#Disregard I will get through it I prommy

[runway-jellyfish]

I will go interact with people and I Will enjoy it and I Will enjoy my alone time afterwards

[pointless-discourse]

hs diet/cooking skills headcandons :3

what would they eat. i prommy im not scrambling for ideas, i am being fully genuine when i say i think about (the majority) of these a lot. disregarding my trans hcs for consistency and to try to reign in my fanon perception and keep it at least semi-accurate

content warning for disordered eating

JOHN EGBERT

eats very well, if a little heavy on the sweets just based on how many are in his vicinity. his dad loves baking. there will be baked goods. despite how sick he gets of sugar, he's gonna nibble.

however, i'm sure his dad knows how to cook and passed that onto john, at least how to follow a recipe

i think john would be a recipe follower most of the time tbh

living with nanna on the ship wouldn't significantly alter his skills

maybe with all that free time he'd start to improv more in the kitchen?

anyway, he is a good cook and is probably going to end up cooking for his disaster friends a lot because he is a charming young man

well not really? like he'll be on it in a pinch if he's asked too, or immediately reminded that his friends can't fucking cook, but she, in typical egbert fashion, will remain doing her own thing a lot of the time

charming young june gets tradwife'd ig

fuck i transed her . oopsie

DAVE STRIDER

we've seen that his fridge is full of smuppets and he hides his food, so his stash is small and is made up of foods that don't need to be refrigerated

texan heat is def a catalyst for that rot

his stash is also made of cheap, low quality food, because i doubt he's getting a lot of money

just an assortment of non-ingredient food like apples and mcdonands

this is on the hypothesis that bro gives dave food money or dave's somehow monetized his skills

if bro is providing this food, it's probably semi-often paywalled behind weird shit or swordfights

TLDR: he likely doesn't have a consistent supply either. enough to sustain some muscle so he can live up to what we've seen in comic, but he's underweight

you think he'll learn to cook on the meteor? wrong. why learn to cook when you can alchemize? what's the point of alchemizing the ingredients for a PB&J and then assemble it when you can just magic up a sandwich?

he cannot cook. he will burn the water. the only appliance he can use is a microwave, and that is iffy in itself because, until he gets the hang of it, will leave a slightly lukewarm hamburger in there for ten minutes

JADE HARLEY

plants. a lot of plants.

freshest thing near her. everything else she has to get through the airplane mail.

she'd forget to eat for a day or two, and then wonder why she's so hungry and then eat enough to feed a family of three. horses. three horess

she lost her grandpa at a young age and then was raised by a dog, so i doubt her eating habits are completely normal

she eats like a dog. jade does not use silverware because she does not like doing dishes. all food is finger food if you're not afraid.

what she eats is of very high quality. if she remembers to eat and can prepare her food correctly, she'll do fine.

on that topic, she's not a bad cook. her chem know-how would help her estimate what would work. but she's never had another person interact with her cooking, so it's lacking a lot of stuff.

research can get her cooking close to the real thing, but it's still mediocre. she doesn't even know what she's missing, because she's never known anything else.

she has a lot of weird tastes that can only come from an insane amount of time to kill. i'm talking mustard everywhere.

john and nanna might be able to reign her in a bit? they would definitely help her improve her cooking skills. watching her eat, there would still be something off about her.

however, she can cook for herself, and it tastes kinda good.

ROSE LALONDE

like john in that she had someone there who would cook for her.

mom lalonde is very absent, but she's still on top of things. she responds to rose's notes. she vaccums. she would still cook for rose on a regular basis, give or take a few off weeks.

that cooking would not be good, because she's wasted whilst making it.

even if the food was good, rose wouldn't admit it.

she often makes a show of pecking at her food, but still eats.

unlike john, mom never showed rose how to cook. rose never asked.

when she gets to the meteor, like dave, she alchemizes all the food she needs. there has never been a reason for her to learn how to cook.

she could probably put effort in and, with strife, successfully follow a recipe, but she is a horrible cook. she does not understand it for the life of her, and she won't until she studies it

she'll master it. eventually.

JANE CROCKER

like june. their upbringings are very similar.

one exception is that she cooks more and is a much better cook than she is because jane genuinely cares about it.

she also has some mad pastry skills.

jane can make macarons.

she would attempt to teach her disaster friends to cook, but would quickly lose patience.

and then she would try to cook for them, but get sick of it a meal in. they are very picky and her temper is not long

DIRK STRIDER

survives purely off rations/canned food

again, dave's food is fuel mindset extends to him and he can stomach a lot of "gross" things, like an entire can of peanut butter. i may have mentioned that before, so i'll give you some PD lore. i have eaten an entire jar of peanut butter out of hunger and i think about that event a lot because it was not nice for my tastebuds

however, i think as a control freak he would be adamant about his food schedule, even mathing out the amount of calories he would need to consume for every meal proportional to what he does in a day

and then a half-hearted attempt to balance out protiens, fats, minerals, and the other stuff

he is very adamant about his schedule and consuming the food he needs to survive, but that schedule is fucked

ex. 3 cans of canned peaches for breakfast at 3:50 in the morning. two large, burnt mutated fish for dinner at noon. no lunch. or eats half a can of peaches for the twenty hours he is awake in a day.

he can cook, as in prepare meat to be consumed alright. it's edible, and it's not that bad. but he is assed at combining ingredients. he cannot create something successful. all his food tastes like shit because he does not pick up on taste. though, i believe if he was cooking for someone else, he could set aside a few days and come up with something that's high-tier in the mediocre range.

JAKE ENGLISH

he eats only the meat of the beasts he's killed. he has scurvy.

he is a good cook (in the sense that he can competently prepare meat) though, and genuinely cares about the quality of the food he makes for the sake of his taste buds, and cooking is something he can get lost in

however: he has insane tastes. he is an expert in preparing food in this hyper-unique way that he is insane for but is absolutely disgusting to anyone else

ex. after years of eating similar tasting meat, he was motivated to use seasoning. he does not own seasoning. he is going insane and cannot eat the same thing again. he uses dirt. tastes bad, but god he is dying for something new after x years of eating the same thing for breakfast lunch and dinner. he continues to eat it because he cannot eat unseasoned meat anymore and repetition-causes-complacency's himself into genuinely enjoying the taste of dirt.

dirt is just the tip of the iceberg

jake is also unintentionally bulking (bodybuilders eat a lot of meat to gain muscle). he eats a lot of protien. however, he hasn't herd of the concept of 'cuts' (where you stop eating as much to let the muscles show) so he has a bit of a tummy

but also, he's sixteen so he's not a fridge. i also don't see him as that tall (huss draws him as shorter than dirk anyay huehuehue) but he has muscle if you look. twunk if anything

ROXY LALONDE

genuinely horrid diet

so zoned out and depressed she barely recognizes her own hunger and even then has no drive to do anything about it

will eat sugary stuff for the happy chemicals

roxy is the one trans headcanon i have where i am completely unable to distinguish it from canon

she is trans in my head. that is as much a part of her to me as her love for cats is

anyway like a lot of trans women she's pressured to be petite and small in her portion choices so even when she has the drive to eat i dont think its a lot

because of her likely not weighing a lot shes a lightweight

part one million on how is roxy not dead yet

and as expected, she cannot cook

she also has some really weird tastes

she is really good at baking a few specific sweets that she eats on repeat (with a lot of recipes from jane)

once she enters the medium and works on her drinking problem i think her eating problems would also get less intensive

not drinking as much she has to face her hunger more

and being around jane, a big gal, face to face, i think that would do something to her idea that to be a woman she has to be small

KARKAT VANTAS

troll rations

not only is he poor so no money for all the nice stuff i also dont think troll society has a big focus on cooking

their only main professions are military based and art doesn't seem to be a big focus, just a highblood thing

again probably some nasty cheap ration bars that keep him alive

but i do think he eats regularly and normal amounts, he has that fighting spirit to stay alive and get stronger

but yeah i don't think troll society would require you to put a lot of effort into culinary stuff. but he can prepare the food well

the meteor inspired no one to cook, but he'd get the hang of human food and probably enjoy it as compared to tasteless lowblood troll slop

humanstuck karkat is a kid chef. he is so fucking good at cooking. baking too.

ARADIA MEGIDO

mmmmm yummy troll slop

same as karkat

ghost aradia didnt need to eat anyway so i doubt that would've affected her diet habits

same with got tiger aradia? don't think she would bother with it, too much else to do

but once she starts hanging around in the dreambubbles, exposed to non-troll slop cusine, she'd have a fun time trying to learn how to cook and delight in all those new flavors

then when she gets to earth c she's a good cook who loves cooking

TAVROS NITRAM

i dont have any headcanons fro tavros because is hate him

sorry tavros fans

uhh he probably eats POOP!!! and LIKES IT!!! because he TAVROS!!!

SOLLUX CAPTOR

troll-slop-enjoyer, but also likes aradia's cooking

humanstuck sollux survives purely off doritos and g-fuel

NEPETA LEJION

utter chad

survives solely off the giant beasts she kills herself

ripped yet still small and nimble

her diet is entirely protein

no troll slop for her

unfortunately for her, this means missing out on non protiens and fats

nepeta has scurvy

humanstuck nepeta is less feral and also eats cute japanese cat themed sweets

KANAYA MARYAM

dont know if it was stated in canon but she would garden alongside eating troll slop

blood

yumy blood

roses blood

you would not believe it from looking at her but humanstuck kanaya eats a lot of spicy food and has a horrifically high spice tolerance

she's also pretty good at cooking, mediocre at baking

TEREZI PYROPE

?????? chalk???????

hopefully alongside the slop

either that or troll chalk is really nutritious

VRISKA SERKET

despite technically being a highblood i doubt she'd engage in their fancy food

she eats to survive, not for the taste

she may have access to higher quality sludge though

i think this part of her would persist, but she does love june's cooking

EQUIUS ZAHHAK

pure, distilled protien and milk

so much milk

its not 2%, not 3.25%, it's 100% milk

he suckles it straight from the moobeast teat

it is really weird and he does not get invited to parties

gigachad

humanstuck equius's diet is 1/4 food and 3/4 protien shakes, bars, and the like

he'd probably also be like those bodybuilding influencers who eat eggs raw or camel nutsacks

GAMZEE MAKARA

similar to roxy in that he's too checked out to remember to eat

but what he does have as a highblood is insanely high quality

sober gamzee does not require any sustenance to survive in a similar fashion as to how he got shot down by caliborn and was fine afterwards

humanstuck gamzee can bake. he cannot cook. he has the diet of an insane college student, ramen cups interspersed with weed brownies

occasionally he gets the munchies and eats enough to feed four full grown goku

i like thinking that someone realized he wasn't doing alright tried to help him, maybe roxy? in a universe where he didn't get lil cal'd

ERIDAN AMPORA

only the finest fish food for him

he dines like a king

he projectile vomits when in a 50 mile radius of the sludge

agile, but weak

doesn't cook, has other people do it for him

humanstuck eridan has a private chef and is offended if you expect him to cook for himself

FEFERI PEIXES

finest fish food for her, dines like a queen

but also attempts to live like the normies once and a while

and take a bite of the (highblood edition) slop

humanstuck fef also has a private chef but helps out in the kitchen from time to time

gonna b real dawgs, i cannot concieve of the dancestors in this manner. peace

[lcs-library]

Short fluffy fic for @ashipiko about her sillies<33333 It’s pre-relationship and has a sort of “fell first, fell harder” dynamic, so I hope you enjoy hehe they were so fun to write!!!

“C’mon, it’ll be fun! Please? Because I’m the coolest and you love me so much?” Ashi pleaded, clasping her hands together and giving Azami the biggest puppy dog eyes she could muster. Even still, she couldn’t disregard the slight blush dotting his cheeks at the l-word.

“…Fine.” Azami accepted after some hesitation, having to turn away to protect himself from getting ten times more flustered than he already was at her antics.

“Yay!” She cheered, dropping the cute act to throw her hands in the air with glee. “We’re gonna have loads of fun, prommy!” She said with a wink.

As it had turned out, her cousins had managed to get a couple of tickets to a new museum in Veludo through some connections. Apparently, it was meant to combine both art and general history, but she decided it wouldn’t be much fun on her own, so who better to take than Azamin? He mentioned liking history one time, right? And Ashi could look at the art! Win-win!

When they arrived(with Azami having to practically spring after Ashi), they were met with a grand exterior, showcasing the large “grand opening” banner. The two gawked for but a moment before Ashi dragged her friend inside by the wrist eagerly, grinning like a madman.

It may have been a good thing that she didn’t see the wreck Azami had become at the simple affection. Not even that, but the fact that she was so casual about it? He could barely comprehend how she didn’t think anything of it.

Once their tickets were accepted and they entered the lobby, Ashi turned to Azami.

“So, where to first? You’ve prolly got better taste in this stuff than I do, Azamin!” She exclaimed, squeezing his hand slightly, only deepening the hues on Azami’s cheeks.

“They’ve got dinosaur bones, so, uh, let’s see those.” Azami replied quietly, avoiding eye contact.

“Dinos, huh? Okay! Sounds super hypesies!” Ashi beamed, throwing up a peace sign before dragging Azami across the museum to find the exhibit.

Azami really wished he could let go. This was completely, utterly, totally improper, even if they were just friends. That didn’t change the fact that it was gross! And in public? What would other people think?

And yet, it felt…nice? To age someone who genuinely wanted to spend time with him was something new. To be connected to someone both physically and emotionally was something he had to admit he missed, even just a little.

Then, all of a sudden, someone who wants it just as much as he does shows up and thing actually start to feel alright? Not only that, but she had a similar mentality about age and how they were treated because of it? It all clicked together a little too perfectly, like they were made for each other.

Wait, why was his heart beating faster at the thought?

“Azamin?” Ashi’s voice interrupted his thoughts. Oh, no, now it was hard to look at her. Shit. He put on a brave face and responded as best as he could.

“What’s up?” A voice crack. Why, God?

“We’re here!”

So they were. Azami gazed around the room, taking everything in.

He almost looked like a little kid in the way his eyes shined, Ashi thought. It was cute, something rare for him.

Soon, she found herself skipping after Azami as he prattled on and on about every single creature, giving her an endless supply of facts as she supported him.

“Where’d you learn all of these, Azamin? They’re, like, super cool!”

“I just liked ‘em as a kid…” he muttered, stuffing his hands in his pockets as he realized how he was acting.

God, he was so adorable, Ashi couldn’t stand it. She let out a hearty chuckle as he tried not to let her feelings show, lest Azami kill her for seeing him like this.

“You done here?” She asked cheerfully.

“Yeah. Let’s go see the paintings you wanted.”

“Okie! Race you there!” She dashed off.

“Wh- hey! You shouldn’t do that here!” Azami cried, rushing after her.

[mikkouille]

BOYS PLANET 1212

From the get go, Boys Planet looked to be a disaster: postponement, changes of plans, and the legacy of Girls Planet 999′s already lukewarm reception and results, plethora of scandals, on top of the history of Mnet survivals not being quite reassuring as for what this one would be. They didn’t even have Yeo Jingoo as their MC anymore so what even was the point for me to watch, right? Well I like bad reality TV, and if the show forewent it’s predecessor’s clunky numbers, it was not merely because they cleaned themselves off the unpromised implication that ‘999′ offered, that being of parity in it’s final lineup’s nationalities- but because had they to pick one to represent the cast of 98 boys (95 by the time of announcement and 93 when the first episode released, once more, a good sign that this was going to be a Very Well Made Show), it’d have to be 1212, for Dozens of Dozens.

A bit of context for newcomers and unknowers as I’ll be mentioning the title a surprisingly low but still relevant amount of time.

From the day the fancams for the ‘Here I Am’ Signal song were uploaded, the word bounced around my brain, with cruel glee: these guys were just not good. At the same time, knowledge of how things were handled with Produce and “Not Produce we swear it’s different” shows did keep me back from immediatly dismissing about 85 boys from being of any respectable skill: if Boys Planet was anything like it’s elders, these guys likely had at most a week to learn a choreography and song, on their own, with little group rehearsals. The mere inability to judge what some steps were meant to look like given how varied the executions were across contestants said it all: they were given no teacher, likely the dance “teacher” and judge responsible for that atrocity of a dance routine showed up once, stayed an hour, and then left them to their own device (and watching episode 2, it is indeed basically what happened. When most of the rehearsal footage is just the kids by themselves teaching each other, the title of “Master” is to put into question: you’re not their masters so much as their executioner).

So I awaited the actual episodes, to see the surprises, or even just the bad dancers who were here as vocalists.

Which to be honest, was a mistake on my part, expecting vocalists was to lobotomise myself, out of the knowledge of the sad state of this industry, the one that we could nearly say this show satirises: Boys Planet isn’t a survival as much as it is a long winded performance art piece meant to criticise 4,5th gen Kpop. And so it was with equality little and great surprise that the Auditions were the same as the Fancams, only this time both eyes AND ears got to suffer the same pains.

(I ran out of embed spots- you only get 5??- so you’ll unfortunately have to click links for most of the video evidence of my claims. Very sorry about that. Prommy I didn’t intend for only the Worse- and Hui’s feast- to be visible but it IS funny).

Where are the standards of casting?

But Signal song fancams aren’t meant to be good. As stated before, they’re a bad metric of talent, or of potential even, as both song and dance are learnt in a hurry, with hardly any mentoring outside of Lim Han Byul disregarding all decency as a human being to instead have his “bullying children” segment. Moreso, a dance focused fancam does not help display the skills of vocalists, so while I did rank all of the Here I Am videos, I was waiting for the audition performances, or Star Level to truly pick out who were the trainees deserving of my attention. Still, the combination of how little candidates truly shone through their fancams, the lukewarm interest sparked by the 1mn PR videos and the trainee profiles, with their citations of way too many symbols of kpop’s downfall as for the standards of performance- not citing names as I do like the state of my life and witness protection would take all of that fun away from me- I had little hopes for what was to come, which did protect me: I was at least not disappointed in expecting nothing.

The performances aired for the first episode were highly enjoyable, in a Schadenfreude kind of way: the ones that were bad were Bad bad, to the point of hilarity: I had legitimate tears in my eyes watching some of these, and couldn’t help share them ahead of our group watching to my co-watcher friend. Things needed to be spoilt; joy to be shared.

Portrayed here, Yang Jun’s most iconic opening of Seventeen’s worst song: mathematically a masterpiece as two negatives make a positive. Also, do know that upon watching Yang Jun’s fancam back before the show started, I claimed him as one of my favourite as I thought dancing that awful must hide incredible singing talents, why else would he be there, right? I’ve had to reassess that statement, but I will not stop my support. He reached public infamy, legend status, and did so much for the show with just these few words.Similarly, team Hyogo gave us a SPLENDID rendition of MANIAC that I view with just as much affection as I do see team Sichuan’s HOT: an enemy of my enemy is my friend, desecrate songs I don’t like and we’ll get along (this is just what the songs sound like to me on regular after all, I think they did amazing).

Many such cases. The full cam footage of the first episode’s performance are overall a feast, a gathering of comically bad stages, put back to back for the heartless public to tear to shreds, only to further humiliate it’s most iconic suckers a week later, in front of Sunmi no less… There is nothing crueler when it comes to reality TV than an Mnet survival.

While a few stages did still look significantly better, and the second week packed overall better performances, the truth is still that the vast majority was mediocre at best, funnily enough, probably would rank 12/20 in my french fashion of rating: not awful enough to be failed but just toeing that line.

And that overall does make sense: why would a company send their best most promising trainees to a shitshow where they can hardly monitor their progress anymore, all for them to get eliminated after two weeks of airtime, but months of recording, alongside half the contestant, and after a combined screen time of about 10 seconds. The investment isn’t good when the winners are already pre-decided, might as well send your newbies, your bottom of the class lineup, avoiding the silent blacklisting of a large TV channel without wasting the time of your talents. As for the viewer, it only makes the experience more entertaining: the mind’s much more rested when all the decent guys are relatively safe for a few episodes when the network first has to weed out the ones who are simply way too incompetent to even get a single pity vote. Instead, you get to laugh at poor youngsters that still probably are doing much better than you would, only they have a roomful of witnesses and large audience to witness them.  I cannot truly cast the stone of ‘this is cruel and uncivilised’ when I myself go back to the Canton China’s team rendition of God’s Menu daily, for reasons that are anything but amazement.

Something that was evident throughout all the stages, including the good and passable ones though, was how little singers were present on set. The show even makes a point of highlighting it: if there is a handful of good performers and dancers, the singing is truly subpar. Only, for the jury to point it out is a bit hypocritical. Comparing the performances and the gradings assigned to each participant show that while the jury- and mainly professional hater Lim Han Byul- lament the lack of good voices, they do not support what little good ones they do have on their hand. Abysmal singers who can dance consistently get better star rankings than good singers with lacklustre dancing. The message is clear: we shall address the issue in words, but only participate in it with our actions.

For Choi Yujin to get four stars with that mid at most line being the only piece of singing we heard from him, while Park Gunwook got assigned three for not being heard singing enough was already quite frustrating. But Gunwook isn’t really a singer either, so the real rage was to see Kim Taerae also get only three stars AFTER the assessment that the show desperately needed SINGERS. If Yujin deserved four stars, then so did Taerae, because his dancing is nowhere near just middle-ground, he’s good enough to blend in the ensemble while carrying a vocal position. But the show does not care for this: they want flashy performers, no matter what their empty claim. But then, it seems Choi Yujin was actually a victim more than an undeserved win, as the show’s true focus seems to now do MY job and use every opportunity to belittle him and call him undeserving of his rank, as if they weren’t the ones putting him there in the first place.

But in all fairness, bad singing makes sense when a good portion of your candidates aren’t done going through puberty: the amount of 2006 to 2008ers present in the lineup should be an indicator as to why we hear so many unstable shaky creaky breaky voices: these are teenagers who should be in school, not in Public Shamings - The Show, no budget edition (because we spent all of it making a Roblox dupe, something the public for certain asked for).

Speaking of things no one asked for: Pentagon Hui’s presence. As enjoyable as it is to get an actual serve in the midst of… Whatever it is others are doing, there’s nothing pleasant about seeing him sit in the middle of all those teens, right out of the army and all out of tears to cry. The misery of every episode 1 reaction shot on him, free this man. At every round, we will have to pretend to carefully examine who exactly is most skilled, as if there wasn’t a guy among the participants who should have been mentoring them, not playing with them. Unlike CLC’s Yujin on Girls Planet, his situation is also nowhere near as dire: while Pentagon hasn’t been in its Shine heydays for a moment, they do not seem to be on the brink of disbandment the way CLC was when Girl’s Planet aired: Hui himself was speaking of comeback plans months before the start of Boys Planet. It seems CUBE ENT just wants to torture a poor guy who only probably wants to go back to his writing studio with his actual group rather than being under the threat of having to spend god knows how long Kep1er’s babybrother group will be active for. At least he provides respite whenever on stage I suppose, but I so desperately want him to get the Produce Camp Lelush treatment: a full time exposure then freedom on the last episode. Make it worth it at least!

Have a little palate cleanser before we carry on.

Sabotage

I love to talk badly about corporations too much to blame only the trainees for their bad performances though. Particularly, Mnet isn’t truly known for either fairness or transparency, and so a lot of what the show displays doesn’t reflect individual potential. When that many stages are bad, the fault is on the network, not only through their casting, but their sabotage. That’s right: here come the delicious speculations of foul play.

Just like fancams of a performance learnt in a few days- with foreign trainees being given one day less to train, by the way- aren’t really indicative of who is talented, the Star Level stages are to be put into question: the showrunners claim that the songs were picked by the teams, but it takes extreme gullibility to take their word when watching some of the stage choices: either those trainees are stupid on top of untalented, or someone isn’t telling the truth.

When I mentioned Canton China’s performance earlier, they are one of the most questionable matchup: why would foreigners who aren’t fluent pick a song as rap-heavy and dense in pronunciation as God’s Menu? Would they really have expected anything but this?

It’s still funny though sorry Canton China. KKAMA HH HH KKAJI.

And how come there just so happens to be such a high percentage of songs that members of the jury worked on, even with their extensive workography, when half the songs are their work, it becomes a tad suspicious, there isn’t just one writer and one choreographer in this industry. The numbers don’t add up. And as iconic as Shine is as a song, it’s still eyebrow-raise worthy to have Just the song to activate the competition’s most famous “trainee”’s backstory and tears. The songs are just too suspicious: fitting neither the skills or style or announced preferences of the participants. In a round where they have to best portray themselves, it’s hard to believe that so many contestants would pick so far out of their comfort zone, just to appeal to one member of the jury. Not to mention the coincidental stage repeats: the two tall and handsome but inexperienced guys just happened to both decide to do My House, in matching outfits too? At least try to be subtle about your script.

And all of those network picks only serve to push forward their favourites, and mostly, the premises of narratives they want to build. As the writers aren’t too original and love to rehash the same storylines, they are pretty easy to spot: the talented guy who did not charm the jury at first but will then sweep them off their feet with one day of practice, great but mean guy who’ll likely be lost by his “oversized ego”, the one who did So Good at first and then never lived up to it… It is much easier to make entertaining situations yourself than to expect them from a crowd of kids who likely wouldn’t start fights with how little time they have to do anything but practice and sleep. Hence, manufactured rivalries- between the Korean and Foreign group notably, something so out of pocket when within those you can find people who belong to one same debuted group split into blue and pink team, and definitely hilarious whenever they prompt a foreigner to say anything negative on the Korean team, taking it to their nationality as root of the issue, when some members of the Global team are themselves part of the Korean diaspora. The choice of Nationalistic War as a plotline is certainly a choice, but only works way less when instead of GP999’s three teams of more or less strictly region locked participants you have one country against the whole rest of the world. But I’d rather pretend this entire decision does not exist, there’s just something uncomfortable about the show trying to become ‘war on Kpop: these foreigners are trying to steal our job’. As if Mnet was even going to pick more than 3 Global trainees for their line up.

Then come my most detested, as I am a hater, the ones who take the limelight when being hardly better than MY picks who are objectively better naturally as I am the voice of truth. I mentioned Choi Yujin, but there are other worsties in the show, some who may get the same sad treatment as their fellow (of being shamed for not living up to expectation built out of nothing), I’m thinking most notably KuanJui from team Taipei whom the show will not manage to convince me is good as an Idol, no matter how much they repeat it: his traditional dancing is very good, but he neither could dance or sing Tiger Inside in a way that I could stomach, and it was neither a matter of awkward lack of confidence nor an issue of assignment that didn’t match his tastes. He may have done better indeed on an elegant song, but when it’s likely the final group will be performing Hip-Hop leaning choreographies, what use is there in lying that he can carry them out? Why are we pretending that he did not just disrespect Ten’s legacy etc etc? As he also carries the fatal flaw of not being a Korean trainee, which, to the Mnet writers’ eyes might as well mean you attempted murder on their families, I am expecting him to be this season’s Cai Bing, suddenly villainized by the community whenever the show needs some drama that doesn’t involve collateral damage for their plan of debutees to be.

Is there no main Slayer?

And how are they even going to make that lineup, you could ask, if everyone is mediocre, if there’s no talent but the 30 years old hag who already has a group at home and enlistment under his belt?

Thankfully, in the mass of Nothing, there still are a few attention grabbers, some I have already shouted out before, some that I keep for this more entertaining section of “lets see some good food”.

Well, good food…

I first want to give a shout-out to my little pity boys, the ones so clearly set up and so thoroughly mocked that you can only feel bad for them. I’d want them in the group just to spite the network. The Houses, as I’ve already mentioned before, have this incredible charm to them (they’re good looking) that makes it hard not to root for their progress (and they’re tall too) especially when the show bestows a montage of them working so hard day and night to escape their reputation (pretty boys should never be sad). Red House Jung Min Gyu is probably the funnier of the two, his awkwardness is in how brazenly he tries, while Blue House Bak Do Ha is the more tragic one, the one desperate with tears, the one who has to carry the burden of being Labelmate with Hui. Neither of them are good, but both seem untrained as hell, and the odds aren’t in their favour when the show cannot acknowledge that even with years of vocal lessons they’d hardly be able to sing Here I Am given their natural pitch. There’s something wholesome in the trauma-bound solidarity between the two as well, my favourite manufactured narrative is the show’s insistence on sliding a reaction shot of one House whenever the other does badly. They are brothers in martyrdom.

The one thing the jury did get right is how much we did need to see them perform together. Power duo.

Another Martyr would be Lee Da Eul: as soon as the fancams dropped he was already the most mocked online, for his sloppy and odd dancing. Just like the Houses, his voice is unfit for the Soprano-ranged songs, and just like them, he has that weirdly endearing thing to him. Unlike the houses though, his bad performance secured him a spot for at least a round, if votes remain the main factor of survival: the hate-views of his fancam alone landed him in the top 9 for two episodes in a row. He’s everyone’s favourite underskilled little guy. And perhaps mine as well. Daeul sweep etc… I hope he makes it to the finale.

He’s hypnotic to be perfectly honest, I’m obsessed with him he’s so woobly he’s so real.

Then come My Dozens. The ones that may not be deserving of the support compared to others, but that I still will support, because it’s my ranking, I get to choose the pretty boys who get in on face alone. Naturally, as the rest of the viewers, I devote myself to the Chiu SweetBlood- sorry I mean Jiwoong Sweep. Is he here and winning just because Bro is Beautiful? Maybe. But if the mass is not good might as well have pretty faces, and the thing is that he’s not completely void of talent, to my surprise and also disappointment, as there was something much funnier in supporting a guy who can legit do nothing but serve face and cleavage. From the get go I could never tell if I thought he was a good dancer or not. His fancam was… Not very good. His footage from his previous group endeavours were not too remarkable but not too bad. But Mirotic seemed to be just the style that best showcased his ability, and he can sustain vocals on top of the dancing, although not the most stunning ones. Still, that’s more than a Dozen needs to be doing, so shoutout to his pretty eyes and bosoms. Was he my favourite of his team? Not even. Did he still kind of Give? To me, certainly. But then I’m not objective towards the one truly handsome guy of the whole competition. Any lacks of his that would get anyone else thwarted from my list of faves is filled out by his mere blinks.

Good dancers who cannot hold a note were aplenty, and if I’m sensitive to guys who can shake it and willing to close my ears for them, I could not just adopt all of them. Some that did still vow me would be, and we’ll do quick name drops, Haruto, whose iconic voice break- cut off at broadcast because Mnet and I sometimes agree on who deserve the Ws- and iconic-er pre-show online presence carry him into my heart at all times, Wang Zi Hao who danced way better in his rehearsal than final stage but did not sound pleasant in either, Cha Woongki, yes he sounds awful no I don’t care he can shake it and threw a fish, and Na Kamden who hasn’t actually shown any singing so who knows maybe he’s good. All of these make it far in my excel sheet only because they aren’t Good dancers but Great ones. In this economy, it’s equivalent to having a minimum of singing skills.

As for singers, they get an automatic pass for me. We have to support what little voices we get.

The first Good singer I heard watching the performances was Jay, Kamden’s singing teammate, and he’s one I have to support double as it seems the public refuses to acknowledge him due to his cringeboy swag. Or perhaps he did something I’m not aware of, but his High School Musical type vocals deserve the acknowledgement: there’s not a lot of other candidates who can do what he does. So what if he’s cringe? What if he has the aura of a guy who posts tiktok thirst traps? What if he’s American? We have a shortage of singers. We need him now more than ever.

I mentioned Kim Taerae earlier, he alongside Lee Hwanhee are the two trainees who give the more Classic Kpop vocals. The former got to have a segment on how ‘he sounds so good but dances so bad’ and the latter is nowhere to be found on the screen. A damn shame, he sounds amazing, but what can we do against the editor’s favouritism except watch the full cam performance and sigh in hopes for a change to come when more group performances happen and they cannot skip him anymore.

Yoo Seungeon mainly, but also Krystian (with a very unique vocal colour, whose uncle possessed him, idk but i fuck with it), Park Gwanyoung (who sounded strained but way tolerable considering) and Winnie (who was mad good given the moves he was doing) aren’t just as good but still have nice vocal potential, and can probably do more, with time or more fitting songs.

Then come the ones that actually caught real attention, to different levels.

My favourite flop with no hopes of surviving, Kim Minhyuk, teammate of Park Gwanyoung, is being snubbed of screen time, of votes, of stars, of everything. Most tortured babygirl. Every day I dump a vote to the trash by giving it to him as if he could make it. First elimination and I know I’ll have to bid him goodbye, but our time together was lovely regardless. I made my peace, I don’t love him to the point of outrage, just to the point of disappointment. 

Lee Ye Dam gave mediocre vocals on his live, but his practice sounded much better, so I do believe he can sing. And mainly, boy he can dance, and he can Slay. Moves AND attitude, it’s maddening given how his PR video had me on the fence about supporting him (made him drop all the way from my top ranks after the fancam, to the Thin Ice section). For my own public image, let’s all look into a spinning spiral and erase it from our minds, and focus on his gambler performance.

Sung Han Bin has me very confused. He’s quite obviously Mnet’s favourite little guy, and he’s surely talented, but he’s got that crazy trait of becoming way less interesting as soon as he’s on stage. His rehearsals and freestyles are way more charming, they film him having a silly little fake competition and suddenly I get the hype, then he does his assignments and I am bored. But well, would I be mad if he won? Absolutely not, he’s solid, he’s safe. He’s just a mystery: how does a guy who look so confident about performing also loses his charisma when he does? A science subject. Perhaps that’ll bewitch me.

Funnily, because they’re besties, the show so badly wants a Sung Hanbin vs Seok Matthew rivalry. They do play it up a tiny bit, but never fully, instead, you get to see Canada boy rave over how good his friend is over and over again, while himself being honestly quite as good. It seems that a lot of people want them to debut together, friendship wins, but also talent wins, because Matthew is a great performer, good dancer, pleasant singer though with room to improve, and seems comfortable and happy on stage, so that’s just nice. Good vibes. Go Canada.

Next one will have people ask, wait, didn’t you have a section for good dancers who can’t sing? And yes, I did, but the thing is to me, Park Gunwook is more than a great dancer. He’s just way too nice to watch dance. Makes me insane levels of “I fuck with this guy’s dance”. So he’s allowed to not sing the best you see. I think he can learn. I think he can be dangerous if he does. Like give him vocals and it’s the end for everyone else because damn. He dance good. That’s it. Sometimes I just need a lil dance guy.

The one sin Jiwoong committed in entrancing everyone with his vampire spell was to take away attention from Jeong Ichan in his team. That guy is kind of crazy if you ask me, and gets no attention for it. Sad! Watch him shake it, hear him sing, he’s quite obviously talented in both aspects. I want him in the final lineup so desperately, but it seems the judges disagree with me. Well, they never had good taste anyway. All he can do now is steal Yoon Jongwoo’s strategy of gaybaiting through Jiwoong to secure his fujogirl’s votes through ship-sweep. I’m begging him to get on this grind. I need him to survive.

For a while I didn’t understand the Keita hype. Not that I thought he was bad: like Hanbin I just thought he was skilled but not that bewitching, at least from his fancam he seemed really skilled, but I just didn’t feel much. I can understand better with his appearances on the two episodes so far. His Conduct Zero stage was fun, and he also did well with Here I Am both in evaluation and in Good Conduct, so go short king! You caught me now, I’m adding you to the ones I look after now. If we have to have a kpop rapper on the team, he can be it.

Kum Junhyeon. That’s about it. I thought he was great in his fancam, I thought he was awesome in Nunu Nana too, like oh he can sing alright? Seems like a fun guy too, let’s twirl our hair and pat ourselves on the back for always knowing he was to look out for, I always knew but now I got the other watchers on my side too. Very satisfying.

Unlike the total disregard for Kim Minseoung. It was to the point I wondered if he was just a known public enemy, he was my favourite from the fancams, and by favourite I mean that Youtube started putting it in my automatic playlists because of how much I watched it-something about the clarity of his moves, so satisfying, so clean, so exactly what I look for, so I pledged allegiance to him forever, and I’m thankful that he did not embarrass me. He’s great. And he’s in the bottom twenty percent with a full four star ranking. Very frustrating. Gives me a superiority complex too: I know what’s up. No one else does. They only like him because he does a flip…

In Conclusion...

The show exactly meets its expectations: bad taste and bad faith from the judges. The public doesn’t know shit. We are short of talent in this industry nowadays. I’m the biggest martyr. Chiu sweep. Ten thousand likes and I drop my list of most hated candidates just to feel something.

[twinknote]

book recs (sorted-ish by vibe). also i am not good at understanding what books are stressful and i’m not sure what will shatter your heart but i will try :)

books that made me feel things (but not heartbreak and pain):

Howl’s Moving Castle (and the whole series) by Diana Wynne Jones — is it a children’s book? yes. is it beautiful and wonderful and makes me so so happy? also yes. if you’ve seen the movie disregard it when reading the book. they’re similar in concept but not really the same. the movie is great but the book is great in a different way so i’d recommend it if you want something calm and magical and perfect

i am realizing that i don’t have any nice happy books

weird / lots of metaphors:

Vicious by V.E. Schwab (one of my fav authors) — this book,, is kinda fucked up. it is.. weird. the main character is in a rivalry with another guy that is so hateful on both ends that it’s actually kinda homoromantic ngl. it is a very revenge-focused book and it does get dark sometimes but overall it won’t shatter you i prommy

Good Omens by Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett — if you haven’t seen the show (doubtful, everyone has) and even if you have seen it it’s wonderful. the show is fantastic obviously but book crowley and book aziraphale will always have my heart

I really really recommend anything by Chuck Palahniuk. Fight Club is his most famous novel but it gets really fucked up so if that’s not your vibe maybe skip him. if it is your vibe i’d recommend The Invention Of Sound (really fucked up actually might shatter you i think it changed me irrevocably) or Invisible Monsters (mildly fucked up but I’m only halfway through it rn so it might get worse?)

The Raven Cycle series by Maggie Stiefvater (book one is The Raven Boys) — this series is gay and also weird. very weird. i don’t think i can explain it kind of weird. i think i read this whole series in 3 days when i got it. it has a definite vibe. i don’t know what that vibe is but it has one. also technically probably a ya series but i don’t remember

anything by Neal Shusterman — i was obsessed with his books for years i think i’ve read almost everything he’s written. a lot of his books are ya novels but they focus on a lot of serious issues in very interesting ways. one of my favorite series by him is called the Skinjacker trilogy and oh my god that sounds so sinister it’s not i prommy. first book is Everlost. it reads almost like a children’s book based on the vibes but it has some deep topics and i don’t remember if it will shatter your heart or not. would also recommend the scythe series and the unbound series but those also deal with heavier topics so keep that in mind

classics (some have a particular writing style that some people have a hard time understanding so if you do then ignore these):

read anything by Jane Austen but especially Emma it is so good

if you haven’t read the Great Gatsby do that. defiantly some gay vibes but a sad-ish end so idk. and it’s important to read. i read it every year. it’s so good

The Picture of Dorian Grey by Oscar Wilde — one of my favorite classics i was obsessed with this for years, kinda fucked up in the way that all classics are but it’s only sad depending on your outlook

the ones i’d recommend the most are Howl’s Moving Castle, Vicious, Good Omens, and Invisible Monsters

tbh i’m the type to look for heart-shattering, thought provoking, really weird books so i tried to recommend the less messed up ones. i was combing my bookshelf and looking through my drawers (i have so many books) but most of them make people cry so a lot of the ones i recommended were ya or on a thin line. except for Howl’s Moving Castle. it’s my #1 favorite chill book (and only chill book apparently)

but if you ever want books that will kill you on the spot i can recommend you great things

THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!! v much appreciate the recs!!! to be fair most of the time idek what will be stressful or shatter my heart. like the last book i read which i Loved was extremely heartbreaking. i am just a mentally ill guy so i like to read things that don't make me have a complete emotional breakdown :-) i DO love weird/metaphorical books tho. also can you believe that i have a degree in english and i've never read the great gatsby OR any jane austen??? having professors who fought against the western literary canon was truly a blessing and a curse

of Course literally all of the books you rec'd are checked out from my library jghjhgjh but i will be bookmarking this list so i can check them out in a few weeks!!!

[mossible]

ok i think ive made my decision on this

excluding the votes of me and the gf, the first option still wins but. like i said in the tags, i think i'm gonna end up disregarding that and instead im gonna meet yall halfway on this

chapter 5 is gonna get split up into a part 1 and a part 2, BUT the first part is still going to be over like. 10k words. as in around 12k. that's for yall who want to read a tonnnn of words!

for the 4 (5) of you that voted for the 2 parts thing, the second part will be a little shorter! i think! it's passed the first draft phase as of me writing this, so it may end up with even more than the 8k words that it's currently boasting rn?? regardless, i won't make y'all who struggle w that sit through more than 10k for the second part. i prommy <3

cracked snowglobes readers your voices are needed lmk what you guys want

[elshouldbeasleeprn]

rambling about cringe interest under the cut (i didn’t realize how long this was going to get so the first sentence below the cut is essentially the same as that one shhhh)

last post about the cringe interest i prommy but i have been watching niki’s dsmp vods and thinking So Hard about c!niki to the point where her character development and arcs might be some of my favorite ever. specifically her like. relationships with people and how they fall into a sort of before and after. how her friendship with wilbur morphed into something one sided (her seeing him as her friend instead of a president, him seeing her as part of l’manberg instead of niki. i can’t remember it verbatim, but that bit of dialogue where niki says she’ll fight for him and he says he needs her to fight for l’manberg) and then flipped after his death (niki disregarding ghostbur, niki being one of ghostbur’s strong memories). how seeing the ghost of her dead friend who betrayed her and her family as his last act, and how she lashed out on the closest living counterpart to him (tommy). how the person she had the closest thing to a romantic relationship with saw the betrayal she was feeling towards tommy and how that directly juxtaposed her care for him and how that hurt their relationship. how she healed and found a family that sees her as a person instead of part of a nation, and how she’s found solace in the complete opposite of where she’s started. when i first heard the ‘i started baking again’ line i cried for an hour can you tell

(also, watching nov 16th from niki’s pov is like. Essential. it’s wilbur’s thing and i’m not trying to take away from that but there’s this moment after wilbur presses the button and the withers all spawn where the last remaining members of l’manberg are huddled around the l’mantree and it’s used as a symbol of l’manberg, of what it’s been through, of who it is as a people and watching niki use it as a place of solace all the while knowing she’ll burn it down was a sucker punch)