#BUT THINK ABOUT IT. THE DOGS!!!! THE GUNS!!! THE… THE COMEDIC TIMING OF IT ALL!!

[cobra-wives]

you give me lawrusso adjacent; chris naked in new york x ruben patterson shootfighter. essentially, literally any amalgamated mixture of the zacchio-verse and their roles. i don’t mind - i love them all.

i nod.

i raise you; cobra husbands adjacent; terry mccain excessive force x captain vernon the dog who saved summer.

pleaaase let them be the villains in johnny and daniel’s lives in EVERY UNIVERSE.

[chaos-in-deepspace]

L&DS Rafayel: Crab Wars | Drabble - Comedy

Ahahahaha so this is a comedic post. I feel like every day life with Rafayel would have these moments of just "Bro wtf are you doing?" and this encapsulated it perfectly.

Pairing: Rafayel x Reader Warning: None Disclaimer: This is an original fan work for “Love and Deepspace”. Do not repost on other platforms or plagiarize. All characters shown in this fic is 18+.

Blog Information | Masterlist

Rafayel

There were so many things you had come to accept when it came to Rafayel. He was eccentric and tended to just do whatever he felt like. So, how did he still manage to get you at a loss for words? Absolutely stunned as you stared at the situation right in front of your eyes,

He had invited you over for dinner, and this is what you came to? You looked at your beloved boyfriend standing in the middle of his kitchen. Around him were five living crabs. Their claws were up and snapping as he stood in the center of a circle. He looked at you, then back at the crab directly before him.

"Okay, what the ever-loving fuck is happening, Raf?" You finally managed to say. You pinched the bridge of your nose and crossed your arms over your chest. You honestly didn't know what to do with this man anymore.

Rafayel seemed almost sheepish, but he had gained control of his emotions and schooled them to appear nonchalant about the ordeal. "Well, I wanted to let them walk around a bit before I cooked then," he said, already a bad start to this story. And then they just surrounded me…I think they assume I'm their king."

You gave him the most deadpan stare you could muster, smacking your lips together, "Okay…so why are their claws unhooked?" you asked next. You knew damn well at the seafood market; they had tied the crab's claws so they didn't get any funny ideas before they died.

"It felt too constricting for them," Rafayel said, "And as their leader, I needed to do what was right by my people,"

"Are you sure they chose you as their king?" you finally asked, "It looks more like you're going to be sacrificed," Rafayel's eyes widened. He placed a hand over his heart and gave you the most offended look he could muster.

"They would never," he gasped, now pouting with his lip jutting out. You looked down at the crabs and then back at him. Why were you even having this conversation in the first place? This was…was it too late to call a pizza place?

"Can you just…put them back in the pot and cook them, Raf?" you huffed. Rafayel looked away from you as he cleared his throat.

"So that's the issue," he said, "I don't wanna grab them. I tried before you arrived, and one snapped at me, and I don't know what to do now," oh so he was being held hostage by a bunch of crabs that should've been their damn dinner. "Can you help me out?" he said, doing his best puppy dog eyes for you.

You blinked slowly before sighing. You reach down to your thigh holster and pull out your gun, taking aim at the one directly in front of where Rafayel is standing. Before you could pull the trigger, you heard Rafayel screaming at you to stop, calling your name multiple times in a panic.

"Can you not?!" he shouted again, "You can't shoot them!" he said and looked at you like you were the crazy one here.

"It would solve the issue, wouldn't it?" You asked, "You were the one begging me for assistance, I came up with a solution, and now you're backing down," you huffed in annoyance, "Such beta bitch behavior,"

Rafayel was stunned to silence, but that only stopped him for a moment, "Did you call me a beta bitch?" he finally muttered, and you smirked.

"Uh ya? Now we either do this my way, or I'm going to chill in the living room and order pizza while you figure…" you motioned towards the floor, "This out."

"Call Thomas?" he finally asked, and you thought for a moment…why hadn't you considered doing that. You pulled out your phone and dialed the man's number, letting it ring a few times before he finally picked up. 

You heard him calling your name in a confused tone: "Hey, is there anything I can help you with?" He was always the professional one, it would seem.

"Thomas, we need help at the studio ASAP." you began, "And yes, this is an actual emergency this time," you didn't even let him reply as you got your phone and took a photo of the situation. "I'm sending over the situation,"

Thomas was silent as he checked out the image, and then suddenly, you heard a loud sigh and a click as he hung up. You paused and looked at the phone, then back over to Rafayel, "Well…looks like you're on your own, bye babes," you turned around and began your journey toward the living room.

You heard Rafayel shouting your name a few times, trying to get you to come back. He could figure it out. He got himself into this mess, and he can get himself out. You, however, would not be risking getting pinched by a crab today.

Imma be frfr I ain't touching live crabs. No freaking way. I am baby.

[just-some-guy-joust]

im stubborn and i like talking here's the reasons i put every character i did in side a into the tourney. I'll do side b later cause i gotta go to bed soon

important first note, quite a few of my decisions were because i was trying to get women in here and it was getting desperate because i had to cut out a lot of women for only being "just some guy" because they were written by a misogynist that made her sit on the sidelines and cheer for the male leads. The Woman Situation Is Always So Fucking Dire.

anyways on to the actual contestants im gonna start with the characters that have been causing the most people to start up shit about them not being just some guy

barry bluejeans (taz balance): 2 submissions, personal bias. i think a lot of people are misunderstanding what this tournament is tbh. this isnt about the "normal" characters, tho normalcy does play a factor in it. this is about dudes who are just some guy. there is a difference. barry is a dnd npc who wears blue jeans in a fantasy world and he loves his wife. yes he is a lich. yes he is involved in the main plot. he's also just chillin. like if the plot didn't happen the way it did barry would be playing sudoku or crosswords. he'd be an average man in a very fantasy world. he is so average and human its funny. he is just some guy

tommy (hlvrai): 1 submission, personal bias. his just some guy energy is so there. he gets a propeller hat that does nothing when all of his crew is getting cool guns and upgrades. his life goal is to go home and take his dog for a walk. he gets a chuck e cheese birthday party. he sounds like he's going to burst into tears at any moment. compared to the rest of the crew, tommy is comedically just some guy

ulala (persona 2): 1 submission, description swayed me. it described the list of characters in persona 2 and ulala was just "your roommate that wanted to go to a party". that's hilarious. also i was getting fucking desperate for women that didn't suck ass as i stated above

apollo (ace attorney): 2 submissions, personal bias, descriptions swayed me. yall the submissions for him were so fucking funny. he's just a lawyer. he just wants to do his job but he lives in the ace attorney universe so everything is fucked all the time. he would've been a normal lawyer if he hadn't met phoenix wright. he's just chillin.

ok now here's every other character

sasha james (tma): 1 submission, friend bias, good description. i asked r if i should put her in because they know tma and they said yes. submission described her as loving to organize and avoided many monsters by being just some guy.

reigen arataka (mp100): 2 submissions. i thought it'd be funny and i was right. he is also just a normal man pretending he's not and he refuses to give up the bit he 100% deserves to be here

joy (underworld office): 1 submission, friend bias. the mc is going through wild ghost related problems and she's just going . hey man. you good??? r's sister submitted her and im not letting her down dude she's awesome

junpei (zero escape): 3 submissions, personal bias. he is literally the only character who has no connection to the larger mystery he's just there because he loves 1 girl. he's PAINFULLY and VITALLY just a dude. i need him

horse (centaurworld): 1 submission. i thought it'd be really funny to include just a horse. her name is horse. thats fucking awesome dude

phone guy (fnaf): 2 submissions. he was the only character from fnaf that got more than 1 submission and there were like 9 fnaf submissions i kinda felt bad tbh. he was also the best example of just some guy out of all the fnaf submissions

gordon freeman (hlvrai): 1 submission. he is a guy playing a video game. he is the straight man to the rest of the crews antics and by god he plays his role well

joshua gillespie (tma): 4 submissions, friend bias, hilarious descriptions. he avoids getting killed because he's so good at following instructions despite him clearly supposed to be dying here. they said don't open the coffin so he didn't. simply don't tuesday

namari (dungeon meshi): 1 submission, personal bias. i like her c: she's pretty level headed compared to like. everyone else in laios's crew. she seems like somebody i could just be friends with and hang out with

shez (fire emblem): 3 submissions, hilarious descriptions. i might try getting into fire emblem because of this. ok so they got murdered in a previous game off screen and now they're the playable character of a new game in a new timeline and they're fucking everything up because they're just supposed to be some guy? thats so fucking funny holy shit i want to know more

henry stickmin (henry stickmin): 1 submission. henry stickmin. like idk i dont feel like i gotta explain this one he's a stickman

stanley (tsp): guaranteed entry

whole (chonny jash): 1 submission, friend bias. tbh i saw him and went oh fuck yeah thats the thing my friends like and then i put him in there. i dont actually know enough about chonny jash to say anything on this but i fully trust the submitter knew what they were doing

larry (pokemon): guaranteed entry

luke carder (inscryption): 1 submission, friend bias, good description. he is just a normal youtuber in the lore of the game. he fucking love card game. good for him man good for him

leorio (hxh): 3 submissions, friend bias, good descriptions. idk a lot about hxh but the descriptions of him compared to the other main characters was pretty convincing

barry the quokka (sonic): guaranteed entry

april o'neil (tmnt): 1 submission, friend bias. absolutely normal girl that just happens to be the one that found the turtles and become their friend

tsuzuru (a3!): 3 submissions, friend bias. descriptions definitely made him feel like a good fit. he's so good at being just some guy i actually thought he was a different character and was shocked when i went to grab images for the tourney and he wasnt the guy i thought he was. which is really funny. like who the fuck is he then. this didn't change my opinion or anything it was just so good

matt (woe.begone): 1 submission. woe.begone fans have ALWAYS been kind to me so they got some mod bias sprinkled in. i dont know what this guys deal is but in the dbtn tourney the guy who got in there had a giant fucking list of things that are happening to him all the time and apparently thats just what woe.begone is like so i believe it when told matt is normal in comparison. everything else is so batshit wild I Just Believe You

gilear (fantasy high): 2 submissions. he seems to be just a dad. wasn't going to get in at first tbh just for personal reasons but i was running out of characters that i felt actually fit the tournament well so ultimately he got in

emmet (lego movie): 4 submissions. honestly with the number of submissions we got, 4 submissions was basically a guaranteed entry. and emmet's whole story is about being just some guy

stahl (fire emblem): 1 submission, hilarious description. fire emblem fans are so funny. what do you mean he can only be perfectly average because everyone else improves/gets worse with him to keep him perfectly average. what the fuck. thats so good

doug (wolf359): 2 entries. i dont know jack shit about wolf359 and honestly the submissions didn't tell me a lot but it was enough to figure he qualifies and i was running out of characters that felt good for the tourney. i trust you wolf359 fans

jack townsend (tales from the gas station): 1 submission, good description. he works at an evil gas station and the description gave me no follow up on what an evil gas station is which is awesome. apparently the horrors are constantly happening and he's just kinda staring at them. he's not paid enough for this

frisk (undertale): guaranteed entry

brian pasternack (yuppie psycho): 1 submission. im gonna be super honest with you here. i dont remember. i know he qualifies but i have 0 thoughts about him. maybe thats a good thing in this tourney. he's an average office worker who has now been tasked with killing The Witch.

trevor (american arcadia): 4 submissions, personal bias, good descriptions. dude i fucking love american arcadia it's so fucking good what a nightmare. he's so normal they were going to kill him for not being entertaining enough

[jamethinks]

Dog breed hcs for the boys:

Both boys are mutts. Lots of mixing and mingling to create ideal dogs. Gives them lots of problems, but they're still lovable in the end.

Bond is a Great Pyrenees, Maremma Sheepdog, Kuvasz, and Clumber Spaniel mix. He's a massive dog with a thick double coat. He's surprisingly lazy for his blend but enjoys having work. He's clumsy, too, but that's for comedic purposes. A major issue for him is the tiny apartment. He's big and a guard dog mostly. He needs lots of space and things to protect. When they go to the park, he always ends up herding the kids or other dogs. He also loves herding Anya and forcing her to bed. He sometimes herds Loid if he stays up too late. He really does enjoy walks with Yor because she normally goes to large open spaces where he can run around. Sometimes, they bump into farms, and he starts herding the livestock. Since her epilepsy diagnosis, Bond has been extra attentive to Anya frequently guarding her, pulling her away from crowds, etc. He can also tell when she's about to have a seizure so he can alert Loid or Yor. He struggles a bit with self grooming and requires a lot of help in that field. Yor can spend up to an hour just brushing him. He also eats a lot of food and is prone to obesity so Loid has him on a strict diet. He has very powerful bark and can get very noisy when he's excited. He's massive, almost as tall as Yor when upright and weighs more Fiona (in her defense, she is tiny). Only Yor can easily pick him up, Anya can not even hold a paw. Loid genuinely think Bond would crush her by accident, so he's very weary about leaving the two alone. But in the end, he's a cuddle bug and likes to act like a lap dog much to everyone but Yor's frustration.

Aaron is a German Shepherd and Belgian Malinois mix (a few other breeds in there since he is also mutt). He's very smart, strong, and energetic. Surprisingly, the lazy Handler is actually very good at managing this beast. He's very well trained and even teaches himself a few additional tricks. He loves working and hates staying indoors all day, hence why Handler has to bring him to work or he'll destroy (actually clean) her apartment. Aaron is actually very young, between a year or two, so he's still extra energetic, breed aside. Handler actually loves having such a demanding dog. She used to train a lot of spies, but now she doesn't get the chance as often, so it's stimulating for her. Like I mentioned before, Aaron has taught himself a few additional tricks. He actually monitors Handler's blood sugar to make sure she's eating enough. First, he'll alert her, but if she ignores him, he'll bring her a snack. He also does this to other agents, so if Aaron starts approaching you, it's a clear sign you need to eat (or you're a rat). He can also tell when Fiona is coming and would leave to avoid setting off her allergies. Although he is very intelligent and skilled, he has anxiety from his time as a bomb dog so he can get a bit of stage fright and doesn't like being left alone or he'll start crying because he is still just a baby. He also can't handle fireworks and loud noises. Even gun shots scare him. He has to take anxiety meds and lots of time resting.

Bonus: Nightfall's cats

She has two Siberian Forest cats. One is like 100, weighs 25 pounds (not fat just objectively huge). He's about half the weight of Anya for context. Thick triple layer coat and barely sheds that fucker. The other one is a white kitten (say 6 months to a year), she's partially deaf. The older is extremely well trained, loves to play fetch and enjoys chasing people. Actually very close with Aaron who's always trying to play with him. He loves taking long walks and actually uses a leash. In other words, he's a cat that acts like a dog. People love it and are obsessed with him, but much like his owner, he's reserved and avoids people. The kitten is full of life and energy but still in the process of being trained. Strict ass Aaron always gives her a lesson in behaving (yes, Aaron can train cats. Just another hobby of his).

She has a third one, but it's a Sphynx and spends most of its days in the house cuddling everyone and everything.

[woodswolf]

Not sure how to phrase this in a complimentary way but I am really glad Captain Olimar isn't a real person with real feelings because I think your righteously vicious takedowns of his character would fucking kill him. Very very good. Extremely good.

(undoubtedly re: these tags)

oh listen anon. listen. listen listen listen listen listen:

did i ever say i wasn't going to say them to his face?

this is literally four sequels down the line (at least by the order im writing them) but the reckoning is coming. this guy is going to be forced to choose between his unwillingness to change in any way that matters and his journey and struggle meaning anything at all. he has never cared about the gun to his own head, but if he doesn't start he's never going to be happy. it takes a push with him, an impulse: something stronger than the friction holding him in his grating routines and comfortable, familiar miseries; something strong enough to overpower his every sense of shame.

dogs leading dogs as it is now is about knowledge and the learning of it and what that knowledge can help its adherents achieve. it's about two very flawed people who come together to mutually recognize the other's personhood, as unconventional as it may seem from their own perspective, and how that knowledge of personhood obtained during that quest can save them. how they can both use that knowledge to alter their perspectives, and how they can learn from each other as they do so: the pikmin learning independence, and olimar learning to accept change.

the problem is that olimar doesn't learn that. olimar learns just about the opposite of that, in fact. and it's going to take all of DLD2, and all of DLD3, and a good amount of DLD4 before anyone will have the will to scream at him with a gun to something he actually cares about, because god forbid would it ever be himself.

this guy is going to get skinned alive by something that knows him better than he knows himself. and he can either sit there and take it, or he can fight back. so it's a shame that he never fights under improbable odds, only the impossible or the certain. maybe if someone drove that like a railroad spike through his stupid stubborn skull he'd actually have a chance.

(on a less literarized note, id just like to say that pikmin 3 is a god tier character study for olimar because it takes a really special kind of person to get that fucked over by their own individual hubris, and an even more special kind of person for Olimar's Comeback to happen at all. (but that's for DLDP3, and by the time DLDP3 rolls around our single most important canon divergence has grown into such a canyon that Olimar's Comeback won't even happen at all. but you didn't hear that from me))

(and on a comedic yet entirely unexaggerated note, this guy's got 99 problems and the various methods by which he lies to himself to maintain a facade of normalcy and self-satisfaction and generally his inability to level with himself that everything wrong in his life is not fine is about 98 of them.)

[felixcloud6288]

Higurashi: Festival Accompanying Chapter 27

This is a Shion chapter.

I genuinely don't like how Shion was kept completely in the dark about what's been going on. I know I like to joke about how she isn't one of the main characters, but this is too much. Every other major character who's been involved across the story knows what's going on so why is Shion left out.

That shot of Tomitake is the same one from last chapter.

The comedic timing of Shion bragging about not being followed only for half a dozen vans to arrive at the Sonozaki residence.

This was probably a fun panel to draw. It looks like Suzuragi drew a template of one of the sisters and her speech bubble, copied and flipped the image, then drew the distinguishing features of both of them.

I had to stop and think for a moment when I realized that Keiichi, Rena, and Mion were the only ones who came out to greet Shion, Kasai, and Irie. I was wondering where Rika, Satoko, and Hanyu were.

Then it clicked: Rika is supposed to be dead, so they're not going to let her casually walk outside. And since Satoko and Hanyu were living with her, letting them be spotted would potentially clue Rika's enemies to where she is.

It makes perfect sense that the Sonozakis would have a surveillance system on their property, but it still feels surprising to find that out.

I like this panel.

One of the things that's annoyed me throughout this series is there's no sense of relative space in Hinamizawa. We know of various locations like Furude Shrine is up a long stairway and by a cliff overlooking the village. But there's not enough information to figure out how anyone would get from one location to another.

This panel doesn't really define where everything in the Sonozaki residence actually is, but it gives us a proper sense of scale about how big their property is.

Okonogi's ears grow longer and pointier the more sinister he gets.

As I said last chapter, the Wild Dogs are specialized in espionage, sabotage, and assassination. They are scarily competent during this chapter because they're doing what they're good at.

They leave no chances that anyone will find out what they're doing. First they cut the phone lines and then the power, and then they waited for the festival fireworks to go off so they could use the sounds to camouflage their blowing open the gates.

And now I need to take an aside for something. In the timelines where the Hinamizawa Disaster happens, the village is closed off for twenty years. This closure goes as far as preventing planes from flying over the village.

Some aspects of Operation Apocalypse aren't exactly neat and clean. Phone lines were cut, people tried to escape and were gunned down, etc.

If Operation Apocalyse were to happen in this timeline, there would be some incidental things such as Irie's wrecked car having gunshots on it and the destroyed bomb shelter gates at the Sonozaki residence that some intrepid reporter might discover and question.

So I think the reason Hinamizawa gets closed off for twenty years is to ensure all potential evidence to some form of sabotage becomes indistinguishable from the rot and decay that would happen after several decades.

Back to the story. Shion gets her moment to shine and gets to have her conclusion to her story as one of the Rule X targets. Keiichi and Rena already had theirs during Atonement, but now Shion and Mion finally make peace over their childhood mixup.

In Eye Opening, the sisters' mixup was a source of anger and jealousy for Shion because she believed the Sonozakis were behind Satoshi's disappearance and if it hadn't happened, Shion could have saved him.

But in this world, Shion knows that's not the case. Instead, the mixup is a source of guilt. Here they are, facing off against a secret organization planning to destroy the village. Mion is caught in the middle and made to take command not just because she's Rika's friend, but also because she's the next head of the Sonozaki Estate.

Meanwhile, Shion wasn't involved at all and is only here by happenstance. If that childhood mixup had never happened, Shion would be the one taking charge and handling the responsibility while Mion would be able to live a peaceful life instead.

That ladder terrifies me. It's not even really a ladder. It's two metal pipes embedded in the wall with footgrips embedded into the wall.

Cute girl with a gun. Shion stonks go up!

I wanna guess Suzuragi drew the gun by tracing much of it from pictures of the actual gun model and then saved it as a separate object that she would paste onto a panel and then draw around. The amount of detail on the gun always seems to be one level higher than everything else in each panel it shows up in.

I know this arc existed first and Beyond Midnight was made later, but I really love this callback to the arc. In Beyond Midnight, Mion fought and "died" to give Shion the life she should have had: The life of the leader of the Sonozakis. And now Shion is about to fight and die to ensure Mion has the life she should have had: A peaceful life with those she loves.

And when both of them are about to face their deaths, they had the same message they wanted to pass onto their sister:

Admittedly, Shion also doesn't feel like she has anything to lose. She thinks Satoshi is dead. And rather than being jealous of Mion's relation with Keichii, Shion wants to ensure they can be together.

It's a big dramatic moment and all, but Shion's actions kind of get squandered because Rika refuses to let her and Kasai stay behind. So when the Wild Dogs get past the two of them, Rika and her friends are found immediately. And now they're caught in a dilemma. Shion and Kasai have been taken hostage and everyone has to decide between protecting Rika and Irie or saving Shion and Kasai.

back

[delugedecade]

Scooby-Doo (as in the 2002 Movie)

forcefully review as watched by Deluge

spoilers, obviously, but then again, I’m the one watching it for the first time.

We're finally here. The first live action movie.

They start with a rap style Scooby Doo into? Well it is early 2000s

They CGI'd Shaggy's running, lol

Of course, kid friendly movie, magic physics defying skirt on Velma

This factory is pretty skatepark shaped.

You can really hear that Lillard just doesn't have the voice just right yet.

Who the fuck? What the fuck?

Oh she owns the factory.

Fred having fans like this is weird.

All this for not going out with him. cringe

HE SAID THE THING

Damn, starting and already breaking up the band.

Oh yeah, the weed joke.

I just had to search up hydrocolonic....

Velma works at NASA.

Getting the gang back together, one awkward meeting at a time

The origin of black belt Daphne

At least Daphne had some enthusiasm in asking Velma and Fred to join.

That's a really wide middle aisle.

THERE'S A TIKI BAR ON THE PLANE?

Oh boy, Shaggy being interested in something that isn't Scoob or Food? Can't be good

People really are dumb enough to not notice the dog.

Scooby Snacks are vegetarian? Didn't they say it was meaty in Phantosaur?

I stand corrected, Phantosaur called it Meat-Berry Medley. So it is a meat substitute.

Another Weed Joke.

ROWAN ATKINSON!

Scooby really just said no to stranger danger

Some real leaps of logic from you there Daphne

Spooky monster, but also pretty bad cgi

I kinda just realized the voodoo thing might just be voodoo chicken

Mindless Zombie 'Fred Walks in', I feel there's a joke there.

Fred really does sound pretty condescending.

He pulled the himbo card. I think. With the dorky chicks line.

Wow that 'hypno' video was cringe

HE SAID THE THING! ARE YOU CHALLENGING ME!

Okay, it devolved into fart jokes...

Three suspects already, but I do feel like they're red herrings.

Again, Voodoo might just be voodoo chicken.

Daemon Ritus definitely sounds like the main lead.

Though trying to solve a mystery only to be found out sounds like a dumb idea, but i suppose pinning it on someone else is a plan

A flashback? really?

Holy shit Scrappy. HOLY SHIT IT'S GOTTA BE SCRAPPY BEHIND THIS! CHECKOV'S GUN

She's definitely drunk.

ohno there's two of them

Oh no there's three of them

HE SAID THE TITLE!

Slightly comedic CGI

I feel that the coast guard are just there thinking its a joke.

Beyotch, yo they slipped an almost swear

this is pretty wild so far.

Mary Jane is a monster by the looks of it

Nothings beats a man and his dog best friend

Hmmm

Okay yeah this CGI does look pretty bad.

Monster explode in the day

Also, they gave Velma cleavage.

OH BOY BODY SWAP

Good it didn't last too long

Never mind, Voodoo guy isn't making voodoo chicken.

Okay, Emile is bad because he knows Mary Jane's monster form

Okay, this is surprisingly touching

The power of Dance-Fu

God Fred, shut up.

Again, Best Buds between a man and his dog

The subtle hints of the original Scooby Doo Theme

A Robot?

Yep, Scrappy Doo is the villain.

Yeah Daphne Black Belt!

Yeah! Pop Rock Scooby Doo theme!

Yeah take that Scrappy

They really made a moment for each gang to have a special.

Velma finally having her moment Let's go!

Oooooh, He almost swore

I forgot this was by James Gunn

Painful going down. and about to be painful going out.

This was filmed in Queensland? Nice

Yeah, not bad. Really did feel like all the pieces of the mystery fit well while still keeping the intrigue.

9/10

@submissiveking99 @tokufan400 @freeusemuses @asexxxualauthor

[adamwatchesmovies]

Rampant (2018)

I keep track of every movie I watch and make a point to write a review for it to grow my library but also to see how my feelings and tastes change over time. When I saw Rampant four years ago, I gave it 3.5/5. I saw that it received mixed critical reviews and couldn’t understand why. Now, I do.

Set during the Joseon dynasty, a plot to overthrow King Lee Jo (Kim Rui-Sung) accidentally releases a plague in a nearby village. The infected turn into highly contagious, flesh-eating 'night demons'. As their numbers grow, Crown Prince Lee Chung (Hyun Bin) and his companion Hak-soo (Jeong Man-sik) must contain this threat while schemers attempt to topple the throne.

I will grant Rampant that the production is first-rate. A lot of zombie films are made on the cheap but not this one. There are A LOT of zombies, with fairly elaborate makeup (no memorable designs, but they’re also not that kind of zombies). The action is set hundreds of years ago, so they couldn’t use any modern costumes or locations. Everything had to be built. The setting automatically makes this film different from most of the ones you’ve seen before. There are primitive guns, but this is not a movie where “Go for the head!” applies. There are bows and arrows but those aren’t as effective either; most combat involves edge weapons. The stakes are also different. A good chunk of the film has the palace overrun with “night demons”, with Prince Lee Chung and his allies trying to keep them contained so they cannot attack the surrounding city and spread to the entire country. Then, there’s the political stuff, which adds some human villains that don’t feel superfluous to the plot - they’re the ones who caused the plague. Even when things get apocalyptic, Minister Kim (Jang Dong-gun) and his cronies aren’t giving up their quest for more power.

I saw all that the first time I viewed Rampant and somehow, it made me overlook the characters. There’s no one to like in this movie. You might think that’s deliberate when we meet Prince Lee Chung, who’s been convinced to leave his womanizing over in Qing (China) to come over. At first, he only cares about someone if he can lure them into his bedroom (don’t get excited, there’s no sex or nudity in this film whatsoever) but over time readies himself to take on the responsibilities he’ll inherit with the throne. No. What I mean is that you won’t like anyone because they’re all boring. Even our protagonist. He essentially turns into a completely different person once he sees the zombies and while his skirt-chasing was annoying, at least it made him stand out. The same can’t be said for the badass survivors he meets when he lands in Jemulpo. You won’t be able to remember a thing about them the second they walk off-camera. That might be better than the worst character in the entire film, Prince Lee Chung’s companion, Hak-Su. Why director Kim Sung-hoon or writer Hwang Jo-yoon decided to include a comedic sidekick in this horror/action/thriller, I have no idea. At one point, he’s being attacked by zombies. It would take a miracle for him to make it out alive, and one of the last things he says to his companion is “Watch out for dog shit on the street”. If the character doesn’t care about his situation, why should we? As for the villains, they're important in theory, but once the plague gets out of control, all of them get wiped out and Minister Kim doesn't matter anymore. The things that interested us at first are all get taken away.

As a zombie movie, Rampant fails because it never does the thing you expect zombie movies to do, the thing that makes them effective: It never has someone meaningful to the main character turn or get bitten so they can feel conflicted about what's about to happen. In theory, the film has high stakes but in execution, everything feels low-key. One of the main reasons being that there are only about three scares in the whole movie and none of them appear past the halfway mark. The pieces to make a great, memorable and unique zombie movie were here but you couldn’t tell by the end result.

And now, I find myself in a strange position. The first time I viewed Rampant, I had a good time. During this second viewing, I just kept getting madder and madder at Prince Lee Chung and Hak-Su. I suddenly noticed all of the movie’s flaws. It just shows that moods and tastes change but can I recommend the film, or can’t I? I'm not sure but let me put it this way: I’m not watching Rampant a third time to get a tie-breaker review. (Original Korean with English subtitles, September 6, 2024)

[nel-world]

funny scene

Movies "Step Brothers" (2008) - Bunk Bed Scene

Dale: "Hey, you awake?" Brennan: "Yeah." Dale: "I just had the craziest dream. I was driving a helicopter with a cat." Brennan: "Did we just become best friends?" Dale: "Yup!" "Shaun of the Dead" (2004) - Don't Stop Me Now

Shaun: "Okay, Diane, kill the Queen!" David: "What?" Shaun: "The jukebox!" "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" (2005) - Waxing Scene

Andy: "Oooooh! Kelly Clarkson!" "Hot Fuzz" (2007) - The Model Village

Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever fired two guns whilst jumping through the air?" Danny Butterman: "No." Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever fired one gun whilst jumping through the air?" Danny Butterman: "No." Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever been in a high-speed pursuit?" Danny Butterman: "Yes, I have." Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever fired a gun whilst in a high-speed pursuit?" Danny Butterman: "No." "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story" (2004) - The 5 D's of Dodgeball

Patches O'Houlihan: "If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball." Justin: "What?" [Patches throws a wrench at Justin] TV Shows "Friends" (Season 5, Episode 8 - "The One with the Thanksgiving Flashbacks")

Joey: "Set another place for Thanksgiving. My entire family thinks I have VD." Ross: "Tonight, on a very special Blossom." "The Office" (U.S.) (Season 5, Episode 23 - "Michael Scott Paper Company")

Michael: "Well, well, well, how the turntables…" Jim: "Have turned." "Parks and Recreation" (Season 5, Episode 14 - "Leslie and Ben")

Ben: "I am super chill all the time." Leslie: "Oh, Ben, you beautiful spineless jellyfish." "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (Season 5, Episode 22 - "Jake & Amy")

Jake: "Cool. Cool cool cool cool cool cool cool, no doubt no doubt no doubt no doubt." Amy: "Are you okay?" Jake: "Totally." "Arrested Development" (Season 3, Episode 9 - "S.O.B.s")

Lucille: "I don't understand the question, and I won't respond to it." "New Girl" (Season 2, Episode 15 - "Cooler")

Nick: "Not a chance, Jessica Day. I’d rather kiss a toilet seat!" Jess: "I’m about to say something serious. I hope you’re ready. I think I’m too drunk to marry you." "How I Met Your Mother" (Season 1, Episode 15 - "Game Night")

Barney: "Legendary!" Marshall: "What's the opposite of eating? Isn't it barfing?" "Community" (Season 3, Episode 4 - "Remedial Chaos Theory")

Troy: "I’m a sexy dracula." Abed: "You mean vampire." Troy: "I don’t need to know which dracula I am to know I’m sexy." These scenes offer a variety of humor from slapstick to clever wordplay, showcasing the comedic talents

Movies "The Hangover" (2009) - Wake-Up Scene

Alan: "Hey, guys, you ready to let the dogs out?" Stu: "What?" Alan: "You know, let the dogs out. Who, who?" "Groundhog Day" (1993) - Ned Ryerson Scene

Ned: "Phil? Phil Connors? I thought that was you! Hi, how you doing? Ned Ryerson! Needle-nose Ned? Ned the Head? Come on, buddy. Case Western High? Ned Ryerson?" Phil: "Bing!" "Mean Girls" (2004) - Kevin Gnapoor's Rap

Kevin: "All you sucka MCs ain't got nothing on me. From my grades to my lines, you can't touch Kevin G. I'm a mathlete, so nerd is inferred, but forget what you heard, I'm like James Bond the Third. Shaken, not stirred, I'm Kevin Gnapoor. The G is silent when I sneak in your door." "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective" (1994) - The Opening Scene

Ace Ventura: "Mmmmm, yes, Satan? Oh, I’m sorry, sir. You sounded like someone else." "The Princess Bride" (1987) - The Battle of Wits

Vizzini: "You fell victim to one of the classic blunders. The most famous is never get involved in a land war in Asia, but only slightly less well-known is this: Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!" TV Shows "Friends" (Season 3, Episode 2 - "The One Where No One's Ready")

Joey: "Look at me, I'm Chandler. Could I BE wearing any more clothes?" Chandler: "I'm not looking at you. I'm looking at the pillows." "The Office" (U.S.) (Season 7, Episode 19 - "Garage Sale")

Michael: "Holly Flax, marrying me will you be?" Holly: "Your wife becoming will I." "Parks and Recreation" (Season 2, Episode 10 - "Hunting Trip")

Ron: "I have cried twice in my life. Once when I was seven and I was hit by a school bus, and then again when I heard that Li'l Sebastian had passed." "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (Season 3, Episode 3 - "Boyle's Hunch")

Jake: "Title of your sex tape." Boyle: "What's the plan?" Jake: "Title of your sex tape." "How I Met Your Mother" (Season 2, Episode 9 - "Slap Bet")

Marshall: "You just got slapped! Bet you're feeling pretty stupid right about now. Slapsgiving is upon us!" Barney: "That was three slaps ago, Slap God!" "Scrubs" (Season 2, Episode 1 - "My Overkill")

Dr. Cox: "Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to present, Man Not Caring." J.D.: "I care, I just don't care about you." "Community" (Season 1, Episode 23 - "Modern Warfare")

Jeff: "Come with me if you don't want paint on your clothes." Abed: "Cool. Cool cool cool." "Archer" (Season 2, Episode 4 - "Pipeline Fever")

Archer: "Do you want ants? Because that's how you get ants." These additional scenes highlight the comedic brilliance

TV Shows "Friends" (Season 5, Episode 14 - "The One Where Everybody Finds Out")

Phoebe and Rachel discover that Monica and Chandler are secretly dating. Phoebe and Chandler engage in a hilarious seduction standoff, culminating in Chandler's confession. "The Office" (U.S.) (Season 5, Episode 13 - "Stress Relief")

Dwight's fire drill prank leads to chaos and hilarity in the office, with memorable moments like Stanley's heart attack and Angela throwing her cat into the ceiling. "Parks and Recreation" (Season 4, Episode 11 - "The Comeback Kid")

Leslie's team tries to set up a campaign rally in a gym, resulting in a series of comedic disasters, including a tiny ice rink and a disastrous entrance down a slippery ramp. "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (Season 1, Episode 6 - "Halloween")

Jake bets Captain Holt that he can steal his Medal of Valor before midnight, leading to a series of elaborate and humorous heist antics. "Seinfeld" (Season 8, Episode 9 - "The Abstinence")

George becomes a genius when he stops having sex, leading to a series of funny scenes where he impresses everyone with his newfound intellect, while Elaine's lack of sex makes her dumber. These scenes are just a small sampling

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy" (2004) - News Team Fight

Ron Burgundy: "Boy, that escalated quickly… I mean, that really got out of hand fast!" Brian Fantana: "It jumped up a notch." Brick Tamland: "Yeah, I stabbed a man in the heart." Ron Burgundy: "I saw that! Brick killed a guy. Did you throw a trident?" "Dumb and Dumber" (1994) - The Toilet Scene

Harry: "Lloyd, what are you doing?" Lloyd: "It feels good to mingle with these laid-back country folk, don't it, Harry?" Harry: "I like it a lot." "The Naked Gun" (1988) - Baseball Scene

Frank Drebin: "Strike? Strike? All right, let me check one more thing." [Frank dances around in exaggerated umpire gestures] TV Shows "Friends" (Season 5, Episode 14 - "The One Where Everybody Finds Out")

Phoebe: "They don't know that we know they know we know!" Chandler: "All right, enough! No one is sleeping with anyone!" "The Office" (U.S.) (Season 5, Episode 13 - "Stress Relief")

Dwight: "Today, smoking is going to save lives." Michael: "Oh, my God! It's happening! Everybody stay calm!" Oscar: "What's the procedure, everyone? What's the procedure?" "Parks and Recreation" (Season 4, Episode 11 - "The Comeback Kid")

Leslie: "Oh my God, everything is falling apart." Ben: "I think this ice rink was a mistake." Tom: "I have never been more embarrassed in my entire life." "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (Season 1, Episode 6 - "Halloween")

Jake: "I stole your Medal of Valor!" Holt: "Impossible!" Jake: "Well, then, what’s this?" Holt: "My Medal of Valor!" "Seinfeld" (Season 8, Episode 9 - "The Abstinence")

George: "My mind is like a computer." Jerry: "So what are you gonna do now?" George: "I think I’ll read a book. From beginning to end. In that order." Elaine: "I don’t know what’s happening to me, Jerry. I think I'm getting dumber." These dialogues capture the humor

their dialogues:

Movies "Superbad" (2007) - McLovin Scene

Officer Michaels: "What's your name?" Fogell: "Uh, it's McLovin." Officer Slater: "McLovin? What kind of a stupid name is that, Fogell? What, are you trying to be an Irish R&B singer?" Fogell: "No, they let you pick any name you want when you get down there." Officer Michaels: "And you landed on McLovin?" Fogell: "Yeah, it was between that or Muhammad." Officer Slater: "Why the hell would it be between that or Muhammad?" "Mrs. Doubtfire" (1993) - Dinner Scene

Mrs. Doubtfire (Daniel): "It was a run-by fruiting!" Stu: "What?" Mrs. Doubtfire (Daniel): "I saw it! Some angry member of the kitchen staff. Did you not tip them? Oh, the terrorists, they ran that way. It was a run-by fruiting." "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" (1986) - Ben Stein's Classroom

Economics Teacher: "In 1930, the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, in an effort to alleviate the effects of the… Anyone? Anyone? The Great Depression, passed the… Anyone? Anyone? The tariff bill? The Hawley-Smoot Tariff Act? Which, anyone? Raised or lowered… raised tariffs, in an effort to collect more revenue for the federal government. Did it work? Anyone? Anyone know the effects? It did not work, and the United States sank deeper into the Great Depression." "Zoolander" (2001) - The Gasoline Fight

Derek Zoolander: "Moisture is the essence of wetness, and wetness is the essence of beauty." [Cut to the gasoline fight scene] Derek: "Orange Mocha Frappuccino!" [Friends start spraying each other with gasoline] [The scene ends in a hilarious but tragic explosion] "Bridesmaids" (2011) - The Dress Shop

Annie: "This is some classy sh—" [gets interrupted by stomach cramps] Lillian: "Annie, are you okay?" Annie: "I'm fine, I just… there's something in my stomach…" Megan: "It's happening. It happened." Lillian: "What did you do?" Megan: "I crapped in the sink." TV Shows "Friends" (Season 4, Episode 12 - "The One with the Embryos")

Ross: "What is Chandler Bing's job?" Rachel: "Oh gosh, it has something to do with numbers… and processing… uh… he carries a briefcase…" Monica: "No! It's… something to do with transponding." Chandler: "I’m sorry, the answer we were looking for was 'Transponster!'" Monica: "That's not even a word!" "The Office" (U.S.) (Season 4, Episode 5 - "Dinner Party")

Michael: "Jan and I have a safe word in case things go too far… Fleischmann’s Margarine." Jim: "That's two words." Michael: "Compound word." "Parks and Recreation" (Season 3, Episode 13 - "The Fight")

Ron: "I regret nothing. The end." Leslie: "Ron, how did you get here?" Ron: "I have no idea." "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (Season 2, Episode 22 - "The Chopper")

Jake: "Tell me about the dream, Scully." Scully: "I was in a chopper. It was raining meatballs." Jake: "Was it awesome?" Scully: "Yeah, it was awesome." "Arrested Development" (Season 1, Episode 2 - "Top Banana")

Gob: "I’m gonna build an airport, put my name on it. Why, Michael?" Michael: "So you can fly away from your problems?" Gob: "No, because it’s the only way to get to Hawaii." These scenes and dialogues are iconic

with dialogue:

Movies "The Hangover" (2009) - Wake-Up Scene

Alan: "Hey, guys, you ready to let the dogs out?" Stu: "What?" Alan: "You know, let the dogs out. Who, who?" "Groundhog Day" (1993) - Ned Ryerson Scene

Ned: "Phil? Phil Connors? I thought that was you! Hi, how you doing? Ned Ryerson! Needle-nose Ned? Ned the Head? Come on, buddy. Case Western High? Ned Ryerson?" Phil: "Bing!" "Mean Girls" (2004) - Kevin Gnapoor's Rap

Kevin: "All you sucka MCs ain't got nothing on me. From my grades to my lines, you can't touch Kevin G. I'm a mathlete, so nerd is inferred, but forget what you heard, I'm like James Bond the Third. Shaken, not stirred, I'm Kevin Gnapoor. The G is silent when I sneak in your door." "Ace Ventura: Pet Detective" (1994) - The Opening Scene

Ace Ventura: "Mmmmm, yes, Satan? Oh, I’m sorry, sir. You sounded like someone else." "The Princess Bride" (1987) - The Battle of Wits

Vizzini: "You fell victim to one of the classic blunders. The most famous is never get involved in a land war in Asia, but only slightly less well-known is this: Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!" TV Shows "Friends" (Season 3, Episode 2 - "The One Where No One's Ready")

Joey: "Look at me, I'm Chandler. Could I BE wearing any more clothes?" Chandler: "I'm not looking at you. I'm looking at the pillows." "The Office" (U.S.) (Season 7, Episode 19 - "Garage Sale")

Michael: "Holly Flax, marrying me will you be?" Holly: "Your wife becoming will I." "Parks and Recreation" (Season 2, Episode 10 - "Hunting Trip")

Ron: "I have cried twice in my life. Once when I was seven and I was hit by a school bus, and then again when I heard that Li'l Sebastian had passed." "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (Season 3, Episode 3 - "Boyle's Hunch")

Jake: "Title of your sex tape." Boyle: "What's the plan?" Jake: "Title of your sex tape." "How I Met Your Mother" (Season 2, Episode 9 - "Slap Bet")

Marshall: "You just got slapped! Bet you're feeling pretty stupid right about now. Slapsgiving is upon us!" Barney: "That was three slaps ago, Slap God!" "Scrubs" (Season 2, Episode 1 - "My Overkill")

Dr. Cox: "Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to present, Man Not Caring." J.D.: "I care, I just don't care about you." "Community" (Season 1, Episode 23 - "Modern Warfare")

Jeff: "Come with me if you don't want paint on your clothes." Abed: "Cool. Cool cool cool." "Archer" (Season 2, Episode 4 - "Pipeline Fever")

Archer: "Do you want ants? Because that's how you get ants." These additional scenes highlight th

with memorable dialogues:

Movies "Step Brothers" (2008) - Bunk Bed Scene

Dale: "Hey, you awake?" Brennan: "Yeah." Dale: "I just had the craziest dream. I was driving a helicopter with a cat." Brennan: "Did we just become best friends?" Dale: "Yup!" "Shaun of the Dead" (2004) - Don't Stop Me Now

Shaun: "Okay, Diane, kill the Queen!" David: "What?" Shaun: "The jukebox!" "The 40-Year-Old Virgin" (2005) - Waxing Scene

Andy: "Oooooh! Kelly Clarkson!" "Hot Fuzz" (2007) - The Model Village

Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever fired two guns whilst jumping through the air?" Danny Butterman: "No." Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever fired one gun whilst jumping through the air?" Danny Butterman: "No." Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever been in a high-speed pursuit?" Danny Butterman: "Yes, I have." Nicholas Angel: "Have you ever fired a gun whilst in a high-speed pursuit?" Danny Butterman: "No." "Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story" (2004) - The 5 D's of Dodgeball

Patches O'Houlihan: "If you can dodge a wrench, you can dodge a ball." Justin: "What?" [Patches throws a wrench at Justin] TV Shows "Friends" (Season 5, Episode 8 - "The One with the Thanksgiving Flashbacks")

Joey: "Set another place for Thanksgiving. My entire family thinks I have VD." Ross: "Tonight, on a very special Blossom." "The Office" (U.S.) (Season 5, Episode 23 - "Michael Scott Paper Company")

Michael: "Well, well, well, how the turntables…" Jim: "Have turned." "Parks and Recreation" (Season 5, Episode 14 - "Leslie and Ben")

Ben: "I am super chill all the time." Leslie: "Oh, Ben, you beautiful spineless jellyfish." "Brooklyn Nine-Nine" (Season 5, Episode 22 - "Jake & Amy")

Jake: "Cool. Cool cool cool cool cool cool cool, no doubt no doubt no doubt no doubt." Amy: "Are you okay?" Jake: "Totally." "Arrested Development" (Season 3, Episode 9 - "S.O.B.s")

Lucille: "I don't understand the question, and I won't respond to it." "New Girl" (Season 2, Episode 15 - "Cooler")

Nick: "Not a chance, Jessica Day. I’d rather kiss a toilet seat!" Jess: "I’m about to say something serious. I hope you’re ready. I think I’m too drunk to marry you." "How I Met Your Mother" (Season 1, Episode 15 - "Game Night")

Barney: "Legendary!" Marshall: "What's the opposite of eating? Isn't it barfing?" "Community" (Season 3, Episode 4 - "Remedial Chaos Theory")

Troy: "I’m a sexy dracula." Abed: "You mean vampire." Troy: "I don’t need to know which dracula I am to know I’m sexy." These scenes offer a

[watching-pictures-move]

Movie Review | Lethal Weapon 2 (Donner, 1989)

Spoilers in the last paragraph.

Decided to give this another go after rewatching the original last night. I do think is starts to settle into buddy cop action comedy cliches, but it retains some of the verve of the original and doesn’t quite play like the action sitcoms that the series would later turn into. In large part that’s because Richard Donner keeps things moving fast enough so that the stupidity or broadness of some of what transpires goes down a lot easier. Putting aside the comedic elements, which for the record continue to get big laughs out of me, it takes at least a third of the movie for them to realize that the accent on the Krugerrand smugglers is South African. So perhaps our heroes are not LAPD’s best and brightest. And the contrivances to keep Leo Getz hanging around are a bit obvious, although Joe Pesci brings an amusing puppy dog energy in the scenes he actually keeps his mouth shut.

And on that note, it helps that you’ve got some great and reprehensible villains in Apartheid South Africa. (Actually a South African diplomat using diplomatic cover to funnel drugs and/or Krugerrands, but close enough.) It’s interesting that unlike a lot of movies flirting with geopolitical elements, this one doesn’t try to distinguish the villains from the regime or compartmentalize them as bad actors. In an alternate universe, there’s a junkier Cannon Films version of this where Murtaugh and Riggs fly down to Cape Town to blow away P.W. Botha. As it is, they have to settle for some really juicy bad guys played by Joss Ackland and Derrick O’Connor. Anyway, Riggs’ indignation around the subject is a little jarring in light of… you know… so this might be the only time Mel Gibson has ever had good politics.

It probably says something that the parts I remembered best about the original were the more spectacular moments, like the jumper scene, the desert ambush, the foot chase and the final fight scene, while the ones I remembered best from this one were “They fuck you at the drive-thru!”, “Diplomatic immunity!”, Murtaugh making a scene at the embassy, and characters saying “Krugerrands” a billion times. (Take a shot with each utterance, die of alcohol poisoning.) Those moments are all great, but I should note that the action played a lot better this time around. I love how much of it is set at night and complemented by the steely blue lighting. And this one has, at least on a technical level, a much better climactic fight scene, that almost feels like shadow play as you see the fighters’ silhouettes from a distance. I also like that Murtaugh gets some of the juicier moments of violence. Obviously the great final kill, but also fucking up some bad guys with a nail gun. And any movie with cool helicopter shit is automatically a good movie, and this has a great nighttime helicopter attack.

SPOILERS: All that being said, I found the movie’s attempt to create personal stakes a little off putting. The reveal that the villains were responsible for the death of Riggs’ wife feels like an afterthought, and Riggs seems more bothered by their killing of a character he just met than of his wife. And there’s the fact that the killing of all the other members of their unit has little gravitas given how little time we spend with any of them. The bad guys are easy enough to hate already, I don’t think these additional gestures really help the movie.

[chihirolovebot]

nvm doing this now . discussions of csm-typical grooming, sexualisation, pedophilia and whatnot below .

The base of my problem with calling Makima a pedophile has its roots in her characterisation. the simple fact of the matter is that she is not in any way attracted—romantically, sexually, or in any form—to Denji. Obviously this doesn't excuse her actions, because you're right, she does make sexual advances on him. But you mention you haven't engaged with CSM, so let me break it down for you.

For those who are unaware, the Chainsaw Devil, which Denji wields the power of, is pretty easily the strongest Devil in the verse, because devils grow stronger the more they are feared—however, the Chainsaw Devil is the only devil to be feared by other devils, making it way stronger than anything else.

The Chainsaw Devil also has the ability to 'eat' slash consume other Devils, thereby erasing the concept they represent. It's sort of difficult to explain, but for an example—if the Chainsaw Devil ate the Tomato Devil and erased it, tomatoes would cease to exist. At some point, Makima reveals to Kishibe that Chainsaw has eaten several devils pertaining to real-life historical events; she asks Kishibe, 'do you remember what the Nazis did to the Jews?' and he is visibly confused—it soon becomes apparent that Kishibe doesn't know what Nazis, or the Holocaust is, because Chainsaw 'ate' the WWII devil. It did something similar with the devils of AIDS, nuclear weapons, and several other fictional devils/events.

This is the primary reason Makima covets the Chainsaw Devil and seeks to control him; she wants to use this eating power in order to erase concepts she finds unnecessary or detrimental to mankind. The power of the Chainsaw Devil is in the hands of Denij—so she has to get control of Denji. How does she do that?

By ruining his entire life.

Makima sets Denji up with Aki and anther fiend, Power. They eventually form a tight familial bond, with Aki becoming the older brother figure, and power the bratty little sister to Denji. He's shown to care very deeply for them. And then, near the end of the manga, Makima sets them both up to be brutally murdered in the worst way possible. She has Aki fused with the devil that murdered his parents, the Gun Devil, which turns him into a mindless beast who tries to kill Denji and Power, forcing Denji to kill him in self-defence. After this, his spirit is broken. He goes to Makima and confesses he wants to be one of her dogs, so that she can tell him what to do, so that he doesn't have to think. After that, Makima murders Power right in front of him, leaving Denji overcome with emotion and releasing the full power of the Chainsaw Devil for her to control.

So now that the context is out of the way—you understand, hopefully, Makima's motivations for controlling Denji. Now let's look at the how.

Makima knows Denji. From the beginning, she knows he's the Chainsaw Devil, because she saw him use the power of it the first time she saw him. Denji's very first words to Makima are hold me, as he slumps into her arms. This tells her the two most important things about the boy she's stumbled across: he wields an insane power, and he craves comfort. This is more than enough for someone as cunning and manipulative as Makima to make some leaps in logic and determine how best to integrate herself into Denji's life.

Denji is a teenage boy. He doesn't know—and neither do we, at first—that what he craves above all else is romantic intimacy. Not necessarily sex. But because he is a teenage boy, this is what he perceives a relationship to be like. Denji's father was abusive, and so he has an inherent built-in distrust of men and places women on pedestals. This comes across both in serious and comedic moments:

But it all boils down to the idea of Denji seeking validation from women rather than men, and Makima uses this to her advantage. She knows that what Denji creaves is genuine intimate connection, and she plays on this. She sort of creepily becomes all the defining women in his life—playing into the seductress role, but also the maternal. One of my favourite ED sequences from the anime has this shot:

Makima is this angelic being, with Denji staring up in awe. Fujimoto stated that "Denji always yearned for maternal love,", that Makima and Denji's relationship was based on documentaries about child abuse, and that Makima's names comes from mama. So she is very very motherly-coded to Denji. But like I mentioned, she also plays the part he thinks he wants, hence the aforementioned sexual advances.

One of the most infamous scenes is after Denji is disappointed after touching Power's breasts, Makima tells him that sexual acts without intimacy feel empty. This is when she does things like bite his finger, caress his skin gently, and place his hand on her breast. Her dialogue is chilling in this particular scene. When she bites his finger, she asks, "Remember it so well that even if you go blind, you'll know it's me from the bite." Similarly, after Himeno kisses Denji and vomits in his mouth, Makima gives him a cola-flavoured lollipop to wash away the taste, literally overwriting the claim Himeno put on Denji's body with her own marker. Makima subtly works to make herself the only option in Denji's mind who can give him what he wants—both what he thinks/knows he wants (sexual gratification) and what he doesn't know he wants, but she does (maternal love and genuine connection).

Makima is not attracted to Denji. Makima, I think, is not attracted to anyone in particular. She's a weapon, a machine, raised by the government. She has a general want to be loved, but not by anyone in particular, and it's implied this is more the Control Devil inside of her than Makima herself, as Nayuta expresses this same desire when the Control Devil reincarnates into her. If Denji was eight years old, she'd play harder into the maternal figure, because it would make him easier to manipulate. Denji is sixteen in the canon timeline, so she plays a bit of both. If Denji were thirty-five, she'd find some way of making herself the most important person in his life, specifically by using his insecurities and internal biases of women in order to manipulate him and isolate him from the others. Even when Denji does get to care about other people, it's all orchestrated.

Makima's manipulation and cunning is right at the heart of her character. It's why I think referring to her as a pedophile is reductive in terms of her character, because she is not attracted to Denji. She sees what will manipulate him into coveting her and she does it. Pedophiles are what they are because they're attracted to children. Makima is not this. She's a child predator. She's a groomer. And these two terms feel far more fitting because they acknowledge the agency she had in her role in this relationship. She deliberately did this to Denji. She studied him, dissected his personality, isolated him from the world and broke him down emotionally and mentally. She did that. Not because he was a child, but because he was Denji.

I really hope this made sense. It's half past four in the morning but this has been sitting with me for ages. And if you have any clarifying questions please shoot and I'd be happy to answer them.

i havent seen csm is makina not the one who literally makes sexual advances on a teenager?? have i been misled??

tell u what i will break this down in the morning bc whilst i would never deny that makima is a child predator (!!!!!!!) i believe that simply referring to her as a pedophile is reductive bc of her character and denji’s . but it’s like 4 in the morning so i’ll explain it better after i’ve slept . definitely don’t take this as me defending her actions she sucks as a person so bad .

[heckyeahponyscans]

Hey folks, I live in Seattle and up till a couple years ago I lived on Capitol Hill. I still have friends living there.  So I thought I’d provide some local insight into the CHAZ (Capitol Hill Autonomous Zone).

There is a lot of misinformation out there, especially from Fox News, which photoshopped a gunman into pics, wow.

First, the best resources to find CHAZ info are local to Seattle: The Seattle Times, Capitol Hill Blog, and the CHAZ livestream where you can see the streets for yourself.

Capitol Hill is a very densely populated neighborhood full of apartment buildings and bustling restaurants and bars. If you work there, you live there (because it is hard to navigate by car, like NYC), and if you live there, you are probably super liberal. It’s also the center of counter-culture and LGBTQ culture in Seattle.

Are the protesters terrorizing the locals?

No, the protesters ARE the locals. They live in the many, many apartment buildings on Capitol Hill.  Having lived there for years, believe me when I say “fuck the police” is a prevalent opinion there even when there isn’t a nationwide protest.

Is there looting?  How are businesses protecting themselves?

The businesses are not being looted; they are open and are doing a booming business. The supply chain hasn’t been broken so they aren’t running out of goods. Also, a lot of workers / business owners ARE protesters.

I saw a picture of Seattle on fire!

Actually you saw a picture of a protest in Minnesota that Fox News pretended was Seattle because they are frauds and shills.

How big is the Autonomous Zone?

Six square blocks.

How did this situation come about?

There was a peaceful march.  The mayor abruptly set a 5 pm curfew.  The protesters ignored it and marched anyway.  Then the police set up barricades to stop the march.  The cops started using tear-gas and flash-bangs and the situation devolved from there. (You can find videos of this on Capitol Hill Blog.)  What prompted the tear-gas was . . . one of the protesters thrust a pink umbrella over the barrier.  Yes, really.

The situation deteriorated for several days/nights running until the police abandoned the East Precinct on Capitol Hill. The violence was very one-sided: the police attacking the protesters.

Then the police left.  From what I heard the mayor ordered them out due to rumors or fears that the police station would be burned down? Which didn’t happen.  Anyway, they abruptly left.  As in, hired a literal moving truck and emptied out their headquarters, in almost a comedic beat.

Do you have to show your ID to enter the Autonomous Zone?

No.  People come and go freely.

What’s with the physical barriers then?

They’re to keep vehicles out. 

Backstory:  While the protests were ongoing, a guy (whose brother was an East Precinct cop) tried to ram his car into a crowd of protesters.  A brave man eating a hot dog threw himself at the side of the car, grabbed the steering wheel through the open window, and stopped him. Whereupon cop-brother-car-man shot him with a gun.

Personally I think cop-brother-car-man was planning a mass shooting because he had extra ammo taped to his hoodie sleeve. You can see the blue tape on his arm in the pic above. (The man who was shot thankfully survived.  Check out those brave medics tending him while an ACTIVE SHOOTER is standing feet away!)

But anyway, that’s why there are barriers. I believe they move them aside for approved vehicles, like emergency vehicles or deliveries.

Are there people with guns roaming around?

Not on a regular basis, although I’ve heard a local gun club had some members there one night when it was rumored the Proud Boys (a Nazi group) might show up.  (They didn’t.)  But in general, no.

Is it scary??

No.  The neighborhood is fully on board and overall there is a festive atmosphere.  There are speeches about BLM, about discrimination, about what people want for the neighborhood.  There are first aid stations, medics and counselors, and people offering free pizza.  If you watch the livestreams, you can see people walking their dogs, out with their kids, etc.

Where will this all end?

I don’t know.  The barriers can’t stay up forever and I think everyone knows that.  The “Autonomous Zone” name is tongue-in-cheek, the protesters aren’t actually trying to secede from the United States.  The point of all this is to force the city to listen to the people in the neighborhood, to enact change.  This is a boiling over of frustration.  The police have never been good-faith neighbors on Capitol Hill.  And Seattle police have always been pretty racist and had a problem with excessive force.

Look at this whole situation.  All the police had to do was stand back and let the protesters march; they would have marched and gone home and that would be that.  All the police had to do was nothing.  Instead they turned a neighborhood into a warzone.

By the way, did you know that yesterday (6/12) in a different Seattle neighborhood 60,000 people marched to support BLM?  And because the city had learned its lesson about dumbass curfews, they let everyone march and nothing bad happened.

Weird how the national news didn’t report on that march, huh?  Almost like they cherrypick the protests that will appear “scary” to their audience.

[insult-2-injury]

Take a Seat-  Chapter 1

After a skirmish up top, your failing shop falls under the watchful gaze of the Eye of Zaun. And his blue-haired gremlin daughter.

Silco x Fem!Reader | Total WC: 34k | Eventual Smut | Slow Burn | Romance | Angst |

AO3 Link

Next chap

"The past is never where you think you left it" -Katherine Anne Porter

The first step into Piltover was always a tad violent on the senses. The sun felt particularly offensive today, its rays clashing furiously with the Undercity smog that battled its way upward, thinning alongside you as the elevator made its ascent, hidden mechanics whirring as you came to a shuddering stop.

You raised your palm to preemptively block out the full brunt of the light as the latticework doors hissed open, proudly revealing the golden child of the two conjoined cities, disgustingly picturesque.

A familiar sense of world weariness nestled into the slopes of your shoulders as you stepped out, squinting toward the towering spires of the new hex gates. You felt out of place here, like a fish out of water. Or, more accurately, a fish who had sprouted two human legs and sauntered its way up and out of the swamp.

You pressed the thin fabric of your scarf to your face as you walked, ghostlike, across the bridge, inhaling a few deep breaths to acclimatize to the change. Even the air here was richer than you.

Loathe to admit, you’d actually taken time on your outfit today, throwing on your favorite dress, a green, watermelon striped piece. You'd even thrown the mirror finger guns before you'd left your place.

But of course, the moment you set foot on the outskirts of the bustling city, you understood why your attempt at fashionable disguise was unfruitful. Because topsiders knew the highly specific likes of their own people, and they could catch onto the stench of a foreign invader in seconds flat.

They sniffed the air like prairie dogs, scattering as politely as they could manage as you strolled through the active marketplace. You couldn’t fault them at all, really- it wasn’t as if a lamb-faced Piltovan could exactly blend in downstairs.

The off-white marble fountain loomed ahead as you turned a corner, wiping the beading sweat off your brows. You were looking around for a place to sit when an orange flash of movement nearby caught your attention.

A young, scrawny boy with shockingly red hair was combing through the food stalls of the farmer’s market nearby. His eyes were glazed over with a kind of hunger that you recognized well enough, the kind that made you impatient.

You recognized him from the Lanes; him and his friends took no small joy in terrorizing the local shopkeepers with ridiculously explicit graffiti. You’d never been able to bring yourself to frown on it, as it was somewhat of a comfort discovering another well-placed, comedically spray-painted pair of boobs hidden around the Lanes. A sign that things hadn’t changed while you weren’t paying attention.

The redhead stood out like a sore thumb in Piltover’s golden-rayed streets. Passersby watched him roving about, wary, as if he was a stumbling, undomesticated dog, growling and foaming at the mouth.

And he did look feral, but in the way that only a fellow child of Zaun could understand.

You slid your satchel onto your hip, heading toward him. You purchased an absurdly expensive loaf of rye and a small block of cheese, having learned long ago that flashing any form of money on the streets of Piltover was one way to put suspicious onlookers at ease, as if adorning yourself in cash made you ethical, less likely to steal.

Oh, thank heavens, they thought, you had money. You weren’t one of those people.

Conversely, if you flashed your coin around the Lanes, you were almost guaranteed to be humbled in a host of different ways if you couldn’t defend yourself. You’d be down cash and your shoes, too, if they looked expensive enough.

“I can spot you a mile away with that hair,” you said, walking toward the kid. “Hope you don’t think you’re being stealthy.”

The kid recognized you, shooting you a glare as you placed the offering beside him. “Least I’m not dressed like some wannabe Piltie.”

You pursed your lips and looked down at your dress. “I deserve that.” Reaching into your satchel that was about a thread away from unraveling entirely, you took out a sheathed knife and placed it into his open palm.

“For the cheese. Or whatever else you’ll use it for. Carving more tits into the walls.”

He examined it closely. “Looks sharp as fuck.”

It took the bothered gaze of multiple passersby to realize that your uncivil discourse had created a ripple of disturbance throughout the peaceful fountain area as a Piltovan child was sullied by their first F-bomb. You, a grown adult, threw another one out for good measure, if only to be on the receiving end of one more glare.

“It is sharp as fuck. What do you think I make, butter knives?”

“Would be more useful right about now.”

It was a brief comfort for both of you, you thought, to find reprieve in the churlish language that only someone from the Undercity could understand. It was the kind of harsh, disrespectful speech that probably simulated something like nails on a chalkboard to a mild-mannered Piltovan. You scanned the fountain area.

“Just wear a hat next time. Cover that hair.”

“Wear some make-up.”

You locked gazes with a familiar face across the way. A warm hand wrapped its fingers around your heart as you abandoned the redhead mid-insult and walked toward your brother.

“Stef,” you said, keeping your voice purposefully flat.

When he spoke your name in return, an aching affection bubbled in your chest, even as you took note of how stale the word sounded falling from his lips. He placed an awkward palm on your shoulder and squeezed, but said nothing else, beckoning you with a tilt of his head. An ancient bitterness ignited in your belly at his lack of affection. He’d never been warm, even when you were kids. You stewed quietly as you fell in step behind him, following him toward the pretentious fountain splashing softly in the heart of the marketplace.

Stefan looked at you with his bright eyes, the same color as yours. His floppy, chestnut hair that he'd started to grow out. His dimpled chin with the scar from when the front wheel had fallen off his bike as you’d both ridden down an unpaved road. He had spared you of any injury, wrapping you in his arms to soften the blow. You blinked away a swell of sadness.

He sat down on the thick, marble lip of the fountain and you perched yourself a safe distance away, criss-crossing your legs and pretending to study your nails, as if being in the presence of your elegantly dressed, Piltovan brother didn’t unsettle you in every possible way.

When you’d been summoned to meet Stefan, you had immediately begun the mental groundwork necessary to keep your emotions subdued. The past could hold no power up top, you promised yourself. Your memories together were nothing but distant drops of water. But they weren’t. They cascaded across your mind like a river carving out a canyon.

“You making knives for kids now?”

Your head turned to where the redhead had ditched the knife in place of his own hands, tearing into the loaf of bread with a vengeance.

“Eh, what’s the worst he could do with it?”

“Plenty.”

Your eye twitched.

“Tell me about the Lanes, anything new?"

Irritation cracked through you like a whip.

“Why not take a little outing? And see it for yourself. Instead of sending some shady Piltie suit.”

You were referring to the lavishly dressed man with impeccable posture that your brother had sent to your door as a physical invitation two nights before. Talk about standing out. You’d be surprised if he hadn’t gotten his ass kicked on the way out of Zaun.

Stefan clenched his jaw and despite your vow to remain unfeeling, you found your voice softening with an old devotion.

“It’s the same, Stef, just more shimmer.”

You brought him up to date on your business, about how recent clientele had boosted your profits exponentially. How because of that you were upgrading the tiny stall you’d rented out in the Boundary Markets. You glossed a bit over just who it was you were selling to. Besides, he was smart enough to figure out that the people who were looking for the kinds of weapons you crafted were probably not looking to use them for soap carving.

Stefan, in turn, updated you. He worked in the council building and shared that they were in the works of planning a celebration for the opening of the hex gates. He hardly responded when you mentioned just how screwed up it was that instead of using a fraction of that money for Undercity reparations, from the devastation topside had wreaked years ago, they were pouring it into an event they were branding the most expensive party of the year.

All in all, it seemed his hierarchy of needs was being met, while you struggled to scrape by. Of course, you weren’t surprised by this in the least.

He sat for a long moment after he finished, clearly mulling something over before running fingers through his hair. “You know, the City of Progress is progressing.”

You arched an eyebrow at his astute observation, biting your tongue. He’d never responded well to teasing.

“And we grow stronger yet.” He saw the way your body stiffened at the word ‘We’. “The Lanes haven’t. Progressed.”

You'd only risen to the surface a handful of times to catch up with him since he'd left the Undercity, but every time you did, you lost further touch with who he was now. He spoke differently, his cadence unnatural, like a child trying to fit into a suit he hadn't quite grown into yet.

“Oh, please do continue.”

He placed his head in his hand, sighing at your barbed words.

"If things were ever to come to a head again, it could get ugly. I just want to make sure..."

"Spit it out."

You knew full well what he was trying to get at. With the rapidly growing wealth disparity, and especially with the opening of the gates, tensions had risen exponentially. And the two cities had certainly not been frictionless before. Aside from that, whatever sort of science was behind the hex gates… well, you could only assume that whatever further experimentations were going on up top came at no benefit to those below.

What he was trying to say was if the Undercity tried to rise again, it would get its shit rocked.

"I'm worried about you."

"I'm fine."

Stefan paused, weighing his next words.

“I know you well enough to know you're probably not associating with the right sorts of people.”

You hummed, unable to form words through the melancholic bitterness that had started to form a nasty, bubbling potion in your stomach, increasing slowly towards a boil.

“I'm afraid that after-" He searched for the right words. "I'm afraid that after... what happened... you’ve become disillusioned. Resentful. I just... I shouldn’t have left you down there so long.” As if you were the last spoonful burning at the bottom of his soup pot, curdling and left to wither. What on Earth did he think you did all day, sit by the door and wait for his return? You stared at him incredulously. “I just don’t want you to be in the crosshairs when we-"

You boiled over.

“I’m sorry, who’s we?”

When Stefan was younger, he’d always had a hero complex and the ego to boot- it was what had pushed away the other children at the orphanage. In a game of make-believe, he'd always had to be the savior, and since no other kids would tolerate his big-headedness, you'd always felt the sisterly obligation to play into his imagination. You'd been a great subject and he'd always stayed true, sheltering you from every storm you would walk willfully into the shadows of.

He had needed you and you had needed him.

So, shooting him off his high horse after all these years felt a little treasonous.

"How’s the council stuff going? You said you, what, water the lobby plants?”

“I’m an administrative assistant."

“That's a fancy word for secretary, Stef. You’re a secretary.” Stefan’s knuckles were white as they gripped the lip of the fountain. “You have a lower security clearance level than a janitor, so keep your mouth shut about the Undercity. At least I provide for the cause.”

You could almost see your brother's head inflating to protect his pride as he bored holes into the cobblestone at his feet. He nodded, as if something had just clicked into place.

“Guess that answers my next question. About whether or not you’ve progressed.”

"And how do you suppose I progress? I'm barely staying afloat as it is-"

"Then let me help you."

"I don't want your help."

"Why, because I'm an evil topsider now?"

"No, because I only accept help from the right sorts of people."

You were being childish, and you knew it full well, but you were burning, the gentle affection you’d felt earlier sprouting thorns that raked down your insides.

Progress. The two of you had entirely different ideas of its definition, you realized. Stefan, he hadn't just moved on, he'd crushed any semblance of his former life in the Undercity. And with that, he'd crushed any realistic idea of who you were.

And you? The past beat in you like a second heart. You cloaked yourself in it, sheltered and basked in its savagery. Looking at your brother with fresh eyes, you thought that perhaps ignorance really was bliss.

"And who's that? Whatever misfit band of criminals walks by next?"

"So, everyone in the Undercity is a criminal now? What about you, you think you're somehow excluded in this?"

"Fine then, stay in the past with your friends."

As if the fountain was suddenly a hot skillet under your touch, you leapt up, hair whipping across your face as a sudden breeze seemed to couple with your wild emotions.

The moment suspended in time, the cruelty of his words beginning to tingle across your scalp, setting in, as if someone had just cracked an egg over your head and the yolk was spilling down your temples.

“You…” Your face contorts.

To his credit, he did have the decency to look a little sorry.

“I just want to protect-"

“Few years too late,” you interrupted, “For that.” You took a step forward. “Hope you can swim.”

With one swift motion, you shoved your brother into the fountain and reveled in the way that he yelped in surprise, hands grabbed wildly at thin air before he toppled over with a satisfying splash. Loud gasps echoed around the open space as he plunged in.                                    

In your head, you’d slain a monster when all you’d realistically done was gather enough courage to push a grown man into a shallow pool. But you took the small victory and ran with it as you watched him struggle to slide his entire body in to be able to stand up.

You jeered at those rushing forward to help. What a scandal.

Your smile dropped as you saw an enforcer among them, charging toward not you, but the redhead at the food stands, who had apparently used the hell out of your small distraction. With how quickly he was foraging through different stalls, he was sure to open his pockets later to an incredibly diverse array of food groups.

“Look out!” You shouted and just like that, you entered yourself as a player in the game. A second enforcer locked eyes with you. Must have been a slow day at work. Or maybe being from the Undercity was cause enough for arrest. Didn’t matter because in a split second, you were running toward the kid, an enforcer hot on your heels.

You may as well have been waving a knife and shouting death threats, the way people dove out of your way as if their very lives were at stake.

“Fucking Run!”

The kid’s eyes were glistening with possibility as he hesitated, wanting more. Needing more. You remembered that cockiness, the way you’d felt invincible when you’d pushed the limits, just barely making it out of a scrape. But as the kid had concerned himself, in his hunger, with the proportion of bread to pocket size, he’d forgotten something crucial: the current ratio of Zaunite to Piltovan.

A bulky shopkeeper lunged and grabbed the boy by the shirt from behind, a comical number of fruits falling out of his pockets as he was yanked forward and grappled.

You growled. Shit. You weren’t about to leave the poor, idiot kid to a mob of topsiders. In the moments it took to cross the 20-foot distance, you weighed your options. Damage to property was most certainly a lesser charge than damage to person, so you targeted the legs of the table instead of the pudgy, veiny legs of the man who held the redhead by the scruff of his neck.

The wooden stilts caved in like toothpicks as you used your momentum to perform a sweeping kick that had the table careening in on itself as you flew past. You spared a glance backward, nearly letting out a whoop at the small burst of adrenaline in your chest when you saw the young boy following in your steps.

Recalling your original purpose, your head whipped over to the fountain and you stumbled slightly. Your brother had always been easy for you to read. It was a sibling thing, sure, but when you were younger, others found his mannerisms odd, cryptic. You'd always been able to navigate his sensitivities, knowing when you’d crossed the delicate line, calming him from his verbal tirades. All because you could just… read him. But in that single second of eye contact, you’d come to a sobering realization that you didn’t know this Stefan, this Piltovan flesh suit of your older brother. And that you actually had no idea where you stood.

You were utter strangers.

The two of you sprinted out of the sunny marketplace and down the stairs, narrowly avoiding attempts of capture by the two enforcers following. It was a bit shameful really, how easily you dodged their flying restraints, like it was a traveling game of Double Dutch.

You should’ve been concerning yourself with the consequences, perhaps. Admonishing the redhead boy who ran a half step behind you for never learning how to shoplift. But you were abnormally quiet. Because your brothers’ golden eyes, blank as a slate, burned behind your own.

The two of you held your gasping breaths until the elevator descended downward, as if a misplaced exhale of air would alert enforcers of your location. The skinny boy was silent, his pride wounded, having been held in the air like a squirming puppy not even five minutes ago. You said nothing, figuring the humiliation was enough.

“Thanks.”

Surprised, you looked over to where he was clearly avoiding eye contact. You muttered, “Don’t mention it.”

He nodded, the movement jostling a single, teetering apple out of his side pants pocket and resolutely, you did not laugh as he bent to pick it up. Instead, you found yourself thinking about the alliterative Piltover headlines the next day. ‘Marketplace Massacre’. Or ‘Terrorist Takeover’. And draw them in with a simple hook: “Have Poor People Gone Too Far?’

The elevator came to a shuddering stop, releasing steam as the doors opened to your city, welcoming in a stench you hadn’t known you’d missed. You inhaled deeply, as if you had been deprived of oxygen your entire time up top.

You settled your face into a steady glare, pulling your scarf tighter around your neck. As jarring as the entrance back into the green glow of the Undercity was, it was vital to not show it on your face. Opportunists stalked, you knew, in the shadows nearby, eyeing those who stepped foot in the city for any chinks in their armor.

You ignored the typical scammers as you walked, those who waited just outside the elevator, ready to sell you ‘the very newest gadgets’ from the City of Progress. It was something you really should fall for only once, and it was dumb even the first time, so the fact that they kept making coin was absolutely mind-boggling.

The redhead took off for home, you assumed, leaving a trail of literal breadcrumbs.

You walked through the heart of the city, figuring you had no reason to worry about heading home. With the harsh changes under Silco’s rule, enforcers hardly ever set foot in the Undercity, only occasionally being spotted around the Last Drop. And well, you could only assume they were pressed under the same thumb.

Besides soothing their wounded prides, Piltover wouldn’t waste resources to go after a young boy who snatched some bread and the likelihood they’d put out a search on a crazed woman who smashed some guy’s fruit stand was slim. They’d shake their fists at the city below as they always did, beefing up security around the marketplace for a short time.

Even so, you were extra aware of your surroundings as you walked back to your home on the outskirts of Zaun, keeping to the shadows.

The routine nightmares were held at bay that night, but only because in their place came the haunting words of your only brother. Curling in on yourself, you drifted into a fitful sleep.

                                  _______________________

You got to work early the following morning, despite feeling exhausted. The hours lost to your brother yesterday had been wasted time, and with your increase in clientele, you actually felt a sense of excitement that had spurred on a surge of creativity.  

You were confident that you’d managed to slide through the cracks as the next day dragged on in your lonely little riverside workshop. You were confident enough that you lost yourself in your work, no longer peering out the windows nervously for prowling enforcers. But it wasn’t an enforcer that had you nearly amputating yourself with a hacksaw as you startled. No, whoever it was quite literally caved your door in with a single knock.

You leapt up, scrambling for your dagger.

“I have a knife!” The intended threat came out more like a general statement and you would have winced if you weren’t so strung out on a sudden adrenaline.

A grunt in response.

You clutched the handle of your weapon and pointed it at the doorway. “Who are you?”

A pause. Then a gruff voice.

“Running errands.”

“For who?”

The man didn’t mince his next words at all, which in any other circumstance, you could appreciate. But at the time, you felt he could’ve done more to soften the blow.

“Silco.”

A bucket of ice water down your back would have been less shocking.

<3 <3 <3

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[annikasevenshots]

Star Trek Picard: S2E4 Reactions (spoilers!)

ngl i had a bad mental health day and watched this on my phone but it was still really really good

it's the ✨Seven putting a hand on Raffi's shoulder whenever they move✨ for me 😩

heavy metal guy being a puppy dog and respectful... love that for him

also say what you want but... he has a dwarven beard??? 🧐

Raffi fiddling with her necklace...

"We should have waited in the other future before jumping back in time" same Raffi bestie i was literally thinking this (and i wrote a fix it fic for you about it 🤠👍)

remember when the fandom freaked out over Saffi's first hand hold. now we have another one and it's so tender and sweet and i'm sorry i just need a moment

i really, really, really like this borg queen. i feel like of all the plot lines this episode i love borg queen and agnes' the most (and that's saying a lot as your local Saffi trash)

She and Agnes play off so well against each other and it's so intriguing seeing them interact and share how similar they are in their loneliness and isolation. It's so amazing

TNG theme playing when Picard beamed down to 10 Forward ARE YOU KIDDING ME OMFG I AM IN TEARS

THIS GUINAN SLAPS. HOLY FUCKING SHIT. I LOVE HER. OH MY GOD.

The way I know it's Sir PatStew shoehorning all these damn pitbulls in these episodes

and i love that for him. pitbull love forever

Okay but? I really, really, really like this Guinan as well. The new actors they brought in to play old characters mesh so well with the story and the tone and the universe and it's so amazing to see

Guinan being more jaded, angry, sarcastic... it's a yes for me, because of course she would be in 2024 in the USA

Also Guinan is TEMPTING me to get red highlights. help

Guinan's *cocks gun* is so sexy of her, no i will not elaborate

NOT CRYSTAL BALL RIOS 😭 star trek picard is a comedy actually

Seven is me whenever i see karens around serving staff lmao "we're just going to back off from your personal space and you're doing a wonderful job 🤠👍"

Also. Seven respecting and thanking the police/law enforcement while Raffi and Rios are fighting against them, whereas in the future Seven is bitter at Starfleet and lowkey ignores them as a Ranger, whereas Raffi and Rios are in Starfleet and are totally subscribed to their ideals and beliefs. Interesting

Raffi's "I hate everything". Her body language in this. The way she's all bristly.

Also, someone gif this. Please gif this and send me the link and I will reblog it forever and ever

Raffi's "I hate this" vs Seven's "AND YOU HIDE IT SO WELL! <3" saffi is a comedic duo actually

not to gloss over the biggest Saffi scene in this episode but the way the two of them interact in the aftermath of grief is something that was really difficult for me to watch because *redacted trauma* so all i'm going to say is

it was very, very well acted and so realistically written, so kudos to everyone who made this scene. and i'm very glad that they didn't make the characters forget Elnor's death in like 2 seconds.

Well, Picard, Agnes and Rios lowkey did so that's a 0/10 for me

if/when i feel a bit better about it i'll definitely try to break this scene down because it was just. immaculate representation on their part

seven DRIVING LIKE THAT holy fucking shit

not her calling that car an antique 😭 y'all know she only knows how to drive because tom paris made them all drive around in the holodeck

Somehow this feels more violent than those bridge scenes where they're hit and everyone has to lurch in the same direction

"What does yellow light mean" "go faster" 🤡when i tell y'all they're comedy queens...

also ew ford product placement

"the cornerstone of every-" y'all know jurati was gonna say "relationship" before she was cut off 👀

once again, i am so intrigued by borg queen/jurati's interactions. i know they paired everyone off to film separately (because of covid?) and this is such a well thought out pair/plot line. not even ship wise but like, their dynamics and back and forth

this borg queen's gentleness in luring agnes to her and promising her what she needs... oh my god. it's just so amazing

Guinan hearing Picard's name and going "shit" like mood lmao

also that kid is so scary... never again please 😭

L.......LARIS????

jurati knowing to limit the borg queen's access and ignoring her and walking away... thank you jesus

that lady in red who was reading lowkey reminded me of Kes

Q?????????

don't tell me Q is the jeff bezos of this fictional earth i will cry

Also Q losing his power... holy shit. Holy fucking shit

[azurdlywisterious]

Okay its later than i said but here is the full breakdown (plus commentary on my abandoned dead money time loop comic) (under the read more because this bitch is hella long lol) (also potential trigger warning for various mental health things like depression and suicide/suicidal ideation and also surgery related triggers) (better safe than sorry)

the chapter title for this one (begin again) is pretty self explanatory imo. its the sierra madre slogan, it alludes to the time loop very well, all around good title honestly

I actually drew parts of this. I really started losing steam when I drew Cheyanne the dog from memory and realized she looked nothing like a dog and that I have to draw her multiple times. that and the fact that it felt like all of my panels that weren't ✨artistic interpretations of suffering✨ or whatever were starting to look really static imo. ( reached the image limit so ill post the few pages i did finish for this in another reblog)

"something something anustart" is a reference to reboot arrested development that I was using as placeholder dialogue. I actually don't remember what I did end up writing for him lol.

the gun is named Holorific because i misread "holorifle damage" as "holorific damage" for most of the dlc and I wanted to preserve that

"we'll meet again" was a later edition because some development in a later scene (will elaborate more on why when we get there)

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the chapter title is in reference to the musical notation calling to repeat a certain section of music. felt fitting for the first reference to deja's relationship with the singer dean domino

Can you tell i wrote this before falling utterly in love with deputy beagle? "the deputy" im gonna cry he has a name past me! its george armstrong beagle! (its not but i want him to have a first name so it's george now) (back to deja)

anyways the part where she bursts into tears seeing the poster was originally going to be the most explicit the romance between deja and dean would get (and would mostly be one sided pining). Uh... things changed. In the next reblog ill post the rubber duck notes (now thats some fun behind the scenes stuff!)

Not much else to say about chapter 2. its mostly just more foreshadowing of things to come

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okay yeah this chapter title is literally a lyric from nicki minaj's "starships" but its got time loop vibes plus this is the chapter with the repcon rockets so it works imo

oh that damn coyote hat! the vulpes death was originally only meant to be a comedic moment, but like most of the stuff here it ended up evolving into something really really cool (symbolically speaking).

since I keep learning more about come fly with me id probably change some of the bulletpoints here (like actually managing to save davison because deja has done this enough times she would know how to do this)

Deja cries a lot. idk how much crying is too much crying. idk. i think her hearing the last words jason says to her would elicit some tears but not full on sobbing.

but yeah. foreshadowing deja's new fear of never seeing her friends again and finding comfort in the hell that is the time loop because she'll get to see them again. its why she never leaves. its why she does the same things over and over again. she doesnt need to go the long way around to get to benny and kill him. she doesnt need to go to repcon. but she wants to see her friends again. and she will play that loop again and again to see her friends. also she has no idea how to leave the time loop (long story we'll get there).

oh yeah and her stash of med-x gets explained later

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this chapter title is just fakedeep and meant to sound cool. they couldnt all be song lyrics

i love an artsy flashback and this chapter is mostly artsy flashback. we also get a reveal that boone knows more than he initially let on. behind the scenes, this is him slowly remembering that he's trapped in this time loop too. later we find out that this is because he was close by to the inciting incident (but thats a tale for a later chapter)

this is also the chapter where we fully find out that deja has a heart condition. I dont think its properly named until like the final chapters (if ever) but in my notes it's officially myxoma (when i was writing all of these bullet points down i had the mayo clinic description of myxoma opened up on my phone)

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did i predict mono red veronica? haha. this chapter title is a reference to the mtg card "chandra, dressed to kill" which feature chandra burning some vampires at a wedding while rocking a red cocktail dress (which is veronica vibes frfr)

idk why i added the black mountain detour other than to reveal that radiation doesnt bother deja? i guess? dont know where I was going with this honestly. like it doesnt come up again.

the relationship deja has with veronica is sadly criminally underdeveloped in my notes. the idea was to flesh it out as I actually wrote it, but damn i think that was doomed to fail. which is a shame because their friendship is canonically so important to deja that she burns whole bridges just to keep veronica as her friend (once again, to be elaborated on later)

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another fakedeep title! this one is also pretty self explanatory lol

touching back on those rubber duck notes, deja was originally not going to know arcade at all. uh... things changed... not to spoil one of my favorite chapters but things changed. i blame dean (this isnt even a stretch)

deja was also originally gonna get her heart fixed by house. and then i remembered who veronica's family is and realized that deja couldnt do that.

this chapter is mostly set up for the ending (spoiler alert she gets a happy ending dammit)

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uh oh my supernatural fan is showing! one of my all time favorite supernatural episodes is the season 3 time loop one named "mystery spot" which heavily features the song "heat of the moment" by asia

"yells at him" is the understatement of the century but thats besides the point lol. idk what it would actually look like but looking at it now id want it to be reminiscent of her full blown breakdown in chapter 15 (at least i think its 15 it might be 16) (youll know it when u see it)

ah the "you make it sound like" page! originally drawn with my beloved courier suzie, i was going to reuse it (with deja in her place) for this part because it turned out so good imo

also more placeholder dialogue. the main point of all of my placeholder dialogue was to get the vibes down. getting it written properly in character was saved for the comic drafting step (probably another pitfall oof)

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not even song lyrics this is just half of an mcr song title (that i heavily associate with deja but thats besides the point) (i also adore this song like top 3 from three cheers frfr)

this one i left short on purpose becuase I knew the christine dialogue was going to take forever (even with deja already knowing everything)

oh yeahhhh the handprint. that note is there because i am an overdramatic soap opera bitch at heart and deja is still grounded in reality and thats just the note that says "i dont care if you think it would be angsty and romantic DONT FUCKING DO IT" (for reference i am the same person that said that suzie would kiss the glass of house's cryopod as a hopeless romantic thing with my whole chest) (okay kinda a lie i said that i would but thats neither here nor there) (back to deja!)

oh oh oh i forgot that this is the chapter what we start to see some of that vulpes hat forshadowing start to pay off!!!! legit i really want to draw this panel still because in my head it looks so cool like ughhhh the manifestation of her guilt literally haunting her hfkjdjfjdhhjgjsfjg losing my mind!!!! fandom of one for this specific panel that exists in my mind

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ayeeeeee its the payoff to chapter 2!

what i mean by "getting lightly bullied by the cloud" is that a hallucination of benny was going to show up as a manifestation of her fear of never being able to escape the loop. this was another cool panel with him holding the gun to her forehead while clearly being made out of the cloud

also yeah the forshadowing that deja has a weird complex around redeeming dean domino (but more on that in a little bit)

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fakedeep but also these two have the cloudiest hindsight known to man frfr

this is the only chapter I actually wrote a whole transcript for (and then posted on a day i was so miserably sick tears were pouring down my face)

oh yeah i get One (1) future diary reference and also already drew this (she was never going to kiss him in the scene i just wanted the ✨composition✨ of the shot)

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zombie prom fans rise up? (if u dont know the song blast from the past from zombie prom ur missing out) (and also thats the beat for me but thats a post for ferrero) (back to deja)

deja doesnt sleeeeeeeeep shes got the guilt nightmaresssssss but more on that laterrrrrrrrrrr

yeah a lot of this was just gonna be dialogue lifted from the game, not much to say here

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this chapter title is from the bridge of "living dead" by MARINA off her album "electra heart" (fucking love that album and fucking love this song)

look i am a very simple tumblrina. i just want the tenderness of the moment it would be so swejerjkfdjhkgd *runs into electric fence*

anyways, "what is arrhythmia? im a tactile learner btw" is a reference to that "what are boobs? im a visual learner btw" meme. thankfully also a placeholder line. of course the actual scene is also sweet enough to give you cavities lol. i mean its what it says on the tin. dean was gonna ask deja what arrhythmia is and deja (after failing to explain. cause arrhythmia) was gonna settle for him just feeling her heartbeat

also phantom benny shows up again

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a bit tongue in cheek since deja's canonical luck score is a 1

okay this is my favorite chapter because its kinda dumb and edgy and explains why shes in the time loop in the first place and why she lied about the followers and the fort and why she said what she said back in chapter 3 to vulpes and just ahhhhhhh every falls into place its why shes hellbent on saving dean because she sees her failings as worse than his and if she cant save him then what hope does she have in her mind ahahahahahhahahaha feralllllll im feral!!!!

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at first glance you think this is another fakedeep but no its from the opening monologue from the fnaf2 song "mangled" by natewantstobattle

more directly lifted from the game stuff, but slight changes to make it fit deja better

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another MARINA reference! this one is from her song "radioactive"

more deja x dean interactions that make me feral. do i have a reason for why shes in the dress? no! but i wanted it for the scene

still kinda want melodrama frfr (i love melodrama)

also what i mean by "rick sanchez moment" was shorthand for me to remember the end of the unity episode of rick and morty where rick goes to shoot himself in the head with his own gun and finds himself unable to pull the trigger (no joke one of my favorite scenes from rick and morty. like i havent watched an episode in years but that scene just stuck with me like legit such a good scene)

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yeahhhhhh hotel california reference go brrrrrr

okay i know i wrote "bribe arcade" but its more accurately "pay for an operation with an absurd amount of money to hopefully make up for selling the surgeon into slavery that one time that DIDNT EVEN HAPPEN ANYMORE" besides the point. her worst fear is that he remembers the inciting incident (the main reason she doesnt go back to the fort in any loop throughs)

yeet yeet skrt skrt is in reference to that rap roundtable snl sketch that i think is fucking hilarious but also all of this is besides the point

slight change here cause i needed a reason for why she doesnt go say hi to them again which is just that the collar keeps beeping (at least in her head)

at one point i knew where she got the guitar from. now all i know is that she must have gotten it in a different chapter but i dont remember lol

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fakedeep chapter title that i thought sounded cool (still thinks it sounds cool)

ayeeeeee its the mental breakdown chapter! idk what i was thinking but im not chaning it becausee im an edgy dramatic fuck! its probably for the best that i didnt get around to this chapter because my art skills are certainly not strong enough to visually portray this properly

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sike! you thought there was only one hotel california reference!

sorry benny fans deja has ✨issues✨

another scene that i thought i had the skills to draw. let the record show that i do not! but i am an edgy fuck that wants to see our protagonist lady covered in blood and sobbing

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this one is a line from "hourglass" by set it off (such a good fucking song!!!!)

its lots of foils and parallels and other narrative things that make me feral frfr

i do feel like that we go from "absolutely unhinged" to "rational decisions" a bit too fast but idk how to fix that (and unless someone wants to take up the passion project of drawing this ill never have to haha)

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a third MARINA reference lets go!!! this one is from "valley of the dolls"

as you can tell from the andy king reference (specifically from his time loop christmas movie vid that was a complete coincidence i think) i was running out of steam on this plot breakdown. but i think i got my points across

i love cyclical storytelling frfr

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jamais vu is the concept of something familiar feeling strangely foreign (the opposite of deja vu)

yes i translated that latin myself i didnt take 7 years of latin classes for nothing babeyyyyyy

look im looking at this now and idk if arcade would actually be so chill/forgiving with this ending but the implication is that hes also been stuck in the timeloop, but life has been mostly normal for him (aside from not trusting the girl that literally sold him to a dictator if she ever showed back up). but once he heard that caesar finally died he figured that she must have learned some lesson wasnt all that bad ig? idk anymore

also happy endings for everyone yippee! i still dont feel like i redeemed dean but its fine its fine its fineeeeeeeeeee

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if you stuck around to the end, thank you so much for reading this! it genuinely means a lot to me to know that people have read my work, even if its unfinished and riddled with potentially terrible choices

also, again, if someone whos reading this wants to take this comic idea on as a passion project, dont be afraid to message me! honestly id still love to make this comic a reality but i do not have the visual artistic talent to draw this (can write dialogue like a pro tho) aaaaaaaa enough putting myself out there and baring my soul for tumblr back to the void for meeeeeeeeeeee

Five likes and ill post the chapter breakdown for my (sadly abandoned) dead money fan comic

[1ddiscourseoftheday]

Mon 7 June ‘21

Liam’s podcast with Steve Bartlett is out and while I still don’t care about that guy I’ll give him this-- he does great at getting out of the way and letting Liam talk. And boy does Liam talk! Liam says A LOT and let’s all just pause to send him some big hugs before we get into right? And then look to the future- Liam’s routine is to say ‘things have been terrible but it’s fine, it’s fine NOW’, always, even when that is absolutely obviously not true, and today is no different but for once I actually believe some of his hopeful bits too which is so great! I hope things really are shifting for him and I can’t wait to hear this new song of his. But there’s a lot that’s hard to hear too, oh Liam. He said that he and Maya have broken up (so yes, presumably why he just moved again such a short time after they moved into their haunted house), talked about his struggles with his alcoholism (and said he’s been sober for a month right now, go babe!), shared the usual distressing stories about his time in the band and what that was like for him (and how it still impacts him), and he talked about his new song and how it feels different for him than his past solo music. Truly though there is SO MUCH more than I can get into here or then you can get from the UA highlights- I HIGHLY recommend actually watching at least parts of the video, also because the attempt to summarize so much erases all the charm and humor, of which there is much. If you don’t think you want to watch Liam’s interviews, it has to be because you aren’t watching Liam’s interviews, they’re delightful! Plus really if you care about 1D and want information about what it was like for any of them, listen to Liam, he’s the one who’s out there talking about it.

About Maya he said, that yes, he is now single, and “I’ve just been not been very good at relationships,” and “I’m a proper perfectionist… at the start of the relationship you put out this complete false character like I might as well go in in costume, I’m like putting out something that is not there... kind of like encompassing someone else’s life with your crap rather than just doing your thing and laying out your store from day one. That’s my biggest problem is that I feel like I don’t lay out my store... and then I’m annoyed when they don’t like what I like,” and “I think my problem is I struggle to be on my own sometimes... I dive in and out of relationships too quickly. I’ve not spent enough time on my own to relearn about myself.”

He laughs about his tendency to ask his manager things during interviews; “My fans think that Steve is doing something to me, they’re like liberty for Liam because he always looks to Steve, but that’s because I like him. It’s not because he’s harming me as a person. There’s like a hashtag Liberty for Liam because they think I’m some like prison child,” and he also said “my manager’s my best friend,” (and he’s said in the past he is a big support for him) and mentioned stuff they’d talked about recently around his therapeutic awakenings.

He talked about therapy being something you have to want to do and be ready to do rather than being pushed into, like getting sober, and says that this time around with his own therapy work he’s really felt that and thrown himself into it and he talked a lot about his relationship to therapy in connection with band days. “I mean one of our old managers went to therapy from being a manager of One Direction. So if you can imagine how that feels like the rest of us definitely need some.”

“We were young,” he said, “What I found was I didn’t know I was the boss until like a few months ago, I still don’t even feel like I am now, like I’m such a child. And everyone I work with now is older than me and wiser than me and I’m like what the hell am I doing here with these people. When we were 17 I thought the security guard was like in charge of me so I was like Can we leave the room? No? Oh ok then,” and “when we were in the band, the best way to secure us was just lock us in our rooms. And of course what’s in the room? Minibar. So at a certain point, I thought Well I’m gonna have a party for one and that just seemed to carry on throughout many years of my life... You know I spoke to somebody about this in child development as a teen, the one thing you need is freedom to make choices. That we could do anything we wanted it seemed from the outside but we were always locked in a room at night and then it would be car, hotel room, stage, sing, locked. So it’s like they pulled the dust cloth off, let us out for a minute, but then it’s back underneath again,” and “the day the band ended I was like thank the lord for that. And I know a lot of people are going to be mad with me for saying that, but I needed it to stop. It would kill me.” Anyway, he said, because it wouldn’t be Liam without an upbeat coda, “I don’t want any of this to get lost in translation. I’m not 100% moaning about my life... it’s had its ups and its downs, but I would rather talk about it and it’s therapeutic for me.”

And what about that exciting new song? Liam said, “We have a really cool song in the pipeline... one of the first ones I’ve actually written myself- with some other people, I didn’t write it by myself, but it’s the first one I’ve really liked. And I think I got so used used carting around other peoples songs and not embedding myself creatively in what I do because I was so scared to find out who I was,” and “I don’t really know how I would tour again. I really want to” [on discord today he said he would be touring next year] “I always said throughout my solo career I’d let my song book speak to me. And I don’t think my song book spoke to me to get off my ass. I only became a solo artist because I had Strip That Down. I wasn’t gonna do it, I was gonna leave it alone. I was like, I survived it once thank you very much- but I’m back in now. Because the song, I knew it was right. It felt right with that song, I hadn’t had that. This year, the song we have I feel really really great about. So I’d rather let the music do the talking than me come out and force it. We don’t need any more useless music in the world, it needs to mean something,” and he mentioned the new song on the discord a lot too, most notably picking out a long comment that thanked him for making the fan feel supported and safe and for “putting your heart in everything you do” and for his support of the LGBTQ community to respond to with, “I think you will really like the new song.”

A few other random bits, he said that he thinks there should be a system to make therapy available to musicians in the industry, “I think I’m definitely gonna get a dog because I need routine,” and “I recently started jujitsu,” yeah you and everyone else huh, so do him and Louis and Oli go to the same gym or ???, and he acknowledged that as an addict he may have just transferred that to working out “but there’s a lot worse things to be addicted to then looking after yourself” hmm but he does seem to say that he’s doing better around body image stuff; he talks about having put on weight during lockdown and seeing himself in the BAFTAS performance- “I saw myself... and I was like ‘oh my god I’ve completely let myself go in this’. And it was fine...I feel so much more secure in myself now.” Oh and that he’s written a comedic movie script “based around AA” and his experiences there, such as how “I had a really weird AA experience the first time that I went. My first experience was with Russell Brand.” LMAO yes! Cannot wait, bring on auteur Liam please! Anyway as if ALL THAT wasn’t enough he’s also dove into the lead up to his NFT release; he said “I'm almost ready to share my NFTs with you guys... Who wants to see them?” and posted a tiny preview that tells us its (their?) title for the first time- Lonely Bug.

Niall and Anne Marie perform on Jimmy Fallon tonight, and the hype is already a go! I guess it’s prerecorded, as we’re already seeing pictures from it; they’re singing to each other with the cute car from the video in the background. Niall signed on to a letter to Boris Johnson asking for changes to music streaming revenue rules and signed by 232 artists (including all the artists Johnson recently named as his favorites, haha). Zayn signed on to a Billboard petition to the US senate calling for gun safety laws. The bar Zayn got into the fight in front of posted “Zayn's a regular at Amsterdam Billiards and he is a true gentleman. On Thursday night he was confronted by an inebriated passer-by outside on the street and was called a homophobic slur. We support Zayn & condemn homophobia in the strongest terms!” And also PS omg again because it just isn’t going away: Harry’s beauty company is called Pleased As, his name is Harry Edward Styles so yes when listed last name first, as legal documents do, it spells SHE but it is not a “feminist abbreviation” (WHAT? even??) nor the name of the business.