#They compete to see who can come up with a wilder thing about the other

[cakypa120]

They know absolutely nothing about Shazam. Children understand this and use it perfectly.

Lightning (Darla): I'll tell Mom everything!!

Switch (Eugene): Which one? They're all dead!

Flash: *chokes on air*

Ms. Marvel: You tried to kill me in the womb!

Captain Marvel: Don't be dramatic, I helped you come into existence earlier.

Ms. Marvel: You wrapped your umbilical cord around my neck!

Captain: Until it's proven, don't care what they say!

Nightwing: I have so many questions right now.

Red Hood: I would have done the same to you if we were in the same womb.

Voltage (Freddy): They kept bringing me down to the ground even though they knew it would kill me.

Superman: What do you mean?

Voltage: Why do you think I keep flying? It's my curse. Whenever I touch the ground, I die. My dad wasn't very fond of me when I was a kid.

Superman: That's terrible.

Thunder (Pedro): *appears behind Voltage and pulls him to the ground*

Voltage: *his feet touch the floor and he falls to the floor*

Superman: *grabs his head and can't hear his heartbeat* OH MY RAO! WHY DID YOU DO THIS?!?!

Thunder: *raises Voltage* That's hilarious.

Voltage: *looks up with huge eyes*

Voltage: See what I meant?! They hate me!

Thunder: You threw Captain Marvel into a volcano the day before yesterday.

Voltage: Little things, little things.

Lightning: *sits on unicorn* It's time to pay for all your sins!

Captain Marvel: I didn't eat your fairies!

Hal: WHAT THE HELL IS A FUCKING UNICORN IN THE WATCHTOWER!!

Thunder: *calmly eats raw entrails*

All Around: *sounds of disgust and nausea*

Switch: ...and that way we can take over the villain's lair.

Batman: Are you really planning on going into a highly guarded lair in an iron horse?

Switch: It worked in Troy. Besides, it wasn't God who threw that apple, it was Ms. Marvel.

Batman: What?

Switch: *shrugs* She was very self-conscious about her acne.

Captain Marvel: *holding a long iron spear* Have you seen Voltage?

Superman: Why do you need him?

Captain: He killed my favorite sheep. And I'll make a kebab out of him.

[catch-me-hello]

No Mercy, Episode 1: Americans could not handle this.

Today, we begin our deep dive into K-pop band assembly shows. We are starting with No Mercy, which ran from December 2014 to February 2015 and brought us Monsta X, one of my favorite groups. The first episode is called “The Cruel Debut War Gets Started.” And right off the bat, after seeing just the first episode, I realized I needed an attitude adjustment when it comes to these shows.

I thought calling No Mercy a survival reality show was a bit overdramatic before I actually started watching it. I was seeing the concept through American eyes. While losing an American survival reality show can mean death in the wilderness, I now know that losing No Mercy means death of your dreams and your pride, not to mention the realization that you have sacrificed years of your life being a trainee in the K-pop system, only to be eliminated.

Honestly, if I had exceptional musical talent and was given the choice of competing on either Korea’s No Mercy or America’s Alone, I’d take my chances in the wilderness of Northern Mongolia for the American show. Being crushed by falling boulders is preferable to having my soul crushed and then being shown the door. Losing the American show means you only die once.

Yes, it is that serious.

Just to provide some context, K-pop idols spend years as trainees, hoping for a chance to debut. They train from morning until late at night, taking lessons in dancing, singing, rapping, and acting, as well as interviewing, songwriting, production, and other practical skills. They can spend up to ten years of their lives as trainees, getting very few days off and working themselves to exhaustion. In the end, only a very small percentage of them will debut. And even if they do debut, there’s no guarantee that they will catch fire with the public and become famous and successful.

Landing a spot on a Korean survival reality show is the chance of a lifetime for these trainees. On No Mercy, there are only twelve spots. Which is why the rankings are so important.  Making it on the show is just the first step. If you get ranked last on the very first episode, it’s considered a failure, even though you don’t get cut in the first rankings. Never mind the fact that it’s an incredible accomplishment to get on the show in the first place. The trainees don’t see that. All that matters is the debut.

If you rank dead last, even if you don’t get cut from the show right then, it means that there are eleven people between you and the debut, and only the top few will get chosen. In other words, you may as well be back in the dorms, still anonymous, getting ready for another 14-hour day of gruelingly relentless dance practice.

No Mercy only ran for one season, and I already know who the winners are. That does not spoil the show for me in the least. Just from the first episode, I’m seeing the band members in a whole different light, and I’m also learning way more about the K-pop machine and how cruel it can be to someone with a dream.

Take Shownu, for example. He’s currently the leader of Monsta X, so I know he’ll make it, but this first episode shows me what he’s been through just to compete on this show. The show focuses mostly on him for right now, and we open with the initial rankings. We only see a few seconds of their initial performances in a small room in front of the judges, and right away, Shownu gets the top spot.

If this were an American show, two things would happen here.

We wouldn’t be told the top spot first. They would start with the last spot and build up to the top two spots, with the remaining two trainees clutching each other and freaking out. In fact, naming the number one spot right away seems anticlimactic. But there’s a reason the first spot gets named first, and it’s spelled out in Shownu’s reaction. He is somber.  He quietly and calmly walks over to the judges’ table to accept his first-place badge and bows to them.  The reason for this reaction is Difference Number Two:

Getting ranked first isn’t just an honor for Shownu. It’s a weight on his shoulders. Out of all the trainees, he now has to spend the rest of the competition trying to prove that he’s worthy of that number one spot. He also has eleven other trainees now gunning for him. The man does not crack a smile once, not even the moment when the judges say his name. For us, the suspense isn’t finding out who got the first slot. It’s finding out the order of the other trainees, whose rankings now indicate how badly each one wants to trip Shownu on the stairs.

Knowing how this is all going to play out, I’m surprised to see how low some of the eventual winners rank in this first round. While Jooheon and Wonho rank #2 and #4, respectively, Kihyun, Hyungwon, and Minhyuk come in at #8, #9, and #10. Kihyun’s relatively low ranking really surprises me, because he is now known for having one of the most amazing singing voices in the industry. We don’t get to see him or the other singers audition for these rankings, so the competition must have been insane.

The trainees then split up to work with different industry experts, who are helping each one prepare a three-minute performance for the next round of rankings. Emotionally, the process is run like a military boot camp. From here on out, the trainees are referred to by their numbers, not their names. The trainee named Yoosu, who is ranked last, is called “Number Twelve” during this process, a constant reminder of his failure. It’s not much better for Shownu to be referred to by “Number One,” considering it’s a constant reminder to watch his back. They may as well call him “Target.”

The experts working with them can be worse than Simon Cowell with severe hemorrhoids. Here is a partial transcript of one expert’s rap lesson with four of the trainees:

Expert: I have to call you by your numbers. #7: Here, too? Expert: Yes, at all times. #2: So I’m Number Two, and not Jooheon? Expert: Yes, you’re Trainee Number Two. #5: I’m 5-Yoonho. (laughs) Expert: (stone faced) I want to call you Number Twelve. You have to do better from now on.

#7: I tried to think of it as Lucky Seven. Expert: Don’t give me that. You’re number twelve in rapping.

This is not friendly banter. The expert looks like a fed-up high school teacher who just caught four students cooking meth in the chem lab. If any of the contestants on The Voice or American Idol faced this expert, they would sue the network.

All four trainees now take turns rapping for the expert, and despite the show’s title, putting Jooheon last is an act of mercy. None of the other trainees should have to follow his performance. If Kihyun is known for his singing voice, Jooheon is arguably the best rapper in K-pop. His lyrics in the Monsta X song “Gambler” and the cocky way he delivers them is one of my favorite musical moments, period. (“ME? I’m a handsome sum of moNEY, I got a vesper marTINI...”)

So I am excited to see young trainee Jooheon perform, and he does not disappoint. At least for the few seconds we get to see. The expert cuts him off after just a few lines and begrudgingly says, “Okay, that wasn’t too bad,” and even though that is this expert’s verbal equivalent of giving Jooheon a Billboard Music Award, I still want to smack him upside the head with his own clipboard. YOU do not tell Jooheon when to stop rapping. HE decides when he’s done.

We then switch over to the vocalists in their session, and this expert is a bit more encouraging. Again, we only get snippets of each performance, but we do get to hear Kihyun. His singing takes my breath away. I don’t see how he’s ranked at Number Eight, unless he really bombed in the first round. I’d love to see him do a rock opera.

Now we get to a segment on Shownu alone, and this is the part that really made me see him and what he’s been through. We learn that he used to be a trainee in a different entertainment company called JYP Entertainment. (No Mercy is run by Starship Entertainment and features their own trainees.) During his two-year stint at JYP, he trained with a group called GOT7.  Instead of debuting with the group, Shownu was cut. He was twenty years old at the time. GOT7 went on to become very famous, touring several times and winning many worldwide music awards.

He's still friends with GOT7. No Mercy cuts away to follow him as he waits for them outside a venue. After their performance, they come out and embrace their old friend. They go to dinner, and right away, even though we feel their chemistry as friends, Shownu is still a million miles apart from them.

GOT7 talk about how surprised and upset they were when Shownu left JYP. Shownu looks sad. He says he’s used to seeing everyone around him go on to debut. The emotional gut punch actually brings tears to my eyes. In a confessional clip, Shownu says that the pressure got to him at JYP, and he couldn’t take it anymore. Later on, he says that every time he sees his GOT7 friends, he feels pathetic.

The show’s title isn’t just about what the trainees go through. This program shows no mercy for the viewers’ emotions.  This is heartbreaking.

GOT7 and Shownu leave the restaurant, and as they walk down the street, fans gather to take pictures. Shownu steps back a bit so he doesn’t get in the way of the cameras. In the confessional cutaways, he’s pragmatic about it, but he’s clearly uncomfortable in the actual situation.

As they part ways, he hugs his friends goodbye, and the fans temporarily stop taking pictures, waiting for the unknown guy to get out of the way. He stands alone in the street and watches them walk away, trailed by their adoring fans.

I hate this show for doing this to me. If I were still drinking, I’d be typing this from inside a bottle of Barcardi right now. My only consolation is knowing Shownu is going to make it. Most trainees don’t get a debut or any kind of happy ending. Shownu is going to be one of the lucky ones.

Back to the competition. I never thought I’d be so happy to see the grumpy experts from hell again. We have arrived at D-Day 1. Our trainees will perform on a concert stage for the original judges and some new ones who are actual K-pop idols. Jooheon is excited. He wants Shownu’s spot.

The trainees are driven to the venue. They are all nervous, except for Jooheon. He is confident. He is ready. I love him so much. Sorry. That was unprofessional. Where was I? Right. D-Day 1.

The trainees line up on the huge stage. Only the stage is lit up. The seats are shrouded in darkness. As the trainees stand there, trying to control the jitters, a spotlight suddenly beams onto the judges’ table. They have been sitting there in darkness, waiting to ambush these poor trainees like angry parents waiting for a teen who is way past his curfew.

But that’s not enough. Large cubes suddenly light up in front of the stage, showing the numbers one through twelve. The trainees have to go stand behind their numbers. I actually wrote “psychological warfare” in my notes. This show isn’t just trying to rattle these trainees. They want the weakest ones to just collapse and be dragged offstage to save the judges having to vote them off.

Honestly, they should just give each trainee a cyanide pill and a shot of tequila. Then they could at least go out with some dignity.

Except for Jooheon. He’s got his game face on. He looks ready to take a bite out of the stage and spit out the splinters.

Shownu is up first, and I can’t believe we’re only 26 minutes into this show. I have already been through the emotional wringer and taken six pages of notes. I don’t know how much more of this I can take.

Shownu takes the stage while the other trainees wait backstage, and right off the goddamn bat, one of the judges says, “When I first met you, I didn’t think you were Number One material, but look at you now.” He is not giving a compliment. His tone of voice implies that Shownu got away with something. And Shownu, to his enormous credit, simply says, “I must have gotten lucky at the first evaluation.” If that had been an American contestant, there would have been hands thrown.

The judges also bring up that Shownu was cut from JYP after two years, and I wrote in my notes, “WHY ARE THEY DOING THIS??!!”

But our guy pulls himself together and sings a lovely rendition of John Legend’s “All of Me.” Then he shows off his skills in a dance routine that foreshadows the incredible precision moves we’ll be seeing in a couple of years.

The judges clap. Their attitude is reserved, but they liked the performance. One of the judges who knew him when he was at JYP says she didn’t know he could sing so well.

Shownu bows in gratitude. I stress-eat an entire box of Belvita biscuits.

Next up: Jooheon. We get a confessional clip in which he says he wants to become such a good rapper, he will drive people crazy.  Again, I think of his performance in “Gambler” and get chills.

He begins, and the lighting crew does not let him down.

The song is mysterious, chilling, aggressive. Jooheon moves like the song has possessed him. The judges are mesmerized. The other trainees backstage are mesmerized. I’m mesmerized.

After the performance, the judges tell him that his performance is already at a professional level. All I can think is, wait until you see him in a couple of years.

Backstage, Shownu says Jooheon did well, and we can see he’s concerned. All the trainees are concerned. They can hear the judges showering praise on Jooheon. Considering that a few of these judges have a default setting of “you suck,” they have every reason to be worried.

After Jooheon leaves the stage, the female judge, who I think is a K-pop Idol herself, says, “He scares me when he raps. He’s scary. The way he looks at me.” Again, check him out when Monsta X is on tour. He can be dangerous.

We’re getting close to the end of the episode, and No Mercy knows how to end on a cliffhanger, although this is an even more effective one for viewers like me who already know the outcome. Our next trainee is Hyungwon, another eventual winner.

As a fan of the group that’s being formed, I’ve always found Hyungwon to be an enigma. He’s stunningly handsome and has a cool, quiet vibe about him, yet the fans also love him for his clumsy, adorkable personality and how he’s often the butt of the jokes in the band. For now, the handsome and cool vibe is on full display, and it’s having an obvious effect on the female judge.

I am on the edge of my seat for this. If you’ll remember, Hyungwon is currently one of the lowest ranked members, at Number 9. The reason for his low ranking is because the judges only remembered how handsome he is, but nothing about his singing or dancing stood out to them.

We the viewers didn’t get to see any part of his performance during the initial rankings. But fans like me know what Hyungwon is capable of. His solo stages during Monsta X concerts are some of my favorite moments of the shows, especially when he performed “Wildfire” on the band’s No Limit Tour in 2022.

“Wildfire” has always been a fan favorite from this tour, and it’s not just because of Hyungwon’s good looks. He could be wearing a paper bag over his head, and his dancing, combined with the set design, still would still have the audience enthralled. (His singing would be a bit muffled.) While I do understand the judges getting distracted by how handsome he is, I want them to see more.

The judges settle in. Hyungwon lifts his microphone. And then, No Mercy kicks us in the metaphorical balls by ending the episode.

Audiences at the time this show was being aired would have to wait another week. Because No Mercy is cruel. No Mercy is a bully. No Mercy is the Korean equivalent of Eric Carmen giving us amazing songs that lift our spirits while simultaneously calling us libtards on Twitter.

And I will be watching and recapping every single episode.

Stay tuned.

[hyog-blog]

Fangs of Fortune (ep.03 - ep.05)

Oh god, where do I start? Everyone has become less stabby now, but mildly insulting each other seems to be the new form of flirting (between, like, everyone?). Okay, between the Zhuo Yichen - Zhu Yan - Wen Xiao trio for sure. I'm seeing you, guys, you don't have to be so obvious about it XD

That flirtatious contract-signing procedure with Wen Xiao, and Zhu Yan calling Yichen 'better than a dog', and Wen Xiao calling demons 'pets', and then Zhu Yan offering her to become one. I mean come on XD

"Here's some free demonic energy, so you can easily kill me later." Is this romantic or what? XD The kind of demonic romance this show seems to be excelling at. Manly healing handholding - check ✔

Also, Li Lun appears out of the darkness with the broodiness of an ex who was left behind by Zhu Yan after giving birth to the Wilderness after doing some powerful wibbly wobbly timey wimey demonic magic stuff (supposedly, he was ditched for a woman, now dead, who was supposedly killed by Li Lun, now imprisoned). And now the poor guy has to compete with yet another pretty woman and an even prettier young man.

I mean, Li Lun, brother, I get it, Zhu Yan is a babe, but killing off your ex's friends and lovers won't make him like you more, that's just not how things work. And judging by the fact that Li Lun got all chained up in some cave, he probably messed up badly. Killed the previous Bai Ze Goddess? Or did something equally un-cool.

Our gorgeous Zhu Yan is a walking and talking Red Flag, although, the kind you want to wrap around yourself and never let go. I mean, how do they manage to withstand his demonic charm? I seriously have no idea)))

Hou Minghao had a serious demonic glow-up. I loved him as a dragon in Back from the Brink (where he was equal parts cute and beautiful), but this regal demonic deity he's channeling here is just wow. Where did all that come from? And once again, it's paired with a decent amount of creepy-ish cuteness (like, it's slightly weird to call a many-thousand-year-old powerful demon lord cute, but he's also not not cute, you know what I mean? XD)

And god bless all the sponsors who made all these pretty fantasy fights possible (the post-production team, I'm looking at you). Also the quality of the picture is incredibly good - everything is so movie-like, I can't even imagine the budget that went into this. But I'm glad they had it!

The vibe of the show is so, ah XD I can't even say it's queer, but it kind of is? With a possibility of multiple polycules wherever you look (or maybe it's just me and my mind playing tricks, but I'm enjoying this to the fullest).

And the way Yichen sneezes every time someone (Zhu Yan especially) is talking about him XD So cute. Bai Jiu is hilarious - screaming like the girliest girl at every prospect of danger and fainting at the sight of dead bodies. The most believable 13-year-old in the history of cdrama)))

I'm loving all the characters so far and patiently waiting for the tragedy of the death of the previous Bai Ze goddess to fully unfold (Wen Xiao's memories hint at more upcoming drama with Zhu Yan).

[afyrian]

no. 5 - cabin firekey masterlist

    “welcome to cabin firekey.. terrible name, i know! i wasn’t the one to chose it though,” you open the doors to your cabin, turning around to look at all of the kids joining you for the duration of camp.

  they all look different from each other, all intrigued by different things. a few of them hold their phones, eyes lit up with the bright blue lights. a couple of them holding their bags while dancing on the balls of their feet. you could picture yourself in them, each of them, even the one who seemingly wants nothing to do with camp.

  “as you all know, my name is y/n, and i’m your counselor. we’ll be competing in activities, hosting a talent show, and having some fun in between. i know that this isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but i’m hoping we can enjoy ourselves,” you take in a deep breath, clasping your hands together, “so pick your bunk and we’ll get to know each other.”

  as they filter into the cabin, you look back into the woods and spot atsumu with his group. he’s already engaging them all in a discussion, expressing himself with his hands and movements. you bite your lip, wondering if this counselor thing was going to be as easy as he’s making it appear from afar.

  you turn back to your cabin, looking around to see that most of the kids had already set their things down. the couple of them that seemed excited had quickly laid out their things, styled it some, their attention on their fellow cabin mates.

  “so, i’ve already seen the names of everyone joining, but how about you give some names to the faces and a fun fact about yourself?” your heart rate quickens as you see all of them looking over at you. 

  the looks on their faces practically scream that they’re all socially nervous, hoping for someone else to start the conversation, “uh, we can start with me.. i used to come to this camp when i was your age. i actually met a lot of my good friends here. mmh i also really like to play video games, so if this stuff isn’t your cup of tea, i’m always good to talk about that.”

  being welcoming was the only way you could think to get them involved. to bring about a side of them that they wouldn’t normally show to others, which is why you loved this camp. slowly, the girls all started to get out of their shells some. like amaya who joined the camp so her parents would buy her a new computer part. or kaida who wants to work in wilderness conservation, paired with her twin kaori who loves theater. 

  it slowly brought smiles to most of their faces, a few still stubborn.. and honestly, you couldn’t help but feel overjoyed that even if it’s your first day, it’s a better week than you could imagine. at least, it has been going well, now all you need for the perfect day is a great dinner. 

  “okay, tonight, the only thing on our agenda is dinner. they’ll have a few options for dietary needs, so please let the servers know if you need anything specifically,” you grab your phone and stuff it into your pocket, standing by the door, “and you can sit wherever. if you know someone from another group, feel free to say hi.”

  “could we sit with you?” hanae, one of the shyer girls, raises her hand slightly, pursing her lips.

  you nod immediately, “for sure, i’ll probably see some of my friends, but yeah, plus you guys can help think of some filler activities between the main stuff.”

  this seemed to make some of the kids a bit more confident, walking down the path together with a pip in their step. you subconsciously look towards where atsumu’s cabin is again, him and his group already gone from their area. almost instantly, you look back forward, scolding yourself for even wondering what he would be up to. you don’t care, you probably shouldn’t care.

  especially when he likely doesn’t even take a peek in your direction, unknowingly setting off a chain reaction of emotions within you-

  “y/n!” a voice comes from your right, the noise of someone running up to you forcing your head to look at the person.

  all you can see is a tuff of blonde hair as someone wraps their arms around you. however, the feeling of the short-stature automatically makes you know that it’s the nishinoya. “noya! i would’ve assumed you would already be at the mess hall.”

  “nah the dudes ended up wanting to catch some bugs so we lost track of time- but can you believe atsumu is here? the balls on that dude,” he shakes his head, completely ignoring the many younger kids surrounding the two of you. 

  you laugh some, shaking your head, “i can’t stop him from being a camp counselor here, and neither can you. besides he doesn’t even remember me! so trust me when i say that it’s not balls.”

  nishinoya bumps into you some, his two left feet unable to walk straight on the narrow dirt path. every little thing starts to help you remember things from camp that you never would’ve thought of. the two of you trekking through the trees, him constantly bumping into you cause he leans when he walks. his voice loud and quick, always making the conversation feel shorter than it is.

  “okay.. but i could fuck him up if need be!”

  “dude don’t you have like ten year olds in your group? and no, don’t even think about it. i will get my revenge when and if the time is right, young noya,” you bow a little, acting as if he’s your padawan. 

  he shrugs his shoulders, eyes clearly now focused on the mess hall. his mind switching between the conversation at hand and the mouth-watering food that the both of you could remember osamu making. you smile to yourself, trying to listen as he discusses some talent show thing his group wants to do. 

taglist (open): @lemurzsquad, @froyaoya, @localgaytrainwreck a/n: noya’s here!! i love writing him and hope you guys like it too

[batsplat]

What was the deal with dovi and his two teammates he did NOT get along with? Personal dislike or what?

so I've rattled off the actual details of the dovi/jorge feud here and this post gives great insight for dovi/iannone. the thing about dovi is that it's kind of funny that it happened twice to him of all people, you know? and the fact that there's (to my knowledge) been fuck all reconciliation? like I said here:

which I think is probably like... my general explanation. it's a) circumstance and b) abysmal interpersonal chemistry. in both cases, you've met the general criteria for intra-team issues:

I should have added that the first criterion is a little more complex than that, because it's also about how competitive the bike is versus expectations. if you thought you were going to be fighting for a title and you're not because the bike is shit, then that's not really the time and place to be starting feuds. but by 2015 ducati was very much on the way up again: for a hot moment early that year it looked like dovi might be a genuine title threat in that year and in 2016 they got their first win since 2010. so, suddenly you've got a manufacturer that's reevaluating its current line up and deciding they want a bigger name to lead the actual title charge... which is where you get the stakes from in both those feuds. dovi/iannone was driven in large part by 'which one of us will get fired' and dovi/lorenzo had the tension of 'this is not the challenger ducati was expecting'. so now you are competing over something a little more substantial... and that makes the difference between 'ah whatever I can paper over these interpersonal tensions' and 'you know what fuck this guy'

the interpersonal chemistry question is obviously more opaque, and again you have to say dovi just got a little unlucky in that regard. from how he talks in his autobiography, it seems like the first feud was just a bit of a radical mismatch of personalities. in iannone, dovi sees someone who is arrogant, obsessed with image and too concerned with beating dovi. it's not exactly a surprise that dovi was severely displeased when he thought he would be dropped for iannone. with jorge... well, you can really see how the competitiveness comes in here, right - the relationship was broadly cordial in 2017 when jorge was in the wilderness and then swiftly deteriorated when he actually got to grips with the bike

also, clearly jorge had some slightly weird stuff going on with dovi... idk, some of the passages read like he thought dovi kinda looked down on him? constantly talking about how clever dovi is, how dovi knows what he's doing... the thing about jorge is that he had a lot of stuff going on as a young man and he was overthinking a lot of things... and some of those things were definitely his rivals... and that did affect several of those relationships for quite a few years. then there's the stuff where jorge repeatedly says how much effort he put into that relationship, celebrating dovi's results in 2017, dovi not appreciating it... I mean, maybe? I can imagine dovi being extremely unmoved by this lol, and certainly not feeling like it means jorge has any credit in the bank the following year. he doesn't like jorge, which is fine... but then occasionally he says something in the press with just enough ambiguity that it allows jorge to go absolutely ape shit and it spirals from there. just a bad combination, really. jorge thought he'd be number one, dovi was very possessive of that project and not willing to cede the lead without one hell of a fight... and they have history and they're both not really particularly willing to give each other the benefit of the doubt. not great

as much as I obviously wasn't being serious calling dovi an awful teammate, he's also not that conflict-averse. he's always been opinionated, reasonably willing to get into arguments (including with the ducati higher ups) and also clearly willing to judge his fellow riders, often quite harshly. he's perhaps not particularly inclined to change his mind either once he's made it up... definitely a character, and perhaps not the type who's really interested in reevaluating relationships post-retirement. jorge on his part has mended quite a few bridges, but it really is just with his fellow aliens - you'll note he's repeatedly incredibly rude about dovi's track record and lack of premier class titles. jorge in general can have a bit of a habit of 'punching down' in a way you won't really get from the other aliens. his nostalgia-inflected warmth towards other riders again really does seem pretty limited to just the aliens, which is how you get him doing instagram throwbacks to motegi 2010 (bonkers lol) and all this *gestures* dani stuff... but with him and dovi, neither of them have really made an effort, and I doubt they will. dovi's the type of guy who wants to see himself as honest and straightforward with these things, so no forcing reconciliation after the fact I reckon. what's wrong with a couple of burnt bridges, right

[nysocboy]

Gemstones Episode 3.9: Baby Billy is Bi, Peter Plots Revenge, and Kelvin and Keefe Cuddle.

 Episode 3.9 seems rushed -- it could easily be three hours long.  The marital-problem and sibling-problem plots have been resolved, but we still have Uncle Peter, The Simkins, Dusty Daniels, and Bible Bonkers, and the writers have to find some way to tie them all together!

Baby Billy is Bi:  Still trying to sell the siblings on his Bible Bonkers game show, Baby Billy (Walton Goggins, top photo), reveals he is friends with Dusty Daniels, the racing champ.  We cut to a scene of the two, plus famous actor Gene Hackman  (played by Kevin Murray) in Monte Carlo on New Years' Eve, 1999.  They're awaiting the Y2K bug, hugging, dancing, and dropping acid as if it's the end of the world.  

We cut to a bisexual after-party, with Dusty, Baby Billy, and Gene Hackman having sex, maybe with men, maybe with women.

"Wait, " Jesse asks, "Did did you have sex with Dusty Daniels?"

"I doubt it,  but you never know...that's not the important part of the story."  The important part: he can talk Dusty Daniels into leaving his fortune to whoever wins at Bible Bonkers, the Gemstones or the Simpkins. 

So Kelvin came out to the family yesterday after years anguish, angst, self-doubt, backing-and-forthing, and annoyed viewers, and he still hasn't said the word.  Now Baby Billy comes out as bi with utter nonchalance.  Why couldn't he have said something to his nephew during Cousins' Night, or back in Season 1?

El Molino: We cut to a locust splatting on a windshield.  It's Uncle Peter and Chuck, driving the U-Haul full of explosives.  Peter has finally come up with a plan,  He doesn't specify what it is, but since it involves the Gemstones and explosives, it's not hard to figure out.  They're nearly out of gas, and the militia took all of their money, so they stop at El Molino, a real Hispanic supermarket with two locations in Charleston, to use the cash-counting machine.  

While Peter is inside, the U-Haul explodes!  He thinks that Chuck has been killed.

Out to the Family: The family gathers in Eli's parlor to watch a tv news report about Chuck's death.

Wait --when did the siblings stop hating their father?  Was a reconciliation moment cut?

 Notice that the guys are sitting on the right side of the room.  In four shots, Keefe moves from sitting a few inches away to leaning against the chair, his shoulder touching or almost touching Kelvin's thigh. They are so close that Kelvin can't move his hand or foot without bumping into him.

  They used to be very careful to avoid public displays of affection, holding hands under the table and forehead-pressing instead of kissing.  Now they casually cuddle in front of everyone, even family members who did not see the kiss.

They discuss the Bible Bonkers Family Feud-style game show.  The siblings will compete, but they need two more.  They were going to ask Chuck, a big Bible nerd, but he's dead, so it will have to be Karl and May-May.  

More Bible Bonkers after the break

Of all the gas stations in South Carolina:  Homeless, friendless, abandoned by his family, Peter sits outside a convenience store.  He prays: "I am in my darkest hour.  I am but a lost sheep in need of a shepherd.  Please give me a sign."

At that moment, Keefe pulls up in the Smut Busters van.  He's using that van for everyday chores?  Surely he and Kelvin have a dozen cars.  

He's listening to the song "Holy Lightning Rod" by Blesst, a Christian metal band (created for this episode?).  In Season 1, he considered metal music Satanic. He's come to realize that you don't need to give up things that you love to be a Christian, like heavy metal, Goth/Fetish outfits, and sex with guys.

Did God send him as the sign, to bring Peter back to Christ?  If so, it doesn't work -- they don't recognize each other.  (After all, they have only seen each other once).  So no soul-winning for Keefe.  But Peter does steal the Smut Busters van.

God saved you:  In the wilderness church, Karl and May-May mourn Chuck's death, clear off brush, and pray -- then she crosses herself   Surely somebody on the staff knew that only Catholics use that gesture.   Suddenly Chuck walks in!  He's alive!

Cut to the family back in Eli's parlor.  This time it's just Eli, the siblings, and the Montgomerys. Chuck explains that he made sure the parking lot was empty, then set off the explosion and ran away, so his Dad would think he was dead and he could escape.  

It still caused a lot of property damage, and no doubt terrorized the shoppers, who thought they were being targeted by a hate crime.  On August 3, 2019, a gunman opened fire in a Hispanic Wal-Mart in El Paso, Texas, killing 23 people and injuring 22. Surely the writers were thinking of that incident when they specified a Hispanic supermarket.

"Why were you super-mean to us, while we were in captivity?"  Chuck doesn't explain, but he avers that he didn't actually want them to die. Then why were you shooting at them?  Besides, he blew up the van to save them.  Doesn't that make up for the kidnapping?  I thought you blew up the van to save yourself.

So, about Bible Bonkers?  Chuck is a Bible expert, so May-May can drop out. The team will consist of Jesse, Judy, Kelvin, Chuck, and Karl.

Later, at the amusement park, Chuck tries to apologize to Jesse. They bond over having Daddies who are embarrassed by them.

The Bible Bonkers Filming:   Apparently several weeks have passed. The Bible Bonkers set is finished, and they're going to film the first episode.  Isn't it a conflict of interest for the Gimstones to sponsor the show and compete in it?  But I guess they'll be donating the prize money to the church.

In the dressing room, Billy offers to give the sibling  the answers to the quiz questions.  Apparently once a grifter, always a grifter.  They refuse.  He claims that their parents were so neglectful, he practically had to raise them. 

As Gideon drives Eli and May-May to the filming, they see Peter in the stolen Smut Busters van.  He's up to no good!  Follow him! Why didn't Keefe report the van missing?

On set, the band starts to play and the dancers twirl about. Showtime! Baby Billy does a cheesy stand-up bit, then introduces the Gemstones vs. the Simpkins. 

Notice Kelvin's textured single-breasted green coat, "The Attico" from Farfetch, "The global destination for modern luxury."   It will become important later.

 The Simpkins team includes siblings Vance, Shay, and Craig, not seen since Episode 1, plus two young Asian girls.  Apparently they are ringers: there is no indication that any of the siblings has a partner or children.  Compare with the Gemstones, who, for all their faults, have devoted partners. 

Baby Bill asks easy fill-in-the-blank style Bible questions to Jesse-Vance and Judy-Shay.  The Gemstones lose.  

Now it's Kelvin-Craig's turn.  First Kelvin does a self-aggrandizing coat-swirling dance. Keefe, watching from the VIP section with the other partners, responds with a  weird robot thing.  It looks like he's following along with the move they practiced.  

Meanwhile, Gideon, May-May, and Eli follow Peter to the Salvation Center.   Couldn't they have called the police from the car?  Don't these people have cell phones?  He drives to the loading dock, on a day when there are no services, so he probably expects the church to be empty. 

When the Gemstones confront him,  he announces that he has filled the Smut Busters van with explosives, triggered by his fitbit watch.  Wait-- where did he get a second batch?

 May -May yells that both his sons are inside.  Chuck is alive after all.  At this point, Peter would probably give up the plan, but he is interrupted by......

The full review is on RG Beefcake and Boyfriends

[itchose]

travis thoughts in episodes 1-2. he makes me ill <3

now that we know what happened with javi, season 3 really is going to be the season where we finally get more context of who travis is as an adult and why / how he reached the fate that he did. and there's already so much in these two episodes that does that and it's already hurting.

kevin said that season 3 is likely travis's saddest season yet. and also when asked what travis wants most this season:

"he really wants to go home. you just know he does. he’s resigned. he’s so pulled back now, there’s a part of him that doesn’t feel connected to almost anyone anymore, and that’s scary to be in that place. i do believe almost every decision we see him make this year, it is in hope ditch effort that life's not over for him. his will to live is so commendable. with everything he’s gone through." [he's lost half his family.] "yeah, everyone. so that really sits with him all season and it never goes away."

he's also been pretty vocal about how travis feels like he's more on the outside than ever, which i find really fascinating after watching these first 2 episodes, because it reminds us everything is not as it seems. the intro has him with some of the girls laughing and whispering things to each other, tai + van tell him that he can join them looking for mari + van watches him closely clearly seeing that something is really going on with him, tai defends him against saying 'hasn't he been through enough?', akilah seeks him out to bring him the duck to make him feel better. there are people actively looking out for him right now, but that doesn't mean it's going to last or that he can really feel that. because even if these people are looking out for him, he doesn't feel like he has a real place amongst them. he's always felt like an outsider but at least before, he had nat, and he had his job out there, and he had his brother (even when he knows he wasn't the best brother to him). you can really feel that he's lost right now.

and lottie is making it worse, which i think was always inevitable, considering what we know about the way his life goes. we really are seeing so much of how travis dies (2 seasons after we find out he dies) - from how his addiction begins, to how he's felt manipulated by the wilderness / how he felt compelled to speak to it in his final moments.

kevin says this about lottie:

"the person he trusts the most is the one he becomes fearful of the most, which is lottie. he does trust her because he's trying to understand his feelings." [he gets to open up and be raw] "they're just kids for a second. and then he's not there anymore. his fear comes in really quick and i do believe that overall, he's fearful of the unit more than one person. the unit of everyone... he cannot compete. there is no competition there. he is on his own."

travis and lottie's dynamic really is just so interesting from the beginning because it starts with her really leading this charge to sacrifice him to the wilderness at doomcoming. in the adult arc, we're trying to figure out how he died and eventually discover that lottie played a role in that, too. his death scene with lottie is given so much context in these episodes alone, with her trying to force him to speak to + bargain with the wilderness (presumably this is how he finds out that lottie could speak to the wilderness when she was near death, as he mentions when he's about to die, since they're already sharing personal things with each other).

honestly all of his scenes with lottie are uncomfortable to me but it feels like it's supposed to be. on doomcoming, travis was drugged, assaulted, hunted, and nearly killed - and now he's being forced to take shrooms despite his discomfort / his history / and his hesitance, and i know it's tempting to want to just laugh at the two being kids and getting high and having fun, but it's actually really scary? how we go from the first time he's drugged and all the trauma he has from that night, to being forced to take the drugs, to now seeing how it leads to his addiction is just so fucking tragic. there's this push and pull with both lottie and the wilderness - he both trusts lottie to know how he's supposed to see the wilderness and he's more and more terrified it every time she gets him closer to it. and that literally never goes away in his life. all of this makes him being the only one to know lottie was out + lottie being the one to really know where he's at makes sense.

backtracking to van's presentation, travis leaves once she talks about all they survived (many people in travis's life did not, but he's not taking it out on her, he steps away to keep it to himself). lottie tells him it's okay to be angry about what happened to javi and his dad. which is something he needs to hear, but he doesn't know how to hear it. he immediately says, "well, what about shauna?" and lottie tells him something else he needs to hear: grieving's not a competition. and maybe travis does understand that, but he doesn't feel like he's allowed to hold any space for his own grief when everyone else has lost too, especially shauna. travis was very actively trying to take care of shauna during her labor, literally bleeding for her to try to save her life, so it's not surprising that he immediately looks to her and what she's lost and tells himself that he's not allowed to be loud in his own grief (honestly the contrasting way in which he and shauna are now coping with their grief is so fascinating - with shauna turning harsher and travis being more reserved).

really love him asking tai and van to go searching for mari. for a lot of reasons - he needs to do something other than getting high with lottie, because he already feels like he's been pushed too far and it's starting to make him uncomfortable. also, because it seems like it's been a while since he's actually gotten to just go out in the woods and i think part of him really misses that, feeling like he had a purpose. and because he does genuinely want to help find mari. and also he seems to trust tai and van. i have a lot of feelings about him and van specifically after all their little background moments in season 2 + their final conversation before they ate javi - i know some people think that makes him weary of van the most, but i disagree. she helped him even if he wasn't ready for it in that moment, and i hope to see more of that this season. his little smile when van and tai tell him he can join them is so sweet and so sad when it falls to something more forced as lottie insists he comes with him.

"you're connecting with it, we have to keep going." / "lottie, i don't know. shouldn't we help find mari?" he doesn't know how to say no because... he has not had much agency in the wilderness at all. in multiple cases it's literally been stolen from him. and now he's being drugged to be used as this conduit for lottie + the wilderness and he doesn't know what to do. the way the show plays with travis's gender explores how those typical gender roles are squandered in the wilderness is so fascinating, and over the first 2 seasons, we watch him constantly navigating what it means to be the only boy left amongst a bunch of girls and how, no matter how close he can get to anyone, he'll never really feel like he belongs (or is allowed to belong) with them. and in season 1, there's so much of him that feels like a performance, saying + doing things a typical teenage boy would do because he feels like that's how he's supposed to be (while making it very obvious that he doesn't even believe it in himself when he says certain things), and we gradually watch him lose that, especially after doomcoming when his agency's stolen, to now being more and more aware that he's outnumbered. and he's more careful with that. so much of what i've seen in the first 2 episodes really is a direct effect from doomcoming, especially.

his "one, two, three, eyes on me" chant when he's trying to calm down from whatever he's hearing and experiencing during his trip is something i will come back to later i think but. whew

his high leads him to violence and it makes him both sad and terrified. he cries and lets van hold him, and i like to think that if van brought him back to their camp, she might've tried talking to him then (given the way she looked at him before they left, how it seemed she was already concerned) - but i don't think travis felt like he should be around people after that. he doesn't like that he hurt someone, and he's upset, and he's exhausted from being pushed past his limit, and he's just so fucking sad he feels like he has to just sit with that himself. akilah seeks him out and he's silently crying to himself; she asks him if he's okay and he nods, trying not to look at her, until she offers mortimer to him. he never says anything directly to her - and akilah's perceptive enough to know that talking to someone else is not what he wants right now - but when he finally does speak, it's to the duck, with a repeated "it's okay" that really reflects both the way he comforts javi when javi pulls his card + the repeated "i'm sorry" under his breath after he eats javi's heart. and he holds the duck just like he probably held his baby brother and he lets himself cry + try to breathe. it's one of my favorite travis scenes.

and that peace doesn't last for long before lottie comes back. he has so much shame for hurting her and doesn't know how to look at her. "i hurt you." [i'm fine] "i tried to hurt you." and he's so scared of how much worse it can get if he has to keep going through with that. and then he kind of throws akilah under the bus but it's not with malicious intent - it's an act of desperation. he can't handle this from lottie anymore and he doesn't know how to tell her no, because he does not know how to do that, and it doesn't feel like she's accepting it when he tries, so he tells her akilah connects with the wilderness more. and he has so much shame for that too in the way that he sinks down in his seat and looks away again and i don't think he even believes that it's going to work to get lottie off his back but he's desperate at this point.

he's scared of lottie right now but i think that he's also scared of losing his trust in her, because right now, she's the person he trusts most. and if she completely pushes him past his limit, he might also lose the friend he has beyond the self-made therapist, and he doesn't want that. he doesn't know what to do without that.

really interested and terrified of what's next for him. i know a lot of people are laughing and having fun with him getting high but it's actually really scary and sad and i can't even hope that it's going to get better for him because we know, based on how he died, that it only ever gets worse.

[lucygraysboy]

billy’s noticed how passionate lucy gray is about this fairytale kind of love and it makes his heart ache, a constant reminder of how he’s failed to give it to her, but it also completely disarms him. she’s so innocent and childlike. “a wilderness princess, hm? i think you already are. you’re the prettiest, kindest, sweetest princess. how does a wilderness princess spend her days? what does she want to do?” he wonders aloud, wanting to hear more about what her dreams consist of so that hopefully in the future he’ll be able to make them come true. “are you cleaning the tub, miss charming angel? how very thoughtful of you.” snickering, somehow this isn’t the weirdest thing she’s done tonight, but definitely one of the most amusing. “not even cowboy princes are allowed to see them?” her angel wings. “so disappointing.” he laughs and kisses her finger, letting out a loud mwah sound just to make her giggle. he’d make a fool of himself any day any time just to make her giggle. “sounds fair to me. princesses deserve to be loved and admired and spoiled.” he wouldn’t mind if this was her idea of a happily ever after. “good girl. do you have any other jammies with you?” or just the silky nightie. he’ll rummage through her belongings and try to find her a clean pair of undies, too. “i’ll always sing with you, lulu gray. i just don’t think i could ever compete ‘cause, yeah, you do sound like an angel.” no wonder this headhunter from new york wants to meet up with her, most likely offer her a record deal. “mm, singin’ a song ‘bout me, hm?” after all, that’s who he is — a fool in love with her. “thank you.” for the washcloth. he’s giggling and wringing it out so that he can throw it over the faucet and leave it to dry, but that’s when she begins to stand up so he has to quicken his movements. “oh, oops. we don’t want you to be cold, do we?” he keeps his eyes glued to her face, blushing as he wraps the towel around her before lifting her up and out of the tub. he sets her down on the small rug and kisses her forehead. “alright, we’ll brush your teeth in a second. first, you dry yourself with this towel and i’ll bring you some warm clothes, okay?” she’s so adorable. 

"ohh, hmmm, okay." deciding it makes sense, even though it still doesn't to her. and– he is just fortunate she's forgotten about that girl he was texting indicating he participated in a one night stand or she'd turn easily back into an angry drunk again. "mmhhm, true love's sparkk. like princesses an' prince's in the movies. that's why i want to be a wilderness princess." lucy gray dreamily speaks, always talking a lot about romanticizing love story books and especially tonight while she's been drunk. "you're welcome, it's trueee, mr pretty eyes." she giggles, doe eyes flickering up on his mystery blues. "i can't. angels can't reveal their wings. they are seeecret. shhh." a finger places against her lips. "oooh, mhmm. truee. we're all meant to be sweet, taken care of princesses with our princess hans ... an' men is suppose' to go to work for us." she giggles, holding her delicate hand out, twirling it around. "s'alright then. i'mmm agreein' to leave this womb tub, jusss' cause you say i'm getting more in the bed." lucy gray decides to comply for that reasoning, rubbing under her armpits, making sure they're all clean. "you singin' with me? you soun' so cute, billbysaur. do i sing like an angel? can i sing like an angel?" she wonders, trying to think of a song that sounds whimsical and beautiful like an angel song... so she can sing it. "earth angel, earth angel, will you be minee? my darlin' dear, love you allll the time, i'm just a fool–– a fool in love with you." singing sweetly as she drunkenly keeps bathing the tub by washing around it, before breaking out in a quiet giggle at her idea to sing earth angel. must be the night for classical tunes. once he comes back over, she offers him her soaked wash cloth like a toddler before glancing down, sticking bubbles to her chest and her middle before standing up just as he predicted. wet hands reaching for his shoulder, already starting to lift a leg to get out of here because her fingers are starting to grow cold and pruney. "you help." with her teeth brushing.

[arcanetrivia]

Ship ask game

Rather than wait to get maybe a couple of asks, I decided to just plow through the whole thing... originally posted by canadianlucifer here.

I'd put part of this behind a cut, but Tumblr apparently doesn't want to let me break the list in the middle to do that, so... oh well.

-----

Who would ask “would you still love me if I was a worm?” and how would the other(s) respond? Definitely not Elaine, and I'm skeptical about Guybrush unless grog was involved. Then she'd probably be like "Darling, I loved you even when you were a corpse full of worms," (see Tales) and put him to bed.

Who comes up with the best date night ideas? Guybrush… eventually. His imagination is wilder than Elaine's and he comes up with more stuff off the beaten path that can lead to unique experiences. But a lot of his ideas are real stinkers, or at the very least pretty impractical. Sometimes he gets it right, though.

Who’s better at carnival games? Elaine, but Guybrush sometimes gets lucky shots that bounce in ways he hadn't intended and things like that.

Who drags the other(s) onto a rollercoaster? Guybrush Thrillsee-- I mean, Threepwood.

Who does the most chores? Eh, define "chores". I think mostly they have other people around for that, whether it's living the gubernatorial life, or having other people at sea to actually, you know, be competent to look after a ship.

Who gets drunk the quickest? Guybrush. He's kind of an embarrassing lightweight for a pirate and can't really hold his liquor that well.

Who watches the most reality tv? Guybrush. (Who I somehow imagine would be into Survivor…)

Who insists their way is better even though it’s objectively the worst way? Guybrush. When Elaine insists her way is better, she tends to be right.

Who believes in ghosts? Ghosts are known to be real in Monkey Island, but if they weren't, probably Guybrush.

Who texts the most memes to the other(s)? Guybrush.

Who makes the most typos/autocorrect mistakes? Guybrush.

Who’s a more nervous flyer? Neither. But Guybrush is prone to say "Whee!" every time a plane takes off.

If they have matching pfps, are they cute, funny, weird, etc? Probably all of the above and it'd be because Guybrush was trying to come up with cute or clever takes on it.

Who’s better at writing professional emails? Oh, god. Elaine, all the way. Do not let Guybrush do this.

Who steals the other(s)’ food? Mostly Guybrush, but Elaine does it more often than you might think.

Who’s more willing to commit murder for the other(s)? Elaine. It would take Guybrush longer to get up to this point (other than in exceptional circumstances).

Their child is chanting “McDonalds! McDonalds! McDonalds!”, who says they have food at home, joins the chant, or buys a single black coffee and leaves? Guybrush is totally chanting with Boybrush. Elaine probably says they have food at home, but isn't completely un-persuadable by this joint childish display.

Who uses more slang? Guybrush, but he doesn't always get it right.

Who uses emoticons? If you mean things formed of punctuation :) :-/ instead of emoji, maybe Elaine. If you mean using either of these instead of words, or especially forming things like a rebus or tacking on emoji for flavor, that seems more like Guybrush. 🏴‍☠️

Who would absolutely slay at the Met Gala? Guybrush, so long as someone else designed the outfit. He's more inclined to showing off for onlookers and has proven experience in actually carrying off a look that might seem ridiculous at first. But don't underestimate Elaine, although her whole deal is going to be more understated. (That said, I'm kinda now wanting art of Elaine in some version of a tuxedo and Guybrush in some kind of wild dress.)

[dkehoe]

OK, I can’t believe that we are already in the month of May. This year has gone by so fast! My TBR just keeps growing and I know there are not enough hours in a day/month/year that I can tackle all of the books I want to read. Despite that growing list, I’m going to pick the 5 books that I’m most excited to see being released in May. These five will definitely be on my TBR and hopefully I’ll be able to crack open a page. #5 BOOK RELEASE This is the second outdoor adventure competition romance that I’ve seen coming out in May. They both look cute but this one edged out the other since it’s an adult contemporary. Looks like a fun and easy read and should be put in your carry on for the first beach vacation of the year. Synopsis: Orie Lennox has spent her entire life prepping for her happily ever after — and now that she’s graduated, she’s low-key wondering, when the heck is it gonna hit. Her love life, her new job, her relationship with her sister: none of it is quite what she envisioned it to be. One evening, on a whim, she applies for a reality show where she’ll be stranded on an island, with a bunch of strangers, to play a game of human chess for a shot at a million dollars. What better way to force herself to break up with the things that aren’t bringing her joy, than to abandon them all on short notice to live off the grid on a beach in the South Pacific! Orie’s shocked when she ends up cast in an experimental romantic edition of the show: and even more surprised to find that her old high school crush, Remy, has been cast as well. Orie’s one of ten contestants, set to compete in formidable challenges, while speed dating, in the wilderness: without deodorant, toilets, shaving cream, or showers. (How!?) She finds herself tied up — literally — in a game of risky alliances as she navigates ever-growing feelings for her one that got away, alongside an exciting array of budding new relationships. Click this link to purchase this book!* Attached at the Hip #4 BOOK RELEASE When Nora has one of her romantic suspense releases I want to immediately snatch it up. This one seems to be more sinister than normal. yeah! Synopsis: As they do each June, the Foxes have driven the winding roads of Appalachia to drop off their children for a two-week stay at their grandmother’s. Here, twelve-year-old Thea can run free and breathe in the smells of pine and fresh bread and Grammie’s handmade candles. But as her parents head back to suburban Virginia, they have no idea they’re about to cross paths with a ticking time bomb. Back in Kentucky, Thea and her grandmother Lucy both awaken from the same nightmare. And though the two have never discussed the special kind of sight they share, they know as soon as their tearful eyes meet that something terrible has happened. The kids will be staying with Grammie now in Redbud Hollow, and thanks to Thea’s vision, their parents’ killer will spend his life in supermax. Over time, Thea will make friends, build a career, find love. But that ability to see into minds and souls still lurks within her, and though Grammie calls it a gift, it feels more like a curse—because the inmate who shattered her childhood has the same ability. Thea can hear his twisted thoughts and witness his evil acts from miles away. He knows it, and hungers for vengeance. A long, silent battle will be waged between them—and eventually bring them face to face, and head to head… Click this link to purchase this book!* Mind Games *Amazon Associate- if you purchase one of these books through a link on this blog I’ll receive a small stipend. #3 BOOK RELEASE I have just recently discovered Elle Kennedy’s college hockey series. If you like your romance a bit raunchy and characters with a lot of heart, you need to reach for one of her books. She was recommended to me and I’ve gobbled them all up. Synopsis: Diana Dixon has a lot going on this summer. She’s rehearsing for a ballroom dance competition, juggling two jobs, and dealing with an ex-boyfriend who can’...

[dailyadventureprompts]

Not gonna lie, the shore game actually sounds pretty fun. One thing I might do if I did this was on one of the earlier days the party is there have them find like some kids playing a simplified version so they at least had a general idea; Xemplaris using the more complicated & complete rules from the original game. But honestly I'm tempted to just have like a shore game tournament if I ever need like some filler or something.

Minigame: Klac

The game of Klac is enjoyed across a myriad of kingdoms and involves players collecting marbles of various materials and then trading them by way of a dexterity based game played in groups of two or more. The exact rules of Klac shift from region to region as local customs and idiosyncrasies solidify and it's not an uncommon sight to see players in more metropolitan center argue about nuances of the rules longer then they end up playing.

Still, the thrill of victory and collecting exotic marbles draws players of all ages to the game, especially adventurers and merchants whose journeys across the world allows them to amass a small horde of marbles as souvenirs of their many travels.

What separates Klac from other marble games is the variety of the pieces involved: Clay marbles are common, as are glass in those regions where the art is practiced, but one can also expect to find pieces made of metal, wood, or stone which can fundamentally affect how marbles behave, with some marbles even being made of patterned ceramics or semi-precious stones. Size likewise is no set factor when it comes to marbles with anything able to be held between the first two joints of the smallest player’s fingers seen as valid for competion. Some specalized artisans are even known to make trick marbles: hollow clay ones that will crack apart when struck rather than being knocked out of the ring, wooden ones with metal inlays that affect their trajectories,  glass ones filled with a mixture of water and mercury to affect thier velocity, hemitite that adheres to others or knock them off course. These diverse (and in some cases frankly unfair) pieces are what make klac such a draw for those who obsess over it, who go to great lengths to uncover new strategies for what seems at first like a simple game.

How to Play Klac at the table:

Since you can't expect your party to drop everything and play out an actual marble game, here's an easy way to play:

have every player roll 3d20 and mark down the numbers, except 1-5, and 16-20, which are immediately discounted, simulating a marble rolling off the playing field.

Starting with the person who rolled the highest, check around the table to see if there are any matching numbers, which cancel eachother out. A quick way to do this is to say " Fifteens, fourteens thirteens" and have a quick raise of hands. This represents marbles knocking into eachother, and knocking them out.

After all matches have been removed, players tally their remaining numbers, highest number wins. in the event of a tie, have a roll off.

Adventure Hooks:

It's a well known fact that rich people love to waste their money on extravagances, and a local jeweler makes an earnest living carving gemstones and casting precious metals to make Klac pieces for her wealthy clientele. When her shop is robbed she reaches out to the party for fear that some of that same clientele may blame her once they realize that their property has been stolen and use their influence to ruin her reputation. As the investigation progresses, it becomes increasingly clear that the thieves weren’t after valuables, but a specific set of marbles commissioned by a particular client, Who just so happens to have stated the outcome of some very important noble dealings on an upcoming klac game.  There’s a deeper mystery here than who stole the marbles, as this deal has massive ramifications that might stretch across the kingdom should it default.

While Traveling through the wilderness, the party encounters a naiad playing Klac on the shoreline and has the opportunity to ask for directions towards their goal. On closer inspection however it appears all of the waterfey’s marbles are in fact pearls of astonishing size and luster. Gambling with the fey is never a wise idea, but with a small fortune on the line perhaps they can afford to be wise another time.

After playing a couple rounds of Klac in the local roadhouse, the party will hear a couple of their fellow gamblers discussing an eccentric local magistrate in possession of a massive collection of rare and beautiful marbles known for inviting complete strangers into his home for the sake of a rousing game or the chance of trading an interesting piece. Knowing an opportunity when they hear it, the party head to the next town over and have just been welcomed past the threshold (and out of the downpour that broke out while they were waiting) when they hear a thud and a tremendous clatter from up the stairs that might be confused for thunder. Rushing up stairs they’ll find the magistrate murdered, his pristine display shelves overturned, and a cowled, avian figure silhouetted in the now open window before diving off into the night.   This trespasser is the kenku Tonk, a roving thief and Klac hustler who’s heard stories of a lich who was sealed inside his phylactery by a group of heroes past, a perfect crystal sphere one could confuse for a marble.  With the murderer in the wind and a hysterical butler accusing them of being accomplices, time is running out before Tonk finds a means of releasing the lich in exchange for a cure to the kenku curse of wordlessness

The Rules of Klac

It’s often said there’s as many ways to play Klac as there are people to play it, but generally the rules resolve down to something like this:

Each player keeps thier marbles in a bag, which they give a shake before the game begins, drawing out a handful of marbles. ( A decision to weigh carefully, as a larger handful means more options for victory, but also more on the line).

Each player then selects five marbles, and puts the rest in a communal cup/bowl/other openmouthed container large enough to contain all the marbles. (They’ll want to select the marbles that are larger and heavier, and/or ones too valuable to lose)

a circle is drawn on the floor, generally seven feet across, with another 1ft circle inside. The cup is then upended over this circle in such a way that the marbles pour out. The cup is then placed right side up in the middle of the circle, displacing the marbles. (all marbles that roll out of the outer ring are put into the cup)

Whoesever marble is closest to the outer edge of the outer ring starts first, and play proceeds clockwise form there. Players must flick one of their five chosen marbles (called a striker) and try to knock other marbles out of the inner ring, If they successfully knock one out, they take that marble into their “ante” and get to take another turn, shooting their first marble again and again until they fail to knock anything out of the inner ring. If the player knocks anything into the cup in the middle of the ring loud enough to make a “Klac” sound, they must instantly stop their turn and put any marble that hit the cup (including their striker) into the cup.

If a player’s turn ends and their striker is still inside the inner circle, it is counted as being a valid marble for knockout allowing other players to knock it out of the middle circle and add it to their ante

When it cycles back to a player’s turn, they may either continue playing from one of their currently deployed striker, or surrender it, chosing one of their four remaining potential strikers and shooting from the outside of the ring again. Players with no more strikers cannot take turns

Play ends when all the marbles are cleared out of the inner circle, or when all players are out of strikers. Each player keeps whatever marbles are in their ante, with the player who got the most marbles also taking whatever ended up in the Cup. All marbles still in the outer ring are returned to their owners ( this becomes a meta-game in high ranking klac circles, who may take disadvantageous moves to knock particular marbles in/out of the outer ring should they be deemed valuable enough)

In friendly games, trading marbles back to their owners is encouraged at the end of the night, and the bargaining that takes place is often used as an excuse to buy drinks for strangers or initiate dares among drunken friends. This also serves as a winddown period to ensure there are no hard feelings over spilt marbles.

Klak Items: 

if your party gets a taste for Klak, consider letting them begin amassing a collection of rare marbles, represented by giving them additional options when playing the abstract game mentioned above:

Better marbles that let them replace one or more of their d20 rolls with: 2d10,  2d8, 4d6, 3d6, 5d4 etc. Each of these have their own benefits and drawbacks, so rather than trying to balance them, simply reward them with one of the options for winning a rare marble in a game or going to the local marketplace to get some (with each town’s market giving a different option)

A champion Klak bag as a common magic item, which lets them add or subtract their slight of hand or gambling proficiency to any of their d20 rolls before they have to start discounting any.

Art

[noncreativepage-blog]

Oh my Gosh! I didn’t even think about all the parents getting together! You’ve sparked my imagination!

Each member of the first years family holds a meeting once a month to talk about all the shenanigans that happen. Just imagine, Epel’s grandmother hosting Baul, Deuce’s mom Ortho’s Parents, Jack’s parents, Ace’s parents, and somehow Ace’s older brother in Harveston one meeting, and they talk about all the crazy stuff that went down in the background that the first years didn’t know about. Epel’s grandma talking about the search parties for Sebek and Epel, the race, the farm, the town gossip, etc, and they’re all just sitting around the table drinking hot coco. 

Then they hold a meeting at Deuce’s house and they get to see all of the crazy blast cycles. Deuce’s mom manages to convince everyone to try them out. Epel’s grandma is a natural. She’s zipping past everyone like she was born for speed. Ace’s family manages well enough, though it’s clear that they’re not super proficient in it. Jack’s parents get all mischievous about it. Jack is their oldest child, so they’re still telling their younger children not to take unnecessary risks. Yet, here they are, doing something “reckless” even though they’re learning from an experienced instructor. Ortho’s mom, she too is made for speed. Her husband… not so much. He sits behind his wife, and just clings to her the entire time. You would think the director of STYX was a bit braver, but he isn’t. (He just likes working on his tech okay. He doesn’t even know how he managed to pull an SSR extrovert like is awesome wife. She just appeared, and suddenly they were married with two kids.) Baul struggles at first- you know, zero tech grandpa- but he gets the hang of it after talking to Ace’s brother. He and Baul ended up talking about horse back riding because that is what Baul is used to, so Ace’s brother mentioned the fact that a blast cycle is just a horse you control with nonverbal commands. True, blast cycles are inanimate objects, but they still have a personality. After that, Baul and Ace’s brother start competing. Both know that they couldn’t compare to Epel’s grandma, and Ortho’s mom, but they can still figure out who gets third place. (Too bad it’s a tie every time.) Imagine that this is also the meeting where they find out that Deuce was a delinquent. The shock from Epel’s grandmother, and then the absolute pride that her grandson managed to befriend a young man who is absolutely determined to turn his life around. I like to think that Jack’s parents were also delinquents. They were totally the type of teens who wore grunge, spray painted public property, and lit a building on fire (It was a small, abandoned building. Calm down, they’re not convicted criminals or anything. They have hidden as much about their wilder side as possible from their children. They can never know.)

We haven’t really seen Ace’s or Jack’s house, but I like to assume that both families just live in a nice little suburban area with a white picket fence, and a cute house. Their visit to Ace’s family home is pretty relaxing. Although, Ace’s father pulls out the scrapbook, and tells everyone about embarrassing thing Ace has done. His brother 100% joins in. The only difference between him, and Ace is the fact that Ace’s older brother has no shame. His parents tell the group about the time Ace and his brother hung underwear from the flagpole, and Ace’s brother is just beaming with pride. Their visit to Jack’s house is a bit more wild. Their younger kids get super excited to come home to all these interesting new people. Where are they from? Why do they smell different? What super cool, really awesome thing can they do? They absolutely love Ace’s brother. He’s young enough that he can rough house with them, keep up with their energy, and still relax with the other adults after the kids go to bed. Both Baul and Epel’s grandmother get into their good graces by humoring them. (You know how little kids will monologue about the most random things, and then ask a question. Yea, that’s what they do to the grandparents. Baul usually grunts, and grumbles a response while Epel’s grandmother goes, “oh I see, Tell me more”.) Deuce’s mom and Ortho’s mom also plays with the kids, but it’s much tamer that what Ace’s brother does. (Please help Ortho’s father. He’s suffering. Physical activity is not his thing, and these children are not nearly as interested in video games as they should be.) 

Visiting Baul’s home is kinda crazy actually. Most of the oldest generation fought in the war, so seeing their human hating commander hosting some humans, beast men, and… robots is a really weird predicament. Baul’s daughter is just happy her father has moved on from his past prejudices. (Don’t get him wrong, he still disapproves of Sebek’s father. That man stole his daughters heart, and had the gall to fulfill her every wish so Baul couldn’t take vengeance against him. Like seriously, how dare this human man actually be a good husband, and father. Curse him (affectionate).) Everyone becomes Mr. Zigvolt patient. Their teeth have never felt more clean, and Epel’s grandmother has got brand new dentures that are the best quality and fit she’s ever felt. Ortho’s parents are preaching the good name of technology. All hail your robo savior for they shall tech you they ways of automatiooooooooh wait… they can’t touch iron. All well, stainless steel it is. Ace’s and Jack’s parents end up doing the most exploring while the Shroud’s are happily trapped in a four-hour long debate about the benefits of technology with a random fae who is obviously messing with them. Ace’s brother somehow becomes part of the fae mafia. He has no idea how it happened. One moment he was normal person, next he was the most protected member of the group. (Apparently his dorky demeanor, and cringe fail personality is completely endearing. Who knew.) Baul doesn’t even bat an eye at the news. He’s just like, “Back in my day there were no gangs, just platoons of soldiers fighting against a great evil!” Fortunately, this fae mafia is only a mafia in name. It’s really a bunch of nerds who read The Way of A HouseHusband, and completely misunderstood what an actual mafia does. Instead, this random group does “hits” were they end up mowing someone’s lawn, and cleaning up the beach, but in like, a super tough way! Yeaaaaaaaaa! Deuce’s mom ends up in a race with a couple of fae. Each one tries to prove who the fasted delivery man is. It’s amazing how much faster you can deliver packages when you’re capable of building the first ever briar valley blast cycle, and speeding around town instead of running. 

They hold a meeting at STYX, and Ortho know. He Knows, and his mother knows he knows, and his mother knows he knows she knows, and ortho knows his mother knows that he know that she knows, and their playing a game of 4d chess that even the creator of this post is incapable of understanding. They end up tiring because both Ortho and his mother tell their respective group that the other knows. Absolute chaos erupts from the first years, and the adult support group is just having an awesome time gossiping, and playing video games. 

Sebek just hanging out with his grandpa. Like, for two fairly loud people they just sit together and do what they want. Sebek maybe sometimes talking about what is happening in school and with the Dia 3. It's bitter sweet because Sebeks grandpa understands like Diasomnia never will.

Idk I just think Dia 3 are so focused on eachother that they kinda forget Sebek :( so Sebek becomes used to being ignored and is happy when getting positive attention. (Que the first years making friends with Sebek.)

[florideas]

Four Coastlines

This is just my list of headcanons for a specific group dynamic: Florida, Hawai'i, Alaska and California. According to a CRS report, these four have the largest coastline in the states if we do not include tidal inlets. All of this to say, I'm brainrotting hard for these four's dynamics :'))

All four of them are chaotic. Don't let the face and mascot Florida fool you, all of them have the capacity for some kind of total mayhem and Florida is kind of proud of it

They are comprised of 3 extroverts and 1 introvert. They do wild things but they make sure that Alaska is having some kind of fun in the meanwhile

One day, they have a beach day, coming to a secluded beach where nobody really goes. Alaska prefers to stay under the beach umbrella while the rest go out to sea. California is trying to teach Florida how to surf but how well Florida is retaining it is up for debate. Hawai'i has definitely buried Alaska in sand before they left tho

Conversely, Alaska has taken them out to the tundra wilderness. California is prepared for the cold and keeps up with Alaska just fine. Hawai'i at least has experienced some kind of cold from her mountains but is definitely unused to it. Same goes with Florida. The only reason Florida and Hawai'i can keep going is sheer spite really. That and California was taunting them so they had to keep going

Beach Buds

FL & HI

Snorkeling is one of Hawai'i's favourite pasttimes. She gets Florida to join in since he also free dives a lot and it's better to have a partner to spot you. They tend to see which one of them could stay underwater for the longest time. Hawai'i always wins that competition

They explore the coral reefs just off the coast of the Keys to see the sights and colours of a thriving ecosystem and the bleached death for those left to the wayside

There's one time where they dived down for a nearly an hour without resurfacing and without any oxygen tanks whatsoever. It kinda freaked California and Alaska out because they're pretty sure not a lot of people could stay down there for that long

Ice cream. They go out for ice cream if they're on a beach and will exchange their favourite ice cream flavours so they could see the other taste it and judge it. No, Florida does not pick out the wackiest flavours just so he could see her wince at the taste, wdym

Florida has taken her to see alligators. She loved holding the babies because they're so small and so dangerous and holy crap is that their mother—

Two Extremes

AK & FL

The only reason Alaska remembers him is because he is the designated "fun" one. It's difficult to not remember someone who constsntly blows everything up with a smile on their face.

They get along because Alaska is one of the few people he actively doesn't mess with. He knows Alaska can and will throw the first punch if annoyed; and though he would love to see Alaska break, he's not about to find out. Alaska kinda appreciates it

Another way Alaska keeps remembering Florida is the way Florida shoves food into his hands. Mostly, it's just tropical fruits like dragonfruit, mangos and pineapples. Interestingly enough, Florida has never given him oranges

In recompense, Alaska started to give Florida some of his blueberries and ligonberries simply because he's confused as to why Florida keeps aggressively handing him fruits every once in a while and feels the need to repay him in some fashion

Hawai'i keeps helping Florida in giving Alaska tropical food — and then asked if Alaska ever had spiced foods and then it just kinda went downhill

Catchin' Waves

CA & HI

Surfing buddies. Hawai'i will drag California out to the beach so she could use her boards more, dammit

California hasn't had this much fun competing with someone — Hawai'i provides a good challenge that is hard to keep up but damn him if he won't stop trying

If there's a memorable event, like California absolutely eating shit by falling off his board, Hawai'i will pop in a nearby souvenir store to grab something from the store and hand it over to California so "he wouldn't forget". Likewise, California hasn't forgotten how Hawai'is hair got stuck in one of the doors for a long while and gave her a door keychain

California is pretentious and Hawai'i is aggressive. With these two, there's no Karen that can ruin their day (should they ever try, they'll find themselves running away with tears streaming down their face while the two high five for a job well-done)

She's the one of the few states that can fully call him out on his bullshit if he starts acting up — harsh glares and threatening gestures from Texas, he could take. Just not from Hawai'i. Her slaps hurt dude

Upper 2

AK & HI

Hawai'i tends to show Alaska everything and anything she's doing via Snap, Insta, Discord, Facetime, anything. That kind of friendship where Hawai'i has video and microphone on at all times while Alaska has his vid closed with push-to-talk on. Sometimes he has video on for that spice

Alaska gifts her small wooden carvings of her favourite animals and flowers every month, just to "put his skills to good use". One time, he gifted her a wooden hawaiian hibiscus, her state flower, for her birthday. Painted it yellow and made sure it has enough detail to seem real. She constantly has it out on display in her home, making sure that Alaska sees it in every video call

Hawai'i has a list of Alaskan facts bouncing around in her mind, will correct anyone about anything from Alaska. That is her bestie don't even try

He has indirectly learn some Hawaiian words from Hawai'i herself. Considering how many native languages he has on his tongue, it just seemed natural for him to learn another native language... just not one from his region. Definitely uses it to surprise Hawai'i

Golden Midnight

AK & CA

California rambles. A lot. So much so that the only one who tolerates it (barely) is Alaska and that's normally because California barged into his room to "get away from idiots"

Alaska tried kicking him out but ugh he keeps coming back

California likes to teach others so he just tells Alaska what it's like to live in the Lower 48. From memes to social etiquette to Taylor Swift albums and if Jefferson should just be kicked out. At first, he wasn't sure if Alaska was listening or not but after Alaska prodded him about folklore, he was more than happy to find out someone does listen

Sure Alaska's just kinda listening to California bc it helps with understanding Hawai'i but it seems to make the beanie guy happy so who was he to say anything

Disney Siblings

Alaska can and will use memes and lingo wrong just so California can do that strained smile that is barely holding back all his frustrations. It's funny

"So then I said—" "Purr, slay, keep going going" "... Alaska, what the fuck"

CA & FL

[Insert all canon interactions here]

"Why the fuck is your park so small? There's nothing to do here!" "Dude at least you can get inside the park at a reasonable time, how long are your lines and how high is your prices?!"

Florida calls California "Calcal" because there's "Norcal and Socal and since you're California, Calcal." California has long since accepted the nickname. Florida won't stop using it

California keeps a whole slew of insults and comebacks up his sleeve all reserved for Florida. California... may or may not use Florida as a sort of training grounds for when he actually needs a deadly insult (Texas or Gov) he can actually use it with no remorse

They have movie nights together. All of impromptu and no planning. Florida just tends to be in the living room watching Lilo and Stitch before California, after spending the whole afternoon in his office, pops down and gets enthralled by the animation again and BAM movie night. They shares snacks but Florida keeps stealing the sweets so California hogs all the popcorn bowls

maybe i'll make a part 2 of this idk i just know these four have my braincells

[talesofsonicasura]

JTTW96! Sun Wukong with a Cyber Sleuth s/o

Consider this my practice for any JTTW fics I write in the future. I'll be using the 1996 iteration for this. The Digimon partner for this will be Herissmon mainly because I want to get rid of the sourness that Digimon ReArise left behind on my favorite Digimon. This is merely the build up as a later headcanon will 'tie the knot'.

You don't need to know anything about Digimon. I'll fill in the blanks when it comes up. Cyber Sleuths are basically a detective that take jobs given by Digimon and Humans. This can be read as gender neutral or preferred gender. This is Herissmon! 👇

How you met Sun Wukong could easily be described as a crash landing.

Your latest client needed help finding parts for an experiment of theirs. It didn't sound hard so you and your partner Herissmon took the job.

What you didn't expect was for the both of you to get swept up in a massive storm that came outta nowhere. At least the job been finished before this sudden catastrophe.

Next thing you knew you were falling out of the sky and landed on something fuzzy. In time to look up to at the unamused face of Sun Wukong. Herissmon fell on Zhu Bajie who had kissed the dirt from impact.

This conversation was going to be awkwardly limited cause you knew Journey To The West by heart and anything digital related would go over their heads.

So with help from Herissmon, you made a reliable half lie. That the two of you were adventurers on a simple quest only to get dragged up by a freak storm right after.

Some of Tripitaka's disciples mainly Sha Wujing and Sun Wukong were a bit skeptical but thankfully bought it. Neither of you wanted an unnecessary fight, especially with the Monkey King.

Herrissmon and you were about to leave until Tripitaka offered to join them on their quest. Bless this kind monk very so but all it would do was make Sun Wukong even more suspicious.

Declining the offer, you and your partner left in hopes of finding a place to think. So imagine your damn luck running into the group once again not even three days later.

Apparently the universe or Buddha wanted you together as you guys kept coming across each other on multiple occasions whether it be in the wilderness or a village.

Whenever that happened, you guys would often share information, trade some stuff or have a meal together. Any info given was more of a heads up like proper clothing or supplies needed. Nothing that could practically illuminate the next big challenge on their journey.

This time Tripitaka had gotten kidnapped (again) by a competent yet cocky yaoguai. This one however, could create a barrier invulnerable to every attack. And the only way to shatter it is with a power that is 'otherworldly'.

You know there would be big consequences if Tripitaka got killed but showing your otherworldly nature would put a target on your and your partner's back.

Thankfully Herissmon gave you assurance to make a decision. That they would be with you no matter what. So, the two of you decided to help them.

Getting to the yaoguai's lair wasn't really difficult. Not surprising as they practically gloated enough to have an open door policy.

You all found Tripitaka being lowered to a bubbling vat of stew as the demon lord in question sat in his throne with an audience.

Seeing you and Herissmon had the asshole mocking all of you especially Sun Wukong. About how low he sunken to get help from a lowly human and pitiful yaoguai.

Consider yourself and your partner royally pissed off. The yaoguai didn't gloat much longer when you activated your unique hacking skill: Biomerge.

An ability that allowed you and Herissmon to fuse into a powerful Digimon known as Rasenmon specifically its Fury Mode this time.

Jaws practically dropping when everyone saw the 'lowly human' and 'pitiful yaoguai' merge to an unholy 9 tailed abomination.

Said demon lord pulled up their barrier thinking Rasenmon Fury Mode wouldn't be able to breakthrough. The two of you practically laughed when you tore the barrier apart with your shared claws as if it was wet paper.

You carefully freed Tripitaka from his bindings and looked at all his disciples with an evil grin. "What do you guys say about getting some payback?"

The yaoguai was practically shitting himself from the wicked gleam in the disciples' eyes. Especially the Monkey King's that burned in fiery light.

In short, they were subjected to an all out pummeling from Sha Wujing, Zhu Bajie, Sun Wukong and Rasenmon Fury Mode. Ending the fight with a team attack using Sun Wukong's clones on all of your tails to unleash a vicious Desperate Vortex.

You and your partner let out a proud roar in your shared body before splitting back to your normal selves. The Monkey King practically shouted 'I knew there was something off about you two! Now pay up!'

Those three assholes must've made a bet earlier from how unamused the Tang Monk seemed to be. Herissmon did get him to crack a smile with your personal saying: 'Sometimes humor can help ease one's own tension after disaster'.

Imagine your surprise when you and partner were about to leave, the Monkey King made an offer to join their group. It was usually Tripitaka that kept offering.

Normally you would've turned them down but at this point, you couldn't lie that you gotten attached. For once, you agreed much to the delight of the group and Herissmon.

Things were bound to get crazier from here on out but it wouldn't be so bad. Although did you imagine a relieved look on Sun Wukong's face? Who knows.

The Monkey King would honestly start a betting pool when it comes to shit like this. I've seen a lot of fics and headcanons involving someone from modern times or the 'real world' get sent into a world where it's a considered story there.

I honestly think that shows/games,etc are glimpses of another world written done into works of fiction. That they are 'real' in their own way or reality. Kinda like a Schrodinger's cat in multiverse terms.

Anyway, stories involving this archetype are quite tricky and I've only seen a few done right. Mainly on the appropriate actions to take but the character's presence subtly changing things without any action on their part.

Something that will happen with headcanons such as this down the road. You'll see, until next time folks. Here's Rasenmon Fury Mode! 👇

My distaste for Digimon ReArise has been put at the bottom. Read if you want.

Now, my beef with Digimon ReArise. It's a mobile game I used to play for years since it first came out. Everything was well and good until recent updates came in.

Removal of every previous plugin from the Clash Battle store. Plugins are basically equipment to boost your Digimon's stats. New plugins made for specific Digimon having a limited time to be bought before disappearing and will only come back if the Digimon comes back in the Gacha.

The Gacha in question feeling more rigged than usual. When the game started, I always had a good chance of getting the main Digimon for it. Sometimes I came out with nothing and it really didn't bother me.

But lately I began to notice my pools started to feel off. Too many repeats of common Digimon despite the chances for the Featured ones being much higher. Or that there been an increase of players with those Featured Digimon who were always on top of the board in the Battle Park or Tournament mode and a very sharp decrease for those in lower ranks.

Then came the Super Digimon. Digimon with extremely high stats that could decimate even well prepared teams. Considering how harder it was to get any Featured Digimon which are now Supers, I couldn't keep up in Tournaments.

I couldn't get any new Digimon, even if I grinded my heart out for the currency needed in-game. I ain't paying real cash. I bulked up my team as best I could and put the best plugins I could get. And all that hard work being demolished in seconds by these new Super Digimon, even if they were 50 levels lower.

Something that honestly hurts cause unlike Pokemon, you can't cheese out with strategies using low level and untouched Digimon. It made all the hard work I've done now worthless.

So I mentioned how the gacha felt off and there was the last straw. Imagine having your opinion get scoffed at by not just other people but one of the moderators to the Discord itself. Told that once you 'get on their level' that you can come back and talk. How someone spent over 2000 and more in game currency to not get anything?

I played this game for fun ever since the start. But how am I supposed when you can't even make any sort of progress? And to be told by an administrator to 'Get on their level then come back?'

At this point, the game I once played for two years had become a pay to win. I've played JRPGs before, a whole lot and I know when something is a pay to win. I've stopped playing stuff like it. And thus, I left the Discord alongside deleting the game.

It honestly hurts when something you spent so much time and been part of your own childhood gets turned into something like this. When the new Digimon you love become sour. Then have that shoved into your face rudely.

[mayihavethisdanse]

“What is this, the Dark Ages?”

Or, Arthurian themes and allusions in the Brotherhood of Steel mythos as seen in Fallout 4. (But that’s a lot of words.)

Yep. We're doing this. 

First, some obligatory caveats: there is no single Arthurian canon, just 1500 years of assorted fanfic based on the whims of whoever was writing at the time. For this extremely highbrow Tumblr meta, I have ignored most of it and drawn on my favorites. Also Wikipedia.

Also, I am not an expert in Arthurian literature (or Fallout lore, come to that), and I preemptively beg the pardon of anyone who is.

Finally, in no way am I claiming that all these parallels and thematic echoes are deliberate or even significant. In fact, I'd break it down into:

Clearly deliberate allusions, whether in or out of universe;

Probably coincidence, but could be someone deliberately capitalizing on a coincidental similarity;

Almost certainly coincidence, but fun to speculate about; annnnd

Blatant Monty Python references. (Because of course there are.)

I'll start with the big one.

Arthur Maxson, boy king and unifier

(source)

So across all the retellings and variations of King Arthur’s life story, there are a few consistent elements, particularly in his early life and rise to power. Some of these threads are echoed in the Fallout universe, specifically (and unsurprisingly) in the person of Arthur Maxson.

Both the legendary King Arthur and Arthur Maxson were born with a claim to power lying in their ancestry, both were fostered away from their families, and both proved themselves in combat at a young age. 

King Arthur united the warring kingdoms of Britain into a single entity, making them stronger against outsiders and receiving general admiration and acclaim. Arthur Maxson united the divided factions of the BoS after the events of Fallout 3 and is held in similarly high regard by his men.

The name Prydwen is a reference to the ship of the original King Arthur. Presumably, Arthur Maxson (or someone in the BoS who anticipated his promotion) christened the airship in a deliberate homage to the Arthurian myth.

King Arthur is associated with his legendary sword. I think it’s notable that Maxson’s legend is associated with a bladed weapon, too. ("He killed a DEATHCLAW with a COMBAT KNIFE!”)

Probably coincidence, but fun: the historical emperor Magnus Maximus, who pops up a lot in early Arthurian legend, was known in Welsh as... Macsen. (⌐■_■)

Round Table, but make it dieselpunk

(Continued under the cut.)

Moving away from obvious allusions and into some looser parallels:

Like the Round Table, the Brotherhood is an exclusive knightly order with its leader being the one able to open it up to his chosen few.

Like the Round Table, the BoS sees itself as defending human civilization against forces of chaos. (I’ll touch on their tech-hoarding tendencies when I get to the Grail stuff.) This idea of civilization in the face of chaos goes back to the BoS’s founding, even though the level of isolationism we see in most of the Fallout franchise is not exactly what founder Roger Maxson had in mind: “Notably, Maxson's ultimate intention was to establish the Brotherhood as an organization that works closely with people outside of the Brotherhood, as guardians of civilizations, not its gatekeepers.” (source) In a lot of ways, Arthur Maxson represents a return to his ancestor’s original ideals.

Renegade knights? Internal politics? Traitors within? We gotchu.

In both the medieval legends and in all chapters of the BoS we’ve seen, there’s a big focus on bloodlines (ew). Ironically, it’s probably Arthur Maxson’s unquestionable ancestry that allows him to be more progressive than either of his East Coast predecessors when it comes to boosting Brotherhood numbers by recruitment (even though you can still see a clear division between “born Brotherhood” and recruited soldiers, but that’s a topic for another day). Maxson sees himself as an Elder who "cares for the people"—however misguided and patronizing that attitude might be—and whatever else you might say about the guy, you can't say he doesn't believe he has a duty. Which brings us to…

Know Your Enemy: Danse as Gawain

Before I start this section, an acknowledgement of authorial bias:

Gawain, as portrayed in the Middle English poem Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, is my very favorite of King Arthur’s knights. (Other stories aren't always as flattering, but like I said at the outset: I'm sticking to the ones I like.)

That poem is my very favorite piece of medieval Arthurian literature. In this section, I'll refer to the modern English translation by Simon Armitage.

...that’s it, I have no other biases to disclose. 

What? 👀

(Art: Clive Hicks-Jenkins)

All right. So in Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, you’ve got this himbo loyal knight of Arthur’s who finds himself caught up in... you know what, let me just paste in the Wikipedia summary. (The Toast, RIP, also did a pretty entertaining and more-or-less accurate recap.)

It describes how Sir Gawain, a knight of King Arthur's Round Table, accepts a challenge from a mysterious "Green Knight" who dares any knight to strike him with his axe if he will take a return blow in a year and a day. Gawain accepts and beheads him with his blow, at which the Green Knight stands up, picks up his head and reminds Gawain of the appointed time. In his struggles to keep his bargain, Gawain demonstrates chivalry and loyalty until his honour is called into question by a test involving the lord and the lady of the castle where he is a guest.

Don’t worry too much about the plot details, though; for this post, I’m more interested in the thematic parallels. The Green Knight story is full of contrasts: order vs. chaos, civilization vs. wilderness, mortal man vs. Other... but let’s start with Gawain himself. 

Some stuff to know about Gawain:

He was "as good as the purest gold, devoid of vices but virtuous and loyal". Gawain took his principles more seriously even than the rest of Arthur’s knights, not out of pride but out of humility: "I would rather drop dead than default from duty," he says. 

He’s faithful and honorable and never even tempted to betray an oath, even when offered every variety of seduction and riches, except for a single moment of weakness in a desperate desire not to be executed for random shit by powerful forces for reasons he doesn't understand.  

Even though he doesn’t really understand why he needs to die, he sticks to his oath. Gawain's one weakness is a moment of desperate, private, human desire for survival. He'll submit to the headsman’s axe if he has to, but he'd still rather live. 

Above all, Gawain is the ideal of a human man: he might be the bravest and loyal man there is, but he’s still fundamentally human.

You can probably see where I'm going with this.

A few more fun facts about Gawain that resonate with Paladin Danse’s story:

He’s got a bunch of really shitty brothers. (No comment.)

Gawain (SPOILERS!) doesn't actually end up beheaded, but he does willingly kneel for his execution and gets a cut on the throat as a reminder of his sin. And, uh, Danse can also get his throat cut! It doesn’t end as nicely but it’s, you know, a thing that can happen.

Gawain might be a really good guy, and he tries really hard to be one, but in the end he’s nothing more than that: there’s nothing supernatural about him, he has no special powers beyond his own principles and devotion. He’s just a dude doing his Best. 

Wait, why not Danselot?

Oh, that guy? Here’s the thing.

Lancelot personifies the continental ideals of courtly love that became popular in the High Middle Ages. Central to his story is the prioritization of personal relationships and romantic feelings in a way that you don’t really see in Gawain's, at least in the Green Knight tale. (Later stories hook Gawain up with an extremely delightful lady, but even that is a different flavor of romance than Lancelot's and has more to do with Gawain honoring his word and his egalitarian treatment of women (hell yeah). In the poem, Gawain is impressed by Bertilak's wife but resists her temptation; in fact, the biggest risk is not that he'll yield to her advances but that he'll be discourteous to her, i.e., violate his principles and cause dishonor to his king and his host.)

Lancelot is driven by passions over principles in a way that Gawain never really is (at least in the stories I’m talking about; later writers have committed character assassination to various degrees). Yes, you could argue that both Gawain and Lancelot betray their oaths, but Lancelot’s betrayal is never, um, blind. He knows what he’s doing and makes a deliberate choice to prioritize his love for the queen over his love for the king. It doesn’t make him a bad guy—he too is an ideal knight with one fatal flaw—but his character isn’t as comparable to Paladin Danse. 

Yeah, Gawain is (in most stories) a prince and a kinsman of Arthur’s, but he’s ultimately a native boy who doesn’t break the mold of a Knight of the Round Table. Likewise, Danse is portrayed as competent and valuable to the BoS, but not exceptional or breaking the mold of what a BoS soldier should be: he simply represents the ideal. Meanwhile, Lancelot is a foreign prince who was marked from childhood as special and fancy, and his storyline goes alllll over the place. (Much like this post.)

For example, Lancelot goes to absolutely absurd extremes to prove his devotion for no other reason than to prove it. (“I’ll do any useless humiliating thing you want. I’ll betray every oath except the one I made to you. That’s what love is!”) Gawain would never. Danse would never.

Ultimately, Gawain's tests are of his character and not of his love. And like Gawain, Danse’s devotion is to service and his principles, not to another person—even Arthur Maxson.

All that said, there are some similarities: both are beloved by Arthur, both are held up as the ideal of what a knight should be. And even if their fatal flaws are different, both make the point that no matter how good and brave and loyal they might be, no human being can be perfect. 

(Except Galahad. Who is, as a result, very boring.) 

I’ll conclude this section with a quote from someone else’s take on the Greek Knight poem:

I like Gawain. He’s not perfect, but he’s trying his best which is all any of us can do. He’s not like the other knights in the Arthurian legends who occasionally ‘accidentally’ kill women on their little adventures and then feel hard done by when they have to deal with the consequences of that. Gawain holds himself to a high standard – higher, it seems, than Arthur and his knights hold him to considering how hard they laugh when Gawain tells them how bad he feels about the whole thing.

I think Gawain is very relatable in this story. We all want to be better than we actually are.

And that, more than anything else, is Danse.

The Grail myth

What’s that? Lost relics of power? Better send some large armed men after ‘em!

The parallels to the BoS’s tech-hoarding ways are obvious enough that the games themselves lampshade them (albeit by way of Monty Python). But it also ties into the larger themes of “purity” versus “corruption” and the BoS’s self-image as a bastion between civilization and chaos. (See Maxson's line in response to the Sole Survivor’s quip about the Dark Ages: “Judging from the state of the world, it wouldn't be a stretch to say we're living in that era again.”)

But the ultimate futility of the Grail mission is also worthy of note. The BoS might want the power of prewar tech on their side, but they’re no more to be trusted with it than any other group of human beings. No matter how they try, the “corruption” of humanity can’t be overcome as long as they’re striving to harness power for their own ends. You can only achieve power by surrendering control of it.

The death of Arthur

The nature of gameplay being what it is, it's not guaranteed that the Arthur figure will be fatally betrayed, bringing Camelot down with him—but it's not unlikely, either.

Awkward.

Some final spitballing:

Outside the Brotherhood, there are some fun parallels of the Arthur myth with the rest of Fallout 4. Betrayal by one’s own son, for example.

The key difference between the BoS and the legendary Round Table: King Arthur’s knights, for all their flaws and human weaknesses, are usually presented as unambiguous Good Guys. The BoS is... a little more ambiguous...

...but damn if they don’t think they're the good guys. 

A-ad victoriam, fellas!

[lieutenant-catboy-little]

us forest service au part the third

The Non-Technician Permanent Employees (okay i didn’t do a great job of organizing these i’ll admit it)

-this is set in some [fictional] very remote town in the western cascades/western cascades foothills (bc that’s my stomping ground)

-North Terrebus Ranger District on the Terrebus National Forest

-this is terribly american but i know very little abt forestry in england so

-franklin is the district ranger, and crozier and jfj are both supervisors on his district

-jop and billy gibson are admin assistants, but bc it’s the forest service they do basically everything the others don’t -- cleaning, inventory, customer service, maintenance etc.

-jop’s favorite supervisor is crozier -- they know each other from before jop was hired -- and he absolutely gives crozier preferential treatment (but he’s not rude to anyone else unless they deserve it! unless.)

-jop gets his redcard (firefighter qualification) at crozier’s insistence and goes on a fire detail when they’re desperate for bodies, knocks it out of the park

    -he keeps his amin assistant job but goes on fire details when he wants to switch things up

    -why would he get covered in poison oak, step on wasp nests, and destroy his joints when for the same pay he can be sneaky and indispensable in the air-conditioned office

-somehow jopson has programmed the radio in the timber bullpen (where his desk is) to scan more channels than any other radio; he pretends he doesn’t know how he did it

    -ed forgets his lunch about once every two weeks and jopson always somehow hears about it and has something waiting for him (ed’s favorite? What a coincidence!) when he gets back from the field

        -ed. King. jop is begging u. 

-bridgens, goodsir, mcdonald, blanky, collins, and stanley are resource specialists

-goodsir is the fish/hydro specialist :’)

-he loves fish biology and is competent in the field but there’s no way this man was a hydro tech. The first time he has to help with riparian surveys he gets so tangled up in vine maple he can’t move and the others have to free him

-bridgens is botany!!! 

-He knows so many latin names by heart and loves to go out with seasonals and work on their plant id 

-He has a HUGE bookshelf in his office (plant id, field guides, ecology, textbooks, conservation philosophy, narrative nonfiction), and anyone is welcome to it

-if no one else is talking on a hike, he will keep a running commentary of every plant he sees and what facts he knows about it

-mcdonald is the wildlife specialist! 

-He definitely hunts (affectionate) 

-Because a lot of his knowledge comes from informal sources (his family/local knowledge), he believes in everyone’s ability to advance, regardless of background

    -he and goodsir are both wilderness first-aid certified, so they’re the go-tos for injuries

        -stanley is actually an emt but is not the go-to for injuries

-silna is a wildlife tech and technically under mcdonald’s supervision. She is extremely good at her job, and will 100% succeed mcdonald when he retires. She also does some interpretation for visitors about wildlife safety

-you KNOW blanky is the soil guy

-He HAS the “SOIL” shirt. His car DOES have a bumper sticker that says “start seeing SOIL”. He tells seasonals who are annoying him to “go huff some soil. Maybe you’ll calm down or experience a life-changing revelation”. 

-absolute legend, bonkers smart. 

-Came up through fire; worked on all the biggest fires of about ~15-25 years ago and has tons of stories: felled a hazard tree that almost dropped a burning branch on him, jerry-rigged a broken water truck, got caught on a breached fireline after the fire crowned over it

    -after a severe injury caused him to lose a lot of mobility in his left leg, took time to finish his degree and get the job he has now

    -still spends more time in the field than most resource specialists 

-Stanley is the NEPA (National Environmental Planning Act) specialist -- detail-oriented and mean but tragically essential 

-Sits in his office all day poring over court cases and laws and sending both important and pedantic edits back on everyone’s environmental assessments

-everyone learns early on to ask bridgens or mcdonald for advice on NEPA stuff before going to stanley

-collins is the GIS (geographic information systems) specialist

-also used to work in fire, but transitioned to this role after witnessing the death (heart attack) of one of his crew members

    -open about his PTSD and advocate for more mental health resources for wildland firefighters/employees in general

-very good mentor, listening ear for anyone (especially the seasonals)

    -keeps a beanbag in his office and Aldo, his emotional support dog, is usually available if someone has had a bad day