#I actually wrote down this concept - gosh looks like a year and a half ago?? At least the initial concept

[sysig]

Yandere Therapy (Patreon)

[zaraki-oriented]

How did you write the 11th Hour? Did you plot it out extensively? What was your process like?

I have been making my way through it and I am enjoying it so much!!!!

All the Zaraki/Unohana moments just make me go

AHHAHAHHAHHAHA

And how you seamlessly integrate other characters and the plot is so engaging, it all falls onto place so well! I love it🥰

I just would love to know more about your writing process!!

Thank you so much for writing and putting so much content out there! 💜

Oh gosh... oh wow... umm - I... have a process - and I plot out things a LOT. But I'm not a pro writer or anything. I take random skills I've learned and practiced from creative writing and script writing classes throughout the years and smush them together into something that works for me, I guess? There are things I can absolutely reccommend, but I dont' wanna sound arrogant or anythin' <3 Hmm... Welp, to be honest the first 2/3 chapters were actually written in 2011. It was a story I started back then and never finished. Then, a year and a half ago, I decided I really loved the original concept, despite the scary size of the World I was creating, and just... started tapping away. See, originally I had only planned that first interaction - the bounty hunt. Which might lead to Kenpachi meeting Unohana in the hospital - romance ensues etc. But instead of forcing an interaction, I decided to follow the plot of a 'villains return'. Pretty classic stuff - bad guy comes back, heroes reunite etc etc. By doing that, I was able to use the in character traits of each character to see what they would do next. e.g. Zaraki is kinda lazy unless something is a challenge. Ichigo takes action if it's a threat, or to do the right thing. Byakuya is aloof to an ignorant degree. etc etc. I mean... that's all pretty basic, and I don't wanna sound like I'm spelling things out to you if you already know them (sorry!) Skills wise, I should have been using three point purpose/action/result system per chapter, with defined character growth each arc - most likely along the 'Heroe's Journey' scale (cos it's easier to read) with a Man vs Man thematic. However, I threw all that shit out the window, and just wrote from the heart. My biggest helpers were my plot diary, plot board, reference imgaes and TIMELINE. Omfg my timeline saved me so many times. There's only one or two plot holes (instead of 10000) because of that thing. I DID keep to a three act system, however (Chapter 1-20, Chapter 21-34) Chapter 34 - Epilogue) - though it's veeery rough.

Also - a lot of late nights and early mornings around work. I would plot out the next chapter at work each day, tap a few notes in my phone, then sit down and write after dinner.

I'm a mad Kenpachi Fan - and KenUno is my OTP. I love any ship with Kenpachi... but this one holds a special place in my heart. I have so much love for all the other characters too! Even the 'bad guys' haha

Anyway - look at me rambling on! Thankyou so much for your thoughtful question, and I'm absolutely thrilled you're reading 11th Hour! It's an expansive universe, with 1x prequel and 2x sequels in the works. There is art getting released for it in 2023, so stay tuned!

All my love, and I hope you enjoy the journey it takes you on! <3

xx K

[fawn-eyed-girl]

20, 21, 25

Hello there @sarcasticbelmont 💖 and thank you so much for the ask!

20) do you write in long sit-down sessions or in little spurts?

This honestly depends on how much time I have. I prefer to write in long sit-down sessions, but sometimes I only have 20 minutes while dinner is in the oven, or while the kiddos are watching something before bedtime, I'll bang out a few hundreds words when and how I can. Sometimes I will have a few hours, and that's why I try to tackle longer fics (like, not one-shots or 2-3 chapter fics), so that I have space and time to think and revise.

21) what do you think when you read over your older work?

oh my gosh, I love looking back at my older work and thinking about what happening in my life when I was writing it, or thinking about how a piece was cathartic. I also love to see what the tropes were at the time--like Voices, for instance, I can tell it's a fic I wrote a year ago, because of some of the concepts and headcanons in the story. I can also see some evolution in my thinking; even though I write Kikyo as a villain sometimes still, I do not because it's expected, but because she is truly the best person to play that baddie role (like, I guess Yura could have been the bitchy manager in Real Me, but Kikyo is just too perfect).

25) copy/paste a few sentences or a short paragraph that you’re particularly proud of

Here are a few lines from a little story I wrote for @lavendertwilight89, called "The Magic Word" (below the cut for lots and lots of swearing):

“Oi, cabbie!” the half-demon shouted. “What the actual fuck do ya think yer doin’, cutting me off in the middle of fucking street? Do ya think I have some kind of a death wish, ya stupid-ass motherfucker? Holy fucking shit, ya could have run me right off the fucking road! What the fuck, man? Give a guy on a bike a fucking break!”

“You goddamn cocksucker,” chirped the cab driver, who Kagome could see was a kitsune. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing with a fucking bike in the middle of the fucking city? Anyone could tell you do have a motherfucking death wish. Next time, stay the fuck away from my cab, and I won’t have to cut you the fuck off!”

“Listen you fucking kitsune runt,” the biker growled, “I fucking dare you to get out of that fucking cab with your goddamn little mealy mouth there and see how fast it takes me to kick your ass from here to fucking Battery Park. Come on, you little fuckwad! Get out of the fucking cab now! Godfuckingdammit,” he said suddenly, ���what the fucking hell is your fucking problem?”

Somewhere in the middle of their tirades, Kagome had started to laugh.

From Get to Know Your Author Asks

[theopenmindpalace]

The Probilynthium

A/N: This is a dream. I wrote it immediately upon waking up... four years ago? while still half-asleep. It is unedited. It is... not very well-written, but since it’s a dream that I no longer remember, I’m leaving it as-is. I may use it as inspiration for something larger eventually.

Exactly five levels make up the Probilynthium:

Higher Heaven

At the top there reigns some kind of beautiful haven created of life and light; I’ve never been there.

Heaven

Much simpler than the above mentioned place, “Heaven” as this is described is made up much of cold, beautiful ice and plentiful oceans. Clouds carry their own cities as well, but fire, earth and rock holds no place here; I went there one time, but I was thrown out.

Earth-Level

This is where it all begins. I came into being here, but I don’t recall what it looks like. I know it doesn’t have earth or fire, as though those two elements have no place in any realm here.

Hell

Or so the others call it. It’s actually not that bad. Like a blistering desert, it has twists and turns and many obstacles along the way down; I spent many years here, trying to bypass all the guardians who might keep us out. The sand is smooth to the touch, and it taught me to control my inner powers more fluently.

The Darkness

At the very bottom of the Probilynthium, there lies a realm very much the essence of darkness. The bubbling vat is only covered by mats of soft magic—the dark kind, of course. Ruling over The Darkness is a creature I cannot name—perhaps I could once, but the memory is lost. The creature was darkness in its purest form, blacker than black tentacles and feelers reaching out around and behind and below it, accordingly. And that eye...yellow isn’t a word to describe it completely; it bores into your very soul, and it judges your heart. Or that’s how it feels anyway. Out of the eye comes forth a beam of energy that would destroy any being in its path; for one of us, it returns us to Earth-Level, and the pain of it is terrible. I live here.

It was a long journey.

I first fell downwards, where I was met with the desert. It was a complete accident, so long ago that I don’t even recall how it happened.

So I fell, but it wasn’t bad; it was more like sliding, in fact. I weaved amongst the sandy dunes and ruins of who-knows-what, dodging random creatures, the faces of which I can’t remember at all. It was amazing, so amazing that I wondered why people called it Hell.

And what could possibly be beyond, in The Darkness?

I tried to get all the way down, but I was eventually caught and sent Home.

Earth-Level...is complicated. The whole place is surreal, and strange. The only room I can pull from my memory is the, for lack of a better term, training room. It was where the newbies decided and practiced their powers; I didn’t realize that when I first fell, though. I’d fallen... Gosh, it’s the first thing I remember ever happening to me, after learning what this place was.

Anyway, I decided to choose my own powers. (Ugh, I wish I could remember what they were called. Let’s call them...Ah! I know—the Essence.)

I should probably explain what The Essence is, though. It’s a vague concept, so this’ll be hard. The Essence is basically your soul energy, and the effects it can have in the physical realm—if that’s where we were; I suspect the Probilynthium is beyond the material plane, but I digress—this power is even more vague than it seems, as it’s different for everyone.

But one thing remains the same; we start out by using our Essence to imitate certain shapes and colors in a form that’s quite similar to the sand in Hell. I remember my brother having trouble with controlling his once it was established, but I was having fun. I waved my hands, and the colored “sand” would follow and do whatever I pleased. I’d learned in Hell that you can’t let the Essence control you—you must control the Essence—but you have to let it move as it would if, say, the wind were blowing it around.

I believed I could learn more if maybe I could get all the way down to The Darkness...

I tried, again and again, to bypass Hell. But it was so hard! Impossible, even. At some point I met a girl slightly younger than me with the same goal in mind—my sister. We began traveling together, but our combined efforts weren’t enough; the obstacles were just too much!

So eventually we decided to try Heaven; that is what we were taught, after all. We were taught to forge forward for the higher powers: The powers of the three holy elements, air, water, and light. And—well, there was the Essence as well, but for some reason no one ever counted it as its own thing. Darkness was forbidden, and in the vision of...whoever was in charge (I really don’t know), we would all eventually settle in either Heaven or Higher Heaven, according to the powers we desire or possess. Usually Heaven was more populated, simply because people never imagined anything better than that, but the idea of mastering the element of light drove still many beyond the borders to try settling in Higher Heaven. Sometimes it worked out, sometimes it didn’t.

So my sister and I decided that maybe The Darkness just wasn’t meant to be. Or maybe we could acquire the power in Heaven or Higher Heaven to get to The Darkness—or hey, maybe Heaven was everything everyone said it was. As fun and exciting—though frustrating—Hell was, maybe it really was the lower point of existence.

So one time when we came across an obstacle that would not back down, we sent its Essence to a portal on the walls and directed it to send us straight up to Heaven.

That’s the thing about the lower regions; they had portals and short cuts that were quite useful, but they could be a pain sometimes. For instance, when they sent us back to Earth-Level when we could see The Darkness right up ahead!

Anyway...we came up in water and swam our way to solid ground—er, ice. But before we could make it, a collection of Acolytes who’d made it into settling here spotted us and immediately knew where we’d come from. They started shouting at us to go atone for ourselves or something like that, and the next thing I knew I was being drowned and blown away by their Essencial powers of air and water. That sent us back to Earth-Land.

I decided then that the three Highers were highly overrated, my sister agreed, and we went back to Hell.

This time, we made it to The Darkness.

The Darkness...how do I describe it? Beautiful isn’t the first word that comes to mind. Terrifying, powerful...home. Yes, from the moment I stepped out of the darkened portal, I felt like this place was mine. My sister’s presence didn’t even register anymore; I took it in, and I finally realized why everyone else was so scared of this place.

It was powerful.

And I immediately knew that I needed to make it mine. I turned to my sister, and I could see a kind of excited fear in her eyes—but not the power lust that now gripped me, which was good.

But the moment was broken when a gargantuan ROAR (for lack of a better word) shook the very ground we stood upon—which, I must say, wasn’t any substance I’d ever seen before.

How we’d missed it was anyone’s guess, but at the very center of this place, floating...staring at us, was It.

That beast...it was both beautiful and terrifying at the same time. But at the time in question...I wasn’t thinking of beauty. My first thought was that I was now going to die.

The Beast’s yellow...eye, if you could even call it that, lit up, somehow getting darker and brighter at the same time, and I knew we had to move. My sister and I took a single step forward and ended up falling off a cliff face that I hadn’t even known was there. We narrowly avoided landing in the vat of bubbling, purple darkness just in time to be engulfed in a bright darkness:

The Beast, the blacker-than-black, squid-like Beast with the yellow, swirling vortex of an eye was right above us, and out of that eye came a painful beam of red blue light that sucked all the darkness into it, only to send the darkness out again in a confusing mixture of colors.

I began to see things from outside myself. I felt pain, and I saw the beam surround my sister and I; we were screaming, though I didn’t feel myself scream—and the next thing I knew...

Back in Earth-Level.

We tried...again...and again, but no matter how many other Darkness monsters we destroyed, no matter how tattered the barrier between Hell and The Darkness became—no, that just made it worse; creatures I’d never seen before emerged from Hell and just made it all harder.

At one point my sister and I felt we needed to get back to the outskirts of Hell before we were sent back to Earth-Level again. Neither of us wanted to go back through Hell again just to come here and be painfully torn from this reality. I was having fun getting back up to the portal; the stairway had been destroyed by our battles, so we were rebuilding it out of rock-like blocks created by the dark powers I’d managed to acquire thus far. But just as I got up there...before my sister could follow, another beam shot through the space and sent my sister back to Earth-Level.

Then I realized something. The eye...no, the Vortex. The Vortex of pure dark Essence was the source of everything here. There was no power greater, and I was almost drawn to it. That was it! I needed to take the power from the Beast; there was no other way to take this place as my home, not without submitting—and I was not going to submit to this animal.

The next time we came, we went for the eye.

You see, whenever my sister and I exited one of the portals, a great blackened substance would fly out of the vat and take shape. By now, Hell was so mixed up in The Darkness that there were sand dunes we could ride across to leap upon the Beast as it took shape from the Dark Essence.

We tried two times, just two. And on the second attempt, we leaped for the eye; I didn’t know how, but for some reason I knew that to accomplish my goals, I needed to pass through the Vortex. And we did; the monster was destroyed.

Just to be safe, my sister and I went to the other side of the portal to be sure we weren’t sent back to Earth-Level. I can’t say “we went back to Hell” anymore, because the line between the two were so blurred, but it was safer on the other side of the slim barrier.

While we were there, I noticed that the ordeal had changed me; I’d taken the power of darkness. I became darkness. When I saw my reflection, I saw five, blackened, tentacle-like veins of power in my hair; my skin became a dim yellow; and my eyes blazed green.  My mentality hadn’t changed, but I would bet my existence that the people in Earth-Level wouldn’t let me near them anymore.

Anyway, my sister and I gazed through a small window into The Darkness. Then suddenly an eye, just like the one we’d been thwarted by so many times, appeared right there in front of us. My sister squealed; I jumped back in equal fright, scared that it would send me back and I would be destroyed by the Acolytes. But the longer we looked...

“Wait,” I said hesitantly, my voice seeming to echo in this realm; I hadn’t spoken much, but now I pointed off into The Darkness. “They’re a bunch of smaller ones!”

The Beast had somehow become—or released—a million little creatures just like it. But they were much weaker; now they were the residents of The Darkness.

And I was their owner.

Time passed like a blur; my sister came and went. I honestly don’t know why, or what happened to her. Living in The Darkness is... euphoric, though peaceful.

But then one day the Acolytes, thinking I was defiling their ways, or something like that, sent someone from the Higher Heaven to destroy me.

Destroying an Acolyte is an offense that no creature dare commit; we just don’t die. But I guess in their eyes I was no longer one of them; I was fine with that.

Still, why couldn’t they leave me alone? I cast out multiple Acolytes from my home, and eventually they grew desperate. They sent many to take over The Darkness, even my own mother came, which felt kind of disturbing

Only one fought me though; the most powerful in their ranks, or so they said. He had all the powers of light, air and water. He even used his Essence against me, which I admit was strong. He almost overpowered me, but when I looked over my dark home and saw light beaming from the powers of the Acolytes, I became angry; I stood up straight and plowed through my attacker’s wind and light; I reached my hand out and engulfed him in darkness; I went on the offensive, and I can’t say I’m proud of what happened next.

I stood over the body of the so-called strongest Acolyte, panting, and I felt my heart heave. I fell to my knees, and only then did I realize that my brother was standing just feet away. I didn’t look at his face. I felt as though I’d just done something awful; I hadn’t meant to kill him!

I don’t remember much after that; it seemed that the others saw my power and left me alone. But my brother...no, that wasn’t my brother. Thinking back on it, that may have been the Acolyte who threw me out of Heaven, all those years ago. I remember him saying something, and I remember my response:

“He couldn’t do anything to me. While life, light, air and water will all...eventually they’ll fade, Darkness will always be, even when everything else is gone and nothing else exists, it can’t fade. It’s the ultimate power.”

Ultimately dangerous.

I began to meditate. I let people into The Darkness sometimes; I just stopped paying attention. My family visited sometimes, but usually I was sitting somewhere on the red, sponge-like mats that floated within and without the vat of darkness, darkness of such pure form that even I couldn’t touch it without feeling melancholy. I ignored them.

Sometimes I liked to listen to them talk though; my mother cared, which was nice. My brother found my seemingly comatose state fascinating, which was weird. My sister...Hell, I can’t remember. It’s like she stopped existing to me.

I had visions sometimes, while I meditated. Weird visions, like dreams; I can’t remember them all now. Maybe I just fell asleep; that’s not really possible for Acolytes, but I wasn’t one of them anymore, so it’s possible.

I did have one dream, though, once, that I actually remember:

A tall, kind man met me in a room. He seemed happy with me, and I think he gave me a gift—a toy, just like I used to play with when I was little—

Back on Earth—just Earth—I used to play with these little toy vehicles—

—he just handed it over and smiled at me. And that was it.

I don’t know if it means anything, but I think I’m content with my life. Even if it’s anxiety-filled, I can deal with it. I feel like I’ve finally settled.

Right?

[vowel-in-thug]

Hi Gemma, how long does it generally take you to come up with an outline for a story you want to write? I'm trying to be more productive, because right now thinking up a story takes me months and it's super demotivating. I get flashes of ideas here and there, non-linearly, and I develop them, but for some reason I can't ever get to a full story, I have a ton of half-outlined stories in my WIP folder though. Any advice you might have to offer would be greatly appreciated!

OH GOSH i’m probably not the best person to approach if “””””productivity””””” is what you’re after lol i take forever to write. but i’ll give this a shot. SURPRISE IT GOT LONGGGGGGGG

well, first of all let me say i am RIGHT THERE WITH YOU. i’ve mentioned here before but before i started writing fic, i had like a five-year bout of writer’s block. i wrote for school and that’s it. nothing creative, nothing on my own. so, y’know, thanks black sails. 

but either way, you are ahead of where i was because i had NO ideas for anything, like a ton of half-outlined stories in a WIP folder??? my dream 2-3 years ago. i would have killed for an idea.

so i’m gonna talk about the process for the cowboy au because it’s by far my longest. like, literally the longest thing i’ve ever written. i’ll try to make this as clear as possible though, in case you haven’t read it.

i first started with what people in ~*~industries~*~ call an elevator pitch, or a book jacket summary. a better way i feel is to think about telling your best friend this story idea in a text message. just be as succinct as possible but trying to map out a whole story as best you can. 

the thing about this though, is to not only expect changes to occur while you’re writing, but to embrace them. 

so my text message to my girl allie would have been something like “they’re a gang of bank robbers, trying to find a hidden loot by a famous zorro-like bandit named vasquez, but somehow silver gets his hand on the map ala the show, and he ends up sort of joining his crew to find it.” but that’s just the set-up, there’s no real conflict once silver joins the Walrus Gang. so then that became: “of course there is a sheriff or law agency that’s been gunning for the Gang since they’re extremely wanted men (and woman)” 

but that ^^^ conflict – took me uhhh awhile to come up with (i’d been ruminating on this cowboy au since i started writing BS fic lol) a lot of internal considerations and thinking of specific scenes just in my head. and that doesn’t even take into account the shit that goes down before the Law gets involved, aka the Fancy Gang. i hadn’t even realized singleton was betraying them right away.

so what i’m saying is, try to write a brief (ha, ironic) summary. like a page. as vague as you like, but SOME direction. like physically write it out. 

i didn’t decide to write in three chapters until i started outlining what would become the first chapter. because those images you have in your head – boy do I get those too, but i try to think of them as scenes instead. you storyboard it. you make a bulleted or numbered list and write out the images you have, in hopefully some kind of sequential order (when i was writing my master’s thesis, i wrote the scenes or ideas on notecards if i hadn’t figured out how to arrange the ideas. it’s a bit different bc it’s nonfiction but the concept is the same). 

for the first outline of the first cowboy chapter, it probably looked something like this:

the gang rides into Nassau 

Flint speaks to Eleanor to try and track down the map

they hear a man at the wild west show might have it

meet silver

i knew they would have to discover through word of mouth about silver (we can’t ALL be clever with a secret feather, BS dads), but having these different scenes rumbling around in my head is so not helpful. I look at a list like that and it’s like, oh. obviously the place to expand and add more is in #3: how and when and why they hear about the wild west show. their discoveries. this was when i decided i would be using multiple povs, because i wanted to show anne with max, and flint with sherriff scott, and i needed somewhere for billy to go, and then of course the only other villain whose name i remembered ned low comes in. and that brought in that whole concept. just like any time you think of a new idea, they sort of spring from another idea, and just like that, your list expands, and you’ve got the making of a clear outline.

and if you’re looking at a list that’s 20+ numbers you’re like “okay maybe this should be chaptered” and then you gotta decided what moments are gonna leave people wanting more – is it something being resolved or a cliffhanger or a dumbass punchline like who the fuck is long joe silverado?

so this might all be old news and not at all helpful to you, in which case i’m super sorry lol. my advice is always to write things out (and my advice is to always write things out by hand . not only does it make you think clearer than typing but the beauty of a new pen and notebook will make you WANNA write) and to first look at the forest – even if that forest is just a green, amorphous blob on a Google Map, it’s still know by everyone as a Forest. 

and then try to look at each individual tree, and number the trees. and that’s your outline. and then when you add the actual plot, character, dialogue, setting, tone, etc those are your leaves and bark and living creatures and nests and cracks and sap and all the other tree accoutrements, i think i lost sight of this metaphor i’m sorry

[almaasi]

reaction post typed while watching SPN 12x18 “The Memory Remains”

(●ω●✿)

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(●へ●✿)

06:42

new writer John Bring??? let’s hope he BRINGs something neat to the table (sorry i had to)

the promo for this looked intriguing and scary so i am READY

(director Phil Sgriccia. the best director imo, booty shots and bisexual subtext)

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06:45

goddamn it, wrong file. 12x18 seems less available than episodes usually are at this time?? granted i’m looking for 720p x264 but still

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06:57

while i’m waiting another hour (yaaay), i just realised, something i really like about Steve Yockey’s episodes (12x06, 12x10, 12x20) is that he puts his characters’ names in the episode title. ie. Asa Fox, Lily Sunder, Tasha Banes.

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06:59

oh ffs i’m too impatient, i’mma get a regular sized download

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07:21pm

okay here goes

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07:22

still sad about mick

all that character development and cas-paralleling for notHING

they made us care about him just to kill him and i’m not actually sure what the point was

(to make us realise the BMol are the bad guys again, i suppose)

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07:23

dear kid who’s weirded out by all the straight couples sucking face

this immediately needs more gay

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07:25

okay no maybe it’s a good thing it wasn’t gay because that kid is gonna DIIEEEE

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07:27

meredith glynn is a co-producer?? SWEET

is it weird i’m proud of her

like i know nothing about her but I FEEL EMOTIONALLY ATTACHED

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07:29

dean’s worried about cas and his expression and mannerisms make him look like a sad child

smol bean with a gun

i feel like 90% of dean’s angst these past couple years have just been him MISSING CAS with all the force of a thousand suns

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07:31

sam mentions dean missing cas, and dean immediately calls him “reading rainbow”

which i know is a reference to the book thing with LaVar Burton

but rainbows

dean’s like “i’m not gay you’re gay”

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07:35

dean: “pchew!”

cas needs to marry this fuckin dork stat

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07:37

i swear i’ve seen that background painting 5 times before

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07:42

the newest instalment in the ongoing adventures of dean and recreational drugs

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07;44

DEAN YOU HAVE A BOYFRIEND STOP THIS

honestly cas goes missing for 5 minutes

like seriously have you tried masturbating maybe

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07;46

thE HOT COFFEE THING

welp

i’m cringing and laughing at the same time

SOMEONE BRING BACK CAS THIS IS HURTING MY FEELINGS

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07:47

sam is me right now

*heavy sigh*

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07:50

DEAN’S SO FUCKING CUTE WHEN HE’S WITH PEOPLE HE’S ATTRACTED TO

HE’S SO CLOSE AND CUDDLY UGH

PLEASE GOD LET HIM BE LIKE THAT WITH CAS SOMEDAY ;A;

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07:52

“3 sheeps” on the wall

definitely symbolism

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sam says “uncontrollable lust” WELP THERE WE GO

inb4 unnamed personality-free pretty girl is a plot point and dean’s under the spell

*sigh* i miss the times when the siren-type creatures were dudes around dean

this episode really needs more gay, for real

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07:56

something i’ve noticed

these characters keep getting described by their professions - ie “walking clipboard” for a health inspector, “the local badge” for the sheriff

i know it’s just a quirky script thing but it’s kind of rubbing me the wrong way

aside from darren, the sheriff, and the boss guy, none of these characters have names, speaking roles, or any personality and it’s fucking bizarre ?? now darren is dead, the boss guy and the sheriff are the last two remaining characters

also the fact that the one woman is nameless and exists just as dean’s lust interest is really not sitting right with me

that said, plot-wise it’s still better than a deadly duo episode

but that’s not saying much since it’s a low bar

i dunno, i was expecting more. and presently i am feeling more and more let down. (eh, let’s see how it goes)

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08:02

obviously the sheriff is meant to be the top suspect, and the whole thing is implying black bill is a dude in a costume (made of fur, and this sheriff does taxidermy)

so i’m expecting a plot twist where it’s not him

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08:04

ugh god

i’m trying really hard not to look at this meat

i hope it’s fake meat

but i’m still squirmy

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08:05

shit

1997 was 20 years ago

why is it so hard for my brain to realise it’s been that long

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08:06

well if darren’s waking up now in a fridge

then i’m 100% terrified this is gonna be one of those stories where all the meat they’re processing is human meat

oh god no i hate those

inb4 THE GOAT GOD IS TRYING TO GET REVENGE

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08:07

look i dunno where this is going

but so far this episode is making me feel more and more uncomfortable

(not scared, just unsettled in the bad way)

and i don’t know what to make of it

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08:09

“billhook meats” sign outside the place darren is trapped

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08:10

darren’s cloud breath looks computer animated

i couldn’t describe in what way, but it does

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08:13

usually i love watching dean eat but my face is just pinched with disgust right now

guess i just dislike the idea of meat in general

like yeah let’s kill something and eat it!1!

(i mean, i eat meat, but i am currently malnourished and have been for 23 years so once i’m healthy again i’d happily go vegetarian) (i’m not judging meat-eaters, i just find the concept generally alarming)

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08:14

this reminds me so much of that episode of the x files with the chicken mince

oh lord that one was the scariest episode i do not recommend watching it

one big ol’ nope from me

i feel faint

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08:19

hey it’s the same basement with the same three windows again

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08:24

i feel like there’s a difference between “dark” stories and “scary” stories

this one’s just dark, it’s not scary

still not sure how i feel about it

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08:26

i lowkey think the goat mask is cute

he looks like he needs a hug

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08:29

more busty asian beauties

where’s the dude porn

as much as this writer is Totally Onto It with the old (racist) jokes, i think he maybe missed the dean-is-bi-and-into-cas memo

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08;31

ohhhhhhhhhhhh i think ketch just realised mary is way older (and/or more undead) than she looks

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08:34

“hunting people, killing them. the family business”

dean almost looking into the camera

-

while i’m paused, i just wanna say: i am decidedly really uncomfortable with this episode

i think dean randomly going for an unnamed girl for no plot-related reason is what’s throwing me. if she had a name and a personality i’d be fine with it, because hell he’s bisexual and has a significant sex drive, and regardless of his feelings towards cas he’s always liked diner girls. but her lack of person-hood is just degrading, y’know??

this episode’s portrayal of women is “pretty thing to fuck” and i’m not gonna lie that disgusts me more than blood and murder ever could

the fact there are no significant solid dean-is-bisexual things to balance out the heterosexuality is just giving the whole thing a bi-erasure character-development-erasure kind of feeling

i miss cas so. fucking. badly. i want to cry right now

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08;45

hey the colt shot something NOT in slow motion

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08:47

if this show is remembered 100 years from now it’ll be for four things: 1. how bible stories were reinterpreted - followed by fanfiction reinterpreting that, 2. the fact it had 13+ seasons against all calculable odds, 3. a community/fanbase with unprecedented dedication, and 4. the fucking queerbaiting

-

08:53

OH NO THEY’RE LEAVING THEIR MARK BECAUSE THIS IS HOME LIKE THE IMPALA IS HOME OH GOSH

quietly thinking about the fic i wrote with TEAM FREE WILL CARVING THEIR INITIALS INTO A TABLE AFTER A DISCUSSION ABOUT EXACTLY THIS

If You Could Go Anywhere (3767 words)

-

why do i feel so sad

why did this episode feel so uncomfortable

this show is so unbelievably wrong without cas. i cannot express how badly i miss him. i miss him like i’d miss a family member.

everything was just a little not-quite-right about this

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08:57

CAS HAD BETTER FUCKING ADD HIS FUCKING NAME TO THIS FUCKING TABLE

I REALLY WANT TO CRY RIGHT NOW

THIS IS A NICE MOMENT BUT WHY DOES IT FEEL SO WRONG

I DON’T UNDERSTAND

the tears have arrived in my eyes

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09:01

i dunno

it’s over

i think you guys can extrapolate from what i’ve already said how i feel about this

i know i hated last week’s episode but i gave that a 4/10

yet halfway through this one i was like... this one’s a 2/10

yet that doesn’t seem fair because it wasn’t bAD i just didn’t enjoy it??

...no..scratch that, it was a little bit bad

the nameless girl and unnecessary heterosexuality, the lack of characters of colour, the busty asian beauties

the plot was okay i guess

ehhh

4/10 again, let’s say

I WAS EXPECTING A LOT MORE and i was left disappointed

John Bring’s writing is very Straight White Dude Who Has Not Heard of Intersectional Feminism-esque. i’m not into it with this as a sole example, maybe another episode would be different

best part was dean sulking about cas, and then sam and dean carving the table (the former enhanced by the absence of cas, the latter incident sullied by the absence of cas) (i was expecting dean to mention cas after they finished carving, but he mentioned mick instead)

i’m hoping next week’s episode will be good. idk what happened to this half of the season but i kind of feels like they’re losing their grasp on the things that make this show enjoyable (unpopular opinion?? unsure)

[theworstbob]

the thing journal, 4.2.2017

scattered thoughts on the things i took in over the last seven days. this week: matt pryor, boyhood, julien baker, literally show me a healthy person, drake i guess, the goldfinch, the discovery, dave chappelle

1) Memento Mori, by Matt Pryor: i mean yeah, it's an album of acoustic folk songs? so i don't. i'm sure there's a lot that can be said about this album? but i'm so not the person to say those things, i could listen to this album again and again and try my best, but i can't be that person. this is no one's fault but my own, i'm not gonna be like "nyeh, this album sucks" because this happens to be something i don't typically dig, because i'm just not the kind of person that listens to folk. (don't you listen to country?) yeah but in country everyone's drunk and heartbroken, this is, i dunno, adult? yeah too adult for me, and i'm comfortable admitting that. (aren't you 27?) listen.

2) Boyhood, dir. Richard Linklater: So it IS possible to be absolutely dazzled by MOVIE-MAKING MAGIC yet be left kind of cold by the finished product. The story of how this film was made is cool, and you can feel the love and passion for this project oozing from the seams, but this is also a film about how a young boy grew up to become a college student with bad facial hair?, and there's a limit to how engaging I find those types of stories. So it's tough, because this is a film completely unlike anything else before it and an absolute treat to watch and think about (gosh, the pains one must have to go through to shoot a film over 14 years and make the finished product look cohesive!), but also a story I could get literally anywhere else. I thought the overall product was fantastic, but enough other people have been waving their flags hard enough and long enough that I'm okay not adding my own to it.

3) Sprained Ankle, by Julien Baker: This week, Bob! attempts to digest three quiet indie things despite not being all that into quiet indie things! For what it's worth, I know I have to give this a more attentive listen, this sort of music would pair better with list-making than it did with Mario Kart 7. I won a race where I had fewer Mario Kart points than all but one other dude in the field. I won the race with a last-turn pass and only by half a second maybe, and once I saw I took 1st, I shouted at my Nintendo 2DS, "REMEMBER THE FUCKING NAME," while alone in my apartment. The Mario Kart 7 headspace is not condusive to an album in which a young woman sings songs about death. I will say: even spending the first listen shouting at Mario Kart 7, I could still tell there was tremendous depth to be plumbed, so at least this thing was able to permeate the mania. Every now and then I'd hear a lyric ("I'm screaming at myself in public/I know I shouldn't act this way in public") and think "oh fuck, that's me, I need more time with this."

4) literally show me a healthy person, by Darcie Wilder: I don't know that any one thing has had a greater influence on my writing, if not my outlook on life, over the last year or so than the 333333333433333 Twitter account. Darcie Wilder is an absolute master of that form. I deleted my Twitter because the website is exhausting and I couldn't handle it (also real talk I'm just a fucking dude in Minneapolis, why do I need to worry about my brand), but hers is one of select few accounts I still visit on a regular basis because the Posts are just that Good, and her voice is perfectly represented in this book. Lesser writers would have published a compendium of tweets. Wilder presents something between a monologue and a short story collection, a recap of the day's thoughts, her mind bouncing from fun thoughts about rats to THIS IS SOMETHING I DID WHICH I DEEPLY REGRET like a mind actually does. It's dope as hell. It's the best thing I've ever read that I was able to knock out in three and a half bus rides. (Also, there's a passage in this book that is just a two-word sentence, "bob died," and it is my favorite instance of my name appearing in a work of art since Undertale.)

5) More Life, by Drake: I took an Intro to Film course at community college, because I like film AND I liked taking classes to help fill the art credit requirement! I took this class in 2008, so naturally, people were abuzz about some of the classics that had been released late in 2007, like There Will Be Blood. The professor DID NOT like There Will Be Blood. When pressed, he said something along the lines of: "There's no story! Daniel Plainview begins the movie as a monster, and he ends the movie as a monster. What changed? What did we spend two hours of our lives watching?" And while I don't agree with his assessment of the film, his perspective has stayed with me. Why do I bring that up? Who knows! Anyway this is the same album Drake has been making for nearly a decade and listening to it didn't enrich my life in any meaningful way because I already listened to other Drake albums. Also this was fucking 80 minutes long and even if I enjoyed Drake's whole thing, there is no excuse for a feature-film-length album, like calm down, just who the fuck do you think you are even? I spent less time reading literally show me a healthy person than I did listening to More Life. That's stupid and I hate it.

6) The Goldfinch, by Donna Tratt: This was recommended to me by a friend, so that's how I read this story about a young man who gets big into antiquing, and now I'm offering a review where, not only am I out of depth trying to proffer literary criticism, it's not even the sort of book that I'd come to on my own, so now I'm HELLA out of depth. This book is written in this elegant, austere way, and I loved the moments in the book where the author was just describing things, this book is at its best when no one is talking, but it was always somewhat jarring when a reference to modern technology was made. It felt odd and out-of-step with the rest of the novel, to have the odd reference to video games or iPods, like what's technology doing here, get out of here, I wanna read about the chairs this dude's been selling. But overall, I dug this book. It's about grief and the power of art and how decisions you make when you're 13 still influence the rest of your life, all things I’m into, and it was a welcome change of pace from what I usually read. (You mean nothing?) Again, listen:

7) The Discovery, dir. Charlie McDowell: ah just what i need a cloudy-day movie about suicide So like, I remember watching The Happening for a Bad Movie Night and thinking that the worst thing the movie did was squander an intriguing premise. There was a good movie somewhere inside The Happening, a movie about how to keep yourself believing life is still worth living, and it's not a perfect one-to-one translation of course, but The Discovery is pretty danged close to being the film I thought The Happening could be. Maybe it's a matter of scale: it takes this concept, "What would happen if science proved the existence of an afterlife?" and applies it to this small family drama, the son of the man who found the proof and their efforts to find out what the afterlife is. It has an offbeat sense of humor (I never realized how much I needed to see Jason Segel and Jesse Plemmons just hangin' out), and I appreciated the hell out of the final twist (even if I could have done without the Usual Suspectsy montage of moments from earlier which presaged the twist; "Look at all the foreshadowing we did! Aren't we such clever boys?" ugh i mean as someone who once paid enough attention to game of thrones to be able to identify every single white dude with a beard, i find that kind of shit annoying, i KNOW he said those things, i was WATCHING your FILM). I found much to enjoy about this film, even if "enjoy" is a weird word to apply to a film where a suicide counter figures prominently in the background.

8) Deep in the Heart of Texas, Dave Chappelle: I think a lot of what I said about his other Netflix thing applies here. The focus was a bit tighter, but ESPECIALLY here, it felt at times like he was telling jokes he wrote a few years ago that he just really wanted to get on television. He did a run on "Wait (The Whisper Song)." I didn't know people were still talking about that. He attributed "Wait (The Whisper Song)" to 50 Cent. One, you think people are gonna remember "Wait (The Whisper Song)," but won't remember The Yin Yang Twins? Two, you're gonna attribute it to 50 Cent? Come on, man. Say Lil' Jon. Lil' Jon is as current a reference as 50 Cent (moreso, actually, given "Turn Down for What"), that name is at least in the ballpark, and it's an easy applause line for you, like dude, shape up, I know it's not that simple but I'm pretty sure I've nailed it. But this was still more good than bad, and it still provided exquisite shots of white people in the front row who somehow didn't know who they had paid to see. Gosh, you could just smell the "well, actually" on some of those bros. That's the best part of these specials.