#Anthology of Short Stories II

[readersmagnet]

Anthology of Short Stories and Poems II by Brian Clements

Delve into a captivating blend of literary pieces of poetry and love stories in Brian Clements’ book, “Anthology of Short Stories and Poems II.” This collection presents thrilling and emotionally engaging stories that showcase the author’s poetic style—a must-read for literature enthusiasts who love to explore various genres.

Get lost in this enthralling book. Grab a copy at www.blclements.com.

[gffa]

THE HIGH REPUBLIC CHECKLIST: If you want to consume these in order, I really like Youtini's High Republic Reading Order list for being extremely comprehensive and solidly updated for Phase III+ or the more middle-ground comprehensive High Republic guide from starwars.com or Wookieepedia generally does a good job putting things in individual release order. This post is just a checklist of what's available and not quite a reflection of read order. (Which I generally suggest following release order, not chronological order, given that you're often meant to know/not know certain things.) Possibly missing a short story here or there, but assume the novels are in read order for each given phase and that it's a useful list for remembering what you have/haven't read yet!

MAIN STORYLINE NOVELS - PHASE I:

The High Republic: Light of the Jedi

The High Republic: A Test of Courage

The High Republic: Into the Dark

The High Republic: The Rising Storm

The High Republic: Race To Crashpoint Tower

The High Republic: Out Of The Shadows

The High Republic: Mission to Disaster

The High Republic: The Fallen Star

The High Republic: Midnight Horizon

MAIN STORYLINE NOVELS - PHASE II:

The High Republic: Path of Deceit

The High Republic: Convergence

The High Republic: Quest for the Hidden City

The High Republic: Cataclysm

The High Republic: Quest for Planet X

The High Republic: Path of Vengeance

MAIN STORYLINE NOVELS - PHASE III:

The High Republic: The Eye of Darkness

The High Republic: Escape From Valo [UPCOMING]

The High Republic: Defy The Storm [UPCOMING]

The High Republic: Temptation of the Force [UPCOMING]

The High Republic: Beware the Nameless [UPCOMING]

The High Republic: Tears of the Nameless [UPCOMING]

The High Republic: Trials of the Jedi [UPCOMING]

The High Republic: A Valiant Vow [UPCOMING]

The High Republic: Into the Light [UPCOMING]

MAIN STORYLINE COMICS - PHASE I:

The High Republic (2021) - 15 issues

The High Republic Adventures (2021) - 13 issues

The High Republic: The Monster of Temple Peak - 4 issues

The High Republic: The Edge Of Balance - 2 manga volumes

The High Republic: Trail of Shadows - 5 issues

The High Republic: Eye of the Storm - 2 issues

MAIN STORYLINE COMICS - PHASE II:

The High Republic: The Blade - 4 issues

The High Republic (2022) - 10 issues

The High Republic Adventures (2021) - 8 issues

The High Republic: Edge of Balance: Precedent - 1 manga volume

The High Republic Adventures: The Nameless Terror - 4 issues

MAIN STORYLINE COMICS - PHASE III:

The High Republic: Shadows of Starlight - 4 issues

The High Republic (2023) - 2 issues [ONGOING]

The High Republic (2022) - 1 issue [ONGOING]

The High Republic Adventures – Saber for Hire 4 issues [UPCOMING]

MAIN STORYLINE AUDIODRAMAS - PHASE I:

The High Republic: Tempest Runner

MAIN STORYLINE AUDIODRAMAS - PHASE I:

The High Republic: The Battle of Jedha

ONESHOT COMIC ISSUES - PHASE I:

Star Wars Adventures (2020) #6 - "The Gaze Electric"

The High Republic Adventures: Free Comic Book Day 2021

The High Republic Adventures Annual 2021

The High Republic Adventures: Galactic Bake-Off Spectacular

Star Wars Adventures (2020) #14 - "A Very Nihil Interlude"

The High Republic Adventures: Free Comic Book Day 2023

ONESHOT COMIC ISSUES - PHASE II:

The High Republic Adventures: Quest of the Jedi

ONESHOT COMIC ISSUES - PHASE III:

The High Republic Adventures: Crash Landing [UPCOMING]

ANTHOLOGY NOVELS - PHASE I:

Star Wars: The High Republic: Starlight - Anthology of Insider short stories. [Includes "Go Together", "First Duty", "Hidden Danger", "Past Mistakes", and "Shadows Remain"]

ANTHOLOGY NOVELS - PHASE II:

Star Wars Insider: The High Republic: Tales of Enlightenment - Anthology of Insider short stories. [Includes "New Prospects", "A Different Perspective", "The Unusual Suspect", "No Such Thing as a Bad Customer", "Last Orders", "Missing Pieces", and author interviews.]

ANTHOLOGY NOVELS - ALL PHASES:

The High Republic: Tales of Light and Life [Includes "The Queen's Bloom", "A Closed Fist Has No Claws", "Shield of the Jedi", "The Lonely Traveler is Home", "After the Fall", "The Force Provides", "All Jedi Walk Their Own Path", "Light in the Darkness", "The Call of Coruscant", and "Rogue Element"]

[mrfancyfoot]

Plots & Prosody: Prompts

Raphael x Female Tav/OC (Evie implied)

.

- Caress -

"She arrives at the House of Hope to find a grumpy, stressed devil in need of a nap.  AKA: Despite himself, Raphael succumbs to some of his more human needs."

This prompt was: ‘A simple caress’

.

Hey..hey, you!  Go drink some water/hydrate yourself. ❤️

Some soft Raphael, cutesy shmoop ahead!

This one, while written for my OC, Evie, uses only she/her pronouns while she remains unnamed, so can mostly be read as a generalized Tav/OC (only caveats being that there is brief mention of her fluffy (fox) tail and claws and a bit of backstory).

.

Rating: T / SFW

Word Count: ~1.9k

Timeline: Plots & Prosody, Part II - Canon

Tags/Warnings: POV F!Tav/OC/Evie; Fluff; Comfort; Cozy; Slight Alcohol/Drug Use by Raphael; Raphael’s Only Soft for Her; Cuddly Devil; Devils Can Purr; Some Slight Charitable Reimaginings of HoH Architecture; Devil Courtship

Main Fic (Rated E/Varied): AO3 + Tumblr | Master List

Related Prompts: A Blank Page , Good Morning

[Quick Context: After Evie spends most of Part I (Game Events) “befriending the devil,” yet denying him her soul, Raphael makes an alternative offer: the Orphic hammer in exchange for her time - specifically, a mandatory number of days every month for a span of two years.  He procures his Crown by other means.  Evie goes about her new life kick-starting her business and re-inventing modern-day things. Unbeknownst to her, Raphael is using what she obliviously believes is a “contractually mandated friendship” period to court her as his future Archduchess.]

❤️ Thanks for reading! :3 ❤️

The evening when she arrived, it was obvious from the deeply etched scowl straining and pinching his face paired with the agitated drumming of his fingers that something had happened - but Raphael was in an unusually untalkative mood.  His greeting was short, his responses clipped and distracted.  He appeared stuck between summoning her out of obligation to their contract while his attention was needed elsewhere and wanting to shove away everything that was preventing him from utilising their time together.

Seeing his stress and knowing well that he would share the details later if he wanted to, she suggested a quiet evening by the fire, simply enjoying the presence of one another.

She would have suggested that he could keep working if he needed to, but she had a feeling that it was work that got him into this mood and maybe a break was warranted no matter its importance - or perhaps even because of its importance.  Raphael was the sort to keep going at something until he hit the wall of exhaustion - either of his energy or of his options, and not infrequently, both.  Anything less was seen as wasteful.  And so, Raphael repeatedly pushed himself to his limits.

So before he could voice any disapproval, she wandered over to a bookshelf and plucked the partially read anthology of Gnomish short stories residing there from when she had time to fill during other visits.  Taking a seat on the chaise near the fire, she beckoned him to the armchair nearby.

He stood from his desk with a roll of his shoulders and massaged his neck.  Circling around to its front, he leaned on it and let his eyes scan over the many shelves of books around his office as he brought his hand to his chin thoughtfully in consideration of his own choice in literature.  But his shoulders slumped minutely from a sigh and she could see his eyes unfocusing as his mind drifted back towards whatever he’d been thinking on before.

Pursing her lips, she reckoned that she’d be fighting uphill on this one.  She asked him if whatever was on his mind was something that needed his attention at that very moment.  At the reluctant twist of his lips and partial shake of his head, she followed up by stating that it would do him some good to get out of his office.

Hooking her arm around his, she made an executive decision and brusquely pulled him from his office.  Despite how he sputtered and tsk’d and harrumph’d in protest, he still allowed himself to be led through the silent halls - if he didn’t want to be moved there was no way in the Hells she’d be able to budge him.  Unsurprisingly, the servants had already made themselves scarce.  She detoured to drop him off at the boudoir with a push, telling him to go relax in the bath for a bit before turning on her heel and continuing to her destination.

She bounded all the way up the spiral stairs of the tower and pulled open the heavy door to the bedroom Raphael had decreed as hers a scant few months ago that had seemingly passed in the blink of an eye.  Her ‘home away from home’ twice a tenday thanks to their contract.

Though they were friends, drawing presumptions from said contract and the prior ones that he had attempted to get her to sign, she could only further conclude that he wanted her presence around as the occasional distraction from his work in some kind of contract-enforced capacity, as evidenced by the amount of discretion that he allowed her.  And if that was what he wanted, she would thusly also be the force ensuring he was taking proper breaks and getting enough sleep when he got like this.

Plus, he could have rescheduled, as per a mutual clause in their contract…yet he didn't.

The room was bright from the open curtains allowing in the ever-shining sun of Avernus.  She admired the fresh cut flowers vased upon a table, then set about creating a soothing atmosphere.  After lighting a few candles and the fireplace, she drew them tightly closed and plunged the room into a cozy, dim ambiance.

She poured herself a glass of water from the fresh pitcher on her nightstand, changed into something comfy from her wardrobe, and got settled in with her book on the sofa.

An estimated thirty to forty minutes later, Raphael poofed into the room in a bright cloud of smoke and smelling strongly of his bath products - cherries and musk - and a hint of the smoke.  He had changed into only a pair of loose lounge pants, and, while he still looked tired, the agitation and irritation from earlier had significantly softened across his features.  In his hand was a glass and a bottle of something with a curious shimmer that she would bet was awfully strong.  Though ‘mortal’ alcohol didn’t affect devils, there were some substances in the Hells that could affect them similarly - she’d eat the book in her hand if that bottle didn’t contain at least one of them.

He was quick to spy her and sauntered over, pulling the top from the bottle.  He filled his glass and immediately downed the contents.  His eyes closed as he savored it.  The glass was then refilled and the bottle loudly plunked down on the nearby coffee table as he turned and sank into the sofa.  

Reaching over, his finger tipped her book up enough to glimpse the cover.  He allowed his head to fall against the back cushion and demanded that she read to him.

She asked if he would like her to start from the beginning.

Raphael replied that ‘from where’ didn’t matter; he simply wanted to hear her lovely voice.

And so - feeling a little awkward at first as this wasn’t something she had ever really done outside of school classes - she picked up where she left off in the middle of a silly lesson story filled with cooking mishaps.

After that story came to a close, she noticed that he was battling keeping his eyes from closing.  Most of his drink was gone, the glass balanced precariously on his thigh within his slackened hold.

He waved her off when she suggested that he could take a nap but either didn’t notice or didn’t care when she slipped the glass from his hand and placed it on the table before she began reading aloud the next story.

Yet it wasn’t long until he was twisting around to impishly rest his head on her thigh, under the guise of needing the rest of the sofa to stretch himself out.

It struck her that the way he fought against his need for sleep - for this wasn’t the first time she had seen him push himself to this point and refuse to allow himself actual rest - was likely another manifestation of his denial and detestation of the human, mortal part of himself.

Seeing him start to lull and yearning for a little bit of payback for the hands that always managed to find themselves threading through the fur of her tail that he’d pulled over his chest, she began running her fingers through his hair, her claws light against his scalp.

With a startled grunt, his hand reflexively shot up as though to stop her, but he caught himself, his fingers curling tensely inches away from her own that had halted, as he seemed to reconsider the objection that was quick to ignite his actions.  His narrowed eyes stared up at her beneath the pinched furrowing of his brow.  She kept steady, her own gaze calmly returning to her book, as though trying not to scare off a wild creature that may interpret eye contact as something predatory.

Slowly his arm lowered again to rest over his stomach and she saw the tension leave his neck and shoulders.  She resumed playing with his hair.

He said nothing of the exchange, as though the interruption never happened.

His hair was soft and smooth with the slightest curl at the ends.  It had obviously just been washed but he must have magically dried it.  It left the slightest residue of some product on her fingers and her movements once more scented the air tartly with cherries.

By the time she finished the second story, his eyes had closed again and his belly was rising and falling with the deeper breaths of sleep.

Truly, even a devil needed his moments of peace.

How many others did he allow to see him so vulnerably?  Knowing that couldn’t number many made her feel both pity and privileged.  That would only become exponentially unlikely as he chased his ambitions and brought the Hells under his power.  He couldn’t afford to allow himself to be vulnerable around others.  The amount of trust he placed in her - despite not even having control of her - brought a sense of awe.  Their friendship was something she had come to cherish so fast.

But she couldn’t fall asleep here on the couch like this herself or they’d both be waking up later with sore necks and complaining.

Closing the book, she contemplated how successful she’d be in coercing him into going back to sleep if he woke up even for the brief moment to relocate to her bed.

Her fingers gently caressed the planes of his face, so much softer in sleep when not pulled and twisted by the scowls and exaggerated masks he wore during the day.

A boop on the nose didn’t wake him as she thought it would.

So she poked his cheek and threw on her ‘no nonsense’ voice, telling him to get up.  His eyes fluttered slightly, but he resisted until she stood and his head dropped back to the sofa.

The jolt did the trick to wake him and she used his momentary confusion to try to pull him to his feet.  He jerked his arm away but sat up with a growl, all the while, looking like he was about to tip over.  With a roll of her eyes, she bent forward and grasped his hands, attempting to haul him up again while advising that they should go to bed.

Begrudgingly, he relented, finally standing and following her guidance the short distance to her bed, his hand still in hers.

She pulled the light cover back and slid to the other side.  He climbed in after her with a yawn but veritably fell to the mattress.  With hardly enough time to pull the cover over herself, he shifted to close the distance between them, slinging an arm over her waist as he pressed his face to her side with a content rumble that morphed into a deep purr.

Within a few breaths, Raphael was once more asleep.

She let out a quiet laugh - forever giddy since discovering devils and tieflings purred - and covered her own yawn.  Getting as comfortable as she could with a deceptively heavy devil now using her as a teddy bear, she closed her eyes and felt the soft haze of sleep overtake her.

Part 2...?

[melishade]

Attack on Prime New Age Anthology: Return to that Sick Mind III

Main Story

Strange Technology

Return to that Sick Mind I

Return to that Sick Mind II

Jazz walked into the medical bay of the Nemesis, carrying a few cubes of high grade energon per Ultra Magnus' request. The lieutenant now council member found it odd, considering it was still work hours, but he was sure that it was for a good reason.

Until he fully heard the sounds of Knockout cackling like a madcon. Jazz peered over the stacked energon cubes in his possession and blinked in confusion at the sight. Megatron and Bumblebee were on medical berths, hooked up to a cortical psychic patch. Knockout was leaning against the wall, holding his side and laughing so hard it looked like lubricant was coming out. Smokescreen and Bulkhead were helping Ratchet sit up, but the medic still looked out of it. And Ultra Magnus...looked like he hadn't moved from his locked position of staring at a screen with Bumblebee and Megatron talking.

"Uh...I brought high grade," Jazz informed, alerting all the Autobots in the room. Ultra Magnus quickly stomped over and snatched the one directly from the top before chugging it with ease.

"Whoa! Magnus, what the frag?" Jazz called out.

"Jazz, you are missing out!" Knockout declared as he picked the second high grade energon with his claws, "So apparently, there are some humans that are claiming that Megatron changed his ways, so Bumblebee wanted to dive back into his mind-!"

"Wait, didn't Bee say Megatron hijacked his body the first time he did it?!" Jazz exclaimed in disbelief.

"Oh that's only the tip of the iceberg, because during that fight with all the red titans, Megatron saved Bumblebee!" Knockout declared.

Jazz nearly dropped the remaining energon cubes in his servo. "What?"

"I know!" Knockout exclaimed, "But long story short, we've been seeing Megatron be nice to humans, get blackmailed by a human, dancing with a human-!"

Jazz dropped the energon cubes onto the ground. Thankfully none of them spilled. "S-should....should I get the council for this?"

"If you want to break their processors, then go for it." Knockout grinned, "I would love to see the looks on some of their faces."

Jazz looked back towards the screen where Bumblebee and Megatron were still talking. But it looked as though Bumblebee was just as annoyed as Megatron.

Bumblebee rubbed his optics with the palms of his servos. "By the Allspark, what happened to you?!"

"Hey, I did not ask for you to come into my helm, and I warned you!" Megatron shouted.

"Well I don't know how to feel about the 'Con that ripped out my voicebox was dancing with humans!" Bumblebee shot back.

Megatron groaned and rubbed his optics with his digits. "At the very least, does that get you to believe the humans' claims?"

"...I hate that I have to say yes," Bumblebee relented.

Megatron rolled his optics in response. Bumblebee's gaze then fell to Megatron's chest, and he remembered Arcee's condition and how she had dark energon in her armor and joints.

"What did you do to Arcee?" Bumblebee demanded.

Megatron crossed his arms. "Nothing. I spent most of my time avoiding her when she appeared on the island. We had one major confrontation with each other."

Bumblebee saw a memory appear, and it was Megatron and Arcee arguing in their holoforms. Arcee was listing off his war crimes, and the human in the middle, Hanji, took steps back from Megatron in fear.

“No you haven’t! Let’s get one thing straight: You! Deserve! Nothing!” Arcee declared, “You deserve to be rusting at the bottom of Earth’s ocean instead of walking around as if nothing’s wrong! As if you could somehow put everything behind you and pretend to be nice for your own selfish gain! I will never put my trust in you! I would rather die than put my life in your hands! Do you hear me?!”

Megatron raised his hand to strike Arcee while Arcee got into a fighting stance. Hanji quickly got into the way of Arcee and Megatron. Megatron seemed startled and momentarily paused, but out of nowhere, a teen Bumblebee had never seen in the photos or the battle punched Megatron in the face before grabbing his collar and pinning him to the floor. He yelled as Megatron turned his attention to him and grabbed him by the neck. The teen tried to pry the hand off of him, but Megatron only restricted his airway further.

“Stop! Stop!” Hanji yelled as they tried to help the teen pry the hand off.

“Megatron!” Optimus shouted as he arrived with Levi. Megatron finally snapped out of his haze and recognized what he was doing. He turned his head to see Optimus and Levi staring with worry. He glanced up to see Eren trying to breathe while Hanji looked terrified out of their mind. But Megatron careened his head when he noticed a crowd had formed. Megatron felt something in his stomach drop as he realized it was the Survey Corps, and they all looked at him…with fear. Moments later, Megatron released the teen and deactivated the holoform.

"...It wasn't my proudest moment," Megatron confessed, "I only spoke with her after that to tell her I would return to Cybertron for trial and execution."

“…I will go with you,” Megatron told her.

Arcee raised an eyebrow in confusion while Optimus and Wheeljack were taken aback.

“When Cybertron is contacted, I will go with you to Cybertron and face my punishment for the war,” Megatron elaborated, “Do whatever you want to me then, but for now, I will be doing my job here.”

“And I’m supposed to believe that from you?” Arcee wasn’t buying it, placing her servos on her hips, “How could I possibly know that what you’re telling me is true?”

“You don’t,” Megatron answered calmly, “All you have is my word, and that is the only thing that I can give you.”

Arcee only stared before sneering. “When you break your word, I’m going to enjoy dragging you to Cybertron in cuffs.”

Bumblebee looked up at Megatron. "So how did Arcee get dark energon on her? You're the only source of it as far as we know."

Megatron sighed in response. "I wasn't aware of the consequences at the time."

"Oh, really?" Bumblebee sneered.

"When I first arrived on this planet, I was unaware of the setup of the world, and how the power of the titans operated," Megatron began, "So when I first saw the Colossal and Armored Titan, I fired my weapons at them."

Bumblebee watched a memory of Megatron firing at a massive Colossal Titan situated atop of a large wall, the shots hitting the right hand of the beast.

"Apparently energon had the ability to affect the actual body of the human inside of the titan, and stop regeneration altogether," Megatron explained, "But dark energon still decayed the body of the user, slowly eating at them from the inside out. During my mission in Marley, I had learned that the dark energon was causing the current titan shifter, Bertholdt Hoover, to lose his mind and body, and the Marleyans transferred the powers of the Colossal Titan over to Porco Galliard."

Bumblebee saw another memory of two boys. One clearly affected by dark energon, chained onto a high platform, and another, injected a serum clearly laced with energon. The boy transformed into a pure titan, and Bumblebee felt sick to his stomach as the boy afflicted with dark energon screamed and cried out for help before being devoured.

"But the transfer of power wasn't enough, and Porco had shown signs of being infected with dark energon."

Bumblebee saw Megatron's human form grab by the throat and pull him back by the hand, seeing the dark energon lingering in his veins.

"I ordered our temporary ally to eliminate Porco, knowing it would be a difficult task. He orchestrated for an infiltration of the Marleyan compound, and Porco was killed in the ensuing chaos." Bumblebee saw Megatron's holoform dripping with blood, and the human form watched in surprise as Porco was shot through the chest, "But now we know that dark energon has the ability to reanimate organics."

Bumblebee covered his optics as a massive purple explosion went off in a walled city. Bumblebee gasped in horror at the destruction caused, but looked up in terror at the sight of a massive Colossal Titan with purple smoke and fire pouring from its head and body. The smoke created storm clouds that began to spread in the sky.

"I was unable to properly fight due to the dark energon, and Arcee was the one taking the initiative," Megatron continued explaining, "She was getting the brute force of the attack, trying her best to cut Porco out from the nape of the neck."

Bumblebee saw Megatron struggling to stand up on his pedes, the dark energon clearly affecting his body and mobility. He chucked his sword upward to Arcee, who was shroud by the smoke. Arcee used the sword to cut the nape wide open, and his body collapsed to the ground with a loud bang. Bumblebee watched the Colossal Titan body decay, and Megatron lying down on his back, a servo on his chest and one covering his optics. Bumblebee couldn't help but grow tense when a titan, heavily damaged by the Colossal Titan threat, trudged its way over to him, dragging the very sword just used to eliminate the Colossal Titan.

The titan raised the sword over its head to ram it into Megatron's own, but paused when Megatron raised his servo to look him eye.

“Reiner…thank you,” Megatron said.

"W-what?" Bumblebee stuttered

“The lives you’ve saved, the worlds you’ve protected, it was all because of you,” Megatron declared, “You acted in my stead, and saved the lives of billions of beings.”

Bumblebee saw that Megatron looked like he was breathing a sigh of relief. “I owe you my life. Thank you.”

"...Gratitude...for a human." Bumblebee looked up at Megatron.

"...I put Reiner through hell," Megatron explained as Reiner fell to his knees, "And then I lied to him for four years for the sake of the mission. I don't regret doing what I had to do for that mission...but I couldn't help but feel a kinship with him. Twisted, I know. But we had both pursued a dream that turned into something twisted, and were left with nothing but shame and regret. I had grown from making his life a nightmare to actively trying to stop him from taking his own life."

Megatron gave himself a running start before slamming his body into the door, busting into the room as Reiner was ready to pull the trigger of the rifle situated in his mouth. The ex-con tackled him to the ground and threw the rifle across the room. Reiner struggled to try and get the gun, but Megatron locked his arms around his abdomen and dragged him back. Megatron’s back hit the wall as Reiner tried to pull his arms off of him.

"But I still couldn't save him in the end," Megatron lamented, "He died because I let my guard down."

Megatron’s optics snapped open and he forced himself on his hands when he realized that Eren had his hand right through the other’s head. Megatron was still trying to process what was happening when Eren dragged Reiner’s titan body towards him and lifted it up towards his teeth. It was only when Eren’s teeth sunk into the nape of the neck that Megatron realized what was happening.

“Reiner!” Megatron grabbed his sword and slashed upward, managing to cut one of the hinges of Eren’s jaw. Megatron would have stabbed Eren right then and there, but Eren used both hands to throw Reiner’s titan body at him. Megatron was knocked to the ground a good few feet away, but the Cybertronian quickly scrambled to check the titan body for Reiner, but the nape was empty. Megatron looked over at Eren and watched in horror at the sight of Reiner in Eren’s grip.

“Arcee, don’t let him eat Reiner!” Megatron yelled as he grabbed his sword and bolted towards Eren.

“Help me! PLEASE! HELP ME!” Reiner begged, but the titan shifter choked on his own blood as Eren crushed him without a second thought. Eren’s jaw fully healed as he was prepared to devour the corpse, but got distracted when Arcee fired at the arm holding Reiner’s corpse. Eren saw the wound wasn’t healing and that Megatron was closing in and made a split second decision. He released Reiner’s corpse from his hand and let it drop in his mouth before he clamped it shut, and in one fell swoop, Eren had swallowed the body whole.

Bumblebee wasn't even sure what to say to that. How was he to supposed to address those memories? It-!

"I assume you have more to ask." Megatron already decided to move on with the conversation.

Bumblebee sighed in response, remembering the texts that Jack had sent, specifically about Armin, and about how he was the most vocal and adamant about Megatron's change. "Armin Arlert...seems to be...the most vocal about you changing."

Megatron was quiet, eerily quiet. Bumblebee didn't know what to do or say since Megatron's back was facing him. He didn't know what his expression was.

"...I haven't been good to him," Megatron confessed.

"...elaborate," Bumblebee ordered.

Megatron clenched his fists in response before he released them. "I was selfish to him. I...saw him as a mirror to Orion Pax. He was able to figure me out so quickly."

"Megatron, stop!" Armin yelled as he ran to him, but grunted as Mikasa pulled him back, "Don't kill her!"

Megatron growled as he pulled out his sword fully and turned to the boy. "She will kill you if you let her live and once she regains full strength. I don't understand why you kept telling me to spare her!"

"If this were any given scenario, it probably would be better to kill her, especially since she has energon in her systems," Armin admitted, "But she's more valuable to you alive than dead!"

Mikasa stared at Armin in confusion while Megatron gave an amused look.

"Valuable to me?" Megatron smirked as he turned away from the two and stared at the girl, "Tell me, Pax, how could this girl be valuable to me?"

"Because if you return to Optimus empty-handed, you won't be able to gain his trust and make things right with him!" Armin answered.

"And I just seemed to dump all of my problems on him," Megatron confessed, "My grief, my anger, my...trauma." Megatron sighed, "I didn't make his life easy."

Bumblebee saw a multitude of memories with just Megatron and Armin. Bumblebee did see violence, aggression, threats against this kid. He saw Megatron yell, impose, intimidate Armin, but...not once did Armin back down. He continued pursuing, asking questions, challenging Megatron. Bumblebee saw a memory of Armin staring at Megatron eagerly while holding a book about the ocean in his hands.

"It seemed...Armin was trying to create a bridge between the two of you," Bumblebee remarked.

"It's not an excuse for the way I treated him," Megatron declared, "I...threatened to shoot him because I was afraid he would expose my secrets! I scared him into silence!" Megatron snapped his helm to Bumblebee, and the Warrior could see the guilt written all over the ex-con's face. "Bumblebee, it was a miracle that he didn't just snap and leave!"

Megatron felt anger rise in his as he snatched the book from under Armin and threw it to the ground. "This foolishness of yours needs to-"

Armin didn't let the ex-con finish as he threw a book at his face. Megatron was clearly surprised by Armin's action, but that didn't stop the boy from throwing another book at him.

"I hate you!" Armin shouted as Megatron shielded his face, "I hate you! I hate you! You bastard! You monster! Eren wants to die because of you! And all you care about are your selfish needs! Not how it affects everyone around you! I wish you'd just disappear!"

Armin threw the last of the books on the desk before slamming his hands on the table. "Just get out!"

Armin began panting from his outburst before realizing he lost his notebook. He wasn't sure if he threw it or not so he began to look all over the desk.

Megatron lowered his arms and saw Armin panicked state as he looked all over the floor for the notebook.

"I made him afraid of his own shadow no doubt!"

“What are you doing here?” Armin demanded rather harshly, but that got Megatron’s attention. The former warlord turned his head slightly to glance back at Armin, and the soldier could see…a rather defeated look in his eyes.

“Where is Mikasa?” Megatron asked him.

“Why do you want to know?” Armin asked vaguely, neither confirming nor denying Mikasa’s location.

Megatron forced himself to stand up on the steps and fully face Armin. “I need to speak with the both of you.”

Armin grew fearful at that and took a step back. “About what?”

Megatron noticed this reaction, but didn’t take a step forward. “I have no intention of harming you.”

���But why do you want to talk to us?” Armin demanded, “You already got what you wanted out of us with Annie. Why do you want to speak to us now?”

“This is a more personal matter,” Megatron admitted, “I just want to speak with the both of you.”

Armin shook his head at that. “No. I don’t want you here. Leave.”

“Armin, please.” Armin gasped as Megatron took a step forward, but that was more than enough for Mikasa to bolt past Armin and punch Megatron directly in the face. Megatron managed to get a glimpse of the blue in Mikasa’s eyes before he got knocked off the steps and to the ground outside. Mikasa then pinned him to the ground and tried to stab him, but Megatron quickly shoved Mikasa’s face and the hand holding the knife away from the holomatter. Mikasa’s other arm was still free, and she punched Megatron square in the jaw.

"I made everyone fear me because I was a coward!"

“After years of watching, observing, listening to second hand accounts, and analyzing your own behavior, I finally know and understand exactly what you are,” Hanji began as their leaned over and crossed their arms, “You, Megatron, are a coward.”

“…what?” Megatron demanded in anger, “Who do you think you are to say that to me?”

“Someone who’s been picking at your mind for three years,” Hanji answered in confidence, “You resort to violence. Always. Considering your own environment and the life you’ve led, that’s all you’ve ever known. I can’t entirely fault you for that. But even after you say that you understand the meaning of oppression, according to Optimus’ account, you still resort to violence. You still resort to abusive and manipulative behavior. To people who haven’t done you any wrong. And the people who do want to extend their hand to you and possibly even help you, you resort to anger. You resort to violence because you’re not used to kindness or sincerity. You resort to violence because it’s easy. You are afraid of what someone might do if they found your weaknesses and your vulnerabilities. You are a coward to something as inevitable as change. You can’t even try to get out of your own head and get out of your own way, and I’d feel sorry for you if you didn’t actively strike fear into the hearts of my subordinates that they come into my office begging for protection from you.”

Megatron got up from his chair and grabbed Hanji by their collar, but the Commander was unfazed.

“Even when confronted with the truth about how horrible you are, you resort to violence, because you are afraid of the truth, and you are afraid of what that says about you!” Hanji continued, “The men and women I have fought beside for so many years have always been scared shitless of titans! They were always afraid of being eaten alive and dying a gruesome death! But even in the face of danger, they did not run! They fought and lived to survive another day, or died so that the rest of us could survive! Despite how afraid they were, they still chose to fight! I would choose a thousand Survey Corps members over any version of you! Because despite your power, you can’t confront your truth! That you never changed and that you’re still a monster who deserves nothing! And killing me won’t change that at all!”

"And I didn't get the chance to properly apologize to any of them!" Megatron declared.

Bumblebee's mouth dropped at that statement. "You-!...you what?"

"Sooooo....," Knockout trailed off as he turned to the Autobots, and the rest of the council members in the room, "We're well past ten minutes, right?"

"Shut up and give me more high grade energon!" Cyclonus ordered.

(Yep, this is gonna be a four parter, or more. Hopefully just four parts.)

[aperiodofhistory]

Books to read in autumn

Historical novels

Wolf Hall by Hilary Mantel: England in the 1520s

The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett: Building the most splendid Gothic cathedral the world has ever known

Outlander by Diana Gabaldon: A back-in-time Scottish romance

Company of Liars by Karen Maitland: A novel of the plague in the year 1348

The underground railroad by Colson Whitehead: Enslavement of African Americans through escape and flight

The God of small things by Arundhati Roy: A family drama in the 60s located in India

The Diary of a Young Girl by Anne Frank: A powerful reminder of the horrors of world war II

Fantasy

A Game of thrones by George R. R. Martin: A Fantasy epic run by politics, strong families, dragons

Red rising by Pierce Brown: A dystopian science fiction novel set in a future colony on Mars

Babel by R.F. Kuang: Student revolutions, colonial resistance, and the use of language and translation as the dominating tool of the British empire

Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree: A fresh take on fantasy staring an orc and a mercenary

Jade City by Fonda Lee: A gripping Godfather-esque saga of intergenerational blood feuds, vicious politics, magic, and kungfu

Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik: A tale of hope and magic, with brave maidens and scary monsters

The Atlas six by Olivie Blake: A dark academic sensation following six magicians

Mysteries & Horror

The Gathering Dark: An Anthology of Folk Horror by various authors: Short stories perfect for the Halloween mood

Sorrowland by Rivers Solomon: The story of Vern, a pregnant teenager who escapes the cult Cainland

The Weird and the Eerie by Mark Fisher: A noted cultural critic unearths the weird, the eerie, and the horrific in 20th-century culture through a wide range of literature, film, and music

Holly by Stephen King: Disappearances in a midwestern town

Vampires of El Norte by Isabel Cañas: Supernatural western

The good house by Tananarive Due: A classic New England tale that lays bare the secrets of one little town

Nonfiction

Ghostland: An American History in Haunted Places by Colin Dickey: The trail of America's ghosts

What moves the dead by T. Kingfisher: A gripping and atmospheric retelling of Edgar Allan Poe's classic "The Fall of the House of Usher

South to America: A Journey Below the Mason Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation by Imani Perry: A journey through the history, rituals, and landscapes of the American South—and a revelatory argument for why you must understand the South in order to understand America

All the living and the dead by Hayley Campbell: An exploration of the death industry and the people―morticians, detectives, crime scene cleaners, embalmers, executioners―who work in it and what led them there

Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas R. Hofstadter: Gödel, Escher, Bach is a wonderful exploration of fascinating ideas at the heart of cognitive science: meaning, reduction, recursion, and much more

[campgender]

from “Soft Butch” by Nora E. Derrington, published in Fat & Queer: An Anthology (2022)

image description below the cut.

I: Soft

There’s an onomatopoeia to the word. It begins with a sibilant, sinuous, sensual ess, then moves on to a gentle ah that caresses the palate. Then the quick succession of consonants hitting the lips and teeth like a playful kitten batting a toy mouse. The word is a delicacy, smooth and subtle.

As a descriptor, it can be tactile: pliable, cushioned, comfortable. Cotton sheets worn silky smooth. Downy puppy fur. Velvet rose petals drawn across bare skin. But of course, the negative associations slip in quickly: pliable becomes yielding, yielding becomes weak. A soft touch. Soft-hearted. A big softie. An antonym not just for hard but for strong.

For as long as I can remember, I wanted to be strong, to be tough. I didn’t want to be soft. How could I be anything but soft, though, when PE was my worst subject and I was so sensitive that the slightest injustice—Nikki’s mom yelling at me for wearing shoes on Nikki’s waterbed, even though the tell-tale footprint clearly came from Nikki’s shoe—or most mundane tragedy—restless teens dismembering a cheap claw-machine teddy bear in my presence—never failed to make me cry?

II. Butch

More onomatopoeia here, too: a voiced plosive, a deep vowel, three consonants in a row. Similar in feel to “macho”—but subtly different in meaning. Stereotypically masculine. Nothing about me has ever been masculine, so how could I ever be butch?

Dickies pants became the rage when I was in high school. As an alternative-rock aficionado who obsessed over the sound and aesthetics of the movie Singles—it came out when I was 12 and changed my life��I knew I needed them. When I was 16 and had both a job and transportation, I made my way to the local Tillys to snag a pair. The black cotton twill was stiff under my fingers as I stepped into the pants and pulled them up.

The Dickies pulled against my hips, uncomfortably snug, and gaped so wide at my waist I could fit a fist between my skin and the cloth. I left the store disappointed. Why did I even bother? “Good, child-bearing hips,” people would tell me, even as an adolescent. I resigned myself to a presentation that never quite matched the ideal in my head.

VII. Soft butch

Despite my fitting comfortably under the queer umbrella, I’d never really given all that much thought to the specifics of my gender identity and expression. I met a trans man when I was 24 who used the same nickname I do, which made it easier to see our similarities, but I knew immediately that his path wasn’t mine. Later that year I met someone who epitomizes high femme, and, again, I could immediately see both how perfectly she embodied that expression, and how poorly it would suit me.

The person I thought of at the time as my boyfriend, then my husband, used to joke that I was the man in the relationship— despite my tender heart, my frequent tears, my undeniable softness—but I was more or less content in just knowing what I wasn’t. It seems possible I could have stayed in that liminal place forever, but then when we were in our mid-thirties, my wife came out as trans.

This is not a story of my adapting to my wife being trans. I’d always known we were both queer, and discovering I was married to a woman came more as a pleasant surprise than anything else.

What did happen, though, was that her coming out gave me permission to do more soul-searching, to try to pinpoint my gender identity and ideal gender expression. I first encountered the term “soft butch” in one of those joke “futch scale” charts—the ones that sort musical instruments or tropical fruits on a scale from high femme to stone butch—but it stuck with me. It didn’t seem to be something I was allowed to call myself, though: image searches on Google or Pinterest just led to rows of photos of beautiful slender white people with artful short haircuts and distressed jeans. Lots of Kristen Stewart and Elliot Page and occasionally Justin Bieber. I am definitely too old and too fat to try to emulate those folks! Eventually I lamented on Twitter that I was drawn to the soft butch aesthetic but didn’t know if I could pull it off, given that I’m not thin. I quickly received a slightly baffled but firm response from a genderqueer acquaintance that of course I could. In some ways I’m still a kid, seeking others’ permission to accept myself.

I realize as I write this that I’m wearing what might be my quintessential soft butch outfit—it fits me almost without my trying. Distressed jeans—a pair that I stole from my wife long before she transitioned. They fit my hips and thighs beautifully, which means I have to cinch a belt tight to make them stay up around my waist, but I know how to manage that now. A close-fitting t-shirt celebrating a punk band I’ve seen in concert a good dozen times. Hair pulled back into a messy bun. Fuzzy gray slippers with arch support, because I’m a middle-aged fat person, so of course I have plantar fasciitis. A gentle breath before a firm statement: the perfect mixture of soft and butch.

[newsmutproject]

Call for Submissions: Erato II

Send us your most seductive flash fiction and prose poetry*!

We’re seeking super short writing in any subgenre, featuring characters of any and every orientation and gender, so long as they’re 18+ and express their consent to all erotic activities. Whether they find pleasure through BDSM, fetish, or vanilla encounters; in long-term romances or one-night stands; with one person, a roomful of people, or just themselves, it’s all good.

How explicitly you want to portray the sex, and what counts as sex, is up to you - but leave the reader in some way breathless.

Vivid writing, clever and original plots, and stylistic or structural experimentation are particularly welcome. We want stories that are sex positive, body positive, and inclusive. Usually at least half the stories in our anthologies feature characters who are LGBTQIA+, including the ace spectrum.

BIPOC writers, trans and nonbinary writers, disabled writers, working-class writers, and writers of other marginalized and underrepresented identities are warmly encouraged to submit. We’re thrilled to work with writers from around the world at any stage of their careers, including those who have never been published before.

*Please note, prose poetry, not verse poetry. We share some inspiring verse poetry on our blog, but don’t publish it—yet.

We’re also interested in excerpts from longer works, including sex scenes from stories in a genre other than erotica. 

Payment & Length:

We’ll pay $25 for the first 500 words and 2 cents per word thereafter, up to $45 for 1,500 words. 

Please include wordcount with your submission. We’re willing to look at slightly longer stories, so long as they still fit the spirit of ‘flash fiction’ (e.g., if you’re at 1,575 words and can’t find more to trim), but payment is capped at $45.

Accepted pieces shorter than 500 words will receive $25.

All contributors will also receive an ebook copy of the anthology and a discount on paperback copies.

For a taste of our tastes, check out our first flash anthology, Erato, and our blog – but we love to be surprised by new concepts, and we actively want to expand the range of identities and perspectives we publish with each book.

You can also read two of the pieces from Erato for free online - both award winners!  

“A Study in Circuits and Charcoal” by jem zero won the Best Feminist Sex category of the Good Sex Awards.

“Touch” by D. Fostalove was a runner-up in the Best Sexy Talk category.

More details and tips below the cut:

Submissions open: April 2 – August 31, 2023 (Extensions can be made upon request.)

We’ll send a confirmation email (manually) within a week of receiving your story. Please query or resend if you don’t see this confirmation in <7 days. 

Acceptances won’t be sent until the submissions period ends and all stories have been considered. Some rejections may be sent out sooner.

Publication date: Early 2024

Some tips to save you time --

Our hard-ons:

All stories will be copyedited before going to print, but well-polished submissions have some advantage. Here’s a guide to dialogue punctuation - getting it right can save lots of editing time (it also shows you paid attention to these guidelines).

We strongly prefer 1 character’s POV per scene unless you’re doing something incredible with an omniscient narrator. Use scene breaks to change POV rather than ‘head hopping’.

We don’t require, but do enjoy, stories that feature realistic sexuality, including safer sex.

Throughout our blog, we share lots of stuff we find interesting about sexuality and would love to see reflected in submissions! For instance: do you know how excited we’d be to publish a story about a character with vaginismus? (Hint: very!)

We’re eager to see sympathetic and sensual depictions of people who are often poorly represented in mainstream smut. Just to start with, this includes Black people, Indigenous people, and other people of color, trans women (as well as trans men and nonbinary people, but we want to especially recognize the impact of transmisogyny), disabled people, and fat people, as well as the many people who belong to more than one marginalized group. Writers of these backgrounds are warmly encouraged to submit. 

Some of our favorite erotic flash fiction opens in the middle of sex. However you do it (and there are many ways to do it), grab the reader’s attention from the first lines.

However short the flash, there’s always room for the ingredients that take a sex scene from a list of mechanical actions to an interaction between multidimensional characters. Some writers get creative by choosing to omit one of those tools, like dialogue - this can work too! We certainly don’t mandate dialogue, or descriptions of textures and scents, or whatnot. But if you’re looking at your story and feel it might be missing something, the Sex Writing 101 list can be useful.

We’re interested in erotic narratives that build or explore a consent culture.  We want to see affirmative consent, whether expressed through a verbal “yes” (or a “maybe, let’s try” or “yes for now”), through action & collaboration (returning their partner’s kiss, guiding their hands to where they want them, etc.), or telepathy. “Enthusiastic consent” can be a fuzzy target (who decides what counts as ‘enthusiasm’? does it leave room for more cautious experimentation or other nuances?), but we’re never going to reject a story because its characters seem too eager and excited to have sex with each other.

All sex that takes place in the action of the story must be consensual. However, stories about characters who have survived sexual coercion or trauma will certainly be considered.

At the New Smut Project, we’re looking for thoughtful stories that explore sex as a positive force in people’s lives. The overall tone of our anthologies tends toward the optimistic, although there’s definitely room for stories that are nuanced, bittersweet, and even gently tragic (both our Good Sex Award winners, linked above, are strong examples of stories that are bittersweet, mixing challenges with reason for hope - and have we mentioned scorching-hot sexiness?). Hope and defiance are very sexy. 

References to other literature, art, music, and more are awesome. Brainy is sexy. Nerdy is sexy. Do keep in mind we can’t publish outright fanfiction unless it’s of a work in the public domain. But we are all about erotic retellings of Shakespeare, or the Epic of Gilgamesh, or what have you.

Right now for Erato II, we’d love to fit in more super-short pieces (500 words and shorter) with intense feeling and imagery - prose with the impact of poetry.

Hard sells and hard nos: 

Our upper limit of 1,500 words isn’t firm because we want to make writers’ lives easier: we know there are times when you aimed for flash, overshot, but trying to trim more words could remove something significant or take more time than it’s worth. Remember, though, this is still a flash fiction anthology, so we can’t include stories that exceed the limit by more than a few hundred words. (The reason we’re not saying how exactly how many more is because that would become a new upper limit that’s not necessarily firm...ad infinitum. If you need a hard limit, aim for <1,500.) 

No coercion as part of the action of the story (as mentioned, it might form part of a character’s history, sensitively handled and not for titillation). This means no characters badgering each other into an activity or characters being “obligated” by circumstances. We’d also prefer not to see sex between teachers and students or doctors/therapists and patients. Especially gross and deliberate violations of the consent guideline may result in your email address being blocked without notice. Don’t troll us. (If you’re not a troll, don’t worry; the kinds of things we block for are not written or sent by accident.) 

No sexually active characters under the age of 18. 

Stories about deception (including infidelity) are very hard sells. Like many of our hard sells, these ideas are worth exploring in literature but often aren’t a good fit with our focus on sex as a positive force in people’s lives.

We appreciate bittersweet stories, but aren’t fans of when tragedy seems like a “punishment” inflicted on the characters for having sex. If characters have contempt for each other in place of sexual tension or the story ends with a death, it’s likely too grim for us (at the same time, stories about desire mingled with grief, pleasure in the face of impending loss, or ghosts with vibrant sex after-lives can be a great fit and are of personal interest to editor T.C. Mill). 

Stories about a character being seduced by someone who turns out to be a vampire, demon, or serial killer and then - surprise! - gets killed/eaten/tortured/dragged to Hell are not a good fit. Cryptid boyfriends (and lovers of other genders) are great, we just don’t want to see them tricking and preying on their partners; that’s not exactly sex positive consent culture in action. 

Other concepts we’re not thrilled to see: stories where characters have sex while very intoxicated/high, stories about sex robots (vs robots who happen to have sex; it’s a key distinction!), and stories where characters have sex because they are hired to (our focus is on different motives for sex; we welcome pieces about sex worker protagonists in their personal lives). Stories with other premises will be much more competitive in the submissions pile. 

Don’t send stories based in transphobia, homophobia, racism, sexism, ableism, fatphobia, and other asshole moves (but it’s fine to send stories acknowledging these prejudices as part of a character’s lived experience).

We can’t accept writing or characters you don’t hold the copyright to (this has been a particular issue with quoted song lyrics. Please only quote lyrics you have written yourself or know to be in the public domain. It also now includes AI-generated text). As mentioned, intertextuality with public domain works is wonderful, though, so bring on the erotic Great Gatsby retellings!

Unlike many publishers, we’re willing to consider stories we rejected from previous calls. It’s best to be upfront about what you’re re-sending and why you believe it might be a fit for us this time around (if the story has been substantially revised, if it received a personal rejection lamenting that we just couldn't fit it in a prior anthology, etc.). Also, be upfront with yourself about whether you have other ideas for stories to submit and if you’re certain you understand the kinds of stories we publish. 

Multiple submissions: We’ll look at 1 or 2 stories per author. You don’t need to send both stories at the same time, but if you are submitting 2 stories at once, feel free to do so as 2 attachments to a single email (easier for us to keep track of).

Simultaneous submissions: Please let us know in your cover email if your story is also under consideration elsewhere. Keep in mind that we’ll hold stories we’re considering at least until September 1, 2023 (and likely later, as it can take some time to make final decisions about which stories we’ll publish).

Reprints: Happily considered! So are translations of stories into English and excerpts from longer pieces. We especially enjoy republishing older stories (reviving those which have gone out of print) and love to look at sexy scenes excerpted from longer stories in genres that aren’t erotica. In your cover email, please give us the details and confirm that you can offer us reprint rights. 

How to submit: Send your story to newsmutproject(at)gmail.com as a .doc/.docx or .rtf file, a Google Drive link, or in the body of the email. In the subject line, include the story’s title and “Erato Submission” to keep your email safe from the spam filter.

We’re not picky about format, but anything resembling Shunn’s Modern Manuscript Format works especially well. However you do it, please include wordcount somewhere on the first page. This info helps us organize the stories we’re considering.

Provide your cover letter in the body of the email, not as an additional attachment. If you’re unsure what to put in your cover letter, no sweat. We don’t need much, but Strange Horizons’s tips are excellent. If authors are comfortable declaring marginalized identities that have informed their writing in their cover letters, we appreciate knowing this and will not disclose the information to others (it’s up to you what you feel safe and comfortable sharing in your published author biography and promotional interviews - and in your cover letter; all this is optional).  

Also, we appreciate hearing in your cover letter about where you learned of this call for submissions! Big thanks to everyone who’s done this so far - it helps us know where to promote future anthology calls.

Submissions will be read by T.C. Mill (she/her) and Guinevere Chase (she/her). 

Questions, updates, and more information: Contact us with questions and suggestions at newsmutproject(at)gmail.com. Answers to frequently asked questions are posted in the q&a tag on this blog. For updates and more info, you can sign up for our newsletter through MailChimp, follow us here on Tumblr, and/or follow us on Twitter (much less active).

[after-witch]

Hello hello, do you happen to have any movie/show rec for like dark content...?? I liked YOU but kinda lost interest around the second season lol. I love your work! You do seem to be like a soul who has great taste in media, so I just thought I'd ask. 😅 I could also use some media recs in general! Movies, music, shows, anything you love!Thank you so much! 💖

Hi! I don't really have any recs similar to You (IMO season 1 is the only like.... genuinely good season, though I wish it kept the books visceral darkness at the end) but here's some horror movies with darker content that I like-- (note this films may have graphic violence, sexual assault, other dark themes)

Zoo (2005); horror anthology based on a short story collection by Otsuichi. Some super fucked up stuff here. I also recommend the book!

Cabin By the Lake (2000); about a horror movie writer who gets some very direct inspiration for his works. Absolutely underrated gem!! It's got a bit of an obsessive/dark love feel to it. There is a sequel that is even more OTT, not as good as the first one though, but it's still neat.

The Night House (2020); A suddenly widowed woman starts having disturbing dreams in their shared home. LOVE IT. Actually have a prompt from last year's Horrorfest for this one that I'm working on.

The Last Exorcism Part II (2013); this film gets a bad rap!! It's got some creepy moments, an underlying theme of an obsessive demon... I suppose you should watch the first film before watching this one though.

Suicide Circle (2001); this film was my personality for way too long but it's still a damn good movie. Very dark, bleak, gory but in an OTT way. The sequel, Noriko's Dinner Table, is also very good.

Nightmare on Elm Street Series; I mean, they're classics. I'd say films 1, 2, 3 and "A New Nightmare" are essentials. But especially 1 and A New Nightmare. 2 is drastically different, 3 is when it starts getting silly with quips and gimmicks, but I love the character of Nancy who appears in 1 and 3 so...

So many more but my brain is blanking... hope this gets you started!! I will say "Zoo" and "Suicide Circle" are definitely the more extreme of these movies, maybe not to every horror fan's taste.

[giveamadeuschohisownmovie]

Pitch for a Dark Pictures Anthology game:

1) The title

FOUNTAIN OF YOUTH

2) The prologue

In 16th Century Florida, Spanish missionary Juan Garcia (false protagonist 1) joins a group led by real life conquistador Juan Ponce de León. The group - guided by indigenous tracker Micco (false protagonist 2) - are on the hunt for the mysterious Fountain of Youth, a location where the water supposedly restores a person’s youth. De Leon believes that his predecessor found the Fountain before they went missing.

The group does eventually find the Fountain, but De Leon is forced to return to his base after receiving an urgent message. To ensure that no one else can claim the Fountain, De Leon orders a few members of the group to stay behind.

The following night, the group is attacked by a mysterious faction. Only Juan Garcia and Micco survive the initial attack. However, their survival is short-lived when the two end up back at the Fountain…and find themselves surrounded by a group of hooded cultists. They try to fight back, but are eventually killed.

The cultists then gather all the corpses and begin to drain their blood in the Fountain…

/

/

/

(Cue the Curator’s entrance)

/

/

/

3) The main story (and the main protagonists)

In present day Florida, the area where the Fountain of Youth was found is now the location of the Romero-Argento Correctional Institution. It is one of Florida’s most notorious prisons as it houses the worst of the worst. We follow 4 death row inmates:

* Jackson Te Wiata (AGGRESSIVE, INSECURE): A Māori-American former MMA fighter who was sentenced to death for killing his cheating wife and the guy she was sleeping with. Despite his tough, aggressive, “manly” front, Jackson is deeply insecure and fragile. Jackson is also the most fearful of his pending execution, having not accepted the consequences of his actions.

* Javier Ortega (REMORSEFUL, COMPLEX): A high-ranking member of a Mexican gang who was sentenced to death for killing five rival gang members, as well as two innocent people who were caught in the crossfire. During his time in prison, Javier has changed his ways and now spends his time writing books about the dangers of gang life.

* Kasim Greene (FOOLHARDY, HUMOROUS): An African-American former security guard who was sentenced to death for killing his heroin dealer, unaware that he was actually an undercover cop. Kasim is the most light-hearted member of the group, having already accepted his pending execution and wanting to enjoy his last years.

* Spencer Ward (INTOLERANT, COMMANDING): A white supremacist/Neo-Nazi leader who was sentenced to death for numerous offenses, namely murder, rape, and various hate crimes. He’s the least repentant of the 4 death row inmates, believing that he was justified in what he did. That being said, he’s willing to work with the others out of self-preservation.

In addition to the 4 inmates, we also follow 1 correctional officer:

* Jesse Cruz (ANXIOUS, UNDERSTANDING): A rookie correctional officer who recently transferred to Romero-Argento. Jesse is the least cynical of her coworkers, believing that all people are worthy of redemption. She also strongly opposes the death penalty. Because of this, her coworkers believe she’s too “soft” for this line of work.

The story is that, on the eve of the execution of a prisoner named Tre Phillips, the protagonists start hearing rumors of strange activities happening after an execution is carried out. Rumors of the bodies of the deceased being taken to the basement of the prison. It’s also noted that the basement is restricted to both the inmates and the correctional officers.

The chaos officially begins when a massive prison riot breaks out, sending the prison into lockdown. Most of Act I is centered on the 5 protagonists trying to survive the riot as the prisoners take over the prison. Because the riot occurred, the real villains are forced to take drastic action, leading into Act II and Act III.

The big reveal is that the basement is where the Fountain of Youth is being maintained. In order to use the Fountain’s regenerative capabilities, the users must fill the fountain with human blood and bathe in it. The villains are actually the Spanish search party that had initially found the Fountain (the ones before Ponce de Leon). Thanks to centuries of human sacrifices, the villains are still alive in the present day.

When the prison was built over the Fountain, the villains came up with the idea of using the death row inmates as their human sacrifices. No one would suspect a thing, especially since they were already condemned by the state. However, their latest ritual was ruined thanks to the prison riot. So now, they’ve revealed themselves in order to complete the blood ritual.

As the protagonists, it’ll be up to the players to determine whether or not they escape the prison…or end up being the latest victims of the Fountain. (Side note: Players can also determine whether the prisoner protagonists can become fugitives or be re-incarcerated).

4) Casting / Face models of the protagonists

* Jackson Te Wiata: Played by the celebrity guest star, Cliff Curtis

* Javier Ortega: Same face model as Merwin from House of Ashes

* Kasim Greene: Same face model as Olson from Man of Medan

* Spencer Ward: Same face model as Jeff Whitman from The Devil in Me

* Jesse Cruz: New face model, couldn’t think of anyone (maybe Erin Keenan from The Devil in Me? I’m only hesitant since TDIM just came out)

* Juan Garcia: Same face model as Salim Othman from House of Ashes

* Micco: New face model, couldn’t think of anyone

[eamusgrove]

Free books!

All my currently-available books (except the anthology I'm in, I don't control the pricing on that one but I assure you the 21 other authors in that are absolutely worth whatever is being charged for it) are currently free in the Smashwords sale.

I'd love for more people to read them! Here's what I've got:

The Man Left Behind and The Boy Left Behind - a twofer, first the story of Henry (who would probably identify as a trans man now) in World War I and then revisiting him in World War II.

Margaret - f/f Jane Austen fanfiction following the younger sister of Marianne and Elinor Dashwood (from Sense & Sensibility) as she takes her first steps into adulthood and helps solve a problem for Colonel Brandon.

The Highwayman - f/f, based on the poem of the same name by Alfred Noyes, with a few tweaks to give poor Bess a kinder ending.

They're all fairly short, I don't believe any of them could be described as steamy, and I think that's all the main points covered - except of course that, again, they're all completely free at the moment. (Until July 31st!)

(And the aforementioned anthology, Queer Weird West Tales, is half price and was already frankly a steal given that there are, as far as I remember, 22 stories in there from 22 authors)

[readersmagnet]

Anthology of Short Stories and Poems II by Brian Clements

When Jack Donavon searches for the person who wronged him, he winds up back in Florida, where he is forced to fight or die. In another chapter, David and Carol Anne Taylor discuss the papers that belonged to David's great-grandfather, who participated in the search for serial killer H.H. Holmes.

Go to www.blclements.com to learn more about Brian Clements and his works.

[greenlantern94to04]

Green Lantern Corps Quarterly #8 (Spring 1994)

When Hal Jordan went bonkers in GL#50, he didn't just kill the Green Lantern Corps -- he also killed Green Lantern Corps Quarterly, the anthology series that, as the editor goes out of his way to point out in this final issue's letter column, was still selling pretty well when it got cancelled. DC could have kept the series going with past stories of the Corps, or maybe current stories of past Corps members, but I guess they wanted to go all in on the "only ONE Green Lantern left" thing and felt this series undermined that idea, so they asked Lobo to stop by and help kill it.

The stories included in this loosely "Emerald Twilight"-connected issue are:

"The Book of Endings"

The issue's framing story is written by Superman editor Mike Carlin, which I'm guessing means it had to be done at the last minute and he drew the short straw at the office. This story reveals that, while Hal and Sinestro where fighting in GL #50, they didn't even notice that the Book of Oa, the massive book containing the history of the Corps and the Guardians of the Universe, was burning up right in front of them (and neither did the Guardians, apparently, or they would have thrown some water on it or something).

As the oversized pages burn, we see stories that have absolutely nothing to do with "Emerald Twilight," like...

"Close Encounters"

This story is set during World War II, when Green Lantern Abin Sur, Hal Jordan's predecessor, is sent to Earth to stop a murderous madman -- but not the murderous madman, because the Guardians have forbidden him from interfering in human wars. Abin's target is an alien mercenary called Dask N'oir, who comes to Earth looking to offer his services (and sci-fi weapons) to the Nazis. Fortunately, the Nazis aren't big on multiculturalism and don't understand alien languages, so they think Dask is a demon and try to fight him.

The Nazis are so spooked that some run off to the Allied side to ask for help against the "demon." There, they bump into the 1940's Flash and (non-Corps affiliated) Green Lantern, Jay Garrick and Alan Scott, who bravely confront Dask... and are knocked out in one blast.

Abin Sur shows up to arrest the alien criminal, but he too gets easily knocked out when Dask shoots some yellow goo at his hand that incapacitates his Green Lantern ring. When Abin wakes up, he realizes Dask stole the ring, leaving him defenseless. That's when Abin notices that one of the unconscious Earthlings around him happens to have an off-brand GL ring on his finger...

So, Abin borrows Alan's ring and goes off to fight Dask, eventually tricking him into shooting that yellow goo at his own hand, thus allowing Abin to retrieve his ring. Before leaving with Dask, Abin returns Alan's ring and wipes his and Jay's memory of the encounter. The story ends with Abin looking forward to the day he can return to Earth (spoilers: he shouldn't) as Alan wakes up and wonders why his ring is in the wrong finger.

"Bad Intentions"

This one is written by future Guy Gardner: Warrior writer Beau Smith, and features an extremely Beau Smith character called Probert the Bad One, a sort of alien Conan the Barbarian with guns. One day, right after Probert has blown up a T. Rex to rescue a kid from being eaten, a Guardian shows up to ask him for help in taking down his sector's Green Lantern, Krudd, who has used his ring to take over a wealthy planet. Great pick, Guardians.

Probert only agrees to help because Krudd has taken his former lover, Poola, as a concubine, but he refuses to take the ring the Guardian offers him, because Probert don't wear no pansy-ass rings. (This might explain why Poola is a former lover.)

Of course, Probert regrets that decision once he's fighting Krudd and realizes his machine gun is no match for a power ring that can conjure up anything, including anti-machine gun force fields. Just as he's saying that, a GL battery materializes right next to him. Probert starts trying to activate the battery with various oaths ("It's probably something girly-like. Flower flower, give me the powers.") until he lands on something that works: "GIVE ME THE JUICE!"

Suddenly, despite still wearing no ring, Probert is imbued with green power, which he uses to materialize more guns. Krudd fights dirty and is actually quite good with the ring, so Probert ends up taking it away by cutting his finger off with a green energy knife (at least he didn't cut off the entire hand, unlike some other maniac).

Once Krudd is incapacitated, the Guardian comes back to take him and Probert's power away, but Probert says nah, it's his now. The Guardian takes that to mean that Probert has agreed to continue helping them "on retainer" and vanishes before Probert can protest.

He still ain't wearing no ring, though.

"Yella Belly!"

In this Gene Ha-drawn story, L.E.G.I.O.N. sends Lobo to Garnet, the most crime-ridden planet in the universe, to collect a criminal. This puts him in conflict with Garnet's very un-Green Lantern-like Green Lantern, Jack T. Chance. Lobo's not in the mood for fighting one of his many '90s ripoffs... until Jack calls him a "yella belly." Big mistake.

In the fight that ensues, Jack tries killing Lobo with a green chainsaw, but the ring stops him because that's not within its parameters. "Letting its wearer get kicked in the nuts" is within those parameters, though.

Jack tries shooting Lobo in the head with a regular gun, but Lobo catches the bullets with his teeth and headbutts him after playing dead. As Jack is recovering from that blow with the assistance of some booze, Lobo gets an idea based on Jack's hurtful remark from earlier: he covers himself in the yellow blood of some other alien he'd killed earlier and exploits the ring's yellow weakness to beat the crap out of Jack, yelling "Yella belly! Yella belly! YELLA BELLY!"

Lobo tries stealing Jack's ring, but it's "encoded by his D.N.A." and can't be stolen... so, for the second time this issue, someone cuts a ring-bearer's finger off. By simply "wearing" Jack's severed finger on top of his own, Lobo is able to access the ring's power and thinks about all the wonderful things he's gonna do with it (starting with exploding L.E.G.I.O.N.'s planet) -- until the ring informs him that it only works in planet Garnet, killing Lobo's interest.

As Lobo leaves with that criminal he came for, we see the finger crawling back to Jack and reattaching itself to his hand. Upon waking up and learning that Lobo left, Jack takes that as a victory and declares himself the baddest dude in Garnet. (Until he was easily beaten by Hal and left for dead in space, anyway.)

Back to the framing story, the narration concludes that the Guardians are a bunch of incompetent asses and kinda had this whole "Emerald Twilight" thing coming. All the stories in this issue feature a ring being stolen and used for nefarious purposes (not always in that order), so maybe it has a point. As the Book of Oa finishes burning, we get a small glimpse of the future: it appears to be a young man...

...wearing a crab on his face?! Huh, weird.

Plotline-Watch:

I guess the above panel means this issue is technically the first appearance of Kyle Rayner's classic "crab face" costume, discounting ads and stuff like that. This should be going for hundreds on eBay, not a couple of bucks!

We'll see Probert the Bad One return on Guy Gardner: Warrior pretty soon. Alan Scott will also make some appearances there, starting sooner than you might think.

Lobo and L.E.G.I.O.N. will cross paths with Kyle Rayner in the near future, though they won't be called L.E.G.I.O.N. anymore...

Speaking of Lobo, as he's leaving Garnet's atmosphere, he kicks some little dweeb off his flying vehicle while exclaiming "One side, fan boy!" I have no idea if that's supposed to be someone in particular or if it's just a random joke, so I will assume it's the titular fanboy from the 1999 Fanboy miniseries by Sergio Aragonés.

And speaking of planet Garnet, I looked it up and its next appearance is in Superboy and the Ravers, of all places, so I guess we'll see that eventually over at the '90s Superman blog.

Guy-Watch:

Guy Gardner: Warrior #19 continues the "Emerald Fallout" storyline and also Guy's fight with Militia (or as Guy has started calling him, "Melissa"). Ice helps, but then she starts getting a little too aggro (a side-effect of her new powers) and tries to take on Militia all by herself while leaving Guy behind, which doesn't go too well for her.

With Ice down and Guy's new armor malfunctioning, Militia's really got our hero by the balls. Militia picks that moment to reveal his identity and why hunting Guy was so personal to him: he's Guy's supposedly dead cop brother, Mace Gardner! Cue emotional "family reunion" music.

Mace resented Guy for becoming a superhero so, after getting crippled, he faked his death and volunteered for government experiments that gave him his legs back at the cost of making him look and sound like a '90s supervillain. Just when it seems like Mace might kill him, Guy's yellow power ring, which has been on the fritz for the past two issues, gets a sudden burst of energy that allows him to defeat his bro in about two seconds.

Seeing that Militia failed them again, his superiors at the Quorum decide to ditch him and remotely disable his armor, leaving him crippled again. What's all this stuff got to do with "Emerald Twilight," you might ask? Not much, until Alan Scott suddenly shows up (told you he'd be back soon) and tells Guy the universe is in danger. So, you know, TO BE CONTINUED.

[thedisabilitybookarchive]

'Unbroken: 13 Stories Starring Disabled Teens'- Nijkamp, Marieke

Disability Rep: Unidentified Mental Health Condition (Possible Bipolar), Blind, Retinitis Pigmentosa, Wheelchair User, Anxiety, Agoraphobia, Idiopathic Pain, Cane User, Schizophrenia, Depression, Hallucinations, IBS, Chronic Pain, Bipolar II, Cerebral Palsy, Autism

Genre: Short Stories, Multi-Genre, Fantasy, Historical, Contemporary, Romance, Realistic, Science-Fiction, Horror

Age: Young Adult

Setting: Persia, USA, Multiple Settings

Additional Rep: Chinese Female MC, POC, F/M, Sapphic Characters, F/F, Latin MC, Muslim Female MC, Transgender Man LI, Black Female MC, Non-Binary MC, Biracial Native-American MC, Cuban wlw Female LI, Queer wlw Female MC

For more information on summaries, content warnings and additional tropes, see here:

[kylesvariouslistsandstuff]

Long post incoming...

I guess I'll try to be more reasonable and put things into perspective.

I also happened to come out of FURIOSA earlier today, which to me felt like a nice antidote to what Hollywood tends to pump out when it comes to big franchises. A prequel that really expands the Wasteland world of MAD MAX without feeling like a Glup Shitto-fest. I was pretty much glued the whole time, astounded at what it was going for, the big swings it took and - in my eyes - greatly succeeded at. You can tell creator/director George Miller loves this world, and wanted to expand it meaningfully with both this and MAD MAX: FURY ROAD, after 30 years of the series being a trilogy. And apparently without anyone getting in his way, at that. Rare for a big action film.

Did you know Miller, who also directed the likes of... THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK, LORENZO'S OIL, BABE: PIG IN THE CITY (and pretty much was a huge part of the original BABE), the HAPPY FEET movies, and THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING... Did you know one of his favorite films is Walt Disney's PINOCCHIO? Which had a massive influence on him and his work?

Oh yeah, PINOCCHIO... The second-ever Disney animated feature film, a film designed to be like its European fairy tale-inspired predecessor - SNOW WHITE AND THE SEVEN DWARFS - but double that, with its more sprawling story and larger budget. More multiplane shots, whole scenes in the ocean, all that hand-animated, meticulously hand-painted water...

And it was the exact opposite of SNOW WHITE when first released in February 1940. While reviews were generally positive, not really as glowing as SNOW WHITE's reception, it was largely impacted by World War II breaking out across the Atlantic. It couldn't play in the European countries where SNOW WHITE made tons of money, and the money it managed to make in the ally territories - the UK and France - wasn't going to cut it. Its American gross was solid, certainly in the shadows of the huge hit that was out at the time - GONE WITH THE WIND... But again, it couldn't cover the film's astronomical costs. Unthinkable for a film, whose opening song, is pretty much synonymous with Disney today... Once a big flop, now it's absolutely definitively Disney...

The Disney studio would continue to lose a lot of money during this period. FANTASIA did not appeal to audiences, and BAMBI also lost money. Only the relatively-cheaper DUMBO managed to make back its shoestring cost, in addition to appealing to audiences more than the experimental dialogue-free epic and the more lyrical, dramatic forest tale. Disney was deep in debt, and spent the rest of the decade making and releasing movies known as "The Package Features". Anthologies composed of short films/featurettes, with some sort of loose linking device for them. Disney wouldn't return to doing a singular type of story following one set of characters until CINDERELLA, released in February 1950 to critical acclaim and great box office.

Some animation fans and historians divide the Walt years into two halves, the Golden Age covering the streak that began with the runaway success of STEAMBOAT WILLIE and ended with World War II's impact on the studio's first five feature films. (Or six, if you count the hybrid THE RELUCTANT DRAGON.) The Silver Age, covering everything thereafter up until Walt's passing, typically marked at the posthumous 1967 release of THE JUNGLE BOOK. Again, in terms of features. I'd mark it at December 1968, when the 2nd Winnie the Pooh featurette - THE BLUSTERY DAY - was released. The wartime losses took so much out of the studio, that Walt and Roy O. Disney reached some compromises, which - to some - affect the features going forward.

Films like CINDERELLA and PETER PAN avoided the elaborate multiplane effects and minute details of PINOCCHIO and BAMBI, making up for it in their striking art direction and filmmaking choices. The storytelling is also something of a shift. Few of those films attempt to wear the frightening elements of SNOW WHITE and PINOCCHIO, the kinds of scenes that Walt often got angry letters from parents over. After BAMBI, not counting the package features, the death of a major "good" character was pretty much hands off as well. For example, during production of LADY AND THE TRAMP, singer/actress Peggy Lee begged the filmmakers not to kill off Trusty at the end of the picture, following his accident with the dogcatcher wagon. Walt and co. complied. By the time you get to the '60s, Walt's final years among the living, you're a country mile from the early films. THE SWORD IN THE STONE and THE JUNGLE BOOK are very lax "characters exist" kinds of movies, the latter having some danger in the form of the impending encounter with Shere Khan. Otherwise, they are much lighter in tone, much more fun-loving, like romps.

Over the years, I've come to really appreciate those later films for the things my 20-something year-old self tended to criticize them for. When really, it's just a matter of fact. Change happened, maybe had to happen, in order for the Disney studio to survive and keep making animated feature films. Few other studios during the Golden Age of Animation could afford such a luxury. The Fleischer brothers certainly gave it a shot, with GULLIVER'S TRAVELS in 1939 and MR. BUG GOES TO TOWN in 1941, but the falling out between Max and Dave coupled with distributor Paramount's neglect of MR. BUG put a stop to that. Feature-length films would be made in other countries using techniques other than traditional animation, though some studios in America would later get in on it once again - albeit with lower-costing methods.

But when Walt was around, it was really only him producing feature-length animated films on a regular basis. And to keep going with that, and not just making more money off of only the re-issues of SNOW WHITE and such, he and his crew ultimately changed course and... Well... I'll say it, I feel they still put in the hard work on a bad day. Even the films of the '50s and '60s that I don't like as much as some others, there's still... Say, a Milt Kahl head swaggle or something great from Frank & Ollie in there. Or a great score, or a good sense of pace, the late great Robert and Richard Sherman absolutely going off with a banger song somewhere, very inspired background art, etc. No slouching! Something like THE JUNGLE BOOK is very much as important to me as PINOCCHIO.

I've come to love all of it, really, even with perceived flaws or the results of the studio changing gears. The work of the animators, artists, musicians, etc.... They pulled the weight and then some, and even the more "middling" films of decades past hold some sort of special place...

Maybe this situation applies to the apparent mandates that Disney executives are compromising Pixar with.

Pixar went for many, many years without a box office loss. THE GOOD DINOSAUR, which was made during John Lasseter's 11-year reign, was the first film to lose money for them. It was released *20 years* after TOY STORY came out, and it's their 16th overall film. I remember the media trying to chalk it up to the film's troubled production, which is a silly sentiment, because TOY STORY 2 and RATATOUILLE were similarly-rough, rocky roads. That one just... Didn't appeal, no matter what work and effort went into it, and I also think STAR WARS 7 opening mere weeks later kinda cut into it as well. It was kinda tossed off by Disney's marketing department after INSIDE OUT debuted earlier that year.

But, it was viewed as a minor dent in the armor. CARS 3 didn't really break even when released in the summer of 2017, but that was a CARS movie, so a lot of people kinda just shrugged at that. John Lasseter was then slowly ousted from the Disney company as a whole months later... Not because of that film, or GOOD DINOSAUR, but because he was exposed by the Me Too movement that erupted in fall 2017. Lasseter abdicated his leadership roles at Pixar, Disney Animation, Disneytoon, and Imagineering, right before the release of COCO that autumn. With Pete Docter taking over as CCO of Pixar in June 2018, perhaps all eyes were on him. Unlike Lasseter, Docter was only running Pixar. Not WDAS, not Disneytoon (which was swiftly shut down upon Lasseter's exit), and no major presence in the parks apparently... How would he take on such a task?

Docter, I feel, had something going there. Lasseter's Pixar became what Ken called Sunnyside Daycare in TOY STORY 3, he turned the place into a pyramid and he put himself on top. So many directors and animators exodused out of Pixar in the early 2010s, notably Brenda Chapman, who had words upon being taken off of her film BRAVE. All of Lasseter's goodwill completely vanished after it was learned that he made many women at the studio - and at WDAS - very uncomfortable, and when it was very clear that he only favored his TOY STORY colleagues and wasn't keen on letting women nor PoC direct films at his studio. Docter sought to reverse that, and to let the filmmakers tell stories that meant a lot to them. Much in the same way he, Lasseter, Andrew Stanton, Lee Unkrich, and Brad Bird did when Pixar was relatively new to making features. It truly was like old times, and I myself was very excited about that.

And it seemed like the sky was the limit... What could go wrong? ONWARD was cut right off, in its second weekend, by the pandemic. SOUL, LUCA, and TURNING RED went straight to Disney+ in the U.S. and most other territories, and their subsequent limited theatrical debuts - expectedly - didn't do great. I see that situation as similar to World War II cutting right into Disney's animated features in the 1940s, impacting the studio/distributor's ability to give them a wide release (at the time, Disney was not big enough to be their own distributor, it was RKO Radio Pictures who were handling the releases of the movies)... and the way the world is now, how expensive it is to take a trip to the movies, what a gamble it is... Animated movies aren't guaranteed smash hits anymore, unless you're something like Mario or Minions, or some entry in a beloved franchise. Remember how PUSS IN BOOTS 2 literally had to claw its way up to such a winning gross and record multiplier? If that had cost the same amount of money as ELEMENTAL had cost to make? It'd be considered a big failure.

LIGHTYEAR was Pixar's big return to theaters, a summer bow in 2022 that was part of the studio's beloved TOY STORY franchise. It opened great, too. $50m! Quite above what other animated movies had been opening with from 2021 to now... But the legs were terrible, word of mouth was sour, audiences just didn't seem to like it. A rare swing and a miss. Pete Docter pulled a "Walt Disney responding to ALICE IN WONDERLAND's disastrous release circa 1951", taking the blame for the film's box office woes. ELEMENTAL opened blah, but had incredible word of mouth. Even Disney boss Bob Iger seemed happy with its slow-burn ride to $500m at the worldwide box office, until he wasn't... Now that's a failure, along with SOUL, LUCA, and TURNING RED... Which all didn't get to enjoy full theatrical releases due to a worldwide crisis that's actually still going on...

So now, the corporate logic is... Those movies all failed because they're too "autobiographical", the filmmakers' respective catharses being told through 90min animated movies apparently doesn't appeal to audiences... and that in order to be financially successful again, Pixar needs to make films with more "general" appeal. Pete Docter is not John Lasseter, and I feel the press takes advantage of that. Docter apologizes for films not appealing, whereas Lasseter - when his CARS 2 got panned by most critics - defended critical missteps with his chest. It's as if he still ruled at the end of the day and no one could touch him - given his four leadership roles within the company, while the quieter Docter... Not so much. I get the sense that Disney execs can push him around and the press can easily label him a weak leader, while John seemed invincible. Iger, for example, was aware of his erratic, gross behavior at awards ceremonies well before Me Too caught up with the Hawaiian shirt man... And he was very concerned, but... Lasseter kept his job for another decade, almost unscathed.

I get that studios often have these sorts of "Well, we've had trouble, what should we be making then?" moments. I feel that singling out the three films that went straight to streaming during a pandemic, and another that was high budget and was operating in a much different theatrical landscape than before, is not it, though. SOUL, LUCA, TURNING RED, and ELEMENTAL were liked by most audiences. They got good to great reviews. They were all nominated for Oscar.

This isn't like how FANTASIA and BAMBI were perceived by critics and audiences in the early 1940s. The mixed-to-negative reactions to those films back then must've played a part in Walt and Roy focusing on relatively safer films in the future. For example, CINDERELLA leaned into what audiences loved about SNOW WHITE, 12 1/2 years prior, and was one of Disney's huge hits of that decade that also did exemplary in re-issues. There's a reason the two big flops of the '50s, for Disney Animation, were the more experimental films - ALICE IN WONDERLAND and SLEEPING BEAUTY. Nowadays, both of those movies are beloved and like PINOCCHIO, FANTASIA, and BAMBI... Are synonymous with Disney, often ranked among the best, cream of the crop. The time isn't always right for certain movies...

But things are often unfair in these big entertainment conglomerates, who are run by money hoarders who only think in the moment... and if Pixar's gonna try to do this "general appeal" thing, they would still have to let filmmakers have all the fun that they can feasibly have with the stories. The current iteration of Disney Animation is buckled under so much executive interference, and test screenings where 7-year-olds dictate what goes in and what doesn't, and... Well... Look at their resulting output. How they still try to do the job passionately and not merely just pass the grade. It's like I'm watching them struggle to get their creativity out on films like RAYA, STRANGE WORLD, and WISH. It's, to me, much like where things were for them circa 1980-82.

And after nearly 30 years of making features, maybe Pixar might enter such a phase themselves, as executives place the blame squarely on the filmmakers for their own failures and uncontrollable outside circumstances... Like I said, we'll have to see how they navigate this particular set of rules. Does it work out for them? Does it create movies that audiences mostly don't care for? Who knows... Maybe I myself will like the movies still, maybe I won't even notice a difference... Maybe this is will all be moot, every sentence of it... But we'll see...

[major-knighton]

HALLOW-LEE-N movie review Oct 9th : Dr Terror's House of Horrors

Another anthology film, starring our favorite recurring name in this series, Peter Cushing. Five tales of horrible demise, and an ending worthy of a dark fairy tale.

Six men in a train compartment, one of them is Dr Schreck, specialist of metaphysics and the occult. He suggests reading tarot cards for the other travellers, which they all agree to even though the art critics Marsh (Lee) insists on being a virulent skeptic and overall killjoy.

The first man gets told a tale of a werewolf going on a killing rampage, and of being killed by the werewolf's wife. A bit weird that the werewolf is named Cosmo and is apparently immortal, but this story was fun and I loved the décor. The fifth card, the one supposed to sow him how he could change this fate, shows him death.

The second man is faced with a tale of a killer plant invading his home, like Audrey II but without the singing. He too gets told he can only avoid this fate with death.

The third man get told all about how he will interrupt and disrespect a voodoo ceremony, and reap deadly consequences for it. This one felt kind of cringe in the this-definitely-uses-stereotypes-of-a-religion-as-a-prop way. Not cool. And the main character of this short story was definitely unsympathetic and arrogant. The music was great though. His fifth card is also death.

The fourth man is the rude and snobby art critic Marsh, who handles being ridiculed by an artist he hates by running over the man with his car. This causes the artist (played by Michael Gough, Arthur Holmwood in the Dracula movie) to lose his hand and later kill himself. The hand comes back to haunt Marsh. He, too, can only escape his eventual fate via death.

The last story is a vampire story, but a lot less goofy than last movie's. It does involve a terrible French accent though. His fifth card is, predictably, also death.

Not telling you what happens at the end but you've probably guessed it.

This was a very enjoyable movie, the transitions between the various locations only to be brought back into the confines of a train compartment at night made for a very disorienting ambience in the best way. The score was beautiful.

Of course, the writers in 1965 couldn't predict how funny it would be for a 2024 audience to hear Christopher Lee call "Doctor Shrek!" in a distressed voice.

Oh yeah, on that note, I noticed the man himself spoke in a higher register than the classic Christopher Lee voice, but that's understandable: 1965 was still fairly early in his career, he hadn't developed that voice yet.

This one goes on my list of cozy spooky movies to watch with a hot cup of something sweet when October comes around. 8.5/10.

[nicholsroy]

May (+ early June) updates and June goals

Blog | Monthly updates

Dropping by your dash with some late monthly updates - including some news! 👀

LIFE IN BLACK AND WHITE 🌙 progress updates

News first: happy to announce that ✨Act I is complete✨ as of June 17th, though I am still chipping away at line edits focused solely on trimming the word count. Some less crucial scenes will likely also be removed for this purpose. Content-wise, it is complete and ready to be queried, and I can honestly say I’m quite happy with the way it turned out.

I will now be shifting gears into Act II, and Act II restructuring and line edits will remain my primary focus until completion. I have already made decent headway on restructuring of Act II, so I anticipate these edits to take anywhere between 1-2 months at most. 

As previously announced, an initial batch of 4-5 queries will be sent out once Act II is around 90% complete.

Other writing

My drabble “Baptism” unfortunately didn’t place in the contest mentioned last month, meaning I will not be moving ahead this time! However, I still think the piece is solid, and I will be revising it for resubmission. I think it would work best as a slightly longer piece, perhaps in the neighborhood of 300-500 words. 

I am currently revising two flash horror pieces, “Speak Now” and “Just Be Careful” for further submissions to horror magazines.

Reading

May and June have been great months for reading! I previously modified my reading goal to 30 books for 2024, but seeing as I am currently on my 18th book of the year, I will likely modify this again to 50 books.

On that note, I would love to read more short stories and flash fiction in the coming months – any collections or anthologies you recommend?

Read in May:

ANGELS BEFORE MAN by Rafael Nicolás

THE DARKNESS OUTSIDE US by Eliot Schrefer

Read in June (so far):

LESS THAN ZERO by Bret Easton Ellis

THE CONDITION by Jennifer Haigh

OUR WIVES UNDER THE SEA by Julia Armfield

GREY DOG by Elliot Gish

Currently reading:

DEAD GIRLS DON’T SAY SORRY by Alex Ritany

+ my ongoing beta reads!