#TRYING NOT TO INFODUMP I HAVE SO MANY PARALLELS I SAW

[ghostlychaosfoil]

guys rottmnt the movie and the day the earth blew up are actually cinematic parallels

[appri-dot]

Pls infodump I wanna know stuff Abt ur ocs🥺🥺🥺🐟🐟

I SAVED THIS ASK FOR WHEN I GET INTO AN OC RAMBLING MOOD BUT I SHOULD PROBABLY JUST USE IT THIS ISN'T UNO!!! OKAY SO UHM- LET ME TALK ABOUT SOME GUYS THAT I NEVER EVER DO! under read more though because they are embarrassing..sigh

Anyway, back to fun things! BSS and Reserved Complex are my dynamic duo Iterator ocs.

Reserved Complex was an early-age Iterator ontop of a preexisting city, she was extremely populated an adored. As they had already grown fond of her before she was created by where she was placed. effectively presenting her as the conscious embodiment of home. As the movement for ascension developed and became more feasible the overly attached iterator started a campaign against it, and even attempted to dissuade her citizens from partaking until forced correction had disabled her ability to propagandize.

She couldn't do anything. And it ruined her a bit.

She became obsessed with their absence, interested in the evolution of life that sprouted from it. Her local group saw her as a very maternal figure, posed as graceful and a parallel to ancients. She earned the trust and adoration of many aside from an individual named Brothers Sworn Secrecy.

Brothers Sworn Secrecy is sort of controversial, he was made to solve the great problem, but a division of ancients who were adverse to the common culture developed on his superstructure. Hedonism and taboo acts were a staple, hidden by a shared sense of secrecy amongst the population. Where they would live to experience pleasure until the era of ascension.

BSS was very VERY closed off because of this, it was obnoxious how impossible it was to communicate with him or his citizens. Until finally there was a seizure of his people to be quickly straightened out for their negative influences, and BSS was abandoned, left with a gift of independence, acutely aware of each and every functional system inside and out of his can, as they one day hoped he could join them.

He had kept all the secrets they buried with himself, removing himself from the local group communications and dedicating his life to secretly discovering the taboo of self elimination.

And everyone lived that way, existing through cycles and cycles with no real deviation from their previous experiences. Until RC did something so unacceptable and offensive that she was effectively blacklisted from any and all communications. (She tried to force the evolution of a new sapient species to replace the ancients, revealing that thousands of cycles of trust lead to some unholy abomination that triggered taboos never considered)

Afterwards she considered trying to communicate with BSS who didn't exactly have her blocked but was just literally off radar. Developing a means to earn the consideration and grace of the group again by using BSS as her target. She made a slugcat🥰 awww! One with a short lifespan and in such a way that it couldn't exactly function properly, and the only thing it could do was reach BSS...atleast that's what it hid itself as. It was an infection, it could breed and fast, as cycles past the creature would essentially just die and have its children die aswell. Many cycles, many generations. Destroying the local ecosystem of BSS's structure, like a virus.

Nothing stopped them, they had no message, and they had no mercy.

So he eventually reinstated his communication to everybody's shock to plea for help and beg anybody to save him. That's where RC steps in. Basically working to "fix" the issue. Using her gross abomination lizards to kill the slugcats in mass. But they couldn't really persist against a monument of icky critters. And RC knew they wouldn't.

BSS as of current is managed by the group as a sick loser. RC earning her spot back as the sweet and tender mother who only wants what's best. And she would've gotten away with it if it weren't for that meddling slugcat!!!! (Leech)

I NEED TO STOP BEFORE I REACH SOME KIND OF LIMIT!!! I LOVE THESE TWO SO SO SO SO MUCH THEY MAKE ME SICK AND ILL AND CLAP MY HANDS, the reason I'm embarrassed and don't talk about them much is because they are what I call, "unofficial fandom ocs" I don't know enough canon story elements to confidently talk about them aloud because there might be some lore inconsistencies in how they are portrayed

Also there's other dudes lol

[starswhispere]

I just finished “of all the stories in the stars ours has yet to be told” and—I am in LOVE. Your characterizations of them are?? So sweet??? Agh. Danny’s feeling over dash wanting to hear him infodump are gonna make me either melt through the floor or evaporate into the ceiling. I just. AGH. Them <33

also I just came off a big hadestown kick, so the Orpheus and Eurydice parallels are doing things to me waugh

(and also also—tall Danny as a headcanon will never not be my favorite thing. You mentioned it was inspired by the fic/fancomic fusion that made him taller than dash (the name escapes me—although it shouldn’t because that series is also amazing—and it’s what brought me to your fic too iirc) —BUT! Yeah. Love love love love <3)

AWWWWWW thank you! I'm so glad you like it!

Hadestown is so fucking good oh my god. I used a quote from the musical as my senior quote lol. Originally I planned on doing Perseus and Andromeda parallels but when I got to the star gazing scene I second-guessed it and asked my coworkers and they voted for Orpheus and Eurydice, so I changed the outline and events and went with this instead. I like it more.

I was inspired by @tatumsdrawing comic. Their comic came across my dashboard and I was like "Oh, I loved that show as a kid, let me give this a little looksy" and I was immediately dragged straight down here and had so many ideas pop into my head. And now I own the series on DVD, it was my Halloween costume, and I have a list of other fics I plan to write. Their comic is actually so good and means a lot to me because I've been trying to get back into writing for a while now and it wasn't until I saw their art that I was able to. So, yes, sometimes I steal their headcanons, like Danny being taller lol. (Literally cannot wait for part ten, I might die of excitement)

But I'm so glad you liked it! I'm so so so close to being done with chapter 8. I wanted it to be done a few days ago but life keeps kicking my ass. I'm working on it rn though so hopefully I can get that posted soon!

Thank you so much! <3 <3 <3

[madokamagicasecrets]

Thank you for Angel's Egg posting, saw it recently with some friends and so your posts on it felt fortuitous.

How did you interpret the soldier and egg girl? We spent ages after the movie trying to work out how we felt about them so I'd be interested to see what you thought.

Oh that's so cool! I'm glad you enjoyed it, I remember watching it on a whim with my sister years ago and just being awestruck and hypnotized by the movie. I've become a bit of a fanatic since then and singlehandedly drove up the value of merchandise of the movie by collecting all of it lol. It's dear to my heart for sure.

I think if you know anything about Christianity then the parallels between the soldier and Jesus should be fairly apparent. A lot of people think (I presume rightly) that the giant eye is supposed to be God, and the soldier seems connected to it in some way. He has a cross-shaped weapon and bandages on his hands. I think given the history Mamoru Oshii had with religion and the crisis of faith that inspired the movie make his role fairly certain in my eyes.

The girl, however, I don't really have a clear role for. A few interpretations of the film say she's going through a biblical test, which I think is probably accurate, but I'm not sure she represents a specific biblical figure. I'm not the most well-versed in religion despite knowing more than the layman though, so I might be wrong. I think that a big part of what makes her interesting to me though, and also the soldier, is this idea about their level of awareness or the intention behind the universe and what they're doing.

If the girl is undergoing a biblical test, does she even know why? Maybe, much like the story the soldier tells, she's forgotten why she's filling the jugs with water and protecting the egg. It may also be a bit unfair to say this given the soldier breaks the egg, but I also feel relatively certain he's in the dark too. Part of why I actually Angel's Egg-posted when I did is because I watched a video essay of someone's personal take on it because I was thinking about it, and it made me realize that the scene in the beginning with the bird in the egg was probably the dream the soldier alludes to. He also expresses memory loss and I feel inclined to believe him. The question of if the characters are genuinely being tested or if they're victims of a God who abandoned the world is probably the most important part of what makes the story interesting.

I'm presuming you know this much but for the uninitiated Mamoru Oshii made this movie right after having a crisis of faith after being deeply religious for many years, to the point of considering being a priest. I think a big part of Angel's Egg is that it is a way of expressing his uncertainty. There's a bit of spite there, but also grieving. There's no solid answers and things are open to interpretation because he also doesn't really have them. He was just trying to understand himself amidst this massive loss in his life, and channeled it into this bizarre biblical test that makes you wonder about its level of intent and if the characters' faith was rewarded at all.

I may have rambled on a bit about adjacent topics, sorry lol. This movie is just so fascinating I kinda can't help but infodump and discuss it. I just hope that what I said was in focus enough that it answered your question haha

[skitskatdacat63]

Dear beloved mutual,

1. You have the power to revive one fashion trend, which trend do you revive?

2. How do you come up with niche but cool au ideas? Do they just appear out of nowhere?

3. You are to help create the perfect f1 driver, choose the dna of two drivers that will be used in the creation of this perfect driver and pick anyone related to f1 to raise them.

Oh my god, these are such fantastic questions. I feel like I have to turn the question back on you and ask how you came up with such unique ones?? Whenever I do this kind of game, I cannot think of actually interesting questions at all lmao

1.

Hmmmm....maybe that we all have to dress formally/more dressy all the time- Again, I like comfy clothes as much as the next person and sometimes when I wake up and have to go out, I cannot muster the energy to dress well at all. HOWEVER at the same time, I don't really feel incentivized to dress up anyways, considering I'll probably end up severely standing out. It just makes me so grrr to look at old paintings or pictures and everyone feels much more stylish compared to nowadays. Though, I guess their version of "dressing down" appears formal to us in modern day. Sigh, I just wanna dress up fancy and not feel like I'm super out of place. I'm just not a huge fan of modern fashion, especially fast fashion. Like we own so many more clothes now then we did in the past, but they're all so much worse quality and mainly boring.

2.

Ahhhhh good question. I think I might have said before, but a lot of them just come from me doing something or learning about something new, and I want to share it with people. But it feels much more interesting to actually do something with that information, rather than just infodump. It's actually a symbiotic relationship. I learn/do something -> I use making an au as a medium to share this new interest -> I then have an actual reason to learn more in depth, actually retain the info and have a reason to share it! I think it has to be something very fascinating to me for it to actually become a full, committed AU though. I joke a lot about creating random ones, but it has to actually stick in my head for it to come to fruition. But a lot of the things I joke about usually end up integrating into an AU. Such as when I use Machiavelli quotes, or draw specific scenarios. But yeah they're usually just random concepts that I want to draw, and then I come up with lore to make it make sense. It's fun though to randomly discover parallels, and make associations prob no one else would ever make. Like to who else other than me would HRE Charles VI and Sebastian Vettel being similar make any sense?? Let me try to write out how I remember coming up with my main AUs: Boy King AU: I've talked about this in depth before but basically I saw a little statuette of a Holy Roman Emperor as a literal boy king and it stuck in my mind for a while, and I'm like, haha Seb statue??? And it all spiraled from there. Matador AU: I think I randomly got a thirst trap tiktok of matadors on my fyp, and I became a bit obsessed with their clothes and aesthetic. And then I was like, Spain...Fernando...matador Fernando!! And actually, the only reason that AU has lore is bcs I'm a vettonso stannie lol(same with Boy King AU tbh!!) Nandopoleon: Well, I've been obsessed with Napoleon a while, so of course I unconsciously started trying to make comparisons. But honestly....they really are so fucking similar, it's insane to me. They are the same person, okay!! Renaissance Muse AU: Purely came from thinking Seb looked similar to The David. But tbh now it's more about statues/works of art I think he looks similar to and want to draw! + Bond AU and Hussar AU: I just find them fascinating and love the parallels. One of my fav posts of mine is still the Hussar to F1 comparison, very similar to matador AU.

3.

Lmfao you already know I'm making the vettonso baby. I like to think since they're pretty similar, the baby would be 2x as talented. It's hard to say who could raise them bcs I feel like those related to F1 who are good parents prob wouldn't put their kid into F1. So maybe Mark? And also I think it's kinda funny for him to have to raise vettonso's love child. But it's like Mark with Oscar. Maybe Mark didn't totally succeed, but maybe he can through managing the next gen, y'know?

anonymously message me (3) things you want to know about me.

[sleepyeye17]

Neurodivergent Love Languages: Infodumping

I recently saw a post by someone named Amythest@neurowonderful about the five Neurodivergent love languages: Infodumping, parallel play, support swapping, ‘crush my soul back into my body,’ and ‘I found this cool object and thought of you’. I thought it would be a nice little Steddie series. Here’s the first one, which is infodumping. (The story that Steve is telling is not based on any actual book. I’ve just been listening to A LOT of the Fated Mates podcast.)

Eddie is sitting on the sofa, watching Steve pace and ramble. Steve wanted to start reading what he called “elf books” in an attempt to understand the kids’ interests better. Instead, he’s gotten hooked on gay fantasy erotica, and spends many afternoons trying to explain the plots to Eddie. Eddie has to admit, he’s based more than one campaign on Steve’s literal fairy porn. 

“Okay, so in this one, there’s this guy named Sorsumilus, okay? And Sorsumilus is cursed. See, when he was young, he was a real asshole, and bullied a lot of people. He was a dick to this witch, so she curses him, and turns him into a dragon shapeshifter, which is something, like, really bad. People don’t like dragon shifters. And she says that unless he bones a human before his twenty-first birthday, he’ll be stuck as a dragon forever.”

“Wow, harsh.”

Steve talks with his hands, throwing them up and gesturing. He speaks with his whole body when he’s excited. Eddie hugs a pillow and smiles.

“Yeah,” Steve says. “And he tells the witch, like, that’s fine, I’m fucking gorgeous, I’ll absolutely pull before then. But she curses him, and says, no human will ever want to fuck you.”

“Even harsher! Jesus!”

“Okay, meanwhile. There’s this guy named Joseniar, and he’s a wandering bard. And he’s just doing his wandering thing, and Sorsumilus sees him and thinks he’s hot. So Sorsumilus kidnaps him and takes him back to his lair. And they bone.”

“Wait. And Joseniar is cool with this?”

“Yeah he’s into it. Sorsumilus is smokin hot. But he can’t tell Joseniar that he’s a dragon shifter, obviously, so whenever he turns into a dragon he has to, like, run off. And Joseniar thinks that Sorsumilus isn’t into him.”

“I thought if the dragon fucked a human the curse would be lifted.”

“That’s the problem, see, because Sorsumilus is still turning into a dragon, and he’s like ‘why isn’t this working, maybe we’re doing it wrong.’ So they have to do it, in, like, lots of different ways. Cause like maybe it doesn’t count if it’s not the right position.”

“Very scientific.” 

“But finally, it’s the night before his birthday, and he starts to cry.” Steve stops pacing and grows still. “And he tells Joseniar that… That he has to leave forever. Because he’s a monster. And nobody can ever love him, and that he’s cursed. And then Joseniar says that…” Steve runs his hand through his hair. “Well, that he loves Sorsumilus, and that the reason he’s immune to the witch’s curse is that he’s actually a werewolf.”

Steve blinks hard and swallows.

“And then he watches Sorsumilus turn into a dragon, and he’s like… He’s like, you’re so beautiful, and I love you.” Steve wipes his eyes and laughs a bit. “It’s stupid. Really stupid. But I liked it.”

Eddie stares. He feels punch-drunk, sitting and watching Steve. He loves the sound of Steve’s voice. He loves Steve’s wide open smile, and the way he gestures when he’s excited. He loves that Steve tried to read fantasy to connect with the kids, and ended up crying over manimal erotica. Eddie loves everything about him.

“Come here.” He holds his arms open and Steve laughs and flops down onto Eddie’s chest. “Steve. You’re so beautiful. And I love you.”

Steve lets out a choked noise that’s half sob, half giggle.

“I love you too.”

“You want to be the wolfman or the dragon tonight?”

Steve buries his face in Eddie’s neck. 

“We can take turns.”

“I’ll see what we have in the dress-up box.”

[annikathewitch]

Favorite DSMP Quotes Part 1

“You aren’t... scared?”

-c!Eret, after c!Foolish doesn’t react to her taking off their sunglasses.

Okay, so I think this is definitely one of my favorite quotes, if not my absolute favorite. I get that it’s a really little moment, but it REALLY hits me hard, for several reasons.

First of all, this stream was one of the first bits of lore I saw live, and I really ended up latching on to both c!Eret as a character and the Eternal Duo dynamic after this point.

Secondly, I feel like the whole “eyes that inspire terror in anyone who looks at them” thing is a part of c!Eret’s character that REALLY doesn’t get talked about enough. Like, can you actually think what that would be like, not being able to show your eyes without people LITERALLY running away screaming? It’s really clear c!Eret’s basically just accepted it at this point. They can’t change it, but he can hide it, so that’s what he does.

This might just be me, but it feels like it has a lot of parallels to neurodivergency. Neurodivergent kids, especially those of us who don’t get diagnosed until we’re older, grow up being told that we’re impolite, weird, annoying, etc., and we just sort of... internalize it? It’s hard to explain in a way that doesn’t sound really weird.

If you spend your entire life being told that the way you act is annoying, you internalize that. You can’t really change it, because the habits that people find annoying are literally caused by the fact that your brain works differently, so you learn to hide it. Even if you don’t see it as a bad thing, you just learn, “don’t do x around y people, because they will scold/make fun of you for it.” ...and you can’t even blame them, because to a certain extent you can understand why they do so. You don’t deserve it, you know you don’t, but that’s just how you Are.

Oftentimes you can try to find people you can be yourself around. I’m very lucky to have a lot of these people. A lot of people don’t. It’s VERY clear that c!Eret doesn’t. c!Foolish was the first person not to react negatively to seeing her eyes that we’ve seen. And he doesn’t even seem to think anything of it.

This quote is like that moment when you’re infodumping to someone and you stop and say “sorry for rambling,” and they respond “no, keep going, it sounds really interesting.” It hits. Because you know that person is someone you can be yourself around, and that makes a tangible difference.

When you’re spending time with someone you know you can’t or don’t know if you can be yourself around, you have to watch my every action. You have to have to watch every little thing you say, careful not to cross that invisible, always-changing line of “too annoying,” and you have to brace yourself for the proverbial slap on the face you’ll get when you inevitably slip up and stumble over that line. It’s draining, and it prevents you from forming any real positive connection with that person.

So then being around people who have proven you can be yourself around them feels so much better in comparison, and your connections to those people become even deeper. And for c!Eret, c!Foolish is the ONLY person they have like that. It would feel like I’m just projecting, or adding angst where there isn’t any... except for this quote. c!Eret’s reaction was just such a relatable reaction, even if the situation isn’t strictly analogous to the stuff I’ve been talking about, this makes it clear that so many of the feelings are the same. That surprise, that confusion, at showing someone a part of yourself you deliberately hide, and not being rejected... it HITS, and it hits HARD.

This one quote adds so much to their dynamic, and it really pulls me into the plot and demonstrates their connection to me more than anything else, even c!Foolish’s actions at the banquet.

[lannisterdaddyissues]

top 5 favorite anime?

ANON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! THIS ASK IS EVERYTHING THANK YOU!!!! i am going to take this so seriously you will come to regret asking this. i can fit so much infodumping into this ask

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

Ok. This anime literally invented women. I cannot emphasize enough how superior the female characters in FMA:B are to any other female character ever. The worldbuilding is so cool (science magic is so dope ngl) and I love the parallels with real-world history! The character development is on another level and the buildup to the climax in the last arc of the series is so ingenious. I'd say it's the Game of Thrones of anime, but it puts Game of Thrones to shame any day of the week. It's one of the first anime I ever watched and I've been obsessed with it for 8 years straight. Absolutely changed my life.

2. Mob Psycho 100

This show looks so fucking weird. It took me ages to watch it because every time I saw it trending on social media, I thought to myself, "what the fuck? Why does it look like that?" But it's good because of that. Literally everything about this anime is "why does it look like this?" Why doesn't Reigen have any powers when he’s the main character’s sage, wise life coach? Why does Mob want to be normal when he has psychic powers? Why isn't it like other anime? That's exactly the point and it's GREAT. There are so many important themes and messages in this series and it teaches a lot of life lessons. It's also one of those shows where everyone is your blorbo and you will be fed for years by the fandom. God bless.

3. Major

Guys. Guys, guys, guys. This is, in my humble opinion, the greatest anime ever made. It would be #1 on my list if not for the fact that it's obscure as fuck and also a sports anime. Now I am not a sports anime fan by any stretch of the imagination (Haikyuu who? Kuroko no Basuke what?) but it is so much more than a simple sports anime, I just want to emphasize that right now. It's about baseball, yes, and all the characters do in fact play baseball, but there is so much drama and character development in this show it puts Your Lie in April to shame. You see, there's something very special about this show, and that is that it spans through the entire main character's childhood and adolescence from kindergarten age to adulthood. Progressing through each season was like watching my children grow up. The writing is superb, and I should add that the first five episodes are the best of the entire series and will guarantee that you binge all six seasons in record time. It sounds so corny, but I don't lie when I say that every single episode made me laugh and cry and scream and cheer. Additionally, I have never watched a single baseball game in my life--I picked this series up purely by chance because I saw the cover art of the sequel and decided to give it a try--but I have so many regrets about not playing softball in school now. Every episode is so exciting and thrilling and I'm on the edge of my seat the entire time with anticipation of the end result. Lastly, this is another one of those shows where every single character is my blorbo and I simply do not have a favorite because I love them all more than I can ever express. The sheer depth of emotional attachment I have to this series is truly unhealthy, 10/10 would recommend. Anyway, thank you for listening to my TED Talk and please watch Major. Your skin will be clear and your crops will flourish.

4. Death Note

I don't even know where to begin here. This show is something else entirely. It's earned a reputation as that show that everyone and their mom is watching, and true enough, it is that show. The suspense in every episode was almost enough to kill me. The psychological warfare is real. It's so refreshing that, for once, I can watch a show where the main character is undeniably, irredeemably corrupt and evil. Give him a book of death and he says "fuck it," goes off-the-walls unhinged, and immediately throws his morals away to begin a career in serial killing and ascend to godhood. Don't even TRY to excuse what he does because it ruins the experience. Even better is the fact that the guy who's trying to enact justice on him is Even Worse. There's also a good helping of gay subtext thrown in if you're into that.

5. Shadows House

Like Major, this anime is criminally underrated but it's relatively new, so I hope it will get more traction in the future. It has one of the most fresh and intriguing premises I've seen for a long time, with some really unique worldbuilding and lore that blew my mind. I'm not really a slice-of-life person, though I do enjoy mysteries, but this one drew me in from the very first episode and exceeded all my expectations for another average series. I love the character development and writing in this show, the character designs and animation are top-notch, and, again, there is a healthy dose of queer subtext for ALL of the characters (not even just the main characters). Another must-watch for anyone who wants to find that special media that they will become obsessed with on a toxic level and never recover from.

[equalseleventhirds]

hi i saw u were doing school so wanted 2 maybe ask some questions on mabel fr when ur back IF U WANT 2 ANSWER THEM i figure it might be nice 2 get 2 infodump... i'm thinking! very hard! about season seven's meta narrative, ekaterina-as-a-teenager (and ekaterina-as-a-Creature-with-the-aurora-silver-group-after-her-teenagehood and personhood r gone), and thomas (mabel's dad). if u have any thoughts on these and wanna share i'm :eyes:. hope u r well

god it took me so long to get to this bcos school killed me dead for a bit and then recovering from school meant Brain Bad HOWEVER

do u mean parallels between the two of them... ekaterina who was scared and alone and just starting to figure her path in life out... thomas who was so lost and didn’t know he would stay that way... ekaterina who kissed a girl for the first time and then was taken away and doomed, not because of it (but wasn’t it partly because of that, because aurora silver told her that she would grow up and marry a man?)... thomas who kissed lily and then was doomed because of it...

how both of them sought sanctuary and direction and had their trust in seeking that betrayed

how both of them had their lives and identities stripped from them, were killed and made into nothing but shadows and pieces and empty hollow echoes of themselves, trapped in an eternal identity crisis of who am i, no not that, no not that, what is missing from me

how neither of them are quite human anymore, but also not quite fae, both kind of dead and unchanging and caught, but anna and mabel give them both new life, new information (about themselves, about their families), a new goal to work towards

how ekaterina-as-aconite hates the girls and the hill and anna-as-king, resents the former king for making her as she is, makes herself a monster to them

how thomas hates the house, hates the martin family for what they did, resents the faeries for not letting him under the hill

how both of them frightened anna and seemed like such a threat until...

how, when you take that hatred and resentment and oh-no-monster-scary away, both of them have this tenderness for mabel. for anna, too, but mabel was there first

how ekaterina was stripped of her future and potential and her family. how thomas never got to see mabel, his daughter, his legacy.

does thomas parallel ekaterina’s father, a little, taken from his daughter for standing against cruelty? only thomas didn’t stand, before, was an unwitting victim. (but oh, he stood after, he tried to warn anna away, and when she was in too deep he told her she had to open the door)

(and thomas keeping that secret and giving it to anna, to let her save mabel... when ekaterina, we know, has another secret, the name of the god of monsters and fragments and many-as-one... i wonder what we’ll learn from her?)

also this is maybe not related to ekaterina but actually i thought for the longest time that the king broke thomas into pieces, but then the official blog dropped hints abt lily maybe doing it, and i had THOUGHTS, and actually come to that it could related to ekaterina bcos aurora silver used her and broke her in order to gain power, in order to bind her to the king under the hill and try to use her to do... whatever she’s trying to do? and my theory says lily was doing something similar to thomas, bcos why else just randomly tear a man apart? unless you are someone weak and cruel as lily, who perhaps thought he could help her not die? (after all, someone else once loved her enough to try to save her; she might have seen that echoed in thomas.) so it’s possible that they were both used by cruel women who wanted to break them for their own means... and while neither ekaterina nor thomas quite broke free, they didn’t actually give their tormentors what they wanted, and instead helped save mabel and anna. interesting.

[necropsittacus]

I got a request for an Infodump Post on the Revelation imagery in King of the Monsters and tbqh one of my love languages is being asked about my Ghidorah opinions so Here We Go

note: I’m using the New International Version of the Bible, and also I have not rewatched KOTM for this (although I may end up deciding to do that) and am going on memories of my approximately three and a half past viewings. Other note: most of this is going to be me presenting specific Bible quotes and then talking about them a bit. Be prepared for that. also this feels super unfinished to me and shorter than it should be to treat the topic properly, and like i need to rewatch the movie and write an essay 

The whole movie, and Ghidorah in particular, is very focused around apocalypse imagery--the end of the world, the rebuilding of a cleaner, better new world, the breakdown of that attempt to rebuild a better world. This has to do with the Book of Revelation’s focus on the destruction of the world as we know it and the coming of the Kingdom of Heaven. 

except that here the attempt to destroy and remake the world (which, in Revelation, is an act of God, with the Devil as a major part of the narrative but not the prime mover) A. fails, and B. isn’t treated as a good idea to start with by the narrative. While the ending, and specifically information we get in the credits, does show us progress towards a better, brighter future for the world, it’s more “gradual healing” than “apocalypse and rebirth.” The burn-it-all-down apocalypse-and-rebirth style of fixing the world is rather associated with Ghidorah, and the people who release/awaken him. The human villains want to purge the world of humanity’s sins. 

This is one of those places where the religious commentary mixes with commentary on environmental/climate change issues...Alan Jonah’s plan is standing in for, well, y’all know what kind of environmental rhetoric, the “humans are the plague, burn it all down so the earth can heal” type. They’re making a point about the inviability of that kind of goal, that you can’t just kill everyone and start over and hope the earth will fix itself, because it won’t (and, here, trying to make it work like that actively makes things worse--Ghidorah has no interest in *fixing* anything), and that gets mixed with the religious imagery in fun ways. 

It could also have to do with the “false king of the monsters”/“Antichrist stands in the place of Christ” idea--Ghidorah is taking the role, as the one breaking and remaking the world, that in Revelation is assigned to God, but he’s more the Devil. 

And that plays into the image of Ghidorah as the false Christ, the false prophet, the Antichrist--releasing him is supposed to cleanse the world of “humanity’s” sins (and this movie doesn’t explicitly go into the problems with that kind of approach--that it’s not humanity it’s capitalism--but I might argue that it’s implicit--that killing off humanity as an approach is explicitly criticized, it doesn’t work, it fails spectacularly), it just...doesn’t work that way, actually 

Revelation 1:8 “I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty.” 

I’m inclined to link this (and the idea is repeated a few times in Revelation, and elsewhere in the New Testament, this is just the clearest example) with the “they were here before us and they’ll be here after us” theme in KOTM. 

One of the major things that happens in Revelation is the opening, one by one, of seven seals on a scroll, each opening followed by a new disaster. I’m inclined to link this to the unsealing and release from stasis of the Titans (supposed to be one by one, although of course Ghidorah disrupts this). 

The Storm Theme

Luke 10:18 I saw Satan fall from heaven like lightning.

Rev. 11:19 Then God’s temple in heaven was opened, and within his temple was seen the ark of his covenant. And there came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake and a severe hailstorm.

Rev. 8:5 Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth; and there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake.

It’s not clear from that quote, but what’s happening here is the opening of the seventh and final seal (mentioned above). 

While Ghidorah’s primary weapons were originally gravity beams, here they more resemble lightning or electricity (or that has consistently been my impression, anyway). This image is reinforced by his/their identification with a tropical storm. I may be reaching with this, but in context of what I’m talking about below I don’t think it’s unfair to bring up the Luke 10:18 quote in this context, as well as the storms and lightning tied to apocalypse more generally.

This is, or leads into, one of the places where I really like how the climate change apocalypse symbolism I’ve been assured by other people is in there is folded in with the religious apocalypse symbolism. 

Ghidorah represents both something that is unnatural, not part of the established order, a destructive force the planet is not prepared to handle (specifically in the form of destructive weather patterns--which has been pointed out to me as climate change imagery, although I didn’t initially pick up on it myself) and as both Satan and Antichrist from the Book of Revelation.

First, Ghidorah-as-Satan:

The motif of a fight against a multi-headed dragon is in itself arguable as Revelation imagery; Satan primarily appears as a dragon. 

Rev. 12:3 Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. 4 Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. 

...

Rev. 12:7 Then war broke out in heaven. Michael and his angels fought against the dragon, and the dragon and his angels fought back. 8 But he was not strong enough, and they lost their place in heaven. 9 The great dragon was hurled down—that ancient serpent called the devil, or Satan, who leads the whole world astray. He was hurled to the earth, and his angels with him. 

Here specifically we get the notion of a malevolent, multi-headed (and crowned--this one’s more metaphorical but checks out with the “false king” thing) dragon being thrown down from the sky, and also the forces more sympathetic to humanity triumphing over the dragon. Also, there’s more “star(s) falling from Heaven” imagery elsewhere that feels at least as relevant, but that gives me feelings. 

Ghidorah as Antichrist

It’s not explicit in the Bible verses I’m working with (or particularly anywhere in the Bible), but I should have a little bit here before I start talking about it too much about what exactly the Antichrist is. The Christian concept of the Antichrist is someone who opposes Jesus and sets himself in the place of Jesus/God, and thus leads the world astray. 

Wikipedia: “Antichrist is translated from the combination of two ancient Greek words αντί + Χριστός (anti + Christos). In Greek, Χριστός means "anointed one" and the word Christ derives from it.[6] Therefore, an antichrist opposes Christ by substituting himself for Christ.”

I want to point out the “substituting himself for Christ” piece here especially, in relation to Ghidorah’s status as the “false king of the monsters.”

Also, it should maybe be noted that a lot of interpretations don’t have one singular Antichrist figure (or even two), but rather an institution, a group, or many people can be meant by the Antichrist (e.g. in a lot of heretical and Protestant traditions the Catholic Church may be Antichrist). Here I’m treating the term Antichrist as referring to one singular figure, who is interchangeable with the Beast, because in the movie we get a specific character in the role. ALSO, the term “Antichrist” is never actually used in Revelation, and may or may not refer to the same thing as “the Beast;” my interpretation, a fairly standard one, is that the Beast is the Antichrist, but YMMV on that. 

For convenience’s sake, I am going to be using “Antichrist” or “The Beast” interchangeably

and “the False Prophet” for the other beast; the terms are a little wigglier in actual usage. Additionally, the figure I’m calling the False Prophet is often conceptualized as a second, lesser or “mystical” Antichrist whose coming presages the “great” Antichrist (the Beast).

One of the slightly off things about these parallels is that while in Revelation there are three separate figures, Satan/the dragon, the Beast, and the False Prophet, in KOTM there are only two, Ghidorah and Rodan. Thus, Ghidorah derives his authority from himself alone, and not from an additional external figure (which also jives with the Satan connection, IMO; Satan’s whole thing in some interpretations is claiming authority for himself).

I’m going to repeat the introduction we get to the Beast here in full. There’s not a ton of physical similarity between the description we get of the Beast and Ghidorah besides the multiple heads, and, as mentioned, Ghidorah grants himself authority, not any external power, but there are other significant parallels:

Rev. 13:1 The dragon stood on the shore of the sea. And I saw a beast coming out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on its horns, and on each head a blasphemous name. 2 The beast I saw resembled a leopard, but had feet like those of a bear and a mouth like that of a lion. The dragon gave the beast his power and his throne and great authority.  

13:3 One of the heads of the beast seemed to have had a fatal wound, but the fatal wound had been healed. The whole world was filled with wonder and followed the beast.

We get this explicitly, which is the first piece of Revelation imagery that was pointed out to me--Godzilla bites off Ghidorah’s third head, which regrows (right before he claims the throne fully). 

 4 People worshiped the dragon because he had given authority to the beast, and they also worshiped the beast and asked, “Who is like the beast? Who can wage war against it?” 5 The beast was given a mouth to utter proud words and blasphemies and to exercise its authority for forty-two months. 6 It opened its mouth to blaspheme God, and to slander his name and his dwelling place and those who live in heaven. 7 It was given power to wage war against God’s holy people and to conquer them. And it was given authority over every tribe, people, language and nation.

This is, again, Ghidorah fully claiming the title of king, and being obeyed/followed by (most of) the other Titans. 

Rodan as False Prophet

Rev. 13:11 Then I saw a second beast, coming out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon. 12 It exercised all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed. 13 And it performed great signs, even causing fire to come down from heaven to the earth in full view of the people.

Here we do get something for the physical description; I think it’s interesting that KOTM Rodan doesn’t quite resemble older material!Rodan (who as far as I can tell, and certainly in Jurassic City which is the other thing I’ve seen with him in it, tends to be basically just a weird red giant Pteranodon, “giant bird” comments from characters in-universe notwithstanding) as much as the other non-original characters. For the most part they just made him a lot birdier, and I don’t think “match the Bible description of the second beast” was like, a driving force in that, but he does sort of have horns. That’s mostly beside the point, anyway; if we’re taking Ghidorah-as-the-Beast as a given, Rodan is clearly the other Beast acting as essentially a second-in-command and herald to the first one. The fire coming down from heaven thing is significant; you could also take “coming out of the earth” to apply to his emergence from a volcano. 

14 Because of the signs it was given power to perform on behalf of the first beast, it deceived the inhabitants of the earth. It ordered them to set up an image in honor of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. 15 The second beast was given power to give breath to the image of the first beast, so that the image could speak and cause all who refused to worship the image to be killed.  16 It also forced all people, great and small, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hands or on their foreheads, 17 so that they could not buy or sell unless they had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name. 18 This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666.

Most of this doesn’t really say anything new for the parallels I’m reading into it, and there’s no equivalence to the idolatry or the Mark of the Beast, I just really like the false prophet as a figure, and it reinforces the “given authority under the first, higher-ranking Beast” thing. 

Miscellaneous other things

Thessalonians 2:7 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the breath of his mouth, annihilating him by the manifestation of his coming. 

“The lawless one” is another common descriptor for Antichrist. I want to point out “destroy with the breath of his mouth” in context of the ending and Godzilla’s atomic breath. 

Additionally, Godzilla’s own rise from the brink of death (after having been nearly killed while acting in a capacity helpful to humanity (fighting Ghidorah), at that) parallels a very central motif in Christianity (the rise of Jesus from the dead). 

Rev. 5:15 Then the kings of the earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty, and everyone else, both slave and free, hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains. 

This gives me feelings re everyone who can going to hide in bunkers.

I’m not going through the whole movie again looking for illustrations for this, it’s probably long enough as is, but I have this one saved anyway and I think it makes the Christianity theme REALLY blatant:

Just the framing of the shot here, the cross in the foreground, and Ghidorah’s pose kind of mimicking it, is telling.

I also want to point out this verse in terms of the visuals here: 

Rev. 8:12 The fourth angel sounded his trumpet, and a third of the sun was struck, a third of the moon, and a third of the stars, so that a third of them turned dark. A third of the day was without light, and also a third of the night. 

We very much do tend to get dark sky.

Rev. 8:7 The first angel sounded his trumpet, and there came hail and fire mixed with blood, and it was hurled down on the earth. A third of the earth was burned up, a third of the trees were burned up, and all the green grass was burned up. 

this feels like More Rodan Imagery Things

Rev. 8:8 The second angel sounded his trumpet, and something like a huge mountain, all ablaze, was thrown into the sea. A third of the sea turned into blood, 9 a third of the living creatures in the sea died, and a third of the ships were destroyed. 10 The third angel sounded his trumpet, and a great star, blazing like a torch, fell from the sky on a third of the rivers and on the springs of water— 11 the name of the star is Wormwood. A third of the waters turned bitter, and many people died from the waters that had become bitter. 

The first part of this, and the bitter waters, feel reminiscent of the Oxygen Destroyer idea (though that was taken from the original Godzilla, so I don’t think they stole this bit outright so much as they found a place they could mix Bible parallels with the older material they were working off). Also, there’s a volcano, probably. And “star falling from heaven” is again always a Ghidorah vibe for me, given the whole “alien descended to earth” thing; same thing with this next line:

Rev. 9:1 The fifth angel sounded his trumpet, and I saw a star that had fallen from the sky to the earth. The star was given the key to the shaft of the Abyss. 

And also, I can’t remember if the thing about his responsibility for the K-Pg extinction event I’ve seen around a few times is a fandom thing or suggested in the movie, but if it is canon--that’s another place that folds the Biblical imagery in with the scientific mass extinction imagery. 

Rev. 9:19 The power of the horses was in their mouths and in their tails; for their tails were like snakes, having heads with which they inflict injury. 

This isn’t necessarily actually a Ghidorah vibe but “tails like snakes used to inflict injury” does make me Feel Some Things in that regard. 

There’s also some other stuff I Think might be readable in that direction, but I’m not as certain about any of it and this is really long as is. 

My conclusion is basically just...they went fucking ham with the Revelation imagery in this movie, both to play into the more major theme of environmental destruction, and I honestly speculate as a response to the criticisms of some other American Godzilla stuff as “taking the God out of Godzilla”--if that’s the case, they’d be putting a sense of spiritual reference into the movie that would be more familiar to a lot of Western audiences compared to the hints of that in the original Godzilla. and i love it and i’m always a slut for the book of revelation 

Thank you very much for reading.

[lobsters-on-their-heads]

OB Rewatch: To Right the Wrongs of Many

I’m not crying, you’re crying

You can read my first watch review, which hits a number of points I left out,  here: https://lobsters-on-their-heads.tumblr.com/post/164138983111/to-right-the-wrongs-of-many

I loved

Sarah’s flashback scenes flow with the storyline, and inform Sarah’s current character. We learn more about her, and get answers to a question that hadn’t occurred to me to ask - why did she decide to keep Kira? 

Siobhan! Being the loving nurturing mother we’ve seen her be for five seasons. Quite different than the woman we meet in episode 2, who was DONE with Sarah’s bullshit.

Sarah rummaging around the basement boiler room, fussing over Helena to get her the things she can, keeping her head cool and her voice reassuring.

Art: “Are you alright?”

Helena: “Most excellent.”

And the back and forth between Sarah and Helena bearing their children, with Sarah repeating the lines Siobhan gave her... I... *sniffles* ....

The shot of the twins

Art and Sarah delivering Helena’s babies. They were, after all, the first two members of Clone Club that she interacted with. Sarah was absolutely the best person to do it.

Helena’s stick figure mobiles

Cosima and Scott helping Sarah practice for her GED. Hell, Sarah practicing for her GED! Which she will eventually take, I know she will.

Siobhan’s portrait. It’s her, a cup of tea, and her shotgun. Perfect.

Donnie is adorable with the babies. It’s a damn shame we didn’t see more of him being a father during the show (probably due to the availability or desire of the child actors). 

The parallel with Season 3′s opener

I loved the entire fucking baby shower. My favorite thing ever is whole Clone Club events like this. I also really hope that those judgey “friends” of Alison’s from Season 1 (you know, the living ones) saw all these random people streaming into her house, including a gay couple, a lesbian couple, awkward nerdy guys, a black guy with his daughter and a disabled girl, and a perma-drunk from the vague South. To say nothing of how those neighbors must feel about Helena.

Cosima taking Purple from Felix and immediately handing him to Delphine.

Love, love, LOVE Cosima’s dress. Which was surprisingly difficult to get a good screenshot of while she’s standing.

Finishing the show with the Sestras together. Okay, so the very final scenes didn’t have them together, but you know what I mean. This scene was wonderful. Yes, they are going off and living happily ever after, but pain remains. Pain that is perhaps related to their fights, but not always. No matter what, though, they always have each other. 

*cries again* 

Helena’s story about letting the babies eat sand! “Where does this sand come from? I don’t know, so I let them eat it.” We all know it comes from the bodies buried under her apartment.

I liked 

The camera circling around Sarah while Westboreland taunted her.

Sarah: “Ah, shut up!” and then she smashes his head with a oxygen tank.

Kira being supportive and understanding of her mom. I like it because Kira’s sweet, but I don’t love it - Kira’s a kid, and she shouldn’t have to worry about her mom.

Helena offering Kira a jam burger and Kira backing up quickly. I hope that was improvised. 

The contrast between the sunny family time of the baby shower and Sarah’s darker solitude as she approaches and enters the house.

The parade of people asking Sarah “How was the test?” I like it for the comedic aspect, but also because every single person there supports and roots for Sarah exactly where she is. None of them show any judgment that she’s taking her GED test instead of, say, her GRE.

I’m as lesbian as they come, but I do melt when I see tough guys holding babies like this.

Sarah’s face as Helena starts sharing her book.

I didn’t like

The placement of Delphine’s condolences to Sarah about Siobhan. It’s been months, and Delphine has almost certainly seen Sarah before now. It’s a nice moment, but it’s out of place. It’s also one of the few times we’ve ever seen Delphine and Sarah alone together, and I believe the only time it’s happened since the first episode of Season 3. Delphine’s sentiments regarding Siobhan are spot on, but it’s odd to hear her emoting like this to Sarah. Even in the rewatch, I was just as uncomfortable as Sarah was.

That Rachel couldn’t come in. Obviously she wanted to, despite her claims to the contrary, and she needs the redemption that the sestras give each other. 

Other notes

I see now that it wasn’t the tray table Helena smashed Coady’s face into, but the stirrup / footrest at the end of the bed.

Westboreland drones on about “I made you” yadda yadda, but he did pretty much jack shit in the creation of the clones except maybe finance and protect. The Duncans did the work.

Pretty sure that’s Sarah’s first kill.

Somewhere in the second half of my first watch of Season 5, I had this fic idea of Donnie and Helena going to the island to rescue Cosima and Charlotte (and Delphine). In that fic, Delphine delivers Helena babies, which is kind of what everyone on Tumblr wanted. Anyway, having Sarah do it here was actually a much better idea.

There was definitely infodump with Alison talking to Donnie about his new job, but I’ll kind of allow it since it involved pouring concrete floors, and... well. That is something he knows about, isn’t it?

As cool as this board is for the show, I’m not sure why it’s set up this way for them. They could store the info in a spreadsheet (Delphine already has it in the computer). The pictures are fun, but don’t serve much purpose for their research. Like, they already know they’re all played by Tatiana Maslany, so they’re not trying to figure that mystery out. But maybe Cosima just likes to look at them?

The birthday card Sarah finds is tucked into the same book that Cosima read to Kira at the end of Season 2. Was the card in there then, or was it tucked in later by Siobhan or someone else?

And I’m totally with with Felix on being upset about the boxes and the for-sale sign. Even if he’s not living there, a lot of the stuff was probably his once, just as much as hers. He deserves to have a piece of his mother to hang on to without Sarah throwing it away (which she totally would).

Évelyne’s probably doing an awful lot of this these days

According to IMDB, Lauren Hammersley is 5′9″. See, this is why Tat always looks so short. She’s surrounded by really tall people.

Sarah had nothing to be sorry about when she snapped at Alison, who was pushing way too hard at completely the wrong moment. 

Most of the Lyft and Uber drivers I’ve had would not have sat silently in the front seat like Yusef did. Rachel probably scared him into submission.

With a number like 274, I think it’s safe to assume that there were originally 300 Ledas, and 26 were either killed by Helena, by clone disease, or by something else. 

Of course Évelyne speaks Spanish. Two dialects of French, English, and German weren’t enough. 

Interesting that the babies are Arthur and Donnie, rather than Arthur and Donald or Art and Donnie. I wonder if a certain US president influenced that decision.

I have questions

Why does Coady follow this asshole, again? Why does she do things that she, herself hates, like killing Mark? What does she get out of it that she couldn’t achieve on her own or with a different crackpot? What is left for her here? What’s in it for that other doctor, too? 

(really disturbing note - had the abortion gone through, would Kira’s magical healing abilities have, uh... ? you know what, let’s not explore that too much)

Why does Sarah struggle so much with school? She’s obviously intelligent and able to focus on and achieve goals when she wants to, but academics seem to elude her. It seems logical to me that her attitude problems and academic struggles would be related. Then there’s her anxiety (called fear, but really) and terrible self-esteem, and everything spirals, but it didn’t always.

A few episodes ago, Scott or Cosima said they had 144 doses of the inoculate ready to go. In this episode, Scott’s worried about expanding the cell line any further. Does that mean they’ve used 144 doses? I doubt it. Does it mean they’re just making shit tons of it? I don’t know how any of this works.

Where is Felix living now, by the way?

Is this realistic for a glass eye?

I would’ve liked to have seen

What happened to Enger, and Art seeing it happen. More than that, though...

I think this ep could have been a solid two hours if they’d committed to it. The extra hour could include

Sarah, Helena, Art, and the twins getting out of Dyad, accounting for the dead bodies scattered around in there, and wrapping up what’s left of Neolution 

Delphine’s return from “France” and finally starting a real relationship with Cosima. I want to see them getting ice cream together.

Also Delphine taking rocks away from the babies

Helena moving into the garage

What’s the plan for Charlotte?

How Felix and Colin became a couple

and still leave us wanting more. Plus, that Delphine / Sarah scene could have found a better spot.

[meiizumi]

Castle of Shikigami: An informal rant nobody asked for about my most obscure obsession to date

STOP i spent like 2 days writing this post and im only posting it on tumblr because it’s the one website i’m a member of that can hold the most text. i wanted to infodump somewhere...... read this to learn something i guess (´･ω･`)

Bad voice acting is the Peak of comedy to me, and while I was looking for something to laugh at one day, I found this game called Castle Shikigami 2 for the PS2. The US version of the game's dialogue is rife with machine translated text that makes no sense, and awkward voice acting to boot. They even have voice actors saying the wrong lines, voice actors speaking implied commands, and a few voice lines are left in Japanese. Apparently, Roger Craig Smith (Sonic the Hedgehog's current voice actor) was in this game but I don't think he's even credited?! I think I know which character he voiced but I’m not exactly sure.

The history behind this game’s localization is REALLY weird. Castle of Shikigami/Shikigami no Shiro was originally an arcade bullet hell shoot em up game. The series was created by Alfa System and it was one of Alfa System’s main IPs. There are three main shmup installments and a text adventure game for the PS2, Nanayozuki Gensoukyoku. Nanayozuki was practically fanservice for whatever number of CoS fans there were back then. Each main game in the series was originally an arcade cabinet, but they were all ported to PC and home consoles. In CoS 2′s case, it came out on the PS2, Gamecube, and Dreamcast, but only the PS2 version got localized. The western publisher, XS Games specializes in publishing quality budget titles such as “Bass Pro Shops: The Strike” for the Wii. I theorize they didn’t care too much about the actual content of CoS 2 and were more focused on selling a game quickly for a low price, so they just machine translated it and adjusted a few things. If you’re wondering if Castle of Shikigami 1 was also translated this badly, the answer is No. XS Games instead removed all the dialogue from the western release of CoS 1, and released it with the title “Mobile Light Force 2″.

“Wait, what do you mean ‘Mobile Light Force TWO’ if Castle of Shikigami 1 is the first game in the series?” If you want to know what Mobile Light Force 1 was, it’s GUNBIRD; another shmup game, but by a completely different developer than Castle of Shikigami. I don’t know why they did that. What really kills me though is that both MLF 1 and 2 use the same boxart, which is COMPLETELY unrelated to the actual contents of either game. AFJQHJFOKLJFDS look at this

There’s more hilarity behind Mobile Light Force that isn’t hard to find so you can search that up if you’re interested. But thankfully, Castle of Shikigami 3's Wii edition got more of a proper localization by Aksys Games.

Now I would bluntly say something like “stan castle of shikigami” but:

1. This series’ lore is insanely convoluted. It’s an essential part of this expansive fictional universe referred to as “Mumei Sekaikan” (I don’t know what this translates to in English) where there’s like, 7 different parallel worlds. There’s more obscure ass games and manga that are tied to this universe, and I think there’s even a tabletop RPG made based off it. Have you heard of “Gunparade March”? Most likely you haven’t; it’s an obscure video game made by Alfa System that also got adapted into an anime, and I feel it can be described as Mechas x Persona. One of the characters in CoS 2 is just one of the GPM characters going undercover to find her senpai who traveled to the CoS world. Or something like that. The 7-world universe isn’t explicitly talked about in the game but they make so many references to it without defining anything that it’s like you Must know about it. There is NO documentation in English about the Mumei Sekaikan I could find on the internet, although there is a wiki in Japanese where I got a ton of knowledge from (GOOGLE TRANSLATE IS MY TRUSTED FRIEND) I feel like I might be THE person in the United States who has the most knowledge on the Mumei Sekaikan, and I could go on another tangent talking about what I know so far (and who this one specific dude Shibamura Yuuri is) but I won’t.

2. The writing isn’t excellent and can be pretty Unwoke ™; the first game came out in 2001 and the third game came out in 2005 if that gives you a sense on what era these writers were in. As far as the games dialogue goes, the characters appear kind of flat. CoS 1 and 2 Kotaro (i refuse to use the official “Kohtaro”) is stupid and driven by JUSTICE to a point where it’s annoying. I can’t tell if Hyuga is trying to be a Ladies Man in CoS 2 and 3. Kim, a religious tae kwon do instructor, spends CoS 2 thinking about how he should atone for his sins, then he turns himself into jail at the end. Sayo’s backstory is that she was a shrine maiden raised as a “human weapon” to have no emotions and her only goal in life was to kill god and then die, something like that. However, after CoS 1, she gets a crush on Kotaro because he actually treats her like a human and Of course that’s what you’d expect from the main teen girl and boy in the series. In CoS 3, Sayo's character is mostly played out to be a major tsundere for Kotaro even though surprisingly HIS character in this game changed a ton compared to 1 and 2 (he had to kill an illusion of his older brother, who he learned actually died earlier, and now he has to kill an illusion of his childhood sweetheart... damb that shit sucks :/). He’s still stupid though

There’s a gag in CoS 2 that I can’t clearly remember where it’s like, Niigi makes Sayo and Fumiko, who are both romantically interested in Kotaro, think that he’s only into little girls? Meanwhile, Fumiko’s magic goes wrong and her appearance turns to that of a child though in response she’s like “hee hee maybe Kotaro will like this”. basically more On-Brand early 2000′s anime unwokeness than average. Speaking of Fumiko, she’s a 400+ year old militaristic witch who constantly teases Kotaro (who’s like 16 or 17) and she wants to marry him for his magical potential since he’s like one of the candidates for becoming God??? From the official CoS 3 character descriptions, “Her hobby is to steal the men from other women. Her second hobby is trampling upon people.” She canonically stole her stepmother’s husband from her stepmother (the 3rd boss of CoS 3). I don’t get how that shit would have worked

3. The game itself is HARD af but to be fair I’m a scrub gamer. I can’t get past stage 3 on easy difficulty without continuing. Yes i bought CoS 1 on Steam, Yes it has a port on steam i feel like i should have mentioned this earlier

4. Besides CoS 1 having a port on Steam, CoS 2 and 3 might be hard to obtain legally. The poorly translated CoS 2 was apparently super cheap back then, but since it’s an old game, its value might’ve increased. When I tried looking up prices for English CoS 3, all the listings were like at least $40 and being broke I wouldn’t want to spend more than $29 for a Wii game in 2019... honestly I just emulated CoS 2. shout out to PCSX2

Last month I was desperate, bored enough, and deep enough in the Shikigami rabbit hole that I tried to find the manga based off of it online. The CoS manga only tells the events of the first two games so I still don’t really get anything about CoS 3, like who Mihee, Batu, and Emilio are supposed to be. However, the plot events also differ. For example, Roger Sasuke exists as a character in CoS 3 but in the manga he literally Dies. There’s 11 total volumes of this; 3 volumes dedicated to CoS 1 and the latter 8 (the “Twisted Castle arc”) dedicated to CoS 2. Only the very first 3 chapters were scanlated to English all the way in 2011. Fortunately, I did find the entire manga uploaded though............... in CHINESE. So you know what I did? I “read” the entire thing using my phone’s Google Translate OCR app to take pictures of each page and comprehend the translations. Of course I still don’t understand CRAP because of the Mumei Sekaikan jargon + machine translation but I understood enough to get emotionally attached to some of the characters. I wish I hadn’t. At least through the manga I learned that the characters DO have some depth and pre-established relationships. For instance, the reason why Roger Sasuke became a ninja is because when he first landed in Japan as a kid, he was getting bullied or something and he didn’t know Japanese then Kotaro saw this and told the bullies to stop. Then after Roy /sorry i mean Roger learned that he was set to home-stay with the Kugas in the first place, he decided to dedicate his life to Japan in order to protect Kotaro back. I think. DO U SEE HOW ABSURD THIS SHIT IS Anyway Nanayozuki takes place between the second and third games and sets things up for CoS 3. There’s a full playthrough of it uploaded to YouTube and I think it contains a lot of juicy lore, but it’s just too much to go over with Shitty Google Translate OCR. There’s also Shikigami no Shiro novels which apparently contain the most backstory, but I have a 0% chance of finding these online for free. Not to mention that these would ALSO be too much effort to Google Translate.

in conclusion: You don’t HAVE to play Castle of Shikigami. Like, I’m not gonna recommend it for the content, but if you love shmups and are looking for a shmup game you haven’t heard of then I will recommend it for the gameplay (old touhou mutuals assemble theres a POWER-UP-BY-GRAZE MECHANIC). I’ve counted like 4 total fans outside of Japan that like this series for the story, and I don’t think that number is going to increase because I doubt CoS 2 will ever get retranslated and ported. I just want you to know that this series exists and that there’s a ton of wacky shit behind it besides the bad Castle Shikigami 2 dub. also if someone knows enough japanese or chinese and has an INKLING of interest in this series umm talk to me and help me decipher stuff

I‘m kinda sad that the series is pretty much Dead though. This is the most recent piece of official Castle of Shikigami art I could find, and this was for the 2018 New Year. The next most recent piece of official CoS art I found was also drawn by the character designer Sonoda Miku all the way in January 2008, commemorating the end of the CoS manga serialization. Alfa System released a spiritual sequel to Castle of Shikigami on the Japanese Switch eShop called Sisters Royale, with character designs I think are still by Sonoda. By “spiritual sequel” I mean that it has some of the EXACT same shot types as CoS and the same mechanic where grazing bullets increases your power and score. This is the closest we’ll get to a Shikigami no Shiro 4. I wonder what the business decision behind that game was but it actually looks like fun and I want to play it so OK Go off i guess