#also we're just different as people and as artists so some of his story choices I just don't vibe with

[troutfur]

bonefall rewrite piece where owlstar and sparrowstar meet at a negotiation of some sort.

Not so fast, REVERSE CARD OPEN!

I target BB!Owlstar on my side of the field to special summon canon!Owlstar in attack position and canon!Pebble Heart in defense position.

Anyway! My bad attempt at a joke aside I'm gonna have to hijack this prompt for my own ends because I've always thought that the Pebble-Sparrow-Owl trio could have a really cool dynamic as a trio in the aftermath of DotC. I need Pebble Heart to be a separate character from Owlstar because both from his position as a meddie and his characterization in canon I have him serve as a mediating influence, as an anchor that keeps his siblings from drifting too far off from each other. Plus I think trios just generally give a more stable ground for character dynamics than mere dyads.

This one I based on a fic I that's been rummaging in my mind for ages about Sparrow facing a coup from Skystar's kin following his death and having to convince her brothers to lend their aid in her campaign of guerrilla warfare to reclaim her position.

(Want to submit a prompt of your own? Check out my guidelines and send it in! I'm only slightly likely to hijack it with a lame Yu-Gi-Oh! joke.)

With labored breaths, Sparrow Fur sat against the rough bark of a tree with a trickle of blood going over her left eye.

Everything since the ambush had been a blurr. Skystar hadn’t even been cold in the ground for more than before one of his brats got cocky and decided to organize an insurrection. There’d been no shortage of cats to stand behind him, the downside of Skystar’s system of advancement by merit was that there would always be a gaggle of malcontent cats eager to stand behind the first cat to promise them a place by his right paw.

Though she had barely the energy to move she attempted anyway to rise to her feet before she was gently guided back down onto her back.

“Easy there,” Pebble Heart instructed, pressing a wad fo wet most as he wiped the spot on her head from where the blood was oozing. “I haven’t even finished cleaning your wounds, Sparrow. Are you like this with Acorn Fur as well?”

She didn’t reply, instead just letting the twitching of her tail to give the message. It had been humilliating enough to be forced to flee her own territory, to hide among the dampness of ShadowClan and forced to rely on kin she thought she’d have no debt to anymore. Yet here she was, SkyClan’s deputy reduced to such a sorry state.

“I know, I know,” the dark-gray tom soothed., adding with a sigh, “It’s so hopeless with you, SkyClan cats.” Briefly he turned around to retrieve a herb from the stash he’d managed to bring alongside him from his nest. “Will you calm down if I tell you that I have someone who can help you out with your predicament?”

“Pryyp?” Sparrow Fur mrowwed. It’d been the first word the ShadowClan medic had heard her say in hours.

“Pebble Heart?” a familiar voice asked approaching the makeshift clinic fashioned from the cover of a fallen tree.

For a moment Sparrow Fur vocalized a sound like a growl. The recently-arrived tom widened his already large eyes in surprise, standing there for a moment before rushing to the side of his brother and sister. It was Owlstar of ThunderClan.

“Do you know who did this to her?” Owlstar asked. “How did this happen? When?”

“I found her a couple sunrises ago,” Pebble Heart explained. “I don’t have all the details and she hasn’t been well enough to tell me herself but I’ve got an idea of what it was, and she’ll need your help.”

“No!” Sparrow Fur immediately snapped, causing her brothers to tumble back as she labored to go back on her feet. She found it hard for the words to come to her mouth but she could say that much. “No! No! No! NO! Not ThunderClan!”

“This is no time to be proud, Sparrow,” Pebble Heart insisted. “If you want to reclaim leadership from Tiger Tail--”

“Wait,” Owlstar piped up, his sight brightening. “Skystar’s dead? And it was one of his sons and not Sparrow who took the leadership? This is excellent! From now on we could--”

Owlstar was stopped in his enthusiasm by a growl from his sister and a scolding from his brother. “This is no time to be thinking of a battle! Sparrow’s hurt and her would-be murderers are chasing her and this is what you think about?”

“Well, I have to think of ThunderClan!” Owl Eyes defended himself. “And SkyClan’s been nothing but a threat. Why shouldn’t I think about our rivalry now?”

At least there was something she could agree with her brother on...

[ach-sss-no]

Schrödinger's Hobbit extemporaneous liveblog chapter 1

(It's extemporaneous because I'm queueing some of these posts and lightly editing for coherence, it's just easier for me to do things this way) I decided to read through a fanfic of mine and make notes for personal reasons.

[A couple people were kind enough to express interest in this! so I wanted to add, if you have any questions about anything in the fic please ask, because I might leave stuff out. Sometimes we all gloss over things that seem obviously notable to someone else. We've all had that embarassing incident where we forget to mention that the marsh we're navigating is cursed and full of dead people]

I'm not reading any of the author's notes. The beginning one is long.

I remember I tried to make it really clear right away that this is book canon because I was starting it off at the canon divergence point which is a scene PIVOTAL TO THIS CHARACTER that is NOT IN THE MOVIES.

This story exists because I assumed there would be Gollum redemption fics out there already and I didn't see any, and I was disappointed because I was curious to see how people would solve this problem and no one had even tried. I mean that. There were a few 'what if he was good?' oneshots and I did really enjoy them but they ALL took place, IIRC, AFTER the redemption point (he was just hanging out inthe Shire or something.) There was just a total dearth of actual-heart-change-character-arc Gollum fic. So I decided to take a crack at it myself, but since I did write it myself, this fic still doesn't fill the desire for wanting to see how other people would do it. I read & write fanfiction mostly as a social thing and my own work never meets the craving for seeing someone else's story. I'm harping on that because nowadays the response to 'I wish there was [x fic]' is usually 'write it yourself! :) :) :)' but that doesn't help me personally. Because what I want is specifically not my own story. I get different kinds of reinforcement from writing than reading.

Alas! I still wrote this story.

I remember thinking I wanted to start off right away firmly in GOllum's POV because, in part, I think fanfic and transformative works should be about things that were not and should not have been in the original, and for what I think were solid artistic reasons, LOTR stays firmly out of Gollum's POV. His POV would be interesting, but doesn't serve his role in the original story. (We do see a glimpse of it in The Hobbit, in a scene which studio executives thru Peter Jackson absolutely desecrated. But we're not here to talk about THEIR AU. This is MY AU. I'm kind of stalling from actually reading it.)

It starts in Cirith Ungol. My take was that Gollum's true, final heel turn was there, what with the 'fleeting moment gone beyond recall' talk.

There is a sticky bit here which is that Gollum's final push towards evil was facilitated by Sam, who sees a moment of real emotional vulnerability and says something snappish. But it's important to me that a redemption story follow from free will choices only. (at least, this one.) So I have a problem where Gollum isn't exactly doing anything wrong at a moment where I need him to make a different decision. I don't want the 'good turn' moment to come from Sam, but it also didn't seem fitting for Gollum to just not snap when he's called a sneak. So, instead, I decided to make it so that Gollum decides he's unworthy to touch Frodo and he doesn't and he doesn't trigger Sam.

What Gollum is thinking in canon in this scene is, as I have said, an utter mystery. I chose a characterization where he's not thinking anything morally deep but just seeking connection.

Just like the mud, when he had come back to the hobbits after finding some worms to eat and the mud had been on his face and hands, and they had looked so sad, and so horrified;

I'm calling back to this moment because there are three moments in the trilogy where GOllum quietly watches Sam and Frodo interacting. Cirith Ungol is the climactic one. The first one is when he comes back from eating bugs and he's covered in mud and for a moment he watches Sam and Frodo interacting instead of saying 'hi I'm back I was eating bugs'

He pulled away, finally. He almost considered reaching back, voice or no voice… but then it occurred to him: his hands were dirty. He ought not to touch the nice Master with dirty hands.

So, like, I want him to make a free will choice, but obviously, if not interrupted, the scene will run as it did in canon and end in lava. I'm trying to go for 'Gollum's attention is diverted for a moment by the mysterious voice and he rethinks what he's doing and chooses a different action which has a different series of consequences' rather than 'Gollum is briefly wrenched out of character by an outside force that is definitely not the author'. It may be weak, but it is a fanfiction AU and we all know why we're here and you're either on board with it or you're not. Whatever.

So Gollum sat there huddled and alone while Sam and Frodo were together just a few feet away.

My thesis is that Gollum is damaged almost more by the isolation than by the soul-stealing ring. The rest of the fic turned out to revolve around him (spoiler) discovering he's an extravert. This is not subtle.

Master said: "Sméagol, I am not worthy of such veneration, even from you. I am only a hobbit. Please get up."

One of the most difficult things about this fic was Gollum's POV. Not writing his inner monologue- that wasn't difficult. That was delightful. Everyone loves writing in MietteGollumspeak. Rather, his limitations in perceiving others' motivations and moods were even more difficult than usual in limited POV, because Gollum has difficulty interpreting social signals that goes beyond the norm, and also, at the same time, everyone needs to be in character. Also, also, Gollum isn't always aware of what he DOESN'T know, and can't always tell the reader 'someone is emoting but I can't tell! :)' That needs to be left implied unless he's really getting confused to the point where he understands he's missing something.

What I'm getting at is that Frodo is telling Gollum to stop bowing in part because it's creeping him out, but Frodo is being very tactful about it and at this point in the story Gollum can't read tone of voice well (and he's not looking at Frodo's face).

There were many points in this fic where I had to just be okay with things being ambiguous or unclear. That's usually for the better anyway.

Gollum heard this and his wretched mind thought: How great must Master really be, if he does not even want me to grovel, to show him his greatness. Not like Her! He must know how great he is, and not need me to tell him, and he is being very polite to Sméagol by telling him he needn't bother. How could I have thought of taking him to Her? She would rip him up like a bit of paper and then he would be gone, yes precious, and She would still be a nasty big spider and I would still be hungry. I will always be hungry, and She will only tell me that She is hungrier, and Master is telling me I needn't bow.

I'm trying to be very clear up front that this is unreliable narrator fic that's deep in POV and you are getting exactly this kind of thing for the rest of the story and if you don't like it leave now. I'm a big believer that stories should tell you very quickly what they are and what you're in for.

To that end, I also slapped a massive wall of AO3 classification tags on this thing. One of them is 'crack treated seriously'. Some people thought it was odd to characterize the fic as crack at all. I think the premise is cracky enough, but I wouldn't consider a Boromir Lives or Wormtongue Lives or Denethor Lives to be crack...

Gollum's situation is a little different though.

Skip ahead: ring scene. A lot of things happen but essentially Gollum chooses to throw the Ring away rather than trying to keep it. (He still wrestled it away from Frodo, but without maiming him)

"Sméagol!" A thin hobbit voice that he should not have heard over the cries of 'my precious o my precious' that he did not realize he was babbling, but he heard. A desperate voice, one that did not expect to be heeded. "Cast it away, Sméagol! Please!"

I wanted to leave it ambiguous whether this is Frodo or Sam or even a hallucination. For all I know this is Deagol talking.

Later on, Gandalf says 'you cast [the Ring] into the fire with your own hand, unbidden' which is a contradiction, because someone did in fact tell/beg him to throw it away. I don't remember whether I was trying to imply that this voice was not real or if it's just a mistake.

I feel like anything that's straight from LOTR with changes to fit the AU is probably the weakest part of this because I'm just copying something from a much stronger writer and changing it a little and the seams show. But I think people are (or should be) a little forgiving because it's a fanfic and the establishing purpose of this should be obvious.

That nasty old Sam's going to let go of me, isn't he. More fool him! I am dying. Sméagol is dead already. 

Another purpose of the fic is supposed to be to draw out and highlight the aspects of book!Gollum's character that I enjoy (and to indulge in playing with them). Sometimes it feels like I can say more about a work through a transformative work than I could by just quote-dumping from it and going 'hey look at that!', which is another reason I write fanfic.

Anyway I like it when he cracks wise. In the way that Scrooge makes cracks about underdone potato when faced with Jacob Marley, Smeagol has the audacity to make digs at Sam while he believes he's actively dying. 'He's gonna let go of me. Joke's on him, you can't kill what's already dead!' It's also characterizing that Gollum is so convinced of the basic meanness of life and such a vindicitve little snot at this point that he really thinks Sam would pull him back from the brink in order to say 'lmao' and let go again.

Oh, one thing I did in this fic that I thought for sure would get at least one confused comment was writing Smeagol without any sign of disassociative identity/multiple personality. He's one integrated person. That was how I felt about him reading the book (at least 95% of the time) and the movies went real hard with their own thing and I thought for sure SOMEONE would say (well-meaningly) that they expected to see multiple personalities. But they haven't! Not so far. (I almost said something about this in the author's note, but I didn't want it to become a topic of conversation unless someone else brought it up, so I didn't.) I believe a new PJ-verse movie with Gollum is set for release soonish? and that will probably drive interest in the character and might lead to movieverse fans finding my fic and finally getting confused by it. I haven't yet seen any confusion from anyone encountering the book canon's version of the events in the fic (which came in for this chapter and also comes in later, much later, when Faramir appears), but the future is unknown!

Anyway when I talk about the character I tend to use Gollum and Smeagol interchangeably as two names for the same guy and if that confuses you I apologize. I am not going to remember to stay consistent.

My fic just uses Gollum as his name in the narration because TOlkien always used the name Gollum in the narration.

"Master!" There was a pause here, for emotion that could not be expressed in words. Then: "I've just been fetching Sméagol, in case you still want him, but I'm not sure he's going to be any good to anyone, ever again. The poor wretch!"

It's kind of difficult to write Sam from Gollum's POV because I like Sam and Gollum just straight out hates him. It's hard not to either dial back with 'but Sam is a good person I don't hate him pleeease' or overcompensate for my personal bias and have him come off worse than he should. (to be fair, Sam is genuinely a huge jerk to Gollum at times in canon. It's hilarious. Also sad though.) It looks like I cheated a little here and dipped into omniscient POV. Gollum might be unconscious already.

Cut to Gollum being carried away by Gandalf (on an eagle; but Gollum can't tell this due to being half-conscious, and later on I'm pretty sure someone tells him he escaped on an eagle and he goes 'sounds fake 🙃' )

Gone! Forever! Without it he was a husk, a shell, the discarded bits left after prying open an oyster- wet things to clack together and then toss into the mud and leave.

I'm reaching for MetaphorsTM because I thought Gollum would think in sensory and emotional terms more than clear speech.

Gandalf is reading his mind because I need a conversation to happen here and my POV character cannot speak due to vague volcano-related injuries.

Time skips happen, Gollum is recuperating and Frodo comes to visit. (Gollum is still half-conscious and there are no visual descriptions from his POV.)

But Master's voice was calm. "You were keeping it from him when I could not. I am not angry. You have kept your promise, and you have done more besides that I did not ask. I thank you. Many have cause to thank you, whether or not they shall ever know it."

Frodo doesn't ouright say this and Gollum doesn't infer it, but Frodo is being so nice because he thinks Gollum is going to die. Like, any minute now.

Essentially, from Frodo's perspective he is in a Disney Death scene. You know. Where people say 'oh he was so great' because they think their friend is dead but then he's not and they have to deal with it.

"It sounds like you shouldn't talk," said Frodo.

That might be a 'please. oh please don't talk'

"Is the nice Master well?" It must have hurt Master to have the Precious go into the fire, too- it must have hurt him very badly. Gollum felt as if the fire was burning in his own skin, even now. And the emptiness, the loss of it.

I was trying to go for 'Gollum's thoughts are more eloquent than his speech can express' (he's having detailed interior worries and self-identification with Frodo that ends up flattened into 'How you doin' on the way out of his mouth) and as the story goes on he begins to be able to say more of what he's thinking. Actually this is something Tolkien does with Sam to some extent (look for passges where there's some flower beautiful thing and then 'But Sam didn't know how to say that'. Through the meta 'oh but Sam wrote the account later on!' we get the insinuation that Sam later learned how to articulate these things.)

"I have heard you are not. I was told that perhaps I should not even see you," said Frodo. "I came anyway because it's possible that I won't have another chance."

"Because I was told you're going to go live on a farm. with Boromir [who is also alive though spolerss]"

Another voice interceded here: "I believe you will have opportunity to see him again, Frodo. Do not worry yourself on that account."

I may have intended that Frodo (who in the book does in fact want Gollum dead! or is at least tempted to want him dead! see: waterfall scene!) is sort of counting on an imminent demise, because he's acting like he thinks the end is near even though Gandalf is saying that's just. not true

Gollum wanted to say you never goes anywhere without your nasty old Sam or something in that vein, because it seemed so odd that Sam was not there if Sam was alive, but he started coughing instead.

Gollum is in Fanfiction Invalid Mode for the beginning part of the fic for a few reasons, one, I thought it would be inevitable for any sense of realism because Frodo and Sam were also in invalid mode in canon after the destruction of the Ring and if Gollum didn't literally crumble to dust he would at least be suffering severe dehydration and other things. But it's also because he is such a stubborn arrogant nasty little bugger. I thought that if I wanted a premise of 'Gollum's presence is tolerated' I had to severely break him down. So he's ill to the point of relying on others for survival moment to moment.

And it's already helping him, because it stops him making rude comments about Sam to Frodo, which would have been a poor strategic move, relationally.

Gollum notes Sam's absence as odd because he did in canon (see again: waterfall scene; frodo shows up to get him out of the pool and into the cop car, and gollum asks something like 'where is the other hobbit, the cross rude one' or something equally uncomplimentary)

Gollum knows Sam and Frodo are inseparable.

Gollum understands their characters better than New Line Cinema did.

And I have cause to thank you as well, not only for your deeds, but because due to your actions I can handily win many arguments I have been having

In the book Gandalf had a difficult time convicing Frodo that Gollum shouldn't be put to death. I doubt Frodo was the only one who thought he was irredeemable. Because uhh he was. in the real timeline. Still worked out well not to kill him though.

Perhaps his time was better spent sleeping than in trying to figure out wizards. "I think you are right," said Gandalf, "for you will never figure out wizards.

Gandalf is still reading his mind, or maybe reading expressions/cues Gollum doesn't know he's giving off. Gandalf can canonically read minds though. See: Denethor.

To be honest he's doing this partly just because I thought it was funny.

The extensive timeskips here are meant to reduce the amount of time I'm spending on writing whump, by the way. There's more of that here and then Gollum is roused by Gandalf and Aragorn so they can have a little chat about... how awkward it is that Gollum saved the world and lived to tell about it.

"Dare I ask why he is still alive?" "Dear me, it was not my decision.

I'm trying to imply that the Valar cheat-coded additional hit points for Gollum because by the laws of the story the destruction of the Ring absolutely should have killed him but I need him alive for my silly little fanfiction. But without outright stating that. Because it feels a liiiiittle bit cheap.

I think there's another place ten or more chapters from now where Gandalf implies it a little more strongly.

"And if my ears or my brain have not lost their sense, I am to believe that you, you yourself, cast the Ring into the fire. And on that point I cannot see how anyone could be mistaken, for if Sam or Frodo had done it they would certainly not have given the credit to you. You did this deed." Gollum had heard the phrase 'you did this deed' before, and no one who had said it had ever been pleased with him. He recalled that Gandalf and Aragorn had had an interest in the Precious, but he could not be certain whether they had been guarding Frodo because they endorsed his mission to destroy it, or if they wanted it for themselves. One of the two big Men traveling in the elf-boats on the River had tried to take the Precious from Master at one point, he had, and Gollum couldn't really tell two tall, dark-haired, gray-eyed, fit Men apart from one another at a distance. He decided to reply with: "Don't hurt us!"

I'm trying to imply through omission of description of Aragorn's tone of voice that Gollum can't read it and is getting no information from it, or else he probably wouldn't think Aragorn is angry.

(Also, Aragorn referring to the brain as the seat of thought/sense is a little off for the time period of LOTR. I wouldn't make that choice if I were writing this now. It's a minor problem, though, I think.)

Gollum is just as confused as everyone else about the fact that he saved the world and everyone has to be nice to him now. Aragorn and Gandalf have to keep explaining it and they ask him to recount events to see if he can start figuring out what happened.

Sam saw me, he was not pleased, oh no, and he pulled Sméagol, yes he grabbed me with his big rough hands and that hurt us, it did, but I had the Precious in my handses when he pulled me, and it came away!"

I decided in the 'Gollum lives and is niceys' AU he should somehow get away with not biting off Frodo's finger because it seemed somehow mean-spirited to put Frodo in a position where he has to reconcile with the person who bit his finger off. Gollum is hard enough to get along with already.

I think the intended alternate chain of events here was: Gollum does not knock Sam out when he runs to stop Frodo claiming the Ring, because he didn't make a break from their party and doesn't have to ambush them -> Sam is awake and alert, intervenes in the fight and inadvertently helps Gollum steal the Ring while doing so -> Gollum does not have to go to the extreme of biting off Frodo's finger. Although given the force involced he probably broke Frodo's finger by doing this and everyone was too classy to tell him.

...I missed an opportunity to have Gollum bite his own finger off instead but even if it had occurred to me I probably wouldn't have done it because it would be too dark in tone to have him deal with the pain and loss of a finger for the whole rest of the fic. Gollum would be very preoccupied with that kind of injury and devote a lot of POV space to it. There would be no plausible, in-character way to get around that.

Gollum's voice dropped low again. "We could have bitten our hand off. O no! Sméagol's nice hand. I would not like that, I would starve without it, so the way I chose was better, yes, it is dreadful to starve, and it is hard to chew through wristses, it is, precious! So many little bones there, and there was no time."

Okay never mind I guess I did include at least a partial 'he could have maimed himself instead but it would have been cringe' (also, Gollum did not put the Ring on- not here, and not even in the canon version of the scene either)

"The fact remains," said Gandalf, "no matter what your reasons, you saved Frodo from an evil end, and saved many others from similar ends. Do you desire a reward?" "A reward! From Gandalf the Grey," said Gollum. "He is offering us a reward! He would have burned Sméagol in fires, he had us dragged to him on a leassh like a dog, and he called us a liar and a thief, now he wants to give us treats and presents." [There's a lot more dialog because Gollum still does not get it] Gollum heard himself speaking, though he was not aware that he had chosen to say anything. "I want to eat and drink and rest when I wish. And I do not want to wear my poor fingers to stubs with wandering, wandering and searching, wandering and searching, and hiding, and sneaking." Even to his own ears he sounded weary.

This caused me to change the whole plot of this fic later on, I'll tell you when we get there.

And that's chapter 1.

[iztarshi]

Mirage TMNT and Ideological Violence (Part One)

This essay is going to be missing some things because I haven’t read or watched everything in the TMNT franchise. Most importantly, I haven’t read volumes three and four of Mirage, and I thought about putting this off until I had. Ultimately, though, I don’t think it’s going to matter. Mirage volumes three and four might have influenced TMNT 2012 or Rise, although I have my doubts, but TMNT 87 and 03 pre-date them. The influence that echoes down through the franchise comes almost entirely from volume 1 and that's what I want to focus on.

Mirage Volume 1 surprised me by having satisfying character arcs for both the turtles and Casey Jones that are also cohesive, centering around violence committed for ideals, the choice not to commit violence, and situations where violence is still necessary. Mirage is not entirely a deconstruction, it’s certainly not Watchmen, but it draws on some violent comics and bounces between parody, deconstruction, and simply playing it straight enough to enjoy the gore and grit. It’s having fun even at its most deconstructive and while I’m most interested in that deconstruction I don’t want to make it sound like this is a comic that’s trying to be taken seriously. I do think, however, that it manages to have themes and something real to say in the process.

I also want to cover TMNT 87, the 90’s Movie, TMNT 03, TMNT 12 and Rise of the TMNT and the ways in which these themes are not carried through the franchise even when they could be. But even just the essay about these themes in Mirage might take multiple posts.

-

The Turtles: the cycle of revenge and choosing to leave it

First up, the violence Mirage deconstructs and comments on is comic book violence, it's very familiar with its own genre and has things to say about it. This is especially the case with the arc focused on the Turtles themselves because the authors don't know anything about Japan. The Turtles are named after artists because Eastman and Laird didn't know enough Japanese names. So, um, we're going to be talking a lot about revenge and honour and cycles of revenge caused by a warrior code, and all of that has a lot more to do with how Western comics were using Japan at the time than it does with Japan. I'm not really qualified to answer questions about whether it was a bad idea to found a franchise on this (I love the franchise but it probably was a bad idea), and it certainly baked "being weird about Japan" into the franchise from the very start, but I do think I need to acknowledge it. And maybe apologise for not saying more about it in this essay.

That said, I'm going to move on to talking about the Turtles and their story.

I do rather love that Splinter's just straight up "kill a guy for me". You get used to the Splinters in later versions who are reluctant to get the Turtles involved in their beef with Shredder, but not this one.

Before giving them this task Splinter also tells them his backstory and I think it's important thematically that, unlike in later versions that follow roughly this backstory, the cycle of violence has already started cycling and it didn't start with Shredder. Shredder was not Hamato Yoshi's rival for Tang Shen, instead his older brother Nagi was. Shredder was seven when Yoshi killed his brother and we see him weeping on his brother's coffin. The Foot raised him to avenge his brother in a similar way to Splinter has raised the Turtles to avenge is master. Nor is Yoshi a good guy, particularly. He did kill Nagi to protect Tang Shen, but he was also an assassin. What ninjas are is not glossed over here. It's not about right and wrong, but only about the belief that you owe it to people you love to avenge them, a belief held by both sides.

The Turtles defeat Shredder and then prove that for them revenge is a matter of honour (and also that not knowing the difference between ninja and samurai has a long history in the franchise).

I think this is important because I was talking about ideological violence and for the Turtles this is a matter of ideology. In being raised as Splinter's sons they have taken on the responsibility of avenging Yoshi as a member of their clan. And here we see them act on that ideology without hesitation.

This comes back to bite them in the Farmhouse arc. Shredder's ressurection means that he is ultimately able to return to avenge himself. Leonardo nearly dies and the Turtles are left feeling vulnerable and defeated in the wake of this.

The Turtles stay at the farmhouse for almost exactly a year. Unlike later versions they don't really have a status quo this is disrupting. They lived in the sewers, which they weren't very happy about, until April offered them an apartment in her building. They lived there until her building was destroyed and they moved to the farmhouse and they stay in the farmhouse for most of the rest of volume one even after going back to New York to defeat Shredder. For them being driven out of New York is a personal loss, neither the world nor the civilian population is more at risk for them being somewhere else, and they don't have any particular duty to go back.

But Raphael can't accept that. He hates giving up after losing a fight, he feels it's wrong to accept defeat instead of avenging what was done to Leo, and he hates that Leo is more anxious and passive as a result of what was done to him. Raphael and Leo get into what may be the first ever Raph vs Leo fight in the franchise, Raph throws Leo through a wall and storms off to return to the city by himself if the others won't come. The others - as Raphael knew they would - follow him home rather than let him face danger by himself and he is able to force the confrontation with Shredder.

During the infiltration of the Foot headquarters Raphael breaks away again leaving the others in a fight with deformed Shredder-clones (which make more sense here than in 03 since Shredder was cloned to bring him back from the dead) to chase after Shredder. Leo follows, thinking furiously that Raph is ignoring that they were taught to stay together and watch each other's backs. This is Raph and Leo as a clash of personalities and ideologies, Splinter taught them both to stick together as a family and to see vengeance as honourable, now his sons take different tacks.

This time running off ahead works out badly for Raphael and he acknowledges this. He then sends Leonardo ahead to fight Shredder. What he sees as his error was taking a fight that was not his - as the most hurt the vengeance should be Leo's - as well as one he wasn't capable of winning.

This arc ends with Leo acknowledging Shredder's death as necessary to restore their honour before burning his body. Thanks to Raph's pushing he has decided to revert to the ideology of revenge Splinter taught them.

If the first defeat of Shredder was simple, the Turtles united in their task and with no doubts, this one is much more complicated. The question of whether they want to re-engage in a cycle of revenge that got their tails kicked hangs over them. It's not a matter of ending someone else's battle now and they don't all agree on what should be done.

As with Shredder's first death they assume they've put an end to things here once they finish "one final task" and as with the first death they have not. It will be a while before they reckon with the Foot clan and truly start to question the ideals Splinter taught them.

City at War begins with the turtles returning to New York. The remains of the Foot clan has gone to war with itself and, as Raph puts it "we cut off the head but the body's still kicking". For those familiar with this arc from 03 it might be surprising to learn that Raph is the one who feels responsible and wants to help clean up while Leo is unsure. This is partly because these are more lethal turtles. Previously they've been willing to kill the Foot clan, seeing them as Shredder's and therefore as part of the feud, while they hesitate to kill non-ninjas even when those people are domestic terrorists. Here, Leo does not want to try to kill an entire organisation and when challenged on whether that's what he wants Raph hesitates too.

The Turtles are at a loose end. They attempt to fight crime on a small scale - stopping muggers - in order to do some good without risking making things worse, but make little difference. When they do face the Foot their presence escalates the violence. They simply don't know what to do.

They face the fact that previously the things they've done have been for Splinter and they've turned to him when unsure. It's time for them to grow up and that means questioning the ideals he raised them with.

Karai offers them another option. She is the head of the Foot in Japan (and not Saki's daughter, since she has an adult daughter of her own she's almost certainly older than him) and even though she starts negotiations by blowing up the water tower the Turtles are staying in and taking Leo hostage she offers them a chance to make peace with the Foot clan.

(Ignore the incredibly skintight outfit. The way women are drawn in Mirage is beside the point right now.)

The cycle of vengeance could never end with them killing Shredder, but it can end here if they make peace with Karai.

I love Leo's line here, "I don't know if I can give him my life". Following Splinter's teaching would mean spending the rest of their lives in the cycle of vengeance that Leo wants to escape.

The Turtles do bring up other considerations. Raph and Don especially question whether it's all been about vengeance and whether they can make peace with an organisation that does the things the Foot does. But all the same, these Turtles have never been crime fighters in general. It has been about personal vengeance with the Foot.

It's not a non-violent solution. This is sort of important - as we'll see in Casey's story - Mirage does not really offer non-violent solutions. It's a matter of choosing what you're going to commit violence for and trying to limit its reach. Karai wants them to help her kill Shredder's elite force, which they do. Donatello in particular has to shoot one of the elite to save Karai. The Mirage TMNT hate guns and Don hates them in particular, he is required to inflict violence in a way he would never have chosen in order to save an ally and he is traumatised afterwards.

It ends with Karai returning to her duties in Japan, still bound to the needs of her clan as the Turtles no longer are, and wishing them well in their new life.

The Turtles have made decisions outside the ideology of violence and reprisal they were raised with and, at least for the end of this volume, they are free.

[sweetmariihs2]

A headcanon-like thing I would like to share about Queen Lorelei

Tw: death during childbirth and some light mentions of suicide and grieving

I love Queen Lorelei (King Roland's deceased wife). She barely appears or it's mentioned in the show? Yes. But oh well. Fandom.

We believe she's that genuinely kind deceased character, that everyone remembers as sweet and beautiful, always more gentle than the world was to her, like a ray of sunshine. She's absolutely adored by everyone and her beauty and kindness always brought all the eyes in the room to her and her sweet laughs and smiles.

But unfortunately she died some time after she got married, during the childbirth of the princes that her body wasn't made to support, because the only reason she got pregnant in the first place was the wishing well, and that action had consequences, which means, she got pregnant indeed but that didn't changed the fact her body wasn't capable of enduring this.

And well, she died because of that. I usually feel really bad about childbirth deaths, because I feel like that could have been avoided months earlier. She was well and healthy but trying to have children took her life, and that just happened because she wanted to have a family and live a happy life.

But well, despite being something that lacks information, her story and character fascinates me, and we try to suppress that desire to see her story through fanfiction and fanmade content.

In my case, I have a constant habit of relating characters to songs, in some cases to whole artists if their whole discography match this character or fandom. For example I can't hear some of Aurora's songs without thinking of Cedric.

In Lorelei's case, it was something I never spoke about, but since we're in a fandom and in constant search for STF related stuff and fan content to keep enjoying our favorite show, I decided to share this.

Basically, I'm a HUGE Lana Del Rey fan since around 2019. I know 90% of her released songs and I also listen to some of her unreleaseds (that despite me knowing a ton of unreleaseds there are more than 200 wandering through the internet so there's no way I know all of them)

During the start of her carreer (actually, her first albums, since her career started years before the debut album) Lana's songs told us stories. Some key words that I would like to relate to her songs are: girlhood, nostalgia and melancholy (+or tragedy if you think about it)

In her first albums (Born to Die + The Paradise Version which is a deluxe of BTD) her songs were centered around nostalgic stories and feelings surrounding girls' experiences. Because she is so beautiful and often delicate while singing about darker topics, it's like her voice and lyric choice just interconnect. She sang about girls who lost their lovers, about beautiful girls that felt unhappy or/because they wasted their youth, about tragic endings, like being taken away from your friends during your teenage years because you guys were doing all kinds of crazy stuff at that time (this song is called This Is What Makes Us Girls), all of this surrounded by a feeling of nostalgia, as if those stories had happened a long time ago.

(Her songs weren't made to romanticize anything, like some people say they were; in fact, a huge part of these songs were inspired by her own life and feelings, and Lana is just telling us stories.)

So, going back to Lorelei, some of Lana's songs remind me of her. Based on what I said you can understand why. But not only that, Lana has some very specific songs that kinds match the fandom's headcanons of how Lorelei would be like (since we have no official info about her character).

Like in the song Blue Velvet, which is a cover from Bobby Vinton's song, but Lana brought a whole different feeling to it. Bringing it to the context of her album, her version sounds a lot more heartbreaking than the original one. The lyrics are about a male character missing his lover, singing about her blue velvet dress and how he will never forget about his love for her, even after she passed. Lana's version has a whole orchestral instrumental through the song and mostly at the end of it, making the song sound nostalgic, tragic and even sounds like some kind of anthem close to the end.

There's also the song Carmen, where there is a girl called Carmen, who attracts all eyes to her and is known for her beauty, but deep inside she's not mentally well, and people seem not to care about or notice how she's feeling. By the end of the song she even gets a love confession (in french), probably hinting at the fact that she receives many of them, but it doesn't matter because those who give them don't really know her or care about it. Despite her state "she's still shining" (in Lana's words), because even though she's suffering, she's still beautiful and loved by people.

In the song Born To Die, Lana sings about enjoying your life while it's still happening, because we're gonna die sooner or later. In the music video the scenes interwine with her sitting in a throne and spending time with a lover, who seems to give her an unhealthy relationship, judging by his aggresive behavior. At the end of the music video they're travelling together by car and her boyfriend, the driver, tries to force her to kiss him back, and because of that their car crashes and she dies in his arms, making him face his guilt because he was the one who did this to her. Tragic ending.

Dark Paradise is a song about grieving a loved one. It was made based on her feelings and her life.

These are some of the songs that match because of the lyrics, but being honest, because of the album being so concrete, the lyrics don't even need to match for me to remember her, because as I said this album is about nostalgic girlhood and melancholia, and she often sings about memories like in the song This Is What Makes Us Girls, that was also inspired by her teenage years when she was taken from her friends, but the memories she carries with them last till this day and it makes her miss those times.

Going to the unreleased, there are so many more. Like the song Angels Forever, where she's singing about memories that at her youth she never thought they were going to end: "we were angels forever, forever angels".

Or Fine China, where she is watching a friend having their first child, and remembering that at her own wedding years ago her groom left her at the wedding, depriving her of the dream life she would have liked to have had, singing "I'm going down now, with all of my fine china and fresh linen, all of my dresses with them tags still on", hinting at what was left of the wedding, of a life she couldn't have, but that she was watching others around her having it in her place. This song kinda reminds me of Roland to be honest, even thought his story with Lorelei isn't really related to their wedding, he was also deprived of a life he wish he could have had. And he had her dresses packed, her stuff still there in the castle, just like in the song the pov had her fine china and dresses with tags still on (they were never used).

It kinda fits even more with that headcanon that Cedric was in love with Lorelei. He never had the chance to live a life with her, and he's a bachelor till this day, watching all the weddings and happy lives through the years but never being a part of them, thinking about what would have happened if life wasn't so cruel.

I had these thoughts and despite being a bit niche I still felt like it should be shared. I know that not many people are fans of listening to recommended songs (at least in my case that's true), but I also made this post for those who already know some of those songs and didn't noticed these connections with Lorelei's story. Those who don't know the songs and want to listen to them now are also very welcomed.

I think about how amazing would be if I made a fanfic about this and using these songs. But I won't do it, it's just a thought. Feel free to do it though, I would absolutely love to read that.

[a-writers-blurbs]

A bit of a disclaimer ig...

Hi guys,

This is going to be a long post that sounds slightly rant-y & I'm going to apologize in advance for that. I am going to make exactly ONE post (this one) about this topic, and I will not be discussing it further or posting about it again. I will also not be responding to any negative comments but deleting them instead.

These are my personal opinions and [...not *trying* to sound rude, but there's no other way to say it...] a bunch of random people online aren't going to change my opinions.

My husband is an artist. He does canvas painting & draws comic books (think anti-hero dark horse). I paint furniture (kinda mini murals) & make chibi drawings. I've also been writing fanfiction since the late 90s.

That being said, this post is about AI art.

I get the controversy, I do. But I've heard this argument before, when fanfiction became more popularized. The whole "You're just stealing someone else's work & changing it up to call it your own" is (at its core) the same argument against AI. The only difference is that instead of you yourself changing it, you're allowing a machine to do it.

But I digress...

Over the last week, I have received several messages about my use of AI art. First & foremost, my stuff is appropriately tagged as AI.

Second, I don't sell or advertise these pictures in any way. In fact, none of them have been posted anywhere but here (as of 6/1/24).

Third, and probably most important, I DONT MAKE THEM FOR YALL. Fanfiction & fanart are a HOBBY. It is something that I do because I enjoy it and it destresses me. I DO NOT do it, hoping I'll get 1000s of followers, views, likes, etc. Every story I write, I print & bind for my library. I will now be doing the same with my AI pictures.

I have a condition that has a symptom called Maladaptive Daydreaming. Because of this, my head is full of an alarming amount of excruciatingly detailed & unrealistic scenarios and images. (To the point that it affects my everyday life).

I can't necessarily recreate the images in my mind without help & the only way to get rid of the random scenarios is to write them out. So I do write them. And now I use AI to help me get a BASE image. I do still go in myself and edit/redraw parts of each generated image to fit them to the characters I want them to represent. I do thus using digital art.

Granted, there's a whole other group of people that think digital art isn't real art... but that's a discussion for another day. Anyway...

TLDR:

I use AI art & will continue to despite some people's dislike. I will continue to delete any and all comments left publicly that are malicious, rude, or condescending. My stories & are are for me. If others enjoy it, great, that's freaking awesome. If not, there are literally thousands of other fanfic authors you can follow instead of me.

Again, I apologize, I know this sounds rude. But I need to be 100% transparent on this one. I am extremely grateful for every folllower & reader I have. I won't lie & say comments/positive interaction isn't a serotonin boost because it is. Yall also give me more motivation to actually complete a story vs. moving on to the next idea. But I'm not going to change the way I do things to appease someone I don't even know.

This is one of the few things I enjoy doing in my free time & have been doing it for 25 years now, and in the last 5 or so years ALL fandoms have gotten so toxic its hard to enjoy anything anymore. Last time it got like this, I simply stopped posting. I'd rather not do that again, but if people (who aren't even following me) don't leave me alone, I'll probably have to do it again, sadly.

But for now, hopefully this post will give people with different opinions to go ahead and block me from their feed. We're not going to agree so instead of wasting energy arguing, let's keep the peace & agree to stay off if each others feeds.

I won't judge you on your idea that you feel it's your duty to harass people over their choices & you won't judge me for enjoying something. 😉

Thank you for listening. Love yall & and I hope your day is blessed!

[whatinthehale17]

Okay so, this is a bit of long shot but I'm planning on starting a fanmade project for TE. It's my favorite choices story and there's still so much you can do with it.

I'm currently figuring out how to use Ren'py right now and watching videos and what not to figure out how to do this. I'm pretty new to all this but I think it'd be a fun project.

I'm probably gonna do some of the writing like the plot and Shreya's route (best girl) and also as I said I'm figuring out the coding as well.

But I'm definitely gonna need some help on this. I know others have expressed interest in a 3rd book and now is your chance if you're willing to help. Again it's fanmade and we're not making money off of this, this is just for fun and you can bail at any time.

I'll be making a discord once I start to get some interest in this so the link will be up at some point but if you're interested, just comment saying you'd like to help and what you'll be able to provide for this project.

Co-runner- I'm gonna need someone to help me run this project, help me keep the thing running and I'm a bit of an idiot so I'll be coming to you if I need help with anything. You'll be the Atlas to my MC lmao.

Artist- If you're a good drawer or you just love to draw and wanna help out on this project, we'd love to have you. I'm thinking we'll need some new characters for the plot and if you want, maybe some new backgrounds too (or we could just pick ones from the multiple backgrounds choices already has)

Writer- I'm a lesbian and obsessed with Shreya so I don't really have any idea about the other routes. But I know a lot of people are obsessed with like Beckett and the other love interests so anyone willing to help work on the different routes would be great. Not to mention the plot of the book, the adventures the pend pals could be getting into and side stuff like your relationship with your mom and the villains and such.

Coders- Like any great game, we'd need people who can code or wanna try it out like I'm currently doing. I've always heard Ren'py is good for that stuff and that's what the ILW crew used and that's what I'm currently learning right now so if you wanna try it out or already know how, we'd appreciate the help.

And of course, if you just wanna help out, you can join and I'll figure something out for you to do. My work schedule is kind of whack right now so this week we probably won't be getting anything done unfortunately (maybe Thursday or Friday if I have people and what not) but hopefully the week after, i'll have things figured out.

Last but not least, my idea for how I think the plot should go-

The gang is back for their next year of school

MC, Shreya, Zeph, Beckett- Juniors

Griffin- Senior

Aster, Atlas- Sophomores

But just like always, the school year is never simple for them.

The High Attuned has been watching over the school and visiting more frequently, keeping an eye on you and Atlas.

Zeph is having trouble with Thief captain as much as he hates to admit it.

Griffin is having parent troubles after they found out about his interest in Natural disaster field work instead of being a professional Thief player.

Shreya has hired an assistant to help with Serene and Sublime, though the assistant keeps messing things up and causing Shreya to lose customers, important ones at that.

With Beckett's urge to please his professors, he works himself too much to the point he begins to experience burnout and freaks out over the smallest things resulting in him pushing his friends away.

Aster is having trouble running the shop and keeping up with her studies and she's worried she might have to close it down.

Atlas is happy to catch up on lost time with their mom but when their mom becomes a professor for the school, Atlas isn't exactly sure how to feel about it and starts to lash out on Theia, resulting in the MC to have to try and fix the relationship.

MC does their best to help everyone with their problems but begins to have problems of their own when the school recruits another sun-att who does everything in their power to one up MC in every way.

Of course, it's just a rough draft of how I think the year should go, but we could always change stuff around if people have better ideas. Also, of course, there will be new spells to learn like in the other books and I was also thinking like...was I the only one that shipped Dean Swan and Theia together? Like Dean Swan already acts like a mother figure to the twins. And some of the sources will be back like Gemma and I really wanted to incorporate the High Attuned because we got like two minutes of information about them and then nothing ever again.

So yeah, this is super long and we can talk more on the discord but if you're interested just tell me what you wanna do.

[septembersghost]

Thank you for your post. I don’t have a problem with Elvis being portrayed as a flawed person because he was and I don’t agree with everything he did, but I feel like there’s no such thing as nuance in regards to him. Like are we gonna disregard the great story Dionne Warwick told about him helping her sell her most records in Las Vegas because he had a toxic relationship with Priscilla? People are multifaceted and are different towards different people but I feel like with Elvis, he’s just painted as 100% all bad by people. That’s why Baz’s movie and Austin’s performance was such a breath of fresh air. I worry about a portrayal of him that’s mostly negative or unflattering, especially when his relationship with Priscilla already gets people so heated. Today people were pissed Priscilla spoke positively of him and said he never took advantage of her. We can disagree with their ages when the relationship began all we want but if she says he never took advantage of her and does not view herself as a victim, why complain about it?

it's infuriating that online comments refuse to defer to priscilla's OWN voice and perspective and remembrances of him - the fact that people won't recognize that shaming/pitying her and saying she's delusional is so much more misogynistic than listening to and accepting her words and her view of her life! she literally said today, "he was very kind, very soft, very loving" and that he respected her and kept boundaries between them, yet instantly we're inundated with takes about how he was awful and tabloid headlines about sex because that gets them clicks. it's so disrespectful of priscilla along WITH elvis. the refusal to treat him like a whole, multifaceted person with complete lack of context extends to victimizing her against her will.

there are such a great number of stories about how good and generous and thoughtful and supportive he was to others - from fellow artists to strangers on the street - we know those beautiful aspects of him to be true. he WAS flawed and had a temper and made mistakes, i don't agree with everything he did or every choice he made either, and simultaneously also wish he'd had better care around him, but this is because we are willing to see and value him as a complex man, not as only a symbol of whatever role we want to foist upon him.

one thing i will say is i do believe baz's film and austin's portrayal is what will remain in the culture through all of this. a LOT of other flimsy or less meaningful "biopics" have faded, but that one will be remembered and vital, especially given the soul of it being that sensitivity and the power of his music. which isn't me saying this film is worthless or whatever, but it's not going to have the same impact (and isn't meant to). i keep thinking about lisa and how moved and happy she was about the film and austin's embodiment of her father - nothing diminishes that, and it remains true.

some people just want to get on their high horses of judgement and complain, but that's honestly so tiresome and boring to me. finding the humanity of someone and the light to be kept there is so much more fulfilling. the people who are nasty about it, that's their loss. we know what the heart of this is for ourselves.

[the12thnightproject]

Game Review Part One: Lovebrush Chronicles

I've been meaning to review this for a while now, and given that we're on the eve of the next main story release, I figure now is a good time.

The short review - this game is fantastic.

The longer review ... is under the cut line.

The basic storyline is this - You (MC) are already an accomplished graphic novel creator, and are en route St. Shelter Academy, which is on an island. Your introduction to St. Shelter includes meeting four love interests as well s checking in with your guardian (who is not - yet - a love interest).

These are:

Alkaid - an astronomy student (whom you have met previously, on an expedition to see the Northern Lights):

Lars - A somewhat flirty businessman, who is a patron of the arts.

Ayn - pianist, music major, lover of sweets.

Clarence - Law student, president of the student council, cat rescuer.

Cael - your somewhat mysterious guardian, who has raised you since you were 14/15 and your mother died.

You also, within a few chapters of beginning the game, get your own cat, whom you can name. Your cat is pictured above, hanging out with Cael. To get stamina, you need to log in and feed your cat.

Unlike many other games, where you need to grind around the clock, there are only two login times (both windows of about 2-3 hours) where you can pick up your stamina (and if you miss these log in, you can make it up by buying stamina with in game currency. I don't know if it varies by time zone, but my stamina logins are between 11 am and 2pm, and between 430 pm and 7pm. There's other ways to pick up stamina, too, all by logging in after the daily refresh and performing a series of tasks across the UI. It generally takes about 20 minutes to sweep through all the tasks and get the rewards you need to smooth your gameplay. This is a pretty simple game to advance as free to play.

Anyway, back to the story...

Once you've settled into the academy, you begin having strange dreams of another world, and during an artistic performance a friend of yours is killed and you are suddenly pulled into a completely different world.

This is Godheim. It's the first world of a multiverse that you begin to explore. In Godheim, you encounter men who are multiverse versions of Alkaid, Ayn, Lars, and Clarence:

This is the first interactive story. Godheim is a medieval/renaissance world, and it's slowly freezing over due to an invasion of giant ice butterflies (just... go with it) who kill everything in their path. You will need to save the planet (and well, it turns out Earth too is in danger) from this creeping winter. The story follows a set route pattern, where you choose Ayn or Alkaid first/second, then Lars third, and Clarence last. You learn more about the cause of the ice butterflies in each route, following them through to a happy(ish) ending, but the first three route endings do not completely solve the problem of the danger, and so you choose to go back in time and keep trying. Clarence's route offers a solution to the crisis.

Your LIs in this world are not the same people as they were in the modern world. They have different ages, histories, memories, and relationships with you. While there are some personality traits that show up in every version of the LIs, but they're faint. In Godheim, Lars is the King (who insists that you are his fiancee), Clarence is the chief mage, Alkaid is an apprentice mage, and Ayn is a captain of the guards (as well as the rightful Prince).

I thought all four routes were great - well written, they kept my attention throughout, there was tension and romance (verrrry PG) in each one. After you get through all four, you can choose one for the epilogue, which contains a more complete ending to the romance with the character of your choice. I was pretty sure I was going to choose Lars, until I finished Clarence's route.

Clarence's route is beautiful. A++++ romance. Worth the time spent in the game right there.

Oh... Cael does appear in this story, but he is not romanceable, and by the time I finished Godheim, I was convinced that he was a quadruple red flag who had been grooming MC throughout her adolescence. (Er, this turns out not to be the case, but you have to read Cael's special story available after you finish Godheim to learn what exactly his deal is.... and it's fascinating, I can't wait for him to get a route now... but it's better to read the story unspoiled so that's all I will say).

After this, you return to St. Shelter, and while you do retain your memories of Godheim, no one on Earth (with two exceptions) has any idea what happened, or even is aware that you were gone.

Life goes on... and then Earth begins to experience a series of increasingly violent Earthquakes, and you begin to see a mysterious countdown in your head and dream of a small boy crying for help. And you realize that you need to travel to another world again.

This... is Eden. And now you are in a post-apocalyptic scorching desert of a planet, full of giant scorpion like monsters and rival raiding gangs. Once again, you encounter versions of Lars (a desert guide), Clarence (an independent mercenary), Ayn (a gang leader), and Alkaid (a mysterious gardener).

And once again, you need to figure out how to save Eden, and this time the danger to Earth is immediate and obvious. In Eden, you can at least choose your route order - with one exception. If you choose a specific route first, it basically leads to an immediate bad ending for you.

Note, yes, this game does have bad endings, however, you aren't forced to start over again, you can just rewind to the decision point where you went wrong, and make a different choice.

To be continued...

Part two here

[time-to-write-and-suffer]

Hi! I agree with a lot of your criticism towards twc3, biggest issues imo being 1. increasingly weaker writing for the characters 2. weak plot. I'm curious: if you could prioritize fixing only one (for example: great plot with increased/meaningful branching but relationship writing stays as in book 3) what would you pick/believe would serve the series best going forward?

The focus has always been on the romance, and that's what I would prioritize if forced to make the choice, and it's one that would please the most fans as nobody's here for the plot. However, I don't believe that the choice is necessary, and that both can be improved simultaneously without sacrificing the other. Simply put, it needs to be scaled down, and it needs to be more focused. I would prefer shorter books, with tighter plots, fewer but more meaningful variations, and less wordy and more purposeful writing.

I know that M!shka has the whole thing vaguely planned out, given that we knew it'd be seven books from the start, but whatever her outlining process is, it's just not visible on the page. I'm honestly starting to think she said seven because it sounded cool, and not because she actually had anything to fill each book with. 3 reads like it's a bunch of random Patreon drabbles slapped together and barely connected by time skips.

Most of the issues -- the cheap and OOC romance interactions, the vague plot, the dropped subplots -- could be solved by just removing a lot of the unecessary fluff and by focusing in on one thing and tying everything else back to it. And I'm not saying that it needs to be plot progression and action all the time, not at all, but there needs to be a throughline that connects what's on the page to the overall story, that justifies the words put in front of the reader. I just don't see that focus and that artistic vision here. It's a bunch of bullshit that doesn't stick together.

Reading book 1 compared to 2 and 3 is so wack, because at the end of book 1, there were so many interesting and exciting possibilities. It felt as though there were many different and equally worthwhile plots that could be explored in the next books. And then you read book 2 and go "Oh ok? So I ... I guess the romances will progress in the next one? That's neat. And there might be some even bigger bad on the horizon?" Then you read book 3 and what do you feel? I felt nothing, aside from anger maybe. Because all you get is like, a half-assed climax and then a cheap teaser. Does it feel like the story is going somewhere? Like there are infinite possibilities to explore? Like we're building up to something? No, not really. That's what's lacking, a vision, a vector that guides your thoughts forward based on the movement of the previous books. Book 3 sorta meanders about and then falls face-down on the ground.

For book 4, I would probably, once again, stop trying to one-up myself with bigger and badder plots and have a smaller mystery happen, something more character-focused and maybe relevant to the detective personally, and give each LI a distinct subplot that ties into the main mystery. Because you decided your LI in book 1, it also opens up the opportunity to make the mystery tailored to the LI. That way, both the main plot and the detective being an actual detective feels interesting and hooks you in, while also providing plenty of romance opportunities and character development.

I also think that having 7 books, combined with having the PC be a detective, and the thing being set in a small town ... Idk, it was the perfect setup for having semi-independent, smaller mystery stories, all connecting together by the romances and characters, and slowly building up to something bigger by leaving crumbs in each book. Just a lot of missed opportunities, tbh. People who say "omg it's just a small cute romance game!! Stop trying to make it more than it is!" but I'm not? I'm all about making it SMALLER and MORE romance-focused! It's when it stretches and tries to do bigger things and overreaches that you start seeing how thin the fabric is.

Obviously it's easy to sit here and think you could do better, and honestly I don't know if I could or if my fixes would actually improve anything, but if given her resources, I'd damn sure try to lol.

[bizarrepotpourri]

Behind the Scenes: The Murderous Brat

[Previously on: Unlucky Thirteen]

As promised, this time we focus on the case of a "depraved murderer barely out of high school", written all on my own without asking other users of A Certain Website for inspiration.

This post, of course, contains mentions of violent crime, death and hornyposting again, so everything is under the cut. Proceed at your own risk.

Important info: you can access the link only if you set explicit material to be shown in your Pixiv settings. For a good reason.

As I said, the idea for this one hit me during the writing of "Unlucky Thirteen", sending me down a rabbit hole of outlining the concept through important-sounding legalese, and that it's based on an actual case. Well, two actual cases and each one of them is a doozy.

The original idea came from a discussion with one of the users of A Certain Website about a fairly recent case of parricide over here in Poland. But when I picked up speed and decided to google the details to confirm a few things, it turned out that I misremembered a crucial detail.

Namely, that the perpetrator wasn't a 19-year-old girl (that was the accomplice), but a 40-year-old woman. How she got a 19-year-old to help is less important - the main sell just got shot down, and that while I already had a full page of the notes including made-up press article headlines and ledes and about a third of the story proper written down. But, good for the story and bad for the real world, my lovely country also had another case of parricide involving high-schoolers a few years earlier. A boy and his angsty artist girlfriend stabbed his parents to death and then some, and by "and then some" I mean the investigators describing the crime scene as something straight from a horror movie.

This meant I had the crime implement (a silenced submachine gun), the motive ("I really, really hate my parents" - and I omitted the previous attempt using horse sedative) and the name from one case, and approximate age, accomplice and "angsty artist" schtick from the other one. I even cooked up bad angsty teen free verse while I was making dinner, and in two languages while we're at it. With that, I got to writing the most important part of the story - the conversation.

My idea was to have the condemned have a talk with the executioner as a last wish, in order to highlight her pretentious, insufferable Angsty Teenage Artist personality. I joked to another user of A Certain Website that I was imagining Julianne as a cross between Hannibal Lecter and Wednesday Addams in a private school sweater, and noted down that she was supposed to be "passive-aggressive" and "morbidly curious" - as expected from someone who shot their parents, cut them up, packed the remains in suitcases and finally dumped the suitcases in several different spots in the wild. Putting it together took me three days, and my original idea of making Julianne a psychotic hate sink just couldn't click. Even the “blue and poo” line that I shamelessly stole from the testimony of one of Australian serial killers (I can’t remember which one, though - I’m fairly certain it was either Ivan Milat or the Barrel Killers, but couldn’t find a source confirming either), who described strangling people as “smurfing”, because “first you go blue, and then you go poo”, didn't quite do it - mostly because its context in the story went from complete sociopathic insanity to gallows humor. Sure, she's still impudent, sarcastic and has ridiculously skewed priorities throughout her life - while I haven’t explicitly put the pedicure line in my notes, I had it in my mind pretty much since I started writing the scene. But then, when I started basing the way Julianne acts while smoking and talking on a former friend of mine, I got two ideas from that: obvious posturing and an apparent addiction to bad choices in life. I mean, I couldn’t have come up with the entire footjob situation if I didn’t know someone operating on similarly fucked-up logic. And to top it all off, one reader's opinion on Julianne as a character was "I don't condone her actions, but I understand her." And that means I achieved the exact opposite of my original idea: of course she thinks entirely too highly of herself and sounds a lot like a countercultural caricature, but on the other hand, you can feel sorry for her being treated like a failure through no fault of her own.

There's a lot of emphasis on Julianne being the youngest woman executed in the Kingdom in this century, for two reasons, both related to the twist in the case with Prosecution appealing the original life sentence soon after Julianne’s 18th birthday: first, long ago I had an idea for a still-unfinished story in which a group execution was delayed until after the 18th birthday of the youngest of the condemned, just so nobody could accuse the justice system of putting children to death. Second, they really wanted to get her: the Kingdom wants to be seen as modern and civilized, even if it has teenage skeletons in its closet, but on the other hand, it doesn't want to be seen as soft on crime as heinous as a double murder using a very illegal weapon. So if you're thinking that it was a setup and the entire schpiel about "psychiatric evaluations" was just an excuse, you're most probably right.

The story also gives some insight into the secrecy surrounding executions in the Kingdom. My original idea was that the names of Special Correctional Officers are confidential and listed only in Ministry of Justice personal files - even the Regional Courts and prison wardens know only the Officer’s badge number and it’s all that goes into the case files. There are also non-disclosure agreements and gag orders, so while the journalists attending the execution get to know the last words of the condemned and witness them being taken away, they not only don’t see the grisly end in person, but are also forbidden from probing the involved people for details. Meaning, Missis Officer won’t get to write a tell-all when retired, as opposed to Albert Pierrepoint, for example. Not that she would - the introduction describes her feelings toward the press fairly well, and she can't help but agree with Julianne when she mentions her hate for tabloids. Not only the "reporting" on high-profile trials often turns out to be sensationalist bullshit that skews reality into unrecognizable mess, with "unbridled joy" being an euphemism for baying for blood, but also the condemned often get the wrong ideas from seeing themselves on the front page. After all, there's no such thing as bad publicity.

Since the city of Blackmill is a stand-in for Manchester, the Raymouth prison is mostly based on HMP Strangeways, but when I got an interesting image of Julianne hanged in an industrial-looking room generated by AI, I decided to abandon the original plan of making it more typical and similar to Wandsworth and Holloway and go with basing the execution chamber on the former Nottingham Gaol (more precisely, their current museum exhibit of 19th century gallows), and the post-WW2 execution sheds built in German prisons, based on the stills from "Pierrepoint" again.

And finally, THE SPLOOSH. While Nicole in "Unlucky Thirteen" might have gotten wet at the last moment for an unspecified reason, Julianne is an utter little freak. While she was mostly trying to get a rise out of Missis Officer with the remarks on leather and masturbating in the noose in front of an audience, she was playing up her actual kinks for shock value. If she wasn’t warned beforehand that any stupid stunt means that her conversation with the executioner is over and she’ll be dragged back to her cell with all the remaining privileges forfeit, she’d probably do something like pulling up her dress and pressing her tits against the glass. But still, in her last moments she went like Madeline in my story “Worst Day of the Year”, just witnessed from an outside perspective.

[number-0-iz]

hi there! this is your secret santa for the grishaverse! i was wondering if you could give me some information on your interests?? like what other media do you like?? (shows, movies, etc.) who is your favorite grishaverse character & ship, what is your favorite genre to read or watch, is there any kind of content you don't like, and are there any triggers i should stay away from, and anything else you wanna share! thanks in advance : )

Oof that's quite the ask! Well here we go:

Other interests:

This is gonna sound cheesy but I love writing when I get the time. The main character of my grishaverse fanfic, Anya Oryalen, truly has a special place in my heart and just feels so real to me, it's a feeling I can't describe.

A lot of the commenters on the fanfic seem to love her as well and it's just something so personal. I have been told that she is a true inspiration and that she is very realistically written in trying to overcome obstacles and hardships and her own walls.

I love to draw but I haven't been able to do it in ages thanks to college and assignments and stuff.

I obviously love to read.

I also love editing for my books and upload then to my YouTube frequently.

Love having sister nights with my older sisters when we're all together.

What other medias do I like:

Well currently I am reading Blades Of Light And Shadow book 2 on the choices stories you play app! I liked book 1 more than book 2 but I still really like it!

I am also on another rewatch of Friends! And Shadow And Bone season 2 so I can take notes for my fanfic!

I haven't really had the time to read other books what with college classes and stuff but the last book I read was Once And Future Witches, currently reading Dragonflight by Anne McCaffery. I also finished volume two of the manga In The Land Of Leadale.

My favourite characters:

My favourite grishaverse characters are Kaz Brekker and Nikolai Lantsov! I have done deepdives on their character, what other people think of them etc as to write beautiful and full characters for my fanfic.

My favourite grishaverse ship:

I'm gonna sound very very basic but I love Kanej. I also like David/Genya and show Malina but not as much as them.

My favourite genre

Well I really love different variations of fantasy. Like contemporary fantasy (fantasy elements in a world like ours), full on fantasy world, historical fantasy, high fantasy and dark fantasy.

I also do quite like Sci fi.

Content I don't like:

(Trigger warning ahead)

Dark genre books that basically tries to reason that things like rape or stalking are okay or sexy. When I say I like dark fantasy, I mean in the sense with gore and death and violence and war and not whatever shit like Haunting Adeline or some SJM stuff that tries to talk good about stuff like abduction. Or the glorification of shit like Stockholm syndrome like in those 365 movies. Read and watch that all you like but keep it away from me and do keep in mind that it is and should always stay fictional.

I'm not a big romance read because I often find that when one focuses solely on the romance storyline, other might suffer. I really prefer it as a sub genres because that way other genres in a book or show can make it feel more whole and complete.

Something else I don't like is how people claim that 'art' or 'architecture' or 'pictures' made by AI are real art/architecture/pictures. I cannot stand that shit. As a writer, artist (don't post that stuff and haven't worked on it a while but still), a person studying Interior Design, that is the type of shit that I absolutely despise and it will have a major effect of the things I will do as a job in the future. Sure some AI can and probably will be helpful in the future but stuff like MidJourney and OpenAI are the dangerous ones that you shouldn't trust at all.

That's about all I can think of! Do come back again and I hope to see more!

[savventeen]

🎧 for the ask game please? i'd like some song recommendations because my playlist is like 80% kpop help-

but also!!! hihi savv i hope you're having a good day today ily ♡♡♡

OMG HI XANTHE!!!! 💙✨ i hope ur having a good day too!!!!

okay im gonna go ahead and give u a few bc ur the only one to send one in so far and i have So Many songs i want to write fic for sjdjdkkddk (narrowing it down to three was actually really hard lmao)

first up i'm gonna give you i will by mitski

so stay with me / hold my hand / there's no need / to be brave and all the quiet things you bear / seal them up with care / no one needs to know they're there / for i will hold them for you 'cause all i've ever wanted is here / all i ever wanted / all i want is / always you / it's always you and we're not out of the tunnel / i bet you, though, there's an end and while you sleep / i'll be scared / so by the time you wake / i'll be brave

this makes me want to write qpr reader x member emotional hurt/comfort. like, just them being vulnerable with each other and holding each other (both physically and emotionally) and reader knowing that while they worry for member, member worries just as much over them and. idk, being brave for the people you care about and having it not automatically equal romance :')

(also mitski's one of my all-time fav artists so if u like this song u should check out her entire discography, her songs make me Feel Things, in like, the experiencing the human condition kinda way)

[putting the rest under a readmore bc i apparently have a lot to say OOPS]

okay next i'm gonna give you sweet time by porter robinson [cw: death mention]

and i feel so stupid / 'cause i wasn't scared of this before / but since i met you / i don't wanna die no more so take a long time / 'cause, oh, the world is lucky to be your home, i know / i need a next life / 'cause i'm not satisfied to know you just once / so take a long time

this makes me want to write some kind of reincarnation/reality-hopping au So Bad. just like, the idea of meeting someone and wanting to know everything about them, and not just the them of now, but every them that could and would have been. idk what the plot would actually be, but [member of choice] needs to find you in all these different realities for Reasons and in getting to know all these yous, comes to love all these different parts of you. sometimes it's romantic, sometimes it's platonic, but it's always with the same dedication

but yeah. "i need a next life, 'cause i'm not satisfied to know you just once" ughhhh. love this so much

(also another favorite artist of mine, specifically his album 'nurture'. listen to that shit on repeat so often lol)

okay lastly im gonna give you it happened quiet by aurora [cw: blood mention]

feathers falling out of the pillow / as if time is standing still / i can’t remember much more / but i know it happened quiet / so quiet you fell apart / like a stone can be broken into sand / a thousand pieces / spread across a crying land / and you can’t remember that day / but you know it happened quiet / so quiet / words falling out through the window / all that remains is a silent call / is the earth colored red? / as i land like a flower on the meadow are your dreams as dead as they seem? / don’t you speak over my voice / i will return from the shadows / and i’ll bleed in your bed / turn it red / like the ground outside your window / love is wild

i would love love LOVE to write a dark fairytale/fantasy fic for this, like!!! god, the vibe of this song feels like those stories that start off soft and fairytale-esque but by the end you realize it's actually a dark kind of warning and not a happily-ever-after.

so the basic idea i have would be something along the lines of: reader was once like, a forest guardian or something, and at one point a human came along and was like "let me live in ur forest pls" and they were skeptical but eventually let them as long as they didn't hurt the forest at all. so the human builds themself a little cottage in the clearing and doesn't hurt the forest and so reader lets themself start to get to know the human and oops! they end up falling in love (bad idea) and in a moment of vulnerability, the human attacks them, nearly kills them, and curses them so they can't protect their forest anymore. bc lo and behold, little human is actually a greedy bastard from the nearby kingdom wanting to take all the resources here.

fast forward a bit, and [member of choice] who has some magical abilities, starts getting really weird dreams about the forest on the other side of the kingdom. cue member being enlisted to help reader enact their revenge plot to save their forest (and also maybe reach some righteous havoc while they're at it) and they become best 'villain' bros the end :')

(once again, love aurora so much, i highly recommend checking out her discography haha)

send me a “🎧” and i’ll give you a non-kpop song i want to someday use as fic inspiration

[variousqueerthings]

yeah woody allen cast that film intentionally w/the idea that he wanted to frame musicals as like… outpouring of emotion in daily life, something more grounded than like a fantasy musical where every character no matter how ordinary can sing. he intentionally asked goldie hawn who was the only Explicitly Trained vocalist to sing worse bc he intentionally wanted the movie to feel like “real people” singing. whether or not that…worked….and was a good choice……. is obviously a different Q

the irony here is that this movie isn't naturalistic or grounded at all, because everything is so obsessed with being oh so cool and Funny and Performatively Smart and new york chic, so it just comes off as someone who doesn't get the intention of musicals at all/doesn't like musicals perhaps/is afraid of the real emotions that (good) musicals are all about!

"I'm a guilty liberal who is the butt of the joke that we can reform prisoners, and the guy I helped is actually a creepy career criminal who uses this naïve rich girl's romanticization of the sexy criminal in order to commit more crime, ha... ha? anyway it's fine, because none of it matters, we're all just as fine at the end as we were at the beginning, except idk, who knows if I'll still be campaigning for prison reform, that's not really important."

woody allen is not "one of the people" or challenging an elite institution through form, the "ordinary life" he's portraying, is... not the ordinary life, and he's not even doing anything new, I've seen low-budget musicals that are made by a bunch of actual avant garde artists fucking about and that is something. this is. not.

I mean, hell, the 1993 cabaret performance with Jane Horrocks intentionally has her singing "worse" in order to juxtapose the character's dreams/illusions of becoming a great performer with the reality that she's in a seedy bar where men come to ogle her and the world is ending around her, but her own personal world is crumbling as well, that is intention!

(also am at the goldie hawn singing moment and she's clearly so much better lol -- alan alda wasn't bad either, + his main Moment was actually happening within the story, which made it work on multiple levels)

the thing I noticed is that when the movie does just allow itself to be a straight musical (ex. goldie hawn dancing moment, some of the ensemble stuff) it's just... better......

anyway: new york rich people stop making media about rich new yorkians as if they're relatable challenge, your life is not the norm

and since I'm doing this for alan alda (and I just finished it) I can say @majorbaby you wanna check out the 52min mark, which is his main singing moment + maybe the only genuine emotion in this movie alongside goldie hawn's singing moment (but that's at woody allen, so... eh), and that I don't know if I'm strong enough to watch another one for him. Teeth-pullingly agonising

I'm making a separate post about how I generally am establishing thoughts about alan alda roles, so that people don't have to engage with the woody allen movie if they don't want to...

[plan-d-to-i]

Hello, plan! Iirc, you're somewhat familiar with SVSSS, right? Can you answer these questions of mine: Did QJL r**** SJ? Is it true that in PIDW, SJ and OG!LBH was supposed to be the main cp Airplane planned and end up together or is it just a headcanon?

We're only told about Qiu Jianluo beating Shen Jiu in the novel. I think that's a mix of fanon & conjecture based on Shen Jiu's subsequent repulsion towards men and seeking safety around women. But that can be explained in canon by the violence he endured at QJL hands and the fact that QJL behaved around his sister.

“Back then Qiu Jianluo would often beat him up, so much so that at a certain point Shen could sense when he wanted to do it, so he would crawl away and hide trembling inside Qiu Haitang’s room. Qiu Jianluo didn’t want his younger sister to see his depraved side, so it was the only place Shen could hide and be safe.

At some point he had someone else he had trusted, an older girl whom he saw as a big sister. But, once she got old enough, she was sold to a shrivelled up old widower who had plans to marry her. And not so long after that they left the city and Shen Qingqiu never saw her again.

It wasn’t shameful at all to like women, but Shen Qingqiu knew very well how shameful it was to treat women as saviors and shrink into their arms looking for self-assurance. He would rather die than let others know about it, much less let Yue Qingyuan know about it.”

I mean this sounds horrific enough to justify his repulsion. In other words what you asked about is not canon. no.

As for the second item I wonder if this is what has people confused :

“Shang Qinghua spread his hands. “You think that I always wrote shameless content that lacked any integrity from the very start? I’ve also written belles-lettres before, but they were all unpopular, so I had no choice but to go down a path that catered to the masses. It must be said that writing novels is a very lonely undertaking. Rather than writing a stallion male protagonist who’ll be stereotypical in the end, it’s more in line with my philosophy for writing to create the current Bing-ge━this kind of weirdo male protagonist whose character is a bit more complicated, has contradictions and conflicts, and has a rough destiny.”

Shen Qingqiu concluded, “So, your philosophy for writing is to write about gay guys?”

Shang Qinghua: “Do you look down upon gay male protagonists? Works of art and artists all like to create gay guys. Belles-lettres favors gays, do you know that?”

“He waved his arms wildly and passionately. “Cucumber Bro, if the System hadn’t chosen you, this faithful die-hard reader, perhaps the plot wouldn’t have deviated so thoroughly, thoroughly to the point that it deviated all the way back to my original scrapped outline. Even though the me back in reality━who couldn’t endure the loneliness and was under financial pressure━chose to finish writing 《Proud Immortal Demon Way》 according to other people’s preferences and what they found cool… now, all thanks to you, essentially everything that I wanted to write has already unfolded in front of my eyes. Cucumber Bro!”

He patted Shen Qingqiu’s shoulders with deep sentiment and solemnity. “You… are the chosen one; as for my career, I have no more regrets!”

… why did it sound like the System and this world were both products of Shang Qinghua’s resentment over scrapping that outline and going with what was mainstream?” (Chapter 81)

Haha I didn't take it to mean that og Shen Jiu and LBH were canon cp, just that Airplane Bro would have preferred to write the Luo Binghe from this story instead of the OG LBH and he's not opposed to him being gay. There's a lot more that happens differently in the new story aside from the romantic relationship. Like Tianlang-jun and Zhuzhi-lang being the villains [fondly] of the story. Even if Shen Jiu's unfortunate background were revealed OG Shen Jiu still abused OG LBH & vehemently resented him. The one man OG Shen Jiu was different about was Yue QingYuan. Shen Yuan is the one who changed the dynamic between SQQ and LBH and then the story/system followed not the other way around.

[fullscoreshenanigans]

Agree with the majority of people that the Ayshe-Norman conflict needed to be expanded upon because it is such a letdown to tease the moral quandary of one of your protagonists who's been pulled back from the brink and objectively committed grievous wrongs reckoning with what he's wrought, only to put a pin it and vaguely nod to it later on as not being entirely settled (because how could it be in such a short amount of time). To be fair, things had already simmered down by the time they meet in the capital, and I like to at least partially contribute that to her interactions with Don and Gilda, but Norman has yet to be shown initiating any act of restitution. It helps that Shirai acknowledges this was an unsatisfactory conclusion to the conflict and meant to further elaborate upon it, but for now we're left in limbo.

#going with ayshe bc i think she deserves it and tbh it would just be more interesting to detail whatever happened there w her??? #like some internal monologue or some follow up even if just a bit #sorry idk how to put it into words (via @trainerbea)

What you said makes sense! You even went further by centering it around Ayshe's perspective after the only follow-up we receive is this panel from chapter 181:

And you can make inferences from it—them being in such close physical proximity while she allows him to hold one of her new puppies, beings she considers part of her family—but still, nothing compared to a more fleshed-out chapter or light novel story. We're never privy to the full spectrum of emotions she regards him or the other Lambda kids with, which is kind of important, given how she's the entire other side of that conflict.

Whether it was a regular 19- to 21-page chapter or a 35-40-bonus-length one, I could see Shirai keeping it primarily in her perspective or alternating between the two, but after what we received for the resolution up until now it couldn't be primarily from Norman's; it would feel too unbalanced.

#I'm still waiting for the Ayshe oneshot Shirai did promise us so... #but! I really don't want to see Ray addressing his relationship with Isabella #why? because it's more fun to think about it yourself #and see different interpretations of various writers and artists #everything else would be great too #I'd also love to see more of Isabella's time in the Headquarters as trainee #and how she changed over the years (because she changed) #not to forget - how James did assemble his supporters #that would be great too #but first I need more Ayshe stuff (via @officersnickers)

After all our chats you know how much of a sucker I am for Ray and the rest of the Grace Field children having an open discussion about the woman who raised them and everything she put them through, so I would 100% be down for that if it had enough room to breathe. If the focus is centered around Ray, I don't feel it would be impossible even within the confines of a regular-length chapter. However, outside of it being directly addressed in a dialogue with other characters (most likely with interspersed flashbacks), I feel like the best framing would be musings over the course of years.

But as noted in other tags, I should have opened the choice up to all the Grace Field kids sorting this out; this was me getting hung up on how messy the last interaction Ray has with her is (on top of, you know, all the prolonged trauma) when the last time Norman saw her she was handing him over to Peter and his nerves looked absolutely fried.

#ray addressing his relationship with isabella is so low on my priority list honestly bc i doubt it would be done in a way that satisfies me #i’m biased but i just don’t think shirai has the guts or willpower to address that implied abuse with any kind of nuance #the strained relationship between mother and son #nothing that can ever truly be mended #i want ray to loath her and i don’t think shirai can really hit that #jointly though i wouldn’t want a chapter like that that solely focuses on ray (isabella was norman and emma’s mom too!) (via @whamss)

We do have the December 2020 exhibition interview where Shirai state she's a (morally) poor person for being taken in by the belief that her actions as a Mom are entirely noble.

I do agree though that the chances of Ray coming out of that hypothetical chapter fully loathing her would be nonexistent with the way her death is framed.

#By this point WSJ should give them the special 35-40 page chapters because 20 pages would not be enough for any plot line above #Of course I would choose the Ayshe-Norman conflict first #But I remember there being an option for fans to choose whether they want to see how Mujika and the demons are post-canon #I've been so curious about that every time I remember it (via @thathilomgirl)

Ooo Mujika post-canon going-ons would be good, too. My initial thoughts are with how bizarrely and conveniently smoothly we see the transfer of power to her thanks to Leuvis' grand display that any immediate conflict afterward would feel awkward and contrived, but as a vehicle for delving into more of the demon world's culture and history and/or there potentially being a significant timeskip by demon lifespan standards to see the long-term effects of her reign, it could be neat.

And yes in an ideal world we'd be getting way more than a single chapter to feel the full impact of any of these scenarios without large chunks lost to timeskips of a few months or years. (I've always got the prayer circle going for a Shaman King situation playing out with more chapters being added in a perfect edition rerelease.)

*The kids integrating into the human world and the potential struggles they face post-finding Emma.

**Ray addressing his relationship with Isabella, either by himself or with other characters.

Interested if people will specify a difference between what they think is most needed and what potentially requires an entire arc to properly address versus what they think can reasonably be addressed in a single chapter, and if the standard chapter length of 19-21 pages versus the 35- to 40-page length of Isabella's and Krone's respective bonus chapters factors in at all.

[the-shared-brain-in-retrograde]

Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

(Or What If... Tony Stark was a Con Artist?)

A joint review...

We met last night for a preliminary discussion and things took quite the turn. Namely the Shared Brain is very much split on this film, and maybe not in the way you would think. We also had a heated argument about Tennis (which @cassandrafey cares a great deal about, and @becksxoxo does not, even though she is the only professional player of the two) and then we got into Cass' inner horse girl (inspired by the My Friend Flicka mention, a horse phenomenon that Becks as a normal person had no reference to whatsoever and has had to google and is chuckling scornfully as Cass tries to defend herself and her interests), which is a place we wouldn't recommend, and Colin Farrell was involved, we shan't repeat it for your sanity and for our own.

But on to the film...

The big surprise of the evening was how much @becksxoxo loves this film, and how indifferent @cassandrafey was to it. It's as though we have watched two very different movies, which I don't think has happened since The First Avenger.

@becksxoxo: Another film Cass is very wrong about...

@cassandrafey: I could say some things here since I have control of the proofread and edit, but I won’t cos I think someone can dish it but not take it…

So as in Captain America: The First Avenger we shall start the review with all the bits we did enjoy together.

Firstly, that little girl's acting at the start was very good. We were both very worried this film was going to take a dark turn very early on, and other than a threatened smack round the face for lil Harmony, it did not. That screaming was brilliant. Good work child. We also have both agreed we do not wish to attend a fair in Indiana in the past, due to both the worry of clowns and the hideous colour scheme.

The narrating and the narrator of the film were also a brilliant touch. Becks really enjoyed the chaotic ramblings of Harry as he flitted back and forth from the various backstories to the current plot, the re-winds, the artistic pauses. It felt very comforting for some reason. It was also one of the many clever ways that they intertwined the pulp crime style of the books that inspired the plot into the plot itself. Also it's nice just listening to RDJ's voice sometimes isn't it, in a none bossing people around sort of way (the way @becksxoxo enjoys him most - a little bit submissive 😉 - she will discuss this again a bit later, you'll be glad to know.)

The flashbacks were a fun way to get to know our protagonists, although is it lazy storytelling? Who knows? Not us. We do not think that Harry makes a very good burglar in practise. He clearly is very good at the thieving things, but he seems very conflicted about the whole thing. Who's looking in the discount bin when you're robbing a place? Someone who doesn't feel comfortable with that he's doing. And he was so devastated when his partner got shot, that breakdown in the audition was so very sad. The neighbourhood watch is quite extreme in New York... We really think that the criminal lifestyle just isn't for him, but then that wouldn't have made a very good film would it. Also, pull your hat down Harry, you look like a gnome.

Harmony's backstory is even sadder still, such a dark and distressing early life that she escapes from using fiction and a single way ticket out of the shit hole town she grew up in. The darkness in Harmony's life winds its way through the whole plot and its truly terrible, but never fully gets addressed, at times even joked about, that only broken girls make it to Hollywood. It’s hard to know if not addressing it is a choice made by the characters as a way of coping, or if it’s just a bad writing choice that stops the characters and story from becoming whole. It's something we're split on ourselves.

We think we'd like to go to a Hollywood party, but we're not sure we'd be invited. @cassandrafey would definitely like to hangout with Harmony, hidden away reading pulp books. I guess that leaves @becksxoxo looking a bit lost, getting drunk, and making up shit stories to strangers with Harry. What a night.

Cass would also like it to be known we are treated to her favourite line in the film here (and as it turns out her favourite part of the film as a whole):

B-Movie Actress: So what do you do?

Harry Lockhart: I'm retired, I invented dice as a kid.

Harry does try to be a good person. He does try to stop that pervert harassing Harmony, and he does try to fight him, but he doesn't really achieve any of these things fully. Becks got in a little Cap reference during the fight in her notes that pleased Cass no end, you'll all be happy to know. "You just had to get him in somewhere, didn't you?" she hissed. It's not Becks' fault that RDJ just gets beat on a lot...

It's also at the party we're introduced to Perry, who Cass was suspicious of the whole damn film, but Becks loves with her whole heart. Perry the PI - Becks suggested we should be private detectives, but Cass quickly shut it down. So that's another stream of income lost to us.

We will address here that the homophobia and 'gay jokes' in this film were not it. We know it was the past, but it has not aged well and did leave you feeling very awkward. It wasn't fun, and it really took you out of the film each time with quite a start. Honestly, we hate it.

Now on to boobs. @cassandrafey says she would let RDJ touch her tits if it was to remove a spider, @becksxoxo countered that she wouldn't mind if the spider wasn't involved either. Giggling ensued. The spider situation was horrible, and the thought of a massive spider climbing around on you is the worst and its was a big fat no from both of us. There was a lot of breasts just out and about in this film, and for the most part I think it was just to show that Harry was a good person for trying to not look at them, although he did usually get a peek in.

He also pissed on a dead woman, so we don't know why Becks loved him so much, but she did. He is definitely a man, written by a man, trying to show women that not all men are bad people. Becks is now have a slow worry about internalised misogyny... She's trying to defend herself now, but words are hard, and sometimes you're allowed to love the problematic fictional people, right Cassandra? (Cass here, as the authority on living problematic fictional people, can confirm that it’s a perfectly normal thing to succumb to). She does think she loves Perry more though.

Perry. Perry, Perry, Perry. We agree that Perry is very competent, and in control, but that has incited very different feelings from both of us. Abject delight and love from @becksxoxo and utter distrust and grave suspicion from @cassandrafey. Cass has also just said that she missed something at the start of this film that may have made her misjudge Perry, but instead of finding out more about this she went in feet first, 'doesn't that man have a large head, isn't he suspicious', and then just ran with it for the rest of the film. Becks on the other hand just loved him. She loved how good he was at his job, how he bossed Harry around and showed him how much of an idiot he was.

Perry: Look up idiot in the dictionary and you know what you'll find?

Harry Lockhart: A... picture of my face?

Perry: No! The definition of the word idiot which you fucking are!

In fact, he was just generally very quotable, and if Cass brings up his giant head again, Becks will use her giant head to put a stop to it.

Cass should be more grateful, because it is also Perry that brings up Colin Farrell in the first place. The Colin Farrell reference also brought up two very different reactions from the Shared Brain. One of us was confused that RDJ and ol' Colin were contemporaries, and the other half was ready to put on half a pantomime horse costume and some lingerie and get to it, if you know what I mean (none of us know what she means, we really went down a tangent that even for us may have been a step too far...)

@cassandrafey: He's just right handsome, I'm just very fond of him.

@becksxoxo: Are you? You should mention it more. Ooooooooh the moral high ground, I haven't been up here in a long time...

@cassandrafey: Am I morally wrong for saying he's handsome?

@becksxoxo: I mean I was really referring to the horse and knickers situation, but...

@cassandrafey: Oh, I forgot about that.

@becksxoxo: [wheezes]

@cassandrafey: Take advantage of this, because it’s not something I say often, but I think we should stop. We've talked about Colin Farrell too much for a film he doesn't appear in.

So back to the actors at hand. Becks has never experienced Val Kilmer before, but she's enjoyed it. (Cass pointed out he was once Batman, but Becks says she doesn’t know who that is…) He was very funny, and he really dominated Harry at times, and that was nice to see...

We should probably mention the crimes and that, which to be honest we sort of got confused by. We think Becks kept up more than Cass, but we were definitely lost at times, and so were the characters. It did get a bit messy, and we did take umbrage with Harry asking us if we had guessed the twist, when we felt it was unguessable.

I guess SPOILER ALERT:

Is it a known fact that people in mental hospitals don't wear underwear? Perhaps we're perverts but we think there might be other instances where people don't wear underwear to go about their business. It seems a part of the plot that came as a surprise quite late on in the film for us. Although I guess it was another point to show Harry wasn't a pervert for being so bothered to check the state of undress of these ladies.

Two more quick points we really enjoyed:

Frying Pan and Mr Mustard. One of our friends once told us she likes to listen to us talk, but she doesn't understand a damn thing we are on about. So we really got Frying Pan and Mr Mustard on a very deep and meaningful level. We have no real idea of their point in the film, or really what they were on about either, but we enjoyed it and we felt represented.

The electrocution of the Harry's balls. It was at this point in the film that Cass was checking her watch to see how long there was left, but Becks was *cackling* with laughter, and desire to also electrocute a man's balls. We did both enjoy Perry's tiny penis gun, although Cass' train of thought had really left the film by this point as she began thinking of tiny bullets and their effectiveness.

We were both very worried that we were in for a sad ending. All of them just lying there, covered in blood, but even as Harry joked they really did turn it around. When Perry wheeled himself in Becks made such a noise. And then the outro to boot, a thousand chef's kisses. Cass really got in her head that they were married, and Becks just wanted more, and would quite happily watch her two new favourites solving crimes and having the good bants.

Cass gave this film 2 stars. The same rating she gave the Eternals. Take that as you will. Less even than The First Avenger. IRL we're starting to have an argument about Steve Rogers. But we shall stop. Becks on other hand has given it 4 stars, and was even contemplating 4.5 but calmed herself down.

We're both a bit startled by our own reactions to this film. Who knew Robert Downey Jr could be so polarising?