#Big Honkin' Gun

[justplainmels]

5.03 | Ascension

“Or a big honkin’ space gun, sir.”

[nitewrighter]

Disclaimer: This isn't about which is the most 'correct' or 'hopeful' or 'moral' choice. This is about FICTION and is purely about which interests you the most on an aesthetic and/or narrative level. Kill the cop in your head and just pick the subgenre that makes brain go brrrr.

[aegagrusscholarship]

familiarity, the lack thereof, and the only way it could have ended.

the thing is, ultrakill is a very diegetic game. near everything, from the style meter to the bottomless arsenal to the shitass graphics themselves, are explained in some way by some in-universe fact.

so, what with violence and the implication that V1 was designed to counter earthmovers

what with 7-4 and the fact that it is a culmination of this implication

i wonder. when V1 looked up at that earthmover, did it know, with whatever passes for instinct in a machine, exactly what to do? and if it did, then, how is this conveyed to the player?

diegetic as the game is, how does it engineer a situation in which the player, themselves, knows exactly what they have to do?

the biggest factor, i think, is the fact that the earthmover's health bar appears the moment you lay eyes (or camera, or whatever) on it, and it does not leave until you have finally killed this colossus.

but this factor is much more subtle than it appears at first glance. yes, big honkin' boss healthbar on screen for the entire level, what more to it. there's a good deal more, it turns out.

first off- this is the shortest leadup by far to any bossfight in the game. you slide through a single vent, and you are greeted with benjamin right out in the open. even P-1, devoid of any other hazards as it is, gives you a long trek down the spinal staircase before you reach the flesh prison. 7-4 has none of it. you enter the level, you enter the stage, and there you have it. you know exactly what you are up against right from the outset, and it's not quite a feeling of familiarity but it tells you exactly what you have to do. which is the point of this all, isn't it?

7-4 is also... not a bossfight! it is a full level! it is a full level framed as a bossfight. the health bar frames this full complete level as a bossfight.

and on one hand, this is not new news. on the other hand, i think this is the crux of it. the thing is, most bossfights are near-to-entirely new. you do not know how the boss acts. you do not know their attack patterns. you do not know their capabilities. you are learning something new. levels, though, you have done a thousand times over and so the player knows how they need to play through this bossfight in a way that is not quite present with any other boss in the game.

the content of the level is new, of course, because that's how it goes. but you know the motions. you have done this for two acts prior, you know the motions. you know exactly what to do.

also! this level does not exist in a vacuum. what i am saying is this: the rest of violence layer shifts its storytelling and its tone and even its graphics. it is something completely new in contrast to the rest of the game. 7-4, though, returns to environments and graphics more akin to what you have experienced before, bringing you back to familiarity and again knowing what to do here in a way the rest of violence hasn't let the player experience.

one more thing about this level: it plays directly into expectations. which is something that the rest of the game actually does not tend to do.

the game, at base, is just not a typical FPS. it gives you movement like a roguelite or a platformer, it takes guns you expect to know the mechanics of and goes utterly wild with how far the archetype can be changed.

in a smaller scope, here is a comparison of the earthmover and the corpse of king minos as two separate colossal bosses foreshadowed in similar ways. and i mean, minos's bossfight isn't unprecedented in other works. but i think the thing that matters here is that you are not, in fact, the underdog as is the case with so many other bosses of its ilk. riven of many voices, destiny 2, similar bossfight similar scale. you are hiding from her you are a fireteam of many you are triumphing over a dragon larger than life. project gestalt, madness project nexus, you are pulling out every stop you can to take down something so far over your head (both literally and metaphorically). corpse of king minos- V1 looks up, stands its ground, and parries his god damn fist.

and the thing is, the earthmover plays into a different expectation, but it's playing into an expectation nonetheless. you look at this thing and you climb it and you dismantle it from within, like you have done in many games prior. you know what your goal is from the moment you see that healthbar and you hook onto the conspicuously placed hookpoints that tell you- you will climb this machine; you will fight your way up to whatever its core is and you will kill it. you play through the entire level with this expectation and you get exactly this expectation. you destroy its core and it begins a countdown, and so very many games have countdowns before the collapse of whatever level you have just beaten, and you know exactly what you have to do.

i don't know. i love diegetic storytelling. i love this level.

it's just familiarity, i think. this level runs off familiarity. it gives you, the player, things and tropes and designs you are familiar with. it signals to you that you should know what to do, and it lets you do exactly what you expect to do.

if i were any more cheesy i could absolutely end this by restating something about the only way it could've ended, but uh. i am not that cheesy. this time.

aw crud now i don't know how to end this oh well goodbye then

[nanomooselet]

Episode One: No Man's Land

He's so fluffy. <3

Man, the fact that Vash ran out to greet all those people by name and he's not even a minute into it when the ships begin to explode is really everything about him you need to know. The first time we see his face and it's after he's been thrown off his feet as cascading destruction is unleashed around him. The face that crashed a thousand ships? Vash of Troy? My poor sweet boy.

Young children can sometimes have trouble with cause and effect, assuming events relate more to their own actions than they really do and blaming themselves. So Vash asking Rem if the sleepers will be okay... There's simply no time to explain he isn't responsible. All the dominos are being set up in Vash's little head. Nai is the one to knock them down.

And then Rem and Nai wearing identical expressions. It's not surprising that even after her death she's his most enduring ideological opponent. Every time I watch it's just more obvious how enormous the effect she had on Nai was, and how he hates it. (By the way, I keep hearing that Rem told Nai to protect Vash - but as far as I can tell that's a conclusion Nai came to on his own without Rem's intervention? Rem said she'd protect the twins herself and didn't anticipate the crash. Did I miss something?)

I've talked extensively about this part, but to recap: feelings. And look, Rem's got purple eyes! Apart from the colour motif (purple = red + blue, so it represents the unity of humanity and the Plants that was her dream) she would have had to get gene-modded for them, which is a fun detail. Rem, of all people, was a little bit vain. I dunno, I find that endearing.

"Real people don't look like that./Real people aren't such caricatures." More of Orange's composition choices making me foam at the mouth.

We don't know how long Vash has been dangling there, but I doubt it was less time than it would take for a human to die of deprivation or exposure. I really don't think Vash actually needs to eat or drink, nor does he hate being a Plant - it's himself that he hates, as a person. If anything Knives is the one in denial that he's just as human? I don't know.

Anyway personally I like to think that the reporters really are caught up in all this nonsense by sheer happenstance. No one's pulling their strings; they're out to write a meaningless gossip piece and Meryl is taking it too seriously. It's worth noting that focused pursuit of the "dangerous fugitive" (read: Vash) is apparently pretty recent, not to mention unusual.

...I'm guessing my girl doesn't play a lot of poker. Meryl's faces. <3

I've said it before, but the show doesn't cheat. Roberto doesn't pull his conclusions out of his ass; he tallies up incongruities and puts them together into insights. He's obviously experienced, but I think of Sam Vimes, a recovering alcoholic, complaining there aren't meetings you can attend for being a suspicious bastard. Roberto drinks because, too often, his suspicions have been proven right. (I suspect Roberto also suffers from a state of being naturally knurd i.e. he's short of sobriety in the opposite direction to being drunk, and has to down a few before he's on par with the rest of us. But I also think his tolerance is good and he plays up drunken mannerisms when it suits him.)

Huh, the man looks good in a tie. I wonder how recent that photo is.

Anyway, Roberto sees Vash's big honkin' gun, but Vash insists he's "not a fighter". He notes aloud that Vash doesn't look like a Plant engineer and Vash dodges explaining. Then he sees this face Vash is making, and it's scared. He's sweating. This is before the MPs barge in, so it's something about the Plant he's afraid of.

Right, thinks Roberto, we'll tuck that nugget of info away, along with how that piece in his holster sure ain't no damn novelty backscratcher. And when an opportunity arises to test the insight, Roberto takes it.

Uh, never mind what I said about cheating. (Although this is an animation cheat, not a narrative one.) I love that they didn't even pretend like he was maybe hiding it somewhere. Also hilarious, though more darkly so, is the complaint that this turn is "bad writing" because the captain was professional, as if he didn't beat the shit out of a suspect in the process of surrendering, stick his gun in random faces, and agree to a duel with deadly weapons against a bounty head he's meant to bring in alive because some random drunk asshole made slightly mean comments.

("Are you are a man, or a yellow-bellied baby who needs his mommy?" Background info implies the captain has reason to be sensitive about the accusation he's hiding behind his parents. I wonder if the dub writers knew?)

Meanwhile Vash is unwilling to fight until his opponent does something absolutely batshit that imperils everyone around him. He's also bizarrely calm about a cluster of missiles being launched and heading right for him. Roberto's right that he isn't afraid of the MPs.

"A fight should be a show!/We've got an audience, we might as well give them a show!" <- Orange says you're goddamn right about that, crazy captain dude. And it's exactly what they did.

Dweeb. <3 He probably left his ammo behind in his bag on purpose, but didn't expect the captain to do something so recklessly violent and suddenly realised he hasn't had time to restock any of his aces in the hole. Nevertheless, I suspect he's still playing up how hard he's freaking out here. The helpless and pathetic act is very much an act; it's only when he's faced with Knives that it isn't.

It's so sweet that Rosa knows him well enough to have faith he'd pull it off with a single bullet. She put a lot of trust in him. I like to think she kept a stock on hand. She also meant it when she said "a friend of Vash's is a friend of mine," so Meryl makes the throw. And she makes it good. Which all helps what's coming to be more devastating, naturally.

LOL at how clearly this is an animation/particle flex, but it's celebratory too, like fireworks on opening night. Over a decade since Vash did his thing on our screens. Here he is returning with a bang!

Wow, I somehow completely and utterly failed to realise Meryl and Roberto's conversation with Vash about Knives takes place the next day until this time around. Of course they would have had to wait until the captain was conscious enough to ride out of town. All the details I pick up and "the sun is setting" or maybe "unconscious people can't ride birds" missed me entirely. What I'm saying is that I'm very smart.

Hi Zazie!

I don't expect an answer to this question, but I have to wonder. Did Zazie wait to report to Knives until now to be absolutely certain it was Vash after seeing him draw that exact gun and do something impossible? Or does Zazie have some awareness of the fourth wall, knew when they'd cut away to show Knives, and acted so as to achieve a "speak of the devil" effect when Vash finally mentioned his full name?

Regardless, I really like the dub, but it's a shame they couldn't keep the ambiguity of whether Knives is talking about Vash or the red Plant when he says he'll rescue [someone] from the "parasites".

I do like the impression he's talking to the Plant husks (even if it's probably really Zazie he's talking to). My man's always open to constructive criticism when his interlocuter isn't capable of making any.

@tristampparty

[otakween]

Digimon Frontier - Episode 49

It feels like I just spent 15 minutes staring at a dragon's ass. The animation in this was so unimpressive for the penultimate episode. There were off model characters (what did they do to poor Plotmon!?), plenty of flashbacks and a slooooow moving dragon Lucemon.

The first half was definitely the stronger of the two. Lucemon FD Modes' defeat was somewhat satisfying, though it was a super obvious fake out (especially due to the episode's name lol). One more to go!

Notes:

So wtf happened at the end? Bokomon's explanation in the dub is "Susanoomon was only able to scan the good side of Lucemon and now the evil side is left behind!" Huuuuh?? But they've been scanning evil digimon this whole time! (Also, what good side!? Him being half-angel didn't exactly make him less evil). Oh well, I'm overthinking things.

Typical digimon move to pull out that "surprise" final boss. It's not so surprising anymore guys...(I guess there must be some kid out there who started with Frontier)

Gotta admit, Lucemon pulled some great faces in this. He reminds me of an Ace Attorney culprit with his flamboyant-ness.

Disappointing that Susanoomon just sounds like Takuya (at least in the sub). They should have at least used a different voice actor if they couldn't combine Takuya and Koji's voices. With Takuya's voice coming out of him, it doesn't feel balanced.

How am I supposed to take this stance seriously? (Also, damn, Takuya has the legs of a figure skater or something)

Susanoomon's big honkin' gun was satisfying

In the Japanese version I didn't realize that the dragon was another Lucemon form because Bokomon said something about "a dark digimon" being "generated from the destruction of the dark area." So I was pissed for a second cuz I was like "After all that build up the final villain is some rando!?" lol

I liked the sparklies when they thought they won

The writers totally shot themselves in the foot with the "half the squad doesn't battle" thing. They looked so dumb on the sidelines half-heartedly shouting "Susanoomon!" when he got hit. They didn't even sound like they cared! (They were also pretty off model in those scenes which didn't help).

Seriously...that second half. It was just this shot for what felt like a century:

Dragon!Lucemon (they never said his name lol) just growls and rises to the human world in a weird purple void for the majority of the 2nd half. It looked like some intern did that scene or something lol

I'm confused about the lil fetus-grub thing they kept cutting to. I guess it's inside of/piloting the dragon, but where? How does that make sense? Guess I'll find out...

Lucemon's message is "obey or die"...does that mean his plan is different this time? His previous plan was to destroy and rebuild, but if he kept doing that than "obey or die" wouldn't really make sense. RIP to all those people on life support in the hospital scene 😬

At first I was kind of annoyed that they showed everyone's full digivolution sequence, but then I remembered it might be my last chance to see them and so I paid close attention.

[magpies-gold]

Back From Mysterium

I did a very small couple of posts before this, but Saturday at Mysterium blew my expectations out of the water, and so I decided I needed to circle back around and try again as a much bigger post.

First, foremost, and coolest - yes! I got to meet Rand Miller (bonus infamous RAWA just to the left as well)! Even better, for once in my life my social anxiety didn't turn me into a non-verbal lump and I was able to say a grand total of two full sentences and a greeting. If you know me at all, then you know that that's quite the accomplishment. Usually @timmcosplay has to do the talking for me when I inevitably choke on my own tongue, but by a quirk of fate we got separated (he wanted to get our Book of Ti'ana signed and got yoinked into a different line up from me, who wanted photo evidence) and I had no choice but to attempt to be a functional human. My theory is that I've talked to Rand's face so many times during the intro to Riven (I always talk back) that it was just second nature to say hello the second he looked at me. Genuinely, though, he's so kind and so patient and I'm stoked that he made time to meet all of us and then spend a couple hours even after that being a presenter and answering heaps of questions.

Tim may have not been with me directly, but he was still creeping in the sidelines getting photos of me getting photo'd and briefly chatting. ;)

Ultimately, we were split into three groups and everyone ran through the events of the day in a different order.

Tim and I were on Team Ytram (or Team Forg as I insisted on calling it) and had little Rivenese froggos on our badges.

After the meet and greet, we got lunch. It was simplistic fare, but the fact that we got hot dogs and Cool Ranch Doritos out back of the Cyan HQ means that they were very special hot dogs and Cool Ranch Doritos. Legendary!

And then... they actually allowed my wee goblin self and Tim to go through the iconic archway entrance and to scramble around their actual studio. I've seen pictures of the place on the internet before and knew how neat it would be to some degree, but now I know where everything is!

In no particular order....

Iconic signage and that giant honkin' Moiety dagger that Adam Savage apparently worked on?? It is truly large in person!

Costumes from Riven! Including Catherine's dress, which I remember my mom was always cooing over when I was playing the game on my clonky PC in the late 90's, and Gehn's costume, with Tim posing (and having not totally slightly held up the rest of the group by getting detail shots for cosplay purposes, no, no, he wouldn't do that....)

Art! Design sketches and THE MAP.

The infamous elevator wherein you'd better know your D'ni numbers if you want to get anywhere (I would get stuck).

And then... artifacts!

They had THE LEVER from the beginning of Riven. Did it never occur to me that the lever was a real lever? THE LEVER IS A REAL LEVER.

Plus there were goggles and books and Gehn's gun (AKA the only Game Over inducing object in Riven) and more character design sketches with actual costume fabric swatches! That last bit made Tim make high pitched glee noises, as someone who both designs and makes costumes himself.

There were presentations after all of that. Trailers, talks, a non-profit project to digitize over a hundred hours of behind the scenes footage from the making of Uru and Riven and other things, which we got a sneak peek of. They showed off a snippet of the remake of Riven. There was just so much. It was hours and hours and I was practically vi-bra-ting by the time we finally were ushered back to the bus and back to Spokane.

I will never entirely get over the fact that I was able to go see all that with my own two eyeballs. As someone who's been enamoured with the universe surrounding Myst island for the full 30 years of its existence, ever since I was 8 years old, who used to make big calligraphy posters of passages from The Book of Atrus and The Book of Ti'ana and tape them up all over Thorhild Central School whether my fellow students and teachers wanted me to or not, and who was so solidly influenced by the idea of books as literal doors to other worlds that it became a foundation for how I view my own characters and stories (namely that I'm no god, and they do have a life all their own), this is a treasured memory.

[rachaelmayo]

This was an art trade with a DeviantArt buddy that I did back in 2006. The character is Uno'caro. My trade partner wanted lots of plades, a big honkin' gun (but not too big), and fancy armor.

I used watercolor and Prismacolor pencils over an ink drawing.

[cherrylng]

Great Guitarists 100 - Mick Ronson, Joe Perry, Steve Jones, Mick Jones, Paul Weller, and Andy Gill [CROSSBEAT (November 2009)]

Mick Ronson What is the sound of glam rock? In a nutshell, it's the sound of Mick Ronson's glossy guitar. From 1970 to 1973, Mick Ronson was David Bowie's right-hand man and the guitarist who defined the sound of the glam rock era. His best-known work from the glam period is Bowie's 1973 album "Aladdin Sane". The sound of glam's golden era can be fully appreciated, including the guitar sighing in "The Prettiest Star". His independent 1974 solo work features songs that show Bowie's influence. He remained in intermittent contact with Bowie and Ian Hunter until his death in 1993. However, I think his best work as a rock guitarist is the 1971 Bowie song "The Man Who Sold the World". Listening to the dynamic performance of 'The Width of a Circle', you realise that he had plenty of potential to become a hard rock guitar hero. -Hirose Tohru

Representative albums "The Man Who Sold The World" (1971, photo) David Bowie "Aladdin Sane" (1973)

Joe Perry Besides Jeff Beck and Jimi Hendrix, Joe Perry's biggest influence was Peter Green, the guitarist of the early blues-tinged Fleetwood Mac. His cover of "Stop Messin' Round" is a favourite, sung by Joe himself and performed live without fail, and is included in the covers collection "Honkin' on Bobo". He mainly uses a Gibson Les Paul, but also plays chords and solos on a six-string bass as well as a regular guitar, and his weighty sound can be heard on two of Aerosmith's best-known albums of the 1970s, "Rocks" and "Draw the Line". The figure of him singing with Steven Tyler on stage with one microphone is reminiscent of Mick & Keith of the Rolling Stones, and countless artists, such as Slash of Guns N' Roses, admire his cool guitarist image. -Ikuyo Kotani

Representative albums "Rocks" (1976, photo) Aerosmith "Draw the Line" (1977)

Steve Jones Steve Jones is the guitarist of the Sex Pistols, a band synonymous with 70s punk. His most famous work is, of course, his debut album, "Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols". At the time of its release, he was playing the guitar behind the bellowing Johnny Rotten, and that's exactly what he did. At the time of its release, the only impression it gave was that of a punk band with a bad-ass vigour, but 30 years later, on the live reunion album "Filthy Lucre Live", the band sounded extremely decent! However, if you look back after the Pistols broke up, they played on many albums, including The Professionals with Paul Cook, Suzy & The Banshees and Bob Dylan. The 30-year gap in the sound of "Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols" may be proof of his struggle to find a place in the world before the Pistols, when he liked Iggy Pop, David Bowie and others and stole their equipment, while being torn between the rise and fall of punk and the rock music that followed. -Ikuyo Kotani

Representative albums "Never Mind the Bollocks, Here's the Sex Pistols" (1977, photo) The Sex Pistols "Filthy Lucre Live" (1996)

Mick Jones Mick Jones used to be a big fan of Mott the Hoople, to the extent that he even followed them around. The guitar that made his mark on the world was that jangly, crisp guitar. The Clash's "London Calling" was a milestone in punk, but it also showed many different directions, including reggae and rockabilly. It is a must-hear along with "Combat Rock", which later spawned big hits such as "Rock the Casbah". The band's versatile sound, while also defining punk guitar cool, earned them a spot on Rolling Stone magazine's list of the 25 most underrated guitarists in history. Since the Clash, he has been involved in various bands and projects, including Big Audio Dynamite, but in recent years he has been more active as a producer, for example with the Libertines. It is no wonder that he is close friends with the members of Hard-Fi. -Ikuyo Kotani

Representative albums "London Calling" (1979, photo) The Clash "Combat Rock" (1982)

Paul Weller During his time with The Jam, Paul Weller was far more highly regarded as a vocalist and songwriter than as a guitarist. It is well known that after the Style Council, which greatly expanded his musical range, his presence as a guitarist increased alongside this. Originally, his guitar playing was more of a backing for songs, focusing on chord cutting and rhythm riffs, and he was not a technically gifted guitarist by any means. He has actively played guitar solos since going solo, but when listening to his playing, I feel the influence of Neil Young, with whom he has also featured on cover songs. The common denominator is his clumsiness, which becomes a passionate emotion and erupts in his tasteful, bad-guitar playing, and his hot, rough guitar charm is even more powerful in his spontaneous playing live. -Yoshihiro Hoshina

Representative Albums "All Mod Cons" (1978, photo) The Jam "Catch-Flame!" (2006) Paul Weller

Andy Gill Gang of Four from Leeds were one of the first post-punk bands to be enthusiastically re-appraised in the 1990s and 2000s. The band's first impression in the early days was Andy Gill's incisive cutting. His clean, cutting-only playing on tracks such as 'Damaged Goods' inspired later alternative acts. It is also symbolic that in later years Gill produced work for the likes of Red Hot Chili Peppers and The Jesus Lizard. Although the general reputation of the band is concentrated on their first two albums, their later works, which replaced the band members and had a more funk-tinged sound, were also revisited in the 2000s. Yeah Yeah Yeahs and The Rakes, who participated in the 2005 revival album "Return The Gift", were the first of the bands to inherit Gill's chappiness and dry funk feel. Gill's shadow can be clearly seen in the arrangements of Franz Ferdinand and Bloc Party. -Masatoshi Arano

Representative albums "Entertainment!" (1979, photo) Gang of Four "Return The Gift" (2005)

Pictured: Les Paul (left) and Dick Dale (right)

Top 10 guitarists by genre: Instrumentalists The country-tinged (1/ Les Paul) is an exception to the rule, and the influence of the guitar he developed, as well as his playing style, is enormous. The founder of garage (2/ Link Wray), known for "Rumble" (also covered by Guitar Wolf), inspired Pete Townshend and many other guitarists. The Shadows' bespectacled man (3/ Hank Marvin), who used tremolo arms extensively to produce a clear sound, was Britain's first guitar hero and was admired by Brian May and Ritchie Blackmore. (4/ Allan Holdsworth) and (5/ John McLaughlin), with their superb technique and wealth of musical information, have moved freely between jazz/fusion and rock, influencing everyone from Eddie Van Halen to Vernon Reid and Mike Stern. (6/ Duane Eddy), who helped make the guitar the mainstay of rock 'n' roll in the 1950s, has earned the respect of too many guitarists, including George Harrison. Telecaster user (7/ Steve Cropper), who supported Stax Records as the guitarist of Booker T. & the M.G.'s, also deserves a lot of credit. Kraut-rock stalwart Ash Ra Tempel's (8/ Manuel Göttsching) has continued his experimental guitar adventures as he released 'Inventions For Electric Guitar'. John Frusciante has been playing delicate guitar sounds sprinkled with various effects since the heyday of punk/New Wave, and (9/ Vini Reilly) has been highly acclaimed by John Frusciante. (10/ Dick Dale), familiar to many for "Mirselou", established the surf guitar with a Middle Eastern melody, and impressed even the young Jimi Hendrix. -Shiho Yamashita

Les Paul

Link Wray

Hank Marvin

Allan Holdsworth

John McLaughlin

Duane Eddy

Steve Cropper

Manuel Göttsching

Vini Reilly

Dick Dale

[pretty-prince-lulu]

it is OCCURRING

okay I'm just saying this should ABSOLUTELY apply to childbirth

varklir didn't make it to bed and there's no option to pick her up from under Misa's head

dr. roly seems to have... not noticed...?

he is ZOOMIN. nowhere near his patient tho.

uh, also there's a mechanoid cluster. we're pretending that isn't a thing.

roly has IMMEDIATELY fucked off. the baby and the mother are on the floor. it's been called a hamster. its mother smells of elderberries. its blue. I could not make this shit up.

lyfield's been making casual conversation the entire time while mel panics. honestly it's on point.

ok. let's see.

she's going to grow up to be a big HULKING MOTHERFUCKER. Bigger than her Dad. Tragically, she seems to have mother's personality. this is going to be one of THOSE children.

okay. name.

what the FUCK autonamer.

human hamster.

if you weren't lyfield's firstborn I'd be tempted as FUCK.

okay. XERAISA. that's less... hamster.

also it does appear that these two bastards aren't married after all. I'm sure that'll happen at a terrible time outisde of my control.

everyone takes time out of their busy day to notice how goddamned cute lyfield's kid is. misamibil isn't there something you should be doing literally right now, with your gigantic backpack gun on your head there

FINALLY

he is beautiful. clever. hardworking. loves aminals. a chicken just like his dad, who is pANICKEDLY DRINKING A WATER. Can't blame him. That took a while. Got his mother's big honkin' horns, but he'll only have a half-jotun frame, so he'll be shorter than her, but eclipse his Dad.

I'll have to have a think of what jobs I want to give him. He's very cute but a bit crap at things.

Aight. Names. Don't dick me over autonamer.

...actually you know what

if dad doesn't want his name, why shouldn't you have it?

[captainblazkowicz]

🌾An eerie plot of farmland with seemingly no one around for miles //perhaps he stumbles upon their lil farmhouse in the middle of nowhere? 👀

[ Eerie Atmospheric Prompts / Accepting! / @outofthiisworld ]

When BJ emerged from the portal that fuckin' na.zi pig scientist threw him into, he half expected to go to some futuristic place with big honkin' robots instead of people, or little green aliens. Instead, place he went to looked like home. Like Mesquite. Plenty of folks back when he was a boy had acres upon acres of land. Some of 'em tended livestock there, like his father. Others of 'em tilled the land, grew things themselves, sold 'em at them farmer markets they held weekly.

It was, to say the absolute fucking least, bittersweet. Sometimes he missed this America. The one before the war. Before the na.zis. Before he saw the American people he thought he respected peddle eugenics and bigotry. Or maybe that was there the whole time, since he was a kid, and he never done noticed it in nobody but his father till it was too late.

America or not, this land was cultivated. There weren't any trees, no undergrowth, no brush, no nothin'. That meant somebody had made it this way, this flat, thus ready-to-till and farm. But who? Felt like he'd been walking for hours. Maybe it was just a few minutes. He didn't know. What he did know though was that sun was setting, with it the cold was settling in, and he needed a goddamn shirt. When they'd thrown him in that portal, they hadn't given him one. Why the fuck would they? No guns neither. Just his fists, his pants, boots, undergarments. And a rumbling stomach.

After walking ahead indefinitely— not like he had a choice— he eventually saw something. Little light. Was coming out a window. A farmhouse. Somebody had to live in there. BJ practically broke into a sprint— or, he would've if he didn't worry 'bout getting himself shot— but decided to briskly walk instead. Soon as he made it to the door— again, he was pleasantly surprised this place had doors— he knocked.

[furballfaggot]

i got a nerf gun for christmas. the licensed roblox murder mystery 2 shark shooter. very big gun very big darts. however my sister already owns one

because i want to differentiate the two, i have done the most gay thing and stuck a bunch of stickers on this nerf gun. because i have mental illness i have done the most cishet thing and also named the nerf gun. her name is helena. her name sticker is made out of an old tokidoki mermicorno collectors guide paper. i intend to put stupid dinky reward stickers on the top fin if i ever get to fire one of her big honkin darts at anyone and any of the 3 hit a person

[dave-acosta]

Come see @Saladin Ahmed and myself at @c2e2 talk about our upcoming Image Comic TERRORWAR! Moderated by my good buddy @kenblakeporter Humanity, Horror, and Honkin' Big Guns: Saladin Ahmed and Dave Acosta's TERRORWAR Fri, Mar 31, 2023 • 5:00 PM - 6:00 PM Location: S403-A https://www.instagram.com/p/CqDgfU6Mjw7/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[riflebrass]

There was another good episode about this. There's a group of aliens called the Tollan. Their technology is incredibly advanced and they refuse to share it with anyone. They shared reactor technology with their planetary neighbors who weaponized it, destroyed themselves, and caused a gravitational distortion that would eventually destroy the Tollan home world. Can you blame them for not wanting to share? We have pretty good diplomatic relations with the Tollan but they have a tendency to remind us of just how "primitive" we are.

Enter the Goa'uld who are at a constant state of war. When they're not conquering and enslaving new planets they're plotting against each other stabbing one another in the back. The Goa'uld approach the Tollan wanting them to act as neutral ground for a legal matter concerning Earth. SG1 is suspicious and spy on the Goa'uld outside the courtroom. The Tollan find this very offensive. They want to leave planetary politics in the courtroom.

The idea that the Goa'uld were plotting against the Tollan was absurd. They had a network of big honkin' space guns providing blanket coverage for the city. If the Goa'uld attack from orbit they will easily wipe out their fleet. These guns have protected them for generations without fail.

That strength was also their weakness. They hadn't actually fought a war in generations so they no longer had the means to think tactically. Sure enough the Goa'uld really were plotting something. While the Tollan were distracted with the court proceedings the Goa'uld had an agent wandering across the city placing beacons on each of the cannons. Hit one gun and the rest will tear your fleet apart. Hit them all simultaneously in a coordinated strike and the safety net is gone. The Tollan are defenseless.

Fortunately SG1 figured out the plan and with the help of a friend were able to cloak one of the guns so when the attack came it was able to destroy the attacking fleet.

When your entire species is so hyper-engineered to be supergeniuses you have to outsource your “so stupid it just might work” plans.

[otakween]

Digimon Tamers - Episode 30

This episode was great and had high production levels, they knew that this was an important one. We get one of those moments where we think we've reached the finish line and then it all goes to shit. Whelp, easy come easy go!

Notes:

Terriermon was extra cute in this episode almost to the point where it was annoying. Like "stop being so dang cute!!"

So it's been established that the shiny things that show up when Culumon is around are, in fact, not digimon. Fascinating. To me they look like the kind of spirits that might show up in a Ghibli movie, in fact I was mentally calling half of this episode "Ruki in Ghibli land"

I did not really realize that Yamaki and his female subordinate were living together lol. Office romance I guess

Beelzebumon is now just going around being an asshole for the sake of "proving his strength," kinda BlackWarGreymon vibes but less existential and more bratty.

Didn't expect the digimon from Our War Game (Infermon) to show up so casually and be beaten so easily. The music that played when he was in his prior form (Chrysalimon) was pretty funky. I don't really get why several Chrysalimon would digivolve into one Infermon but okay...

Beelzebumon gets an insert song. Seems they're a little insert song happy at this point in the season. I guess they wanted CD sales.

The little forest spirit guys look like axolotls actually. Their little smiling muppet mouths crack me up

Some intense shots of Ruki's purple eyes this episode. Another interesting eye color choice!

Beelzebumon's weapon is a big honkin' gun...I don't think they could do anything about that in the dub. Hide all the angry Christian moms with that name too...

Takato gets separated from Guilmon! That's an interesting twist. What's he supposed to do all alone? Maybe he'll meet up with a friendly stranger digimon or something.

[spockvarietyhour]

The Bugs send another meteor our way, but this time we’re ready. Planetary defences are better than ever!

[alex99achapterthree]

Ah yes, the good old days!

Getting bounced around in turbulence back at the end of that long tail and losing your lunch...

The spectacular view of enemy fighters boring in on you while you wield your fifty-caliber machine guns, just like the tail gunner in a WWII B-17...

Being able to yank a handle, dropping off the entire end of the aircraft and casually stepping out of the resulting hole with your personal parachute when things got a bit too real. No violent ejection seat for you!

Of course, then the gunner got moved up front with the rest of the crew until guns and gunner were eliminated completely. Now the electronic warfare officer can watch the show on radar, sprinkle chaff and flares in front of an incoming threat and try to fox it with jammers. No more big honkin' guns blazing away from the tail.