#Full Ranking

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2022: #02 & #01

02. SPAIN Chanel - “SloMo” 3rd place

Decade Ranking: 3/79 [above Daði Freyr, below Konstrakta]

LET’S GO!

At last, I get to show my TRUE CHANEL STAN COLOURS <333333 I mean, i’m sorry for those who aren’t a fan, but SloMo was incredibly good. Chanel succeeds like no other where recent girlbosses like Eleni and Hurricane have failed - she brings out my inner squealing f*ggot and I LOVED every second in me. 

TAKE A VIDEO, WATCH IT SLO MO MO MO MO

BOOTY HYPNOTIC, MAKE ME WANT MO MO MO MO Just when you think you’ve outgrown the vapid bangers, Chanel surges forwards as a human conduit of rainbow energy and leaves you scalped and gagged and eaten. The definition of PUSSY. SLAY. CUNT. 

Y no se confundan, señoras y señores, “SloMo” is not that great of a song, I recognize that. It’s a 7/10 J-Lo reject and you can tell.  It easily could have veered into Sekret territory and become an embarrassing debaucherous cumdumpsterfire. 

But it didn’t. 🙂 

Because Chanel wouldn’t allow it. Which is impressive given her journey. See, this is another area where Chanel obseletes the Elenii and Hurricanes of this world - she was an underdog all the way through - The Spaintards (not to be confused with “Eurovision fans from Spain”) have long since forgotten but they used to loathe Chanel for daring to beat Tanxugueiras (really, her?) and Rigoberta (kinda valid at the time, but less so now obv), hurled abuse at her in a ploy to force her to quit, and when that didn’t work angrily groused RTVE to make JURIES LESS POWERFUL so a disaster like this couldn’t happen again!!! There’s a reason Chanel no longer wants to perform SloMo and wishes to move on in her life, and honestly, same girl re: ESC2022.

 In spite of all that, Chanel remained motivated and chipper put in all the effort of the world at every single performance, and unlike Cornelia improved every time. You may not like it, but THIS is what peak performance looks like. 

Was this the best live performance of all times? The fact that I’m considering it should tell you enough. It’s definitely the best live performance of a Girlbanger For The Gays since “My Number One”. Numbers do not lie. THIRD in the jury vote, THIRD in the televote, THIRD overall. 

The best part is that I did NOT see it coming? Like going into the finale, it was clear Kalush and Cornelia would come top five, and having seen the rehearsal footage, I was confident Konstrakta and Sam join them as well. I NEVER saw Chanel’s top five coming. I was convinced, cynic that I am, that she would be my default Doomed Favourite and that Brividi would eat her TV alive and the juries would ignore her. Instead, she demolished Blahmood and Blancunt, and left no crumbs. 

Afterwards, Chanel casually fanned herself as golden sparks flowed from the ceiling, a visual representation of her arch. She knew right then and there that she’d NAILED it and made herself proud.

“SloMo” was the pinacle of achievement in this year, a tale of overcoming adversity, working hard and tirelessly to accomplish be as best as you can be and proof that, no matter how deep your depths get, even the shittiest countries can accomplish great things if they keep on trying. It was #Inspiring. But above anything, it was mostly three minutes of unbrindled trashy fun that makes me SQUEAL in gayvoice. #GayPowersRestored.

And now she is THE MOST POPULAR / BEST ESC ENTRY OF ALL TIMES, as per ESCRadio’s top 250. I should hate this given what it implies about Chanel’s fanbase and also fuck Chanel’s fanbase, but I enjoyed SloMo more than Euphoria anyway, so... i... actually... agree with the results. HA HAHA HA HA HAA HAHA HAHAHHAHAHAHAHAAAAA!!!!

and now for a #1 that hopefully surprises nobody. 

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#01. SERBIA Konstrakta - “In corpore sano” 5th place

Decade Ranking: 2/79 [Above Chanel, below Shum]

 ~OnaS eroProC Ni SomRefNe SneM~

WHAT COULD BE THE SECRET BEHIND THE PHENOMENON KONSTRAKTA? 

WHAT COULD IT BE?

WHAT COULD BE THE SECRET BEHIND THE PHENOMENON KONSTRAKTA?

WHAT COULD IT BE?

WHAT COULD BE THE SECRET?

I believe the answer lies in a stroke of brilliance. 🙂 It’s honestly near impossible to unspool “In corpore sano” and all of its layers in words because *everything* interlocks with each other perfectly. But we all know WHY we’re here

👏 BITI ZDRAVA 👏 👏 BITI ZDRAVA 👏 👏 BITI ZDRAVA 👏 👏 BITI ZDRAVA 👏

 ✋🤚 BIT 🤚✋ BIT ✋🤚  BIT🤚✋   BIT  ✋🤚   BITI ZDRAVA 

Through the power of Soap, Friendship and Biti Zdrava, Konstrakta and her kabal of spa zealots effortlessly enrolled the entire anti-vaxx country of Serbia and its minions into her Health Cult. I couldn’t be more giddy that this went to Eurovision. How could I not be/: an underground gothic pop song, the first  Eurovision entry to use BLACK HUMOUR as its preferred means of communication.😍😍 Black humour is the best humour, so yeah anything that opens with inspecting Megan Markle’s Healthy Hair, and follows it up casually informing us that a giant spleen is undesirable and ugly and may cause the irreversible condition known as death 🙂 is InstaFave material. 

BETTER WASH MY HANDS AGAIN BEFORE I BECOME SICK. IF I GET ILL, I DIE 🙂

The real genius though comes from the fact that Konstrakta took a VERY serious concept (the lack of health insurance for all the self-employed, which in Serbia includes anyone working in the culture sector), and a VERY personal topic (the death of a close friend, who passed away because he couldn’t afford aforementioned healthcare without the insurance) and turned it into a socially-critical parody. 

“In corpore sano” may be completely in Serbian and Latin (LATIN <333333) but it is also fluent in the hidden language of Sarcasm 😍 Konstrakta nailed the exercution with her flat, deadpan demeanor and anemic delivery. This is one such a case where being as low-energy as possible works miracles. She’s the 🔥 THIS IS FINE 🔥 meme incarnated in human form. 

(or for those that have played Baldur’s Gate, she has the exact same personality and demeanor as Xan <3)

WHY DON’T I JUST SAVE MYSELF THE EFFORT AND JUST LIE DOWN AND DIE? 🙂

The dichotomy of Konstrakta praising the efficiency of the autonomous nervous system or good hydration because they help keep the body hale (finally safe! God Grant Us Health!), juxtaposed to compusively washing your hands showing that she’s ridding herself of her germs but losing the battle against her dark thoughts (I Am Left On my Own), was some galatic-level storytelling genius. It is SO impressively clever, on a level you almost never see at ESC and if you do is usually executed poorly.

Which brings us to the act. Usually songs with A Profound Hidden Meaning resort to pedantic staging full of hidden symbolism. It’s tiresome to engage with when you’re ultimately tuning into have a good time. “In corpore sano” for all its ingenuity and snark, never attempts to be smarter than it is. 

At its core ICS is Nurse Pratchett and her five patients (two twunks, two stern-faced top-knot ladies and able-bodied Peter Dinklage) acting out some Biti Zdrava nonsense, and it’s all very fascinating, occult and sinister. There’s clearly more going in, some artistic vision but do you need to understand the backstory in order to get the song? 

I don’t think so. 

The hidden depths are a nothing more than a reward for the discernible sleuth willing to learn delve more deeply, and if you don’t, you can at least still get off by hand-clapping and exfoliating. This is how highbrow staging should be done. It rewards both value seekers AND those tuning in for a good time. Hans Pancake dead in a ditch (again.)

So um yeah, overall, as you know (if you’ve followed my ranking of all 2010s songs), you know that I’ll put a clever cookie with an avant garde pearl and excellent on-point emotional delivery first in any year, at any moment. “In corpore sano” isn’t quite on the level of Shum, but I can defo say that the 2020s are now 2/2 in terms of iconic favourites 🤗 

So that’s it for the 2022 ranking. I hope you’ve enjoyed this marathon more than I did (making the gifs at the end was REALLY painful because my computer’s HDD is nearing death AND my internet is slow), in any case it’s finally OVAH!! 

Let’s hear it out ONE LAST TIME for the best entry of 2022: SERBIA:

MENS INFIRMA IN CORPORE SANO

ANIMUS TRISTIS IN CORPORE SANO

MENS DESPERTA IN CORPORE SANO

MENS CONTERRITA IN CORPORE SANO

I STA CEMO SAD?

Why, I rank 2023 of course . 🧐 Probably very quickly and in some limited capacity (maybe 5 per post again) but I should be able to finish before my birthday (08/05) which is when the first dress rehearsal footage is released. I’m off to Amsterdam for EIC though, so stay tuned for the updates if and when I get back!!!

THE RANKING:

[arrimorr]

My ocs, Sir and Ser, aka the eldritch malevolent policemen 😔

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

they continue to be Thee besties ever. number one duo spot in my mind!

[tokyo-daaaamn-ji-gang]

Ok but the twins are literally the definition of looks like a cinnamon roll but could kill you and looks like he could kill you but is a cinnamon roll. It's them 🧡🩵

So many guys over the years have probably avoided Angry but gone for Smiley, assuming he's the nice one/ easy target then got mercilessly beaten up

[moongothic]

Madoka is the promise you won't turn from a child, full of hopes and dreams and the wish to save the world, into a bitter adult who just wants to hurt others and ruin people's lives

Madoka promised to be there for you to remind you of the person you wanted to be and to stop you from becoming what you sought to destroy

Madoka made that promise and became the very embodiment of it

[ddeck]

you know. just like with specific terms and nicknames like clanker or shinie, clones must've come up with unique meanings for their armor paint. like with different meanings assigned to colors of mandalorian armor except since the choice of color is out of their control, all the importance lies in shapes and placement

[lime202]

A name turning from a curse to a blessing.

[shittyv1daily]

I wonder if v1 would be good at rhythm games

day 186: p-rank/full combo

[thekittyokat]

you ever just have a lot, a LOT of feelings all at once about a character and not even remotely enough words or brainpower to FORM the words to describe everything you're feeling. so it feels like you may explode. yeah

[scoriarose]

Is that clumps of asbestos in your snake enclosure?

Absolutely. Nothing but the best for my children.

[borisbubbles]

Eurovision 2022: #10 - #6

10. UNITED KINGDOM Sam Ryder - “SPACE MAN 2nd place

Decade rank: 18/79 [above Last dance, below Je me casse]

UP IN SPACE MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN

There are moments I forget Sam Ryder and Space Man are real things that happened. A good song representing Union Jack colours, by an influencer who looks like a labrador superimposed onto the face of Janice the muppet through deepfake software. Are we sure this was not a fever dream? 😳 Are we sure this is the BBC ? 

So uh yeah, the UK had a pretty good entry last year. 🙂 At last, a British hopeful who isn’t embarrassing right out of the gate and could unironically be described as enjoyable. If The UK were winning a jury vote any year, then 2022 was that golden opportunity.

The crazy part is that they did AND it felt earned? “Space Man” is so unequivocally British-sounding. The score effortlessly conjures up that unique Brit-rock vibe that we know from Queen, David Bowie, the Beatles, and turns it into something that sounds like a clarion of triumph thundering gloriously over the Turin 2022′s remaining proceedings.

I feel like Space Man’s inherent sense of achievement and of victory - despite the lyrics dealing with the dark side of success and the return to the simple life - (you know i love a clever lyrical contradition) made so many people flock to it. There WAS some lameness to be found (”searched around the universe / been down some black holes” did the songwriters look at grindr bio’s for their material?) but overall Space Man stood up as the rare Good UK entry.

So if you have all that empowerment jazz in your song, you need a good act to bring it out? Fortunately, the BBC for once did well there too. As soon as I saw they had built a spacecraft out of scaffholding (clever lateral staging btw), had stuffed in Ryder into a swarovski-studded leotard and forced him to perform a cheesy guitar solo I knew. I knew they had managed to summon the spirit of Ziggy Stardust to bless Ryder with winnerness and that he would steer his rebar rocket into a top finish. And so he did. 

Now, as for my reservations because I have a few

One, Ryder. Yes, Ryder had the best vocal out of anyone this year, period. I have no doubts he’s a genial young man too. Cool if you care about these things. I however do not, because I don’t find him charismatic. 🙂 First of all, he does fucking look like a deepfake what the hell is up with that? Secondly, the adlibs. Normally I like it when contestants go full ham but here I find it irritating. Space man is good and doesn’t fucking need embellishment. Therefore the adlibs must be some kneejerk instinct Ryder inherited from his influencer days, which ew. The BBC have taken Ryder out of the TikTok but they have not managed to take TikTok out of the Ryder. 

Two, The Social Media Craze. You already know I feel about that stuff and how it interacts with Eurovision, although I mind it not so much here - Space Man came fifth in the televote and not first (and thankfully, also not seventeenth), and was also adopted by the radio stations ahead of its viralness. Also Space Man went less viral than Snap. Its popularity was a natural evolution.  All of these things are preferable when you’re solidly into “Good Not Great” territory. 🙂 Still, any mileage derived from braindead spyware apps is a sin on principle, so ::ding:: 

Three, Irrespective of anything else I’ve written above, I’ve always solidly liked, but never fully loved Space Man. This applies to both the song and its staging. I don’t mind that it got second, but it did beat better entries while doing so. Eleven months later I still feel that way, and as we go forward in this ranking, it has to leave within this update. If I have to choose who to rank higher between an annoying influencer with a good song and a bunch of lovable randoms with clown fiesta music, the randoms always win! 

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09. IRELAND Brooke - “That’s rich” 34th place

Decade Rank: 16/79 [Above Destiny, below Natalia Gordienko]

NO TITLE SCREEN?! ROBBED!!!! RIGGED!!!

God I wanted it for Brooke, I really, REALLY wanted it! In the same vein as Ryder, finally an entrant for Ireland that isn’t a walking cringe, or a dead on arrival lamus or an offensive sap. Finally an Irish entry that isn’t fucking HOPELESS. (um ignore that I believed in Maps until it crashlanded into last place lol)

But of course, less hopeless than the average Irish entry only meant "another solid NQ, just not in last place this time”. lol. 😥 

I greatly enjoyed Brooke though. Here’s yet another flawlessly flawed combination of song and singer, united in holy floptrimony. “That’s rich” is a trash baby of the finest camp qualité, and at least half of its sassy vernacular belongs in an Almanac for All Time Eurovision lyrics. LOSER LOSE YOUR ATTITUDE I’M DOING GOOD YEAH THAT’S ON ME and BYE BYE FOOL are and will forever be a part of my brain-to-post jargon from this Brooke onwards. Me and the friends even conjured up a French version called “C’est Riche” which is the ultimate high honour you can get, as I’m sure you’ll agree.

The way Brooke and That’s Rich synergize together spoke to me. The song is very sassy and feisty and playful, whereas the singer is kind of... a dorky shrew (<3). Reminder that Brooke is a friend to all Spanish Customs Officers and dedicated enough towards maintaining that friendship to greet her Italian audiences with  “OLÉ OLÉ OLÉ” . She went ALL IN on channelling ALL the emotions during her live performance. Unlike Ryder’s, Brooke’s adlibs felt genuine enough to adore. Let the GIF reel commence: ´

É, CRETIN

C’EST RICHE, J’EN AI EU ASSEZ DE VOUS

C’EST RICHE, T’AS UNE AIRE DE CLOUN

C’EST RICHE; TU N'AS QU’AUCUN CLOU

DONC C’EEEEEEEST RIIIIICHE

VA T’EN, CON 🙂

Ryder dead in a ditch. Brooke broke from her betadom to live the ALPHA LYFE on that stage and based on merit, I thought she had it. Yet almost nobody (of relevance) cared?! How? Well ok I know why (it’s eurotrash <3) but honestly how difficult was it to just penalize all the cheaters on the spot? I guess garbage like Fade to Black and River absolutely DESERVED those algoritm points!!! In the end, I can accept this outcome because WRS also served edible fun and I sorta nibbled, but Europe denied us a feisty feast here! Another year were Ireland deserved better! WILL IT EVER END?!

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08. AUSTRIA Lum!x ft. Pia Maria - “Halo” 36th place

Decade rank: 14/79 [Above Natalia Gordienko, below Senhit]

LEMME BE YOUR HAY-LA HOOOOOOOOOOOOO

There you have it. This year’s best non-qualifier. And its journey was through Eurovisionland was WILD. 😍

Where to start? Like always and more pressingly than usual, at the selection.  Imagine waking up to Austria declaring that a 20 year old Gabry Ponte protégé with no solo experience will be their rep, accompanied by something or someone called “Pia Maria”, a name that gave you zero hits if you put it through google or spotify. So of course me and the gang instantly started spec’ing whether “Pya Mariyah”  was a huge untapped talent discovered through chance by Lum!x (not implausable! Janet Grogan is, after all, a better vocalist than Adele), a highly advanced neural net or Philipp Kirkorov in disguise.

Then “Halo” was released, and it doled out BpM at a faster pace than most nightcores and had an absolute word casserole for lyrics. 😍 “Philosophers like Socrates go find something to get on your feet. Go sharpen your teeth” lmfao what?! 

 And like that, the journey dove head-first into hilarious absurdity. WHAT IS THIS ENTRY?! This was chosen by the SAME people that bored us with Cesár Sampson and Vincent KinderBueno? HOW did ORF land on Pia Maria? Where did they find her? Did they select her via a raffle, or was she in the room when Lumix realized he needed a vocalist? Was she a random they snagged off the streets? Is she someone’s secret nepobaby? It honestly fries my brain that this was deemed a serious attempt at a qualifying entry by the fandom.

So yeah the second they had set a foot in PalaOlimpico,  Pia and Luca immediately immolated themselves to death in a blaze of chaotic neutral. I hope everyone saw this coming because I sure did and relished every nanosecond of it. Pia became winded approximately 40 seconds into the performance and spent the rest of the performance running a losing race against her vital capacity.

Luca meanwhile, oh man. Pia gets a bad wrap for her vocals, and she was Not Very Good, but like what do you expect from a newbie cajoled into performing a litany of jibberish. What really took “Hayla Ho” on a ride down Hysteria Lane for me were Luca’s jubilant adlibs juxtaposed to Pia’s visible failure. Every time Pia missed a note she at least looked a bit disappointed with herself. Luca went on a fucking runner’s high with every passing beat, blissfully unaware to the hellscape forming itself around him and Pia.

He absolutely CANNOT contain himself. 😍 So much so that his voice cracks THREE SECONDS INTO HALO. 😍 The true insane asylum heights of fusedmarc were never reached, but they came sorta close.

So yeah, like That’s Rich, Halo was instantly ironic eurotrash. Unlike That’s Rich, I not once thought Halo would do well lmfao. How could anyone think that?! Its entire purpose at Eurovision was to be a great and memorable trainwreck. They passed with flying colours <3

Oh and as all great morality tales go, this one ends with Pia deleting Luca off her social media mere hours after the live performance, having accomplished her goal of getting a three-week free holiday 😍  If that doesn’t cement her as the most relatable neural net of this decade, then idk what will. 

K and now for a MASSIVE leap in quality: 

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07. THE NETHERLANDS S10 - “De diepte” 11th place

Decade rank: 11/79 [above Manizha, below TBA]

🦉😂 -- S10, me.

Yep, above Manizha who was top five for me in 2021. 2022 is strangely top-heavy, where the good entries are all GREAT and the rest of the contest simply doesn’t exist. 

So yeah, time to discuss a few Real Songs before the final countdown. Sometimes it’s easy to forget that Eurovision is a music contest. This selectful forgetfulness is achieved when great music fails to reach the top 10! 🙄 And people wonder why juries are important. Forget the Die Togethers and Fade to Blacks of this world - THIS is sort of interpretation juries ought to reward. 

Anyway, “De diepte” is kind of my jam and you may think this would make the write-up easier and you’re so so so wrong. Stien dwells deeply (ahem) in that Victoria zone where the quality is so obvious it renders further words redundant. WHICH IS PERSONAL RANKER HELL!!! 

 “De diepte” is not some dreck-wreck featuring several layers of mass hysteria (some of which only exist in my head <3) that I get to describe in various degrees of colourful language. "De diepte” is a song. A real song. It’s emotionally layered, intelligent, well structured and easy to listen to on repeat, and I have for several hours total. The moment RIGHT after the big note, when S10 looks almost overwhelmed with emotion and is about to cry man, I Felt That. I Felt it in my core, in my bones, in my soul. I’m not made of concrete. The contrast with Botmanda couldn’t be greater:

Now as far as my random things I specifically loved about S10 go, they include: her nom-de-plume which caused several people (including Matt 🥴) to pronounce her name as “Season Ten”, the fact that AVROTROS wanted to push a song in Dutch and then came up with a chorus that can mostly be summarized by two emojis, and of course this:

It’s not quite the Tinkara sorcery, but the intent is there, and I appreciate it. 

Other than that, “De diepte” is a very good showcase of Dutch indiepop, which -living 30 km from the NL border- is a genre I know very well and fucking love. It’s what I would call A Real Song, a song that actually speaks to people and has legs outside of the contest. It’s defo something I would listen to during the off-season when i’m detoxing from ESC if it had not been ESC itself.

However, I have to also put my Big Ranker’s Pants on and make my Big Ranker decisions: When picking who I rank ahead of other entries I like roughly the same, I need to assess the contest. 2022 was light on europulp spectacle and heavy on the”“Good Musical Quality” type of entry. So in a sense, I feel like i need to prioritize spectacle over song to a certain degree. Or at least those I am able to praise with more profound terms than “this is very good, not a top 10, REALLY, Europe?”.

And on that note~

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06. PORTUGAL MARO - “Saudade, saudade” 9th Place

Decade rank: 10/79 [Above S10, below TBA]

Ok so, S10, Maro and the 5th placer are basically three acts I like equally much, and they’re ranked based on how much I can talk about :-) 

THOSE ARE THE RANKER’S RULES, SORRY! Speaking of things that rule, I present Maro: a woman who forgot to stage her song in the semi of FdC because she assumed nobody would like her and then won the final in an overwhelming landslide <3 

and for good reason because “Saudade Saudade” is berry gud. Like “De diepte” i feel like its appeal is just very obvious? It’s clever, it’s emotional, it’s very well performed. It is one of those songs that would find their way to an audience even without the exposure of the Eurovision Song Contest.

That said, Maro *very* narrowly edges out S10 for me for a handful of reasons. First off, while beam sorcery is a nice staging trick, I do find the circle of wymyn powah a slightly stronger visual representation. It creates some interaction on the stage,which translates to spectacle, which translates to good television. 

Secondly, the vocals: Systur’s harmonies were already outstanding. Maro and her backings are even better. Maro’s own hoarse vocals holy heck. t’s difficult to fully engage into praise because Cornelia exists and we’ll get there in the next post, but talk about a song whose rawness came alive through sheer vocal timbre. Anyone who can sing is able pull off a “De diepte”. The list of people that are capable of doing a “Saudade Saudade” is very short.

Thirdly, both songs deal with break-ups and letting go, but I find Maro’s methods more wholesome.  “Saudade, Saudade” is literally an attempt at unspooling raw thoughts being put into little word blankets, and coming to the realization that the best memories and strongest emotions cannot be turned into lyrics. They exist in the heart. And that I can feel.

Ok some other little details here include Maro recruiting her former rivals Ginger Ale Lady and Woman’s Corpse Lady into her backing cabal, the fact that her fucking insta handle is or was @ItsAMeMARO and her growing disbelief that people really *truly* liked her as much as they did, and you know you have a pretty awesome contestant on your hands. Maro feels humble in a genuine and endearing way that you rarely see in Eurovision where most contestants are inexperienced, ambitious or huge fans. 

Overall though, Maro runs into the same ranker curse as S10. There just isn’t much to discuss beyond the music, and the music is really darn good. Still, it’s a very positive sign that the juries recognized that by giving her 5th place (without a single 12? lol?) and countered her bad position in the R/O. In the full picture she falls a bit short for me though. 🤷‍♀️

CONGRATULATIONS TOP FIVE!!!

WHO. WILL. WIN?!

[abrahamvanhelsings]

crozier being kidnapped and telling goodsir not to worry because edward will be there on the morrow, completely sure of it, like it's inevitable. edward in fact immediately going to rally the men to get crozier back and finding they held a vote without him and it's been decided they'll leave without crozier (and without the sick). edward having the choice between being left alone with no chance at crozier's rescue or his own survival, or taking up his duty and leading the men onward. crozier in hickey's camp believing in edward's sense of loyalty and edward not showing up, not knowing how edward fought for him. crozier showing up at the final camp seeing edward mutilated but alive like he told him to, only to die. thinking about edward's absolute sense of loyalty to his captain and duty towards the men tearing him apart and it never saves anyone

[serpentface]

Fuck we are under attack (Janeys armor reference image)

The Imperial Wardi military has no standardized weapons or armor (except for a few small, elite and specialized groups of soldiers). The vast majority of soldiers have to supply their own, and one's armor is only as good as they can afford. Janeys can afford very, very good armor, though this set opts more for comfort, visual appeal, and basic coverage of vital organs than truly comprehensive protection.

This set consists of a lacquered and finely scaled iron lamellar covering the torso, shoulders, and wrists, and two layers of thick padded skirts protecting the upper legs and groin, all worn over a standard skirt and a light undershirt. The veil draping from the helmet is externally decorated with fabric and conceals an internal set of chainmail (the rest of the mail that would complete the set has been neglected). While this armor is not as fully protective as would be ideal, it is designed to allow for an adequate degree of protection while maintaining freedom of movement to engage with versatile duties (riding, fighting with a sword or spear, archery, shooting a musket, verbally abusing your soldiers to cope with stress, etc).

This armor is substantially more decorated than is typical, while not outright being fully ornamental/ceremonial. The padded components and belt are trimmed with consecrated white lionsmane (a material typically reserved for Odonii and their kin, used to increase prowess in battle), and the helmet has a purely unnecessary skimmer gull plume flopping around on it (for good luck).

There is a great variety of armor produced in Imperial Wardin, but it tends to fall into the categories of lamellar (usually iron or leather) and chainmail, and/or thickly padded linen armors. The latter is of increasing importance in the contemporary, as it is the only armor that offers SOME degree of protection against musketfire. Padded armor certainly cannot withstand a direct hit, but it can sometimes absorb distant or glancing hits from ammunition.

[samarecharm]

People who really like shuake also seem to write themselves into a corner wrt Akechi and his relationship to Akiras team. Contrary to popular belief, the team, including Haru, does not hate Akechi. At worst, they tolerate him and deal with his attitude. Hes a good teammate and respectable fighter and the team recognizes that at the end of the day, he was a teenager who was manipulated and abused by a man who saw him as disposable. Just about every thief understands this intimately. They have the same mindset wrt adults who take advantage of the people beneath them. Under different circumstances they wouldve been friends. And if u approach it from that angle, it becomes less about Akechi being the sole person who ‘gets’ Akira, and more about the thieves being the only people in the world who ‘get’ Akechi.

When you expand your thoughts to include the thieves as members of his Team and not roadblocks that get in the way of your ideal shipping dynamic, you allow urself to give Akechi and Akira more depth and nuance to their own relationship.

Akira and Akechi are wildcards; both of them struggle with the face they choose to display to the world. Its the first time Akira interacts with someone who is, at a literal, technical level, his ‘equal’. But Akechi is one of many firsts for Akira yeah? Every thief has their bond with Akira thats completely unique and personal. Akechi will never be the person who witnesses Akiras Awakening, hes never the person who watches Akira have his restless nights alone in the attic, and hes never the person who realizes in real time that the teenager hes housing is just Some Kid, not the delinquent hes been warned about. Hes not Ann or Yusuke, or any of the thieves; he doesnt have the time or experience that they have with Akira, and I think its interesting to explore that part of their relationship, shippy or not.

Akechi is someone who is incredibly lonely and self depreciating despite his cockiness and attitude. He has no positive bonds to speak of save for his connection with Sae. To have him see a team that works together and cares for each other, how do you think he would feel? Out of place? Inferior in some way? Angry about how hes been alone for so long in this single minded quest for revenge? Wouldnt that be a point of struggle between the two of them? I think what makes shuake good for me is knowing that Akechi needs alot of time to heal, and the thieves would want to help with that process. They do it bc they care, bc Akira cares, and bc they trust Akiras opinion (and he trusts theirs in return); if Akira feels like Akechi is someone who can be trusted Now after everything thats happened, then the thieves would do their best to help. And how would Akechi feel about that? Angry about the show of pity? That even now, he has no real say in what happens to him? Or begrudgingly grateful that they are cordial with him? Because they do care, he KNOWS they care, they care TOO MUCH actually; but the one thing he values over brawn and wits is honesty- fighting for what you believe in without having to use soft words to justify it.

[mazojo]

Anyways XO Kitty love interests summarized

Dae

Min Ho

Yuri

[three-dee-ess]

Have you ever tried fantasy life?

YESS i love fantasy life. It's genuinely so good. It was actually the game that originally convinced me to get a 3DS back in 2016!