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miss-musings · 3 months ago

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I agree with so many of these points, all around!

As much as I loved Crosshair's S3 arc, I was a bit frustrated that we didn't get to see him do more to atone for his past crimes. We get a few crumbs of him being selfless or helping people, but I would've like a lot more.

Ultimately, I think you're right: he didn't really have a change in morals. He had a change in priorities, in perspective.

I do think he saw that what the Empire was doing was "bad." When we see him in his quarters after the mission to Desix in 2.03, he's clearly been unable to sleep. Like, maybe the choices he made on Desix and Cody's words are haunting him.

However, I think he was able to justify it to himself for a number of reasons: the first and foremost being that -- as he says -- he's a soldier and does what's needed.

Something I don't think we in the TCW/TBB fandom talk about enough is how morally reprehensible the clones' missions and decisions were during The Clone Wars. The Republic is more or less framed as "the good guys," but by modern standards, some of their battle tactics are ... questionable, to say the least. I mean, all those "War Crimes during the Clone Wars" videos exist for a reason.

We don't get to spend a lot of time with Clone Force 99 in "The Clone Wars" show, but the very first mission we hear about is them "putting down an insurrection on Yalbec Prime." This mission -- for whatever reason -- included cutting off the queen's stinger while she was still alive!?! Assuming the Yalbecs are kinda like the Geonosians -- buglike aliens who are sentient -- that's really messed up. Even if you wanna assume the Yalbecs are essentially animals, that'd be like a IRL person bragging that they cut off a rhino's horn while it was still alive. Like, WTF??

Later, once we see CF99 in action, they are very trigger-happy. They love shooting up and destroying droids. And even when they're face-to-face with the Poletecs in 7.02, they seem a little more aggressive than was necessary. I'm pretty sure if Rex hadn't been with them and specifically emphasized that they were to disarm only, CF99 might've handled that very differently.

(SIDE NOTE: I'd also like to point out that TBB S1 has a bit of a double-standard about CF99 members committing war crimes. Crosshair's dark deeds in 1.03 are treated with the weight they deserve. He kills an unarmed/surrendered combatant, then kills one of his own troopers, then orders his colleagues to kill civilians. And this is all given the appropriate dark tone and neon signs saying "This is f*cked up" that it deserves. Meanwhile, in 1.08, Wrecker throws two clone troopers to their deaths -- and I'm pretty sure one or both of them were unarmed -- and it's treated like a joke. Like, WTF?!?! Why is the show OK with Wrecker killing an unarmed clone trooper(s)? He could've easily stunned them, but he actually takes the time to pick them up and throw them to their deaths, and it's framed like it's supposed to be funny ... or a good thing... I'm sorry, but I just have a problem with that.)

EDIT/ADDITION: Let’s also not forget that CF99 had a 100% mission success rate before Kaller AND they didn’t formally report to anyone like Rex and other clones did. So, I would not be at all surprised if they were committing war crimes on a regular basis, especially before Echo joined them. Maybe not “murdering civilians” levels of bad, but still nothing fantastic.

This is all to say that CF99 carried out their missions and did what needed to be done. Sure, they were maybe a bit aggressive and trigger-happy, but they didn't actually hurt any civilians... on-screen.

Then we start with "The Bad Batch" show and the events in 1.01 "Aftermath." I honestly think the writers used this episode to do a "soft makeover" of some characters' personalities. Hunter and Crosshair both seem slightly different than their TCW selves. Hunter is much softer and more compassionate, while Crosshair is even more prickly and aggressive than he was in TCW -- to the point where even his brothers struggle to get along with him.

Now, Crosshair's shift seems partly because of the inhibitor chip. Unlike his brothers, he's more than happy to kill a group of unarmed civilians because "they were plotting against the Emperor."

And while CF99 might've done some morally questionable things during their time in The Clone Wars, they do draw the line at murdering civilians.

And to be clear, Hunter & co. made the right decision. Crosshair and his Imperial squad commit actual war crimes when they return to Onderon in 1.03 "The Replacements." While Crosshair was under the influence of the inhibitor chip at the time, based on what he does later in S1-2, I don't know if he would've done anything differently if he was acting of his own free will.

In my mind, he removed the chip not because the Empire was using it to control him and commit atrocities, but because he almost killed his family while under its influence.

He seems to have no qualms about helping the Empire invade and oppress planets. He only reaches his breaking point when he sees that -- for all the clones' sacrifices -- the Empire treats them as disposable.

That was something Hunter tried to warn him about in 1.15, but Crosshair thought because he was "superior" that he would be immune. He thought he would have a place in the Empire, that he mattered to them, but he didn't.

Ultimately, I think Crosshair stayed with the Empire for a variety of reasons:

Being a soldier was all he'd ever known, and he didn't want to "drift" through the galaxy the way his brothers were, without purpose, and "scavenge like rats" just to put food on the table

He was upset with his brothers for abandoning him

The Empire gave him respect, authority and purpose -- at least initially

The Sunken Cost Fallacy -- he'd already invested so much of his life and energy into serving the Empire, he wanted to see it pay off (probably in terms of a promotion or something)

However, none of these reasons were based on morality or what the Empire supposedly offered people.

In 2.03, Cody says that the Empire establishes peace throughout the galaxy, but this is something Crosshair never talks about. Quite the opposite, in fact. He specifically tells Hunter in 1.16 that the Empire will "control the entire galaxy," and that he's eager to be a part of it.

So, while Cody and other clones might see the Empire as "the Republic but just under a different name" and that they were still working to establish peace and order just like they had during the Clone Wars, Crosshair never mentions this as a reason for staying with the Empire.

Ultimately, Crosshair's character doesn't seem to be one who is driven by morality. He and his brothers probably did all sorts of morally questionable or reprehensible things during the Clone Wars, so maybe he felt like he needed a "compass," rather than a moral code, to guide him and his choices. And that "compass" was loyalty.

Crosshair is loyal to those who are loyal to him.

His brothers abandon him but the Empire doesn't. Along with a continued purpose, it also promotes him and gives him a new squad.

In late S1 but especially in S2, we can see that Crosshair might be second-guessing his loyalty to the Empire. He's stranded on Kamino for 32 days; he's demoted; and no one outside of Cody and ~maybe~ Rampart seem to respect him.

But, that loyalty is finally broken when the Empire leaves him and Mayday for dead and makes it very clear that he is disposable. So, Crosshair turns on them. That's even how he frames it to Hunter in 3.05:

Crosshair: So, yes, I did betray them. After they betrayed me.

So, as you discussed, he rejects his identity as a soldier. He would rather die or be imprisoned for treason than continue to serve an institution that would throw him away like garbage.

Then in late S2 and S3, with his loyalty to the Empire broken, it reverts back to his family. He tries to warn them; he helps Omega escape; he helps Hunter during the fight with the Ice Wyrm; and so on.

Yes, I would've loved getting more glimpses of him atoning for all the terrible things he did with the Empire. And yes, now that you've pointed it out, I do have a problem with how Howzer's beef with Crosshair is framed in 3.06/3.07.

But, I will say: Crosshair did a very big thing in opening up about the CX operatives in 3.06.

Considering how traumatized Crosshair was from his time on Tantiss, I imagine it wasn't easy to talk about how Hemlock tried to turn him into an operative. So, while it arguably wasn't enough to make amends with Howzer, it was at least a step in the right direction.

Crosshair also saves Howzer's life later in 3.07 when CX-2 kills Nemec and Crosshair pushes Howzer out of the way.

(Also, regarding the 3.06 scene where Howzer's like "remember me?" and Crosshair just blinks... maybe he legitimately didn't remember Howzer. I'm playing Devil's Advocate here, but Ryloth was probably 15-18 months before the events of 3.06, and we don't know how long Crosshair was on Ryloth or how many times he and Howzer interacted. We only see a few exchanges between them. Plus, after being imprisoned and tortured on Tantiss for six months, Crosshair might not have immediately have recognized Howzer. So that awkward stare and blink might've been him trying to remember how/where he knows Howzer from because it's before Howzer mentions Ryloth.)

Once Crosshair and his brothers put their lives as soldiers behind them for good and permanently settle on Pabu, I'd hope that Crosshair:

Does whatever he can to atone for his past crimes

Develops a better moral compass than "I'm loyal to those who are loyal to me"

Gets some much-needed therapy

Still, while it wasn't perfect, S3 did a good enough job of making me believe Crosshair is a better person -- or rather, that he's realized who is really worthy of his loyalty. I mean, he didn't offer to help Ventress on board until after she'd proven herself by saving Omega, and even then, he still had doubts and questions about her.

I'd love to see a post-Tantiss comic or get a cameo of them in a possible Clone Rebellion show, because I do think Crosshair is on a better path but he arguably still has a long way to go.

Hot take:

Crosshair does not have the Imperial disillusionment and redemption arc of The Bad Batch

Emerie does.

Crosshair has an arc for sure yes but it's not that.

I was thinking about this scene:

and how it got right what this scene kinda didn't:

(It was so close but then bad writing decided to undercut the moment with a joke rip)

And I think it's really interesting that these characters who were more or less raised into the Empire/First Order and chose to leave it are all directly asked why.

But take a look at Crosshair's answers in comparison:

Different context for the asking, yes, but still, compare that to clones like Howzer, Cody, Slip and Cade who left or turned against the Empire because they knew what the Empire is doing is wrong and they weren't just going to blindly follow orders:

Crosshair - Loyalty, Purpose, and Survival

Crosshair didn't choose to join the Empire (though the show isn't very clear or consistent about how much control the inhibitor chips have) but he did, for whatever reason, choose to stay. By the end of S1 we know his chip has been removed and as he definitively says "This is who I am." There were likely still other influences on his decision, but listen to how he talks about the Empire in the S1 finale:

Hunter: Crosshair, I've seen what the Empire is doing. Occupying planets and silencing anyone who stands against them. You know it's not right. Crosshair: You still don’t see the bigger picture, but you will. Hunter: Can't you see they're using you?

Crosshair: We’re not like the regs, we never have been. We’re superior. The Empire can’t protect the galaxy without strength, this is what we were made for. Think of all we could do, together!

Crosshair: You all are meant for more than drifting through the galaxy. It’s time to stop running. Join the Empire, and you will have purpose again.

Hunter: They destroyed an entire city! Crosshair: They did what needed to be done. Kamino, regs, the Republic, that time is over. The Empire will control the entire galaxy, and I am going to be a part of it. Hunter: Don't fool yourself. All you'll ever be to them is a number.

He undeniably knows what the Empire is doing, but he does not care. In fact it sure sounds like he actually supports it and finds self-meaning in it. Hunter spends those episodes trying to convince him it's wrong, he doesn't change his mind. In the end they offer him an out and he doesn't take it.

Wrecker: You coming with us? Crosshair: None of this changes anything. Hunter: You offered us a chance, Crosshair. This is yours. Crosshair: I made my decision.

The next we see Crosshair in "The Solitary Clone" (S2:E3) he follows orders and shoots the Desix governor, right after Cody heartbreakingly tries to do what's right and find a peaceful solution.

Cody: Tell me something, Crosshair. This new Empire, are we making the galaxy better? Crosshair: We’re soldiers, we do what needs to be done. Cody: You know what makes us different from battle droids? We make our own decisions, our own choices. And we have to live with them too.

After this (glorious!) conversation, Crosshair stays. Maybe this began to seed some doubts, but he actually smiles a few scenes later when Rampart assigns him another mission. It seems like for him it truly is as he said in S1:E1 (chip not enhanced yet but still influencing him enough for his brothers to notice he's acting strange):

Crosshair: Republic, Empire... what's the difference.

Crosshair: Orders are orders.

This unethical mission that finally pushed Cody over the edge does not change Crosshair's mind about the Empire, at least not enough for him to take action.

But what does?

Mayday: And here we are, the survivors. Combat troopers stuck babysitting cargo shipments. Crosshair: Mission’s a mission. Mayday: Yeah, I used to say the same thing.

Mayday: After all the clones have done, all we’ve sacrificed. We’re good soldiers, we followed orders. And for what?

This mission has nothing to do with how the fascist Empire treats the galaxy, it's about how they treat their soldiers. It's about how Mayday loyally fought and served his whole life and Lieutenant Nolan let him die

Lt Nolan: He served his purpose as a soldier of the Empire. Crosshair: You could have saved him! Lt Nolan: Perhaps you didn’t hear me, he is expendable, as are you.

Crosshair thought he could find purpose within the Empire, and Nolan shows him exactly what that will be.

His turning point is accompanied with this powerful visual of the ice vulture, a symbol (and threat) of death, and also set up within the episode a symbol of survival:

Mayday: Vicious creatures, but you have to admire ‘em. They find a way to survive.

This critical moment (that gives me chills, oof this episode is a masterpiece!) comes right after Nolan calls him expendable and directly threatens him:

Lt Nolan: And if you speak to me again with such disrespect I'll see to it you meet a similar fate, clone.

then Crosshair sees the vulture's shadow and turns to Mayday's dead body (ahh visual storytelling my beloved) then makes his decision:

Crosshair turns against the Empire not because he believes Hunter was right about this:

Hunter: I've seen what the Empire is doing ... You know it's not right.

but because he was right about this:

Hunter: All you'll ever be to them is a number.

Redemption (both in fiction and irl in my humble opinion) comes with making amends and reparations (which is why death 'redemptions' bother me so much but that's a rant for another time). Unlike Emerie, Crosshair never explicitly denounces the Empire or his own actions within it. He never says anything to specifically show if and how his views have changed from what he said on Kamino. He makes amends with his family (sending the warning message, helping Omega escape, making up with Hunter) but that's about it. The most we get in terms of acknowledgement is this:

Crosshair: I thought I knew what I was getting into with the Empire. I thought I was being a good soldier. Hunter: Nobody really understood what was happening back then. Crosshair: I’ve... done things. I’ve made mistakes. Hunter: I have regrets too, Crosshair. All we can do is keep trying to be better, and who knows there just might be hope for us yet.

Which is nice and all but it's more about them making up as brothers so it's way too excusing tbh ("no one knew what was happening back then" ummm? "The Empire will control the entire galaxy, and I am going to be a part of it" remember? And even if at first Crosshair was being controlled by the chip, the fact that he chose to stay after it was removed* means he condones and is therefore still accountable for those actions).

There's also a bit of self-destructive guilt:

Crosshair: Omega, don't risk anything for me. I belong in here.

Crosshair: Omega needs you both. So I’m doing this alone, it’s what I deserve. Hunter: Don’t even think about plan 99, Crosshair. Omega needs all of us.

(which thank you Hunter for pushing back on the death redemption bs and oh look is that a wrap up for the purpose thing?)

But there's no action taken on his part to make up for what he's done or to stand against the Empire (aside from the bare minimum of help with Tantiss, only after it became personally relevant, which like yeah he had trauma to deal with but still).

While I do think the implications/follow-up of Crosshair's turn should have been handled better in S3 (like rip Howzer! he deserved an apology, but that's a rant for another time), I don't necessarily** think this arc is a bad writing choice. It's just saying different things than we expect:

Maybe Crosshair's story is not about standing up against an unjust system, like we see with many other characters (who deserved more screen time but that's a rant for another timeeee). Maybe his story is about how even those who are loyal to the Empire, who actually believe in it, still suffer under and within it's rule. Not to garner sympathy, but to show that there is no winning.

Crosshair has another 'so what changed' convo in S3:E14 with Rampart, in which they draw parallels to each other:

Rampart: You used to believe good soldiers followed orders. Crosshair: Depends on who's giving them. The Empire betrayed us both. Rampart: And you think you can fight them? That's not you. You're like me, loyal to no one but yourself. Crosshair: I've changed.

(note how he says who's giving the orders, not what the orders are)

"Loyal to no one but yourself" describes Rampart much more than Crosshair, since we often saw Crosshair pride himself as a loyal soldier of the Empire whereas we saw Rampart abuse power to be self-serving within the Empire (like when he killed Wilco to save face). But they were both betrayed either way. Vice Admiral Rampart, snively Imperial opportunist through-and-through, shouts "I was following orders!" as he is arrested for the Empire's purposes.

Even Hemlock, the final boss immoral Imperial scientist, who has to be benefiting the most from this system, echoes the expendability idea:

Hemlock: What I am working on is beyond your understanding. Something so vital to the Empire it makes me indispensable.

Then there's CX-2, also set up as a parallel/foil to Crosshair (fight me), who in the end is discarded as no more than a weapon, a tool that served it's purpose, showing us what would have become of Crosshair if he had stayed.

There is no winning in the Empire. Loyalty is not rewarded, it "doesn't go both ways." Everyone has to fight for their value. Even high ranking individuals** who for a time benefit from the injustice, in the end are just pawns to be used up and cast aside at a whim for the Emperor's gain. Even people who are motivated by self-interest alone cannot survive within this system, the only viable option in this galaxy is to fight the Empire and dismantle that system. (unless you conveniently find a magically safe island to hide away on but that's a rAnT fOr AnOtHeR tImE)

Which brings us back to...

Emerie - Cooperation, Compassion, and Choice

(Okay this post has already gotten away from me but I still want to talk about her to show the contrasts.)

Emerie may not have been given a lot of screen time to really flesh out her development, but there is a lot that is pretty clearly implied with her:

Crosshair: They’ll never turn her [Omega] over. Hemlock: They don’t have a choice. She is a clone, and therefore Imperial property. *Camera cuts to an angle more centered on Emerie’s face*

Crosshair: Give me your access card! Emerie: It won’t get you outside!

Emerie: I tried to warn him what would happen if he did not cooperate with the Doctor.

Emerie: Prisoner? Omega, you are no such thing. It will take time to adjust, but you will acclimate. It is far safer in here than out there.

Emerie: You should go back to your room. Crosshair: You mean her cell?

Emerie: Why children? Hemlock: Children are easier to attain and more agreeable to the subjugations. They are unaware of why they are here and what they possess.

Emerie: They're children. Like I was... Was your plan to discard them too? Nala Se: The Empire will keep them in order to control them.

We don't know a lot about Emerie's background, but it's clear that she had a lot less choice than Crosshair and less opportunity or ability to leave. Unlike Crosshair, we never directly hear Emerie's views of the Empire (and she was most likely 'taken under Hemlock's wing' before the Empire even came to power), but lets look at how she talks about the Tantiss:

"Remain calm. Cooperate and you might survive."

"Don't make this worse, Crosshair! There is no escape!"

"All of us serve a purpose here."

"The Doctor will inform me, if it's necessary."

"It's best not to ask questions."

"Escape is not possible, Omega. This is for your own good."

She honestly does the best she can within the system she is also trapped in. She tries to help Crosshair, Omega, and the vault kids in the only way she knows how (warns Crosshair about the hounds and security, tries to protect Omega from Hemlock, tells Scorch his "actions were extreme" with Jax, insists on overseeing Bayrn's retrieval, double checks his m-count (to give him an out), and tries to find out where he came from). When she gives Omega, and later Eva, the doll, I think it shows just how little she really is able to do here (and it's kinda heartbreaking imo).

The framing of this shot especially (after Jax's escape attempt) visually shows how Emerie herself is trapped/imprisoned:

Despite the fact that very little of this is Emerie's fault, she has very little power and she is doing all she can, the narrative does not excuse her role in the Empire:

Nala Se: What will you do, Emerie? Emerie: There is nothing I can do. I don't have that kind of power. Nala Se: Don't you?

Emerie: I- I was doing my job. Echo: Yeah, I’ve heard that before. You’re a clone. How can you be part of this?

These fighting-the-Bystander-Effect conversations parallel these exchanges:

Hunter: We made a choice, and so did you. Crosshair: Soldiers follow orders. Hunter: Blind allegiance makes you a pawn.

Crosshair: We’re soldiers, we do what needs to be done. Cody: You know what makes us different from battle droids? We make our own decisions, our own choices. And we have to live with them too.

which did not change Crosshair's mind. And honestly, all respect to Echo's disappointed mom glare™ but I think it's clear Emerie had already made her decision, she just needed help to actually be able to do anything about it. When she stopped Echo, with her voice wavering on the verge of tears (ahhh v good voice acting), she clearly had no intention of turning him in. She's on her own in the Empire's most secure facility with very little resources, if she had tried anything on her own she most likely would have failed and been killed

Omega: Emerie, you don't have to do this. Emerie: (sigh) I’m sorry, but I do.

but as soon as she is enabled by an ally, she immediately turns around to help: giving information and getting Echo through security, helping the kids escape, and giving Omega the tablet that allows them to free the other clone prisoners.

Where Crosshair's turn is accompanied by the symbolic imagery of the ice vulture, Emerie's is the removal of her (literally rose-tinted!) glasses:

Symbolizing how she has shed her previous views/indoctrination that altered her perception of the Empire and blinded her to it's wrongs. It's disillusionment.

Emerie's story shows us that even those who are raised and indoctrinated into this system can, should, and will escape (with needed help). Even those who did not choose to be apart of the Empire and are not making the decisions still have the responsibility and ability to act on what they know is right.

Emerie, whose name means 'Home strength' 'Brave' and 'Powerful', and "reflects the importance of leadership and authority in the workplace".***

While Emerie is only in one more scene after her turn, so the wrap up is a bit rushed, she still very simply does what Crosshair does not:

Emerie: Because I was wrong about this place. And I'm trying to do the right thing.

Echo: I’m sure Senator Chuchi would find what you have to say very helpful for our cause. Emerie: I have a lot to make up for. I’d like to help out however I can.

She admits wrong, takes accountability, commits to making amends, and leaves with Echo to go take on the Empire (which hopefully we will get to actually see more of some day).

So, in short, she's showing us how redemption is done right!

---

Notes:

*Whether this writing choice was good/logical/in-character or not is another discussion entirely, but I'm going off of what we were given, what the show is presenting in the canon text and (reasonably inferred/intentional) subtext. Crosshair is pretty multifaceted and I could only touch on so much here. There's a lot of ways to interpret his character/choices, but I tried to avoid the realm of speculation or fanon explanations (even if they sometimes make more sense lol).

**History and political theory are not my area of expertise at all, so I have NO idea how well this aligns with real-world fascism stuff and therefore what implications this storytelling choice could have. I think the message of like 'if you think you could survive or gain power by doing what the Empire/fascist system wants you are wrong' could be good (like how everyone is actually harmed by the patriarchy type of a thing), but I hesitate bc maybe there are those who would benefit, since it's a hierarchal system, right? If anyone more knowledgeable than me has incite to share, by all means

Either way, I do think it works in-story and in-universe though. It's just in the execution. The main problem (even from a strictly theme/character arc stand point) is the lacking follow-up/consequences for Crosshair in S3. Like you gave your character accountability by removing the chip and I think that's great setup for an arc but you gotta follow through with that and actually hold him accountable!

***I'm always curious when clones have 'normal' names, like why did they chose the name Emerie of all things? So I looked it up. Idk how reliable sources are for name meanings so take it with a grain of salt but it's still fun. Fits pretty well, and clones names have definitely had significant meanings in the past (like how Rex and Jesse both mean 'king') so I'm pretty sure it was intentional.

Anyway, thanks for coming to my tedtalk

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actualcoolbugfacts · 2 years ago

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✨cool bug facts's✨

The Tetragonula carbonaria, or the sugarbag bee!

Goth bee!! 🐝🐝🖤🖤

The anatomy of these indefatigable insects!!!

They are a species of stingless bee. This does not mean that they don't have a stinger, rather, they have a functionless stinger. The adult workers and males are mostly black and have some brown tints in certain areas. Newly emerged bees are white on every part of their body except their abdomen.

The workers body length is around 3.9 mm to 4.3 mm, and their wing length (including tegula) is around 4.1 mm to 4.6 mm. The males are the same length, but have different antennae. They produce the largest honey and pollen pots out of the genus Tetragonula.

They store their honey in pot-like structures around the nest, that the queen lays eggs into, and then a worker quickly seals the pot that the queen fertilized. Unlike other stingless bee species, they store their honey in pots rather than combs.

If their queen suddenly dies, they can build emergency queen cells by fusing two worker-sized cells that contain eggs or young larvae. Some queens can only produce diploid males, who are infertile and physically weaker. Workers find these males to be a nuisance to the rest of the hive, and might kill a queen who produces diploid males. The center of their nest is made up of honeycombs in a spiral shape. Even the molecules of these honeycombs are spiral-shaped. Their honey has a sour taste to it.

Diet.

They pollinate the orchid species Dendrobium lichenastrum, D. toressae, and D. speciosum.

They collect their pollen from the Cycas media, which is a cycad.

Behavior.

Sugarbag bees do not like flying, and will not fly further than they find necessary. The younger bees perform their work in the nests, and as they get older they will start working outside of nests. They consistently have four to five worker bees surrounding the nest, seemingly acting as guards. They will only fly in temperatures higher than 18 °C, and temperatures above 42 °C can kill them. Their colonies are active all year round, the daily activity period is longer in the southern hemisphere's warmer months. The intensity of the daily flights is most intense in September and least intense in May. They mummify small hive beetles (Aethina tumida) that enter their nest by coating them in wax, resin, and mud or soil from the nest. While the workers do have ovaries, they are inactive. This is unusual, as stingless bee workers can produce unfertilized eggs that can grow into haploid males. This may be because the workers do not want to be distracted from their work, so they leave the egg laying to the queen. Another possibility is that the queen does not permit them to lay eggs due to their inferiority, though little antagonism occurs between the queen and workers, making this theory unlikely. When a worker does produce an egg, it often causes a conflict between the worker and the queen, and the queen will start the patrol the area where new brood cells are being produced, and using a hands-on policy to prevent this from happening again. Unlike other stingless bee species, the queen does not harm the worker who laid the egg. When threatened, all nest mates will form a bee-cloud and wrestle intruders, usually causing both the bees and intruders to die. The sugarbag bees may be the only party dying, however, if their intruder is not a bee or a significantly larger creature than the bees, such as a human. Their main predator is the pink flower spider, or the Diaea evanida, which is a spider crab. This crabs reside on flowers that bees tend to pollinate and can change their colors to suit the preferences for different bee species, but the sugarbag bees do not attract to any of these colors. Sugarbag bees tend to choose one specific kind of flower to pollinate, usually only for specific trips, but sometimes an individual bee might pollinate only one type of flower. The males may fly several kilometers away from the nest in order to mate, and may never return to their original colony.

Habitat.

They're exclusively located in Australia, from Queensland to southern New South Wales.

The nests are found in tree hollows and other cavities throughout forests, woodlands, and heaths. T. carbonaria nests are also found in Telstra pits in rural and urban areas, and will inhabit water meters when their usual habitats are not available. They prefer larger trees and wider tree hollows or cavities in order to produce a sufficient amount of insulation.

#bugs #insects #bees #stingless bees #sugarbag bee #tetragonula carbonaria #bugblr #entomology #melittology #apiology #cool bugs #cool bug facts #cool bug's #cool bug fact's

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bladesappreciationweek · 4 years ago

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Flora:

Ardenwillow: A tall, leafy plant with wide gold-flecked leaves. When ground, the leaves make a salve that can be used on scrapes or burns. Found in the forests outside of Riverbend.

Blue Moss: Imbued with magic that filters up from deep within the earth, it can counter the decay of ghoul wounds. Found in the catacombs beneath Undermount.

Indigo Moonbloom: A tiny bush of deep purple flowers, who’s faces turn towards a full moon. Thought to be extinct, their petals can be ground up and brewed into an elixer that is said to heal the deepest corruption. Found at the Magic Lake in Deadwood.

Leventree: Large emerald fruits grow in the tree’s canopy. Their skin is jeweled, and bruises easily. It tastes tangy and sweet, and the pit can be dissolved over fire to form a shimmering rainbow healing salve. Found in the forests outside of Riverbend.

Meyberry: Just a tasty fruit, apparently. Listen, they can’t all be magical. Found in the forests outside of Riverbend.

Pythonas Vines: A knotted purple vine that grabs and squeezes living creatures until their bones break, then absorbs their nutrients. You can trick them into releasing you by playing dead. Found in the Deadwood.

Fauna:

Bloodsquid: A massive tentacled creature with bulbous eyes that can be stunned by mermaids with a song that goes “Begone, foul creature of the deep! Return to where you lay to sleep!” Once stunned, they’re easily frightened and return to the depths. Found in the Forbidden Cove.

Drakes: A horse-sized creature covered in shimmering, iridescent feathers. They are wise, largely tame, and belong to only the wealthiest families in Undermount.

Drakna: A cautious species, they never attack unless certain they’ll win. They capture their prey and stash them in cocoons that dangle from their tree-top webs. The queen’s stinger is poisonous, and one of the most deadly weapons in the world. Found in the Deadwood.

Egovore: A rare sentient plant that uses pheromones to create illusions that lure people in, allowing it to feed on their minds. It makes the air around it smell of bread and fruit. Found in the Deadwood.

Fae: They are made of magic, and warp reality without meaning to, and throw wild parties. They refused to take sides during the great war, and were killed by the Shadow Court. Thought to be extinct.

Fae Fish: Give off their own light, and glitter in the water. Their scales are like jewels, and they leave a glowing trail in their wake. Found in the Cartesian Sea.

Ghasts: Powerful necromantic monsters. Their touch is dangerous, spreading corruption. Only legendary weapons and strong magic can defeat them. Found in the catacombs beneath Undermount.

Golem: A massive creature of living stone, it was the guardian of a fallen Elven house. Believed to be the last of its kind, it was found in the ancient ruins beneath Undermount.

Greendrake Serpent: Their large scales have healing properties. Found at Zepher’s Cove.

Grobtars: Grobtars are the amphibious species that live in the ocean depths. Little is known of their culture except for unreliable accounts from captured sailors; however, grobtars are feared for their vicious, merciless attacks on traveling ships. Their chiefs are especially tough, and fight with tridents, among other weapons. Found in the Cartesian Sea.

Kromps: Frilled, lizard-like creatures. They hoard shiny things for their burrows. They bite with razor sharp teeth, and the females are venomous. Found in the forests outside of Riverbend.

Lapna: Rabbit-like creatures that appear in hoards. Pesky little beasts, they communicate through a cacophony of angry squeaks that often draw larger creatures. Found in the Deadwood.

Mermaid: A human-like creature with hair the color of seaweed, and faint luminescent scales all over their bodies. Their kisses are said to be good luck, and taste like sunlight and seawater. Found in the Forbidden Cove.

Necromantic Monster: Angry pile of bones with branches growing out of its back. Found on the Cursed isle.

Owlbear: Carnivous beasts with great strength and limited intellect. They fear fire and are easily started. Found in the forests outside of Riverbend.

Unicorn: Long thought to be extinct, their presence is thought to be a good omen. Found at the Magic Lake in Deadwood.

Vorglin: A spectral shape with tendrils of smokey flame that feeds off energy, specifically fear. When fed an emotion it doesn’t enjoy, it transforms them into elemental discharge — like gold. Found in the Temple of Ellara.

Voxper. Dog-like creatures that were once companions to the elves, they are now pets for the wealthiest and most powerful human nobles.

#playchoices #choices stories you play #pixelberry #blades of light and shadow #bladesaw #creator resources

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zaph1337 · 4 years ago

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Monster Hunter Rating 13: Vespoid

There are a few things I dislike about the Spring season, but at the top of list? The ants and wasps come back. Freaking ants keep getting in my freaking house crawling in my freaking kitchen because they want my freaking food! But it could be worse; they could all be wasps. I despise having to live with those things around, even if I’ve only ever been stung once as a little kid (yellowjackets are on my sh*t list forever for that, by the way). But it could be worse; they could all be Vespoids.

(How it appears in Monster Hunter 1)

(How it appears in Monster Hunter Generations)

Appearance: Y’know, I really wish I could make out these guys’ faces better, but I can’t exactly do anything about that, so let’s go over the rest of them. Vespoids look like your average purple wasps that just happen to be four feet tall. Well, okay, not really. Real wasps don’t have three pairs of wings or barbed stingers (at least it looks like there’s a barb at the stinger’s base), nor do their stingers protrude that far out of their bodies at all times (and before anyone brings up ichneumon wasps, those are ovipositors that are used to bore into wood to lay eggs on/in things like grubs; they can’t be used like stingers). Other than the wings, color, and maybe the face, Vespoids look basically like you’d expect a giant wasp to look, but they’re just alien enough that they don’t really give me the same anxieties as looking at a wasp up-close would. 5/10.

Behavior: Like a lot of other wasps, Vespoids live in colonies with a Queen. Where are these colonies? Practically everywhere! Forests, jungles, swamps, deserts, volcanoes--for God’s sake, these things can even live in snowy areas no sweat, so you’re probably never safe from these things outside of a village! Apart from the Queen, Vespoids come in two varieties: the smaller, more fragile workers and the larger, more aggressive soldiers. The workers have the jobs you’d expect: tidying up the hive, taking care of the Queen and eggs, and gathering food. The soldiers, on the other hand, have one purpose: protect the Queen with their lives. Now, you would think that the wiki would have more data on these two varieties, but it doesn’t. I’ve even looked at the Vespoid Queen page to see if there was any mention of the Vespoids involved in her fight being different from the ones you normally encounter, but no dice. I guess there’s a reason this image is on every monster’s ecology page:

The Vespoids you see most often are the workers searching for food. As you’d expect from wasps, “food” basically means anything they can kill. If the prey is small, they’ll paralyze it with a sting or two and carry it back to the colony. If the prey is a biggun, multiple workers will sting it before cutting it into pieces that can be transported back to the colony. Ew. The workers are well-equipped to traveling great distances in search of food thanks to their lightweight bodies, which aren’t weighed down by their durable exoskeletons...I say “durable” because the wiki says “durable,” but these guys have the Hornetaur problem of “hit me and I shatter.” I’d cut them some slack by pointing out that the attacks they’re hit with are coming from powerful weapons which might not even kill them in one hit, or from even more powerful monsters, but those things are the norm for the wildlife of this world, so no slack will be cut for them. See previous comment about above image. Anyways, Vespoids can be so successful that their colonies can become too large to support, so when that happens, they’ll split the colony up into smaller colonies that are still relatively close to the main one, but are dispersed over a wider area. I don’t know if this is behavior seen in eusocial animals irl, but it’s pretty interesting. The Vespoids are basically a mix between ants and wasps in behavior, from what I can tell, which is...decent, I guess. They still kinda feel like the bare minimum you need to do to make a eusocial animal. The thought of a small procession of giant wasps carrying chunks of meat through the air is pretty morbid, though, and sometimes, that’s what counts. 6/10.

Abilities: What do you think these guys use to fight? Those stingers aren’t for show; they’re packing a payload of neurotoxin used to paralyze prey. Even though their attacks are more of a nuisance for hunters who are already in a battle than a substantial threat (which tells you just how much more powerful the humans of the MH world are than us), need I remind you that these things travel together? If they weren’t so easy to kill, they’d probably be as bad as some of the larger monsters you have to fight. But that’s all these guys have for an attack, which is basically what real wasps do (except, you know, it’s coming from a wasp that’s 4 feet long). 4/10.

Equipment: Unfortunately, all Vespoid weapons are recolors of Hornetaur weapons. This is likely because they were the first insectoid monsters in the series and many of their weapons use parts from both of them. For example, the Duals Blades known as the Insect Slicer are made by upgrading the Insector+ (which looks exactly like the Insector and the Insect Slicer) with both Hornetaur and Vespoid parts:

You can tell that these are more Hornetaur-themed based off the colors. But you can upgrade the Insect Slicer into the Alated Insect, which has a color scheme closer to Vespoids:

Though, honestly, Vespoids aren’t as shiny as Hornetaurs are, so this still doesn’t exactly look right. Another weapon that uses both Hornetaur and Vespoid parts is a Hunting Horn called the Sonic Glass:

Again, more Hornetaur than Vespoid. I didn’t show this off when I covered Hornetaurs because I wanted to stick to weapons which didn’t require parts from multiple specific monsters because I thought it would be harder to say which monster the weapon was based off of, but now that I think about it, that’s stupid. You can tell by looking at this that it’s themed after the Hornetaur. But the version of the Sonic Glass that appears in Monster Hunter World, the Sonic Horn, has a color scheme that’s much more like the Vespoid’s:

...look, it’s ugly, but I’ve mentioned before that I’ve been told Monster Hunter World has the worst weapon designs in the series. And before anyone asks why I’m not showing off the Glass Royale, that’s clearly based off the Vespoid Queen, not the regular ones. All right, now it’s time for the armor to just be the Hornetaur armor recolored.

Oh. They’re actually different. Didn’t expect that. Well, they’re very...pointy. Seriously, there are spikes all over these things. And the female set’s helmet looks like a bug’s head, and knowing Monster Hunter, it’s probably real. Ew. I definitely like the Hornetaur Armor better than this, ‘cause it’s just...kinda dull and ugly. The colors don’t do a lot for it. I hate how every Vespoid weapon is either a recolor or closer to the Hornetaur in terms of theme, and the armor, while unique, is unappealing. At least the raptors had some unique weapons, even though they had basically the same armor. The Hornetaur weapons offer a lot in terms of design, but I feel like I have to give this a low score on principle. 4/10.

Final Thoughts and Tally: Look, when I said that this was “definitely gonna be more interesting” than the Velociprey, that was because I didn’t know how plain and unoriginal the Vespoids were. I just saw “giant bug” and thought it would be cool. Don’t blame me for that! Well, good news is, the next monster has to be more interesting than the Vespoid, for reasons that you’ll see when I get to it...or if you wanna go to the Monster List on the wiki yourself, but that’s called “spoiling.” 4/10.

#monster hunter #monster hunter rating #zaph1337

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the-named-anon · 2 years ago

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Hi yeah so I got a little heated in the tags but if you want to learn some stuff about bees you should read it!! It’s like a whole essay though.

Wild that folks keep saying beekeepers abuse bees as if bees are not both venomous flying animals and fully unionized

#hi so I took a beekeeping class and most of the time beekeepers clip off or destroy the queen cell when it’s a swarm queen.#otherwise they let the bees do what they want to #I’ve never heard of killing your bees if they don’t produce well. that’s thousands of dollars you just destroyed #normally if they aren’t producing well the beekeeper will get a new queen #also the queen doesn’t go anywhere. she can’t. she’s too fat lol #bro beekeepers get pre-mated queens. there is no ‘preventing from mating’ if they didn’t there is a good chance that queen won’t come back.#they go a very large distance to mate so there is no inbreeding #also yeah their invasive but pollinators are dying to pesticides and without beekeepers we literally wouldn’t have as much almond stuff as #we do. there would be none. drones aren’t crushed???? where the fuck is this guy getting his information from???? if the hive didn’t need #the drones they’d get rid of them themselves??? the workers chew off their wings and legs and then kick them out of the hive?????#THEY MAKE BEES THAT ARE LITERALLY DISEASE RESISTANT. BEES ARE THE ONES SUSEPTABLE TO DISEASE BECAUSE THEY ARENT FROM HERE #also so what if they use fake hormones? they don’t want their bees to leave so they’ll build a new hive box so they have more room??#bees are a beekeeper’s livelihood. it is really REALLY expensive to replace? it’s like if a streamer’s whole set up was stolen.#OF COURSE THEY’D TRY TO KEEP THE BEES FROM LEAVING YOU DUMB FUCK (the guy who used a source that’s 200 years old.)#wait also the bees’ll kill their queen if they don’t like her by overheating her #so crushing a queen is much more humain #also a rival queen will call to an ‘unborn’ (still developing) queen and if the other queen responds she’ll sting her #a queen’s stinger is made specifically to kill other queens

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perish-the-creator · 5 years ago

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A Simple Plea

(Sequel to

https://perishablehomosexual.tumblr.com/post/185820520024/offspring-of-him)

The relative relief that left as a form of a sign from Rodan’s mouth was the only response he could create as he saw the Queen arrive from the horizon. From the smell and feel of it, the king had not come.

He looked behind him at his son. The little thing was toying around with the food Rodan had brought him. Though it was clear at the moment, if one looked hard enough they’d see the budding seeds of separate personalities from each head. It reminded the fire demon of his....former partner. It was at that thought that he realized he couldn’t really describe the relationship he had had with his child’s other parent. It was more than just slave and masters, otherwise this little one wouldn’t be here right now.

Speaking of which, he really needed to give his son a name. Well three names to be specific. One name for him as a whole and two names for the individual heads.

As Mothra grew closes, Rodan felt the familiar throb from the wound she had given him so long ago. Subconsciously he pushed his child back towards the lava they lived in, as if to protect him from the coming titan.

His son protest, of course, and retaliates by biting at his elder’s wing. Rodan doesn’t flinch and keeps his eyes focused on Mothra; focused on her stinger. She was regarded as a goddess of peace with a fierce bite with opposed as Rodan very well knew and though he was doing nothing against her, he couldn’t help but feel cautious; feel scared.

Mothra hovers above him and gives a gentle greeting just as her eyes drift to the hybrid that sits beside his wing. He sees those eyes and wraps his wing around his young. The two-headed child does not understand the tension, and instead bobs its heads around and makes noises as if doing a playful taunt.

Rodan nips at his son to stop. Mothra flies closer with curiosity and concern.

King will kill him. Her blunt and emotionless tone as she spoke those words made Rodan’s spine tingle.

I..I know. Hearing the defeat in his own voice made him feel ashamed of himself. Was he a coward? One’s confidence does drain after being defeated and conquered more than three times. But he is no threat. He’s just young and will be no trouble...

But he is the son of a tyrant. A foolish false king from the stars. The fact that he exist only brings a single victory to that horrid ruler. The child whines at the Queen’s words. He may not completely understand, but the harshness of her voice and the way she looks at him made the young one quiver and nuzzle against his parent. Mothra gave a grunt. I did not come to simply remind you of his fate. I came to give you a warning. Our king makes his way now. I recommend to try to get your spawn to fly, otherwise, he’ll be all too easy prey.

Rodan felt a small pang of hope as she said that. Maybe it be because she’s a peace goddess. Or that she didn’t believe in killing the innocent, but the fact she considered even warning him when she could’ve easily let him suffer the grieve of the knowledge of losing his young made a small ounce of hope spring that he had somehow forgiven him fully.

Thank you...my queen. Rodan bows his head while Mothra gives a sort of chuckle in return.

You can call me Mothra, Rodan. We were friends long ago. We can be friends again. There was this sort moment of relative calm, but it was interrupted by the booming roar of their king. He...he came earlier than should’ve!

#rodan x king ghidorah #rodan #Godzilla King of the Monsters #Godzilla #Rodan support group #mothra queen of the monsters #mothra #KoTM #rodorah

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galionne-vibin · 5 years ago

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With my Guidance - Chapter 1: First Companions

Title: With my Guidance

Main Characters: Rodan, King Ghidorah

Summary: There were many things Rodan never expected to happen. Learning that Ghidorah had in fact survived his battle against Godzilla was one. Finding out he had done so by reverting to a hatchling was another. Becoming an impromptu mentor for said hatchling was a third. And yet, all it took was a single night for all three scenarios to become reality.

Read on AO3 or below

—

So here’s the first chapter to my first ever Godzilla fic! It’s super cheesy with next to no drama, but I hope it’s still enjoyable!

—

It was a cool, cloudless night over Boston. The city ruins still stood tall, somehow, gutted skyscrapers threatening to topple over at the slightest push. It had been a few weeks since the grand battle between the king of monsters and his three-headed rival had taken place, annihilating the entire city. No human had yet dared to return to the devastated area due to the radioactive fallout. There wasn’t a single living being for miles around.

… That was, except for the colossal bird-like creature rummaging through the debris.

The winged titan was letting out low, gentle caws as it pushed aside broken wooden beams, singed cement chunks and shards of glass with its beak.

Rodan didn’t know precisely what had drawn him back to these cursed battlegrounds. After everything that had taken place there ; after everything he had been through in just a few days ; it seemed more likely he would simply disappear into another volcano and hibernate for a century or two. And, truth be told, that was his original plan. Once Godzilla had dismissed the assembly of titans, Rodan had flown away and made himself a new nest in Fiji’s Mount Taveuni volcano as Isla de Mara was now a dying wasteland. The inhabitants had watched, in slight anguish and awe, as the Fire Demon built itself a new refuge on their land. Once the work was done Rodan had plunged right into the bubbling pool of magma and let the heat take away the many aches and pains crippling his exhausted body. Ghidorah had left many deep scars on him ; burns from his gravity beam, slashes and scratches from his claws, bite marks… But the wound that kept burning and aching no matter what Rodan did was the stab wound he had received from Mothra’s stinger.

Oh, he deserved it. He knew he did.

Part of him was still having a hard time believing he had actually fought with the queen ; that he had attacked her… He had joined Ghidorah willingly, that was a fact. It was his and every other titan’s role to obey the alpha. At the time he thought he would just remain on standby and wait for Godzilla’s inevitable return ; that he’d wait it out and not cause more trouble. But there was something… Something instinctive that made him act out under Ghidorah’s command. Suddenly every order the new king gave was his personal mission to accomplish. It sent his mind into an unmanageable frenzy, his body bubbling with excitement, adrenaline and a desire to strike. It would have been easy to dismiss his loss of control as being born from his fear of Ghidorah, or maybe even the new Alpha’s powerful, dominant aura taking him over. But Rodan knew he couldn’t pin everything on the three-headed monster. It wasn’t that easy. He’d let himself go as well… He’d let himself go when he should have fought back. Had he tried, he might have been able to resist his influence. Instead he let go and allowed his newfound lust to kill to take him over.

Yeah… He deserved to be stabbed. He just hoped the Queen would be able to forgive him.

Rodan felt a sudden twinge in his gut and moved to another pile of rubble.

It wasn’t the first time he’d felt something like that- in fact these odd twinges had been occurring for a few days now and were part of what had made him leave his volcano. He had tried to ignore them at first, thinking they might just be stemming from his wounds and general malaise. But they had continued, accompanied by a growing feeling of urgency ; and became so strong he ended up leaving the comfort of his nest to go wherever his gut feeling would take him. This was how, after a few hours, he ended up landing back in Boston. He couldn’t help the dreadful feeling creeping in the back of him mind. Something felt… Wrong about the situation, but he couldn’t stop himself from digging. It was as though he knew he was about to uncover something terrible ; but something that needed to be uncovered nonetheless…

He took a step back and scratched at the scorched debris with his talons, removing another layer of dirt. He dipped his head again and pushed more rubble to the side, unearthing a heavy slab of concrete which haphazardly rested over two crushed vehicles. The twinge in his gut suddenly grew so strong it was almost nauseating ; and the sense of urgency that had been gnawing at his mind rushed back to him, hitting him with full force to the point where he was almost lightheaded.

Right there.

Rodan found himself trembling with anticipation as he lowered his head, pressing his horns against the cold concrete and pushing with all his strength. The metal scratched and screeched under the moving weight, sending sparks flying everywhere. Rodan groaned and huffed, taking a step back before headbutting the slab one last time, toppling it over. A thick cloud of dust and ashes rose from the ground, masking the area and making the titan cough and retch loudly, shaking his head vigorously. After a few minutes however the cloud finally settled, and suddenly he saw it.

A minuscule, trembling heap of golden scales ; covered in a grimy layer of soil and soot.

“No…”

Hesitantly, the pterosaur brushed the tip of his beak over the scales, waiting for a reaction. Almost immediately the small creature shifted and let out a soft whimper, opening its wings and uncovering its body- as well as all three of its little heads.

“Ghidorah-?!”

Rodan stumbled back with a strangled cry of surprise. For a moment he wondered if maybe his eyes were playing tricks on him ; if maybe he was hallucinating… But no. No matter how much he shook his head or blinked, the minuscule hydra was still there. Clear as day. The pterosaur took a moment to compose himself before leaning closer to inspect it. The three heads, the golden scales, the two tails… There was no doubt about it ; this truly was Ghidorah… Even the scent was the same- albeit not as overpowering. Rodan sat down as he kept staring at it, still in disbelief.

Granted, Ghidorah surviving the assault wasn’t a complete impossibility. Most titans were not only incredibly resilient, they also had astonishing regeneration capabilities which usually tied into whichever energy or element gave them their life force. In Godzilla’s case it was radioactivity, in Rodan’s it was fire and heat. Should they be mortally wounded, being bathed in these elements would bring them enough energy to repair their bodies. There had in fact been a few times before where Rodan had returned from the brink of death by simply diving into an active volcano or lying down in the middle of a forest fire and absorbing the flames. Mothra herself had an even more complex ability the volcanic kaiju still didn’t fully understand. All he knew was that it involved her reverting to her larval stage one way or another after ‘death’ and going through the whole maturation process again. In a way, something not too dissimilar from what he had here…

The question now, though, was what was he supposed to do?

What was he supposed to do?! This was Ghidorah ; Godzilla’s lifelong rival and the titan who had attempted to destroy the entire planet- and now he was back. He couldn’t just leave him there! His first thought was to simply call over the king to let him deal with the situation. After all, this was his job ; he could take care of it. But then again…

Rodan looked down at the hatchling. It was chirping and squeaking softly, curling its wings back around itself as it shivered in the cooling air. It was tiny ; barely over 3 feet long without the tails and didn’t yet seem able to hold either of its heads off of the ground. Its eyes seemed to remain closed as well. And it looked so weak and fragile… Just a snap of the larger titan’s beak and he could crush all of its little bones-

Rodan winced and shook his head as he felt a sudden wave of unease wash over him. The image that had flashed through his mind was… Distressing, to say the least. He wasn’t sure why however- he’d had no qualms about killing smaller creatures (such as humans) before. But this tiny hatchling felt different… Watching it squirm on the ground and struggle to keep warm brought forth a new assortment of emotions the Fire Demon had never experienced before. He knew this was Ghidorah ; The Destroyer of Worlds ; yet he somehow couldn’t bring himself to harm the tiny hydra…

As he pondered about the situation he began unconsciously stepping away from the hatchling, mumbling to himself. But just as he got a few feet away, he suddenly felt a twinge in his gut again. This time however it was also accompanied by a soft sound and as he turned around, he saw the hydra was chirping in his direction and seemed to be looking for him. The winged kaiju blinked a few times, before hesitantly approaching the hatchling.

“Did you just… Call out to me?”

The small hydra didn’t answer as it was probably too young to even understand the titans’ spoken language, but Rodan had little doubt that’s exactly what had happened- and suddenly it all clicked. The twinges, the urgency to fly back here… The little one had been calling out to him through the hivemind titans all shared ; and somehow Rodan had heard it from the other side of the world. And not only that, but it had called him specifically… Rodan, the lonely king on a lonely mountain…

He opened a wing and delicately set it over the small kaiju, blanketing him comfortably against the cool nocturnal breeze. The three heads cooed softly as they blindly nuzzled closer to each other and the sight brought a comforting feeling to the pterosaur as he looked down at them. The hatchling had called out to him specifically… Because he was Ghidorah’s only companion. Rodan closed his eyes and exhaled deeply. He still remembered the extra-terrestrial kaiju telling him about his plight- being born on a dying planet with no choice but to flee ; never finding a world that wouldn’t attempt to kill or enslave him… Hope to find a new home turned into fear. Fear turned into despair. Despair turned into anger. Anger turned into overflowing, destructive rage…

Destructive rage turned into a vital need to annihilate.

It still surprised Rodan how easily the false king had trusted him with this tale. Maybe it was because he was about to burn down the planet anyway. Maybe it was to get things off his chest. Maybe it was to sway his new servant even further to his side with a sob story. Or maybe he knew they both led lonely existences ; and maybe (just maybe) he trusted Rodan just enough to understand… To be his second in command and first companion in destruction…

It was a tempting thought ; believing someone would put this much trust in him after all these years of solitude. As the last of his species and the lowest step in the titan hierarchy (even more so now), fighting by Ghidorah’s side had been an incredibly invigorating experience. It made him feel in control, powerful ; like he did matter at least a little bit on this vast, ever-changing planet.

All this because for just a moment, he wasn’t alone in the world anymore…

Because Ghidorah was there.

Rodan sighed deeply as he stood up. He’d made his decision. It was certainly one he was going to regret sooner or later… But for now, at least, it was clear what he had to do.

He looked over to the hatchling and saw it was fast asleep. With as much caution as he could he leaned back on one foot and slowly, delicately closed the talons of his other foot around it before gently lifting it off the ground. He made sure it was safely nestled in before taking off, keeping that leg closer to his body to keep it warm.

It was going to be a long flight home…

#godzilla #godzilla king of the monsters #godzilla fanfic #rodan #ghidorah #with my guidance

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ganymedesclock · 6 years ago

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Okay so... I’ve gotten so distracted talking about the Atlas that I didn’t make a post about this beauty! Which is a crying shame. Because when it comes to the Hammerhead Robeast, as I call her, I have two major contentions:

1. Haggar has likely retrieved Sincline and is using Lotor’s designs and research for her own purposes, and the Hammerhead is merely a prototype for what’s to come

and

2. I don’t think the podded Altean removed from Hammerhead’s body was only a battery.

For point number one, well.. if you look at Hammerhead and you look at Sincline:

Look at the shoulder plates, look at the prongs on the feet, the lateral ‘fins’ on the head, the spines protruding from the center of the hips and the overall “hourglass figure” build of it. The “cuffs” on the wrists with fully articulated hands. The glowing ‘panes’ on the upper biceps.

Furthermore, you can compare Sincline’s favored two blade weapons:

to what the Hammerhead splits its scythe into:

Several of those pieces- the specific way the foot prongs are set up- are allusions to the generals’ armor, not something Haggar would put on a structure on her own. While other pieces of it highly resemble the upgraded sentries (its overall color scheme and face plate in particular) I can’t help but feel the Hammerhead was designed by Haggar looking at Sincline. Which she wouldn’t have seen back in s6 because Sincline was only assembled in full after she’d tapped her sleeper agent spy- Shiro- and he was in a totally different galaxy trying to kill Keith.

Haggar has retrieved Lotor from the rift. Collected him, as she collected the colony Alteans, and that’s most likely what she’s been so busy with while AWOL for four years with the druids and Sendak keeping all her enemies busy. With the Hammerhead being the fruit of her labors.

The Hammerhead has Haggar’s handiwork all over it. Its chest laser uses her unique black-on-purple energy scheme that we’ve never seen even other druids use, it’s explicitly compared to the Komar, her previous opus, and I was thinking about how much s1e3 and s7e13 mirror each other. Sendak is set up against the paladins and fails, his ship crashes... and Haggar rapidly retaliates by sending down a Robeast.

But it’s using Lotor’s designs, Lotor’s work, Lotor’s research. And, given the revelation of the Altean inside of it, the people Lotor wanted to protect- which was his goal, as he repeatedly says- he earnestly believed sacrificing a proportionately small number of the colony Alteans was his only means to stay in power to protect the rest of them.

That’s significant, because it raises the implication that Haggar’s use of Lotor’s work is likely against Lotor’s own wishes... but Haggar made it clear she was going to move ahead with this back in s6e5.

Remember:

Haggar’s primary objective with tapping Shiro as her spy was to bring Lotor to her. That’s why she started watching in s5e2, after her flashback about Lotor. In s6e5 she had Shiro leave a trap for the paladins but focus overwhelmingly on bringing Lotor and the Sincline ships to her. She didn’t have him stay behind and kill any of the people he took out.

Haggar put an awful lot of effort into that whole dramatic Honerva reveal and trying to talk Lotor to her side. As soon as he didn’t go for it, she got angry, and demanded the generals take him away from her, which makes two things clear: she wants Lotor, and she doesn’t care how Lotor feels about it- if he won’t walk into her arms as her son, he’ll stay as her prisoner.

She also outright commends Lotor for “continuing my work” which in and of itself suggests she’s got interest in what Lotor was doing on the colony and with Sincline- since she did want those ships.

It’s unlike Haggar to just passively give up on something she sunk that much effort and resources into. It’s unlike Haggar to give up on anything, unless she’s got a bigger fish to fry that will get her the same result. So I really doubt Acxa threatening her once with a shot that she effortlessly dodged was enough to make her give up on Lotor, who she’s been scheming after for a while.

And Haggar has a marked habit of attacking right at the end of a battle. As soon as her enemies are exhausted or don’t have any fight left in them.

Let’s think about how nicely s6 worked out for Haggar.

Lotor rejects her, sneers in her face, he’s adamantly her enemy, he doesn’t want her approval, and the last thing he’s gonna do is share his work and the people who he at least has mixed sentiments about wanting to protect with her. He actively challenges her that the end is near and he only might spare her.

And then Lotor rushes off, urgently, trying to reconnect with Allura, the generals, the rift, and three for three, they all fall through on him. Sincline has its defenses torn down by Voltron, who’s unable to stay in the area to secure it, Lotor’s alone, and very likely injured himself.

He’s in no state to fight a second drawn out battle against Haggar, who we caught only the faintest glimpse how vast Haggar’s forces are in s6e5.

Haggar could just pluck him out of the rift like an apple off the tree. She’s got Sincline, and she’s had enough time to study it. She may have even had Lotor’s “help” constructing Hammerhead, because it’s established that when the empire (both Slav and Sam Holt’s cases) or Haggar (the many allusions that druids can search people’s minds) really wants someone to design for them, they don’t take no for an answer.

So I would expect Lotor is alive and out of the rift, but, in one way or another, he’s either Haggar’s prisoner or her thrall.

Onto point number two:

Hammerhead doesn’t merely stand out compared to the other robeasts for her sheer power, but the versatility of her armaments and strategic cunning. Because the robeasts as we’ve seen them are one-trick ponies; Prorok as a galra comes up with rather ingenious tactics like we see in s1e7, while as a beast in s2e3, he operates exclusively by vacuum, laser, rinse and repeat. Drazil’s one trick is lasers. Myzax’s one trick is catching people between his own attacks and the energy ball.

They lack much imagination, and we never see them obviously take in and reconsider their environment.

But Mecha Zarkon, and Sincline have an edge in that category because the person inside hasn’t been turned into a monster, they’re still awake. They’re driving.

And Hammerhead is more like Sincline than Drazil in this regard. She obviously strategizes- uses very different tactics vs. Voltron and vs. Atlas. When Atlas first takes the battlefield in its combat form, Hammerhead backs far off and stays away from its blasts, then changes to hit and run moves using that bigger energy form sparingly and trying to hit Atlas in its blind spots, use its size and relative slowness against it.

Hammerhead has a broad diversity of weapons and makes use of all of them. With the implication being...

This person is not merely the beating heart of the Hammerhead beast... she was likely its mind as well. Voltron and Atlas weren’t fighting a robeast with a hostage... they were fighting her.

Which puts a whole new concerning edge on this stinger, and what’s going to happen in s8 when she wakes up. How conscious she was, how deliberate her attacks were... that she’s at least in some sense a victim is obvious to me because an exploitative, abusive person like Haggar doesn’t change her stripes, but if the Hammerhead fight is an indication of this lady’s personality, I’d expect her to be tenacious, clever, and aggressive by her own merits.

Especially because while I know I’ve been enthusiastically looking for a certain DotU Queen of Darkness in every mystery female character that shows up...

This is a pale-skinned redhead with “horns” positioned up and wide on her forehead with distinctive blue shoulder pads, pointed ears (since she is an Altean) and... just compare the line on Merla’s metal headpiece to the “shadow” on the pod Altean’s helmet, and the red, diamond-shaped “brooch” both of them have in the exact same place.

Which, incidentally, if this is correct, would be another thread pointing towards Lotor’s survival- since Merla mostly worked with Lotor. And it could also be very interesting since, if I recall correctly, there genuinely was a scene where Merla appealed to the paladins to try and get them to help Lotor (she questions them being defenders who are supposed to help anyone in need, no matter who it is, to which Lance fires back a “Lotor’s not a who, he’s a what” which IIRC Jeremy Shada actually recreated in his modern Lance voice once at fan request)

#voltron legendary defender #vld #Hammerhead Robeast #Mystery Altean #Lotor #Haggar #readmore

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thewayoftheshadow · 6 years ago

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Space Orcs: Bees

Everybody knows what a bee is. I don’t mean a bumble bee or a wasp, which many people call a bee. I mean a plain old honey bee. Bees are very beneficial. They do way more work and contribute to so much more than most people think. Currently on our farm we have three bee hives that we started this spring. Caring for a new hive is sometimes difficult and constant work. There are also many safety procedures that must be followed for both the beekeeper and bees health.

How would an alien react to bees and beekeepers in general? What would they say when they find out how one sting can cause pain for a week or even be life threatening to some? How would they react if they found out that a single hive can house around 60,000 bees? What would they say about the lengths that people go to keeping a hive alive even if it kills them?

Here’s my take on it:

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Year: 2863 Region: Greater-Sol Planetary #: 3 Time: 1200 Earth-UTC

A farm in the North-Western Hemisphere of Planet 3: Earth. A human and her alien friend are on leave for two weeks on the humans, Sarah, parents farm.

Sarah: Now that you’ve seen the chickens lets go see the bees next.

Ysiz: What is a bee? Is it similar to a chicken?

Sarah: No no no, they’re nothing alike. Bees hurt much worse than chickens when they’re angry.

Ysiz: Why do all of the earth animals wish to hurt you? Have you not domesticated them?

Sarah: Oh these are domesticated. Only thing is we cant domesticate bees. There are too many of them.

Ysiz: More than the chickens?

Sarah: Oh yeah, try about half a million.

With this, Sarah leads her hard shelled companion over to what humans call a shed to get ready to go to the bees.

Sarah: This may sound personal, but do you have any fleshy bits like humans? or are you all shell?

Ysiz looks at Sarah and wonders why she would ask something so strange.

Ysiz: I can assure you I have no ‘fleshy bits’ as you put it.

Sarah: Good, you wont need a bee suit.

Sarah then takes out this strange white jacket with an attached hood and mesh netting. She puts on the jacket, throws the hood over and does up the series of zippers and Velcro patches to make sure that no bees can crawl into the hood. She then reaches down and pulls her socks over her pant legs.

Sarah: This is to keep the bees from getting under my clothes and doing me, or themselves, any harm.

Ysiz: They can harm themselves?

Sarah grabs a pair of thick elbow length goatskin gloves and puts them on.

Sarah: They harm themselves by harming me. When they sting me their stinger gets stuck in my skin and rips out of them. They tend to die rather quickly after that.

Ysiz: They have stingers? Did you not say that there were half of a million? You are crazy for keeping that many bees.

Sarah: Yes half a million, about 50,000 per hive box. Also the stinger is there for attacking anything that is perceived as a threat to the hive. To some it can be painful for a couple days. But if your really allergic it could kill you if your not treated fast enough.

Ysiz says nothing but shakes xers head while Sarah grabs a metal tool with a small hook on it.

Ysiz: So, what will you be doing with these bees then?

Sarah: Today ill just be checking for the queen bee to see if the old one is still there, she should be getting close to three years old.

Ysiz: They have a queen, so they must be like the Ulhilm species from the sector next to my home sector.

Sarah: Not quite, just follow me and I’ll show you what they look like.

After a brief five minute walk Sarah and Ysiz arrive at the collection of hives all lined up.

Sarah: Before we get closer, don’t stand near or in front of the hives. They have a specific distance in front of the hive that they need when they fly out. Don’t obstruct it, they will sting sometimes if your in the way. Just stay beside or behind me and you will be fine.

Sarah pry’s the lid off the closest box and is immediately greeted by a constantly moving sea of bees and a low humming sound.

Ysiz: Do you hear that Human-Sarah? They are making a noise, they may think we are predators.

Sarah: Nah, its ok. That’s just the sound of thousands of bees beating their wings. They’re doing something called fanning. It moves the air around inside and helps keep them cool. Go look at the front and you can see there are some by the entrance doing it.

Ysiz peers over the top of the box and sees tens of bees facing away from the hive and moving their wings very fast to filter hot air out of the hive. Xe turns around and sees Sarah holding a large frame covered in bees and a strange geometric pattern.

Ysiz: You were right about the bees Human-Sarah, there are many of them. What is this pattern they have made? It is different colors.

Sarah: Its called comb. They use wax and create this comb to store things in. They store their brood in the comb as well as food, called honey, and pollen. When they have an abundance of honey we take the comb and extract it and use the honey ourselves.

Sarah sits in silence for a few minutes and keeps pulling frames out and putting some back before she reaches for the middle frames.

Sarah: Right now I should be close to finding the queen, she likes to sit closer to the center to lay eggs. She looks a little different from the rest of the bees, but not by much.

A few minutes pass before Sarah is excitedly telling Ysiz to look closer at the frame.

Sarah: Look right there, that’s the queen. She has a red dot on her back that was painted on when we got her a couple years ago.

Ysiz: She dos not look different from the other bees. They all look the same. Except that one and that one, they are slightly bigger.

Sarah: That would be a drone. Its a male bee that mates with queen, they don’t really serve any other purpose. Also, she is slightly different, she is larger than the workers and a bit longer.

After Sarah finishes the last hive she walks back to the shop with Ysiz in tow while pulling off the beekeeping gear.

Sarah: Wow it gets hot in that get up. If only it wasn’t so hot today.

Ysiz: I am confused Human-Sarah.

Sarah: About what?

Ysiz: Why would you maintain something that is hard to maintain AND can kill you?

Sarah: Well, bees cross pollinate flowers and crops. Without bees life on earth would be very different if not there anymore. Their cross pollination when they gather pollen helps with the diversity of the genetics of plants. They essentially spread seeds from plant to plant.

Ysiz: So they are very important.

Sarah: Like I said, life wouldn’t bee the same without them.

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There ya have it, bees. This idea came to me at one in the morning after finishing some problems for one of my engineering courses. So sorry if this seems to ramble on or jumps around at some points cause I’m a bit tired. I wanted to get this one out before I forget it and kick myself later for not doing it. Anyways, If anybody finds any errors or areas of improvement let me know and I’ll be glad to make corrections! Also, please let me know if you plan on writing about bees too or if you have, I’d love to see somebody else’s take on bees.

Also, here is a picture of the tool with the hook mentioned above:

Its called a bee hive tool, or just a j hook. Its used to pry open the lid on a hive and scrape anything away, or up, that needs to be scraped. Due to propolis, which is kind of like bee glue, cementing the lid closed the tool is needed to pry the lid up. The hook portion is used to lift the corner of a frame out so that you can grab it with your hands and lift it from there. I hope this was informative. All of the stuff that was said by Sarah should be true unless I was taught wrong. In which case, correct me please!

#Humans #humans are space orcs #humans are space australians #humans are space oddities #aliens #bees #writing idea #space #space orcs #HUMANS ARE WEIRD

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that-shamrock-vibe · 6 years ago

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Movie Review: Halloween (Spoilers)

Disclaimer: Alright so I am doing two separate reviews for this movie, instead I am giving an overview of the movie with some detail but not in depth. I am also posting this review the day the movie first airs so if you have not yet seen the movie do not read on.

General Reaction:

I am slightly concerned about just how much I enjoyed this movie. Yes it’s official, I am starting to enjoy the horror genre. I don’t know what it is in recent years but, particularly since seeing It and television shows such as American Horror Story, this kind of thing does not phase me like it used to, in fact it gives me somewhat of an adrenaline rush.

That’s not to say I wasn’t hesitant to see the latest horror slasher movie because, particularly with the Halloween franchise, the main worry I have with them is the jump scares. I am 26 and value my heart and do not want it to give out in a cinema.

However I knew Halloween was a must-see due to the fact that this franchise, as well as others like A Nightmare on Elm Street and Friday the 13th are the classic big slasher franchises. Also I wanted to see it on the day of release so that when the gossip mill started turning about what’s in this movie I was not put off by the gore-ification.

Speaking of which, and this is where we slightly go into spoiler territory, this is possibly the goriest horror movie I have ever seen, more than the original for sure, but the choices in ways of showing the level of gore here was fascinating and actually bordered on artistic both from the creators standpoint and also Michael Myers. The goriest moments are the kind of hiding behind your hands type of moments because, particularly the later moments, they are quite grotesque to watch but with the cashier at the gas station having his teeth removed and jaw practically torn open only for Michael to use his bloody teeth as a warning to the reporter was both disturbing but also slightly artistic from a murderer’s point of view.

This is why I am so fascinated in this type of slasher movie, other horrors like Alien, Predator and even It are fantastical horror because these creatures don’t knowingly exist, however Michael Myers and others like Jason Voorhees are so terrifying because that type of person could very easily exist and has in history. But they also present a psychological threat as well as a physical one as shown in this movie with the effect Michael had on Laurie.

The main issue I had with the relationship between Michael and Laurie is trying to determine exactly where it stems from with the retcon this franchise has made. In promotion for the movie it has been stated that this movie is a sequel to the original Halloween released 40 years ago and is a real-time direct continuation omitting the 7 sequels that spanned from 1981-2002 and the two soft reboot movies in 2007-2008. This means that the reveal of Laurie being Michael Myers sister is now non-canon and referenced in a throwaway comment near the beginning of this movie. But if you take away the sibling connection between the two, then why does Michael seek vengeance on Laurie? Is it just because he is a psychopath on automatic or are they keeping the sibling connection in flux? I just think it is because Michael enjoys killing people who are home alone. If he ever met Kevin McAllister he’d do the world a favour right? Even though killing kids is bad.

On that note this was my other big issue with the movie, now I get in horrors they make it so nobody is safe, and this movie follows classic horror tropes of letting the audience know who is going to die before they even do because the character will say or do something stupid. However, as far as I am aware, showing the death of kids has always been where the line is drawn, It gets away with it again because it’s not showing them die on screen. But here, there were two boys who couldn’t have been older than 10, and one was strangled at the start of the movie until you heard his neck snap and the other’s fate was ultimately left unknown, unless I missed something, but the fact they show any sort of gruesome death for a child crosses a line for me and it made me slightly uncomfortable liking the movie after that.

But to put a positive spin on things, the two young actors, Vince Mattis and Jibrail Nantambu, did a much better job at acting for their brief 5 minutes of screen-time than the two young adults who played Allison’s and Vicky’s boyfriends. I did like the guy who was besties with Allison’s boyfriend though.

My final note on this part is about the score and specifically that classic theme tune. I have always thought the original theme was the perfect set-up for the movie and the fact they also incorporate it into scenes whenever Michael Myers is on the hunt adds to the tension of the movie. Here though the updated versions which seems to feature both a stronger bass and piano blend made what we are watching almost exciting. Particularly when the opening scene cuts directly into the rather genius titles it added to the anticipation to see what exactly Michael gets up to.

Cast:

The cast as a whole is great, Jaime Lee Curtis is superb in this role. Yes it was her first major role and her mother is a known scream queen from Psycho but I just enjoy watching Jaime Lee Curtis act, she is similar in acting style and roles to Christine Baranski for me.

Judy Greer surprisingly played the role of the daughter and mother side-role rather well here compared to how she plays the mother side-role in Ant-Man. I started to really like her towards the end and there is one bad-ass moment she has that I felt worked really well. I also understand her and her family’s relationship with Laurie here because of what has happened throughout the last 40 years and how closed off she has been.

As for Nick Castle, who I believe only reprises his role as Michael Myers for one or two scenes from the original movie, I do think James Jude Courtney did a similarly great job throughout the movie of providing that same creepy and sinister presence but there isn’t a lot to say about a character that doesn’t speak and wears a full face mask that makes the actor behind it expressionless.

Franchise Future:

There are several stingers in this movie that set up potential sequels or even prequels to this movie. For instance it seems that Laurie’s granddaughter Allyson went through a similar journey here as Laurie did in the original movie so seeing if the experience traumatizes her in the same way as it did Laurie going forward would be an interesting venture.

Also I would love to see this movie being a rejuvenation in the classic slasher franchises and characters, we already have Michael Myers in current culture, but I want to see Freddie Kruger, Leatherface, Jason Voorhees, Ghostface and Norman Bates all given the modern-day Halloween treatment. Yes Bates Motel was a hit and Freddie Highmore was great in the role but to see the character back in a cinematic setting would be great.

Overall I rate the movie an 8.5/10, there were some clunky moments and weird dialogue choices however in terms of horror, which again is something I used to openly avoid, I left the movie with quite a buzz. I do think this is a great choice for anyone deciding what to do for Halloween this year.

So that’s my review of Halloween, what did you guys think? Post your comments and check out more Movie Reviews as well as other posts.

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thederailersdnd · 3 years ago

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Session 24: we’re following the leader...

When last we left our heroes, Syrin of the Ebony Wings was informing them all that the Animus crystals were in transit to the castle when they were stolen. Witnesses said it looked like children from the forest. And something was left at the scene of the crime. Syrin tosses the evidence over and Ryker catches it: Acorns. Syrin admits her first thought was of Wander and her people, and Wander begrudgingly takes a look. These aren’t normal looking acorns; they look Feywildian. The crew agrees to investigate and Yevin catches up as they are lead to the wagon.

At the wagon they are introduced to the guards. Apparently one of the guards had been distracted by a pair of lovely… eyes… at the time of the theft. Looking in the back, there is a pile of acorns where the box should be and a trail leading off down the road. Syrin charges the Derailers with hunting down the crystals. There are two in the box, one for them, and one for her ship that is running low on power (good thing Ryker didn’t steal it).

Following the trail of acorns, the crew soon comes upon the flower shop owned by one of Havayla’s sisters. The sister, completely covered in flowers and a little disoriented, greats everyone enthusiastically. Their quest explained and she points them to the back of the shop where there is a door leading to the city park. Running out into the park, the Derailers discover a magical fog barrier with ensnaring vines.

Nahtan and Arunak step through first, making their way past the vines with little trouble. As they stumble to the other side, they are met with a strange scene: there are two figures, a youngish elf with white hair in green garb, playing a pan flute while an elfin girl in tattered clothes and long dark hair dances around the glade. A bear bobs along to the tune while a couple trees sway their branches and clap in time. There is a box places precariously on a nearby boulder and the members of the revelry do not yet notice the interlopers.

As Ryker and Yevin make their way through the vines, the Derailer’s presence is noted and the dancing stops. The figures challenge the crew with a riddle, stating “If you don’t answer correctly, the trees (not Trii) will kill you, and then berries (not the berries on the bush, the bear named Barries) will eat you. Except the bear only eats berries, so only the trees will kill you (but not trii).” The riddle is “What is as large as a grandfather tree, sings like a fuzzy stinger, and dances as well as Eros?”

At this time, Wander and Havayla also stumble through and, after some shock from the pan-flutist over Wander’s heritage, proper introductions are made. The thieves are Prancing Prince Pater Pandelion and Trii. Pater is a killer of dragons, specifically the Jabberwock that killed his parents. This leads to some comparison from the Derailers: “oh you’ve only killed one Dragon?” He and Trii came through from the Feywild and stole the box of crystals for their friend Eros, who wants to make jewelry from them. And everyone must answer their riddle or tell them their favorite color, or be killed. After learning that the “queen of flowers” they met earlier was Havayla’s sister, Havayla is greeted as a queen and is exempt from the killing.

Giving up on the riddle, everyone lists their favorite colors. Ryker: blue (he’s an air genasi, it’s kinda his thing), Yevin: purple. Havayla is the queen so didn’t need to answer (but says silver anyways), Wander: amethyst (from a stone her nieces gave her), Nahtan: faded red. Arunak: brown (like leather. His explanation is frowned upon by Trii until he says it reminds him of a belt he got at the orphanage). Colors named, it is revealed that the riddle had no answer! Trii just wanted to see what people said and judge their character from there.

Favorite colors given, everyone is invited to dance, which they do. Ryker uses the opportunity to inch closer to the box, but was seen by Pater. In a quick back and forth over said box, it is realized that the box is an illusion! Wander casts detect magic and can sense the crystals moving just out of her range. Taking off, she leads the way through town, finally catching sight, or at least obvious evidence of, an invisible individual making their way through the crowded streets. Just as they get to the city gate, Wander casts dispel magic, revealing a faun holding the box. Arunak throws a sphere of binding and successfully stops the faun’s retreat.

The crew catches up with Pater and Trii in tow. The faun is revealed to be Eros, who really, really, wants the crystals. Beginning to sense that something is off with his friend, Pater continues to to question Eros, when there is a strange burbling noise. Up on the wall is a green, gangly dragon-type creature, with long antenna-like strands on it’s head, buck teeth, and long claws. The Jabberwock has returned for revenge!

Ryker, as usual, takes the first strike. Then Pater pulls out a package from his belt, opens it and sprinkles some dust on himself before launching into the air towards the jaws that bite. Eros transforms into mist to escape the bonds, but is then held by Wander. Trii trips into the fray and attempts to cast a spell, but Yevin, unsure of her motives and not entirely trusting their new companions, counters it. Arunak monks his way 100 feet up the wall to attack the Jabberwock with his fists and is buffeted off the wall in return. After a couple rounds of relative confusion and frustration for the close combat players as they are limited in their ability to attack something in the air, Yevin transforms Arunak into a giant ape. Aperunak grabs two large stones and flings them at the Jabberwock, severing its neck once again. The Jabberwock falls and dissolves into mist.

During combat, Nahtan gives control of his wolf (now named Moon Moon) over to Ryker, who instructs it to take the box back to the Fiddler’s Bar (unbeknownst to the rest of the team). Once the Jabberwock is slain, Ryker stealths away (again, sneakily and without telling the team) to finish hiding the crystals.

Meanwhile, Eros is continuing to act very weird. Trii charms him into compliance and they decide to go back to the cave where they came in. The Derailers join, messaging Ryker about the plan and telling him where to catch up. Outside the cave, Eros’s answers are more erratic. He can’t remember parts of his recent history, speaks of himself in third person, talks about seeing his reflection in the pool… or maybe he saw Eros in the pool… Havayla steps in to cast “Remove Curse” and Eros just melts away completely.

Now even more confused, the crew seeks answers further in the cave. They come upon a pool surrounded by fey plantlife. But the pool is strangly colored and the surrounding mushrooms are dying. Across the pool is a large Oni. He appears to have cut his hand and is dripping the blood into the pool. At the appearance of the Derailers and guests, he makes a comment about Eros having failed and disappears. Quick survival checks reveal that he is only invisible and attacks are made as he comes closer to the party.

After the killing blow by Pater that knocks the Oni’s head into the pool, the team starts to investigate the pool. The Oni’s blood has obviously corrupted it, but how? And how can they restore it? Ryker shoots an arrow with rope on it to pull the Oni head out of the pool as Havayla reaches in to cast remove curse on the water. As they both touch the water, something happens. Suddenly Ryker is fascinated by the silty ground around the pool and begins to eat the mud. Havayla starts screaming as she looks at her companions. Nahtan, ever the adventurous one, takes a drink and similarly succumbs to madness.

Arunak springs into action using the sphere of binding to prevent Ryker’s pica, stuns Nahtan, then chases down and subdues Havayla. Wander goes to each one casting greater restoration, telling Ryker “you owe me” as she does so. Realizing that they cannot fix the pool and that no one should touch it, Pater gets to work collapsing the cave on top of it.

Back outside the cave, Pater and Trii thank the Derailers for their help and participation. They’ll return to the Feywild, maybe Eros is there on the other side of the pool and they can figure out how to clean it from that side. Pater gives the crew three bags of pixie dust. Havayla asks if they want to meet a unicorn (an emphatic and honored yes) and Ryker suggests that they all go back to the bar for a drink. Returning to town, introductions to Aurora are made, with Pater giving utmost respect to both Aurora and “queen” Havayla. At the Fiddler’s Bar, Trii prepares a hero’s feast as thanks and they pass wound Feywildian mead.

Ryker passes Yevin a drink, but sneaks in a potion of regeneration. Yevin drinks and feels a strange sensation in his right hand; his missing fingers are growing back. What at first appear to be regular half-elven fingers are quickly replaces with two bronze scaled claws. Ryker reveals that he snuck the potion of regeneration he’d had into Yevin’s drink. Yevin hides his hand, finishes his drink, and quietly steps out.

Pater and Trii bid their farewells. Wander asks that if they come across any Firbolgs that look like her, with the names Steady, Ivy, Constance, or Noddy, to tell them that their auntie loves them. With a nod and a flash of flowers, Pater and Trii vanish back to the Feywild. With half the day still ahead of them, everyone goes about their own business. Havayla wants to talk to her mother, Ryker and Arunak are going to take the crystal to Reg for the airship, Nahtan is going to a woodshop (?), Yevin is already gone, and Wander is exhausted and will be in their rooms. And that is where we left the session.

What will come next? We’ll find out next time… which will be in two weeks. Next session will be a one shot run by Havayla’s player and the following week will potentially be another one shot as our DM will be unavailable.

Thank you to our guests for this session, Pater and Trii!

#the derailers d&d #Once again #there are some details left out because it was so chaotic I couldn't keep track. We learned that Ryker and Havayla saved the Summer Queen's #the feathered snaky thing is totally a spy for Skulldrinker and it was tailing Yevin when the session ended.#sidequests are fun!

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faux-pas-intellectual · 7 years ago

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Reasons why the bee movie sucks, aside from the obvious

Summary of the Bee Movie

Before we begin, let me run over the plot of the Bee Movie, because for many of us, the sheer concentration of bee-related puns is too overwhelming for any single person to power through. So, the bee movie starts when Barry B. Benson goes for his Bee College graduation, and goes through an orientation into the job market, which I’m sure we all wish we had. He gets upset at the fact that he’ll work until he dies, as we all are, and he decides to take a bit of a risk and join the worker bees—I’m sorry, Pollen Jocks on their job, a bit like he’s gotten a day-long internship with them. He then gets into a sticky situation (literally, he sticks to a tennis ball for a bit), but he gets saved by this human woman and florist, Vanessa Bloome. They get to know each other and hit it off, and by the end of it, Barry’s pretty head-over-heels for her, and so they start spending more time together. This is when Barry finds out that humans have been stealing and selling the bees’ honey, and he gets around to suing all of mankind, or honey-producers, at least, for their honey sales. Now, we all know that bees are integral to the pollination of flowers. Barry – a honey bee who literally saw and heard about pollination and its importance during his ‘internship’ – somehow didn’t consider the likelihood that bees not going out to pollinate flowers would cause flowers to start dying out. Which it does, although in a rather scientifically unsound amount of time. He and Vanessa then take a plane to a flower parade which has some of the last surviving flowers, and smuggle a parade float to have enough flowers to pollinate all the flowers in their city, or something like that. All the bees help them do just that, and they pollinate all the flowers, almost immediately bringing the wilting or dead flowers right back to life.

What Will Be Covered

Now, what exactly is wrong with the bee movie? Well, a lot. The obvious would be the very uncomfortable and largely criticized romance between a human woman and a bee. The second most obvious problem is the sheer number of really, really bad and frustrating bee jokes, both verbal and more subtle, visual puns. The bee puns are plenty, and the lady bees have beehive hairstyles, whereas the gentle-bees have buzzcuts. Aside from that, the entire movie is painfully scientifically unsound, from start to finish. And to add on to that, the sociopolitical message of the bee movie is, to put it lightly, a little bit questionable. But that last point will be a little lengthy, so we’ll cover some of the glaring inaccuracies of the Bee Movie first. Now, I’d rather do a lot of incredibly painful things before I rewatch the Bee Movie with the sole purpose of finding inaccuracies, but since I just watched it again about a week ago, I still have a pretty clear idea of what was rather noticeably wrong.

Scientific Inaccuracies

The Issue with Pollen The most basic grasp on how plants work will tip you off that there was something wrong with the Bee Movie’s understanding of pollen. When Barry follows the Pollen Jocks out to collect honey and pollinate flowers for the first time, one of the experienced bees tells him that they take some of the pollen from one flower, and sprinkle it onto the next. And that would be fine, except that when he demonstrates this, the bee gathers pollen from a daisy, and then sprinkles it onto a rose. Now, anyone who took science at the age of 11 will know that this isn’t how pollination works. The pollen grains contain sperm cells and, when met with the stigma of a flower, will fertilise the egg cells within the flower, and this will begin the process of the flower ripening into a fruit. Since this is the process of sexual fertilisation, the pollen grains will have to be from the same species of flower as the flower that it fertilises.

Now, this isn’t the only thing that the Bee Movie gets wrong about pollination. There’s another thing that doesn’t quite make sense about pollination in this movie is the role it plays for flowers. The time lapse in the movie shows that within four days, the plants in the city have all started wilting rather drastically and visibly. Now this just isn’t right. Pollen, unlike water or sunlight, isn’t necessary for the survival of the individual plant. Pollination only needs to occur when the plants have to bear fruit, and produce offspring, usually at the end of spring and nearing winter, as seeds can remain ungerminated – is that a word? – until the time whereby the conditions are optimal for the plant to grow again. This, obviously, is specific to plants which can’t grow in the winter. Depending on the plant, this period whereby fertilisation is important depends on when the plant species’ flowering cycles and periods. So without pollination, plants will not just start to shrivel and die. And, anyways, bees aren’t the only way for pollination to happen. There are other things which pollinate flowers, too, like wind, and humans, and other nectar-sucking creatures like hummingbirds, so the flowering plant population would drastically fall without bees, for sure, but it wouldn’t all just die.

But the biggest issue with all of the problems in how the movie depicts pollination is in one of the final scenes, where the bees are pollinating all the wilting and dying plants. The pollen, in this scene, acts like some sort of pixie dust, because sprinkling it on flowers and plants brings them all back to full health and a state of vibrant colours immediately. This is obviously not how pollination works, and not how pollen grains work. At all. In fact, it’s rather insulting to anyone under the age of 10 that creators of the Bee Movie think that pollen grains would magically resurrect literally already-dead plants, even with our beliefs suspended for this film about talking bees.

Somehow, even with all these issues regarding just pollination, there are other scientific inaccuracies within the movie. And these issues are much more integral to the movie itself. Specifically, there is an inaccurate representation of the biology of honey bees, throughout this entire movie.

Problematic Bee-ology The biology of bees isn’t in any way something that I expect people to know off the top of their heads, but I think it’s fair to expect the people writing an entire movie about bees to know, at the very least, the bare minimum about honey bee biology. So what did Dreamworks get wrong about bees in the Bee Movie? Well, everything, really. In reality, all male bees have no stingers, and have no job except for mating with the queen, after which, they’re killed by means of having their endophalluses -- which is the bee equivalent of a penis -- ripped out, alongside their abdomen. So who does all the work in the hive? Well, the worker bees do. They do all of the hard work, like collecting honey and protecting the hive. And all of them are -- you guessed it -- female. Every single worker bee is a female bee. So the Pollen Jocks, which look like an oddly buffed-up version of literally every other bee, should, in fact, be female. For that matter, every working bee in any of the largely arbitrary careers available to bees should be female. Male honey bees are just for mating purposes. So, really, the Bee Movie is what happens when people apply human societal norms to bees, while simultaneously expressing their hero worship for those with a masculine physique that’s considered ideal. And this explains why the Pollen Jocks are all male bees, with the inverted triangle body shape for men exclusively applied to them. It’s because some human people considered the bees which collect honey and leave the hive as to having a rather glamorous and very important job, and so obviously, it’s allocated to the muscular male bees. Who would have expected that the creators of Bee Movie would have applied human gender roles to bees? But this isn’t what I meant when I said that I would be covering the socio-political messages within the bee movie.

Questionable Implications

Somehow, the bees in the Bee Movie, despite being about a community of bees living in a hive under a ruling monarch which we never see, ultimately runs like a capitalist society, where the working class bees don’t get to keep what they produce, and they produce far more than they really need. As a result, the bees work till they die, which is actually what pushes our protagonist, Barry, into action that leads him to both meeting Vanessa and later, suing humans for selling honey without the knowledge of bees. A bit of an aside here, but the Bee Movie depicts beekeepers as evil and abusive towards bees. And recently, this has become untrue. In fact, a quick search will tell you that bees are not controlled by the beekeeper, and allowed to leave if they wanted. Usually, the bees actively choose to stay, because they recognise that the beekeeper’s hives are clean, dark and sheltered, which they like. Previous beekeeping practices have a lot of faults, which one should be wary of supporting since they're pervasive, even now. However, as the importance of bees is being more largely discussed, beekeeping practices have improved to aiding weaker hives to help with their survival which would previously have been more likely to die. In general, while some beekeeping practices are still not quite up-to-date, and beekeeping in smaller local practices tend to be better in that regard, having beekeepers does aid in the preservation of bees.

Now, back to the point about capitalism and bees. Barry B. Benson sues the humans and since bees have perfected their honey-producing process so that the bees have sufficient honey despite being exploited, it isn’t long before the process is able to stop entirely, with enough honey having been made to last the bees a long time. Barry’s friend Adam tells him how everyone has stopped working and is now merely lazing about, and expresses his grievances over the fact that his whole life had been leading up to contributing to honey production and contributing to the colony, and that Barry had taken that dream away from him. The well-deserved rest that the bees receive from the fall in demand for production and labour is presented with empty, desolate work stations, instead of the relief one would expect from finally getting a break from their tireless efforts which often costs them their entire lives. The situation worsens as the suspension of honey production means that the bees no longer have to collect nectar, and as a result, flowers die as they aren’t pollinated. We already know that this isn’t how pollination works, but we’ll just go along with it. The movie goes on and we end with bees coming to an agreement with mankind to allow humans to continue selling their honey, so that the bees can continue working themselves to death for the profit of an entity other than themselves, and maintain the natural order of things, or something like that.

Even after setting my own biases aside, there’s something inherently malicious with painting the portrayed bee society as both necessary and pivotal, the loss of which causing huge detrimental effects to the affected areas. When applied to the real world, the implication of this message is the justification and normalisation of a real and very harmful issue in many societies today. Unintentionally, the Bee Movie has sent a message of its support for labour with little rewards, and the justification of slaving away to produce beyond what is needed, to the point of numerous workplace hazards resulting in frequent deaths. While played off as comedy - ha ha, the bees die so often, a new job opens up every millisecond - it’s no laughing matter in the real world. Contemporary slavery is a dire issue, affecting almost 45.8million people around the world, and about a quarter of that is likely to be children, forced into child labour. Most of the work done by the impoverished have small returns for an immense amount of physical labour, and they are hardly sufficient for survival, much less comfort. In fact, many apply for jobs which adhere to extremely lax safety precautions, leading to a high injury and death rate, all for the sake of a relatively higher wage. People are being forced to exchange their safety and their lives for a pay that is still too low to lift them out of absolute poverty to this very day. The Bee Movie states that the bees’ revolt against producing honey to accommodate the wants of humans as ‘an unholy perversion of the balance of nature’. Under the assumption that the bees’ honey production is comparable to capitalism, then this isn’t true. Largely socialist countries exist, and amongst them is Finland, which has one of the highest standards of living in the world. Personally, I’m not of the opinion that having a high standard of living is an unholy perversion of the balance of nature, but it seems that others may disagree with me.

Conclusion

Overall, the Bee Movie is subpar. It isn’t even that enjoyable of a B-movie, considering its lacking humour which is built mostly on too many puns and no finesse, and the on-screen romance is uncomfortable. Consistent scientific inconsistencies are also a major issue, considering anyone under the age of 12 would already be aware of the process and use of pollination, and that it isn’t some magic fairy dust that brings plants back to life. The subtle sexism that exists in making the rightfully female bees all masculine and male is an unnecessary application of human society to a movie about bees, and yet the creators did not take into account the message it sent about the justification of a society that valued production over lives and how that could in turn be applied to human society.

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