#BTW none of you get to make fun of me for this. This is tumblr. Okay bye.

[xolboragainandagain]

I made a crossover AU between Ninjago and Transformers: Prime as a joke, and now I have a whole plot of Zane being sent to TFP's universe instead of the Neverrealm and meeting Starscream and both of them developing an unhealthy platonic (Though it'd be a really funny romantic ship) relationship together that parallels a lot of their own past relationships in different ways which I'm going to try to make into a longfic. Have this art for them I will never finish

[andhumanslovedstories]

I've been running this writing experiment lately to cut out phrases like "I felt" in my fiction writing. Like I was looking at a sentence in a draft that said, "he felt as if character's eyes were pinning him in place." And then I was like, "well, does he think that or is it true? As a result of this person watching him, he's froze. It's not like a thing, it is that thing."

Oh and "almost"! I'm always going, "He felt almost relieved that it hadn't happened." Well, did he feel better that it didn't happen or didn't he? Or "somewhat", I'm always going, "she felt somewhat perturbed."

And like none of that is wrong, to be clear. I don't know if it'd improve your writing, I don't even know if it'll improve my writing, but I use this sentence structure all the time so every viewpoint is from a voice that thinks about what it thinks, hedges its statements, and offers the same ability for wry little jokes formatted in the exact same way. And I have a lot of writing like that and I think (!) that they're good, but read as a whole, I'm like, "god, they all sound the same." Like there's one melody that I write songs to, so even with different lyrics, it's almost (!) the same song. Something I've been struggling with in regards to my writing and why I've felt so blocked is how boring I found writing my usual way. I'd read something and enjoy the individual parts of it, but then I'd step back and I didn't like the whole. And I got good at this enough at seeing that I didn't like it to do it in real time as I was writing, which as you can imagine didn't improve the process of writing because now I was bored AND dejected about being bored.

There's this sentence-level structure fact that I use unconsciously. A pattern I find easy is short sentence, short sentence, short sentence, long sentence. So I write that. "He [verbed]. He [verbed]. Then he [verbed]. As he [verbed] to his [consequence], he [verbed] that [noun] was [statement of condition]." Which could work, it often does make for a nice rhythm, but it's something I reach for often because it's easier for me.

Just last sentence, I originally typed, "I find it easier for me." But if what I mean is "using this pattern is less effort than another pattern," then it's easier for me. One voice is hedging its bets and the other asserting. Either is fine! But they're different! And, again, GOD you would not believe how many words I've cut out of this paragraph as I write it. I'm so chatty. I love using twelve words when six will do. And that gives my writing a specific tone to my ear.

So if I am bored of that tone, why not try using just the six words? Why be understated? Why be afraid of stronger opinions? So right now with my fiction, I'm experimenting with cutting out as many self-reflective words as I can. Sometime you do need to draw attention to the face that this is the character's interpretation, but like you definitely don't need to do it as much as I naturally want to do it. You don't need to always go out of your way to allow the possibility that the narrative voice is wrong. During editing, I trim the weaker ones (I originally typed, "what I consider the weaker ones" Is that more accurate?). But I think them being there in the first place shifts my language which shifts my character's which shifts my plot. It's sentence structure all the way down!!

(this barely applies to my writing on here, btw. i try to do good but yknow this is a tumblr blog. i'm not trying to get a lit mag to accept it.)

Anyway blah blah (chatty!) the point is I've been trying to write in a way opposite of my interests. Something that doesn't take itself too seriously, that emphasizes EMOTION and ACTION instead of minimizing it, and that clips through scenes at a good pace. Doing this been amazingly fun. I've been having such a good time doing it. I am writing so much because I really enjoy doing it. The process of writing is so fun again.

This post is about two things. One is my new mood stabilizer and therapy day camp. The other is about the benefit of pretending to be MXTX.

[kolbalissh]

Hi, i gotta get this out here as soon as i can so here goes

so apparently someone didnt like my art (specifically the recent alecca drawing which as of now ive privated) and went off to some third grade f1 gossip cesspool instagram page and dropped my drawing down there and theyre basically publicly shaming my blog and my art specifically the rpf content

which is why im making this post as a refresher on what rpf actually is - real people fiction - key word FICTION

please for the love of god, understand that with any fandom space comes creation and that it comes in multiple forms of art writing music and so forth, and rpf has been a subculture of this specific f1 fandom for a LONG ASS TIME the most dated first f1 rpf fic goes back to literally mika/michael on ao3 in like 2002

us making this sort of content doesnt MEAN that we actually think of these drivers in this light, because that is the line that NONE of us should cross

how is it any different if one ships a driver with a model or a influencer, than us shipping them with another driver? in both cases it is still the 'real people' clause so why is one okay and the other 'vile and disgusting' (quoted exactly from the story they posted abt my art btw)

some part of me knows its not that deep, because it really isnt we all just want to support our favourite teams and drivers and have fun in this fandom space together and follow basic fandom etiquette, if you dont like, then dont interact, something i myself have been doing ever since i started liking formula 1

but another part of me knows that i shouldnt be getting shit online for stuff that i make for my small community of people, where we genuinely mean no harm and if it bothers you, then thats a personal issue of yours

rpf has been a long running subculture for decades now, it has certain moral boundaries that we all follow here and none of us cross it so its really disheartening to see that the stuff i made being plastered across on ig as dehumanising and fetishising, because the intention behind my art is nothing but of support and joy

and lastly i just wanna say, that if ur an active tumblr user and if my (in my opinion, very lowkey art compared to regular tumblr content) is getting you this worked up then u should consider changing social medias lmao

[sumbarbietingz]

Imma be real I’m not a toji girly and I don’t have a dog in the toji fight but Im not gone hold you, I find it profoundly hilarious to think about toji as an old ass Japanese man calling somebody ma, nigga coded or otherwise 😭 lowkey I always thought of him as a bum ass light skin from the Bronx that’s in and out of jail cause he’s got something to prove. to me toji would be on love after lock up or something 😭 like I would read that fic and have a very good laugh idk. given the actual gross shit that’s written in fics this seems like such a low threshold for people to be upset about , but I’m new to the fanfic world so maybe there’s mad history there idk 😭

I think we can all agree that Toji has been written like a hood nigga. Me and my moot said this too btw

Yet a bunch of delayed bitches said this (hiding their names cause I’m not giving none of these irrelevant hoes anymore engagement)

I’ve said it and I’m saying it again, they’re making it an issue bc they’re anti-black. How come you’re suddenly so concerned about this mf’s culture and ethnicity when it comes to aave and a fucking slang but you’re reblogging fics where he’s whitewashed and acting like he grew up in Calabasas without a problem? Then they proceed to talk about niggaboo fantasy and wigga apocalypse.

Since you’re new let me tell you, black writers were like a very very very small minority in the fanfic world especially here, it has only been a common thing recently. Whenever the reader was black you would get crucified for it. I left tumblr in 2019 and when I came back last year I was very surprised and pleased to see so many black writers making fics for black folks, which has motivated me to write again.

But even with the fact that we are finally free to write what we want and have fun, there’s still ppl (surprisingly black folks) complaining about reader being too hood, aLwAys WeAring WiGs, AlwaYs bEing CurVy wiTh lOng hAir and GetTinG hEr NaIls dOne, like we really can’t have shit.

These mfs priorities are so fucked. Like y’all let pro shipping and age rising slide, these fics got thousands of notes but god forbid Toji calls the reader ma/mama😐

Besides, if they really cared about any of ts they would stop reading/writing fics in English. As far as I know none of them make Toji accurate culturally speaking. He’s speaking English fluently, uses American slangs, never speaks a word of japanese, the location is definitely not in Japan and you can’t tell me they visualize him there either. This is just hypocrisy at its finest.

[sasaranurude]

Okay. I've been playing Tokyo Debunker today, since the release happened to catch me on a day when all I'd planned to do was write fanfiction. I just finished reading the game story prologue (it was longer than expected!), so here's a review type post. If you're reading this post not having seen a single thing about this game: it's a story-based joseimuke gacha mobile game that just released globally today. It's about a girl who suddenly finds herself attending a magic school and mingling with elite, superhuman students known as ghouls. If you look in the tumblr tag for the game you'll see what appears to be a completely different game from 2019 or so: they retooled it completely midway through development, changing just about everything about it due to "escalating competition within the gaming industry."

I'll talk about how this looks like a blatant twst clone at the end.

Starting with the positive: The story is charming. I enjoyed it thoroughly the entire time and am excited to read more. The mix between visual novel segments and motion comics was really nice--it broke things up and added a lot of oomph to the action or atmospheric scenes that visual novels generally lack. I like the art in the comic parts a lot. the live2d in the visual novel parts is... passable. Tone-wise, I think the story was a little bit all over the place and would like to see more of the horror that it opened on, but I didn't mind the comedic direction it went in either. The translation is completely seamless. The characters so far all have unique voices and are just super fun and cute. Of the ones who've had larger roles in the story so far, there's not a single one I dislike. It's all fully voiced in Japanese and the acting is solid. (I don't recognize any voices, and can't seem to find any seiyuu credits, so it seems they're not big names, but they deliver nonetheless.) Kaito in particular I found I was laughing at his lines a ton, both the voicing and the writing.

He's looking for a girlfriend btw. Spreading the word.

The problem is like. The gameplay is the worst dark-pattern microtransaction-riddled bullshit I've ever seen. Hundred passive timers going at all times. Fifty different item-currencies. Trying to get you to spend absurd amounts of real world money at every turn. There's like five different indicators that take you to various real-money shop items that I don't know how to dismiss the indicator, I guess you just have to spend money, wtaf. Bajillion different interlocking systems mean you have zero sense of relative value of all the different item-currencies. I did over the course of the day get enough diamonds for one ten-pull, which I haven't used yet. Buying enough diamonds for a ten-pull costs a bit under $60 (presumably USD, but there's a chance the interface is automatically making that CAD for me--not gonna spend the money to check lmfao), with an SSR rate of 1%. BULLSHIIIIIT.

There's like a goddamn thousand-word essay explaining the dozen different types of character upgrades and equippables and equippables for the equippables!! Bad! Bad game design! That's just overcomplicating bullshit to trick people into thinking they're doing something other than clicking button to make number go up! That is not gameplay!

In terms of the actual gameplay, there is none. The battle system is full auto. There might be teambuilding, but from what I've seen so far, most of that consists of hoping you pull good cards from gacha and then clicking button to make number go up. There's occasional rhythm segments but there's no original music, it's just remixes of public domain classical music lmao. I'd describe the rhythm gameplay as "at least more engaging than twisted wonderland's," which is not a high bar

At least there's a cat in the rhythm bit.

And like, ok, I gotta remark on how derivative it is. Like I mentioned in my post earlier, this game is unabashedly aping twisted wonderland's setting and aesthetic. (That said, most of the stuff it steals from twst is magic school stuff that twst also basically stole from Harry Potter, so...?) However, it isn't exactly like twst: in this one, the characters say fuck a lot and bleed all over the place and do violence. Basically, the tone is a fair bit more adult than twst's kid-friendly vibe. (Not, like, adult adult, and I probably wouldn't even call it dark--it's still rated Teen lol. Just more adult than twst.)

Rather than just being students at magic school, the ghouls also go out into the mundane world to go on missions where they fight and investigate monsters and cryptids. Honestly, the magic school setting feels pretty tacked-on. The things that are enjoyable about this would've been just as enjoyable in about any other setting--you can tell this whole aspect was a late trend-chasing addition, lmao. So, yeah, it's blatantly copying twst to try to steal some players, but... Eh, I found myself not caring that much. Someone more (or less) into twst than me may find it grating.

Character-wise, eh, sure, yeah, they're a bit derivative in that aspect too, but it's a joseimuke game, the characters are always derivative. Thus far the writing & execution has been solid enough that I didn't care if they were tropey. If I were to compare it to something else, I'd say the relationship between the protagonist and the ghouls feels more like that of the sage and wizards in mahoyaku than anything from twst. There's some mystery in exactly what "ghouls" are and their place in this world that has me intrigued and wanting to know more about this setting and how each of the characters feels about it. I have a bad habit of getting my hopes up for stories that put big ideas on the table and then being disappointed when they don't follow through in a way that lives up to my expectations, though.

So, my final verdict: I kind of just hope someone uploads all the story segments right onto youtube so nobody has to deal with the dogshit predatory game to get the genuinely decent story lol. Give it a play just for the story if you have faith in your ability to resist dark patterns. Avoid at all costs if you know you're vulnerable to gacha, microtransactions, or timesinks.

[ms-demeanor]

why do you delete your posts after a month??? couldn't you just make a new sideblog to keep things organized?? /genuine question

I currently have *counts* 55 sideblogs.

My main blog has the largest readership of any of my blogs by miles and miles, and for a while I tried to do things like "make a post with compusever as the OP then reblog compusever to ms-demeanor so that it still travels" or "set up ms-demeanor-art-blog as a portfolio so I don't have to link people to my main if I'm submitting to a collection" but by the time it became an issue, one of the bigger problems with that is that most people send asks to my main, not to my sideblogs, so I can't answer computer questions as compusever and reblog to ms-d, I have to answer as ms-d and reblog to compusever. (this, btw, is the correct thing to do. I don't answer most of my asks on main and I answer almost NONE of my asks on my sideblogs because I just don't look in the inboxes for the most part)

And I don't see much utility in keeping 30-50 asks about password managers on my main. If I look at the total posts on my sideblogs I've got something like 150k, whereas on my main I think I just broke 6000. That is a reasonable number to dig through for my own purposes, and the *important* blogs where meaningful stuff gets filtered off are in my pinned post. (Nobody needs the link to my stucky blog. That is a notebook with stickers on the cover and stick figures scrawled on lined paper, not someplace that I do anything that I want anyone looking at. I do, however, want people looking at the porn on my venom blog or sending me memes for my dune blog)

IDK it got confusing someone at a coffee shop convinced me to sign up on tumblr in 2012 and at some point my personal blog became something that people looked at for information and it's hard to balance "this is where I put the dolls that i'm mashing against each other and also where I put computer repair information and also where I talk about mental health stuff and also discuss the problems with the supreme court and also where I put a book about what to do if someone dies and also there's a bunch of snapshots of my dog and my spouse."

That's part of the reason I've started ms-demeanor.com - there are a lot of things that people ask me about repeatedly and I'm happy to keep answering the questions but it's a lot faster if I can provide a link and even searching in my own blogs that I've curated for the express purpose of organizing things by category is impossible on tumblr, so I'm (slowly) writing down the stuff that I think will be helpful to people somewhere else.

So I guess TL;DR: Tumblr is a weird combination of public and private and this is the balance I've struck between trying to share information that people will find useful and still having this be a fun place for me to hang out.

[pixelxgore]

hers a billfold wip as a treat i changed his face bc i have free will

The art is to encourage you to read my silly little insanity (you should totally do it btw)

I'm dyslexic so sorry if anything is spelled grotesquely wrong lol autocorrect sometimes has no idea what i’m trying to spell

Starting with my head cannon because every thing will make more sense with it (or it wont that's entirely up to you) Imma try my best to make this enjoyable

So I head cannon both bill and ford as aspec this is important for the rest trust (I'm Aroace myself so some of my words are based of of experience ) being aroace doesn't mean you can't have a toxic one-sided relationship with a triangle

(most of this is pretty vanilla but I still wanna talk about it)

I believe it started of as a one-sided relationship on fords part (wow shocker) but it wasn't really love because he's ace it was more of infatuation (this stems from the fact he is a science boy and like ooo demon triangle thing) mistaken for love (I'm pretty sure this is common among aroace people or I just had an original experience) and maybe bill had just a little bit of the same feeling but instead of infatuation it was just pure obsession and when they had there little “tragic break up” and bill finally came to realize his obsession and it consumed him (idk i think that how abusive obsession is) and he realized he can’t live with out ford (i man he can but unhealthy obsession) and thus bills one sided relationship with ford where he just tries to get his puppet back but can’t figure out why he needs him so bad so he comes to the (subconscious) cuncultion there in love (because of course that’s the reasonable decision) and then you all know what comes after

I think bill has major will wood music vibes so I have nominated three songs of his for bill ford (cuz I'm genuinely going insane over them)

This is for fun and based off my head cannons

All of my discussions are made purely of the vibes the song gives me and how cool than animation in my head looks so take everything you know about these will wood songs and throw it out the window cuz none of that is relevant :3

i saw someone say “Will Wood songs can really be interpreted in different ways, and most of them seem like wisps of similar thought rather than a concrete narrative, so you're always a little bit right and wrong when you take a guess.” and i think you should keep that in mined

(I'm gonna embarrass myself so hard (⁄ ⁄•⁄ω⁄•⁄ ⁄) )

I'm not gonna elaborate much but just trust me ok I put it kind of in chronological order

fords one sided relationship with bill: ...well, better than the alternative

Ok so this one is the least perfect out of all of them cuz it only half what I want (obviously this song is a stretch but hear me out) It's mostly for the like the last half of the song (remember what I said about throwing out the meaning for get that i lied) this song about the struggle ls of growing up and is a heartfelt plea to be understood and accepted for who we are (which obviously ford was a wired kid) and this kinda ties into the one-sided infatuation because it also is about the romanticism of nostalgic love, and the pressure of society telling you to find someone and "settle down" as we get older (witch yk aroace can’t really do that) so he’s grasping at the fact that he is enamored with this demon he just summoned (because science) so he can come up with this narrative in his head of how he is in love and can finally fit at least one of the societal boxes (idk it sounds like something to me probly ooc but I'm having fun)

bills one sided relationship with ford: ¡Aikido!

obsession with someone and how people often use coping mechanisms such as drugs to help with their feelings of uncertainty and helplessness. (yes this is copied not fully of a site this is tumblr not an english assignment) it also explores the idea that love and obsession can often manifest in neurotic and even pathological behavior.(oooo oooo look i’m so smart like staring the apocalyps) i’m not this cool this whole thing started with the first like whit h is “I apologize for playing with your eyes But I’m obsessed with you” witch reminded me of how bill used for as a puppet and then yk fords whole world came crashing down (this one explained its self more i have to do less mental gymnastics) and he’s like im sooo sorry i can’t live with out you

there whole relationship from the deal to the end of bill: Misanthrapologist ("In case I make it,"

Outtake)

ok this one is the one that mostly made of vibes because the song is about an unhappy codependent relationship through metaphors of christianity, nihilism, outer space, and mozart (witch only really encompasses a portion of the relationship) the song stars with “I wanna meet your make Shake him by his ensanguined damask lapel Holler "Look what you've done Gave this planet a sun And made a man to wonder if he's more than the sum of his cells"” which makes me personally think of obviously the deal fore made with bill and how bill stroked his ego all the way through there partnership um you can see where i goes from here just go listen to the song

ok this one’s off topic and only for my imaginary animation but the line “So how could I stand a chance, let alone dance With the way you sweep me off these two left feet?” just like imagine this with me it’s bill (human probably cuz i don’t work with the triangle) and young ford in the minedskape thing and its bill dipping ford and when it goes down it switches to bill and fort in bills pyramid thing with ford chained up do you see the vision ok I’m done now (´°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥ω°̥̥̥̥̥̥̥̥｀)

[not-xpr-art]

Curled tight as a question mark...

(01/2025)

Ok so I've been super obsessed with the AMAZING Trolley Problem AU fics by @silverview & @unreesonable (where Drew is the 22 year old Blake abuses instead of Ellie) for literally ages so it was only a matter of time before I'd end up doing some art based on it pfft...

Links to the fics below btw (also gonna ramble about this piece a bit since, as usual, I put way too much thought into it pfft)!!!

a better son / daughter

special arrangements

and all I'll do is kiss him (btw title of this piece actually taken from a line in this one which I really loved!!!)

spaces between

Highly recommend all of them btw, they're so GOOD!!!!!

~~~

Ok, so I immediately wanted to do a sorta twisted version of Klimt's 'The Kiss' but the concept kinda got away from me as I was painting it... Plus I couldn't get the vibrant gold colour to work with the general colouring of the figures so the background became like vaguely vaginal curtains that I could probably spin some kinda symbolic link to Drew's mother if I wanted to lol...

(think I made a joke on bsky that I'm in my Georgia O'Keeffe era and NO one laughed smhsmh...)

I've also been wanting to do something based on the iconic The Fallen Angel painting by Alexandre Cabanel but never really had a particular subject in mind... until NOW! (ofc the emotion is different but idk I think the reference still works... Drew's tears are more desperate, hopeless, resigned, and perhaps less angry than Lucifer's?)

I wanted the piece to feel like Drew is trapped. Trapped by his turbulent relationship with his mother and father, trapped by his status and position in life, trapped by his sexuality, trapped by the drugs... And ultimately trapped by Blake, who was supposed to offer him a paternal embrace, a comforting hand on his shoulder, to properly help guide him out of the hole he's stuck in but all he did was take advantage of his vulnerability and drag him further into that pit...

Also, kinda funny story, but I tried doing a cute romantic in9 art before I started this but my brain and hand were having none of it lol... NO adorable yaoi for you manipulative toxic yaoi ONLY !!!!!!!

Stylistically I wanted to try and make this look sorta traditionally painted, which involved me using a combo of my regular program alongside ms paint since I like the texture of some of the brushes on there tbh (plus those brushes are really great for painting body hair which I had so much fun drawing a lot of here lol)! Overlaid with a vaguely canvas-y texture lol

Oh, and also I put the diamond pattern of the jumper Drew wears in the episode on his underwear here both because it was going to get covered if I put it on his t-shirt and because it's sorta a fun way to reflect how this is an AU lol

Also have some close ups since tumblr has completely destroyed the quality of this lol:

(final close up is actually of a version of the painting without the texture overlay btw which is why the colours are slightly different, but I thought it might be interesting to share so u can see the brushwork texture a little better??)

uh anyway... that's all folks lol!

[kingskyless]

thoughts on natlan's arc in genshin🌋

tldr: i'm pissed off!! watch me rant about storytelling under cut. please take your storytelling seriously and with love, jesus christ

this is long btw! this is what happens when you piss me off with your poor writing choices! i crave blood!

--

these are thoughts i wrote on my private twitter but i'll put them here too, why not.

i really, really don't like being negative towards anything anymore, chosing to embrace the silliness of poor storytelling and just grab what i do love, but man did the final act for natlan piss me off

I've been waiting for Natlan since the game came out because we knew it was going to be inspired by pre-hispanic America. Aztecs. México. (i'm mexican for context) and it was!!! with the inclusion of Maori, Peruvian, Lakota, Hawaiian and Yoruba. and it was done Horribly

Natlan is still mostly inspired by México though, I made a whole video on genshin's mexican rep, when it comes to overworld, food, names, music and lore inspiration yeah, the Mexican rep is done well and very fun! but it's still mixed with the cultures previously mentioned which is bad!!

and it gets WORSE because you look at the characters, be it playable or NPCs and nothing about them is mexican (or any of the previous cultures) nothing at all, and that's when the issues start.

I literally made a tumblr post a few days ago how I didn't think Natlan's story was bad, we just didn't connect with the characters due to character design. And while it still holds truth, this final act just undoes all the build-up it had in the previous acts, leaving no true conclusion and, therefore, ruining the story as a whole. a lá game of thrones.

Natlan in its first 3 acts was actually really well done, presenting the different tribe cultures, character personalities and how they mix with one another, and they had very strong set up for more world building and Very Important Lore Reveals (the Abyss having a "heart", dragons, THE SHADES, FALSE SKY?) I really enjoyed myself playing the first acts!

But the marketing makes you distance yourself from the characters, devs decided to push back the culture of the tribes in game and delay the next acts of the story, and you disconnect!!!

going back to the first acts and it's wonderful set up, then what is the point of having all this beautiful set up, only to just - not explore it in the CLIMAX OF THE ARC. and it was very very important lore and conversations to move the story forward and raise the stakes!!!

and they ignored it or barely mention it!!! yes having all the answers shown at you is not fun, and they can totally explore these aspects of the lore later on, but by the way Natlan was written from the start it was 10000% expected to have those conversations in THIS arc.

there's also the set up that's been there since the games release. None of this is explored, we don't know who "he" is, who's the crossed out name, what was the secret of the god of war. there's nothing, this is never explored.

NOTE: that it is true the story was revisited or straight up rewritten way after this material was released, it is something that can happen during production, it partially happened with sumeru already. the thing is when you make changes like these, if you already established in previous trailers or manga certain lore, you have to be extremely careful, as the audience is already expecting something like this to happen in the story. when you rewrite this and there's no pay off it causes confusion and frustration among the audience, as you are no longer following what you set up and it creates plot holes a throw away line about the muratans or murata would've done to connect the manga with the current natlan, but there's not even that.

They establish very important new characters, but don't explain their true role in the story beyond "evil" . What is Gosoythoth? why can it become a dragon? why are there voices around it? why are the former archons so negative? . Sure, we as an audience can make headcanons about it (and some answers were partially told, not nearly enough though) but it's information that needs to be talked about in the story, but the characters never question this and it's never explored.

and we KNOW they can write compelling characters and stories because Fontaine is right there!! it explores very important lore and intertwines it perfectly with the cast and their own personal struggles, what the fuck happened in Natlan.

it just pisses me off and makes me very sad, I was excited for natlan for many years because, for better or for worse, that's my culture they're taking to tell this story, and seeing them fuck up both frustrates me.

i'll keep playing because i still want to see how they wrap it up but aaaaa, i haven't been this mad since Inazuma, and i dont think Inazuma pissed me off this bad.

the following is things that bothered me personally and not something i can criticize from a storytelling standpoint:

the entire traveler parade after beating gosoythoth made me uncomfortable to no end. really really giving white saviour. it draaaged and everyone was kissing their feet and i was PRAYING for more depth in that but no! fuck me!

if you wanted to have the corny ass parade, okay, have it, but maybe show the traveler not being as happy? or carrying mental wounds after the battle??? GIVE THEM DEPTH OR SOMETHING?????????

you couldve expanded on the four shades, expanded on the abyss, expanded on the angels, expand on xiuhcóatl, expand on fucking gosoythoth since it was literally right there???? flesh out paimon, flesh out the main cast????

and totally flesh out capitano, he did absolutely nothing and he's the first of the harbingers, we just saw him get his ass beat by mavuika in the first act and then nothing??? (cutscene was great!) im not mad at the ending he got, it was very in character, i just wish there was more to him

natlan was set up as a nation of dragons and we learned nothing of them in the main arc, it set up the abyss having a personification and we learned nothing of it

this is mostly something i wouldve loved, but they set up the shades and time manipulation as we saw from mavuika, and no mention of istaroth??? hello???????????

also how did ororon know about nahidas power????

[your-favourite-yapper]

tll me evrything aplease

tws: cheating, vague mentions of drug use, suicide (1ce by pill 1ce by gun, its not grqphic but you can drfo tell whats happening), age gap (srs isnt tech a child but i dont think that makes anything b8r in terms of morality)(during prongsfoot: srs is 19 james is 27 and in remus x james remus is 27 iames is 45),everyone dies except for rjl (v rare occurence), outing (regulus outs james and sirius), i don't know what time frame this is, i have NAWT read or watched cmbyn bc it's too sad, ships that happen in order: wolfstar, prongsfoot, bitchkiller, jily, remus x james, james x gun (none r endgame except the last 1), ALOT of typos @mrstellmeafuckingsecret this is part one btw bc tumblr is 2 sec from crashing

SO sirius + co. Have a second family home in Italy theyv3 be3n goingb2 since they were babies and like orion is a professor and needs an intern and he usually gets a young woman but him and walburga fight abt this so walburga makes him get an older man (even tho on fridays wc are the days orion works tye latest, she gets the gardener to come 20 minutes early) anyways enter stage right: james

The home is in the Italian countryside bc regulus hates the noises of traffic and in the more rural areas there lives Remus and he's a sweet boy srssage and him and sirisu have an on off rlnship (its on off bc even tho its implicit bn them that they're in a rlnship even when sirius is away srs ALWAYS cheats w other girls and rjl is in the rural part of toen so he walks like 3 miles 2 get service 2 talk 2 sirisu only for sirisu to not respond.....he makes gifts for srs and srs barley responds and saves up his savings for like a month to buy sirius lipgloss after sirius said he wanted one )

Umm anyaways..jfp comes and sirius is v annoyed bc ??? Now he has to LIVE w this hobo??? But they warm up 2 each other and srs was always a Lil mean to regulus but when james was w him he'd acc Bully him and he'd run off wo regulus (he had his bugs hed be fine) and make fun of regulus 2 james bc even tho there's only a barely 2 yr age gap bn them sirius NEEDS james 2 see him as more mature and walburga doesn't like james bc he's taking her bby away from her but since she's a poised matriarch and needs to b a good hostess since her husband is lowkey tweaking 99% of thr time (the other 1% is when hes passed out drunk) she can't threaten him w one of their special occasion knives

And James has to remind himself of the decade of an age gap bn them but how would he do that when sirisu is in absurdly low hung swim shorts and is sprawled by the pool all gangly limbs and silky black hair and open pretty mouth and and his YOUTH bc he's a practically still a child and this is wrong wrong wrong wrong so james is v inconsistent w his behavior to sirius

One moment he's staring at Sirius w his mouth practically dropped open and he's making winky faces at sirius and he's just staring at Sirius from behind his sunglasses and the next he's blowing sirius off and snapping at him w words that cut cut cut and sirius wants to dig his fingers inside those cuts and show james his insides and he's intrigued bc how could he not be? No one has ever treated him like this

and all the while Remus is at his cottage w his sick grandma (who in siriuss opinion should just kick the bucket at this point) in his 2 bedroom house where he lives w 4 ppl and sleeps on a mattress on the floor, staying up late and making anniversary cards for him and sirius. and regulus is watching his older brother sneak off w a complete stranger rather than talk w him abt bugs like they would when they were 8 and all was ok back then but all is not ok rn bc what was so nice abt james anyways?? He doesn't kno 5 languages, he doesn't play 3 instruments, he doesn't kno siriuss breakfast order when Sirius was 9, he doesn't stay up hoping PRAYING that sirius would open his eyes and realize that regulus is-and has always been- RIGHT. THERE.

Anywho ..1 day james kisses sirius under the trees near the pool and sirius can feel his whole world upend but then james pushes him away and srs asks why and james says srs is so young and srs says that's not the rzn and james says that it's all a joke to sirius and sirius says that acc he's still in a 4yr rlnship w a boy so... and james starts yelling at him and sirius kisses him and they make out and have sex and all is good!!!

But guess who also spends his time under the trees near the pool? Collecting bugs and rocks to show his father now that his brother is practically gone?

Regulus tells his parents and he's happy bc finally sirisu would get his dues and maybe after that they might even make up w james out the house!!

Walburga who is ever so composed tweaks. Tf. Out. And James is shocked bc walburga smiled at him and made sure to tell the servants to serve him his eggs abit overcooked bc uncooked eggs make him nauseous and she always made sure the wine of the night would be jamess favourite and now she's screaming at him and ...is that A KNIFE???!!! so umm yeah he takes like half his stuff and skeddadles (coward)

and walburga then screams at sirius and sirius is shocked bc walburga is never mad at HIM and walburga is shocked bc she swore to herself that she'd never yell at sirius and the day he was born he was born STRONG and beautiful and perfect (and not like regulus who was born a stillborn(and he wasnt even orions and so he was contaminated and weak and far too soft and)) and now she was screaming at Sirius and she must have stopped at some point bc when she blinks she's in her bed and she can hear Sirius cry and she doesn't comfort him and infact feels childishly vindicated even tho he won't stop crying and (and the next morning he was gone and the only person left was) regulus.

It's all HIS fault bc why would he tell her that when he knew it'd make her upset at sirius and didn't he understand how pERFECT sirius was??? So she cries and yells and cries and yells and cries and yells and doesn't notice (even tho she does and there it is again that childish vindication) it when regulus takes her sleeping pills up to the bath 2 wks after sirius left and she doesn't care (she does. bc regulus still had her blood if not orion's) bc sirius is GONE

Sirius after running away goes 2 Remus first to beg 4 some cash so he could catch the bus to the hotel james would be sure to be at, and him and remus haven't talked in DAYS and so he doesn't kno that remuss grandma has (FINALLY) kicked the bucket and remus opens the door and app asking for cash first thing is not??? ok??? Bc remus starts yelling at him w red rimmed eyes and sirius is confused bc ?? Bro u got upgraded from having to live w 4 ppl in a 2 bedroom house to 3ppl in a 2 bedroom house ????

But Sirius leaves and stays at a shady pub w the little cash he has and has to share a room w a man w piercings and tattoos and green hair and drugs and he's lonely so they fuck and get high and fuck and get high and fuck get high and get high to fuck and fuck high and he forgets abt Remus and forgets abt regulus and his mother and his father and the stupid gardener who comes 20 min early and he forgets james and and

JAMES ! He tries catching the train and gets the money from the man under the pretense of getting more drugs and goes to the hotel but james left a day ago ashen sirius was busy getting high n fuckin and he breaks down right there in the lobby bc james was probably back at his family home in America and well ummm yeah...he dies(?) In the streets (its v much a lucy gray bird situation i dunno u dunno)

[yourstruly9489]

Distortion Fanart (michael centered)

(saturated version on the left, og on right)

This is long, so a break before closeups start!

Closeups:

Text reads "The Distortion" (the o has a spiral inside of it)

More closeups but the doors on the left page are open, left to right, top to bottom:

Text reads: That was very stupid

Text reads: I am the throat of delusion incarnate

Text reads: There has never been a door there, Archivist

Text reads: How would a melody describe itself, when asked?

Text reads: "MICHAEL" That is a real name

Text reads: Does your hand in any way own your stomach?

Text reads: My very existence, tied to my pointlessness

Text reads: Did you notice which door she left through?

Text reads: I am not a "who," Archivist. I am a "what"

And that's the end of the closeups :D

All the text inside the doors are quotes from Michael Distortion btw. The only exception being "MICHAEL" bc Jon says that, but Michael does respond by saying "That is a real name" so I think it counts as a Michael quote. At least enough to be included.

I'd also like to thank a couple members of the "michael enjoyers" community for helping me come up with enough quotes. I do not remember your names, but thank you :D

The decision to make this spread was fairly impulsive. It started by me doodling spirals on a scrap piece of paper while trying to design a birthday card for a family member. While doing so, I thought, "why not fill a full page in my sketchbook with spirals?" And that turned into "I could make it into a Distortion spread."

And so, we have ended up here with a full Michael Distortion spread.

It was lots of fun to do, and has possibly gotten me out of artblock. Although, trying to come up with 9 unique doors that weren't yellow was quite the pain. Alongside the 9 different spiral patterns inside said doors. (although a couple of the spirals are copies of another)

And now a couple fun facts.

I am currently listening to "More Doors For Me" by elybeatmaker. I thought the song would be fitting.

I have only watched the first 14 episodes of TMA, and none of the TMAGP episodes. Everything I know about TMA is from my sister and Tumblr. For this reason I did only Michael, bc I know him far better than Helen. (she appears less in fanworks)

This spread took me five days. This is because I was either busy, or didn't have the motivation to work on it. The doors took the longest.

There is so much tape. The black background on the left page is black construction paper taped in, the spiral patterns underneath the doors were taped in, the doors themselves were taped on, the yellow door was also taped in, along with the hand and the wrist, both separately taped. It's a good thing I want a thick sketchbook.

My sketchbook's paper is a bit thin, so you can see the spiral behind the yellow door on the back of the next page. (I have since drawn over it, so I don't have a pic)

Each door has a separate color chosen to be the main color of said door. The colors include: Pink, Red, Orange, Yellow, Lime, Green, Light Blue, Blue, Purple, and Brown. The only one that is a normal door color (brown) has Michael inside it.

If you look closely at the right page, you can see where the lines start to get uneven in the background spiral.

I really like the idea of showing someone this spread and have them randomly open the doors, just to see a surprise Michael. :)

Materials used: generic pencil (for the initial sketch) 05 Micron pen random Prismacolors a cool multicolored lead pencil I don't know the brand of kingart twin-tipped brush pens Sipa fineliner pens scotch tape X-acto knife kid scissors black construction paper yellow cardstock A5 Fabriano sketchbook that I hate with a burning passion

Since you read this far, have some bonus Michael doodles!

^This one was variations of a scene from a dream.

^This one is from a doodle page I have laying on my desk, hence the scribbles nearby. I did not color in the lines (yes, that is nendou from TDLOSK to his left) This was also the first time I ever drew him.

I love giving him spiral cheeks :)

[djevelbl]

I sat for a second staring into my phone and pondering the blorbos bc of a shitpost and huh. Branzy really IS very much 2econd 2ight 2eer (that was fun, goodbye.) by Will Wood coded isn't he??? like, most if not ALL of the song is SO him that it's INSANE. this only happened once before to me and the previous guy can't be my blorbo anymore bc of.... reasons, so I'm happy to have another silly little guy replace him in being SO coded after one of my favorite Deranged Songs /vpos

Ramble up ahead btw, read at your own risk

you KNOW the ramble is getting serious when I do the weird Tumblr Post Partition Thing AND went from writing it on the phone to WRITING IT ON THE PC (any lengthy post I write EXCLUSIVELY on the pc bc it's more fun and comfy for me lol)

The only line I can't in good faith say I relate 100% back to Branzy is LITERALY the second one, which is a bummer lmao — "Screaming at the top of my lungs in the confession booth" but like. I'm throwing it out there for any other, more veteran Branzy fans to go rabid over as I have and maybe even also discover how it could be Branzy-ified bc I truly believe the WHOLE SONG can be Branzy-ified lol

SO ANYWAYS. MORE SONG LYRICS !!!!!

I specifically came to this whole thing bc of the fourth line in the song, "The devil made me do it, but I also kinda wanted to" bc YES??? THAT'S SOOO BRANZY CODED?????? like the amount of fucked up shit /aff he's done in his videos is INSANE I mean he DID make a video where the WHOLE. PREMISE was breaking 100 irl laws in the Afterhours SMP lmaooo also I'm kinda tempted to break out the fuckin LYRIC MEANINGS for this as well — hmmmm...

fuck it, we live only once and life is too fucking short/shitty to have hangups over going insane about our little guys

So yea, fourth line is all about temptation, choices and a careless sentiment as one takes full responsibility for their actions — the Devil might've offered you riches, love, security in exchage for someone's head, but ultimately you're the one who takes that step forwards to answer the siren's call; Will Wood sings here about temptation and how, at the end of the day, you're the one acting upon that temptation, how that's a thing only you can be responsible for, and how he himself doesn't care much for the guilt the word "sin" carries with it; "we'll live the way we want, and we don't care if it's considered 'sin.'" — MarsAndTheGreatExpanse on the lyric explanation in Genius (yes, Imma be quoting some of these people. yes, I'm taking it THAT seriously). All of this is very much like Branzy to do: the most recent example I think would be the Candyland mod video, where he has SUCH BEEF with gingerbread men that it's just pathetic /aff at this point lmao — he goes around killing them and hating on them SO. HARD it's really funny. Of course, there's a difference between Will Wood singing this and Branzy fucking, idk, wanting Jimmy the Gingerbread Guy's guts spilled all over the Candyland floor in an overexaggerated candygore that would belong to none other than uhhhh fucking. idk danganronpa??? but like, suspend your disbelief and be down to clown with the insanity here for a minute, thanks <3

There's also his 100 IRL Crimes In Minecraft video, where he sold Kaboodle's soul WITHOUT HESITATION the moment he was prompted for it lmfaoo (he also did racketeering, extorsion, murder, created a fucking GANG WITH REDDOONS??? spread difamation [that really fucking wasn't. no matter what the cult leader uhhh wither skulls guy was saying], was distributing illegal substances I'm pretty sure, impersonated a cop, idk what else I might rewatch that video actually). There's also his 100 Hearts Factory, where he UNIRONICALLY made a fucking child labor joke with the villagers, and was busting up unions in there at some other point as well. There's whatever in hell he has with Clown bc if Branzy is UNETHICAL AS ALL HELL /silly on his own then with Clown they're both HORRIBLE, TERRIBLE, NO GOOD AT ALL /silly and I love that for them actually.

"My grip on my secrets slipping while I'm speaking in tongues" really just reminds me of Branzy's bloodlust and how everyone seems to fucking forget it's there???? even if it reminds me of it in like, a roundabout way

"Take it with a pillar of salt, H.A.L.T, it's not my fault" is all about how his words are non-literal, how he shouldn't be taken as such, and how he's the way he is from birth and he can't really change it — Branzy doesn't try to hide who he is and how he feels about things (it's his greatest asset) and he also doesn't let anyone tell him how to be (unless you're a murderous clown but like, his simping is a WHOLE different can of worms; I'm not a couple's therapist lol, I'm not paid for this shit), he just kinda is; the only reason he isn't an active threat is because he doesn't care for PVP enough to become better at it. The onlu hangup I've got with this line is the H.A.L.T thing — it's apparently a form of mindfulness recommended to people who have a hard time taking care of themselves, and it stands for Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired (might have to look into it for myself,,,,, anyways)

"I'm cut from a different kind of meat" is Will saying he's different, in a completely separate category to everyone else, and paired with the next few lines the implication becomes very obvious: you can't understand me, and you're not meant to. Branzy is so hard to put down into words sometimes because he's genuinely many things all at once: he's impulsive but plans are important to him, he's cunning but SO damn stupid, so harmless yet one of the most dangerous people I've ever seen /vpos /aff, he's kooky and charming and fun yet knows how to be intimidating if he so wishes to be, yet he's also SO pathetic wet cat man coded that it becomes IMPOSSIBLE to be scared of him,,,,,,,, GOD "I'm cut from a different kind of meat" you are, Branzycraft, you really are,,,,,

"More than you can chew, hard to swallow me" this is all about being more than people can take, more than people can understand, more and more and more and more. And honeslty he is: he's hard to put into words because his personality pulls him in all different directions and shapes, he's bigger than he lets on, more all-encompassing and somehow formless in how difficult he can be to pin down and describe — I like to think, if Branzy were ever to sing this (a demon boy can only dream sometimes,,,,,,,,), I imagine he would sound SO cheeky and teasing, kinda smug yet chill. I also love the combo of bit off more than you can chew and hard to swallow pills sounding like that

"Forget bored stiff, I got rigor mortis, call it morbid curiosity" there's something about the line, how it's written and sung that gives me a sense of flippancy that goes really well with Branzy's insane yet really chill attitude. Also the whole "death and blood and gore, LifeSteal's essence and the birthmarks It imprints into It's players" thing of LifeSteal is just. PERFECT for the line idk idc I won't take any criticisms on this point <333

"How can I commit to reality, when my third eye's open and I like what I see?" using the third eye imagery here makes the line be about how Will Wood's imagination is so interesting that nothing real can compete, and thus he just. doesn't commit to any of it — Branzy goes by whatever he fancies that very moment, almost like he lives his own fantasy as he goes about life and honestly, I kinda wish I was him ngl

"Baby, I might be crazy but I didn't lose it, no I set it free" this one's mostly self-explanatory bc like, ALL LifeStealers ARE insane to some degree — you kinda NEED to be to survive in there; if you're not ALREADY, then the culture itself WILL claim your sanity. It's only a matter of time — so OFC this line fits Branzy, especially because he is SO carefree over how he is, who he is, careless of how that affects others and simply going about life like the deranged forest creature he was born to be

"I can't ignore what's under dance floorboards, the rhythm of my heart a dead-as-disco beat" in the explanation in Genius, people say this line might be a reference to Edgar Allen Poe's (yes, this went there. get used to it) "The Telltale Heart", where a murderer stores his victim under his house's floorboards and goes mad, imagining the corpse's heartbeat gives him away — honestly this kinda reminds me of The Patches Incident in a jester walks into an amusement park by hattrem on ao3 (GO READ IT. IT'S GOOD. IT'S GREAT EVEN. GO READ IT !!!!!!) — the contributors say Will Wood might've used the metaphor to suggest he's mover or inspired by his own madness or guilt, a sentiment I'm sure Branzy shares in how he briefly hesitates before going full throttle with whatever fucked up shit he's decided is funniest this time around

"But I still move my feet" here, Will is painting us the following picture: even through the guilt or pain he might feel about something, he keeps on going and keeps on dancing "move my feet"; Branzy never fully stops, he never gives up — he might change course, redirect, take a step back to think and plan, but he never stops. He jumps through the hoops and does all the dances, and he never stops.

"To slip out of this groove, I'm free" here Will Wood is succinctly summarising the point of the song: it's fine to be a little bit (or more like a LOT) crazy, to slip out of constraints and be truly oneself, regardless of how that looks like and Branzy fucking follows this like a mantra lol

I'm gonna lightly skim over the next two lines — "Now to row, row, row my boat over the falls" and "And maybe wake up from but a dream, yeah" — bc it's just a reference to the Row, Row, Row Your Boat nursery rhyme, with a more cynical spin; something something the cheerful initial demeanor ripped appart at the hands of that bloodlustful beast living in his veins and caressing his psyche, in one swift swoop and almost instantaneously, just to disappear once again into his bloodstream and be flushed out.

Also I'm gonna talk about the whole chorus right now, and not mention it again unless it's relevant to any other lines I might be discussing:

"I'm just a psycho, babe

Come and go out my mind

I didn't lose it, babe

There wasn't much to find

I'm just a psycho, babe

Come and go out my mind

I'm only passing through"

The way the lines are sung, so happy-go-lucky and carefree, so flippantly and cheerfully, it all reminds me so much of Branzy's persona — so cheery and showman as everything seems to fall apart around him, and it's a coin toss whether that's to his benefit or to his detriment; he doesn't let past alliances, teamups or enemies to deter him from what he wants and what he craves — he desires someone's demise? even if through elaborate traps, he'll get it. He's only here to have fun, to come and go as he pleases.

"If you knew what I knew, if you saw what I see" this one goes hand in hand with the next one, so!: "You'd look through illusions, hallucinations, and lucid dream" there it isss! simply put, people wouldn't be able to take it all in if they saw what the character sees — Branzy must've seen a lot of fucked up shit during his three or so season run in LifeSteal, and considering Tubbo is going insane over the shit LifeStealers keep pulling in The Realm SMP (YOU WERE IN THEIR HOME AT SOME POINT?? YOU WENT INTO THE TIGER ENCLOSURE GIRLIEPOP. WDYM YOU'RE FUCKING SURPRISED THAT PANGI KILLED ALL BEES IN A 1K RADIUS FROM SPAWN???? THAT CLOWN HAD ALREADY PRESTIEGED ENCHANTING ONCE AND WAS ABOUT TO DO IT AGAIN???????? WHAT) I think these lines are appropriate not even just for Branzy, but LITERALLY any LifeStealer at that lmao

I'll be honest, I've got NOTHING for "And I know that meaning can be such a pretty thing to keep" and "But I got facts and I'm not afraid to use 'em, take the good with the bad, take off the back you make a new front" so uhhhhhh I'll.... improv something? uh. um. shit uh so uhhhhhhhh something something Branzy takes everything in stride, and manages to turn it into an advantage (like acquiring the scariest player in LS as his work husband)??????? yeahhhh that works

"Some days I'm glad that I am a madman and I'd rather be that than" and "An amicable animal, mild-mannered cannibal" are about preferring one's own brand of insanity over the gentle brutality of mainstream society — Branzy kills, like everyone in LifeSteal, and in that they're all a community, yet Branzy still prefers his contraptions and elaborate plans, the honey-sweets to his personal venus flytraps and brand of death over the constant betrayal and active manipulation, the orbital cannons, the battles to the brink, the ambushing of weaker players

"But I'm more level-headed and clever than ever and I'm getting better one forever at a time" is about embracing one's madness, and being better for it — Branzy, amongs other things, is a truly terrifying /vpos character whenever he desires to be because he embraces all the twisted, dark, immoral facets to his person without a second thought, and with this he's stronger than others could ever dream of being

"And if sick is defined by what's different, well then pull the plug out and let me die" I don't think LS!Branzy has ever had a problem with dying, even there's always something pushing him to seek survival — it hurts, you're one heart closer to a permanent death, but I don't think that has always perturbed him enough to lash out and become so desperate that he'd be willing to throw caution to the wind; in this, Clown and Branzy are equals, similar to each other, going onto the main stage and performing the same steps.

"Vice-versa, vice versus virtue" here Will Wood is comparing good and bad behaviors to each other, and while there's something of a truth to what the contributor said on Genius about the usage of vice-versa specifically ("The literal meaning of 'Vice Verse' is 'with the main items in the preceding statement the other way around.' In short terms, it means 'the other way around' Following the theme of the song, Will is saying he is the polar opposite of soiety, or he is 'the other way around' in society" — AceTheBowlOfCereal23) I still think there's more to that — paired with the rest of the line, it feels to me that it all speaks of interchangeably using "good" and "bad" as adjectives for Wood's behavior, in such a way that makes both words become almost meaningless; for there will always be someone out there who disapproves of who you are, regardless of what you're doing. Branzy has a similar outlook, of considering whichever thing is happening right now as "good" or "bad" purely based on his own perception, how it might be beneficial or not, instead of using a more socially accepted definition for each and every event he comes across — especially in LifeSteal he does this, where everyone is constantly terrified of Clown and wary of him, yet Branzy only sees good things in the guy

"Well who I am I choose through all the things I do" our actions define us, somehow, in some way, and Branzy picks and chooses which ones he allows himself to be called by: he constatly says he's incapable of killing, he's harmless! Have you seen him holding a sword? Yeah, killing him is like kicking a baby in Wallmart! yet he'd managed to collect AT LEAST 100 hearts for his Big Top Tent event that closed out on Season 5, simply because people like him.

"And if it rhymes it's true, but I hate poetry" for some reason I can see him saying this even if he 100% does not mean it and is only saying it for the bit — not all of these line connections need to be that deep tbh

"Now with my moral compass pointing south, going down" Branzy has a fucked up moral compass ever since LifeSteal, next line

"With no-no-no-no-no-no-no-no-no respect for reality" so uh. idfk dude. this line exists — connect it back to Branzy or don't, I don't think I can

"A tourist passing through" and "Well that was fun, goodbye" are the lines Will Wood added onto the chorus to create the outro, and they just kinda remind me that Branzy is no longer in LifeSteal, but is still so influential and important to the people who keep playing the server season after season,,,,,,,,,,

Whoa, infinitely long yap session be upon ye! this was fun! I don't wanna do it again anytime soon! (might do it with PrinceZam and the three different Idol by YOASOBI English versions I'm mildly obssessed over [the official one, Trickle's and Will Stetson's]) so uh. I hope y'all enjoyed this? Question mark? Anyways!

[kairithemang0]

...I let the disney kid in me loose again

CONTAIN HIM!!! LOCK HIM UP!!!

anyways Curtwen sleeping beauty because Curt Philip just sounds fun. uhhhhh i love them. uh yeah. that's about it I just love them I think that curt should fight a dragon to get to Owen I think that they should meet in a forest and dance I think that Owen should talk to animals and I think that entire movie is perfect don't @ me also Cynthia is Maleficent because she should get to turn into a dragon and say hell in a disney movie also that line remained in kingdom hearts

i love you kingdom hearts bbs I love that you let the SOON TO BE KH TUMBLR SEXYMAN IN @kingdomheartssexymanbracket POLL VOTE FOR HER PLEASE GUYS MAKE HER WIN YES IM PLUGGING MY STUPID BLOG TO THE FANDOM NONE OF THEM ARE IN PLAY KINGDOM HEARTSSSSSSSSSSS PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE SHE DESERVES IT SHUT UP I KNOW THAT FANDOM HAS LIKE ACTUAL SEXYMEN AND MARLUXIA OR AXEL ARE PROBABLY GONNA WIN BUT SHUT UPPPPPPP LET HER WIN LET HER WIN VOTE ESMERELDA IN THE CURRENT POLL BTW LET MALEFICENT WIN LET HER WIN SHE'S SOOOOOOOOOO GRWOUHTEWOUHROUEW I LOVE HER SO MUCH PLS PLS PLS

i am getting ahead of myself

curtwen. sleeping beauty

:)

I'm a normal individual

play kingdom hearts

for me? play kingdom hearts for a sad little boy?

[ofeliaxoxo]

On the mischievous question from your other ask, there are some more translation notes (and a longer part of that interview segment) here for anyone curious I think OP did such a nice job of trying to explain / provide context for non Italian speakers haha. Why were they doing sooo much with their reaction to that question lmao - https://www.tumblr.com/nottiinrosso/734854887978975232/sky-italia-abu-dhabi-preview-tumblr-doesnt-let?source=share

(Plus the other small character notes… Carlos saying he is more stubborn between the two of them… also rolling my eyes at him trying to sneakily raise his hand when they thought the question was "who like girls better"…)

The timing of the interview kind of also gets me. Like they look so relaxed here to me they're just having a good time even though they're not fully understanding all the Italian lol. None of it is actually that funny but it is when they're together because they make each other laugh through all the media they have to do. Like that's basically what they'd been doing for three years (at this point in time) finding ways to make all of the more annoying parts of their jobs Fun lol.

But this is also Abu Dhabi 2023 aka the last race weekend they had before both of them knew that they weren't going to be teammates anymore after 2024. Or maybe by late Nov Charles already knew that Lewis to Ferrari was basically a done deal idk. Obviously we'll never really know the precise timeline of it. So I guess at the very least it was Carlos' last race before knowing he'd be done driving for Ferrari and being teammates with Charles at the end of the following year. And remembering that makes me a little more :/ watching this stupid interview again lol… :/

slay thank you for the extra context!

i love this actually because they're both like. huh. half the time but that doesn't stop them from doing their best.

kind of dead at them thinking they're being asked who likes girls more. just a totally unreasonable question lmao but it shows how used to being asked ridiculous nonsense they are that they fully accept it without question. charles decides to mediate by saying look we have different types. whos to even say which of us is more of a fiend. while carlos is cautiously trying to claim Nasty Dog Championship.

what stands out to me is how they both instantly raise their hands when asked who's fastest but carlos also extends the little "both of us" branch which charles does Not do.

"None of it is actually that funny but it is when they're together because they make each other laugh through all the media they have to do." literally. and tangentially related to this point is a moment from one of the team torque eps where carlos is trying to answer a question but he cant think of anything so theres a moment of silence which he breaks by just directly saying to alex "help me". and what came to my mind was the comparison how instinctively and smoothly charles and carlos did help each other with media without ever having to say it.

"at the very least it was Carlos' last race before knowing he'd be done driving for Ferrari and being teammates with Charles at the end of the following year" :(

to sum up: me when i LEAN into my buddy and we have our own special jokeee we are sooo funny and you dont get it btw! just us:)

[rewordthis]

SAKAMOTO (BBBVAMP) AND TSUBAKI FROM THAT SHOW YOU WATCH (WINDBREAKER...?) I SEE HIM EVERYWHERE.

Hellooo, Cat!✨ Glad to have you in my askbox for the first time! Welcome! 🤗 And happy birthday, too!!! (I saw your post! 😄)

So this is from this game! And you ask for my Do-M! degenerate and Tsubaki-chan-san? Okie dokie! I’m coming with a sledgehammer! ⚒️

GIVE ME A CHARACTER; and I’ll break their ass down:

So WHAT about our bat-shaped cookie!

How I feel about this Do-M!

I am CHEWING HIM. SPITING HIM OUT. AND EATING HIM LIKE A FUCKING GOAT ON THE MOUNTAINS! He is such a fucking loser that I absolutely LOVE his BOTTOM ass! You tell me he became so obsessed in dying in Mori’s arms he fucking rejected ANY woman that threw herself at him??? FOR REAL?!?!?! That means he is good-looking, too btw?! HELLO??? He is so desperate and jealous I am going INSANE. And he somehow is still strong and smart and devious enough to try and fuck with Moriran’s plans! I want to slap him silly and then throw him on a sleeping Mori! MUAGAHAHAHA HE WILL FUCKING EAT MORI! NONE OF THEM IS GETTING OUT ALIVE!!! 🍆🍆🍆 (please catch my drift!)

All the people I ship romantically with this bottom-ass idiot

Mori. I’d laugh my ass off if I ever shipped him with Nagayoshi, though. Especially after their first meeting. They are BOTH FUCKING BOTTOMS. That’d be funnn…

My non-romantic OTP for this cookie-dough

The infamous BrOTP section… The students. Giiirl~ I just laughed so much with the G4 making him their doll. He was fucking cute. And ridiculous. But cute for what a mush he is to the kids. I love him for that. 💖

My unpopular opinion about this troll

I think I tore him down enough with my feelings for him. But, yeah, I really consider him a superbly lonesome guy that just can’t be normal about his life. He based his entire identity around his family name and he probably had to hide his activities and occupation before becoming a teacher, so he is straight up weird socially and a goody-two-shoes to everyone to cover up for being (at least a bit) lacking in this area. I really think he has more loneliness in him than the average Japanese man and what he lets out and perhaps he can even feel a bit of Mori’s loneliness even though it is inflicted on him for a different reason. 🤔😗

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this degenerate in canon

Ughhh… I really wanted him to be able to shake Moriran even a bit. I need him to get under Mori’s skin, you know? I really want Mori to warm up to him and come to love him. That would be really… *siiiiiiigh* amazing~ 😩

Now on to the next one! The new wind in town~

How I feel about Tsubaki-chan-san

So—Tsubakino is new to me in all honesty, since other than the official art and snippets of him around tumblr he just got introduced in anime. Your’s truly is an anime only, in this fandom rn. From this one episode, though I quite like him. He is super cheery despite giving off the feeling that he had gone through a lot of shit and he had to do a lot of work with himself to reach the level of confidence he has now; and I like characters that introspect and look at themselves honestly. I especially love how his speech is polite yet his vocabulary is all on the “sexual” side. lol I laughed and kicked so hard when he commented on Sakura’s looks and then some, I paused for a couple of minutes until I could calm down. I am not forgetting that soon, nor will Sakura, I bet! He is fun! Waiting more gems from him! 💎

All the people I ship romantically with Tsubaki-chan

Soon, very soon to decide that! Ah, but since he has a HARD crush on Umemiya, I am rooting for him! Ume looked surprised when this was brought up and here I’m hoping he will give Tsubaki-chan-san a chance… 🥹 (after the appropriate angst of course. *nods to myself*)

My non-romantic OTP for Tsubaki-chan-san

So this basically is BrOTP section like I said… I think he’d make a nice, funny duo with Sakura, considering how Sakura really is easy to read and his reactions around Tsubaki-chan-san so far are “system malfunctioning” which is freaking hilarious. 🤭 (I think he’d be fun with most other characters, too like Sugishita maybe or Nirei. I’m just looking for comedy at this point. hehe) I also think, Kotoha makes for a super and powered up duo, too. I’ve seen arts of them and yeah.. girls go shopping!

My unpopular opinion about Tsubakino

Uhh… Idk yet. One thing should probably be that many refer to him as “they” or “she” when truth be told, Tsubakino refers to himself as “man”. He doesn’t pretend to be a girl or “act” cute or anything of the sort. He likes cute things and attention and use polite speech peppered with male jokes and… that’s it. He’s pretty straightforward in that respect. I don’t appreciate it when people turn characters into flags to use for whatever agendas. Let the man be cool in his skirt, he fucking earned it.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with Tsubakino in canon

Again… I’ll have more grasp over him in 1-2 episodes, but from his introduction, I really want to see at least a ti~ny bit of angst between him and Umemiya. Oops~ Not the devil in me thirsting for emotional turmoil that hits hard, even from the side characters. Muhahaha 😈

So this was my Sunday Dismantling Character workshop! Hope you N’joyed! 😎

If you want me to kill any other character… well, askbox is open~ Feed me! Hehehe

[mcytblr-archive]

Early MCYTblr Interviews: tack-tick

today's interviewee is tack-tick, a pioneer of the "phistin" ship and DSMP fan since before the first election! below is a transcript of the interview.

Q: What was your overall time in MCYTblr like?

A: I'd say my overall time in Mcytblr could be described as finding diamonds in the rough. This fandom is defined by finding your group, sticking to them and if you're smart not really looking beyond that. I did look beyond that and saw a lot of discourse and such. I had a good time with my friends but I did get negatively affected by the discourse at times. It was kind of a toxic shithole but by God mcytblr was our shithole lol

Q: Do you remember any specific discourse that affected you, or was it just the overall culture around you?

A: As a Technoblade main, it was the discourse surrounding his character that messed with me. At the time, I was mutuals (none in the phistin palace dw guys) with some people who hated his character. I, as an anxious teenager, was very worried it would cause drama if I unfollowed them and my dash became a lot of those long negative essays about how he was an awful person and yknow the drill. It was mainly my own fault and my dash became signfigantly better once I realized no one would be offended of I unfollowed, blocked a bunch of tags, started up my own discord server and focused more on writing fanfic instead of doomscrolling. A good lesson in curating your dash of anything else. (Btw those former mutuals are fine people, we just had radically different tastes in what we liked and disliked about the Dream SMP)

Q: You mentioned the "phistin palace"-- before we get into that, would you like to explain the "phistin" rarepair itself?

A: Now we are cooking! So, Phistin is the ship of Kristin and Philza. It's main focus was on the scraps of lore that we had about their relationship which was Kristin was the immortal goddess of Death and they couldn't really see each other often but loved each other very much. I'd say it's main appeal was being one of the few ships that was just really stable in the Dream SMP compared to the Karlnapity polycule and whatever youd call Quackbur. Fun fact, I can't find the post now but if i remember correctly me and tumblr user Demonadelem helped name the pair Phistin. Although, that was ages ago so I could be misremebering

Q: Was the ship entirely within the SMP, or was it just the general ship name for the real-life couple?

A: It was both. Since Kristin didn't really stream on the dream smp, a lot of her personality had to be based on what Phil said about her and her other streams. Basically, lore about the ship was pulled from the SMP but the dynamics and personality was from both. You could play around with the dynamic if you focused on Kristin being a goddess

Q: With that basic information laid out-- what was the "phistin palace"?

A: The Phistin Palace was a discord server I founded in August of 2022. Phistin was a ship that was basically a side thing I did in fandom because my main focus was Technoblade and emerald duo stuff. I think if you're a Technoblade fan you're legally obligated to be a Philza fan and vice versa. I don't make the rules. So Phistin was something I did when I wanted a break from Technoblade as a way to practice romantic shipping.

Then Technoblade passed away and I didn't want to do anything with his character for a while so I focused completely on Phistin. However, when I tried to find any fics they were either a background ship with only one line or Kristin was already dead from a tragic disease who's main symptoms were lying daintily in bed. While I was writing my own long form Phistin focused fic, Two Birds if anyone read it, I got a comment that complimented me for "giving her an actual charatcer" and maaaan that is a very low bar to be praised for. So, I started the palace as a way to find other Phistin fans who actually cared about them beyond Kristin being angst fodder for SBI.

Q: Do you have any fond memories in specific of the "Phistin Palace" discord server?

A: Oh so many. During the Syndicate finale, three of us all liveblogged and freaked the fuck out when Kristin showed up for the first time in a minecraft skin on the server. I made on of those AI chatbot things that was popular for a bit and the bot was supposed to be the Kristin character. I asked if she had a pet and she said she has a gecko named Tim. The entire server instantly decided they would die for Tim and he's now an emote. The general chat is also named Tim Time Fucker. A mermaid AU that was made that the majority of the server contributed a lot of lore to we named it the Communist Mermaid AU because the server collectively owns it now. Many good moments there

Q: Beyond the Phistin Palace, are there any large community events that you remember/took part in, or did you mostly stick to your friend group?

A: I remember The Penis SMP of course. I never really took part in large community events but I did watch them happen. I read the Passerine chapter where Tommy died becasue my dash flipped out when that dropped. I'd also try to watch Sad-ist animatics live when I could. At most, Id make a meme during a stream that would rack up a couple hundred notes or one thousand if I was lucky A thousand was like once or twice I think

Q: You mentioned that you were also a Technoblade fan before you became more focused on Phistin-- was your experience in that side of the fandom any different?

A: It certainly had more content than Phistin did lol. I was never really in any Technoblade discords or anything but back in the day it was focused on emerald duo and being funny. or angsty. Nowadays, it's way less lively unfortunately. It's not as bad as in 2022 but Technoblade fancontent seems to be less foucsed on the character and more on memorials/remembrance. At some point, you run out of things to say and not a lot of people wanted to stay in a fandom that just felt weighed down by it all. I did leave so things could perk up someday but I don't think that's likely

Q: We've talked about the fandom and how it responds to content-- let's talk about the content itself. What were some of your favorite moments from the Dream SMP as a whole?

A: The Red Festival Technoblade stream was the first one I ever watched live so that's a good one. The stream where L'manberg getting blown up at the end of The Manberg Arc is iconic for an underrated reason. I don't know how many people remember but Phil was highly speculated to be on the Dream SMP someday. On the day of that stream, he started on his hardcore world, then stopped his stream and did his dramatic switch surprise entrance to enter the Dream SMP for the first time. Also Technoblade escaping the anvil and then killing Quackity with a toothpick was great. I've never liked watching Twitch streams on my Ipad so most of my favorite moments come from YouTube

Q: Were you sad that Phistin wasn't a more popular ship, or did you enjoy the tight-knit community?

A: I was sad Kristin kept friggin dying, the poor woman lol. Sometimes I wish it was a bit more popular but the community was nice. The main issue is Phistin stuff started tanking hard on Ao3 in terms of numbers and tended to get misstagged quite a bit

Q: You've brought up a few times that Kristin was often fridged, disregarded, or replaced (on several notable occasions, by an actual Samsung fridge). How did you feel about it? Do you think there was any particular reason for it?

A: I mean, I really don't like it but I understand it. A lot of people loved that SBI angst but also wanted to write all the SBI. So the obvious solution is to kill off Kristin for free angst and keep all the SBI in the story. Passerine is a fic i respect a lot but it also kickstarted this trend to be honest. Kristin herself also didn't physically show up in the lore a lot so it was really tricky to write her. When I first wrote her, it was intimidating because I didn't have many fics to look at as good examples.

Was it shitty and a bit sexist? Yes but I don't think sexism was the only reason. Kristin's character was in a unique situation compared to the others. I have no problem with Kristin dying in a fic. The main issue is that often came with her personality being reduced to good mom and that's it. I'm not gonna call a bunch of probably first time writers evil sexists when I know what it's like to not know how to write her and being scared you'll get her completely wrong.

Q: Since it's come up, would you mind giving a quick rundown of what exactly the fanfic "Passerine" is? (As well as any memories you have relating to it!)

A: If i'm being honest, I only read the chapter where Tommy got murked. What I know from osmosis is it's an SBI royalty AU that had some kind of meta twist at the end and it was very sad. It also got a sad-ist animatic made out of it which jesus christ I'd give for that. I tried it but the writing style was too wordy for my liking. It's mainly important for Phistin history even though Kristin wasn't in it. No, The Fridge died in it but everyone just kinda assumed it was Kristin for long enough it got the ball rolling. Also I think Niki read it on a stream

Q: Before we wrap up, is there anything else you remember about MCYTblr/the DSMP that you'd like to talk about?

A: The DSMP sure was the minecraft server of all time that is defined as a server that was doomed from the start. Whoever makes a video essay on it is gonna have a hell of a job. 10/10 experience would not recommenced. Hello to the Phistin Palace if any of you read this :D

Mcytblr is getting more chill with shipping from what I've seen. Thank God, keeping making Philza Minecraft kiss those men and his wife.

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