cast the latest round of shields over my room. During which I Used This Symbol.)

Oh yeah, speaking of casting all that cleansing/protective stuff: Sometimes being a pop culture witch is rewatching one of the things that has inspired your craft more than anything, incorporating it back into the thing you do, and it works SO FREAKING WELL that you wonder how you forgot about Using That Thing. Tagged: For me it's a certain protective seal that I ward my space with when I need Heavy Duty Blocking/Protecting and it always works better than all the iron or fire or mirror shields I've ever conjured. It's mostly an amalgam sort-of-mandala of a bunch of familiar symbols but Put It All Together and it's fucking MAGIC.

[the-girl-who-didnt-smile]

BIG PAPA / THE DOORKEEPER 

[1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8]

Aliases: Big Papa The Doorkeeper (god) The Trickster (god) Master of Fate The Devil

Real Identity: The god of Chaos

Species: A god

Gender: Male

Age: Over 13.7 billion years

Family: Bon Dieu (Creator) Grandmother Serpent (“sibling”) Lady Rose (“sibling”) Lady Love (“sibling”) Maman de la Vie (“sibling”) Baron de la Mort (“sibling”) Ironman (“sibling”)

INTRODUCTION

The Seventh and Final Child of Bon Dieu.

The single greatest jazz musician in existence, The Divine Messenger of Human Destiny, and the original dog furry, Big Papa is the most powerful god in Hazbin Hotel. 

APPEARANCE

When he first spawned into existence, Big Papa phased through many different forms before deciding to assume the form of a human who is simultaneously the youngest and oldest of his siblings. From neck down, he is approximately half of Alastor’s physical age, while his face is twice his age. He just made his head look like an old man, because he’s a really chaotic guy.

It’s a college student wearing a Santa beard, 24/7.

Asymmetry is present throughout his design to reflect his dual, unpredictable nature. He is almost always seen smiling, not because his face is stuck like that, but because Papa is almost always in a good mood. He also has a habit of opening his left eye wider than his right eye, where he frequently winks with his right eye.

He always wears a red zoot with a gold chain and two-tone tuxedo shoes, and is almost always seen smoking a pipe. He wears a red fedora that has three gold bones on it, and a little gold feather. The bones have nothing to do with Death, but symbolize his love of dogs. At times, he closes the jacket of his zoot. At other times, it is open. If he existed, he would surely be a fashion icon of the 1930’s. 

He carries a magic, gold staff that has a coil and orb sitting at the top. Unlike Alastor’s staff, this staff appears to have a mass. If dropped, it falls to the ground with a loud THUD. You go to try to pick it up, and you’re like “HOLY SHIT! This thing weighs like A MILLION POUNDS!!!” It does not actually weigh one million pounds, but is dynamically adjusted to be “just too heavy” for whoever is trying to lift it, because Papa is a Troll. But it appears to be weightless in his hands, because he’s just that strong. As it is not made out of matter, his staff cannot be broken. He can shapeshift the staff into anything, including a microphone, trumpet, snake, a little gold dog, and/or the Sun. 

Due to his love of dogs, Papa is almost always seen with at least one or two dogs near him. He likes to attract stray dogs to him by making bones appear out of nothing. You can hear him coming by the sound of dogs barking, and very loud footsteps. 

HE IS A VERY LOUD MAN!!!!!

This guy REALLY sounds like he’s from New Orleans. He has a very memorable laugh. In a single voice, it has this quality where it somehow sounds as if a five-year old, a twenty-year old, and an eighty-year old are all laughing at the same time. His laugh can be contagious, and can sound downright maniacal when he wants it to.

Although he has a very human appearance, Papa frequently subtly shapeshifts his appearance in order to mess with humans. For example, he will make his face move purely by shapeshifting, as if there are no muscles underlying his skin. This produces an uncanny effect, but before you can notice what he’s doing, he goes back to making it look like he has muscle structure. He will also subtly shapeshift his face, height, and other aspects of his appearance when nobody's looking. 

At other times, he employs optical illusions to make it appear as if he has shapeshifted when he has done no such thing. He deflects all ordinary attacks by causing bizarre, “Looney Tune physics” to occur. You try to shoot him and the bullet bounces off of him, zipping around the room as it draws a portrait of him dancing the zydeco before it flies through the center of your forehead, killing you instantly.

There are a couple of visual clues to his inhumanity, namely:

His smile: Papa does not smile like a regular human. It’s just pure D. As The Real-Life Sun God Nika, he is the only man in all of fiction more WILL OF D.  than Monkey D. Luffy himself!

Bones on his hat: The bones are not attached to his hat in any way, but are just floating there. He makes them grow, shrink, and rotate when he feels like it. A human looking at him would just assume this is some sort of parlor trick.

Mustache: His mustache is impossibly shaped like a bone. This trait was inspired by Edwar D. Newgate (One Piece). 

He picks his nose with his pinky finger.

To signify his status as the leader of the gods, his magic is gold in color.

As a shapeshifter, Big Papa assumes many different forms.

CHILD FORME

Big Papa is good with kids, not because he is a parental figure, but because he is himself childish. Meaning, he can authentically think the way a child thinks, just as authentically as he can think the way an elderly man thinks.

He is both young and old, wise and immature. 

When he assumes this form, he likes to turn his staff into a big, shapeshifting, universal key. That’s when you know he’s up to no good… 

FEMALE FORME

Although he usually assumes a male form, Big Papa will randomly change his gender on a whim. This is his female forme.

She sounds like Ella Fitzgerald when she sings.

I call her Mrs. Papa.

DOG FORMES

In addition to turning himself into a child and a woman, Big Papa can also assume the form of any breed of dog or Hellhound.

Because he loves all dog breeds, it is advised to draw him as whatever your favorite breed of dog is.

[windvexer]

Low-Spoons Record-Keeping: Practicing Spells & Techniques

While record keeping has benefits, it is not necessary or required to progress in your path. While low-spoons record keeping is right for some, please do not feel pressured that you "should" be able to keep records. It is still a burden and a time and energy consuming task, even if you have found ways to simplify it.

Fact: Writing down a spell or exercise each time you do it is the worst.

Fact: Casting lots of different spells introduces lots of different variables and makes it all the more difficult to track progress and see what works for you.

Fact: Fix both of these problems at once by writing down one spell or exercise and just annotating the page with the date every time you perform it.

Examples:

> Spell/exercise written in shorthand. If I already know how to seal a spell, if I already know how to do a saltwater cleansing, I don't need to explain that to myself every time I write down the spell.

> Symbols let me quickly reference aspects of the spell.

> No optional steps. I think ahead and really consider what I'm willing to do every time I cast the spell. The more variables and inconsistencies I allow, the harder it will be for me to know what is really working and what really isn't.

Now, each time I perform the spell, I'm going to follow those steps exactly.

This eliminates the need to take notes when I actually cast the spell.

This keeps my practice consistent.

This lets me know if the spell, as I have written it, actually works for me or not.

I write down the date every time I perform the spell/exercise.

> All I do is add the date.

If the spell/exercise delivers the expected results, I add a second notation to indicate that I achieved manifestation.

> For spells that manifest days or weeks later, I strive to mark down the exact date I noticed manifestation, even in hindsight.

> I might add symbols to indicate the date of manifestation is approximate.

> For an energy work or "instant magic" exercise, I might mark down how many hours or minutes it took before I noticed results.

> For an energy work or instant magic exercise, I might simply make a check mark (especially if I am updating records after the fact and only remember that it worked, but not exactly when)

Tracking Progress:

> By looking at how often I add a second notation, I can see at a glance if I am making progress or not.

> I can see that as I practice this candle spell over the months, manifestation becomes more consistent, and days to manifestation get shorter.

> I can see that I am not getting better at this energy exercise as time goes on.

As I work with one technique over a period of time, I will likely notice things about it that weren't apparent to me at the beginning. I may choose to add notes.

> These notes will help me decide how to build/adjust the next techniques I work on.

To practice general ritual formats, extra notes may be helpful to track success with intents and correspondences.

Let us imagine for example that I have chosen to experiment with basil, chamomile, and rosemary. I'm only using those three herbs right now no matter what spell I cast.

To keep track of this, I need to add a few extra notes, but I can still keep them to a minimum:

(I apologize for the unlined visual clutter, hell if I know where my nice dotted paper went).

> Now, looking back, I can see that chamomile doesn't work for me when I want to banish, and basil doesn't work for me when I want money; but if I swap their roles, success seems likely.

> If I am consistent with my technique, I don't need to write everything down. If my statements of intent are always present-tense simple sentences, like "I have cash now," or "I fall asleep quickly," I don't need to write down the exact wording.

The time may come when you're done with a specific technique.

Noting down an "exit interview" may be helpful so you remember what happened or why you're moving on.

Apparently only 10 images allowed per post ^-^;

If you're done with a technique, consider writing why in the remaining blank space.

"2/20/22: Stopped practicing, waste of time," is a very helpful note for me. Yes, I will forget why I stopped and question going back to it in the future.

"8/8/20: Updated spell to include spirit offering, see 'Candle Spell Spirit Honoring'," is useful for me, because it creates a link in the narrative. Two years from now, I will have forgotten why I stopped using this specific spell. "I updated my technique and I'm trying something new, look for a page with this label" is going to keep me on track in the future.

Summary

By writing down a specific technique and practicing it over and over, you not only give yourself the benefit of consistent practice with limited variables, but you significantly reduce the burden of updating your records each time you practice.

While this technique can be expanded to add extra notes for each iteration, at its core, only the date is required to mark down when practice occurred. Everything after that, including whether or not to track manifestations, is optional.

[animatedminds]

Star Wars: Visions - Episode 8: Lop and Ochō

Early reveal for the rest of the review: this is by far my favorite of the films so far (who knows, maybe Episode 9 will extremely wow me, but until then...), for what is actually a variety of reasons that I will probably go into at length. And because there’s nothing I like better than to nerd out at length, there is better time than now to delve into... Episode 8: Lop and Ochō Developed By: Geno Studio Directed By: Yuki Igarashi Another one that uses a brief narration to approximate the opening crawl of the films, again to great thematic effect.

This is also another one with an explicit timeframe. During the rise of the Galactic Empire, we focus on a formerly isolated planet that has reached out to the Galactic Empire in hopes that the Empire’s influence can modernize their society (some very clear Japanese historical subtext here), leading to many aliens immigrating to the planet. This includes Lop, a homeless bunny-girl alien (mildly jarring, since Gamorreans aside animal-people aliens is something you’re more likely to find in Wing Commander) who escaped from captivity and one day bumped into the patriarch of the ruling clan of the planet and his young daughter. The daughter - Ochō - insists on adopting Lop, leading to her father bringing her into the family: and so Lop and Ochō become like sisters.

Years later, strife strikes as the patriarch - Lop and Ocho’s father - realizes that the Empire only intends to exploit their planet and mobilizes a guerilla force to strike back. But Ochō takes the opposite opinion: without the Empire’s influence, their backwards planet is doomed to fall behind no matter how noble their culture is, so they must submit to ensure their own future. This rift explodes as Ochō formally joins the Empire and their father steps up his efforts to fight back, while Lop stops at nothing to stop the fighting and bring her adopted family back together again.

The very first thing I’m going to focus on here is the choice in how the story opts to approach the setting. Here, instead of getting a Jedi who visits this planet, seeing these people as an outsider does in the way most of the other shorts set up narratives of this type, the focus is on this particualr culture and how its individuals see the Empire’s presence. You are immersed into these people and their ideologies, their history and how Lop and Ocho fit into it all as heirs in the next generation. This is a fantastic way of doing this - you may recall that back during my review of The Village Bride, I commended that short for giving the people of that short a distinct means of looking at the Force, but even in that one the people were secondary: objects of the Jedi’s perspective. Here, Lop is technically an outsider, but that only outlines the prominence of the setting and storytelling as she is then raised alongside this new family and world.

The presentation here is very similar to something like Lost Stars, a book in the current canon that I’ve always seen as one of the best Star Wars novels made in the last few decades. Like Lost Stars, this short uses the characters culture to set up their upbringings and situations, and then applies that to the issue of the Empire: Lop chooses to oppose the Empire - or, more accurately, to try and bring Ochō back home - because of how much her adopted people’s attachment to family has shaped her. Ochō chooses to join the Empire because she sees nothing but the big picture, her good intentions leading her down a draconian path, and as the story goes on her conceit as an entitled heir eventually starts to show itself. The conflict does strike similar beats as the one between Thane Kyrell and Ciena Ree for similar reasons: the story makes sure we know why these characters are going to split before the split happens.

The characterization is good, is what I’m saying. A great example of doing great, distinctive character work in a short amount of time.

I should also get the visuals. This short combines bright, modern character designs with a very classical, painted aesthetic for the world around the characters. This gives it a very classic animation feel, like watching a Miyazaki movie or Sleeping Beauty: the location art of this episode is among the series’ best, and the action animation manages to combine a fluidity of motion with a simplicity of choreography, in a way not unlike The Ninth Jedi - another of the shorts whose action animation stood out.

Back to the plot with another interesting track: the story makes it unclear how strongly force sensitivity plays a role, which also gives it a good contrast to the others which generally don’t just star Jedi, but are almost exclusively about Jedi intrigue and entanglements: Lop is clearly strong with the force, but she has no context for that and her objectives have nothing to do with being a Jedi - she is centered around her people and her family. The lightsaber we see in the short - fantastically - has a backstory similar to the Darksaber we see throughout The Clone Wars, Rebels and The Mandalorian: centuries ago, a Jedi was trained from this warrior culture, and instead of passing their saber down to a padawan or giving it back into the Order, this Jedi instead passed the saber down through their family, again cycling back to the way this short uses the characters’ unique perspective and history to approach the setting rather than the other way around. The people in the short only have legends of the Jedi, and the only thing that’s significant here is that the sword featured is the prized possession of their clan.

This gives the story a lot of room for questioning, especially as the ending is open rather than definitive: is Lop going to learn more about the force, and if so will she do through the lens of her people? Who was this old Jedi, and does the sword have a history like the Darksaber does? And most importantly: the war against the Empire does not end with the end of the short: where will it go from here? Will Lop and Ochō ever be reunited? There is a degree to which this short comes off almost like a pilot for a longer story, which would serve me just fine - for the reason I’m about to get into now: As always, a purpose of these reviews is to look at how much potential these shorts - which are currently non-canon - have to some day become canon, or even at least be followed up on by the studios involved. The potential there comes down a few key factors: the major one being the amount of support these shorts get from the fanbase. But another is in how easily or organically these shorts can be incorporated into the framework of the Star Wars universe.

And are the chances for this short’s incorporation good? ABSOLUTELY. I generally judged the other shorts’ potential on how little they contradicted the world and setting around them. With this one, however, its simpler to think of it from the opposite direction: this is exactly the kind of stories that gets told in the Star Wars universe today. There are several stories I can think of just like this in concept that were made within the last few years alone, or even being made right now: the current canon loves its stories about X culture in one corner of the galaxy and how its reacting to the rise of the Empire, which heroes come from there and why. Where those heroes go in the end. The comics, especially, always seem to be on the lookout for more focus characters to play with, but I also mentioned Lost Stars earlier, and that’s a very good point of comparison: for the same reason Lost Stars makes for one of the best prose installments of the current canon, Lop and Ochō has a lot of open real estate it can waltz into to define its own part of the universe.

Besides a couple superficial stylistic things (the symbols on the lightsaber blade, as I mentioned before, Star Wars doesn’t typically do strictly “animal people” as species - that’s more a Wing Commander thing - but that doesn’t mean they couldn’t if they really wanted to), there’s nothing really stopping this thing from getting canonized. I really hope people make some noise for it, because I’m being serious when I say this of all the films has The Best Chances of being followed up - minus The Duel which, of course, was already getting a followup before the series even released.

All in all, I mean it when I say this was my favorite of all of the shorts. It, pound for pound, has everything that I found enjoyable about this set of films all in one package, ever interesting means of approaching the Star Wars universe that I was looking for, all of the interesting ways of looking at situations we already know that I was hoping for, with a set of endearing characters on top of it.

If we can get more stuff like Lop and Ochō in the future, I would be more than happy. If we can get more Lop and Ochō specifically, all the better for it. I also mean it when I say I hope people make some noise for this one. It’s worth it.

[dissociativedaydream]

Vertani - OC!Species

Appearance

Humanoid race.

Skin

Tones vary though remain similar to the human species

Eyes

Iris colors are usually gold, red, or purple though brown eyes are also seen.

Have a reflective lens behind their cornea which allows them better night vision.

They display signs of photosensitivity around their eyes when in bright environments, less severely their skin when exposed to sunlight for long periods.

Teeth

Canine teeth are the easiest identifier to spot as the top teeth are double-pointed in an inverted V, longer peak to the front of the mouth.

Hair

Generally thick and black, textures vary by home region

Curls are rare but are the ideal native beauty standard

It’s usually kept long regardless of gender

Braids are commonly used to show status or life events

Hair is kept up unless in the presence of immediate family or highly trusted friends

General Biology

Bodies are able to regulate body temperatures very well except when sick

Will become sluggish if too cold but thrives in heat

Skin will dry out easily in dry environments regardless of temperature, oils are frequently used to keep skin healthy

Omnivores - Cannot physically go onto a vegetarian diet but can become strictly cavernous and remain healthy.

Homeworld

Their home planet was destroyed and race enslaved up until approximately 35 BBY during which a number of slaves were released though some remained in servitude as they had no other means of survival in the galaxy.

The name has been forgotten by their species but stories let them know that it had been covered by jungles and swamps. It was mostly a temperate climate, jungle regions could get cooler than their swamp counterparts though still remained rather warm.

Culture

Language

The native Vertani tongue has gone extinct, basic now being their first language though many are multilingual.

Religion

While their language died out, their religion continued. The primary god was a dual deity, one side being a god of death, the other being a goddess of fate. Like with many dual deities its symbol often shows as the sun and moon imagery. While the exact name of the animal species that the deity is associated with but it’s generally accepted that the god of death is a large, ground predator while the goddess of fate is seen as a flight-capable bird.

Occupations

Before enslavement, the Vertani people were a warrior species, many of which native-born of the species were frequently force-sensitive though they were unaware of what that means to Jedi/Sith. Instead, they saw those with gifts as chosen by their deity to lead or teach in their military. As their species intermixes with others, force sensitivity is becoming less common but still probable at a 70%:30% ratio.

During enslavement, their skills were used by their masters to assassinate rivals/work on bounty jobs for them as a means of income. Some continued with that line of work after being given freedom since it’s what they know and easy for most because they don’t have a home planet any longer.

Clothing

Clothing is usually layered with the bottom layer being a tunic and leggings. Metal rings usually hang from their waist to gather skirt layers to allow for easier movement. Some wear armor consisting of a breastplate, vambraces over their lower arms, with guards over their thighs and shins. There’s no distinct difference in male or female clothes.

Common for warriors to wear metal caps over their canines, sometimes they’re decorative but if they’re bounty hunters or mercenaries the caps usually contain poison that the wearer has developed an immunity to. If captured or don’t care if their opponent lives or not, they’ll bite to administer the poison.

Courting

Courting without an arrangement was rare to see but still expected even if marriages were arranged. Gifts are usually exchanged between the two betrothed, Ventari encourages their betrothed young to research their to-be mate’s species to decide what present would be best. Frequently these gifts are handmade.

Marriage/Divorce

Most families stick together in small nomadic tribes, members would only really leave for marriage purposes. Since their freedom, many marriages became strategic in a political sense, often marriages were used to buy the family resources, land, or even protection.

Marriage ceremonies are usually large affairs when they can afford it. The ceremony consists of hand binding and vows afterward there’s a feast/party with music and dancing. Traditionally the two newlyweds will dance together in the middle of the dancefloor with their families dancing around them until one spouse carries the other off to their marriage bed.

Divorce is not permitted in the first 3 years of marriage at that point, if there are no children present, the two spouses can basically just walk away from each other. If children are had during that window, divorce is less common and also more frowned upon by their society.

Reproduction

Birth rates for the Vertani were relatively unaffected by their enslavement, families remaining large but gender ratios were skewed, females outnumbered male births 4:1. Due to this, it was incredibly common for females to commit to each other (whether romantic or platonic) or to marry outside of their species, some earning their freedoms prior to liberation this way.

The Vertani have proven to be compatible with numerous species, their reproductive cycles have shown to adapt to their mate’s needs through their regular reproductive cycle follows the typical heat/rut cycle. Once married, after some time, their cycle timing will match their spouses’ cycle to give the couple an optimal chance of having children (this occurs whether the spouse is the same gender or not the same species).

A standard Vertani pregnancy is 8 months with a fetus able to survive outside the womb by 6 months. But more often than not the pregnancies vary in length depending on the Vertani’s mate’s species. After having a baby if the Vertani is the birth giver, their reproductive cycle will pause for the following 9-12 months.

Misc. Customs

Younger generations greet older family members by taking their hand and touching it to their forehead as a sign of respect.

While families usually eat together for meals, parents will usually feed their children first, making sure they get their fill before they start eating.

Tea is consumed for ceremonies, especially weddings. They will consume alcohol if it’s integral to their spouse’s culture but only when required. Frequently to them, alcohol tastes bitter and they can easily get sick off of it. Despite this alcoholism ends up being a frequent problem.

Facial piercings and tattoos are common (body piercings are less so since there’s less cultural significance and more personal preference). Tattoos usually display life events of the individual as well as significant symbolism to their families.

[luxraydyne]

Renju's Body Painting, Symbolism Breakdown

I’m not lecturing anyone on what to make of this piece, just a couple of nice folks pointed out how much Stuff is going on here, so I figured it’d be interesting to return to this a couple weeks on and see what I can recall of what I was thinking.

Pose: 

Referenced almost exactly from Becquet's sculpture of Sebastian, with the figure tied with ropes to a tree-like stake.

We know that Renju gifted the Guido Reni painting to Marble himself, firmly tying the icon to him.

The story goes that Sebastian was persecuted and ultimately executed by the Romans for his commitment to his Christian faith.

Renju speaks of God once or twice, though it's more likely the symbol is significant to his queer identity, a point he shares with Mama, hence the gift of the painting.

He keeps his devotion to Pewter a secret, a fact which hinders the investigations into his murder, and in a twist of irony, leads to his lover's destruction. He lives more truthfully by divorcing Shoko and finding Pewter, but dies seen as a liar.

Red rope:

The red lines slicing through the frame roughly align with the wounds in Renju's body, standing in for the arrows lodged in the body of Sebastian.

They also form an approximate X or crucifix shape.

The black cables from which Renju's body is suspended in left path are changed to red, suggesting the blood pouring from his face (absent here) as well as the red string of fate myth.

Red thread:

There is also a red thread wrapped around Renju's neck, representing the ligature used to strangle him in left path, again, a morbid take on the red string of fate story.

Strangulation is, moreover, indicative of Renju's silence regarding his trauma, both from being preyed upon by the yakuza as a teenager and from hiding his love for another man from everyone who knew them.

Cloth:

The white sheet draped delicately over Renju's body, maintaining some dignity and acting as a cushion between his back and the stake, is hemmed in the same green as Pewter's lab coat, suggesting the small, subtle comfort their relationship provided.

It also has implications of persona and masking.

Let’s not shy away from the nudity of his body either. There is a definite sexuality to the fleshiness of it all, as well as a stark vulnerability, a sense of exposure.

Hook (top-left):

Taken almost directly from the diorama-like crime scene in left path. There is an artfulness to the horrific display.

The block and tackle setup with the hook and pulley is usually used on boats and sailing ships, fitting the nautical theme of Sunfish Pocket

It also objectifies Renju's corpse, rendering him into cargo

Scales:

Fish scale pattern, painted in gold, suggestive of the wealth, beauty and opulence that were the trappings of Renju's persona.

Alludes to the mermaid motif, adding a certain Otherness to Renju, a sort of unreality which pervades him throughout the story.

The fish caught by boats, of course, are meant to be killed and eaten.

Glasses (top-right):

At both crime scenes, in left and right path, Renju is missing his glasses, leaving his face exposed and bleeding, and presumably impeding his ability to see.

Here the spectacles are cracked and spattered with blood on the left side, alluding to the tearing out of Renju's left eyeball in both timelines.

Watch:

Pretty self-explanatory. The gold watch gifted to Renju by Pewter, matching his silver one.

The time reads 8:00, Renju's time of death in left path, and a crucial piece of evidence.

The watch face is huge, out of proportion with the other paraphernalia from the crime scene, implying the importance of this relationship to Renju, but also the threat it presents, unbeknownst to those investigating.

Oil barrel:

Nothing too complicated going on here, just a reference to the oil barrel into which Renju's corpse is stuffed in order to transport him to Sunfish Pocket where he would be put in display.

There’s possibly something to be said about the dirtiness of the oil barrel, the intended contents somehow dirtying or ‘soiling’ Renju’s body when he is stored in there instead. It’s a stark contrast between the clean white clothes he tended to wear, versus the black oil.

Pills (bottom-left):

In left path, we know Renju was drugged in order to incapacitate him before he was killed. This becomes more ironic the more you think about it.

I did consider including a glass or bottle of alcohol here as well, as a nod toward Renju's use of substances to alleviate his mental strain, but figured this might confuse matters and the implication of the sedatives did the job well enough on their own.

Car headlights (left):

Most obviously representing the car accident that puts Renju in hospital in right path.

Renju's car is also crucial to Shoko's murder and left path.

The headlights have a spotlight-like quality suggesting the harsh gaze aimed at Renju as suspicion is constantly on him.

The lights fade into shadow, however, gesturing toward both the darkness of Kabasaki and the accident in right path.

Blood (bottom-left):

In the absence of much blood on Renju's body here, the splatter pattern, tracking upward, is intended to imply the violent impact of the road accident in right path and the fatal damage inflicted on his body.

Eyes (bottom-left):

Another brutal irony to Renju's character is his transition from observer to the observed, and a victim in both cases. He grows from a kid forced to be the Kumakura's lookout whilst elderly murder victims died in their bathrooms, into the pretty face of a company, constantly looked at and judged by the public eye.

Paradoxically, Renju seeks the public gaze, and hides from it at the same time. He marries a woman he doesn't love to please the eyes, and hides the man he does cherish to please them. Ultimately, his attempt to love Pewter AND protect them both instead destroys them.

In left path, Renju is gawked at like an art fixture (like a painting? a sculpture?). In right path, Pewter is dragged out into the open and stared down in his place. There is no safe place.

Tire tracks (bottom-right):

Nothing fancy. Tire tracks unnaturally crossed to indicate the chaotic traffic accident that wrecks Renju's body in right path.

Road markings:

See above. Road passes straight through Renju's body, suggesting the speed and impact of the truck.

Text (bottom-right):

Lifted directly from in-game dialogue.

Mama catches Date staring at the painting on the wall of Marble, and explains that it was a gift. She seems a little surprised that a) Date hasn't noticed it before, and b) that the symbolism of it is not obvious. Aiba then explains the tale of St. Sebastian and his execution.

Shadow (background):

Behind Renju, there is a shadow of a single wing outstretched, a subtle suggestion of a fallen angel, and bringing us back to the theme of sainthood.

Of course, at the conclusion of the story, we realise that Renju has been long dead by the time his corpse is found in either timeline, his consciousness trapped in Shoko's body strung up on the merry-go-round, so you could argue that much of the imagery doesn't fit. Still, my focus here was on Renju's body as an object, as part of his identity which is taken from him, and as a parallel to Sebastian's body.

[herocentral]

Possible Hero 6

Authors notes: I told you I’d be back folks with the next chapter to Possible Hero 6. As mentioned in the previous chapter we’re now moving into the Countdown to Catastrophe arc of the season 1 finale. As we all know, the episode in season 1 finale was originally meant to be a three part episode only to be turned into an hour long episode, so I’ve divided it into parts to the best of my abilities. Now let’s begin.

Big Hero 6 & Kim Possible (c) Disney

Chapter 8:  Countdown to catastrophe part 1

A new day dawned in San Fransokyo, after a triumphant victory for the teams of Big Hero 6 and Team Possible over Dr Drakken and his army of Destructo Yama robots the heroes all enjoyed a Noodle Burger breakfast treated by Kim. They all went to the Lucky Cat Cafe to check on everything and during the crisis James and Ann (Kims parents) agreed to keep Hiro’s secret identity as a member of Big Hero 6 from his aunt. 

However though Drakken is behind bars Shego escaped and hasn’t been seen since, however Kims mind was focussed on something else. Whilst the rest of the team were busy with other things Kim and Ron met Hiro and Baymax in the garage. They were looking at a certain conspiracy board about a certain villain BH6 were pursuing for some time. 

“So who’s this Obake guy?” Kim asked. 

“That would be the question thats been bothering us in the past few months.” Hiro said. 

“Okay but how was he able to hack the Kimmunicator like that?” Ron asked. 

“And why would he help us to find Baymax?” Kim then wondered. 

“Again I don’t know.” Hiro said, “All we know is ever since we became Big Hero 6 again after I enrolled at SFIT, weird things have happened and Obake was at the centre of most of it, all we know so far is he’s planning something but we don’t know what.” Hiro explained then looking to his conspiracy board. 

“All we know so far is he’s interested in Lenore Shimamoto.” Hiro explained, but the name seemed to ring something in Rons head. 

“Shimamoto, hey KP didn’t we do a class report on her back in Middleton?” Ron asked. 

“Yeah I remember, Shimamoto was a gifted artist.” Kim recalled. “Yeah first time we met him in person he stole her journal and put us into some pretty weird traps.” Hiro explained. 

“How weird? Kim asked. 

“Well some of them looked like my room and Freds too, we don’t know how he was able to pull that off” Hiro explained “and recently before we met you guys he stole a high power magnet from SFIT while we were under some kind of illusion gas he gave us on halloween.” Hiro explained. “Mine was of Tadashi.” 

“What he made an illusion of your brother?” Kim asked. 

“Yeah but more than that he actually talked to me.” Hiro added with a hint of despair in his voice. Rufus went up to Hiro’s shoulder and put a comforting hand on his face. 

“Okay thats just low.” Ron said. 

“And he did that just to keep you out of the way?” Kim asked. 

“Wait I think Fred said something 

“Yes, Obake’s intentions are unknown.” Baymax added. 

“And he’s been recruiting villian’s to help him?” Kim then asked remembering some of Hiro’s stories. 

“Yeah some of our villains like Globby, Noodle Burger boy and Momakase.” Hiro then added. 

Kim took a moment to look at the conspiracy board along with considering everything Hiro said to her and realised whoever this person was he was good.

“So whoever Obake is he’s clearly smart, carefully planning every move, playing his hand with the cunning of a fox.” Kim deduced. 

“Okay but what’s his endgame?” Ron then wondered. 

“I don’t know but whatever it is it can’t be good.” Hiro then added. Just then the Kimmunicator sounded off and Kim answered it. 

“Go Wade.” Kim said.

 “Kim, I still haven’t found any trace of Shego, but I’ve been picking up some strange chatter about people seeing what looked like a pink glob monster breaking into a Krei warehouse.” Wade relayed.

“Glob monster?” Ron asked. 

“That’ll be Globby.” Hiro said. “Basically a common crook turned supervillain by accident when he stole Honey Lemons purse.” Hiro explained. 

“Ah.” Kim said understanding. “We best go stop him.” Hiro then said. 

“Hiro, you are to attend an appointment with Professor Granville later today.” Baymax explained. 

“Hiro maybe you should go to your meeting Ron and I can deal.

“No, I’ve still got time besides you guys don’t know Globby you’ll need some help.” Hiro Insisted. 

“Come on how hard could this guy be?” Ron asked. 

Later at Krei warehouse:

“Hard very hard!” 

Ron now in his mission gear/armour was stuck to a wall next to an armoured Baymax by a pink goop compliments of Globby who’s green eyes glowed as he flung Hiro now in his armour into a crate and he tumbled into another crate below and into one on the floor. 

Suddenly he looked up and quickly ran to avoid shards of metal which struck the floor with such force. 

Hiro slid past the shards and hid behind a shelf only for one of the boxes in the warehouse to be yanked away by a shard attached to Globby’s hand. 

“You sure it was a good idea to come without the rest of your buddies!” Globby taunted. 

“Baymax ,Ron!” Hiro exclaimed but ran quick to avoid the metal shards coming towards him. He avoided more shots from Globby but one more was heading right for him but was quickly intercepted by Kim who deflected it with her armours energy shield. 

“Seriously a villain who can shape shift into any element?” Kim asked Hiro. 

“Yeah who knew.” Hiro said 

“Okay yeah but weren’t we due for one of those?” Ron asked. Whilst Globby kept throwing metal shards at Hiro and Kim a beeping noise came from Baymax’s visor. 

“Whats that?” Globby asked. “It is an alarm.” Baymax explains. “Hiro we must leave for your meeting with Professor Granville, soon.” 

Globby just ignored him and continue firing shards at Hiro and Kim who moved quickly to avoid them. 

“So what’s the sitch with this meeting?” Kim asked. “Oh its the meeting about my final…” Hiro suddenly came to a realisation. 

“Wait my final project meeting thats today?!” Hiro exclaimed. 

“Yes it is in eight minutes.” Baymax explained. 

“Uh excuse me we’re fighting here.” Globby said feeling ignored. 

“Oh I hear you dude Kim and I keep getting things like this all the time.” Ron said. 

Globby ignored this and fired a ball of goop towards a table in the centre of the warehouse which hit a button under it which revealed a secret hidden compartment which swung round to a more high-tech table which had a metal briefcase with the Krei tech symbol stamped on it. 

“There you are.” Globby said forming another hand from his chest. 

“gah dude that is sick and wrong!” Ron said rather disgusted. 

Globby ignored him and reached out for the brief case. 

“Sorry Globby gotta wrap this up!” Hiro said jumping over the table and hitting the button underneath which caused it to swing back to the normal table but Globbys hand was attached to it and it pulled him off Baymax and Ron releasing them from his grip. 

“HEY!” Globby exclaimed as he was catapulted onto the table and hit the floor face first. Kim acted quickly and pulled out her lip stick which when opened fired a goop on the floor sticking the glob monster in place. 

She and Hiro then went over to Baymax who using his jets lowered him and Ron to the ground. They were okay despite having some goop on their suits. 

“You guys okay?” Hiro asked. “I am sticky.” Baymax said simply. 

“Aw man, well at least it’s better than loosing my pants.” Ron said. 

“Well glad your trainings paid off.” Kim complimented Hiro on his move to trap Globby. 

However with their backs turned Globby was ably to break himself free from the goop trap. 

“Catch you later!” Globby announced and he slinked away into the notches in the floor taking his leave. 

“Great he got away.” Ron said. “Well at least he didn’t get this.” Hiro said looking at the briefcase but something seemed rather odd about it. 

“So what is it?” Kim asked. 

Hiro looked at the case and knocked his fist on it and it gave off a metallic clanging sound indicating it was made of metal. 

“Titanium shell, Biometric lock?” Hiro analysed. “This is some serious security.” 

“So whatever’s inside must be pretty valuable if this Globby guy came to steal it?” Kim deduced. 

“Hiro.” Baymax said getting their attention. “Your meeting is now, in seven minutes. Is your final project proposal ready?” 

“Ah, not exactly.” Hiro said nervously. “As in haven’t started yet?” Kim said with a raised eyebrow. 

“What we’ve been busy between stopping Drakken and everything else.” Hiro explained. 

“I hear you man the price of a super hero double life being on time for school.” Ron said in comfort. 

“Uh huh.” Rufus agreed. 

“But I’ve still got some time.” Hiro said. “Right?” Everyone present looked unsure. 

“How long until we get back to SFIT?” Hiro asked as he went over to Baymax and secured himself onto his back. 

“Approximately seven point five minutes.” Baymax calculated. “See plenty of time.” Hiro said assuringly. 

Baymax flung his wings out and took off with his jets only for the goop to pull on him like a rope then pulled him down to the ground again like a rubber band. 

“I am still sticky.” Baymax pointed out. 

“Oh boy, so the drama.” Kim said facepalming. 

Later at SFIT 

At the Robotics lab on the SFIT campus Honey Lemon, Gogo and Wasabi were presenting their final project proposals to Professor Granville for the SFIT Open house. Honey Lemon was discussing her final project to the Professor. 

“ Thus for my final project, I propose an investigation into Lenore Shimamoto’s scientific work.” Honey Lemon explained. 

Granville looked at her tablet and the students proposal and came to a decision. 

“Your project is approved.” Granville decided. Gogo meanwhile was looking around for any sign of a certain genius that was absent from the room. She heard a tone on her phone and saw it was a message from Hiro, and she waved to Honey Lemon. 

“Stall!” she whispered. 

Honey Lemon understood and pulled Professor Granville back before she could walk away. 

“I mean, she kept it all secret it’s really fascinating you have to admit.” Honey Lemon said stalling. 

“Yes thats why I approved your project.” Granville said walking away only for Gogo to shake her arms telling Honey to stall her for longer. 

“Why was it a secret?” Honey said putting her arm on Granvilles shoulder. “Thats the big question.” 

Gogo looked around again and saw something at the side of the room and signalled for someone to come over. 

“Which, I will attempt to answer.” Honey Lemon said just as Hiro, Kim and Ron now in casual attire, entered the room with Baymax, panting like mad. 

“I hear you panting Mr.Hamada.” Granville said knowing Hiro was in the room and he was still holding the case he got from Krei’s warehouse. He needed to hide it quickly.

“Uh h, hey Professor Granville, is it my turn already heh heh.” Hiro said sheepishly handing the case to Baymax who turned round to hide it whilst Kim and Ron looked innocent too. 

“It is Mr.Hamada.” Granville said rather strictly. “I hope you put as much thought into your proposal as your friends did.” 

“Uh yeah no about that heh heh.” Hiro chuckled nervously. “You have nothing.” Granville said simply. 

“Whoa she catches on fast.” Kim whispered to Gogo which she nodded. 

“I have nothing.” Hiro admitted. “Sorry Professor Granville I’ve just been over scheduled.” He explained whilst Honey Lemon pulled Gogo behind Baymax. 

“With?” Granville asked looking at her tablet. 

“Uh..” Hiro was about to say something until. “Uh sorry it’s really our fault Professor.” Kim interrupted. “See Hiro was helping me and Ron on this school project of ours back home and I guess it took up a lot of time than we thought.” Kim explained. 

“Yeah, yeah thought a super genius on the subject of, uh uh robotics would help a little heh heh.” Ron added to which Rufus nodded. 

“Yeah yeah thats it!” Hiro said. “Can I maybe get an extension.” He then asked. 

“I’m sorry Mr. Hamada the rules apply to everyone, even you.” Granville answered “Remember your final project counts as 60% of your first semester grade.”

“Oh that much?” Hiro winced. “If you hope to see this smiling face again next semester, I suggest you step up.” Granville then suggested rather sternly which even sent a chill down Kim and Rons spines. 

“I will.” Hiro answered. “By the deadline!” Granville advised. 

“Okay if that doesn’t scream Mr. Barkin I don’t know what does.” Ron whispered to Kim who just rolled her eyes. 

“Right right I won’t be..” “LATE” Fred suddenly came in wearing his mascot suit with a unicycle in hand. 

“Really sorry I’m late Professor Granville.” Fred apologised. 

“Given that you aren’t a student, you don’t need to be here at all, nor do Miss Possible or Mr. Stoppable.” Granville pointed out. Hiro had just gotten up and Baymax turned his head round to see what was going on. 

“Oh does that mean you don’t want to see my Mascot final project?” Fred said spinning the wheel on his unicycle. 

“There is no mascot final project.” Granville exclaimed. 

“I don’t know sounds like a cool idea to me, the Mad dog would rock at that!” Ron said only to be shot down by a stern look from the professor. 

“But it involves sparklers.” Fred explains reaching into his suit head and pulling out some sparklers in his hands. 

“Watch.” Fred ignights the sparklers by striking them on the wheel of his unicycle and then rode it round the room and everyone watched with some concern. 

“Fred, that does not appear to be safe.” Baymax advised.

And he was right before Fred knew it he crashed into something in the lab and groaned in pain as he did. Granville left the room and Baymax went over to him all but leaving Hiro to figure out what to do for his final project. 

Krei Tech:

Later Gogo, Kim, Hiro, Baymax, Ron and Fred decided to return the case that Globby tried to steal to Alister Krei to find out what was inside it. They moved the brief case to Krei himself who looked at the heroes in their suits/mission gear. Fredzilla was busy looking at a statue of Krei and poked it only for the head to crack off 

“So I have Big Hero 6 and Kim Possible, to thank for the mess in my warehouse.” Alister said simply. 

“Uh a simple thank you would be great.” Kim said. 

“We stopped Globby from taking this.” Hiro said gesturing to the case. 

“But why’d he want it?” Ron then asked. “Whats in the brief case Krei?” Gogo then asked. 

“Ah nothing.” Krei said. “My scan indicates that there is not, nothing inside.” Baymax said scanning the cases contents.

“Well its nothing valuable see for yourselves.” Krei said unlocking the case’s biometric scanners. Pulling out what looked like a crushed up piece of metal.

“A few yeas ago, Krei tech and every other tech company was trying to create an energy amplifier.” Krei explained.

Hiro looked at the crushed tech as did Kim while Fredzilla handed to Gogo the Krei statue head. Which she tossed away when he and Ron looked at the piece of defective tech. 

“Is it supposed to look like a burnt Noodle burger?” Fredzilla asked. 

“Pretty sure no.” Hiro whispered. 

“So if it worked what would this energy amplifier thingy do?” Ron asked. 

“Bleeding edge technology that would exponentially multiply the output of any power source.” Krei explained. “But there were, complications.”

“Let me guess it didn’t work and burnt down some labs?” Kim asked.

 Krei cringed at a flash back of one of his warehouses going up in flames after a failed test of the amplifier and being forced to call the fire department. 

“What? everyone lived.” Krei said looking out the window.  

“and we learned a very important lesson the energy amplifying business is not a sound investment.” 

“So it was a massive failure.” Gogo said. 

“It was not technically failure if the whole idea was impossible in the first place.” Krei then explained. 

“Impossible.” Hiro breathed and began to wonder “you sure?” 

“My people say it is.” Krei said “and as clever as you all are I hired the best and brightest in the business and they couldn’t crack it.”

Krei took the defective amplifier and just looked at it. “it was just one warehouse fire after another.”

“The warehouses always pay for our mistakes it’s not fair.” Fredzilla said sadly. 

“Yeah it’s a cruel world for warehouses.” Ron added to which Rufus nodded in agreement. 

“Then why did Globby try to steal it?” Gogo asked. “She’s right it doesn’t make any sense.” Kim agreed. 

“Maybe he collects garbage because thats what this is.” Krei said taking it over to a bin in his office. 

“Expensive garbage but still garbage.” Krei just threw it into the trash can.He then looked to his watch and noticed the time.  

“Now if you’ll excuse me, I have meeting with R&D about something that is both possible and probable, fire proof warehouses.” He said then taking his leave. 

“Hm I guess that could work.” Ron wondered. Hiro meanwhile went over to the trashcan and looked at the defective energy amplifier and he soon found an inspiring idea for his final project. 

Later at the Hotel:

That night at the Hotel that Kim’s family was staying in Kim was in her room talking to Wade about what they had just learned today. 

“Well Kim, Krei’s story checks out, no other tech company has been able to crack energy amplification and probably never will.” Wade relayed looking over what he found on his computer. 

“Okay but that still doesn’t explain why Globby would go to the trouble of stealing it.” Kim wondered. 

“Well maybe he was stealing a defect, so that whoever sent him could reverse engineer a better version that could in theory work.” Wade theorised. “But that person would have to be good at that kind of field.” 

“Well Hiro did say Globby is working for this Obake guy, so maybe he has something to do with this.” Kim theorised. “By the way any luck on figuring out how he hacked our frequencies?” she then asked. 

“Sorry Kim somehow when he hacked us he didn’t leave behind a trail for me to follow, but I’ll keep trying to find an exploit.” Wade replied much to Kims disappointment. 

“Well please and thank you anyway.” Kim sighed as she turned off the Kimmunicator. None of this made any sense, even to her why would someone go to the trouble of stealing something that not only doesn’t work but may not even be possible to create. There was something missing from this equation but what, what could it be?

Elsewhere:

It was now nightfall and at the San Fransokyo Art museum Honey Lemon was with Wasabi, Ron and Rufus in the storage room. She decided the best way to begin her research project into Lenore Shimamoto was at the museum where her painting City Rising was on display. The group entered the store room and Wasabi was carrying Honey Lemons research material whilst Ron and Rufus were there helping her look at things. 

“Thanks for helping me carry my stuff Wasabi.” Honey Lemon thanked. “And Ron thanks for coming to help me with this.”

“Ah no problem Honey Lemon, it’s what friends are for.” Ron thanked. 

“I’m so excited about my final project!” Honey squeaked with excitement as she pulled back a crate for the dust to fall off it and nearly land on Wasabi who avoided it. 

“Are you sure you want to spend a lot of time in here Honey Lemon?” Wasabi asked rather nervous about the amount of dust in the room.

“Yeah I mean you never know what could be crawling in an old store room.” Ron agreed and as he turned round and saw an old Japanese samurai mask which had a rather scary face. Ron yelled in fright and it moved to reveal Rufus who could only giggle in amusement.

“Ha ha very funny Rufus!” Ron said sarcastically. 

Honey Lemon meanwhile pulled out an old diary that once belonged to Shimamoto, it was a dairy she had found once at an art school to then be recovered from a certain enemy of theirs. 

“What do you mean?” Honey asked as she looked through the pages of the book.

“Its just so..” Wasabi shone a torch which was actually a purple UV torch and it revealed some stains all over the place.

“gah un clean un clean!” Wasabi panicked and Rufus could only hop onto the clean freaks shoulder and comfort him. “What is that even…”

Suddenly Rufus spotted something when Wasabi shone the torch over the book and immediately squeaked to get his attention. 

“What what is it Rufus?” He asked and Rufus snatched the torch from him and hopped onto Honey Lemons shoulder much to her surprise and he shone the light onto the book revealing something rather strange. 

“Wait was that?” “Did you just see that?” Wasabi and Honey Lemon gasped. 

“What see what?” Ron asked as they gathered around the book.

Honey Lemon flipped the pages of the book under the UV light and it revealed what appeared to be advanced math equations covering the pages of the diary.

“Whoa that is some serious math test.” Ron said rather amazed. 

“This ain’t no test Ron.” Wasabi observed. “This math is way ahead of Shimamoto’s time.” 

“So you said she was a scientist maybe she was smarter than you guys let on.” Ron guessed. 

They looked down the page and saw something written on the bottom of the page. 

“Mums the word?” Honey Lemon read. “She was hiding something?” Ron wondered. 

“Shimamoto had a secret.” Wasabi said as Honey Lemon took photos on her cat phone. 

“Theres more here than just equations.” She said “Its gotta be a clue.” She closed the book. 

“Yeah and I’m betting thats what leads us to what she was hiding.” Ron guessed

 “Yes maybe.” Honey said. “Good work Rufus, you have a keen eye.” She then said petting him. 

“Aw shucks” Rufus blushed. 

“Now we have to go back!” Honey Lemon declared. “To a cleaner environment?” Wasabi hoped. 

“To a Taco stand?” Ron asked. 

“No to Shimamoto’s lab!” Honey said running out of the room.

“Lab wait what lab?” Ron asked running after her. “I’ll explain on the way.” She answered. 

“It was worth a shot.” Wasabi said turning off the torch to which Rufus shrugged. 

Next day at SFIT:

Hiro was working on his computer in his lab and he had with him the burnt out energy amplifier that Krei had showed him earlier. He was looking over the math and the possibility of how it could work, and Baymax just watched from behind. 

“Hm this might be doable.” He said as he looked at his notes. 

“Am I to believe this is your final project Mr. Hamada?” Hiro jumped and saw Professor Granville standing next to him looking at the scrap junk on his desk. 

“Uh yes.” Hiro said “I mean yes, it is.” 

“What is it?” Granville asked. “Expensive garbage.” Baymax explained with a knowing finger. 

“Uh no Baymax.” Hiro said, “I’m making an energy amplifier.” 

“An energy amplifier, this is not what I expected from you.” Granville said rather surprised. 

“I know, me neither.” Hiro said amazed. “But I think if I can minimise energy losses through…”

“Impossible.” Granville answered. “Well it won’t be easy but…” “I mean that I reject this proposal! because it is impossible” Granville then interrupted Hiro in a rather loud tone.

“What? no but, I, I think I’m really onto something here.” Hiro tried. “Look at my..”

“Arrogance showing!” Granville snapped.

Meanwhile Kim had just arrived on the campus and was heading for Hiro’s lab she wanted to see him about something regarding this Obake person. Before she arrived at the lab she could overhear a very loud voice and it was Professor Granville’s she stopped outside the door and listened to what was going on. 

“This is too advanced an undertaking Mr. Hamada, even for you.” Granville continued. 

“But Professor Granville, this could revolutionise energy efficiency, and change..” “It is also incredibly dangerous!” Granville interrupted Hiro and Kim couldn’t help but overhear the tone in her voice. 

“Try to think responsibly for once!” Granville then insisted.

“I am! But your not listening!” Hiro argued. “Because you don’t think I can do it.” 

“It is not always a question of CAN! Mr. Hamada” The professor exclaimed slamming her hand on the desk surprising Hiro even Kim was a little surprised. Granville took a breath before continuing.

“Sometimes it’s whether you should.” She then said with a hint of upset in her voice. 

“But I can so I should.” Hiro finally decided Granville just took a breath before speaking again. 

“My decision is final, come up with another proposal and soon.” She said then walking away not even noticing that Kim was at the door, she then entered the lab. 

“Hey.” Kim greeted Hiro. “Oh hey Kim, how much of that did you hear?” He then asked. 

“I heard enough.” Kim said rubbing her arm. “Do I even want to know what that was about?

She then took notice of a certain piece of expensive garbage on Hiro’s lab desk. 

“Wait is that the scrapped amplifier that Krei showed us?” Kim asked. 

“Yeah, seeing that gave me an idea for my project, to see if I could crack the energy amplifier.” Hiro explained. “So I ran some numbers and it should be doable but Granville doesn’t want me to go through with it.”

“Well, she does have a point Hiro, I mean you heard what Krei said, about the fires he had there are risks to consider.” Kim explained. 

“Yeah but I know I can do it.” Hiro said. “I mean if I can create armour and tech to protect the city I can build an energy amplifier that could revolutionise the energy race.” 

“Hiro I never said you couldn’t.” Kim said. “Its just the way Granville said it, the tone in her voice showed she was concerned.”

“Hiro, you still have time to devise and alternate proposal may I help?” Baymax then suggested. 

“Its okay Baymax I already have a back up plan.” Hiro said as he was arranging his papers. 

“That is excellent news.” Baymax agreed. “Hold on what is this back up plan?” Kim then asked with a raised eyebrow.

“Oh I’m going to prove professor Granville wrong.” Hiro said simply. 

“Wait what?” Kim said in shock. “I do not understand.” Baymax said. 

“I’m going to work on the amplifier.” Hiro said. “Only in secret.” 

“Even if Granville said no?” Kim said rather concerned.

“Her decision was final, would you like me to play it back?” Baymax said replaying the professors last recorded words.

“My decision is final.” the recording said.

“Oh yeah I heard.” Hiro said moving his papers around. “But if I pull this off, and I defiantly will. Then Granville will be just too impressed to be mad.”

“Hiro look I know you can do it.” Kim said. “But are you doing this to get your final grade? or just to prove a point?” 

“Look Kim I get your concerned and all that but I’m only doing this to get a good grade.” Hiro replied “I’m gonna make her eat her words.” 

“That is not physically possible.” Baymax said. 

“Well I’m going to do a lot of impossible things.” Hiro said with a confident face as he left the lab leaving Kim with a look of concern on her face. 

“I have some concerns.” Baymax said. 

“Your not the only one.” Kim agreed then she remembered. “Baymax, any chance you could play back what Granville said please?”

“Of course.” Baymax said and played back the recording of Granville’s conversation with Hiro and she took note of the tone in her voice as she listened. 

“Hmm Baymax what can you tell me about the tone in her voice.” she then asked. 

“Her tone indicates concern and rather saddened emotional states.” Baymax diagnosed from the recording. 

“Yeah but the way she said it, it’s almost like it was personal.” Kim wondered and knew she needed some answers.

Soon she was on her way to the Deans office and upon arriving she knocked on the door. 

“Come in.” Granville said and Kim entered to see Granville on her computer looking over things. 

“Professor Granville.” Kim announced. 

“Ah Miss Possible, to what do I owe this visit?” Granville said. 

“Well I was just heading in to talk to Hiro after everything that happened recently and well, I couldn’t help but overhear the argument about his final project.” Kim explained. 

“Ah I see.” Granville said with her full attention. “If you don’t mind my asking Professor but I couldn’t help but notice the tone in your voice when you rejected his proposal, it seemed like you were generally concerned.” Kim explained, 

“Very observant, yes I was concerned about what Mr.Hamada was proposing, energy amplification whilst an interesting field just isn’t possible to create, let alone the risks that come with it.” Granville explained. “Yet he insists on pursuing it regardless which is much like him dangerous shortcuts and even the lack of consideration for the risks he takes.” 

“Okay no arguments there, but Hiro does know the risks and can sometimes surprise people, and if he makes mistakes he has to make them on his terms.” Kim explained to which the Professor understood  “

but from the way you said it, it sounded deeply personal.” Kim then said. “Professor, did any of your students attempt Energy amplification before?” 

Granville took a moment to think about what was just said to her. “No Miss Possible, but I will say this if something can be done that doesn’t mean it should, you can never know what the consequences could be.” 

“Now if you’ll excuse me I have projects to approve.” she then said Kim just nodded and took her leave of the office. Once on the other side of the door Kim was still unsure of what was said to her, she could tell instantly that Granville was lying. She pulled out her Kimmunicator and called Wade. 

“Wade.” Kim said on the kimmunicator. “Oh hey Kim whats up?” he asked. 

“Listen I need you to do some background checks on someone.” Kim asked. “Okay who would that be?” Wade then asked. 

“Professor Grace Granville.” Kim answered. “And whilst your at it look through SFITS student database and find out about the students she’s taught past and present.”

“Okay anything specific?” He asked. “Find out if anyone has looked at energy amplification for a project.” Kim answered. 

“Sure I’ll look into it and see what I can find I’m guessing its about the prototype Globby tried to steal?” Wade asked. 

“You know me so well, let me know what you find.” Kim said putting the Kimmunicator away. She was about to leave the campus when. 

“Kim! Kim!” Called a voice and she turned to see Fred running towards her with Mini Max. 

“Oh hey Fred, Mini Max.” Kim greeted. “So whats up?” 

“Well I have the perfect plan to catch Obake!” Fred said rather excited. 

“Okay I’m listening.” Kim said rolling her eyes smiling. 

“Glad you asked he said pulling out some of his superhero action figures which had the teen hero all but confused. 

“Globby has been trying to steal Krei’s energy amplifier, and Globby’s been working for Obake.” Fred explained acting out the villains with his figures. 

“Okay but one problem with that, there’s no energy amplifier for him to steal.” Kim pointed out. 

“Or is there…”Fred then said rather dramatically. “I get the feeling you want me to say where are you going with this?” Kim then asked. 

“Well we set a trap for Globby, making him think we have an energy amplifier, we can catch Globby and make him lead us to Obake.” Fred finished. “Gogo’s already on board with it.”

“Thats…. actually a good idea.” Kim said rather impressed. “Nice huh the figures sold it right!” Fred said. 

“Uh no, but it’s still a good plan.” Kim then said. “I’ll have Wade spread the rumour that Krei tech has actually made an energy amplifier and then that’ll lead Globby right to us.” she then took her leave.

“YES! PLAN FRED IS A GO!” Fred said rather excited even doing a victory dance. 

Hiros Garage

Meanwhile Hiro was hard at work on his secret final project, he had a 3D render of the energy amplifier design on his computer and after a few clicks on his keyboard he rolled his chair over to the other computer on the far side of the garage then over to get a book from his work bench, read a few pages then roll back over to his main computer. Baymax had just entered with a sandwich in his hand. 

“Hiro” Baymax said. “You have been working for seven point three hours, research indicates that fatigue can lead to cognitive impairment.” 

Whilst Baymax was explaining Hiro was still working on his project not taking his eyes of the multiple screens. 

“I have brought you a sandwich.” Baymax said offering Hiro lunch. 

Hiro then snapped out of work mode and took the sandwich from Baymax. 

“Thanks Baymax your the best.” Hiro thanked punching his stomach. 

“What is the status of your unsanctioned research?” Baymax then asked. 

“I’m defiantly onto something.” Hiro said whilst eating his sandwich and taking notes in his note book. 

Just then a buzzing noise emerged from his screen and it was Fred on a video call. 

“Hiro!” Fred said. “Whats up Fred?” Hiro said still working. “Kinda busy.” 

“Oh no… big deal.” Fred said “I just have a plan to capture  Globby!”

“Ah ha thats great.” Hiro said still working on his computer. 

“Isn’t it, we just need to convince Krei to pretend that he completed the amplifying thingamajig and lure Globby out then we catch Globby in the act and take out Obake!” Fred said and as he described his plan his call was being moved from screen to screen by Hiro who at the same time was working on his final project. 

“Sounds good Fred ah, Baymax and I are in.” Hiro said not paying attention. 

Fred was more than pleased and was about to bring out his action figures. “I actually got the idea from my f…” Just then Hiro canceled the call on Baymax’s screen and got back to work. 

“Hiro, I have finished my risk assessment of your unsanctioned final project.” Baymax explained running the numbers before showing a graph on his chest screen. 

“There is an eighty percent chance of failure.” Baymax explained. 

“Oh thats not so bad.” Hiro brushed as he worked. “within that eighty percent there is a ninety six percent chance of disastrous failure.” Baymax continued to explain showing another graph. “I have concerns, I will list them now.”

“One, fiery explosion.” Baymax noted showing a house exploding on his screen of course Hiro was focused on work. 

“Uh yeah thanks for the analysis Baymax, but I’ll be fine really.” Hiro brushed off and rolled his chair over to the other work bench. 

“Two electrocution” Baymax continued to list.

Meanwhile:

SFAI (San Fransokyo Art Institute) a school for artists to thrive their creativity and is also the rival school of SFIT in its courtyard stood a statue of its founder Lenore Shimamoto on its left stood what used to be her house restored to mint condition however below it lay a secret that was discovered by Big Hero 6 some time ago. 

Honey Lemon, Wasabi, Ron and Rufus entered what appeared to be a secret lab hidden underneath the house itself. They walked down the stairs whilst Wasabi was avoiding all the cobwebs.

“This is even worse than the museum.” Wasabi moaned. 

“Okay who just hides a lab under their own house?” Ron asked. 

“Someone who wanted to hide something Ron.” Honey explained. “See she was secretly a scientist and didn’t want anyone to find out about her work, thats why we’re here.” 

“She hid her journal in a secret compartment.” Honey then explained. “Maybe there’s another one.” 

“Don’t worry I got this.” Ron said as he went over to the nearby book case. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned from movies and missions with Kim is that compartments are always hidden behind book cases.” 

So Ron began pulling out a book hoping it would trigger something, but sadly to no avail on the first try, so he tried another and another and another, but every time there was no unlocking sound. 

Wasabi then noticed a small plane hanging off the ceiling and blew on it and the plane flew away into another book case that was about to fall over, but Wasabi quickly caught it. 

“I’m just not gonna move from this spot anymore.” Wasabi said holding the case and Ron was still pulling out books. “Ew by which I mean this spot.” Wasabi said accidentally knocking down a plant pot which Honey Lemon quickly dived and caught in her hands. 

“That was close.” She breathed in relief.

“Okay so maybe it isn’t the book case”  Ron said eventually conceding defeat. 

As she got up she noticed the flowers in the pot, they were  a certain type of flower.

“Huh, Shimamoto liked chrysanthemum’s” Honey observed. Rufus hopped onto the table and took a sniff of them and just gagged considering how old they were, then something sparked in Honey Lemon something she remembered from the journal. 

“Thats it!” She gasped. “Whats it?” Wasabi and Ron asked. 

“People used to call Chrysanthemums mums, Mums the word!” Honey explained then she looked at what they were housed in. “The vase thats what the clue leads to.” 

“Maybe there’s something inside.” Ron guessed picked it up and looked into it only to be hit in the face with dust which Wasabi caught as well. 

“ACK!” They both coughed. “Hundred year old Pollen! AH I’M OUT!”” Wasabi exclaimed as he rubbed it off his shirt.

“ACH that is sick and wrong!” Ron gagged “First plants try to kill me now they suffocate me!”

 Rufus shook the pollen off him. “Plants ptooo!” He gagged in disgust. Wasabi then passed the vase to Honey Lemon who examined it. 

“Or maybe there’s something outside.” Honey observed as she rubbed the vase to see what it was made of. 

“Its a wax cylinder!” She gasped. “Like an old timey record.” Wasabi guessed.

 “The kind you can play in gramophones?” Ron asked. 

“How’d you know that?” Wasabi asked. 

“Please my dad keeps one in the attic back home said it belonged to his great grandad.” Ron explained. Honey was still looking at the cylinder.

“Hm, Lenore Shimamoto wanted us to hear whatever she recorded on this.” Honey theorised. 

“Great so how do we play it?” Wasabi asked. 

“Yeah unless one of you has an old gramophone we can play it on?” Ron asked. 

“I have an idea, but your not going to like it.” Honey Lemon said and Wasabi Ron and Rufus looked at each other with the same look of concern not liking what could happen next. 

Several hours later:

“Your right I don’t like it.” Wasabi said as he “Ditto.” Ron agreed

as they and Honey Lemon were suited up in their armour and mission gear. They entered what used to be Baron Von Steamers lair or whatever was left of it after Drakken’s self destruct getaway. 

“Told you.” Honey said. “Are we going to go to every gross place in this town today?” Wasabi asked climbing through the door. 

“What makes you think we’ll find anything here Drakken practically trashed the place when he moved in.” Ron wondered to which Rufus nodded in agreement. 

Honey Lemon made three chemballs from her purse and threw them to the ground making three glob  cushions to land on as they bounced from one to another deflating as they landed. The smallest one popped in Wasabi’s hand and he threw it away. 

Just then a stray rat went into his path causing Wasabi to yelp in fright only for Ron and Honey Lemon to stop him. 

“Shush, or we’ll trigger the…” Suddenly Honey Lemon was interrupted by the sound of an alert sounding all over the room. 

“Trap.” Ron grimaced. 

Just then steam emerged from behind them and they turned to see something rising from the ground it seemed to be some kind of seven wheeled machine with extra limbs of a hammer a steam gun and a flame thrower, it was powered by coal and steam and bolted together. The three heroes looked in fright at what they saw knowing it was one of Baron Von Steamers old traps. 

“Uh, that wasn’t here the first time!” Ron squeaked. 

The Hotel:

Meanwhile at the hotel the Possible twins were busy watching T.V with the rest of the Possibles minus Kim. Just then the door opened and Kim came in. 

“Hey guys.” Kim greeted. “Hey Kimmy cub how’s Hiro doing on his project.” James asked. 

Kim just sat down on the couch and breathed a sigh this told her parents something was wrong. 

“Whats wrong sweetie?” Ann asked. 

“Well its just, Hiro wants to pursue this energy amplifier project but Granville doesn’t want him to but he’s going to follow it anyway.” Kim explained. 

“Well if it’s a problem why don’t you tell Hiro to pursue something else.” James asked. 

“Granville tried but Hiro’s dead set on proving her wrong like he has something to prove, when he’s proved it saving the city.” Kim explained. 

“Honey I don’t quite understand the situation but, maybe this is something he needs to do for himself and make his own mistakes to learn from.” Ann explained. “You should know that more than anyone, remember Rons hair cut not to mention the whole Mad dog situation.” 

“Yes I remember.” Kim said with a smile and a slight chuckle. “But it’s not just that, I feel like the Professor is hiding something the way she talked about the project was like she had been through it before.” 

“Well lots of people have things they’re not proud of Kimmy some even still haunt them, but from my experience it’s a reminder not to make the same mistake, like I did on more than a few rockets.” James explained as he read the news paper. 

Just then Kims Kimmunicator sounded off and she excused herself from the room and answered the call. 

“Go Wade.” Kim said. “Kim I did those background checks on Granville like you asked and I found something strange.” Wade relayed. 

“Strange how?” Kim asked. 

“Well it turns out she was a teacher at SFIT before Hiro even enrolled.” Wade brought up the professors background history and even her old look when she was first employed at SFIT. 

“Hiro did mention something about Granville being a teacher before he enrolled, but what made her quit?” Kim wondered.

“Well I did some digging into the city archive and found that there was an accident at the campus involving one of the professors experiments.” Wade explained bringing up the file. 

“Was anyone hurt?” Kim asked. “Well one person was but they couldn’t identify him.” Wade said. 

“Okay anything on that other thing I asked you for?” Kim said changing the subject. 

“Yeah after digging trough the SFIT student database it seems only one name comes up for approaching an energy amplifier project.” Wade explained.

“Does this student have a name?” Kim asked. “Yeah someone by the name of Bob Aken, but the wired thing is when I tried accessing the file the system locked me out the file was sealed.” Wade explained. 

“It would need special authority for that?” Kim wondered. 

“your right and I know who, it was authorised by a Grace Granville.” Wade explained.

Kim was more than surprised than before not only was the professor hiding something but it would seem she was trying to cover up her failures and who was this Bob Aken? Just as she was pondering another call came in on the Kimmunicator. 

“Hey Kim!” Fred called. “Oh hey Fred whats the sitch?” Kim asked. 

“Good news Krei’s agreed to go along with the plan to catch Globby took some convincing but thanks to Mini max we were able to do it.” Fred replied. 

“Your gratitude is much appreciated.” Mini max said. 

“How’d you convince him?” Wade asked. “Oh Mini Max reminded him that Globby stole his wallet when we first met him.” Fred said. 

Kim was glad that at least one good thing has turned up from tonight the trap was set now it was tomorrow was the time to net their Globby fly. 

Back at Baron Von Steamers Old lair

Honey Lemon, Wasabi, Ron and Rufus were fighting for their lives against the security system that Baron Von Steamer put in place to protect his lair from intruders.  

The steam bot chases after them and their running to avoid it.

“SERIOUSLY WHO HAS A DEATH BOT POWERED BY STEAM!” Ron exclaimed. 

“Yeah thats Steamer for you!” Wasabi exclaimed. 

Suddenly they find themselves cornered and the bot blast fire at them. 

“Run!” Honey Lemon exclaimed as they split up to avoid the fire blast, Ron and Wasabi ran to the right whilst Honey Lemon and Rufus fled to the left. 

“We’ll keep it busy!” Wasabi yelled to Honey Lemon. 

“I’ll cut off the power!” Honey lemon replied. 

Wasabi used his left plasma blade to cut through one of the spikes in the lair and then tosses it at the bot getting its attention. Only for it to crush the spike with its hammer. 

Wasabi leapt into the air and grabs onto the bots head as it tries to use its hammer to crush him. Wasabi tries to avoid it. 

“Hey steam head over here!” Ron called as the bot now turned its attention onto him. Ron started running away from the bot still keeping its attention.

“Okay keeping it busy!” Ron yelled as he ran for his life. 

Honey Lemon uses this opportunity to fire a red chemball at the bot only for it to use its fire cannon to melt it down whilst still trying to crush Ron and Wasabi.

Wasabi makes the mistake of latching onto the robots hammer arm and it shakes him up and down in a fast motion until he’s catapulted across the room and lands on Ron and they end up rolling through a trash pile in a ball. 

They accidentally knock down a piece of scrap metal which knocks into another like a line of dominos and then a small hook pulled back a curtain revealing what looked like an old style gramophone. 

“Hey.” Wasabi said amazed. “Wow thats lucky.” Ron agreed.

However their joy was short lived when the trash pile continues to fall and land on a wooden beam which accidentally flips a switch. All of a sudden Wasabi and Ron began to feel the floor open up and a bright orange light emerged from the floor. 

“Oh come on!” Wasabi and Ron exclaimed. Ron fell through the hole and Wasabi was quick to catch him by the legs as Wasabi held onto the doors with his own legs. 

“Hang on!” Wasabi yelled. “Thats easy for you to say your not over a furnace!” Ron yells back “HONEY HE…LLLP!”

Not only did they have to worry about falling into a furnace but the steam bot was closing in on them and the doors Wasabi had his legs on were splitting further and further apart. 

However before it could strike a chem ball fell to the ground and turned into spikes of ice that penetrated the furnace in the robot rendering it useless.

“Wasabi ,Ron!” Honey Lemon called and hurried to the pit. 

Ron was slipping but before Wasabi lost his grip Honey dropped a chem ball into the pit which exploded and turned into purple coloured goop which emerged as a peak then turned into a slide which Ron and Wasabi slid down. 

“Whew.” Rufus said relieved. “You guys okay? Honey asked. 

“Sure as long as you define okay as, in massive agony!” Ron whined. 

They turned their attention to the gramophone and Honey Lemon began turning the handle to make it play. 

“Well let's see if this old thing works.” Honey said and moved the speaker into the cylinder and the gramophone began playing a log. 

“Barons Log. On this day I Baron Von Steamer proclaim that my latest scheme to defeat Boss Awesome cannot fail!” The recording played.

 A flashback shows the proclaimed Baron setting a plate of cookies under a cage with a sign saying free cookies. The Baron then hid behind a wall waiting for his opponent. 

“Victory will be mine!” The barons voice said. 

“Wow Fred was right this guy is old school, not to mention obsessed.” Ron said

“Yeah you gotta admire his confidence.” Wasabi agreed. 

Just then the gramophone started playing another log. 

“Barons log, addendum.” The Baron sounded rather depressed, and with good reason. 

“Victory, was not, mine.” He said as he started crying. In the flashback he was sat in the cage crying his eyes out in defeat. 

“Okay clearly a private moment.” Honey said tilting the speaker so they couldn’t hear anymore. 

“Good news the player works.” Wasabi pointed out. 

“We’ll just borrow it.” Honey said then pulls out a note with a heart on it. “I’ll leave a note.” Honey said smiling. 

“Well great let’s go before anything else happens.” Ron decided as Rufus landed on his shoulder.

“Yeah dude but first.” Wasabi points down and Ron see’s his pants are down, again.

“AW COME ON SERIOUSLY!” Said a rather annoyed Ron. 

“You ever consider getting a belt for that?” Honey asked. 

The Following Day

Baymax emerges from his charging station after a full nights recharge in Hiro’s room. He steps out and turns his attention to Hiro’s bed. 

“Hiro.” Baymax said as he walked over, he shuffled over to the right side of Hiro’s bed and it seemed he was still sleeping.

“Hiro.” Baymax said again but got no reply he then pulls back the bedsheets only to find it wasn’t Hiro in the bed but rather Mochi lying on a cushion who meowed in response.

Baymax headed out to the garage and looks round the wall to see Hiro still working on his project. He was starting to build his amplifier and had it secured in a vice it was purple and black in appearance, he was making adjustments with his tools. 

“Hiro, it is time to go.” Baymax then said walking into the Garage whilst Hiro worked. 

“Baymax? is it morning already.” Hiro said still working. 

“Yes the press conference will begin, in 20 minutes.” Baymax reminded. 

“I can’t stop now I’m in the zone.” Hiro said still working on the amplifier. 

Baymax just blinked. “Fred, Gogo and Kim require back up.” He said. 

“I know but I’m so close to finishing.” Hiro said. “Look I had a breakthrough I just need a little time to..” Then a thought hit him. 

“Baymax, could you do me a huge favour and head to Krei tech first.” He asked. 

Baymax was rather surprised by his friends request. “Without you?” He asked blinking. 

“Yeah without me I’m just so close on this.” Hiro answered. “Don’t worry I’ll catch up.” 

He then turned back to his work and Baymax started to leave the garage to get ready. 

“I will go.” he said leaving the garage, but not before he turned back to see his friend. 

“Without you.” He then took his leave and if though it couldn’t be seen but it looked like Baymax was experiencing sadness. 

“Goodbye” he then said leaving. 

Krei Tech

Meanwhile at Krei Tech the press conference was already underway the news reporters were gathered to hear Krei’s big announcement. High above Gogo, Fredzilla and Kim now armoured up were on the look out for any sign of trouble.

“Hiros late.” Gogo said rather impatiently. 

“Or maybe we’re early.” Fred wondered. “We’re not early.” Gogo then said. 

“Guys chill I’m sure Hiro’s on his way.” Kim assured then right on cue Baymax flew in wearing his armour. “Ah speak of the devil.” She said. 

However when Baymax landed Hiro was nowhere to be seen much to the surprise of everyone. 

“Wait where’s Hiro?” Gogo asked. “Hiro said that he would catch up.” Baymax said with a thumbs up. 

“That was not part of the plan.” Gogo said. “Relax Gogo, even if Hiro doesn’t make it the three of us Kim and Mini Max are more than enough to handle Globby.” Fred assured. 

“He’s got a point Gogo, besides Hiro probably has his project to think about, I’m sure he’ll show up later.” Kim agreed. 

Just the Krei tapped the microphone to get the press’s attention as the four heroes watched from above. 

“Once again, Krei tech industries has done the impossible!” Krei announced then pressed a button on a remote he was holding. 

“I present to you an energy amplifying… thing” The platform revealed a Krei tech briefcase and confetti started flying out of the bottom of the platform. 

“Uh which we like to call.” Krei took a moment to think of a name for this creation. “Pat-rick. Yes Patrick.” He decided. 

“Are you going to open it or what?” Bluff Dunder asked. “We’re rolling.” He gestured to the camera. 

“Ye, yes I’m going to do that.” Krei said moving slowly towards the brief case. “Now, right now, right…” Before Krei could open the case. 

“NOW!” A pink globe hand pushed Krei away and Globby appeared on stage. 

“I think I’ll be taking this! yoink!” Globby said picking up the case.

“Lets go!” Gogo said and the Heroes jumped down to the ground to face the glob villain. Globby sees some of Big Hero 6 and Kim Possible arrive on the scene. 

Gogo races towards Globby only to be cut off by a red laser blast. Gogo turned to the origin of the blast and it uncloaked to reveal floating turnip faces and behind them was a flying jet with five mechanical arms attached to it and piloting it was a burger head with eyes it was Noodle Burger boy.

“Howdy and hello burger buddies.” Noodle said spinning in his armed jet pack.

“We’re here to toast your buns!” 

“Oh no.” Gogo said “Uh who’s that?” Kim asked. “That is Noodle Burger Boy.” Fredzilla answered. 

“Buns I get it.” Baymax said. 

“As if this couldn’t get any weirder.” Kim wondered but then right on cue a blast of green energy knocked her in the back, she fell to the ground then got up to see a certain green suited villainess among this weird group of villains. 

“Surprise Kimmy.” Shego smirked. 

“And it just did.” Gogo said with a deadpanned look.

Gogo engaged the flying targets trying to hit them with her mag lev disks but missed Fredzilla performed a super jump and fired from his mouth a blast of fire which Globby jumped to avoid as Fredzilla landed on the ground. 

“Next!” Fredzilla said. “MINI MAX NOW!” 

Just then Mini Max emerged from the display platform wearing his armour and flew towards Globby. 

“MINI MAXIMIM ROCKET PUNCH!” The tiny bot exclaimed as he flew at the glob villain at top speed. 

Globby screamed in terror. “Just kidding.” Globby then made a hole in his body and Mini Max flew through it and crashed into the opposite wall and was caught in some wireing. 

“Well played gelatinous foe!” Mini Max said. “I’ll get him!” Fredizlla jumped up and fired a blast of fire at Globby only for him to miss it separate then reform on the ground with the case inside him. 

“This is not how I saw my plan going within my head?” Fredzilla said as he saw the turnips firing lasers from their eyes. 

“You don’t say!” Krei said rather annoyed. “Let me show you how I see it going.” Globby proceeded to grab Krei and fling him at Fredzilla who rolled onto the ground. 

Globby started laughing evilly as he began to morph into something and he revealed himself as a giant T-Rex who let out an ear splitting roar!

“He can turn into a dinosaur!” Krei exclaimed in surprise. 

“Honestly I’m surprised he hasn’t done it before.” Fredzilla said rather amazed. “But look at those tiny useless arms!” he then gloated as T-rex Globby wiggled his tiny arms. 

“You think!” Globby then extended out his arm and flung Fredzilla into a wall. 

Meanwhile Kim was fighting Shego who used her energy gauntlets to create blades to fight with and Kim blocked them with her armours energy shield. 

“So this is where you disappeared too after Drakken lost!” Kim said with effort. 

“Yeah like I was going to jail just because Dr D’s amateur plan didn’t work!” Shego said as she swung her right blade at Kim who quickly avoided it. Shego fired energy blasts at the teen hero who backflipped multiple times to avoid them and landed safely.

“Besides it’s better to be on the winning team, this guy Obake actually appreciates my potential.” Shego then said

“But seriously your working with a glob man and a robot fast food mascot.” Kim said in a confused tone. 

“Hey look I’m not liking this new weird crowd either but a girls gotta do what a girls gotta do.” Shego admitted before firing another energy blast at Kim who blocked it with her gauntlet shield. 

Gogo rode her mag lev disk skates around the wall trying to fight the laser firing turnips firing her disks at them one by one and even used her feet skates to knock them down, a group approached her but she jumped out of the way to avoid them. 

“Theres too many of them!” Gogo exclaimed and saw a laser coming in from Noodle Burger boy. 

“Breaking news from Krei Tech industries!” Bluff said on the news but a laser blast hit the edge of the building and the rubble nearly crushed them but luckily Baymax was on hand to smash the rubble with his fist before it hit them. 

Suddenly robot tentacles grabbed Baymax by the arms and lifted him up into the air. 

“Oh no!” Baymax said as Noodle flew him into the air then flung him into a wall with a massive crash. 

“He he he he he!” Noodle laughed with glowing red eyes. 

Kim was still defending herself from Shegos blasts as she saw Baymax knocked out and Gogo was barely standing her ground agains the flying laser firing turnips. 

“Gogo!” She cried “Call the others!” and Gogo responded with a nod. 

Gogo and Honey Lemons apartment

Meanwhile at Gogos apartment Honey Lemon, Wasabi, Ron and Rufus were all gathered around the kitchen table with the wax cylinder and gramophone they got from Steamers lair. Wasabi was holding his phone to record this for Honey’s project. 

“This is it guys.” Honey said rather excited. “This could be the secret behind Shimamoto’s greatest discovery.” 

“Well come on play it already, I want to know if it was worth nearly getting melted for!” Ron said and Rufus nodded in agreement. 

“Are you ready.” Honey asked and just before Wasabi could press record the phone rang showing the caller ID to be Gogo.

“Gogo, we’re kinda busy.” Wasabi answered but then heard the sound of laser fire and they looked at the phone to see Gogo in the middle of a fight. 

“Are you kidding me!” Gogo said annoyed. “Noodle Burger Boy, Globby and Shego are attacking Krei tech!” She said trying to hold up her phone. “We need back up! Hurry!” 

“On our way Gogo!” Ron said.

Hiro’s Garage:

Back at the Garage Hiro was applying the finishing touches to his energy amplifier he releases it from the vice and then takes it over to his computer. 

“Okay just got to test it out.” Hiro said but neglected to hear his vibrating phone. 

Hiro proceeded to hook it up to an amp which was connected to his computer ready for testing. 

The computer screen started showing the readouts of the device, and Hiro with a deep breath turned on his amplifier and it started surging with purple energy and the readouts showed it was amplifying the computers power tenfold. Hiro was screaming with excitement that it was working. 

“I.. it’s working!” Hiro said rather excited. However the charge began to work too well it caused an electrical short on his computer screen and nearly caused his hard drive to explode. Bolts of electrical energy were surging around the room and Hiro was quick to un plug the amplifier.

“Its working!” Hiro said amazed. “Baymax did you…” However he noticed Baymax wasn’t in the garage, then saw his phone was sounding off. He went over to look and saw he had multiple missed calls from Honey, Wasabi, Kim,Fred, Ron and Gogo. Then he remembered he had something important to do.

“Oh no!” Hiro said in horror. “No!” A text from Gogo then opened to say “WHERE ARE YOU!” And another one from 

Kim saying “HIRO GET OUT TO KREI TECH NOW!” 

“no no no!” Hiro paniked as he activated his Skymax pod. 

Back at Krei tech:

An arial dog fight was taking place between Baymax and Noodle Burger Boy. Noodle flew in front of Baymax who quickly flew away to avoid him but Noodle flew after him flying high into the sky and fired a laser blast which clipped the red robots shoulder causing him to fly out of control, but managed to recover. 

“Baymax you have to fight back!” Gogo ordered on the coms. 

“Say rocket fist!” Fredzilla jumped only for Globby to grab him. Noodles tentacle arm hit Baymax in the chest flinging him into a wall and he managed to recover as Noodle hovered in place. 

“Baymax Rocket Fist!” Kim exclaimed. 

Baymax readied his rocket fist but when he was scanning for a target Noodle was nowhere to be seen. Suddenly he was restrained by Noodles robot tentacles. 

“Oh no.” Baymax said. Noodle climbed out of his jet pack and onto Baymax’s chest whilst holding his head. 

“Golly mr, I’ve got a special order for you.” Noodle then started messing with something on Baymax causing him to go haywire. 

“Reboot data packet invalid.” Baymax said as he was crashing down. “Reboot internal authentication error, reboot reboot protocol malfunction reboot reboot.” 

Baymax flew out of control and Gogo saw he was going to crash. 

“Baymax!” She exclaimed as Baymax crashed onto the ground damaging his wing in the process. 

“No!” Kim exclaimed and saw the cause of it flying around. So she threw her energy shield like a frisbee and it clipped Noodles jet pack sending it flying out of control and the shield returned to Kim a move that would make even Captain America proud. 

However she was then blasted in the back by Shego and flung into Gogo they got up to see they were surrounded by the flying turnips. Before they could react one was smashed by a purse, it was Honey Lemon armoured up and fired several Chem- balls at the drones freezing them and they fell to the ground. 

“Thanks.” Gogo said as Honey helped her and Kim up. 

“Nice timing.” Kim thanked as she jumped back into the fight against Shego.

Fredzilla then jumped up and tried a swing kick on T-rex Globby only for him to get stuck and absorbed into his nose. 

The glob dino then just sneezed the costumed hero out of his nose and onto the ground.

“Give me my wallet back Globby!” Krei cried as he was hiding nearby. “It was a gift from my accountant!” 

“Well I, I lost it.” Globby explained. “You are a monster!” Krei said rather annoyed. 

“Guys this stuff is oozing into places!” Fred cried from inside his suit which was leaking Globby’s goop inside.

“Hang on Fred I’m coming!” Wasabi cried as he sliced apart the drones with his blades to reveal them as Buddy guard robots. 

Wasabi tried to get get Fredzilla free only to get stuck in the goop too. “Uh oh!” Wasabi panicked. “I’m stuck, like really stuck!” 

“Yeah man thats really in there!” Fredzilla said and Globby was about to step on them until Mini Max flew in to the rescue. 

“Fear not friends brave!” Mini Max said as he flew into Globby’s T-Rex leg which suddenly morphed into a hammer. 

“Take this you pint-sized pest!” Globby said as he smashed the hammer down causing an explosion. The smoke cleared to reveal globby wings. Globby had now turned into a pterosaur which flew into the sky holding Wasabi, Fredzilla and Krei in its claws. 

Kim was still dealing blows with Shego’s energy blasts blocking them with her shield until the green villainess had turned her blasts into a set of plasma claws and sliced at Kims gauntlet destroying the shield leaving Kim venerable to another energy blast which knocked her to the ground. 

She looked up to see Shego about to deliver the final blow but before she could. 

“The cavalry’s arrived!” A voice called and Ron flew in with his jetpack knocking Shego down with his fist. He then helped Kim up from the ground. 

“Thanks Ron.” Kim thanked. “Hey assist its what the sidekicks for.” Ron said. 

Shego got up and was about to blast the two until something kicked her across the face it was an armoured Rufus with his jetpack. This angered the green villainess as she tried swatting the naked molerat. 

Pterosaur Globby still held his prisoners in his claws until he flung them away only to crash into Gogo and Honey Lemon. Who soon found themselves surrounded by the three villains Kim and Ron soon joined them as they went into a defensive pose. 

“Looks like it’s the end of the line for Big Loser 6! and Kim Possible” Shego said with a sadistic smile.

However before they could attack an engine revved up and out of nowhere Hiro sped in armoured up and on his scooter as he jumped from some rubble and flung his scooter into Noodle as he crashed to the ground. 

Noodle was flung into Globby and his eyes glowed red.

“Oh not good!” Globby said as Noodle fired his laser eyes causing him to explode all over the place and Noodle Burger Boy just crashed to the ground. 

Shego looked rather irritated by this development. 

“Don’t count us out yet Shego!” Hiro said “Now where’s Obake and whats he up too!?” 

“Oh please as if I understand what his plan is!” Shego said rolling her eyes. “Okay boys time to go!” 

She said as she got Noodle and Globby reformed himself and grabbed the case with the energy amplifier and Hiro watched  the three villains escaped with what was left of the Buddy guards.

“Sorry I’m late.” Hiro apologised turning to his rather unhappy teammates. 

“Where were you!” Gogo demanded. “I kinda lost track of time.” Hiro admitted. 

“Doing what dude, you look like you’ve barely slept?” Ron asked and Rufus nodded in agreement.

“My final project.” Hiro answered. “Wait till you guys see..”  “Thats great Hiro but someone could have really gotten hurt today.” Honey pointed out.

“Hiro I know how much it is that you pass your grade but you need to consider your priorities, we needed you and you blew us off!” Kim then scolded. 

“She’s right, we needed you, Baymax needed you.” Gogo then agreed gesturing to the downed robot. 

Hiro gasped in horror as he saw his friend down on the ground. “Oh no!” Hiro said rushing over to his injured friend. 

“Baymax!” He said as he looked at the damage. “Baymax?” 

Just then Baymax rose up as he rebooted his systems from whatever Noodle Burger Boy did.

“Reboot complete.” Baymax said with his eyes blinking. “Hello I am Baymax.” He greeted

“Baymax are you okay? talk to me buddy where’s the damage?” Hiro asked as he looked him over. 

“I briefly malfunctioned.” Baymax explained. “I am fine.” He then assured and Hiro responded to that with a hug. The others came over and Hiro looked to them apologetically. 

“Guys, I I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean let you down like that.” Hiro apologised. 

“We know, but don’t do it again.” Gogo said. 

“Hey man it happens to the best of us you want to know how many times I messed up cause I had other things to do.” Ron admitted. 

“I forgive you Hiro, I mean my super awesome perfect plan didn’t work cause Globby got away, probably a little your fault.” Fred said. 

“Guys come on we couldn’t have known Globby would have company this time.” Kim pointed out. “But that aside we now know where Shego went after we stopped the Destructo Yamas.” 

“Yeah and who she got those energy gauntlets from, Obake.” Wasabi added. 

“Yeah but there are two positive take aways from all this.” Fred then said. “One I got to fight a dinosaur, which was awesome! and two all they stole was an empty briefcase.” 

“My lawyer gave me that briefcase.” Krei said rather upset. 

“As a Christmas gift?” Ron asked to which Krei just looked with a raised eyebrow. 

“I offer my consolation wealthy citizen.” Mini Max comforted by patting his head.

Elsewhere:

Deep in Obake’s lair Momakase used her blade to slice open the case only to reveal a poorly drawn picture of Fredzill signed by himself. 

“Obake will not like this.” Momakase said to Globby, Noodle and Shego. 

“Oh great, so this was a fools errand!” Shego said rather annoyed. 

“Well you should be used to that working with an amateur like that mommas boy you called your partner.” Momakase teased. 

“Hey watch it sushi girl! I may have to work with you and these two idiots doesn’t mean I have to put up with it!” Shego threatened with an energised hand.

 “Actually ladies I’m thrilled.” The group looked to See Obake standing behind them.

“Everything went exactly as planned.” He explained. 

“I don’t get it?” Said a confused Globby. 

“Yeah it was a bust? What was the point of trying to stealing something that doesn’t even exist?” Shego then questioned. 

“Oh of course you don’t.” Obake said going over to his monitor. “Krei’s pack of simpletons couldn’t finish the job, I needed the services of someone, truly gifted.” The left side of his face began to glow neon purple. 

Hiros Garage:

Hiro was holding his energy amplifier and twisted it to turn it on and it surged with power. It glowed neon purple which reflected its light onto the one who made it. But little did Hiro know of the significance his creation would actually play. 

Authors notes: 

Uh oh what could Obake possibly have in mind for the young genius and Kim is suspecting that Granville maybe hiding something about why she didn't want Hiro approaching the energy amplifier. Well answers to come in the next chapter.

[carabas]

So I’ve just finished reading the Dragon Age Tevinter Nights anthology, and short reaction: enjoyably hit and miss right up until that final extremely thorough direct hit, thank you Patrick Weekes.

Much, much longer version:

1. I don’t know how reasonable it is to try to extrapolate about what’s going to be in the next game based on a random short story collection, but hey, the novels that came out before DAI were about the mage rebellion, the Orlesian civil war, and eluvians, so.

So things I’m now expecting to see in the next game, aside from the Tevinter-Qunari conflict and Solas of course: Nevarran necromancy, Antivan Crows, Wardens who are struggling with decimated numbers after DAO and DAI (would be the perfect time for Razikale and Lusacan to both wake up at once really), and the Lords of Fortune, a never-before-mentioned Rivaini treasure hunting organization which appeared in I think three different stories here. 

Plus a few stories were very much signalling This Specific New Character Will Be Showing Up Again, whether in the games or elsewhere; I'll be shocked if Lucanis the “Demon,” reluctant heir apparent of the Antivan Crows who just got into a cliffhanger conflict with a Tevinter magister, doesn’t have more to do.

2. THERE IS A MAP, there is a great big fantasy map surrounded by nifty little illustrative details to poke at.

There’s a label reading “White Spire,” not in Val Royeaux, but on a mountain beyond the Arlathan Forest. Is that an error or is there really a White Spire mountain? If not an error, has it always been named that or is that new, possibly a new center for the mages after the war, after the original Spire fell? At no point is either Spire mentioned in this book aside from this map.

Lots of astrological sun and moon patterns prominently featured around the edges. Is that one moon chart depicting moon phases or an eclipse? Is it too conspiracy theory of me to be counting the nine dark moons (or spheres? like in that DA4 idol illustration’s seven slots?) on the dragon’s wing? Probably. Or are those spheres a reference to the second moon that never seems to actually be visible, is that missing moon actually deliberate. 

Most of the astrological charts are fairly straightforwardly showing sun/moon phases but what is the crowned figure in the one on the lower right meant to represent? The Maker? What’s going on with the horizontal lines passing through it/behind it? The two moons beneath it - is that an illustration of the moon in two phases or being separated into two (metaphorical moon in that case, presumably), do those horizontal lines also indicate separation, do I need to move on from the astrological depictions here, definitely.

Love the big horseshoe crab sea monster.

3. Patrick Weekes’s first story in the collection: halla shapeshifting! An elf named Strife who I fully expected to be revealed as an agent of Fen’harel mimicking ancient elven names like Sorrow and Pride, though I was wrong - would it be charming or just annoyingly unsubtle if that became a thing among his agents. An ancient forest guardian with lyrium blades who hunts magic in a way that struck me an awful lot like a forest-themed equivalent of a golem, though I may be wildly off base with that one.

4. Nevarran necromancy story. An odd bit of the chant to highlight for a funeral: “And the Maker, clad in the majesty of the sky, set foot to earth, and at His touch all warring ceased.” I continue to squint suspiciously at overlaps between Maker and elven god imagery. Also, evidently mortalitasi believe that when someone dies, an inhuman spirit is pushed out from the Fade into the physical world, and that’s part of the reason behind their housing spirits in bodies - neat! The existence of Curiosity spirits, also neat!

5. Is Ghilan’nain’s horrible body horror place supposed to be spelled Hormak like in the title and previous canon references, or Hormok like throughout the text here? I know this was just a mistake but maybe I’ll use this to say that in-world there’s multiple ways of transliterating Dwarven.

6. Lukas Kristjanson story #1, the one featuring approximately a million minor Inquisition character cameos and a meditation on Solas’s regrets, introduces a character with the phrase “free mage by special commendation,” and I was briefly thrown by that little signal that we are Not In My Worldstate, that the mages aren’t all free by default - except then the story went on to destroy Solas’s fresco so I wound up quite grateful for that little heads up that this isn’t my worldstate actually.

(Unfortunately I can’t get into this guy’s writing style at all, which is a shame because it’s one of the big Solas stories in the book.)

7. There’s a little plot point in the Wigmaker Job story that demonstrates those elven artifacts Solas had us activate all over Thedas do indeed strengthen the Veil - like, he wasn’t lying to us about what those orbs do, that is how they work, here we see a Crow stab one in order to deactivate it, weaken the Veil and unleash a horde of vengeful demons. Nice confirmation.

8. Genitivi is the Randy Dowager. (Possibly. At least, Philliam wrote a scene in which Genitivi alludes to being the Randy Dowager. I do appreciate an unreliable narrator but after a certain point it does make the lore hard to keep straight.)

9. By the time we got to the story about adventurers stealing an incredibly powerful healing amulet just to donate it to a mysterious contact at a makeshift hospital trying to help people where the Qunari-Tevinter war has spilled over, I knew better than to expect any cameos from DAO/DA2 characters. And with the mention of the squire, I was pretty sure the mysterious contact was going to be Vaea, and it was. Still. Anders would approve. And for a moment I was fantasizing that it would turn out to be him, or connected to him. A new mental setting for him and Hawke post-mage-freedom - makeshift hospitals at the edge of the invasion, secretly sponsored by a certain pair of absurdly overpowered, dungeon-crawling, treasure-hunting fugitives.

Yes, my Dragon Age interpreting is still all about Anders even when he’s not remotely present.

10. You know, I really expected the leaders of the Crows to be a bit more ruthlessly competent than this. Someone is setting up a grand demonstration, recreating infamous historical assassinations carried out by the Crows but now with the leaders of the Crows themselves as the victims, incredibly flashy, incredibly clearly sending a message, and yet not one of the characters trying to figure out whodunit is speculating about the meaning behind that message??? the motive in going to all that trouble??? it’s all, hm, perhaps it’s the qunari invaders. hm, this one was posed with a pearl necklace just like the one in the historical murder it’s recreating, i bet the culprit owns a pearl-fishing business! I know they’re assassins not detectives but at least show the professional courtesy of paying attention to the message in the show your fellow assassin is putting on for you, geez.

Anyway. Interesting Crow details: they talked about neutral ground and territories divided between the Crow households here, does that just apply to Antiva or like, does Arainai have claim to all jobs in Ferelden? 

And the line “Teia's back was bare except for a tattoo marking her as a member of House Cantori” puts Zevran’s tattoos in a slightly different light for me - he’s mentioned that some symbols are sacred to the Crows, and logically it follows that having that symbol tattooed on him would indeed mark him as a Crow to other people in the know, but that his tattoos mark him as belonging to House Arainai is a thing that did not hit me from that.

11. An agent of Fen’harel muttering “Felassan” to activate a rune. In memoriam? Charming. I mean it’s a rune that’s intended to kill an entire city, so possibly the more literal slow arrow is meant, but I’m still charmed.

12. PATRICK WEEKES CLOSING OUT THE BOOK BY JUST DUMPING THE CONTINUING DREAD WOLF HUNT PLOT ON US. 

So much. 

An actual giant wolf in the Fade, I’m so happy for tumblr user corseque. 

A character again raising the possibility that Solas is not an ancient elf but rather a young elf who stumbled onto old magic, a theory I thought debunked by Trespasser but here we are considering it again. 

A minor side note that a lot of Kirkwall’s templars went rogue after the explosion - that’s not relevant to the post-DAI plot really, I’m just noting it for my generally-DA2-focused fanfic purposes. 

The possibility that somniari (presumably) can kill even dwarves who don’t dream in their sleep. Somniari in general or did Solas personally step in here?

A ritual involving the red lyrium idol resulting in the phrase “As if we were the blood and the cavern the body through which it flowed” right before the POV character enters the Fade, which is a rather Titan-esque turn of phrase. 

The Dread Wolf again asserting that all creation is in danger and he’s trying to fix that. A biased POV character recognizing that, huh, funny how those spirits around the Dread Wolf which surely must be demons actually look an awful lot like Justice and Valor. 

And Charter’s notes at the end, so direct, not only spelling out the new details on the idol for us (that the figure represents a crowned figure comforting another) but thoroughly hitting us over the head with Solas’s essential characterization in his own words, as if Weekes is still trying to clear up any possible lingering misinterpretations there. (Prideful, hotheaded, foolish. Doing what he must. Sympathetic to elves. Said that he was sorry.)

And the quiet simplicity of Solas coming to this meeting of spies in person because, pause, “...the Inquisition was involved,” written in such a way that you could read all sorts of things into that pause, whatever the Inquisition and the Inquisitor might mean to him.

The book would have been worth reading for this last story alone, what a note to end on.

[welcometoitalia]

21 Cultural Pointers about Life in Italy

1) TIME: Kick off your shoes, throw away your watch... everything is relative. Whilst much has improved in recent years, trains, buses and people tend to work on an "approximate" timetable. Learn patience and go with the flow.

2) LANGUAGE: Other than in Northern Europe, English is not as widely learnt and used in Italy. Until recently, French was promoted above English. Italians suffer from a sort of language inferiority complex so that even those who do speak good English are convinced that they do not and therefore only speak when absolutely necessary. A common mistake in listening to an Italian speaking his mother tongue is to assume that they are angry or excited. This is not always the case as you may witness in seeing two Italians "argue" and then kiss each other on both cheeks and disappear for an Aperitivo (pre-dinner drink).

3) NATIONALISM: As reflected in regional dialects, modern Italy was actually only unified in the mid 1800's. Still today, great divisions exist between North and South. This means that culture, traditions and life style vary significantly between the various provinces. True allegiance is to the local town or province and less to Italy as a whole. If you want to compliment an Italian, remark kindly on his home town.

4) POLITICS: Often called "the Politics of Favors", politicians don't fade away, they just become prime minister for the 10th time! Bringing down Government is a national pastime, averaging nearly one government for every year since World War 2. Reflecting the national divide, Italy has a strong ex-communist and a strong ex-fascist block. Most Italians believe the country is successful despite the best efforts of the government; tax avoidance is another national obsession. One of Italy's stronger parties is dedicated to the break up of Italy. Lega Nord (Free the North) has a passionate following - in the north! To mis-quote Beppe Grillo, a famous Italian commentator: “One Italian makes a Latin lover, two together can never agree, whilst three make up four political parties.”

5) DRINK: Italian bars often double up as coffee shops as there is a much more limited drinking culture than in other European locales. Italians on the whole do not have a "drinking culture"; many bars reflect this less intense relationship with alcohol, although the club scene is more "traditional" in its appeal. Wine is often less expensive than bottled water and whilst a staple feature of Italian meals, it is very rarely drunk to excess.

6) FAMILIES: Careful of stereotypes but, whilst waning, the family is central to everything and all. It is normal for unmarried children to live at home, even if they are in their 30's and 40's. Children move away... to the house next door! ;) ... and shouting between balconies to borrow some sugar is common. The grandmother plays the role of matriarch and family members like to turn up for a meal and are gladly received.

7) RELIGION: Catholic, of course (about 90%). Strangely though, Italy now has one of the lowest birth rates in Europe, So called Mafia bosses may fastidiously attend church on Sunday and married Catholic men may happily have an “amante” (lover). Many Catholics are uncertain if they are Christians as well as Catholic, such is the hold and “brand” strength of the Catholic church. Church attendances are, however, in decline and the number of new priests has declined by 85% in the last 50 years.

8) SPORT: One thing all Italians agree on is the national football/soccer team, often referred to as Italy's "true" religion. When Italy won the World Cup, people took to the streets in their cars, blowing horns, standing on car roofs and the entire nations transport system ground to a halt for hours as Italians demonstrated their passion for the game. Other sports take a back seat although cycling, volleyball, skiing and Formula One have their place on the front pages. One of the largest selling national newspapers is entirely dedicated to sport (LaGazetta dello sport).

9) WORLD AFFAIRS: Not our affair... so who cares, right? 

10) FOREIGNERS: In most cases are greeted with enthusiasm and delight, although heavy non-European immigration has started to create phobia and resentment of the non European invasion in recent years.

11) FOOD: Italians are passionate about... Italian food! So much so that even when abroad, many Italians will go out of their way to seek out the nearest Italian restaurant. Each region of Italy has its own "local dish" and each dish may be prepared in a different way according to local custom. A wedding meal may last more than 6 hours and feature up to 20 courses. Such is the strength of Italian food that finding a Chinese, Mexican, or other type of restaurant outside the big towns is a challenge.

12) DRIVING: The Italian zest for life is well reflected in the Italian driving style! Cars are viewed as a status symbol; Italy has one of the highest percentages of Mercedes owners in the world. Speed limits, like train schedules, are considered approximations. Recent clamp downs and a new point system is beginning to dampen this zest and the best advise for foreign drivers is not to panic if a car cuts in, speeds by, or tailgates you. Don't worry, they have had lots of practice and are very good at it!

13) QUEING: Or lines. Until recently, the concept was an enigma for Italians. The advent of supermarket deli ticket lines and other such devices are being readily adopted and even when no line exists, Italians appear to have an uncanny sense of when it's their turn.

14) GREETING: Even vaguely familiar acquaintances will kiss each other on each cheek, but a hand shake will suffice. “Buongiorno” (formal) and “Ciao” (informal) being the classic accompaniment, followed by "come stai?" - the (informal) “how are you?”. In English-speaking countries, it's normal to reply "fine, thank you" even if you feel awful, in Italy they may well tell you how they actually are! Failure to greet or say goodbye to somebody can be taken as an insult.

15) FASHION: Italians will generally conform to the latest fashion trends, colors and styles, indeed foreigners can easily be spotted, even in a crowd, as they often do not conform to this hidden code. Italians take pride in their dress and are much more brand-conscious than some other nationalities.

16) BUSINESS: Italians prefer to do business with those they know and trust (hence, the relatively low success of Internet companies). Unlike some other industrialized powers, the back bone of the Italian economy is based on people, not multinationals. This is reflected in the proportionally high level of family businesses. Even large Italian businesses are often originated, directed or owned by a family (Benetton, Fiat etc). The local family shop concept still prevails, even though supermarkets are beginning to change the fabric of shopping.

17) PLANNING: Whilst many Northern Europeans are busy planning their next summer holiday in September the year before, summer holiday catalogs in Italy are not even printed till March! Planning ahead is considered restrictive and often Italians will decide what to do for the weekend on Saturday morning. Don't try and force Italians to plan, or expect next seasons bus timetable to be published months before. 

18) EUROPEAN: Italy is a great believer in “voting European”, agreeing to many issues and then simply not implementing the directive. Italians themselves see Europe as an escape clause from their own government's perceived incompetence and corruption, however when put to the test, Italians in reality dislike anybody who tells them how to live their lives. Most Italians were enthusiastic about the Euro, until they found that most shop keepers used it to increase prices twofold.

19) HUMOR: Warning: “Sarcasm is not defined”. Do not try sarcastic or ironic jokes on Italians, many will think you are serious. Humor is a lot more lighthearted and obvious (Benny Hill was a big hit) and Italians are not afraid to make fun of themselves. The famous Oscar-winning actor and comic Roberto Benigni once remarked: “If the Berlin wall had been built by Italians, it would have come down on its own.” The prime-time nightly comedy program “Striscia la Notizia” goes out of its way to poke holes and find humor in Italian news and politics. Few Italian comedies work well when translated but have an avid following in Italy itself.

20) TELEVISION: Italians love game shows and reality TV (Big Brother is a yearly event). Like Italian fashion, brand names are important. The host's "brand" is critical and what he or she wears is critically examined. Nearly all shows feature "dancers or assistents", nearly always women, and nearly always clad in mini skirts and revealing tops. Where other countries would cry foul, Italians revel in the female form and are happy to have it presented to them as often as possible, even when totally irrelevant to the show.

21) HOTELS: Contrary to popular belief there is no unified star rating system in Europe. Each country provides its own system. A hotel's ambience is not assessed in any system, only facilities. In Italy, a 3-star hotel will have a restaurant, on-suite bathroom, bar, and lounge area. Room sizes in Italy are below the European average, mainly because many hotels are converted residences. Most hotels are family-run with attentive, very friendly service and homecooked meals. It is not unusual for the grandparents to take over responsibilites when the owner is away or to be greeted during school holidays by the 14 year old son (who probably speaks better English than the parents). This family atmosphere is one of the charms of smaller Italian hotels.

Oh, and one last warning: be careful of the stereotypes. Whilst you can always draw a thread (or even a rope) of similarity (as above) between the nationals of a country, the extent and size of the thread can vary.

Edited and adjusted from an article by A. Reed, a Brit in Brescia, Italy

[meditativeyoga]

How Yoga Can Disrupt the School-to-Prison Pipeline

This is an interview with B.K. Bose, who began the non-profit Niroga Institute with a few yoga students in 2005. Niroga was asked to assist work with a team of delinquent girls in an alternative high college in the San Francisco Bay Area, and also from the very first yoga class the Niroga instructors might see just how these trainees took to the conscious activity, breathing and focusing (the ABCs) like fish to water. They appeared to attach with a place inside themselves that was safe from all the dysfunction around them.

Today, Niroga carries out over 100 yoga exercise courses a week in 40 websites throughout the Bay Area, serving over 5,000 children, young people, and grownups annually, in mainstream as well as different colleges, adolescent halls and jails, rehab centers, and also cancer cells healthcare facilities. It likewise performs trainings for numerous teachers, psychological health and wellness specialists, and violence-prevention authorities nationwide. In these trainings, individuals get aid with personal sustainability (stress monitoring, self-care, and also recovery from vicarious injury), which also has a favorable impact on their professional technique. Niroga shows Transformative Life Abilities (TLS: conscious yoga, breathing methods, as well as meditation).

Rob: What initially inspired you to do this work as well as exactly what continues to encourage you? Just how, if in any way, has that inspiration transformed over time?

I learned yoga as a kid, yet my technological training was in computer technology. While I was working as a researcher in Silicon Valley, I saw the ravages of persistent tension around me. It was affecting the wellness, partnerships, efficiency, and also worldwide competition of numerous people and companies. I understood about an ideal solution!

So I came to be a pupil of persistent anxiety and also its pervasive influence on people and areas. I learned that stress and anxiety is not only a risk factor for the majority of persistent illness (which are accountable for 75 percent of our health-care budget), however it impacts all of us the means down to our DNA, speeding up aging and also modifying our genetics maps (switching on disease-causing genetics). Chronic tension is additionally a common impact of every significant social determinant of health and wellness (e.g., income inequality, institutionalized racism, as well as the breakdown of traditional household structures). I additionally gained from the current injury research study that we hold chronic stress, traumatic stress, and post-traumatic stress in our bodies along with our minds. An incorporated mind-body strategy is essential for optimal healing.

How could yoga come to be a game-changer in stopping institution failure as well as minimizing adolescent delinquency

Approximately one in 2 young people is quiting of our inner-city colleges. About a million youths are dropping out of college annually across the United States ... When a youth leaves of school it is really most likely that he or she will be entailed in criminal offense and violence.

Many of the kids and young people who go to biggest threat of institution failure come to school not all set to find out. They are handling the injury of abuse and also disregard, crime and physical violence, weapons and gangs, medications as well as fatality. We rush to show them, failing to remember that we need to heal them first.

If we can bring ideal trauma-informed programs such as mindful yoga exercise, breathing methods, as well as reflection to adequate youngsters enough times, I believe we can reach a powerful tipping point. An efficient as well as affordable method to doing this is by training the adults that are around these youngsters (e.g., teachers, counselors, and also moms and dads) in these methods. This would have a twin benefit: It would certainly help the adults with their very own anxiety administration, self-care as well as healing from additional injury, as well as also allow them to produce communities of method in their colleges as well as homes.

Why should wellness professionals and college administrators find out about Transformative Life Abilities (TLS)?

The most current neuroscience study reveals that chronic stress interrupts our ability to hold focus as well as manage our emotions, neuroscience additionally shows that mindfulness practices can alleviate these very results. [1-4] Scientists have actually currently established that self-constraint is a forecaster of scholastic accomplishment, which low self-constraint is in charge of a wide variety of individual and interpersonal issues. [5], [6]

Independent scientists studying the result of Niroga's TLS amongst thousands of young people in urban schools have actually revealed that TLS lowered anxiety, enhanced emotion policy, enhanced school involvement, as well as transformed attitude toward physical violence. [8] I think this has multi-dimensional impact on our school-to-prison pipeline, along with on education equity as well as the accomplishment gap, considering that many of the youth leaving of institution and also winding up in adolescent hall are kids of color.

In addition to the studies you point out above, is there an evidence base for your program in particular? What is the return on investment?

As I claimed, there is engaging clinical study revealing 1) stress and anxiety influences self-control, as well as self-control predicts academic accomplishment, and also 2) yoga/TLS reduces tension as well as increases self-discipline. So it is rather feasible that yoga/TLS will affect academic achievement, and this needs to be investigated. It will require getting yoga/TLS to a great deal of youth arbitrarily picked to get TLS adequate times (sufficient frequency and also duration), as well as following their trajectories for numerous years. We are simply starting to obtain passion from entire school districts to examine just this.

Of course, we see circumstances of change on a daily basis in our straight solution programs in the area. When a young man is able to let down his armor of hyper-vigilance, when a girl in a homeless shelter claims that her continuous psychological pain is relieved with the method, when opposing gang members have the ability to close their eyes and also loosen up next to each other at the end of a session, when a high-risk teenager graduates from a different high school and joins our instructor training program to ensure that she can assist draw her close friends out of the mire of sadness, we consider these triumphes bread for our journey!

It expenses less than $1,000 to saturate a youngster or young people's life with TLS. If we used TLS throughout our institutions, and also if the graduation rate can be raised by just 1 percent, the math is simple and clear-- we would certainly get our money back often times over!

What is the best challenge you face in bringing TLS to those who require it most?

There are so many misunderstandings around yoga exercise. Despite 20 million people doing yoga in the United States, it is frequently viewed as socially elite. It is additionally often presented as a fitness trend for versatility, or simply as stretching.

So we call our program Transformative Life Skills (TLS), abilities that nudge us in the direction of healthy and balanced actions as well as healthy way of living options, also as they change us from the in out. Secured in mindfulness, connecting with our breath, we arise in activity, to ensure that the entire technique ends up being dynamic, symbolized mindfulness-- mindfulness in movement, or removaling reflection. It is an universal, secular transformative technique, which anybody can do anytime, anywhere.

Awareness regarding the power and possibility of these transformative practices requires to expand among instructors, health-care experts, and also violence-prevention authorities. Idea leaders in these interconnected major domains of social function are just beginning to recognize that these reliable techniques are evidence-based, validated by cutting-edge research study in several disciplines. Long-lasting funding dedication is needed, to make sure that detailed research study could be carried out to develop system influences, such as secondary school graduation price and the recidivism price in adolescent halls.

What are 2 vital features of your strategy to decreasing stress and anxiety and also enhancing self-constraint and resilience among at-risk youngsters as well as youth?

We think that every child and every youth has limitless capability for self-awareness and also self-mastery, to act rather compared to simply react, to attain their greatest potential.

We also think that we are not aiming to take care of or aid any individual, simply to offer them with love as well as empathy, unselfishly as well as unconditionally. Doing so is our opportunity. We are happy to those we offer, because each of them provides us with the opportunity to expand in lots of ways.

What are several of your concepts regarding or expects the future of 'service yoga exercise' in America in the next decade?

I desire about the opportunity when a lot of individuals in neighborhoods across the United States as well as past have access to these profound and powerful techniques, so that they can act with self-awareness and also self-mastery a lot of the time. Such gain access to will change ourselves, help recover our communities, and also aid make our vulnerable planet much more lasting for generations to come.

None of us could do this alone. We will certainly need all our enthusiasm and also compassion, vision as well as creative imagination. Yoga specialists will should extend their method past the limits of their floor coverings, bringing it from people to institutions, from classrooms to companies, from jails to juvenile halls, building healthy and balanced as well as dynamic neighborhoods one breath at a time.

[necropsittacus]

I got a request for an Infodump Post on the Revelation imagery in King of the Monsters and tbqh one of my love languages is being asked about my Ghidorah opinions so Here We Go

note: I’m using the New International Version of the Bible, and also I have not rewatched KOTM for this (although I may end up deciding to do that) and am going on memories of my approximately three and a half past viewings. Other note: most of this is going to be me presenting specific Bible quotes and then talking about them a bit. Be prepared for that. also this feels super unfinished to me and shorter than it should be to treat the topic properly, and like i need to rewatch the movie and write an essay 

The whole movie, and Ghidorah in particular, is very focused around apocalypse imagery--the end of the world, the rebuilding of a cleaner, better new world, the breakdown of that attempt to rebuild a better world. This has to do with the Book of Revelation’s focus on the destruction of the world as we know it and the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. 

except that here the attempt to destroy and remake the world (which, in Revelation, is an act of God, with the Devil as a major part of the narrative but not the prime mover) A. fails, and B. isn’t treated as a good idea to start with by the narrative. While the ending, and specifically information we get in the credits, does show us progress towards a better, brighter future for the world, it’s more “gradual healing” than “apocalypse and rebirth.” The burn-it-all-down apocalypse-and-rebirth style of fixing the world is rather associated with Ghidorah, and the people who release/awaken him. The human villains want to purge the world of humanity’s sins. 

This is one of those places where the religious commentary mixes with commentary on environmental/climate change issues...Alan Jonah’s plan is standing in for, well, y’all know what kind of environmental rhetoric, the “humans are the plague, burn it all down so the earth can heal” type. They’re making a point about the inviability of that kind of goal, that you can’t just kill everyone and start over and hope the earth will fix itself, because it won’t (and, here, trying to make it work like that actively makes things worse--Ghidorah has no interest in *fixing* anything), and that gets mixed with the religious imagery in fun ways. 

It could also have to do with the “false king of the monsters”/“Antichrist stands in the place of Christ” idea--Ghidorah is taking the role, as the one breaking and remaking the world, that in Revelation is assigned to God, but he’s more the Devil. 

And that plays into the image of Ghidorah as the false Christ, the false prophet, the Antichrist--releasing him is supposed to cleanse the world of “humanity’s” sins (and this movie doesn’t explicitly go into the problems with that kind of approach--that it’s not humanity it’s capitalism--but I might argue that it’s implicit--that killing off humanity as an approach is explicitly criticized, it doesn’t work, it fails spectacularly), it just...doesn’t work that way, actually 

Revelation 1:8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.” 

I’m inclined to link this (and the idea is repeated a few times in Revelation, and elsewhere in the New Testament, this is just the clearest example) with the “they were here before us and they’ll be here after us” theme in KOTM. 

One of the major things that happens in Revelation is the opening, one by one, of seven seals on a scroll, each opening followed by a new disaster. I’m inclined to link this to the unsealing and release from stasis of the Titans (supposed to be one by one, although of course Ghidorah disrupts this). 

The Storm Theme

Luke 10:18 I saw Satan fall from heaven like lightning.

Rev. 11:19 Then God’s temple in heaven was opened, and within his temple was seen the ark of his covenant. And there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake and a severe hailstorm.

Rev. 8:5 Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth; and there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake.

It’s not clear from that quote, but what’s happening here is the opening of the seventh and final seal (mentioned above). 

While Ghidorah’s primary weapons were originally gravity beams, here they more resemble lightning or electricity (or that has consistently been my impression, anyway). This image is reinforced by his/their identification with a tropical storm. I may be reaching with this, but in context of what I’m talking about below I don’t think it’s unfair to bring up the Luke 10:18 quote in this context, as well as the storms and lightning tied to apocalypse more generally.

This is, or leads into, one of the places where I really like how the climate change apocalypse symbolism I’ve been assured by other people is in there is folded in with the religious apocalypse symbolism. 

Ghidorah represents both something that is unnatural, not part of the established order, a destructive force the planet is not prepared to handle (specifically in the form of destructive weather patterns--which has been pointed out to me as climate change imagery, although I didn’t initially pick up on it myself) and as both Satan and Antichrist from the Book of Revelation.

First, Ghidorah-as-Satan:

The motif of a fight against a multi-headed dragon is in itself arguable as Revelation imagery; Satan primarily appears as a dragon. 

Rev. 12:3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. 4 Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. 

...

Rev. 12:7 Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9 The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. 

Here specifically we get the notion of a malevolent, multi-headed (and crowned--this one’s more metaphorical but checks out with the “false king” thing) dragon being thrown down from the sky, and also the forces more sympathetic to humanity triumphing over the dragon. Also, there’s more “star(s) falling from Heaven” imagery elsewhere that feels at least as relevant, but that gives me feelings. 

Ghidorah as Antichrist

It’s not explicit in the Bible verses I’m working with (or particularly anywhere in the Bible), but I should have a little bit here before I start talking about it too much about what exactly the Antichrist is. The Christian concept of the Antichrist is someone who opposes Jesus and sets himself in the place of Jesus/God, and thus leads the world astray. 

Wikipedia: “Antichrist is translated from the combination of two ancient Greek words αντί + Χριστός (anti + Christos). In Greek, Χριστός means "anointed one" and the word Christ derives from it.[6] Therefore, an antichrist opposes Christ by substituting himself for Christ.”

I want to point out the “substituting himself for Christ” piece here especially, in relation to Ghidorah’s status as the “false king of the monsters.”

Also, it should maybe be noted that a lot of interpretations don’t have one singular Antichrist figure (or even two), but rather an institution, a group, or many people can be meant by the Antichrist (e.g. in a lot of heretical and Protestant traditions the Catholic Church may be Antichrist). Here I’m treating the term Antichrist as referring to one singular figure, who is interchangeable with the Beast, because in the movie we get a specific character in the role. ALSO, the term “Antichrist” is never actually used in Revelation, and may or may not refer to the same thing as “the Beast;” my interpretation, a fairly standard one, is that the Beast is the Antichrist, but YMMV on that. 

For convenience’s sake, I am going to be using “Antichrist” or “The Beast” interchangeably

and “the False Prophet” for the other beast; the terms are a little wigglier in actual usage. Additionally, the figure I’m calling the False Prophet is often conceptualized as a second, lesser or “mystical” Antichrist whose coming presages the “great” Antichrist (the Beast).

One of the slightly off things about these parallels is that while in Revelation there are three separate figures, Satan/the dragon, the Beast, and the False Prophet, in KOTM there are only two, Ghidorah and Rodan. Thus, Ghidorah derives his authority from himself alone, and not from an additional external figure (which also jives with the Satan connection, IMO; Satan’s whole thing in some interpretations is claiming authority for himself).

I’m going to repeat the introduction we get to the Beast here in full. There’s not a ton of physical similarity between the description we get of the Beast and Ghidorah besides the multiple heads, and, as mentioned, Ghidorah grants himself authority, not any external power, but there are other significant parallels:

Rev. 13:1 The dragon stood on the shore of the sea. And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on its horns, and on each head a blasphemous name. 2 The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority.  

13:3 One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast.

We get this explicitly, which is the first piece of Revelation imagery that was pointed out to me--Godzilla bites off Ghidorah’s third head, which regrows (right before he claims the throne fully). 

 4 People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?” 5 The beast was given a mouth to utter proud words and blasphemies and to exercise its authority for forty-two months. 6 It opened its mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander his name and his dwelling place and those who live in heaven. 7 It was given power to wage war against God’s holy people and to conquer them. And it was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation.

This is, again, Ghidorah fully claiming the title of king, and being obeyed/followed by (most of) the other Titans. 

Rodan as False Prophet

Rev. 13:11 Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon. 12 It exercised all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. 13 And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the earth in full view of the people.

Here we do get something for the physical description; I think it’s interesting that KOTM Rodan doesn’t quite resemble older material!Rodan (who as far as I can tell, and certainly in Jurassic City which is the other thing I’ve seen with him in it, tends to be basically just a weird red giant Pteranodon, “giant bird” comments from characters in-universe notwithstanding) as much as the other non-original characters. For the most part they just made him a lot birdier, and I don’t think “match the Bible description of the second beast” was like, a driving force in that, but he does sort of have horns. That’s mostly beside the point, anyway; if we’re taking Ghidorah-as-the-Beast as a given, Rodan is clearly the other Beast acting as essentially a second-in-command and herald to the first one. The fire coming down from heaven thing is significant; you could also take “coming out of the earth” to apply to his emergence from a volcano. 

14 Because of the signs it was given power to perform on behalf of the first beast, it deceived the inhabitants of the earth. It ordered them to set up an image in honor of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. 15 The second beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed.  16 It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17 so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name. 18 This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666.

Most of this doesn’t really say anything new for the parallels I’m reading into it, and there’s no equivalence to the idolatry or the Mark of the Beast, I just really like the false prophet as a figure, and it reinforces the “given authority under the first, higher-ranking Beast” thing. 

Miscellaneous other things

Thessalonians 2:7 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the breath of his mouth, annihilating him by the manifestation of his coming. 

“The lawless one” is another common descriptor for Antichrist. I want to point out “destroy with the breath of his mouth” in context of the ending and Godzilla’s atomic breath. 

Additionally, Godzilla’s own rise from the brink of death (after having been nearly killed while acting in a capacity helpful to humanity (fighting Ghidorah), at that) parallels a very central motif in Christianity (the rise of Jesus from the dead). 

Rev. 5:15 Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and everyone else, both slave and free, hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains. 

This gives me feelings re everyone who can going to hide in bunkers.

I’m not going through the whole movie again looking for illustrations for this, it’s probably long enough as is, but I have this one saved anyway and I think it makes the Christianity theme REALLY blatant:

Just the framing of the shot here, the cross in the foreground, and Ghidorah’s pose kind of mimicking it, is telling.

I also want to point out this verse in terms of the visuals here: 

Rev. 8:12 The fourth angel sounded his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of them turned dark. A third of the day was without light, and also a third of the night. 

We very much do tend to get dark sky.

Rev. 8:7 The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down on the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up. 

this feels like More Rodan Imagery Things

Rev. 8:8 The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, 9 a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed. 10 The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water— 11 the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter. 

The first part of this, and the bitter waters, feel reminiscent of the Oxygen Destroyer idea (though that was taken from the original Godzilla, so I don’t think they stole this bit outright so much as they found a place they could mix Bible parallels with the older material they were working off). Also, there’s a volcano, probably. And “star falling from heaven” is again always a Ghidorah vibe for me, given the whole “alien descended to earth” thing; same thing with this next line:

Rev. 9:1 The fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. 

And also, I can’t remember if the thing about his responsibility for the K-Pg extinction event I’ve seen around a few times is a fandom thing or suggested in the movie, but if it is canon--that’s another place that folds the Biblical imagery in with the scientific mass extinction imagery. 

Rev. 9:19 The power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails; for their tails were like snakes, having heads with which they inflict injury. 

This isn’t necessarily actually a Ghidorah vibe but “tails like snakes used to inflict injury” does make me Feel Some Things in that regard. 

There’s also some other stuff I Think might be readable in that direction, but I’m not as certain about any of it and this is really long as is. 

My conclusion is basically just...they went fucking ham with the Revelation imagery in this movie, both to play into the more major theme of environmental destruction, and I honestly speculate as a response to the criticisms of some other American Godzilla stuff as “taking the God out of Godzilla”--if that’s the case, they’d be putting a sense of spiritual reference into the movie that would be more familiar to a lot of Western audiences compared to the hints of that in the original Godzilla. and i love it and i’m always a slut for the book of revelation 

Thank you very much for reading.

[handeleugene]

It was a real privilege to not only attend but have the incredibly high honor to speak at Blend Fest this past year. Such a humbling experience and one of the highlights of my career. Since giving my speech so many people have reached out to me asking for advice & tips on public speaking. I’m no expert by any means but I wanted to peel back the layers & share an in-depth overview of the process that went into putting my speech together.

When the Blend team reached out in February asking me to speak, I of course, said YES! And then promptly proceeded to get to work. I wanted to get started right away because I felt a strong obligation to rise to the occasion & deliver a great product that was worthy of the amazing conference that is Blend. It was incredibly exciting yet incredibly nerve-racking putting this speech together. Symptoms of impostor syndrome were present throughout this whole process but the one thing I took comfort in, was knowing that this wasn’t my first Rodeo. I’d been teaching since 2014 & I’d done 4 talks in the last two years, all leading up to this grand moment. Even though I had 8 months to prepare for this speech I wanted to get started right away because I knew a deadline 8 months away would be easy to procrastinate on. I also knew from the beginning that I wanted to memorize my speech so the earlier I could get it done the more time I could have to practice, revise, & refine my speech. The very first thing I did in preparation for my talk was to start being more observant of the world around me. It just so happened that I was attending Motion Plus Design LA only a week after learning I would be speaking at Blend. So I used this conference to do field research & take notes. I took notes on what captured the audience, what didn’t, what was well received & what wasn’t. The big take away I got from all the talks was that vulnerability really resonated with the audience & made the speaker relatable. Any personal experiences you can draw from to help emphasize the point your making really landed well with the audience. And not taking yourself so seriously was something I noticed worked well on stage as well. Once I got started drafting up ideas & concepts for my speech I decided NOT to start completely from scratch. Instead, build upon past topics I’d given that I knew resonated with audience members & leaving behind the topics that didn’t. That meant taking some of the most successful parts from my F5 Speech as well as my talks at Otis College & Hyper Island. Now a strong part of me wanted to just stop there, take the “Don’t Mess with Success” approach knowing that I already had a solid foundation. But one thing I’ve learned is that past success doesn’t guarantee future results. There’s always room for improvement, I really wanted to push myself on this one, do in-depth research, educate myself more on certain topics & come up with new material that I haven’t presented before. Like I mentioned earlier, I wanted to deliver a unique product that was worthy of Blend. Recycling old material with little revision would save me A LOT of time, effort, & stress but would be the lazy route. One thing about me is that I stubbornly like to do things the hard way. I recently read in Ryan Holiday’s book The Daily Stoic, that you can often find comedians doing small sets at local bars in LA & NY. Well established comedians are constantly testing out new material on local audiences to see what jokes land & what jokes bomb. By the time you see a famous comedian on stage doing their big tour & Netflix special, they are already well prepared because they’ve done a countless number of small gigs refining their material along the way. I share this story because I wanted to use this same approach in preparation for my Blend Fest Talk. I intentionally signed up to be a guest speaker at a Local LA meet up called “Creative Neighbors” in July. I wanted to force myself to have the first draft of my Blend Fest Speech ready to present at Creative Neighbors & use this small intimate environment as my testing ground for some of the material I was writing.

Speaking of comedy, we all know the quickest way to win over a crowd during a speech is to get a few laughs in. I’d be lying to you if I said I didn’t want my speech to be as funny as possible. From my own personal experience, I’ve found that the most memorable talks were the ones that made me laugh the most. Knowing myself, I knew that making my speech funny would require ALOT of work. I must have listened to 2 or 3 standup comedy specials a week in the span of 9 months. Studying not only the material but the delivery & the stage presence of comedians. Some people came up to me after my speech & said that I looked like Hassan Minhaj with my hand gestures which is funny because I definitely tried to mimic his enthusiasm on stage. The more I studied comedy the more surprised I was to learn how formulaic jokes can be. Lots of jokes follow a format that is recycled but just repurposed to align with each individual’s experience. The Call Back Technique probably being the most popular example of this. I tried to use some of these formulas I was learning to write my own jokes based off of my own personal experiences. I even learned that the truth alone isn’t always funny, sharing an exaggerated version of the truth for the sake of storytelling is commonplace in comedy & was definitely a technique I used in my speech. Once I had the blueprint laid out for my speech it was time to rehearse. One thing I failed to do in my talks prior was leave adequate time to practice my speech & it definitely showed. This time around I wanted to have more confidence & stage presence & not rely heavily on my speaker notes like before. I knew taking this approach would require more work of course but again, I wanted to deliver a product worthy of Blend and the many heroes of mines which would be in attendance. So memorizing as much of my speech as possible felt like the right thing to do.

One thing I learned in this cyclical process of rehearsal, revise, refine, was the way that you write & the way that you talk are two completely different things. If you’re writing the script for your speech you have to write it in a way that you would talk, sounds obvious in theory but proves harder in practice. A lot of the refining of my speech was centered around making the scripted part of my talk as conversational as possible. This conversational aspect I kept tweaking all the way up until the night before my speech. It's a weird phenomenon but you don’t really know what your speech sounds like until you rehearse it out loud. The last thing I wanted to do was to sound like I was reading to the audience or giving a lecture. I had to get out from behind the podium and actually speak to the audience as much as I could.

I learned some amazing tips from David JP Phillip’s Ted Talk about Public Speaking. David educated me on the power & influence you have just with your voice & body language. For instance, changing the pace of what you are saying can increase focus, lowering the volume of your voice creates anticipation & strategically placed pauses generate undivided attention. In public speaking, it is said that body language accounts for approximately 55 percent of communication, voice tone 35 percent, and words 10 percent. This was incredibly enlightening for me and a strategy I incorporated throughout my speech. During the times of my talk that I was reading from my script, I would put certain words or phrases in ALL CAPS to indicate raising the volume of my voice to emphasize a certain point & prevent a monotone sounding dialogue. And I would put multiple periods between words........to indicate longer pauses.  I've never memorized a speech before so I looked to the internet for some creative tips to help me besides the typical brute force method. I've come across multiple articles that reiterate a common theme when it comes to memory, our brains are really good at visualization. We remember pictures of things that are meaningful way better than we remember abstract concepts. If we attach a meaningful image (or drawing) to a concept we're more likely to recall that memory later on. I used this method to help me memorize my talk by drawing symbolic images on index cards to help me remember the first 9 minutes of my speech. The goal going in was to have my whole speech memorized but I only got to 11 out of the 20 minutes down (first 9 & last 2). Even still memorizing half of my speech was a major accomplishing I'm definitely proud of, especially considering the fact that I'd never done that before. I was able to get that much memorized because I dedicated the last 3 weeks leading up to my talk to practicing around the clock.

I was very surprised at how well the talk was received at Blend. I knew I had some solid material but I would have never guessed how much of an impact my talk would have on so many people at the event. It's incredibly humbling because hearing all the positive feedback made all the hard work that went into this speech so worth it. Some people went as far as comparing my speech to a Ted Talk or a sermon on Sunday, which is some of the highest compliments I could ever receive. Leading up to it, I was incredibly afraid because throughout this entire process I was completely out of my comfort zone. I knew I was taking a big risk by stepping away from the podium & in doing so removing my safety net, but it was so rewarding being able to deliver a speech that I knew I was capable of. I’m definitely not a natural when it comes to public speaking. I’m an introvert by nature so I had to really tap into an alter ego to deliver this prepared speech. If I looked comfortable on stage its largely due to the fact that I put a substantial amount of time, effort, research, & practice into my talk. 

You can catch some highlights from my talk here on my Instagram stories. If you weren't able to attend Blend but you're still interested in seeing a recording of my talk then email me, I'll set up a private screening for you.

[fuckyeahrebelfinn]

A thread I wrote on twitter about Jewish mysticism and Kabbalah in the ST in regards to Finn and Rey. (Transcript below cuts because this is long enough as it is.)

So on that meta about Kabbalah and Jewish mysticism in the ST and how it may shape Finn's and Rey's roles in #EpisodeIX But before I can talk about Finn and Rey I need to talk about the Tree of Life and how this is seen Jewish mysticism.

Kabbalah is the embodiment of Jewish mysticism and is incomprehensible without a thorough understanding on all of the Jewish religious text, from Torah to Talmud. Of course, JJ wouldn't have time to go into depth with this so maybe this should be called pop culture Kabbalah.

But to give a cursory understanding. The Tree of Life have three columns. On one side, Gevurah, on the other Chesed and in the middle Balance. Balance is the ultimate good in Jewish understanding and neither Gevurah nor Chesed is seen as ideal in their pure form.

Gevurah translate into English with Judgment. It is discernment, limitation, critical thought, the power of the word 'no'. In extreme form this leads to tyranny and oppression and thus needs to be tempered by Chesed.

Chesed have no easy translation into English, the closet approximation is 'Loving Kindness'. It is endless giving, patience and endurance in the face of adversity.

Untempered by Gevurah it leads to giving to the wrong people, having patience when one shouldn't and enduring what should not be endured.

Finn and Rey each embodies one of these two columns. Finn is Gevurah and Rey is Chesed. 

Think about how they each are when we meet them.

Finn is literally raised by Gevurah unchained. Remember I said that Gevurah untempered lead to tyranny? Tyrannies such as the First Order. 

Rey on the other hand we see endure what should not be endured, for the reason of love of people who have abandoned her .

Each of them are their pillars unrestrained in the moment that we meet them. And what spurs their respective journeys is when their founding pillars are pushed into motion by the opposite one.

Finn first deciding action in one of compassion, in refusing to shoot the villagers, it is born not out of his own pillar Gevurah, but out of Chesed. The act itself though is one of Gevurah, the biggest nope thinkable.

Both of which are reemphasized when Finn rescues and escapes with Poe. Gevurah touches Chesed and Finn acts on this.

Rey is the reverse. As said when we meet her she is simply enduring. Later we learn that this is because she is waiting for her family to return for her. She is giving endlessly, but to people who do not seem to care about her.

Her story starts with a 'no'. With a, 'this is wrong'. First when she rescues BB-8 from the predatory scavenger then lets the droid stay with her and finally refuses to sell it. Acts of compassion and giving, but born out of a developing sense of 'no'.

Her endless endurance meets injustice forcing her to act if she wants to find balance in herself, just as Finn must act on his developing Chesed to achieve it.

In both cases their "backsliding" in their respective heroic journeys takes them back to their respective columns in their purer form. Which as I mentioned above is bad. Balance, the push and shove between Gevurah and Chesed is not only desirable but needed.

Each are also presented with a cautionary tale about how they could end up if they refuse to listen. Finn in Kylo and Rey in Luke.

Kylo is Gevurah unrestrained. Not because he doesn't know Chesed, but because he continuously rejects it and refuses to act on it.

Luke on the other hand is Chesed untempered. He simply endures on his island and before that he seems to have taught out of love and indiscriminately and in doing to ended up teaching the wrong people.

And before this site's lack of reading comprehension strikes again. No this doesn't mean Luke is as bad as Kylo, it means that both pillars untempered by the other leads to undesirable, but vastly different, outcomes. Remember, balance in the key and the ideal.

So where will this lead Finn and Rey in #Episodeix? That is of course a very good question, because it could lead so many places, but I'm going to hazard some guess.

In #EpisodeIX we'll see Rey develop a stronger sense of judgment and discernment. She is no longer giving indiscriminately to those who do not give to her. I could see her, since much of her character is centered about belonging, to be rebuilding the Jedi already.

But unlike Luke will show greater judgment in who she teaches and how. Possibly lots of hr plot will center around how and who to teach.

Finn will be showing greater compassion, but as always it will be tempered with judgment. This is a good argument for a Stormtrooper rebellion in #episodeIX for while the Stormtroopers may not be good, they are mostly child slave soldiers like himself and worth compassion.

Another possibility for Finn in #episodeIX would be helping the disenfranchised and forgotten people of the galaxy, the people he and Rey are very symbolic off, rise up against the tyranny of the First Order and fighting back against them. Maybe, it'll be both.

Of course I'm only speculating. What is certain is that in #EpisodeIX Finn's and Rey's journeys will continue to intertwine. Because Gevurah needs Chesed just as surely as Chesed needs Gevurah. Only through them can any true balance be achieved.

[9w1ft]

okay everyone, kaylor and non kaylors alike. i want you to take a seat for a sec. i’m normally not the kind of girl to rudely barge in here... and i’m terribly sorry, but real talk. we need to talk about somebody lovely on The Swift Life

if you want full context on everything that has been happening since mid june, please look through my #tsl tag.

for now, just the essentials:

1. i have been following a recent string of gifts being given by the @TheSwiftLife official account on TSL. the one that started with the yacht taymoji... added into the In The Kitchen Pack...

2. these gifts from @TheSwiftLife caught my attention because, a lot of the content (wording and symbols) relates to our fandom. but you don’t need to understand more than the fact that i am a kaylor that has been looking at this from a kaylor perspective.

3. at some point it occurred to me that maybe these taymoji were telling a coming out story. if you want to know more, please look through my #tsl tag.

4. i got to a point in my sleuthing where i saw a throughline. but i felt kind of like a mad woman so i openly asked on tumblr for the taymoji gods to send me a sign.

5. shortly after, i got a sign in the form of a taymoji gift. the puzzle piece heart taymoji that had the flavor text “put the pieces together.” so i made my first proof post, attempting to identify the storyline.

6. after the puzzle piece proof, we got a 2 week period of no further gifts. i thought that maybe this was over and i has shared everything i had to

7. after that, taymoji gifts started being given out that at times mirrored certain conversations within the kaylor community on tumblr (example)

8. so i decided to try and address tsl directly, as a way to confirm if they were truly looking at our blogs. i asked them to post a taymoji gift that perfectly embodied who I am. i had a specific taymoji in mind i was hoping they would post because i left a clue in my tumblr profile. and that exact taymoji was gifted on @TheSwiftLife main feed, 13 days after i made the post.

9. that day also happened to be 13 days before my birthday. it was such a coincidence i was quite moved and posted about it with many thanks to them

10. separately i kept thinking on this whole string of taymoji gifts.. how it was so odd for it to have started off with a yacht taymoji. who is even running this event?? i thought. so in thinking about this, i recalled how kaylors often refer to one member of Karlie’s family as our ship’s Kaptain. i made another post on tumblr asking if there was a certain Kaptain running this event. the next day, the one and only Kimby Kloss posted to her instagram story a photo of her wearing a baseball cap with a yacht charter company logo on it, tagged @yachtzoomc.

11. kimby... could she be helping out with this Yacht In The Kitchen Event...? amidst my speculations, and general goosebumps overall, the following happening just occurred:

Kalinda King is an account on The Swift Life app, known in the community as a social media manager for the app with @KalindaKing being her personal account

whenever there’s a big update, or new content about to be released, she has posted relevant information and hinted at what it would be in the form of a riddle.

because of this, and also just because she is super sweet, she has become a prominent and beloved member of the app’s community. interactions with her are almost part and parcel of the app—people want to be reblogged by her, noticed by her, people @ her all the time. she’s kind of a mini celeb.

i was looking at her page the other day as i check her feed from time to time and noticed that her bio says she is a fan of “the good wife”

i casually googled “Kalinda King The Good Wife” out of curiosity, as any good gaylor swift fan does, and i got to this page on wikipedia:

Kalinda is the name of a character in The Good Wife. King is also the last name of the creators of the show. all quickly viewable information.

🧐KalindaKing is definitely a pen name! 🧐 i thought. in fact, kalinda doesn’t post about her personal life, nor does she have a face for a profile photo. but maybe i was wrong, i thought, so i started scrolling through Kalinda’s posts in search of something to dissuade me.

in doing so, i could see that she posted 35 days ago that she went to see taylor’s concert (the day i was looking was 9/19)

35 days ago from 9/19 is approximately 8/15

that’s after the tampa show and before the miami show

so kaylors... put on your thinking caps please:

🧐who do we know that...

1. lives in florida

2. has a first name that starts with K and a last name that starts with K

3. likes to interact with us

💋

😘

that’s right.

Kimby Kloss (younger sister of Karlie Kloss) has by all indications been interacting with swifties on TSL as community manager and has been a valued part of the swiftie community at large, likely for an *entire year*

let. that. sink. in.

think i’m nuts? so did i!

so i put all my eggs in one basket and posted to my tumblr the other day “i know who you have been. do you want me to share it?

and i went to bed.

and i woke up the next day to this taymoji gift.

it is my birthday on september 25th, as i posted about in reaction to TSL gifting the exact taymoji i was asking them to.

📯so this is me🏤speaking now.📯

please... if you have a tsl account, or are willing to download the app and make one... i will make a quick post on my tsl account of the same name. if you could kindly give it a reshare and swiftsend. i have full confidence that it is intended for this detail of the rep era to come out now, and i want your support. maybe, do it as a birthday gift, for me. ☺️

the more swiftsends (like an upvote currency) the post gets, the higher chance it has of going on the main feed which *all the app can see*

think about that. think about how many people the information could reach. how many minds could possibly be swayed. think about how the app has been interacting with us and with me, and about how they alerted me that they gave me three presents just now when i asked for final confirmation if i could post this. (please please read through my blog hashtag #tsl if you want to see more about how it’s been developing)

this is likely the final piece 🍰 needed from me this era.

i say that because, and i meant to make this a birthday post but i’d rather have the weekend to ride this out, it is *you* kaylors that have done the heavy lifting. all of you. i’ve called myself one of you because i fell down the rabbit hole this year but i did because of all of you before me. i have spent this whole year falling in love again with taylor, but also, falling in love with you all.

your wit, your resourcefulness, your love for taylor and your ardent desire to support her in securing her best life. listen. we hold in our hands a wealth of knowledge and insight into the mastery and illusion of this artist, and i want every fan of taylor’s to know how dedicated we are to her, and how gorgeous,

nay, a step above that,

how incredibly gorgeous her mind is. (and oh my god kimby!! 😩🙌)

there are less than two months til her tour ends in november. at their behest, let’s put this into motion for them.

2019 Edit: please read the follow-up!

[halilog-blog]

Acer Aspire 5 Audit Light-weight and 1-5 Incher at $399

While still PCs prove that, no matter the shake outlays, they are sometimes consummately proficient great high quality PCs are becoming thinner, lighter, lighter, and expensive. The machines, as an instance, the Acer Aspire 5 are still noticeable by the bulk of those PC buyers. Acer Aspire 5 is more light-weight and costs around $399 2500 (AU$500).In the place of using plans and the latest invention, a numbers of the mid-officers perform their undertakings and unobtrusively while striking a balance among ground-breaking and refreshed specialized components and staying in touch costs only can be expected under the conditions.Medium-run PCs would be the well along the best way to get from a substantial quantity folks and therefore so are perfect at case you will want some thing future-evidence, simply because they've significantly more dominant and more fresh parts compared to high priced machines, yet they'd like never to handle the price of those chances.Acer has Morning Acer Aspire 5 to now add Intel Center chips from the age, therefore today is the moment.

Access and Altered:

In the united kingdom, probably the most paid off expected Aspire 5 features a8 GB DDR4 Slam, Intel i3-6006U process or, inch incorporated examples, also 5.9-inch 1080p display. The Acer Aspire 5 is currently extended in a range of settings and costs, starting at approximately $399 (roughly #300, respectively AU$ 500) to your Acer Aspire 5 A515-51-3509 together using Intel Center I 3 7100U Processors and also a 15.6-inch Total HD Display. Aspire 5 Australia is your cheapest version and highlights an I5 8250U chip with an Intel Center i5 15.6″x 768 display, a 15.6 GB Smash plus a GeForce 940MX charge card.There are still an enormous quantity of Acer Aspire 5 installments to select, that may differ depending up on your geographical area, together with best in category models including an Intel Center i-7 8550U, 17.3in. 1080p, 1-2 GB Smash, a HDD and also SSD and outstanding Nvidia GeForce MX150 GPU designs sparkle to get $999.99 (roughly #700, AU $1,200). Beyond these constraints, just really a exhibit is of controller alternatives.The version analyzed here may be your Intel Center i-5 8250U layouts, 8 GB DDR4 Smash, 256 GB SSD, along with Acer Aspire 5 A515-51-50Y5.

Plan:

The design of this Acer Aspire 5 will be likely to be thin as ultra-books such as Dell's XPS 1 3 or a sus' ZenBook 3 nothing is striking. It does not mean it has nothing to offer you. The Acer Aspire 5 is just really a significant PC having a magnitude of 2.16×38.16×26.3 cm and burden of 2.20 kilogram, but it is not overly big or difficult to vehicle. Be as it can, it is possible to believe that its difficult to whip outside and have an attempt at a train.It's really a system with a handful of of structures. The body has been created of vinyl and also it includes an symbol from Acer along with a surface.The screen is significantly far much better than ordinary, using a huge bezel After an PC start. The half an base backings as you are able to without much of a stretch switch web-cam console.

 The bottom bezel has an Acer logo and under the work station pivot, graved'Aspire' gives an touch. The pivot makes it possible to improve the display at borders it's nothing but a PC which may reverse 360-degrees into a position.Acer Aspire 5 comes supplied with two USB 2.0 port, one USB 3.0 memory jack, USB C memory jack, Ethernet memory-card, and SD companion.We would desire to get the following USB 2.0 interfaces, the USB C interface can be definitely an invitation expansion, which supplies you with a particular level of prospective assurance.

Console and Touch-pad:

There has been A coating revealed at the lower 1 / 2 the work station having its console and touch pad. It has been given a conclusion by acer, yet it is less superior since aluminum lovely. It did not require much energy to this touch pad.The console is tremendous, making writing about it pleasant to get a term it isn't the console that is pleasant games or very responsive that we've attempted with consoles.The Acer Aspire 5's tremendous framing component rendering it possible to put up the touch pad, that is counter-balanced to a single side of their body's point.The size would make it easy to use moves, for example tweaking two palms however a few may believe that its aggravating after writing once they break the hands of their curser onto it to zoom out. The touch-pad feels small and plastic, and it is actually just really a disgrace.

Value--ACER ASPIRE 5:

Acer Aspire 5 is still a work station for undertakings, that's that the variable within it. The strong nation drive (SSD) keeps Windows-10 quite fast and invisibly multi-functional chips with 8 GB of Smash along with quad-center Intel Center i78550U. Aspire 5 works for Windows work space software that are overall --it will not feel as quick as PCs it's perfect for missions.Even as we have established, the SSD of this version we tried guarantees matters work quicker, so we'd advocate a SSD version -- ideally with a conventional drive if your spending instincts. Even the 256 GB SSD was 5 to finish establishments you might wind up needing putting funds into an plate that is hard to oblige media and your applications.The IPS monitor is fine; as we all watched portables, the distinction isn't as eloquent. Whatever the scenario, a full-hd (1920x 1080) screen is welcome also produces pictures and films seem far more advanced than PCs with lesser aims, and also the Acer Shading Knowledge innovation aspire to improve gamma and immersion onto the screen as ardently as possible to produce it look at precisely exactly the exact identical class as possible.We never have seen comparison, by, and very enough , the screen could be suitable for missions that are standard . On the off likelihood, you will see an system Whatever the instance you want to improve records or photographs.Intel 620UHD's illustrations that are card can not deal irrespective of a handful games that are great with day matches. Any sensible man would agree.

Battery Life:

Acer Aspire 5 maintained going minutes and half an hour utilising the PCMark 8, replicating moderate to use batteries that were large that was notable. It can occupy battery lifetime if working with the internet, you reduce the display.It in virtually any event indicates that you are able to burn off up the most of a day.The battery normally can take a little time three hrs to rekindle.

 The Acer Aspire 5 has been very theraputic for all of people separated out of the touch-pad that is loosed, it's quality and a plan. The range of vents is welcome also leaves this toaster and workstation with a couple peripherals lifetime.We did not care for your touch pad, and it is really a point.The screen is a tiny washed off, much less incredible as we may want to look in regard.

Last Choice:

The Acer Aspire 5 is still really just a decision on the off likelihood that you're browsing to get a PC it does not cost substantially does not bargain the essence of ones that are older and segments. The version we've tried was perhaps not competent while with respect to layouts.Together these traces the Aspire 5 values considering that you desire daily missions without linking to an energy attachment, battery lifetime has been amazing.But in case you want your work station manage graphics and video shifting or to conduct day matches that are present, you ought to choose still yet another.

 https://www.techandgeek.com/acer-aspire-5-review-light-weight-and-15-incher-in-399/

https://www.techandgeek.com/dell-xps-13-review-supports-4k-hdr-dolby-vision/

https://www.techandgeek.com/samsung-galaxy-fit-review-is-this-the-best-fitness-tracker-around/

https://medium.com/@rosefoster746/acer-aspire-5-audit-light-weight-and-1-5-incher-at-399-9dfbf0769177

[dragonofyang]

Survey Update: 60 Respondents

Here is an update of the survey responses, my analysis based on the results at hand, and my preliminary conclusions based on said data. This post is acting as a log entry of my results as they were collected and analyzed on August 24, 2019. The analysis and chart screenshots below the cut are only accurate to that date. Please visit https://www.teampurplelion.com/merchandise-survey/ for live updates to both the charts and my analyses until my next log entry.

To participate in the survey, go to: https://forms.gle/nJHvea9F64TdiqRj7

As a disclaimer, here are some factors that may potentially skew my data:

Availability of official merchandise

Current respondent pool

Fandom participation

While I will do my best to make an effort to demonstrate where these factors are present and form conclusions with them in mind, it’s worth mentioning that availability of official merchandise is precisely one of the things I hope to examine with this survey, and demonstrate to WEP LLC, the main party in handling merchandising, where the market is and has been for the past three years.

Charts and analysis below the cut.

Vrepit Sa!

General Spending Overview and Observations

[ID: A pie chart titled “Do you prefer official or fan-made VLD merchandise?” displaying four slices that represent four types of responses. The largest slice is blue and labeled “Fan-made”, taking approximately 2/3 of the available chart. The next largest is “Both”, taking a little under the remaining third, and at the top of the chart are two very small, unlabeled slices in yellow and green.]

Fans largely prefer fan-made merchandise, with two-thirds of respondents selecting that as their preferred type. Many fans also like both official and fan-made, and when asked about why they preferred the type of merchandise selected, the responses consisted of wanting to support independent artists, higher quality of merchandise in fan-made products as opposed to official, fan-artists provide a wider variety of options in characters, and that Season 8 of VLD altered their preference away from official merchandise, with one respondent returning approximately 500USD worth of official merchandise after Season 8 aired on Netflix.

[ID: A bar graph titled “Total Spent on Merchandise (USD)” with two bars, and the Y-axis features money amounts in increments of $5,000. The legend on the right labels the blue bar as “Official” and the red as “Fan-made”. The blue bar is short and measures under the $5,000 line, while the red bar is significantly taller, coming in between the $15,000 and $20,000 lines.]

When we look at the estimated totals spent by respondents, we can see that fan-made merchandise has brought in over 400% of the income that official merchandise has. In other words, WEP LLC would need to sell over 12,000USD more merchandise to approach the amount sold in fan-made merchandise.

Since fans prefer the larger variety, higher quality, and flat out availability of certain characters (such as Lotor, members of the Blade of Marmora, etc), and given how some respondents specifically cited Season 8 as being why they prefer fan-made merchandise, it’s not a surprise that fan-made merchandise purchases vastly outpace official purchases.

[ID: A bar graph titled “Total Spent, by Category (USD)” with five different pairs of two bars along the X-axis, and the Y-axis features money amounts in increments of $5,000. The legend below the title labels the blue bars as “Official” and the red bars as “Fan-made”. From left to right, the pairs are labeled along the X-axis as “Total Spent”, “Solo”, “Ship”, “Ensemble”, and “Symbols/Bots”. In “Total Spent”, the blue bar does not reach $5,000, while the red bar is squarely between $15,000 and $20,000. In “Solo”, the blue bar only stretches about a quarter of the way up to the $5,000 line, while the red bar is firmly between $5,000 and $10,000. In “Ship”, the blue bar is exceedingly short, while the red bar is nearly at $10,000. In “Ensemble”, both the blue and red bars are very short, with the blue bar reaching approximately a third of the way to $5,000, while the red bar is about half that height. In “Symbols/Bots”, the blue and red bars are even shorter, at about the same ratio in height.]

This chart compares the totals spent per category to the overall estimated total between official and fan-made merchandise purchases. The total spent estimates for official merchandise is 3,498.90USD and fan-made is 17,300.58USD. However, there is something interesting about those estimates. When purchases are broken down, people give pretty specific amounts and specify what they spent it on, so when we add the subtotals of each category for official merchandise, we get the total of 4,888.40USD, which is a nearly 1,400USD discrepancy. When we do the same for the fan-made purchases, we get a total of 18,161.91USD, a discrepancy of 861.33USD. With that in mind, we see that out of the respondents, people underestimate how much they’ve spent overall, which I find extremely interesting.

[ID: A bar graph titled “Solo Character Purchases (USD)” featuring 16 different pairs of blue and red bars along the X-axis, and the Y-axis is labeled in increments of $1,000. The legend labels the blue as “Official” and the red as “Fan-made”. The character names along the X-axis are, in order: Shiro, Keith, Lance, Hunk, Pidge, Allura, Coran, Lotor, Zethrid, Thace, Throk, Krolia, Sven, Kosmo, Kaltenecker, and Unspecified. Lotor features the tallest of the red bars, reaching nearly $3,000, and has no red bar. Allura has the next-tallest red bar, coming in over $1,000, and a very small blue bar. Shiro, Keith, Lance, Hunk, and Pidge all have varying heights of red and blue bars, with red always being taller, but none passing $1,000. Coran, Zethrid, Thace, Throk, Krolia, Sven, Kosmo, and Kaltenecker, meanwhile, do not have any blue bars and very small red bars. The “Unspecified” category has a small red bar and then a blue bar approximately half the height of the red.]

In terms of solo-character sales, Lance is most popular for official merchandise, bringing in approximately 325USD overall, with Shiro coming in second at 275USD. However, Lotor is most popular for fan-mademerchandise, bringing in nearly $3,000 by himself with Allura coming in second at approximately 1,218USD. This appears to be partially shaped by merchandise availability, as Lotor has no official merchandise. However, the demand for merchandise of him remains stronger than Lance. As a contrast, if we take the most popular official merch character, Lance, we can see he does not even come close to breaking the 1000USD line on that chart for fan-made merchandise.

[ID: A bar graph titled “Ship Purchases (USD)” featuring 17 different pairs of red and blue bars along the X-axis. Y-axis goes up in increments of $1,000. The legend below the title labels the blue as “Official” and the red as “Fan-made”. The ships are listed left to right as follows: “Lotor + Allura”, “Keith + Lance”, “Shiro + Keith”, “Pidge + Lance”, “Lotor + Thace”, “Sendak + Haxus”, “Zethrid + Ezor”, “Keith + Lotor”, “Shiro + Allura”, “Shiro + Pidge”, “Hunk + Pidge”, “Pidge + Keith”, “Krolia + Texas”, “Keith + Matt”, “Keith + James”, “Allura + Lance”, and “Unspecified”.  “Lotor + Allura”, “Keith + Lance”, “Shiro + Keith”, and “Unspecified” are the only categories with blue bars, though none of the blue bars approach the halfway point between 0 and $1,000. “Shiro + Keith” has the tallest red bar, nearing the $5,000 line at the top. “Lotor + Allura” comes in second at the $3,000 mark, and “Keith + Lance” comes in third with the red bar nearly at the $1,000 line. All other ships have very small or nearly-invisible red bars, and no blue bars.]

In terms of relationship sales, Lotor and Allura are the most popular for official merchandise, bringing in nearly 300USD even with Shiro and Keith coming in second at nearly 232USD. Shiro and Keith are the most popular for fan-made merchandise, bringing in over 4,500USD in sales, while Lotor and Allura trail behind them at a little over 3,000USD. While only Lotor was the most popular solo character in either category of merchandise type, ships with Lance, the other most popular solo character, do not break 1,000USD in sales for any one ship, with Keith and Lance coming in just shy of that for fan-made merchandise, and only 163USD for official merchandise.

[ID: A bar graph titled “Ensemble Totals (USD)” with five pairs of bars along the X-axis, labeled in order as follows: “Canon Material”, “Team Voltron”, “Team Sincline”, “Blade of Marmora”, and “Unspecified”. The Y-axis goes up in increments of $250. The legend under the title labels the blue bars as “Official” and the red bars as “Fan-made”. “Canon Material” has no red bar, due to being limited to official merchandise such as the DVDs and comic books, and its blue bar reaches nearly $750. “Team Voltron” has a very short blue bar, and the red bar is near but below the $500 line. “Team Sincline” and “Blade of Marmora” have no blue bars, and very small red bars. “Unspecified” has a very tall blue bar, passing the $1,000 line, while the red bar is approximately one-third its height, passing the $250 line.]

In terms of ensemble sales, not many respondents specified what they purchased, however canon material such as DVDs and comic books brought in nearly 750USD alone, vastly outperforming any character-related merchandise. However, considering there were no ensembles available beyond the two configurations of the Paladins, it’s no surprise that even Team Voltron ensemble merchandise performed better when fan-made as opposed to official. With no Galra Empire merchandise, Team Sincline, the Blade of Marmora, or any other factions, fans simply did not seem to have the option to make those purchases at all unless they found fan artists who would.

[ID: A bar graph titled “Robots and Symbols (USD)” with 9 pairs of red and blue bars along the X-axis, and the Y-axis ascends in increments of $100. The legend under the title labels blue as “Official” and red as “Fan-made”. The categories along the X-axis are as follows: “Voltron Symbols”, “Voltron”, “Black Lion”,  “Red Lion”, “Green Lion”, “Blue Lion”, “Yellow Lion”, “Galaxy Garrison”, and “Unspecified”. “Unspecified” on the far right has by far the tallest blue bar, reaching nearly $500, while its red bar is only approximately a quarter of the way to the $100 line. “Voltron Symbols” has a blue bar reaching approximately two-thirds up to the $100 line, while the red bar is squarely between the $200 and $300 lines. “Voltron” has a blue bar reaching nearly the $100 line and the red bar is in line with the $200 line. “Black Lion” has a slightly taller blue bar than red, but it only reaches approximately halfway to the $100 line. “Red Lion” has a slightly higher blue bar than “Black Lion”, but the red bar is approximately one-third the height of the blue. “Green Lion” has a blue bar reaching nearly the $100 line and a negligible red bar. “Blue Lion” and “Yellow Lion” both only have blue bars, with “Blue Lion” nearly reaching the $100 line and “Yellow Lion” close behind. “Galaxy Garrison” has only a small red bar and no blue bar.]

In purchases of symbols of Voltron and/or the robots, fans also did not disclose the majority of official merchandise purchases, however again fan-made merchandise purchases continue to outpace official when specified, at least for symbols such as the Voltron V and Voltron itself. Given how there are options to purchase official merchandise of the lions and other robots or symbols, it’s not a surprise that these are preferred, since most fan-made merchandise seems to focus on characters, ships, and symbols heavily associated with characters (i.e. Keith’s knife, or Garrison uniforms) rather than general affiliations (i.e. the Galra Empire, the Voltron Coalition).

Current conclusions based on this data: fans underestimate their purchases by a significant margin, and official merchandise would fit the typical Star Wars style niche in which you align yourself with different factions had they chosen to sell anything beyond Voltron-related merchandise, and would benefit from selling higher quality solo character merchandise, especially if they expanded to include other major characters such as Emperor Zarkon, Haggar, and Lotor, as well as minor characters such as Kolivan, Thace, etc. The market exists. However, only fan artists are serving it in a significant and observable way.

Consumer Faith Responses

This section focuses on if fans would purchase official merchandise as Season 8 currently stands as opposed to if the original is released, as well as their reasoning for their answer.

[ID: A pie chart titled “Would you purchase official merchandise for VLD as it currently stands on Netflix?” There are 10 slices of the chart, with only two labeled. The largest slice takes nearly three-quarters of the available chart, is blue, and labeled “No”. The next-largest slice is yellow, takes up approximately a third of the remaining space, and is labeled “Yes”. Seven of the remaining eight slices are of equal size, with the eighth being a slightly darker yellow and twice the thickness of the others, though unlabeled.]

[ID: A pie chart titled “If the original s8 gets released, would you purchase official merchandise?” There are 11 slices of varying sizes, with only three labeled. The largest slice is red, labeled “Yes”, and takes up less than half the available space. The second-largest slice is powder blue and labeled “Maybe”. The third-largest slice is orange and labeled “No”. Two of the remaining eight slices have comparable sizes to “Maybe” and “No”, and then the remainder are all significantly smaller.]

Notable preliminary responses

In the first question, 73.3% of responses are resounding nos. 11.7% would purchase merchandise with VLD as it stands currently, 5% say it depends or probably not, and the remainder would but only if certain conditions are met (i.e.: quality of merchandise goes up).

In the second question, only 10% would not purchase merchandise even if the original season is released. While 40% said yes, the remainder either need to see the season and/or merchandise first, or they would purchase merchandise if certain conditions are met (i.e.: seasons 7 and 8 are official, not director’s cuts).

Current conclusion: consumer faith in VLD as a show and in its merchandise are low, and in order to regain customers, seasons 7 and 8 must be reverted to their original forms.