#I wholly think it’s ok for a group of kids to be out for a day

[tired-inyxe]

That’s arguably worse

[max1461]

Yeah my entirely subjective, personal impression of the BAP/koryos stuff is that it appeals to... this desire to like "run around with the boys", right, like, get all the boys together and release your inhibitions and run around causing mayhem. Uh. This is imo a gender neutral thing but BAP presents it as gendered. Anyway. That's like the uh, playground psychology that seems to be on display here.

Except my playground psychology was that I wanted to wander around by myself and look at plants/cocoons/weird sticks/etc., and I always felt some mixture of confusion and disgust at what I perceived at the time as like, the sweaty writhing mass of other kids. Uh. Needless to say I lack the koryos drive. It's not running around in the woods that I take issue with, but running around in the woods with a group. At most a single treasured woods-running partner who I've cultivated a one-on-one relationship with for many years please. No group running for me please.

Like, another manifestation of this, and I've talked about this before, is that I've never been part of a friend group. All the important relationships in my life are wholly one-on-one and have been since the beginning. My best friends have each met each other like, once or twice in 8(?) or so years of knowing them. I don't do this on purpose it's just how I tend to operate.

Anyway, right. I would hate BAPworld not just because I think it doesn't make any sense morally speaking, but also because organizing society around "running around and getting wild with the boys" is like, my fucking nightmare scenario. Or, not a nightmare actually. Because uh the playground was always organized around that, right, koryos-ethics are what emerge on the playground. And I never hated it or anything, I was just completely disinterested. I had my own more important stuff to think about and little interest in joining the big writhing mass.

As an aside, I've also talked on here about how I was never bullied, and how in fact people are (irl at least) essentially never mean to me in any capacity. Uh. And I think this is why. Somehow I have just the right mix of politeness + disinterest in the social games of others that they lack a foothold. I think as a kid (and possibly even up to the present day) I gave the impression of someone who, if you were mean to me, would just kind of go somewhere else and do my own thing largely unbothered. And I gave that impression because that was 100% true; the few times I recall someone doing something that seemed actively pointed to me as a kid I remember basically just walking off and it never amounting to anything further.

This all might make it sound like I hate socializing or something, but as an adult that's not really true. As a kid I admit I didn't have that much interest in interacting with people my own age, but as an adult I like socializing quite a lot. It's just, uh. Well I think I have a decidedly different attitude towards social interaction than most people do, although how it's different is difficult to pinpoint. I find myself really disinterested in social games, status jockeying and whatnot; not unable to see it happening but just emotionally unmoved by it, not concerned with the outcome or with participating myself. I think this is definitely a good thing and has saved me inordinately many headaches over the years. On the other hand I the pleasantries of socializing; I like small talk and I like getting to know people, finding out what they're interested in and how they feel about things. I kind of just feel positively towards everybody at a baseline level. But it'll usually take a year or more of knowing somebody before I decide like, ok we're actually friends-friends and not just acquaintances. I guess that's fairly normal.

[crimeronan]

Worst timeline AU, but Vee never made it to Camila’s. Camila’s absolute despair at seeing her Luz return but completely shattered and then seeing this weird red-eyed point ear boy appear at her doorstep. What in the world would she think?

GOD. i think camila would assume that hunter's appearance is just the result of some genetic condition she's not familiar with -- there are plenty of humans with unusual appearances who are definitely 100% human. i don't think she'd jump to "fantasy creature" immediately

i think luz would be completely hysterical about the importance of Keeping Hunter Here & camila would just assume he'd been held captive alongside luz. the assumptions she makes are probably closer to what actually happened to them than you'd expect, even if neither hunter nor luz was actually imprisoned in a murder basement. you think about the shit both of them went through in this AU and it's like. yeah you might as well have been in a murder basement

camila would want to find out how old hunter is and if there's any chance of anybody coming to the house looking for him and if he Wants to go to the police about all of this.... but it becomes apparent Very quickly that hunter is undocumented and a legal adult and deeply mentally ill and wholly uninterested in finding his own family.... and camila is like. yeah we're not calling the cops about this. they would not help and also would make this situation 100000x worse. you can stay as long as you like and we'll figure out the rest as we go along, ok?

camila figures out pretty fast that luz thought hunter was dead & that hunter is Desperately important to her. there is not a single molecule in her body that would ever even Consider separating them, or arguing with them about whether their relationship is healthy. that is So Low on the list of priorities.

i think she'd be privately and quietly doing a LOT of reading & reaching out to local aid groups that explicitly work with situations like this. just like. how do i get these kids help without putting either of them at risk of institutional violence. Pls.

[lyriumheart]

ok i finally have the braincells so here's some of my criticisms/pointing out of .... questionable content in bg3 that i've personally come across. it may get a bit long. apologies for if it's difficult to read, i'm just trying to lay out my thoughts here. some things are also more serious than others.

The Dark Urge this one is relatively small, as playing the dialogue for the dark urge kind of hints at it, but i do think that it needs a MUCH clearer indication that it can be dark and probably disturbing/distressing to play as. and also that it should probably not be reccomended for a first run, as it does change things quite a bit.

sexuality and romance choice i think it would just be helpful if, when a party member hits on you or shows interest, that you are able to say 'i'm not into girls/guys/anything at all'. and that this specifically shuts down their comments. i have a friend that was disappointed that he couldn't say this to lae'zel, and got further uncomfortable when she kept on saying 'you will wonder what i taste like' when he's a gay guy trying to play a gay guy. it would also be uncomfortable for someone not interested in that aspect of the game/romance and sex in general, i would imagine. also related to this, and i do understand why every single romanceable character is bisexual as this just makes things a lot easier, but i do feel that there should be characters that just are not bi, even just among npcs. there's some npcs in same gendered relationships which is good, though i think there needed to just be more characters that clearly are not bi. (though given the dragon age modding scene's track record, i also get just wanting to avoid that outright.)

trangender characters you the player character can be trans and i love this. i do wish there was a way to have the more feminine frames with a flatter chest, and vice versa, though. i mean we have genital options, but no chest options...? (also no weight or further body shape options but i digress). i also think i noted maybe, two? npcs? that were transgender? and i feel that there really needs to be more trans and nonbinary npcs, specifically prominent ones and not relegated to background characters that you blink and miss (which one of the ones i found was). bg3 has given me as a player far more options to play a trans nonbinary character than any game ive played thus far, but there needs to be more beyond just the player themself in terms of trans rep.

party member racism as a romani person myself, i found myself relating to the tiefling group quite a lot. i dont expect larian to not include fantasy racism in the game, but playing as a tiefling and having a party member, lae'zel, call you and your kind 'cockroaches' with no way to chew her out for it, and just having no proper way to direclty combat the racism of your party members in general is. very uncomfortable. astarion also has some lines like this, and while he does eventually change his attitude, i havent been able to change or confront that with lae'zel. not good for someone youre meant to adventure with and trust.

the goblins and treatment of the way that the goblins are depicted and treated (while not wholly larian's fault since they didn't make the setting- still not an excuse tho) could have been handled better. there are a few instances where you can stand up for them as being people without condoning their actions, but overall they are treated as 'dirty uncivilised tribals' and i hope i dont need to explain why that kind of depiction is bad. they're background cronies of the bbeg, explicitly revealed to having been manipulated and controlled into serving the bbeg, and any exploration of actual goblin culture is treated as a joke.

murdering goblin kids specifically is okay apparently on the topic of the goblins- i was appaled when i realised that in order to free halsin, you have to kill two goblin kids. in fact, if you choose to attack the whole goblin camp, you kill more goblin kids. nobody bats an eye at this. yet, when you do the reverse and attack the grove where there are children that you can kill/cause the death of, this is explicity treated as a bad thing. it's just disgusting that goblin children being killed is not given the same treatment, just because they're goblins.

ableist abuse is fine when the person was abusive to you first in the underdark in act 1 (and later in act 3 if you helped them), there is a dwarven? couple, baelen and derryth bonecloak. baelen has gone missing, and you can find and rescue him. he clearly has some kind of neurological disability, and has difficulty with verbal communication and his memory. his wife, derryth, berates him and treats him as stupid for his disability. you can confront her about it in act 1, and later in act 3 go snooping and find out more information about their relationship- baelen, prior to whatever caused his disability, was an abusive and evil man who beat her and gave her the facial scar she has, among other abuses. of course this abuse is horrific, but this is then used to justify derryth's own abuse of the man, since he now is reliant on her for food ect. she basically says that she can treat a disabled man however she wants because at least she cares for his needs and he abused her anyways so it's payback. i do believe that his disability does not override or excuse what he did in the past and that she has every reason to still hate him, but this still does NOT excuse this treatment of him now that he is disabled and relies on her as a caregiver. becoming disabled is not a fucking punishment and it's disgusting that larian even chose to include this kind of thing in their game at ALL. it's also worsened by the fact that i see many people commenting on how they're going to just kill him because he deserves it, and it's 'doing him a favour since he's disabled now'. this is the kind of sentiment that larian are encouraging by having this narrative in their game and as a disabled person myself, and someone who has family and friends who literally act the way baelen does with his disability, it is not fucking okay.

twin drow sex workers i hope i don't need to explain why it's fucking gross and creepy that larian have two sex workers in act 3 be twins that regularly participate in sex with the same client at the same time, and the player is also able to do so. some party members, such as karlach, comment on how them being literally brother and sister is gross, so it's not as if larian are not self aware enough to see why it's not good to fetishise incest. but they put it in there anyways! for the player to indulge in! and it's depicted as sexy! being a survivor of incest csa, i was pretty shocked and appaled by that inclusion. they could have very easily just had the two be runaway lovers. there was literally no need for them to be made twins.

sexual slavery and abuse is sexy when it's halsin if you do actually sleep with the aforementioned drow along with halsin, he will have a new dialogue where he talks about being held prisoner in the underdark 'chained to the bed, somewhere between a prisoner, a guest, and a consort'. so, he was kept as a sex slave and just slave and captive in general by drow for a while. the player can say that's horrible, but halsin brushes this off and says it wasn't so bad. because apparently he liked being kept as a sex slave? this is just brainwashing and coercive rape, larian. considering how they handled astarion's sexual abuse and slavery, it was outright shocking to learn that halsin's own abuse is handled so poorly and in fact turned into some weird bdsm fetish instead.

[embryhallowed]

People get real mad when you point out that they don't actually have morals or core beliefs they follow in spite of current social opinion.

"You've abandoned the ideals of leftism if you say Israel is 'occupying' Palestine."

Ok. Hey, what do you call it when a country sends military forces outside of its border to remove, with deadly force, the people who have lived in this region for millennia? What do you call it when they send military forces who massacre civilians, burn villages to the ground, and depopulate cities to make room for new colonial settlers? What's the word for it when you go to a land, violently remove the people living there, and then say it's your land and only your people can live there? What do you call it when that country puts any remaining indigenous people behind a fence and have armed soldiers patrol their neighborhoods? When they detain those people without trial for years on end with no legal representation? Hmmm what's the word for that?

How do YOU define a military occupation? How do YOU define colonial violence and ethnic cleansing?

"You're anti-semitic and just hate Israel!"

Ok. I mean, I believe that everyone on this planet, every person of any ethnicity and any religion, has the right to exist in peace and safety, has the right to be governed through representation, has the right to observe their faith without harm or persecution. This applies to any and all people.

I also believe that making laws that discriminate against anyone for their religion or ethnicity is wholly and entirely wrong. I believe states who privilege certain religions and ethnicities above others, who enshrine this privilege into the law of the land, are wrong. I believe that states who deny a group of people the right to be governed through representation are wrong. Wholly and entirely wrong.

Jewish people have every right to exist and practice their faith in peace and safety. NO ONE has the right to say "hey guys I'm going to take this already populated land away from the people already living there and make a new state where all the people who look and think like me have all the rights and anyone else doesn't belong here."

Like IDK what you want me to say. Should I make exceptions to my morals? Say that it's ok because it's supposedly "gods chosen" or something? Claiming divine right to anything just tells me you're going to commit some huge sins against other humans and use God as a justification for it. I think that's obscene in multiple ways.

Being an American is wild. You'll see people cry about "kids in cages" and say "what about the children!!" but turn a blind eye to the decades in which Israel has casually slaughtered children.

You'll see people clutch their pearls about Ukraine, then cheer and say "glass Gaza!"

You'll see people proudly claim "liberty and justice for all" and then be absolute bloodthirsty ghouls calling for the extermination of Palestinian people.

Have you ever considered gaining some fucking morals?

Wild.

[mingiswow]

Boyfriend!Seungmin

⚠ English is not my native language, so pardon me if there’s any mistake. And you can always tell me what’s wrong.

Thanks, anon for the request! Sorry if took me a while 💖💖

our little puppy

not so little but oh well

omg my mind goes places with this boy

but because he’s so evil lmao

but okay leggo

you and him have been friends for quite some time

you met through school friends

you guys are part of the same squad (do people still use this word? idk)

and you have the biggest crush on him for like forever

but was too afraid to say something and kinda ruin the friendship and the group

so you just kept to yourself

and your best friend

That accidentally let it slip when she drunk texted Seungmin thinking it was you

Any resemblance to real life is purely coincidental 🤡

He was genuinely surprised because he never thought you reciprocated his feelings

He just sent a print screen of the text she sent with “how about a date next Friday?”

You were so shocked, to say the least

1) you were going to murder your best friend

2) also you needed to thank her

3) asdfghjkl he liked you back

he took you to a cute little ice cream parlor

And you guys talked to each other for hours

Like… you were friends already but this was different

It was more intimate

after the date, he walked you home and asked if he could kiss you

because I’ll be honest here: Seungmin is pretty straightforward

He’s not afraid to tell the things he feels and wants

Even if deep down he is a little bit afraid

And when you guys kissed you knew it was him

So it didn’t take long for him to ask you to be his s/o

but we all know he is going to be the ironic boyfriend, right?

he has a sharp tongue

Which may lead to some arguments between the two of you

But he can’t help it, sometimes just slips out of his mouth and when he sees it you’re mad at him

I feel like if the arguments get more heated than usual he won’t assume he is wrong (if it’s the case)

His pride is quite thick

So you’ll have to learn to give way

but those arguments don’t happen often so don’t worry

He loves laying his head on your lap and to listen or talk about the day

Play with his hair and he’ll be at your mercy

He loves having you playing with his hair

also, give him massages on his shoulder or back and he’ll ask you to marry him

He loves your food

Doesn’t matter what it is

If you made it, he loves it

Loves taking you out to fancy dinners as well

He is definitely not a fan of pda

He doesn't feel comfortable with it

He’ll only hold your hand or smth like this if he feels like there’s someone getting too comfortable with you

He’s is not the jealous type

He needs to be really pissed to become jealous

Like the day he took you to an event and a senior idol was hitting on you even when you said you were taken

So he just pulled you close to him and walked away and pressed you against the closest wall

He’ll look deep into your eyes before finally relaxing, putting his head on your neck

“I love you so much, please don’t leave me”

That’s the moment you see him being vulnerable

Which makes you fall even more for him

Kiss him with all your love and he’ll know you won’t leave him

Ok Seungmin kisses

Slow

Passionate

Starts with little pecks all over your face until reaching your lips

He takes his time so he can feel every piece of his body reacting to the intimate touch

Hold your face between his hand

And just keep holding it until he can’t take anymore and pulls you closer by the waist

I know you want this so here you go

Nsfw from here on

He is a lover

That’s all I have to say

Just kidding

But fr he loves appreciating your body

Will touch, feel, kiss, lick, and bite every inch of it

And compliments you while doing so

He takes your pleasure first

He is a giver

He’ll go down on you and make sure you have at least two orgasms

He loves seeing you give yourself wholly to him

To trust your pleasure to him

So he’ll give you everything he has and a little bit more

And he can last quite some time

So expect a night full of love and pleasure

He’s is not a very kinky guy but there are certain things that turn him on

Sit on his face/fuck his face and he’ll eat you out like it’s his last meal

The boy knows how to use his tongue and mouth so take advantage of

Provoke him on his nipples and he'll see stars

Let him cum on your face and he’s in heaven

Has a foot fetish as well so play with his dick with your feet and boy oh boy he’ll be cumming in seconds

also if you happen to have boobs (no matter the size) he'll love to fuck them

The king of aftercare

He’ll run a bath for you both and rub moisturizers and bath butter on your skin

Likes to put on romantic slow music and bring some food and wine so you can recharge your energies and talk a little bit more

If you feel sleepy he’ll sing for you

Watch you sleep but not in a creepy way

Has a folder on his phone full of cute pictures of you sleeping that he’s planning to print someday

[nightcolorz]

Random Gotham Rogues Headcanons

(In honor of all the wonderful people who wanted more after my last post, yes I see y’all)

*Jonathan has a huge sweet tooth, the poor bastard didn’t try sugar until he was like 12 and eats candy like it’s his last meal.

*He’ll forget he needs food to live for way too long and eat a gallon of ice cream or some shit that’ll give any sensible man heart palpitations and just be like “😐👍”.

*Selina tells the newer rogues she was raised by cats to freak them out, Jervis still believes her. (Tbf, Selina does walk around with a cat tail on hissing at people and purring on their laps, I don’t blame him).

*Edward has a tiktok account that he made to fule his own ego, he’s a fragile little shit, literally all of his hate comments have video responses (as you can imagine, Edward gets A LOT of hate comments).

*One time a teenager called Edward “submissive and breedable” and he was too baffled to make a clap back.

*The Rogues have a surprising amount of stans. Ivy’s fan base consists mostly of lowly simps, Joker gets stopped on the street daily by greasy redditors and zealous scene kids.

*No one likes Joker, he thinks it’s because he’s “Batman’s favorite” (it’s not).

*For a while Joker has been insistent that he fucked Bruce Wayne once at one of his many parties, no one believes him except for Harvey (begrudgingly).

*He says it’s “Perfectly in character for Bruce” as much as he may hate it.

*Selina denies everything.

*Oswald and Jonathan share solidarity as “the weird bird people”. At first Oswald was a little put off that Jonathan only held knowledge of crows but soon got over that when he realized that now he had an excuse to infodump on someone who might actually be interested.

*Every time Jonathan visits Oswald’s aviary to pick up Nightmare and Craw Oswald jumps at the opportunity to talk about his numerous birds in excess, Jonathan’s a surprisingly good listener.

*Despite Edward and Joker’s long term rivalry Edward has remained relatively civil when faced with Joker’s constant egging on. That is until one iconic day in Arkham Asylum when Edward beat the absolute, ever loving shit out of Joker in the cafeteria. To this day no one knows what exactly got him to snap, not even Joker.

*Harley keeps a scrapbook about all her misadventures + friendships as a rogue, she has a habit of taking pictures of the others at the most inappropriate times (during a heist, while being beaten to a crisp by Batman, ex).

*One time Harley asked Batman to pose for a picture to put in her scrapbook, he obliged to everyone’s surprise.

*Edward is wholly insistent that he doesn’t belong in Arkham, and is convinced he’s completely sane. He’s weirdly obsessed with the fact that Oswald is sane “as well” and will make unprompted snide remarks like: “Blackgate sounds terrific, unfortunately I’ve been misplaced among MORONS, it’s a shame that the system is too incompetent to properly judge my un-categorizable psyche.”

*Oswald usually responds with a simple “🙂👍” or “ok” to avoid conflict, disagreeing with Edward could be catastrophic.

*Art therapy is an occupational hazard for all the Arkham staff. (Seriously, who thought giving super villains an outlet to express themselves was a good idea).

*Edward can’t draw so he spends his time harshly criticizing the other rogues art, that’s caused more than a few fights. The one time Edward’s ever actually done art in art therapy was when he drew a green triangle and explained in complex detail how he colored it to perfection.

*Jonathan is no longer allowed to share his art with the group before having it reviewed by a staff member after emotionally scarring a few patients. He’s one of the few rogues who presents his art every time, just to see the disturbed looks on the others faces when he explains whatever twisted art piece he came up with this time.

*Jervis is probably the most dedicated artist of the bunch, he‘s not allowed to make himself any hats (for obvious reasons) but he’s still a very skilled seamstress and has a very interesting art style (Jervis tries not to draw anything explicitly linked to Alice in Wonderland in fear of getting repercussions, as rogues often do when they engage with their ‘personas’).

*Harvey isn’t very technically skilled in drawing, but Harv usually spices their art up enough to make it interesting. Their drawings are always two themed, as expected. One time Edward criticized a painting of theirs for being “too unrealistic” and Harv had to manually restrain himself from kicking Edward in the teeth.

*Victor can’t draw either, but he writes pretty good poetry. His writing is excessively melodramatic and flowery, and his themes even more so. Half of the presentation period is spent listening to Victor muse about the meaning of life or some shit, his poems are VERY long.

*Waylon and Ivy are the obligatory pretentious painters, both have a fondness for flowers (for very separate reasons). The two will often compare their paintings and wax poetics about the beauty of nature or some bullshit before never speaking again. That’s one of the positives of Art therapy, it brings rogues together who would otherwise not grant each other a passing glance.

*Group therapy is just as (if not more) atrocious than Art therapy.

*The only one who ever talks is Joker (and sometimes Harley, but way less).

*Joker is the embodiment of an irl troll, he does a much better job at getting responses from the other rogues in therapy than the therapists ever could (usually hostile responses but still).

*Occasionally a new and bright eyed therapist will try and coax childhood memories out of the rogues, it never ends well (usually with the rogue or the therapist in hysterics).

*The majority of the Arkham staff are either terribly unqualified or terrible period.

*Music Meister lived with Edward for a short while after escaping Arkham together but he was promptly kicked out because he wouldn’t stop singing.

*Selina and Ivy had a huge argument once because Selina’s cats nibbled on Ivy’s plants.

Okay this post is all ready super long so I’m gonna end it here, as I said last time I can always make more if you guys like these (I’m not running out of headcanons anytime soon!)

[anhed-nia]

When these posters first appeared, I could have sworn they were Urban Outfitters ads. The use of pussyhat pink to deliver the message that "this ain't your grandpa's slasher movie" was overly on-the-nose for me, and the row of sneering, identically-attired Bratz dolls didn't exactly scream "horror" or "suspense" to my ears. Unsurprisingly, I also hated this movie, which I found forced and highly artificial on the whole: a cheap attempt to put a girl-on-top twist on a classic title from an (allegedly) misogynist subgenre. But IS the new BLACK CHRISTMAS as artificial as I think it is? Or am I just far enough removed from the 18-to-35'ers to whom this movie was marketed, that I don't have any idea what might feel natural and inviting to them? This film, and others like it, are destined to make horror old timers convulse with disgust at what can feel like modernity being "shoved down our throats"--but as the wise old birds at Fangoria have been reminding us, just because new movies are no longer aimed at YOU, doesn't mean they're part of some kind of politically correct conspiracy to fuck up your favorite genre. It just means that there are new human beings in the usual target demo; their culture is different than the one you grew up in, they are different kinds of teens and 20-somethings than what you once were, and so the media landscape is necessarily changing. And like, I wholly accept that. But it doesn't stop certain things from feeling really manufactured to me.

ELM STREET's Nancy Thompson always felt painfully authentic to me, pretty, smart, a little dorky, but able to stand up for herself--and she was nobody's fashion plate. I felt the same way about Laurie Strode, and even though HALLOWEEN is so often identified as the root of all misogyny, I liked her friends, too, who were warm, funny, and charmingly ordinary, no matter what The Shape had to say about their lifestyle.

On the fantasy side of the fence, you find characters like BEETLEJUICE's Lydia Deetz, a figure of pure imaginary aspiration for little wannabe gothettes like me--but that aspiration, toward that kind of ultra-individualized presentation, was real, it didn't feel fed to me by marketers. (I mean, ok, so she's really Tim Burton's ultimate fantasy, but at least it was a fantasy shared between me and him, not so much me and him and an ad firm and their test groups.) A similarly exaggerated character is DREAM WARRIORS's Taryn White, whose idealized self is a blade-wielding punk goddess, and that definitely resonated with me as a kid. (Still does, ahem) It wasn't something I saw when I went to the mall or turned on the TV; it corresponded to a real longing, for real self-expression.

Actually there might be something about the texture of modern makeup and recording media that adds an extra layer of artificiality to this kind of thing, but the jury's still out.

My point is, I have no idea whether contemporary teens and college kids see the cast of a movie like 2019's BLACK CHRISTMAS, or FREAKY, or STRANGER THINGS, or FEAR STREET (the latter two are supposed to partially represent MY generation, ironically, but you get my drift I hope), and feel that they see themselves represented on the screen with a reasonable dose of realism. I'm not even speaking about any sort of identity issues here; I just mean the way these characters are fashioned, their verbal quirks, their attitudes. To me, in productions like this, all of the characters feel like they've been 3D printed by whatever factory populates CW shows, and their personalities are just as stiff and deliberate and programmed for "relatability" as that would imply. And THAT'S the kind of sensation that can make you feel like something is being "shoved down your throat"--not by the younger generation itself, but by marketing professionals who are trying to hook that coveted demographic as soon as they're old enough to hold money. But because I am not a part of that cohort myself, it's really not up to me to say whether these productions are as pandering as they seem to me, or whether they are much more genuine than I am personally able to perceive. Maybe the new SCREAM will give me more to chew on. Feel free to share you impressions.

[autumnslance]

I've got a writing question that's been on my mind for a while: how do you keep your OCs from becoming self inserts? Every time I think of developing an OC I realize that it's attributes that I

Oops, you got cut off! But in general: all your OCs are going to have traits of yours; it’s inevitable. Sometimes big things, sometimes small things. It’s how we relate to them, and also just natural, I promise. We write what we know, and we know how we interact with ourselves and the world.

But there is a difference between sharing some traits with a character and making them a self-insert. It’s letting their life, their community and culture, their experiences, also influence their traits and thinking, in ways that might be different from how you would respond in a similar situation. Even if you share those attributes.

This is me so let’s go behind a cut shall we?

Dark Autumn is as introverted and solitary by nature as I am; she can and does interact in professional and friendly ways with people (as I try to do), but needs alone time to recharge. However, Dark also has a very different outlook and relationship with her family than I, since her family is large and supportive, very close knit. If family is a lottery, I got the $50 scratch off prize while she hit the Mega-Millions. So I take that into account when thinking of her relationships not just with family, but with friends and potential romantic interests; Dark sees things through a lens of positive, low-drama familial relationships that I can barely fathom. This also means she has a support network and resources myself and other characters don’t, so gets some wish fulfillment of working through issues with care and grace instead of remaining in unhealthy places. She is my “comfort OC” so gets a lot of good things I wish I had—which shapes how she responds to others, like taking care of a FCmate and becoming something of a big sister figure for him, or the responsible older sister figure of my group of OCs. Which is me, really, idealizing my own older sister tendencies into this giant woman who’s better at it.

Aeryn was written to be on the ace scale; not my first character to be so, but the first written that way as I began to realize where my own orientations lie and wanting to examine that through fiction. That she fell for a certain rogue in the process of playing through MSQ again was not at all intentional. I like Thancred as a character—he hits a lot of tropes I enjoy—but in my own mindset, he’s a frustrating younger brother. I didn’t think I’d do NPC x WoL shipping. But there it is, because in determining Aeryn’s own experiences and how those shaped her, it ended up working out that way (and I spent the better part of 2 years writing the characters separately to figure that out and if it could work before writing them together because it’s not something that comes naturally to me).

Aeryn’s internal anger is something I have a difficult time with; it’s outside my own nature to carry things like that. I have my angers, certainly, but they are different from hers. I tend to need a lot to set me off and then it burns out hot and quick. Aeryn’s more of a long boil she keeps bottled up. I’ve gotten a few things through various fics, I think, but it’s why I do things like reference arguments but rarely depict them. Being non-confrontational myself (I’m meek and have hangups thanks to my own life) it’s a challenge. Aeryn responded to childhood traumas (that I never dealt with), bullying (that I did), losses (that I haven’t yet), and the responsibility she’s been given (thank goodness I don’t) far differently than I. Maybe I’d be more volatile, too, if I had her life. But I understand where her anger comes from sharing some of the reasons, I just shape it differently than my own.

There’s a lot of things about Dark and Aeryn that are accidentally similar, just due to the timing of their character generation and other RP OCs made for other games along the way; “Oh I haven’t done X or Y in a character in awhile” sort of thing, but how each approaches those similarities and why—their quietness, their issues with using magic, their tendency to “adopt” others as family—all come from different places and resolve differently, too.

C’oretta comes from a part of me that doesn’t quite want to grow up. That wishes I had been more of the peppy, active, cheerful, risk-taking, live it up stereotypical party kid, that “popular girl” archetype I felt so often on the outside looking in about. As my second character, I wanted her to be different from Dark Autumn—visually, emotionally, mentally. Where Dark is steady, C’oretta is flighty. While Dark is people oriented, C’oretta’s a bit selfish (like I often feel). Dark’s introverted, C’oretta’s extroverted. Much of C’oretta’s attitude is a deflection against the hurts in her life, a way to fight back against some terrible things. It’s a way I could never react. But I also can’t get away from a character who loves to learn and wants to try new things—but where other characters gain the ability to stick with and see them through, C’oretta gets my easy frustration and boredom, and then the “ooh shiny” of a new interest. There’s a history of ADHD (or whatever the acronyms are now) and even autism and learning issues in my family; it’s possible I have some undiagnosed ND stuff going on, and people have noted these things in C’oretta that I’ve based on my own experiences and those of people very close to me.

Many of my characters have traits I wish I had, or were better at; patience, kindness, consideration, convictions, courage, thoughtfulness, and so on and etc. They’re good at skills I haven’t the knowledge in, or the ability to do. They’re certainly more active than I am, or could be! Because I can take the time to think and plan and research and write those things out better, and just maybe along the way not only learn something myself, but try to practice it better myself. I can even sometimes let them teach me what I can possibly do or be, not just imagine it as an ideal that’s out of reach.

I try to let my characters make mistakes I wouldn’t—or in some cases, have in my past, and that’s OK. Especially if I learned from them, but maybe the character does not. Maybe they do but it takes awhile, or repeated instances until it sinks in. Maybe I let them make errors I still make, as a way to puzzle out better solutions I should probably entertain for myself.

Character voice is something I’ve felt I struggled with in keeping my OCs distinct. Do characters ‘sound’ alike, in dialogue and prose? Having distinct ways of speaking helps; C’oretta’s breathless chatty run-ons are certainly different from Dark and Aeryn’s quieter tendencies. I have to remember to trim down Aeryn’s dialogue more often, say less aloud, add more gestures and facial expressions. I tend to be a talker, an over-explainer (if you can’t tell), while the only times she gets like that are specific. Dark’s somewhere in the middle of those two, like I am. A lot of the reason I like writing NPCs and try to keep them close to my interpretation of canon is to practice distinct character voice to get better at it in my OCs, so they don’t sound like me!

And something I’ve never admitted to before is that I think for me, it helps that from the time I was a kid watching various series of Star Trek, I always have had an in-my-own-head-only self-insert. She’s always a support character (that’s what I’m best at). She has cool and unusual abilities to help the actual heroes, cuz heck it’s my internal fantasy and that’s fun. She has traits I want to be better at or wish I had, developed over time with more energy and focus than I can actually muster in reality. As time’s gone on, she’s become more of a mentor and Mom Friend as I’m now older and see a lot of protagonist characters as “my kids” now. She appears in nearly every story I’ve loved over time, in one iteration or another. And because I have a headspace character where I can say “this is what I, ideally, would say and do and be capable of in this situation…” My other characters that I actually write about can vary between doing something similar (if it suits them) to doing something completely different (cuz darn kids never listen) as I can compare them to the self-insert and decide where to diverge.

So it’s a mix of myself and my traits and knowledge, but taking into account how each character would respond and use those same attributes differently than I do or would. Write what you know, write who you are—and then add in some wish fulfillment, some what ifs, some bad choices, some good choices, and shake things up. Give the characters tics and tricks different from yourself and let that shape them, too, by remembering to take those things into account (even if you have to tape a note to your monitor).

And finally, don’t be ashamed of your self-inserts; I’ve known some great characters that started as self-inserts and grew, through their experiences, into wholly different people than their writers over time. Heck, the epic romance my original WoW priest was part of was with a character that started as a self-insert; his player began the game knowing nothing of the lore or roleplaying, but as he learned the story and how to RP, and determined how his character fit into the world and how that shaped him, the character diverged over time, while still sharing some key traits (some endearing, some frustrating, as people are and all part of that friend). It’s not a bad starting point at all. The rest can come over time and practice, especially if you make a lot of OCs and try to make them different from each other while also being aspects of yourself.

[darlingpeter]

grayscale.

the reader faces the aftermath of losing a close friend, and sweet boyfriend matt knows just how to get through to you when you need another perspective.

this fic is a labor of love. although this story is fictional, please know that you are never alone in the hardships that you are facing, and there is a wonderful community of people out there whose inboxes and messages are always open if you need advice, to vent, or just to get bad stuff off of your chest. you are worthy of love and the space and support that you need to heal. 

pairing: matt murdock x reader, best friend jessica jones x reader

warnings: reader is going through some emotional bad times

length: 2,405 words

Everyone knows that grief is an important part of life. As you grow, you lose people, and the lessons that you learn from it are necessary to truly appreciate what you have while you have it. 

But no one talks about how hard it is to grieve someone who hasn’t died. 

In the first stages, you found yourself getting absorbed in the what ifs, cycling over and over again in your head about things you could have done differently that would have changed their mind somehow and made them value you as much as you did them. Even worse was fighting the urge to reach back out to them in an attempt to rekindle something similar to what you had before. But the rational part of your brain constantly steered you away from that because how would that be possible? You couldn’t pretend to ignore everything bad that had come into light and keep a good conscience at the same time. A similar end would be inevitable, and it would hurt just the same if not more the second time around. 

Matt was aware of what you were going through. He listened as you poured your heart out to him, brought you water and tissues when you could do nothing but cry, and was there to make sure that you were taken care of. If he sensed a bit of hesitation in your voice if you asked him for anything, he would remind you in a gentle tone that made your heart flutter that he was there for you in any way that you needed. Over time, though, you closed off to him. You couldn’t help but feel like your emotional outbursts were an annoyance to him since he already had so much else to worry about outside the walls of your shared apartment. Unbeknownst to you, when you started changing the subject and brushing him off whenever he asked about how you were feeling, he knew that he was going to have to make a call to the one person he knew would be able to talk sense into you. 

The first time that he invited Jess and Luke over since things changed, you were initially wary of being forced to socially interact, but after you changed into clean, comfy clothes, had a shower, and actually got to be face-to-face with your best friends for the first time in far too long, you started to feel better than you had in a long time. 

Luke had taken control of a speaker that you had in the apartment, showing you and Matt a few new artists that he had been getting into, and with the way that Jess hummed and sang along to the lyrics, you knew that you weren’t the first to hear him gush about the new finds. You ordered Pizza and sat around shooting the shit with one another. 

When you popped into your room to grab an extra blanket, the sound of the door closing softly surprised you, and you turned to see Jess with a sympathetic smile on her face. Your mood soured. You had a feeling that she was going to want to talk to you with the comforting look in her eyes that she had been fixing you with since she had arrived with Luke. “Red told us that you had a bad falling out with a close friend. How’re you holding up, kid?” She asked and instinctively, you bristled. At this point you had been packing everything down and trying to avoid thinking about the situation altogether, which made it sour and turn to irritability where it sat within you. You scowled, annoyed at the fact that she wanted to stir up the difficult emotions that you had been working hard to hide. Seeing this, Jess raised both of her palms to face you in a surrendering gesture. “Easy, babe. I just want to make sure that everything’s alright.” She said softly.

Frustrated, you folded the blanket a couple of times in your hands. “It is.” You said shortly.

Jess frowned. “We both know that’s not true.” Sometimes you hated how easily she saw straight through you. She sat on the edge of the bed, and patted the spot next to her, inviting you to join. “He didn’t tell us the full story, but I know you, and I know from what he told me that I would be having a rough time, so I can’t imagine what you’re dealing with right now.” You take the spot next to her and lean into her side, letting out a deep exhale when she wrapped her arm around you and gave your shoulder a comforting squeeze. When you relaxed into her after a moment, she knew that she had worn away the stubborn act that you put on. “I know that Matt isn’t the best when it comes to talking about feelings, and I want to give you the space that you might need to talk about things a little more in depth with someone that might be able to communicate a little better about understanding what you’re going through. Or you could just lay on me, which is cool too.” She finished with a small laugh.

For a moment, you considered just sitting in silence for a few moments before rejoining the group, but the longer that you sat against Jess, the bigger the knot in your chest grew until you were squeezing your eyes shut and fighting tears that were starting to well up. “I’m tired of being sad.” You said, hating how small and watery your voice sounded. “I wish I could forget everything about what happened so I could stop carrying around this weight with me.” 

And then you were crying. The more you tried to suppress it the stronger it came on, and the more your breath came in hiccups from your chest, so you stopped trying to hide it and instead opened the floodgates on your best friend. You told her the full story, about what caused the falling out and how hard it had been to adjust, as well as how angry you had been feeling with yourself for not being able to move past it. You told her about how you didn’t want to continually bother Matt so you had started to bottle things up. Even though you knew that it wasn’t the best way to deal with things, but you had hoped that in doing so, it would just pass over and make the whole ordeal easier. 

Jess listened to what you had to say, but also offered some advice. Because of how close the two of you were as well as how blunt and honest she was, Jess was the queen of getting through to you and telling you things that you didn’t want to hear.“The quickest way to get through this is to feel what you need to feel completely and wholly. By not tackling it head-on, no matter how much better it seems in the moment, it’ll eat at you and cause a lot more hurt over time.” This stung, mostly because you knew that she was right. You had been able to witness a small taste of what she was talking about already, and the thought that the bitterness you had been feeling had the potential to grow and have the chance to cause outbursts that could push the people you loved away. You nodded as she gave your shoulder a squeeze. 

“But I don’t want to feel like I’m burdening Matt with my problems.” You whined, digging the heels of your hands into your damp eyes and rubbing at them in exasperation. “I’m scared he’ll start avoiding me because he doesn’t want to hear me complain about my garbage when there’s nothing that he can do.”

To your surprise, Jess barked out a laugh, and you looked up at her with a glare. “Were you not just telling me how he was going total mama-bird over you when things were bad?” You deflated and shrugged, caught by your own words. “Just because you’re the only one who can work through this in your own brain doesn’t mean that you’re struggling alone. We’re all gonna support you in the ways that we know how. And if you’re worrying about the way that Matt is doing it, maybe that’s something that you should talk to him about and make sure that you’re getting the support that you need and that he’s not feeling burned out.”

Nodding, you let her advice sit with you as you leaned against her, letting her hug you from the side while you listened to Matt and Luke’s music muffled through the bedroom door. When you finally straightened up and let her arm fall from your side, Jess gave you a supportive look. “Feeling ok?” She asked.

“A lot better.” You responded, which made Jess give a little cheer that made you smile. “Thank you for… everything.” You said, unsure how to put into words your gratitude for making the effort to get through to you when you were so resistant off of the bat.

She bumped you with her shoulder with a playful grin. “Of course, kid. I’ve always got you. Now let’s go make sure those two haven’t finished off the pizza or torn the place up to bad out there, yeah?” 

Grabbing the blanket from where you had put it down and following Jess back into the main living area feeling much lighter. 

~

After the night that Jess and Luke stopped by, things started to feel like they were getting better. Her advice made you feel like you could dig yourself out of the hole that you found yourself in. You were able to sit down with Matt and express the things that you were worried about, and with that line of communication opened up, you felt free to check in with him when you were concerned that he was being overloaded. Fortunately, after that chat, you were able to go about life more freely than you felt you had been able to in weeks, and after a few weeks you were able to look a short ways into the past and be proud of how far you had come.

However, your good mood unfortunately broke. 

Out of nowhere one morning, you woke up under a wave of depression. You tried to get up and go about things as usual, but disinterested and suddenly exhausted, you ended up back in bed curled in on yourself. After what felt like hours of drifting in and out of sleep and checking your phone, you heard the door open, and you looked to see Matt poke his head into the room. “Hey, sweetheart.” 

At the sound of his voice, tears started welling up in your eyes and you blinked hard to try and keep them from falling. You made a sound of acknowledgement that came out more like a whimper, and his eyes widened, his brow furrowing in concern as he stepped fully into the room. “Oh no,” he cooed softly, padding across the floor to the bed. “No, no, no.” He climbed under the covers on the empty side of the bed facing you.“Talk to me.” He hummed, delicately thumbing away a tear from your cheek.

You almost didn’t want to tell him why you were sad. You had been doing so well! You didn’t want him to pity you for not being able to get over the loss, but you know that if you made up a lie on the spot that he would be able to tell, so you took a steadying breath. Damn his senses. 

“I don’t know why it hit me like this again.” You told him, trying hard to keep your voice steady. “I thought I was done with this.” 

At the admission, your face grew hot with shame and you sniffled, wrapping your arms around yourself. “Hey, hey, none of that.” Matt murmured, pulling you into his arms. You buried your face in his chest and took hold of his t-shirt, taking in the scent of the cotton and his laundry detergent and grounding yourself in it to keep your mind from spiraling further down. 

“I’m embarrassed.” You whispered, and Matt shushed you, removing your hand from his shirt so that he could raise it to his mouth and press a kiss to your knuckles. 

“I know that it’s hard to feel like you’ve made progress only to be set back, but dealing with grief is never a linear process.” He told you, brushing some of your hair back from your face. “Things like this take time, and bad days will happen even after things have been good for a while. But I promise you that things will get better, and that these reminders will start to sting a lot less as it goes on.”

It was silent as you lied together, him listening to your heartbeat return to normal, and you thinking about what he had said while your tears dried. When you finally made a move to get up, Matt’s arm around your waist tensed as he held onto you and kept you from budging. You were only able to let out a confused sound before he took your jaw in his free hand and pressed a soft kiss to your lips. You raised your hands to his stubbly cheeks, and he leaned into your touch, a look in his eyes that was reassuring. “What was that for?” You asked.

He shrugged, a smug smirk on his face as he ran a calloused thumb across your bottom lip. “I just wanted to know you were smiling.” 

That you were. For the first time all day, you felt almost giddy as you giggled, pressing a quick peck to his smiling mouth. “You’re so soft.” You teased, climbing out from under the covers and stretching. 

“Just for you.” He replied, swinging his legs over the side and following your lead. When he got close, you stepped forward and wrapped him in a proper hug. You squeezed him, trying to find the right words to thank him, but with the way that he squeezed you back, you knew that you didn’t need to say anything at all. “You’ve got this, sweetheart.” He said quietly.

And for the first time in a while, you full-heartedly believed it.

~

masterlist

a/n: hello wonderful people! i’m back to classes and with structure comes more ways to work writing into my schedule! i’m working on a couple of wips right now, but my inbox and messages are open to new requests if you’re interested in dropping me something! 

any feedback is appreciated as always!! thank you so much for taking the time to read my work, and every note this gets makes my day! :-)

taglist (open): @krazy-katt-lady​ @occasionallygiveadamn​ @rotisserierogers @howlingbarnes​ @peculiar-persephone​

[fizzingwizard]

Episode 32 arrives! It’s, I gotta say, quite an improvement on what we’ve had lately. Quite an improvement. Even so, it’s nothing that’s gonna rock the world... but hey, I was so desperate for something different to happen that y’know what, I’ll take it.

Pic of the week:

A Digimon who just wants to roll around in the grass. Go’way, baddies.

More below!

So as you probably gather... we start with Takeru this week! Haha! Good riddance Taichi! I luv ya but I’ve had enough of ya! Take a break!

jk I totally missed him the whole thirty seconds he wasn’t on screen

Takeru and Patamon are running for their lives, of course! Patamon makes a valiant effort to evolve to protect Takeru but...

... Poor baby. He gave it the ol’ college try but he just ain’t as young as he used to be.

Things look grim until Komondomon shows up with a creepy disembodied hand sticking out of his fur!

Phew, it’s just Sora. Her brilliant plan to rescue Takeru is to grab his arm and drag him along with them... I mean... sure... Whiplash has been proven Not A Thing in this universe so...

After getting rid of their pursuer, the group checks in with the others. I’m reminded of how silly separations feel when you can just communicate with each other by walkie-talkie. Yamato’s been riding Garurumon for a long time now lol. At least we got to see him...

He sweetly encourages Takeru and tells him the best thing he can do to help Patamon with his evolution issues is be there to support him. Then he tells Taichi “I leave Takeru in your case.” Ok sure, like Sora’s not right there...

Taichi: In my care? Should I point out that I already lost one little sibling to the dark side? Nah...

Seriously, though... that’s the current situation. Taichi is actively going over SkullKnightmon to get Hikari back. If Takeru stays with him that just means Takeru gets to go into danger again too. Of course, it seems that the dark side is suddenly uninterested in Takeru and Patamon so... I guess it’s okay 9_9

We then check in with Mimi! Who is being her awesome Mimi-tastic self. Ugh I love her.

Wondered what happened to Golemon. Turns out there was nothing much to worry about because no one loves a macho boxing match like Tachikawa Mimi. If there’s ever a season where these kids grow up, I hope Mimi is like, a big fan of sumo or something.

Taichi: O... kay... well... Mimi sure is... an intersting person...

Agumon: Hey you should make her your girlfriend!

Taichi: what nOOO BAD IDEA ABORT ABORT

Meanwhile, the situation with Jou is, um, questionable to say the least...

(how is keeping that towel on)

Jou: HEEEEELP!!!

Taichi: ... you didn’t hear anything, did you? Me neither. *closes link*

Finally we check in with Koushirou. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you what he says. -__-;

At least we see him get bombed a bit. He’s okay though.

Meanwhile unconscious Patamon gets a visitor from baby angel Lopmon, who tells him about hist lost memories.

He adds that the other legendary warriors have lost their power and it’s up to Patamon and his bond with Takeru to save the world more or less.

He encourages Patamon to find his hope.

Patamon: Who am I? What am I? All before me is dark. I know not what path to take.

The others, having nothing better to do, peep on Patamon’s crisis of faith.

Takeru relates a story about learning to swim and being scared of the water, but Yamato stayed with him so eventually he was able to learn to do it. Aww. Not quite comparable to Hikari’s “I wet the bed and Taichi changed the sheets and then told our parents that he was the one that did it” from the 99 series but still pretty good.

The sweet moment is interrupted by a flash of light! Then dark! Then light! Then dark!

It’s another scary Digimon! Oh dear. It’s Kerberomon. A three-headed Cerberus as I’m sure you figured out. Once again, this show does not how to convey what the stakes are. After everything we’ve been through, it’s hard to take random nobody Digimon as serious as each episode wants us to take them... but it’s obvious from the build up here that Kerberomon’s going to be tough to beat for Reasons.

Greymon gets hit and says, “I let down my guard!” MAYBE DON’T DO THAT THEN

Also it is very windy.

Le ouch. This is the Digimon from earlier whose name I forgot to take down. He’s come back with his friend...

... Scarier-in-the-dark-mon.

They’re surrounded~ Oh noes and whatnot.

Taichi is a bit cool here, clinging to Komondomon’s helmet and directing the battle like a war general. Mostly he’s telling them how to avoid getting hit by Kerberomon’s powerful attacks but I like that we get to see him using his head like this.

What I think is happening here is, Komondomon isn’t as fast as the kids could be if they were on their own, so their speed is hampered and that plus the number of assailants makes this battle tough. I am sure we’re supposed to assume that the reason WarGreymon doesn’t appear is because it takes a lot of energy to bring him out, even though last time he appeared twice in the same episode -.-;

Sora decides to be useful and goes to help Takeru get to safety.

... She is immediately struck by an attack and collapses, badly hurt somehow. This is so dumb. First of all, they don’t even animate her getting hit. There’s a flash and then she’s down. She should at least get to throw herself over Takeru protectively or something. Geez. 90s anime did it so much better. She’s just standing there and gets hit. What, did she forget there was a battle raging around her?

Second, WE ALREADY HAD DAMSEL IN DISTRESS SORA. It was Jou’s motivation to be cool way back when this show was rather more interesting than it has been of late. Why do the boys need Sora to get SERIOUSLY INJURED to be able to fight?? WHY?? Like, Taichi gets caught in the line of fire ALL THE TIME, but he never gets injured to the point where he can’t continue on. (Except for that one time with Devimon but those were exceptional circumstances!)

Like, why are we making Sora so weak?? This is so unnecessary.

I guess Yamato was right by entrusting Takeru to Taichi instead of Sora though...

... Uhhh.... never mind X’D

Taichi: Whew... m-maybe no one saw that...

Our be-bibbed god reappears to offer sage advice.

Patamon recalls his final moments as Seraphimon... being enveloped into darkness.

This is cool - we see his angelic wings turn to demon ones briefly before he slides back to lower levels. Not sure if it means anything but we have been theorizing that Patamon could still be infected by the evil that wounded him in the past.

Patamon then recalls things that happened after he was reborn and I’m reminded for the billionth time how much harder the emotions around Angemon’s death hit in the 99 show...

Suddenly Patamon realizes - his hope is Takeru, and he is Takeru’s hope.

The boys put on their game faces. This is what I mean by Sora really didn’t need to get hurt here. I get that it gives Takeru a reason to be protective, but the thing that evolves Patamon is Patamon’s feelings, the same way Agumon’s feelings were what rescued them from Devimon etc. That’s an interesting thing about this show - the Digimon’s feelings seem as important to evolution as, if not more than, the kids’.

Patamon evolves!! Very creepily! But... not to Angemon!

He becomes Pegasusmon! Who... looks a lot bigger than I remember, even considering Takeru is very small... xD

So this is pretty cool! I’ve been wondering how on earth the show was gonna keep introducing evolutions after already using up so many key players, especially for Taichi. But it looks like Armor Digimon can appear, and that makes me think that we could see all kinds of evolutions for the entire team that we’ve never seen before. I like that idea, but I don’t really know if this show has time for it. Maybe it will just be Pegasusmon and Nefertimon who are available to Takeru and Hikari so the writers can preserve the angels for the most epic moments only. That seems the most likely way things will go here, and the only qualm I have with it is, they’ve played all of Taichi’s cards already, and he’s the main character. He has to have something else in the future...

He attac!!!!

Kerberomon doesn’t last long, although why is wholly inexplicable. What about Pegasusmon gives him the edge when MetalGreymon and Garudamon couldn’t handle it? Is it because he’s an Armor Digimon? That may be it but the show doesn’t bother to explain.

Another thing I’d love to see, if there are gonna be more than just one evolutionary tree for the partners, is the kids actually strategizing when they decide which evolution to use. One of the cool parts of Tamers was the kids actively supporting their partner with skill as well as heart. I don’t think that’s gonna happen in this season, but you know, a girl can dream.

Takeru: Hurray for murder!

The three Digimon work together to put the lid on Kerberomon. Garudamon has the coolest moment. Squash.

Taichi checks on Sora who seems fine now. Grrrrrrrrrrrr.

Aw, but these two really are adorable.

What a sweet ending card T_T I want more of these.

Okay so yeah, this episode was a much needed upper after the stream of “watch Taichi fight random forgettable monsters” episodes we’ve had lately. I’m glad we got it. I still, just, like, why can’t they get the emotional build up right?? I wouldn’t say 99 Adventure did anything insanely unusual in how it treated the various crises the kids faced, but it def did a better job than this show. In 99, they understood the importance of moments of reflection, of talking about things, of showing expressions and how other characters react... And I still feel like this reboot DID do that, at least somewhat better, in the beginning. Like what went down between Yamato and Taichi after Ogremon was killed. That was pretty good.

They’ve totally lost what makes Digimon great. I hope this episode is a sign that they’re gonna take it back, but, my heart just hearts y’all.

Next episode... I’m rather surprised since we are REALLY overdue some face time with Yamato, not to mention Mimi and Jou, but apparently we’re sticking with Taichi. At least it looks lke we’ll get some new plot stuff related to Hikari.

If this all leads up to something that makes sense, I will retract all my complaints, I swear. Except about the gratuitous nonstop fighting. But the rest, I will take back.

Taichi’s determined!! This is Digimon Adventure! Let’s go on a freaking adventure!!

[obxrush]

You Don’t Belong Here Pt. 2

A/N: After a ton of requests and reblogs later, here is part 2 of You Don’t Belong Here. Enjoy!

Recap: Looking out to the road, he frowns as he sees you get into an uber. He stares until the car drives away, and quietly, he mutters, “I’m sorry.” - Part 1

Later in the day, you find yourself still thinking about what JJ said. You have your knees hugged to your chest, your forehead flush against your knees. Sighing, you raise your head and look out the window to see that the sun has just set.

Just then, you hear a knock on your door, and you roll your eyes. After getting yelled at by your parents for ditching the brunch, you had locked yourself in your room for the remainder of the day. Most likely, whoever is knocking is probably one of your parents, attempting to think of a half ass apology. You stand up and go to the door after smoothing out your dress you have yet to take off.

Your eyes widen when you open the door because Kiara is the last person you would have expected. “What’re you doing here?” you ask quietly, taking in her appearance. She looks exhausted, and you wonder why.

“I wanted to see how you were doing,” Kiara replies timidly.

“I’m fine.”

“You don’t sound like it.”

“And, you look tired.”

“Can I come in?” she asks after sighing. You look at her with a semi-glare but allow her in. She sits down on the armchair next to the balcony door. “I, uh, fought with JJ before coming here.”

“Oh?”

“So did the rest of the Pogues. We couldn’t really stand for what he said, and we had left him to cool off, but he tried to pretend everything was okay, which kinda ticked us off.” She rubs her forehead in frustration. “I’m sorry for bringing you there. If I had known he would bully you like that-“

“I’m not wholly surprised, to be honest. I didn’t exactly expect someone on the opposite end of the tax bracket to like me and what I represent. Money matters, especially with the enormous wage-gap in the Outer Banks.”

Kiara folds her hands against her lap and nods. “Yeah, I had to get that through my head when I tried hanging out with them in the beginning. JJ hated me the least then, actually. But, with his dad…”

“What about him?” you ask, curious about your bully’s backstory. A leverage against him doesn’t hurt. It isn’t the best thing to have, but after what you went through today, you also want to hurt him.

“I really shouldn’t say. It’s not my place to.” Goddammit. “The only thing you can know is that he basically has no money. He sees JJ as an expense.”

“I see…”

Kiara looks up at you and gets up. “I honestly think you should still try to hang out with us.”

“Really, Kie? Are you actually kidding me?” You shake your head, turning away from her to absently play with the various perfume bottles on your dresser.

“I’m not joking. If the Kooks are killing you as much as I remember them doing, then you need to get out of there.” She puts a hand on your shoulder. “Please, try one more time. John B and Pope are willing to try, and we’ll handle JJ this time.”

You look at the mirror to see Kiara’s pleading face. As much as you want to say no, this is the perfect opportunity to fight back with JJ. You’re no saint; he hurts you, you hurt him. “Fine. But, I swear, Kie. If he says anything about my parents, I’ll-“

“Don’t worry,” she reassures you. “I won’t let him say stupid shit again. Promise.”

XXX

You follow Kiara along the dock of her house and spot the HMS Pogue. Kiara waves at the boys, but only John B and Pope wave back. JJ’s back is to the dock, and you can see that his arms are folded across his chest. You tap Kiara on the shoulder lightly. “He looks pissed off,” you whisper, but she waves it away. Shaking your head, you walk to the boat. John B helps you onto the boat first, Kiara following closely behind. You sit down at the front of the boat with Kiara to your left and JJ to your right.

Pope gives you a smile and asks, “What’s up, Y/N? Glad you’re back.”

You smile back and reply, “I’m ok, thanks. Kiara convinced me to join you guys.” You spare a glance to JJ, who still hasn’t moved, but you’re glad that he hasn’t said anything yet. “Pass me a beer, Kie.” She smiles and opens up the cooler.

The ride was relatively quiet, save for Pope and John B talking about random things. Occasionally, Kiara asked you about school and what you liked to do. But, all the while, JJ stayed silent. It worries you because you expect an explosion any minute now, almost as if you’re staring at a ticking time bomb.

“JJ, you good?” Pope finally asks. You steer your eyes from the marshland to the boy in question. He finally unfolds his arms and visibly glares at Pope. He opens his mouth, but no words come out. Instead, he shakes his head and looks at you. There’s no obvious malice in his eyes.

But, you still have an itch that needs to be satisfied. “What’re you looking at?” you ask angrily. His nostrils flare, but his mouth is still shut in a straight line. “I asked you a question.” The rest of the group look at you while JJ furrows his brows.

“I’m trying to keep my temper in check,” JJ mutters, looking at you pointedly.

“Your silence is deafening,” you deadpanned.

“Well, I’m sorry if-“

“Finally!” you cheer sarcastically. “He apologizes.” You chuckle darkly. “Do you have any idea how your words affected me?”

Before he can reply, Kiara jumps to his defense. “Hey, I told you we’d keep him in check-“

“That’s not enough!” you scream. “If I had said something about his family, you’d make me apologize immediately because I’m a privileged Kook who has no right to look down on others, right?!”

“Then, say something.”

You stare at JJ. “Are you serious?”

JJ shrugs. “Yeah. If I hurt you so much, do the same to me. We’ll call it even.” It is tempting, you thought. He’s giving you the opportunity to hurt him, but…

“No. I won’t stoop to your level of bitterness. I don’t have that much spite in me.”  

XXX

A/N: Hope you enjoyed. Here’s my masterlist!

Taglist: @downbytheouterbanks​ @jj-maybank-stan​ @everydayimfangirling​ @butterfliesinthenightsky​ @agirlthatisbi​ @treestarrrrrrrr​ @babyblue52​ @obssesedweirdo​  @lasnaro​ @jj-maybanks-wife​ @prejudic3​ 

Let me know if you’d like to be added or removed!

[izartn]

On the The Host romance:

A lil note: @into-september as you’re reading Twilight, and your last post made me realise this, I thought it better to write my own post and tag you! Hope you don’t mind.

The Host is the first novel of an “adult” science fiction trilogy by Stephanie Meyer which never was finished. Published in 2008, the same year as Breaking Dawn, I guess she preferred gaining the benefits of her vampire saga to keep on writing. 

For shame, because for me, The Host is much better at establishing worldbuilding, a concept and its protagonists + a romance (not that there isn’t anything cuestionable in it, but to my taste it’s better done than in Twilight). Here is the first paragraph of The Host wikipedia’s section on plot: 

A species of parasitic aliens called "Souls" have invaded Earth, deeming the humans too violent to deserve the planet. When a Soul is implanted into a host body, the consciousness of the original owner is erased, leaving their memories and knowledge. 

Wanderer, a Soul, is placed into the body of Melanie Stryder. However, Melanie's consciousness is still alive and begins to communicate with Wanderer mentally. Wanderer's assigned "Seeker" suggests that she could be placed into Melanie to retrieve the memories before disposing of the defective body, but Wanderer makes several attempts to deny her Seeker's wishes. As Wanderer starts to uncover some of Melanie's memories of her younger brother Jamie Stryder and her boyfriend Jared Howe, Melanie gets her to follow a series of landmarks throughout the Arizona desert to find her Uncle Jeb, hoping that Jared and Jamie are with him. By doing so, she would be denying the Seeker Melanie's memories and the humans they would lead her to.

Just. Read that and have the face to tell me it doesn’t sound more interesting than Twilight I dare you. Of course the books are different genres, although the focus is in the... more sentimental part in both. It’s just that The Host story is more unusual and the worldbuilding dreamy and subtly horrific. 

Well I said I was gonna talk about the romance right? Spoilers incoming!

 A bit of more context is necessary; in The Host, Melanie, the human Wanda (nickname of Wanderer) is possessing, is in love with the boyfriend mentioned in the sinopsis, Jared. Wanda being in the body of Melanie, feels things for him. We can divine for context this is sexual attraction plus having access to some of Melanie’s memories and noticing Jared is pretty ok as humans not possessed are left on Earth. 

Melanie reaction to this oscillates between “don’t you dare touch my boyfriend alien” and “well of course you fell for him, he’s pretty awesome” to “if I can’t it’s ok if you want to” when she’s feeling herself disappear at one point. Which is bullshit bc her conscience comes back when Wanda goes to tell Jared to kiss her bc she’s feeling Melanie disappear and when he gets near Wanda, Melanie usually mounts a whole circus in her head. It works. 

Well that’s one part of the romance. The other is Ian, a human in the settlement who is pretty level-headed and who starts talking to Wanda, as her guard first and then as her friend. No previous contact with Melanie, so he mets Wanda in Melanie’s body and isn’t excessively hostile or sad. Bc you know, an alien is in the body of you “niece, girlfriend, sister, etc” isn’t really conductive to good first impressions although that alien has come bearing the news that said person is still alive somewhere in their brain. 

(Also the whole human group is so hilariously based on those paranoid about the government/end-of-days usa people... And it works! LMAO) (The social dynamics are interesting in this book ok? basic but ingenious)

So Wanda falls slowly without noticing for Ian; Ian falls first and confesses and everything. I think their first kiss was a bit sketchy? But generally they good. 

The interesting thing is this: Melanie and so her body, is in love and attracted to Jared. Wanda, inhabiting Melanie’s body, starts realising that although Jared is pretty ok and all that, he’s really Melanie’s love; she doesn’t exactly like his more violent tendencies. 

(Really he’s more apocalypse survivor hardcore, but he really was a dick to her at the start, bc alien possessing girlfriend and all. Also gave her mixed signals, etc. Very american male which, eh. Melanie is also very apocalypse survivor hardcore; the two mesh well bc of that lmao) 

Well, as Stephanie Meyer is SM, and she has some weird ideas about romance the thing is, Wanda doesn’t feel sexually attracted to Ian. Bc all the hormones in her body are signaling only Jared. But she really is romantically attracted to Ian, and loves him. When they kiss, she likes it, but it’s not super passionate nor does it brings the same high that the few occasions Jared kissed her. To Ian’s credit he doesn’t really get it at the start, but then is immediately acepting of Wanda’s boundaries. I think he pushes a bit? But this SM so. Sigh. (I like to think in the hands of another author he wouldn’t do the sterotypical male thing but yah)

What I mean is that Stephanie Meyer, without intention, created an ace romance. Sure, it bc really weird biological alien science, but if you take it to mean Melanie is demi and only feels attracted to Jared, that makes her body reactions logical when Wanda also falls in love. She isn’t occupying the body wholly; there’s the host original presence; so she falls romantically but not physically. If I’m saying great idiotices please correct me under; I don’t have any background on sexology or biology. 

Sadly, Wanda is also super worried of not being able of correctly loving Ian, so. Negation of ace identity in one, two..., warning to folks sensible to it. 

And well, she ruins it when at the end when Wanda is put outside Melanie´s body into one who doesn’t have a human conscience. She explained the others how to take “souls” out of humans without killing any part, and how to take the “souls” to the space ships where they’ll be transported to other worlds. But sometimes the humans have passed so much time suppressed, or have been taken so young, that there isn’t a conscience-anyone to recover. 

The Host is very weird, bc this is a race of genocidal colonist aliens who are weird beautiful little ribbons of silver in their original form, who after abandoning their original world by possessing another race who invaded them realised they could live whatever lives they wanted possessing people without dying and just. Went for it. They are a supposedly all peace loving gents, who cured all poverty and illness by their superior technology and like, very comunist-anarchist society. Who abhor violence, but don’t see eliminating other people identity as violence. 

They are weird and amazing; when they realise having and raising children as humans costs so much, they start acting as parents to those humans without going to have a soul implanted on their kid, bc they love them as they are. A mess of contradictions, and Wanda is so interesting bc of this. 

Sadly, SM acted again, and made Wanda one of the rare females able of auto-destroying to create more fragments of herself (aka other souls). The rest of souls don’t have any gender and chose bodies as whatever sex they like most. Guess Wanda being an alien was fine, but not having an explicit gender was too much, lol. To be fair, she says she prefers female bodies, but doesn’t really mind. Good on Wanda. 

There’s a secondary romance too; the search of Ian’s brother, Kyle (who almost kills Wanda once) for his abducted girlfriend, Jodie. Results the soul inside her body, Sunny has all of Jodie’s memories of Kyle and is like, already in love with him. She lets herself be abducted, and when they explain they’re gonna get her out and why, is like, cries and begs, but accepts it bc is Jodie who Kyle loves. She hasn’t ever heard her like Wanda did Melanie, though, so when like a week or two pass and Jodie’s conscience remains dead Kyle consents (bc the other relatives of Jodie are soulified) to bring back Sunny. Wow. What a clusterfuck. They don’t date but there’s this weird vibe where Kyle has stopped hating all souls after Wanda’s mess and his encounter with Sunny, and Sunny herself is like; yay! I can live with humans and Kyle and I’ll keep trying to awake Jodie. And the two of them are described as inseparable? 

It’s more intriguing than Twilight; I wished there were more fics interested in exploring cool canon divergences and all. I didn’t dive in the problematiqueTM aspects of the book but come on, this is SM and you have reading comprehension. I just wanted to talk about how interesting is the intersection of sexuality in romance in Wanda’s case >-< Still better than Twilight but I guess the aesthetic of vamps surpases The Host. Which. Valid ok? Each to their own. 

[ootori-sibs]

Commoners do it better

Day three of @ohshc-week : hurt/comfort or & commoners

Tw for: assault, wh*re mention

Arai was just a normal young man; he had good grades, he had a part time job and a summer job as well. He was bisexual but hadn't even had his first kiss yet, his last crush had gotten into a private academy and had started hanging out with the one percent. He respected her for taking an opportunity where she saw it, apparently she'd even started dating one recently, if rumours were to be believed- he wondered if it was one of those redheads he'd met, or many one of the blonde ones.

His little public school had been invited to watch the Ouran private academy's sports events, just another way the rich liked to flaunt their wealth and talent. Arai didn't really care, he just wanted to see Haruhi again, he still considered her a friend in spite of his previous crush on her, who even keeps crushes from middle school? But unfortunately she was sat over by her club, and Arai didn't really want to disturb them again- last time that happened the twins seemed rather upset at him.

It seemed Haruhi was dating the tallest blonde, if the way he kissed her forehead was any indicator, they made a lovely couple. Another thing Arai noticed is that the young man wearing glasses seemed to be distancing himself from his friends, Arai knew nothing about how these rich folks functioned, but he knew enough about Haruhi to realise that she clearly hadn't noticed, or she'd be making an effort to keep all her friends included. He frowned, leaning over to the girl sitting next to him, "hey, do you know who that kid with the glasses is? The one to the left of Haruhi, about two seats over?"

The girl glanced at him, before looking to where he described, practically swooning, "ooh, that's Kyoya Ootori, he's like, super rich, he's hot too- a member of the hosts club, apparently Fujioka joined that club earlier this year which like, personally I think she's sleeping around cause like, why would a girl hang out with so many attractive guys like that, it's weird I tell you. Fujioka's such a nerd anyway, I don't see what they see in her."

Arai just sighed, not bothering to thank her, the girls still at his school were so rude, so valid. But what she'd said about the boy still stood up, Kyoya Ootori huh… Arai knew that the Ootori group was a very famous company, a monopoly if ever there was one, every big hospital in the area had their name on it somewhere, he was fairly sure his health insurance was theirs as well- he'd have to ask his mother. He figured he'd go watch another event as the football match concluded, Ouran's home team putting on quite the show.

He passed the stands built for the show, there were even concession stands peppered around, guess the rich liked to make money off their guests at any turn, Arai was considering picking up something to nibble on soon, his mother had given him double the normal allowance, considering he was visiting the richest school in Japan. He had his hands in his pockets, just looking around at the pretty cherry trees, it was a lovely clear day out and Arai was so glad he didn't have to study for once. He was just passing the second exit for the stands when he heard noises; the sound of struggling, coming from under the stands.

Arai peers under the stands, oh, some of the Ouran football team are here… and that Ootori kid. The poor guy appears to be cornered, as the captain of the football team leers at him, a couple of inches taller, but standing on his toes to appear more threatening. "-you really think we care about what those idiots have to say? They don't care about you Kyoya, everyone knows there's only one reason anyone keeps you around."

The poor guy seems unbelievably nervous, Arai can see how his hands shake and hear how his voice halters, "I-... My father will-"

"Oh that's right Kyoya, go running to daddy why don't you?" The football captain sneers, chuckling at his own cruel joke. His lackies were holding Kyoya back tightly, no way for the boy to get free of their grasp.

One of the footballers pipes up at that, seeming wholly amused by the whole thing, "oh, I heard he calls Souh daddy~" The whole club laughed at that, one of the boys holding Ootori, shook him roughly, mocking and hurting the boy.

"I- it's not like that, it's not-" he excused it, seemingly more upset at the insult then the pain, Arai found himself frozen in place, watching this scene unfold.

"Oh you whore Kyoya!" The captain laughed- Kuze, Arai had seen his name on a sign near the stands, "does his rat commoner know?" Oh great, they were classist too, though Arai was really more concerned with Kyoya.

Speaking of the boy, he was glancing away, refusing to meet his aggressor's eyes. "I told you Kuze, it's not like that…" he seemed annoyed now, still terrified, but now it was almost as if he was more tired then scared, how long at they been at this? The boy seemed quite worn down.

Kuze grins at him, getting really close to Ootori's face. "Well if you're such a whore, then you won't mind…" and he kissed the poor guy, whilst the other footballers held him still.

Arai glanced around in a panic, he had to do something. His gaze fell on a pebble and he grabbed it without even thinking, throwing it full force at that Kuze boy.

The guy looked over at him, frowning, "excuse me? What the fuck?" All the boys are looking at him now, and Arai feels how his fists clenched, noticing the look of recognition in Ootori's eyes.

"Let him go." Arai forced his voice to sound commanded, though he'd never done anything but follow his whole life.

Kuze just laughed at him, indeed stepping away from Kyoya, but his lackies did no such thing, "oh? What's this dirty fucking commoner playing at then?" He chuckled, hands on his hips, staring at Arai in quite the mocking fashion.

Arai took a deep breath, glaring right back, not letting his gaze falter. He took a measured step forward, not wanting to give away how scared he was. "I said, let him go. What kind of pathetic losers pick on someone weaker than yourselves? There's like six of you! Against one person?"

Apparently these boys had never been called pathetic before, as every one of them seemed surprised by Arai's words, Kuze simply glared, "a commoner? Calling us pathetic? Oh give me a break!" He laughs out loud at that, mocking and cruel, "you couldn't even afford to speak to us."

He was disgusted, but just kept approaching, keeping a safe distance however. "I find it rather typical that you'd hide behind your parents bank accounts, funny thing about us 'commoners'; we can hold our own without the need to get any family involved." He hoped he wouldn't have to go through with it, but he cracked his knuckles, "you ever been a fight with someone who doesn't even have a reputation to uphold?"

He was shaking in his boots, he knew he'd never be able to fight these athletes in any way, but he just hoped these rich fuckers would fall for his threats. Their eyes certainly went wide, one or two of the footballers stepped away from Kyoya, not wanting to get into a scrap with Arai one bit. Kuze looked slightly taken aback, it was clear he hadn't expected to face such a confident guy today, "ugh, there's no way you could take all of us, don't be stupid."

"Maybe not," Arai admitted with a nod, forcing a polite smile, "but I can certainly ruin those faces of yours, isn't reputation everything for you folks? Most commoners keep weapons and blades in their bags on the daily, the real word is dangerous gentlemen." He spoke the truth, keys and scissors count as weapons right? Of course the real world was a danger, where did they think danger came from? Space? Arai took another step forward, staring Kuze in the eyes with a determination that can only come from being a good man, with a moral compass, "so I ask you again, Kuze: Let. Him. Go."

Shocked at being called his first name, but a commoner no less, Kuze took a step back, a clear sign of weakness from the captain. His team instantly dropped poor Ootori to the floor, and their captain glared. "Fine!" He then turned and spat on the ground near Kyoya, "this fucking commoner won't always be here to protect you, bitch." With that, he stormed off, his team in pursuit.

"Why would you do that..?" Arai glanced down, seeing Ootori knelt on the floor, adjusting his glasses and looking up at him.

Arai paused, crouching down to reach Kyoya's eye level, "well anyone would in that situation, I don't know anyone who wouldn't. Are you alright Ootori?"

He nodded, "I'm fine, it's nothing really." Ootori had sighed, shifting to sit down more comfortably, so Arai sat next to him, nodding.

"Is that a normal thing?" He asked, watching Ootori closely, making sure that he was alright… he noticed how not just Ootori's hands were shaking, but his whole form.

"I'm sorry Arai, could you leave, I fear I am about to uh, experience extreme emotions." Ootori coughed nervously, glancing away.

"Oh, are you about to cry?" Arai hums in thought, smiling softly, "it's ok Ootori, you can cry around me, I won't tell anyone." He put a gentle hand on the other boy's shoulder, feeling him tense up beneath him, Arai paused for a moment before gently rubbing Ootori's back, allowing him to relax.

The rich boy was in tears, but he wasn't crying, at least not how Arai had seen it- Ootori was completely silent, the only sign that he was actually sad were the tears that ran down either side of his face as Arai gently rubbed his back, "it's ok, let it all out, I've got you…" Arai just kept murmuring words of encouragement and comfort, he didn't know this guy well at all but they were both Haruhi's friends, and Arai felt he had to be a decent human being at least. "It's alright Ootori… can I call you Kyoya?"

He nodded, "yes, sure," Kyoya sighed, glancing away from Arai. "So you're Haruhi's friend huh?"

"Yep," he smiled, wondering why Haruhi wouldn't have gone for this one, he's so much more subtle than her other friends, "we never actually spoke in Karuizawa, but I kinda wish we had, you seem pretty cool Kyoya."

Kyoya wiped his tears, brushing his trousers down. "Hm, well I am apparently the 'cool type' according to Tamaki. I apologize for having this be the first time we've spoken."

Arai paused, frowning slightly, "hey, don't worry about it, it doesn't change my opinion of you in the slightest." He spoke the truth, he'd never judge someone for any sort of experience like that, he didn't understand why someone would.

Was that a smile? There seemed to be the barest hint of one on Kyoya's face, the boy finally looking Arai in the face. "I'm glad, I wouldn't want any of Haruhi's old friends to think any less of me, she's quite a lovely young woman, it stands to reason he friends are as well."

"I could say the same to you, but you seem pretty awesome on your own." Arai moved his hand from Kyoya's back to his shoulder, smiling softly up at the guy, "why aren't you with your friends by the way?"

"Hm? Oh well Tamaki asked me to go get the commoners coffee from the club room but uh… I got a little held up, they're probably waiting for me." Kyoya shakily stood up, "do forgive me."

"Oh, can I come?" Arai stood as well, smiling kindly, "I'd love to see where you lot hang out."

"Oh of course, you can come if you'd like." Kyoya began to head towards one of the buildings, adjusting his blazer, "it's not set up so you won't have the full effect, but it's still a lovely room."

"I don't doubt that," Arai happily followed him, acutely aware of how his uniform was nowhere near as fancy as his.

They walked through the hallway, Arai talked to Kyoya about a lot of things; grades, family, the differences between rich and poor. Arai learnt that Kyoya was also a straight A student, he was happy to hear how Kyoya especially hated biology, especially human biology- Kyoya had already learnt almost everything they were teaching this year, thanks to his brothers and family hospitals, Arai simply found that fascinating. He also learnt that Kyoya had two brothers and one sister, all older than him, in return he told Kyoya all about being an only child, he expressed how much having siblings would be great and Kyoya told him exactly how wrong he was.

He'd of course noticed how hesitant Kyoya was to share any information that wasn't common knowledge, but Arai was simply happy to hear Kyoya's opinion on such public knowledge, plus it wasn't like he knew any of this, he didn't go around researching folks. By the time they go to the club room, the third music room on one of the wings, Kyoya had opened up enough to explain he'd been mildly jealous of Haruhi had first, and Arai couldn't imagine how that felt, though he supposed it must have been the same thing that one twin was feeling when he lashed out at Arai back in Karuizawa… Arai had never felt such envy, but he could sympathise.

Kyoya opened the door, holding it open for Arai, "here we are." Arai stepped forward, the first thing he noticed was the smell, warm coffee and roses, it was so… nice. There were roses in every case, and some stray petals on the floor, the curtains were closed but what light came through, bounced off the many gold objects in the room, including the small chandelier and gold adorned ceiling. There was a laptop, probably Kyoya's, on one of the tables, that had five bags neatly placed- Arai had to assume that Haruhi had taken her bag with her, just like Kyoya, they were both so practical like that… that was one of the things Arai had liked about Haruhi.

Kyoya wasn't stopping to stare however, he was used to seeing this room every day, he simply headed over to one of the tables, picking up a jar of instant coffee, "oh, huh, do rich people drink instant coffee too? I thought you guys like, got gold coffee beans or something…"

What was that sound? Oh, Arai had caught him off guard, Kyoya was chuckling. "Gold coffee beans? We're rich, we're not Midas." Oh, he made a little joke of his own, Arai chuckled lightly at that, he loved a little mythology joke. "But really," Kyoya continued, "we do usually use fresh coffee beans and we do have a coffee grinder in the storeroom. It just so happens that the club really enjoys commoner coffee?" He shrugs slightly.

"Commoners coffee?" Arai raised an eyebrow at that, tilting his head slightly.

"That's how most refer to it, I'm aware it's not exclusive to the poor." Kyoya rolls his eyes, tucking the jar into his bag, "I should probably get back to the hosts now, where do you need to be?"

"Oh!" Arai had completely forgotten what his train of thought was before coming across Kyoya, "oh yeah, I was just going to grab a snack or something," he shrugs, "I don't really need to be anywhere right now."

"Oh, can you afford snacks? I'll pay for it, I should probably get something to shut Tamaki up with anyway- don't want him asking where I was." Kyoya headed back to the door, hand on the doorknob.

Arai, ever the quick thinker, responded fairly snappy, "only if you let me buy you coffee some time!"

Kyoya froze, glancing back to Arai, "I… well then, I suppose I'd have to send you a copy of my schedule."

He smiled, surprising even himself with such confidence, maybe it was the adrenaline from scaring off the football club. "Please don't feel obligated to though, I just think it'd be fun…" he shrugged softly, feeling suddenly so nervous once again, there was a reason these boys were considered the beauty elite, even in a school such as Ouran academy- and here Arai was, trying on such a bold move with one.

"Oh I'm not saying no, certainly not, just a very busy man." Kyoya almost smiled at him once again, "besides; I need to schedule things to fit club activities and social events around school."

"Wow, that sounds very exhausting, don't you ever have free time?"

They were walking now, back down the corridors and down the stairs. "I suppose so, but I mostly use that for studying." They spent the entire way back, just talking about school and their studies, Kyoya offered to show him how he kept notes when they met up for coffee, Arai told him he'd like to see his notes, but he'd rather take that coffee date to get to know Kyoya, not Kyoya's study habits. They picked up some pretzel sticks from a concession stand, one pot for Arai, and one that Kyoya planned to use to bribe his friend into silence.

When they got to the stand, they paused, Kyoya looked down at Arai, silent for a moment- by now it was clear to Arai how emotionally constipated the richer boy was, so he didn't mind the silence, filling it himself. "I hope we can have that coffee date soon, Kyoya, you're really cool. I hope those boys don't bother you again."

Kyoya nodded slowly, "thank you Arai, I'll see you then…" and he turned, but Arai wasn't finished.

"Don't you need my number?"

Kyoya glanced back at him, once again getting so close to cracking a smile, "oh, I'll just ask Haruhi." Arai did wonder how he'd explain that to Haruhi, but he didn't ask, he just nodded, happy to have met Kyoya.

Maybe the rich weren't so bad… well they were- but Kyoya was cute.

[royalheroine]

Helen regretted arriving to new york city much earlier than her family. She arrived to see a stream of aliens coming through a big portal in the sky. She had to act fast. She should’ve run. Should’ve stayed in a cafe or something, but she did something highly impulsive. She fought.

She quickly found a broken pipe in the alleyway and started hitting at the aliens. The aliens started shooting bolts of light at her and she adapted by finding a broken off car door. She was surprised that it blocked most of the shots. She found herself protecting the stay victims and escorting people to nearby bulidings or outreach refugee camps.

Blood sprayed on her face while she stabbed a alien in the head with the sharp pipe. She didn’t notice the wound on her left side, and didn’t complain about the scratches and bruises on her legs. She just wanted it to end. She hoped her family is not here, even if they didn’t care about her. She then decided to head to the stark tower, maybe the aliens held hostages in there.

----

She found herself going up to the top floor after realizing that no one is being held hostage on the lobby floor.

---

The elevator door opened and she saw a man with raven black hair. Wearing a royal overcoat adorend with gold trimmings and fabric. He held a glowing scepter.

‘Shit did i just find the villian?!’ she thought to herself.

“And who might you be.” He smirked.

She carefully stepped out of the elevator. Trying to identify or at least avoid his attacks. Surviving multiple aliens seemed hard, but this encounter would be even harder.

“I-I thought people would be taken hostage in this tower- I think I thought wrong. Wait-” she looked at the crescent shaped charm on his chest.

“A-are you a god?” She asked. The symbol looked very similar to the symbol in her norse mythology storybook. The storybook that she read over and over again.

“Oh, so you know your place. You realize who I really am, your god.” He spoke to her.

“Y-are you- Loki?” She abandoned all feelings of fear and terror. Those feelings were replaced with feelings of childlike curiosity.

“Yes, how does a mere mortal know about my name?” He was curious too. He thought that mortals only knew about their own realm.

“Uh- apparently people from the past worshipped you, and Thor and Odin and others, they’re called Norse. And I guess they wrote stories about you! Stories that I read a lot. And, yeah, I know this is a really weird thing to say to someone who is invading your planet but- I- you’re my favorite god.” She looked away.

‘Thats my last words. I literally called my killer my favorite and I’m going to die. Great.’ She thought to herself.

Loki put down his scepter. He wanted to entertain this small, puny mortal. A mortal that didn’t seem to fear him.

“Come child.” He guided her to the bar.

—

“So, what do they say about me?” He asked her.

“Well… They said that you can shapeshift and that you had a baby with a horse.” She giggled. The god wrinkled the bridge of his nose.

“God, the way you mortals create stories are weird and highly inaccurate. I only raised a baby horse, not gave birth to it.” He clarified, leaning the scepter against the bar.

“I mean, you were not portrayed as wholly evil or wholly good, since mischeif is neutral in morality. Which means you’re not a villain. Right? She asked

“That’s where you’re wrong. My brother is a hero and I am the villain. A villain who is not even asguaridan.” He told her.

“Y-you’re also compared to your brother?” She asked shyly

“Yes, all the time.” He huffed

“Well, you’re in the same boat, my brother, Finn. He’s older, cuter, a golden child and good at everything. Meanwhile, you have me… Messy, uncoordinated and decided to fight instead of run away like anyone else.” She said.

“Fighting is a more noble pursuit than running.” he told her, but he noticed that she was bleeding on her side.

“Oh dear, that’s not a nice sight.” He carefully laid her down on the couch.

“W-what?” She was getting faint, she didn’t notice that she was bleeding out. Loki summoned a rag and started using his healing magic. But he had limited knowledge.

“Stay with me dear, once you wake up, we will rule together, besides, two monsters should shine in the sunlight.” He assured the sleeping child.

---

The girl woke up to see a group of heroes circling Loki. She stood up but her wound thobbed.

“Ah!” She dobled over. Clutching her side. A man dressed in blue and red came over to her.

“Did he hold you hostage?” He asked.

“No- I- he healed me.” She said grogilly. She didn’t realize that it was all over.

“Dear, you should’nt move as much.” Loki called to her. The blue hero looked confused.

“Ah- where is he going?” She asked.

“Back to asgard.” The blonde hero said.

“Are you Thor then?” She asked. Staggering once she stood up.

“Yes” He smiled lightly, probably trying to calm down the shaking child.

“Your age?” The blue hero said.

“11.” She meekly said.

“You hurt a child!” Thor shouted at Loki.

“No! He actually took care of me! We- had a conversation!” She shouted in protest.

“He hypnotized you.” The blue hero tried to get the situation straight.

“I WOULD NEVER! NOT A CHILD!” Loki shouted. Thor only put a mechanical gag on loki.

“I-i”

“Lets get you down, alright?” The blue hero gave a comforting smile.

She found herself stuffed in a small elevator with a bunch of heroes and a villain. She was slightly shaking from the excess adrenaline and the pain from the wound. Loki kept glancing at her, worried that she might faint from the blood.

“Sooo…. What is your name kid?” The man in the iron suit asked.

“Helen. Helen Conrad.” She told him.

“Well, lets lighten up! Lets all introduce ourselves. I’ll start off. My name is Tony stark! Real names only!”

“I am Steve Rodgers.” The blue hero smiled.

“Natasha Romanov.”

“Clint Barton.”

“Thor Odinson”

She smiled brightly. “Thank you for introducing yourselves!”

----

She found herself in the lobby, witnessing the fight over a glowing blue cube.

‘Why are they so obsessed with that cube?’ she asked herself.

--

“Your parents haven’t shown up.” Thor pointed out as they sat ontop of the car.

“Not surprised, probably busy with my brother.” She leaned back. Probably thinking that she’d just settle back into her normal life.

“What if you came with me. To Asgard.” He asked her.

She turned to him. “Y-you’d really bring me?” She asked.

“If your parents are as neglectful as they are, then I should probably just bring you to a better place. Your skills will be better cultivated on Asgard than with your parents.” He said.

“Also, you’ve made a profound impact on my brother, Loki. So would you be kind to come on behalf of him? He doesn’t show it but he’d like you to come too.” he asked.

“D-definately! Definitely!” She shouted. Jumping up and down.

“I-i- d-definately- w-wait. Give me a s-second.” She was getting too excited that her stuttering became apparent. She took a deep breath.

She gave a curt, “Yes. yes I would like to go.” She smiled. Thor grinned.

“You would definately love the palace.”

---

Loki and Thor held on to the container with the tesseract and Helen stood behind the container.

“Are you sure we should let a child go to a different realm with two gods, and one of them tried to invade our planet.” Steve asked Tony.

“I’m sure Thor would keep her safe, besides, we might have to hold her in the tower when she comes back.” Tony repled.

“Why?” Steve asked.

“I’m pretty skeptical about the fact that a child was able to battle her way into my tower and talk down the god of lies without getting killed in the process.” He remarked.

---

Helen was beamed in the entrance of the rainbow bridge. She walked with the two gods. One in chains and one with the hammer. She looked at the view of Asgard. It looked grander than she’d imagine. The golden towers were glistening in the sunlight. The rainbow bridge was translucent but had rainbow like branches pulsing through the bridge. She seemed scared to cross the bridge at first. Having a slight fear of heights. But Thor grabbed on to her hand and gave her comforting look.

Loki looked on, wishing he could do the same. But glad that his brother did it in his place.

---

Helen was being addressed by the king of Asgard. Odin.

“You have the heart of a heroine and the capacity to empathize with even the toughest of villains. Tell me, child. What is your name?” He asked her.

“He-he-Helen.” She stuttered. Cursing herself for stuttering in front of the king.

“Conrad.”

“Conraddotar?” Odin clarified

“You can call me that.” she said.

“Enjoy yourself at the palace, you are now considered royalty for extending your kindness to my son, Loki.” Odin said.

---

Helen wore a simple green gown. She was happily skipping around and exploring the palace.

“Helen, dear, can you come to me?” A voice sounded in the hallway.

She turned to see Queen Frigga.

“Let’s fix yout hair, shall we?”

--

Helen was sitting on Frigga’s bed while Frigga was braiding her hair.

“Thank you for everything that you’ve done. Tell me, Helen, what is your family like?” She asked.

“Well, I have a brother, and two parents. But my parents lives revolve around my brother. But- Im ok with that. I do things by myself and I got used to it.” She said.

“Ah- im sorry my dear. But here, there are servants and maids that can help you. So relax. I know how traumatic the invasion was, so I hope you realze that you are safe.

----

Helen was sitting on the steps, looking at Loki in his cell. She noticed that he has a lot of furniture in his cell. He was reading a book, and she was scribbling something in her notebook.

“Mind telling me what you’re writing down, dear?” He asked, thumbing through the pages.

“Uh-I-I’m actually d-drawing.” She said. Trying not to stutter.

“What are you drawing?” He asked.

“You.” She meekly said. Loki put the book on the table and walked towards Helen, he sat down in front of her.

“Mind showing me?” He smiled lightly.

She tore the page out and she showed it to him. It was loki and helen, under a flower tree. He was reading a spell out of the spell book.

“That looks adorable. When I escape, will you hand it to me?” He smiled.

“Of course.”

—-

“Do you like the accommodations in the palace?” Loki asked, hoping that they are taking care of her.

“Yes, but I wish I can enjoy them with you.” She answered. Twiddling her thumbs.

“So I decided to sit at your cell and talk to you!” She grinned. Loki’s heart melted. He’d never knew that he’d meet someone who was so naive and childlike. Enough to paint him as a positive figure. But he didn’t care. He just felt a sense of kindness towards her. He feels fond of her. He never realized that he was fawning over a mortal. Who’s life can flash before his eyes.

“That is great child.” He said.

“Wish I had my chello here, could’ve played you a tune.” She said. Loki used some of his magic to steal away a chello from the music room and teleported it here.

“Then play me a tune then.” He smiled

—

Loki was spellbound by the tune, she played a song that a mortal composed. But he didn’t know that the mortal is a master at music composition. Apparently the song was Blue Danube, by Johan Strauss. He swayed to the melody. By the time Helen was done he asked her a dozen questions.

--

“How long have you played?”

“5 years. Started at a young age, when my parents believed in my talents.” she told me.

“They should’ve known how bright you’ve shined.”

“Don’t blame them. They stop trying after finding out about my stutter.” She said.

“Your parent’s arent even parents.” I told her.

“I realized that when I hit 9.” she replied.

“Then maybe you should have a different father. Someone who adores you, who encourages you to be as different and unique as possible, who doesn’t compare you to anyone, who empathizes with you. Someone- someone like me.” He slowed his rant. Realizing something.

“D-do you want me to be your father?” He asked. Taking a big risk, being vulnerable .

“I-i-i’d lo-love yo-you to!” She was a stuttering mess, her brain was trying to process the proposal.

“Dear, slow down, take a big breath.” He grinned

“I would like for you to be my dad.” she slowly said. Tears coming out of her eyes.

“I would whipe those tears from your eyes but I’m stuck in this wretched cell.” He chuckled.

“I want to hug you.” She sniffled.

“You’ll get the chance.”

---

Everything was broken, damaged. But Helen rushed towards Loki’s cell. She just got word of Frigga’s death. And she didn’t want to lose her new father. She saw Loki in his cell, seeming to be fine. But she just broke out in sobs.

Her breathing was ragged. Tears flow through her eyes, and she was sniffling. She collapsed to the ground. Choking and crying. Crying for him, Loki. Feeling too much of his pain. Loki put down his defenses.

He had a green shirt but his hair was matted, her crawled to the crying child and wanted to reach out to her, but the barrier kept him from touching her.

“H-hey. Don’t cry-”

“You’re depressed so I’m depressed! I don’t want this to happen, for you to be sad! I-its my fault! I’m sorry. I-I. i’m- s-s-sorry. Mr. Loki! I-i have no-no right to be you-your daughter!” She was stuttering, trying to calm herself down. But the stale air and the buzzing barrier, it was hard to.

“No, don’t say that, you’re my daughter through and through. None of this was your fault. None of it. Please, stop crying for me.” He guided her to a deep breath.

“S-sorry.” she apologized for her shrill crying

“Don’t be sorry.” He smiled.

---

Helen gave Loki a big hug when Thor freed him from the cell. Loki returned the hug while threading his fingers through her braided hair.

“Darling, I have to help Thor. But I will come back.” he told her.

“A-are you sure?” She asked.

“One way or another. Yes.”

--

When Helen found out about Loki’s demise, she locked herself in the room and cried. She sobbed, blaming herself for letting him go alone. Hating herself. A knock sounded at the door. The door opened and she saw Odin.

“S-sorry if my cries are too loud.” she whipped her tears.

“It’s alright my child.” Odin sat at her beside.

“I-Lost my dad.” She stuttered.

“He said he’d come back-”

“One way or another.” Odin’s illusion was dispelled by Loki. He smiled kindly at her.

“I am sorry for causing you unnecessary pain. But I had to keep up the illusion for my safety.” He whipped her tears with his thumb. And enveloped her in a crushing hug.

“But now we can rule together. My little princess.” He smiled.

[arecomicsevengood]

TOP TEN OLDER MAINSTREAM COMICS I READ THIS YEAR

I kept track of all the comics I read this year, and not all of them were new. I have no idea who this will help or benefit but at least the circumstances of me only listing the completely arbitrary older work I read for the first time this year will deter anyone from arguing with me. However, for the sake of possibly being contentious, let me mention two comics that fall outside the top ten, because they’re bad:

Trencher by Keith Giffen. David King did a comic strip about Keith Giffen’s art style on this book in issue 2 of But Is It... Comic Aht that everybody loved, and made me be like, ok, I’ll check it out. But it’s basically just a retread of Lobo in terms of its tone and approach, but without Simon Bisley. I don’t really know why anyone wouldn’t think Bisley is the better cartoonist. Also, those comics are terrible. Thumbs down.

The Green Lantern by Grant Morrison, Liam Sharp, and Steve Oliff. I bought the first year of these comics for a dollar each off a dude doing a sidewalk sale. Found them sort of incoherent? I haven’t liked a new Grant Morrison comic in ages, with All-Star Superman being really the only outlier since like We3. This is clearly modeled off of European comics like Druillet or something, and would maybe benefit from being printed larger, I really dislike the modeled color too. But also it’s just aggressively fast-paced, with issues ending in ways that feel like cliffhangers but aren’t, and no real characters of interest.

As for the top ten list itself, for those who’ve looked at my Letterboxd page, slots 10-8 are approximately “3 stars,” 7-4 are 3 1/2 stars, slots 3 and 2 are 4 stars, with number one being a 4 1/2 star comic. The comics I’m listing on my “Best Of The Year” list that’ll run at the Comics Journal alongside a bunch of people are all 4 1/2 or 5 star comics. This is INSANELY NERDY and pedantic to note, and I eschew star ratings half the time anyway, because assignations of numeric value to art are absurd except within the specific framework of how strong a recommendation is, and on Letterboxd I feel like I’m speaking to a very small and self-selecting group of people whose tastes I generally know. (And I generally would not recommend joining Letterboxd to people!) But what I mean by all of this is just that there is a whole world of work I value more than this stuff, and I’ll recommend the truly outstanding shit to interested readers in good time.

10. Justice Society Of America by Len Strazewski and Mike Parobeck. Did some quarantine regressing and bought these comics, a few of which were some of the first comics I ever read, but I didn’t read the whole thing regularly as a kid. Parobeck’s a fun cartoonist, this stuff is readable. It’s faintly generic/baseline competent but there’s a cheap and readable quality to this stuff that modern comics lack. Interestingly, the letters column is made up of old people who remember the characters and feel like it’s marketed towards them, and since that wasn’t profitable, when the book was canceled, Parobeck went over to drawing The Batman Adventures, which was actively marketed towards kids. It’s funny that him and Ty Templeton were basically viewed as “normal” mainline DC Comics for a few years there and then became relegated to this specific subset of cartooning language, which everyone likes and thought was good but didn’t fit inside the corporate self-image, which has basically no aesthetic values.

9. The Shadow 18 & 19 by Andy Helfer and Kyle Baker. I’d been grabbing issues of this run of comics for years and am only now finishing it. Kyle Baker’s art is swell but Helfer writes a demanding script, these are slow reads that cause the eye to glaze over a bit.

8. The Jam 3-8 by Bernie Mireault. I made a post where I suggested Mireault’s The Jam might be one of the better Slave Labor comics. Probably not true but what I ended up getting are some colored reprints Tundra did, and some black and white issues published by Dark Horse after that. Mireault’s art style is kinda like Roger Langridge. After these, he did a crossover with Mike Allred’s Madman and then did a series of backups in those comics, it makes sense to group them together, along with Jay Stephens’ Atomic City Tales and Paul Grist’s Jack Staff, or Mike Mignola’s Hellboy, as this stream that runs parallel to Image Comics but is basically better, a little more readable, but still feeling closer to something commercial in intention as opposed to self-expression. Although it also IS self-expression, just the expression of a self that has internalized a lot of tropes and interests in superhero comics. If you have also read a lot of superhero comics, but also a lot of alternative comics, stuff like this basically reads like nothing. It’s comfort food on the same level of mashed potatoes: I love it when it’s well-done but there’s also a passable version that can be made when depressed and uninspired. But drawing like Roger Langridge is definitely not bad!

7. WildC.A.T.S by Alan Moore, Travis Charest, et al. I wrote a post about these comics a few months ago, but let me reiterate the salient points: There’s two collections, the first one is much better than the second, and the first is incredibly dumbed-down in its nineties Image Comics style but also feels like the best version of that possible, when Charest is doing art. Also, these collections are out of print now, a friend of mine pointed out maybe they can’t be reprinted because they involve characters owned by Todd McFarlane but Wildstorm is owned wholly by DC now.

6. Haywire by Michael Fleischer and Vince Giarrano. I made a post about this comic when I first read a few issues right around the time Michael Fleischer died a few years ago, but didn’t read all of it then. This feels way more deliberately structured than most action comics, with its limited cast and lack of ties to any broader universe, but it’s also dumb and sleazy and fast moving, and feels related to what were the popular movies of the day, splitting its influences evenly between erotic thrillers about yuppies and Stallone-starring action movies. The erotic thriller element is mostly just “a villain in bondage gear” which is sort of standard superhero comics bullshit but it’s also a little bit deeper than that. The first three issues, inked by Kyle Baker, look the best.

5. Dick Tracy by John Moore and Kyle Baker. These look even better! A little unclear which John Moore this is? There’s John Francis Moore, who worked with Howard Chaykin and was scripting TV around this time, but there’s another dude who was a cartoonist who did a miniseries for Piranha Press and then moved on to doing work for Disney on Darkwing Duck comics. Anyway, Kyle Baker colors these, they’re energetically cartooned, each issue is like 64 pages, with every page being close to a strip or scene in a movie. I’m impressed by them, and there’s a nice bulk that makes them a nice thing to keep a kid busy. (For the record, my favorite Kyle Baker solo comic is probably You Are Here.)

4. Chronos by John Francis Moore and Paul Guinan. I was moving on from DC comics by the late nineties, but Grant Morrison’s JLA was surely a positive influence on everyone, especially compared to the vibe there in the subsequent two decades. These are well-crafted. There’s a little stretch where it uses the whole “time-traveling protagonist” thing to do a run of issues which stand alone but fall in sequence too and it’s pretty smooth and smart. The art is strong enough to carry it, the sort of cartoony faces with detailed backgrounds it’s widely agreed works perfectly, but that you rarely see in mainstream comics. The coloring is done digitally, but not over-modeled enough to ruin it.

3. Martha Washington by Frank Miller and Dave Gibbons. A few miniseries, all of which sort of get weaker as they go, but all in one book it doesn’t feel like it’s becoming trash as it goes or anything. When Miller dumbed down his storytelling in the nineties it really was because he thought it made for better comics, the tension between his interest in manga and Gibbons’ British-comics classicism feels productive. I do kind of feel like the early computer coloring ruins this a little bit.

2. Xombi by John Rozum and JJ Birch. Got a handful of these on paper, read scans of the rest. This is pretty solid stuff, not really transcendent ever, but feels well-crafted on a month-in, month-out level. I read a handful of other Milestone comics, and a lot of them suffered from being so beholden to deadlines that there are fill-in issues constantly. This is the rare one that had the same creators for the entirety of its run. There was a revival with Frazer Irving art a decade ago but I prefer JJ Birch’s black line art with Noelle Giddings’ watercolors seen here. They’re doing an early Vertigo style “weirdness” but with a fun and goofy sense of humor about itself. I haven’t read Clive Barker but this feels pretty influenced by that as well. (The Deathwish miniseries is of roughly comparable quality. I read scans of the rest of that after I made my little post and, yeah, it does actually feel very personal for a genre work, and the JH Williams art with painted color is great.)

1. Tom Strong by Alan Moore, Chris Sprouse, etc. I got bored reading these as a teen but getting them all for cheap and reading them in a go was a pretty satisfying experience. It’s partly a speed-run through Moore’s coverage of the concept of a comic book multiverse seen in his Supreme run, minus the riffing on Mort Weisinger Superman comics, instead adding in a running theme of rehabilitating antagonists whose goals are different but aren’t necessarily evil. It’s more than just Moore in an optimistic or nostalgic mode, it also feels like he’s explaining his leftist morality to an audience that has internalized conflicts being resolved by violence as the genre standard.