#and all of them are capable of critical thinking.

[maddiethedogstories]

The Baby Doctor

Reposting this because it seems to have disappeared from this blog for some reason! Enjoy!

This wasn't supposed to happen! She was never supposed to be here. She was a smart, intelligent, capable woman. She had graduated from medical school for God's sake. But, she had pissed off the wrong nurse. Now, here she was, helplessly her diapers for the entertainment of the whole labor and delivery night shift.

It has been the third week of Dr. Bun's residency. She was on the tail end of a horrendous on-call shift. She was working through her charts and, in her delirium, got sloppy in her attention to detail. She accidentally ordered that one of her patients should be given a deadly amount of pain killers to deal with post-delivery pain.

Luckily for her patient, the doctor supervising the young doctor did not trust her yet. He caught her mistake, fixed it, then tracked down Dr. Bun to give her some aggressive constructive criticism. That's where Dr. Bun fucked up.

Rather then owning her mistake and promising to do better, Dr. Bun deflected the blame onto the nursing staff. Specifically, she alleged the nurse treating the patient, Nurse Angela, must have got in the system and messed up the order. Dr. Bun's supervisor was skeptical, but chose to trust his newest charge. He let the resident off with a warning and went to give the nurse a piece of his mind.

Unfortunately for Dr. Bun, the software the hospital used to treat patients kept careful record of precisely who made what orders. Fortunately for the girl, however, her supervisor had no idea that software has that capability. Nurse Angela, in the other hand, was very aware of it.

A couple of days later, when Dr. Bun was back in the hospital changing into her scrubs for the shift, Nurse Angela walked into the room holding two things--a print out from the record keeping software pinning the deadly medication order on Dr. Bun and a bulky, white adult diaper.

"Dr. Bun, I have a bone to pick with you. You pinned a potentially deadly mistake on me when, both you and I know I had nothing to do with it," Nurse Angela said. "That sort of dishonest, manipulative behavior is something I'd expect from a naughty toddler, not a doctor."

Dr. Bun began to feel upset at being challenged so directly by a person she considered beneath her.

"I didn't lie! You must have screwed up my orders, nurse," Dr. Bun, spitting out the word nurse as if it was the worst epithet imaginable.

Nurse Angela just calming walked up to the young, arrogant doctor and handed her the print out of the record confirming Dr. Bun's mistake.

"That is not what this says. Did you know dishonesty is a fireable offense at this hospital? One that the hospital reports to the medical board as well as any future employers?" Nurse Angela asked rhetorically. The older nurse smiled as the young woman's face dropped.

"I… uh… I'm so sorry! I'll do anything to make this up to you! Anything, just, please, don't tell anyone!" The resident pleaded.

The nurse's grin widened, becoming predatory. She motioned with the white, fluffy object in her other hand.

"Well, like I said Doctor, you've been acting more like a toddler than the responsible adult you are supposed to be. I think you need a reminder of that at all times from now on. Until I decide otherwise, if you want to keep your job here, you will wear and use one of these at all times when you are at work. The hospital's bathrooms are off limits to you, and, like the naughty toddler you are, you are not allowed to change yourself. If you want your wet or messy butt changed, you will have to track down one of the nurses in my labor and delivery unit and convince them to change you, understood?"

The young woman had no idea how to respond to that. Her eyes darted between the document in her hand and the bulky adult diaper being held by the nurse. Thoughts of being fired and her career being ruined darted through her head. She couldn't afford to pay back her student loans if she wasn't working as a doctor.

Backed into a corner, Dr. Bun did the only thing she could. She accepted Nurse Angela's offer.

Dr. Bun immediately found herself changed into the first of what would be many diapers by the nurse in the locker room. The next few weeks were full of humiliation and torment for the doctor as she adjusted to her knew position as the nursing units pet toddler, but, eventually her work days fell into a comfortable pattern.

She would use the restroom just prior to leaving work to minimize the risk of messy 'accidents.' She'd report to work where one of the nurses would help her get dressed for her shift. Then, she would proceed with her day as normal, seeking out a nurse for a change when she felt her diaper get too full.

Yes, it was humiliating to have the waistband of her scrubs pulled back or her crotch squeezed by another woman to have her diaper checked. Yes, it sucked laying on a locker room bench while her ass was wiped by someone she considered her subordinate. However, the human mind was resilient and could get used to anything once it happened enough.

Plus, her new situation has some benefits. She was getting praised by her supervisors for how well she worked with the nursing staff. Plus, not having to run to the bathroom all the time gave her more freedom to care for her patients. After a month as the hospital's diapered doctor, Dr. Bun would actually describe things as going well.

Nurse Angela was happy to see Dr. Bun's turn around, but noticed she was starting to get cocky again. The positive reviews from her supervisors lead her to once again become increasingly condescending towards the nursing staff. So, to remind the young doctor of her position, the nurse made Dr. Bun another offer she couldn't refuse.

That's how the young, professional woman with a medical degree found herself here. Nurse Angela has thrown a special, team building party at her home for all of her fellow labor and delivery nurses. The young doctor was also invited as entertainment.

When Dr. Bun arrived, she was stripped of her adult clothes. She was diapered, put in an childish shirt with padded mittens, and had a pacifier slipped in her mouth. She was instructed she was nothing more than a baby for the evening, not allowed to speak, walk, or care for herself in anyway. Worst of all, a suppository was shoved up her cute little bottom.

A baby blanket was laid in the middle of Nurse Angela's living room and she was instructed to stay on it. As her co-workers arrived and began to surround her, cooing at her like she was an actual baby, the babified doctor's stomach began to rumble and cramp. Once the last guest arrived, she couldn't take it anymore. Tears of embarrassment running down her face, Dr. Bun got onto all fours, sticking her diapered ass into the air as a wet fart escaped her butt cheeks.

Nurse Angela looked down and smiled. She drew everyone's attention to the scene. "Look everyone, I think the baby's about to make a stinky for us!"

Dr. Bun's coworkers laughed as they watched her lose control. Closing her eyes and grunting loudly, Dr. Bun pushed out a huge load of crap into her bulky diaper. She closed her eyes as she did it, pretending she was anywhere but here. While she had messed herself before, and many of these women had in fact changed one of her messy diapers, it had never been so public and so humiliated. The nurses cheered the doctor on as she debased herself like an infant for enjoyment.

When the doctor was finished, Nurse Angela beant down and whispered in her ear. "Remember doctor, no matter how good you are at your job or how many accolades you receive, to us, you will never be more than a stupid, untrustworthy little baby. Now sit in your mess and play with your toys. It's going to be a long night."

Dr. Bun could only do as she was told, suck on her pacifier and cry as she came to terms with the fact that she'd be these nurses plaything for the rest of her life.

[nekrotiize]

It's a controversial take because everyone's stupid but I'm never going to stop calling fandom + shipping culture homophobic. Fandoms are consistently extremely homophobic, and shipping culture is consistently even more homophobic.

Yes, the way fandoms center men so religiously is obviously misogynistic. The only people who deny that are themselves misogynists. But the aggressive centering of men and the resultant fixation on male/male dynamics lends to this slimy coating of homophobia that nobody talks about. The misogyny is an issue, clearly. But gay men are, to most people in fandom, toys. We are sex objects to coo over. It's intensely voyeuristic. Every god damn interaction is scrutinized to hell and back, and the second a man shows any kind of emotional connection with another man, it gets pounced on, and he gets thrown into a mill that flattens him down to one of three deeply heterosexual yaoi tropes that are fandom's only way of processing the existence of gay men.

It doesn't even matter what that man is. A disconcerting amount of time, people will start fawning over the idea of literal rapists being gay with zero critical thought applied. As if gay men being painted as and assumed to be sexual predators isn't a method that's been historically used to literally legally murder us. (What the fuck do people think "Gay Panic" means, even?)

Gay men aren't given the ability to be human beings in fandom. We're not afforded nuance. We're accessories, we are constantly objectified, and no one ever takes the time to consider that we have cultures, and that we are real human beings. We keep getting shoved into the most heterosexual boxes physically possible for the easy digestibility of people who do not want to see us as human beings. Semes- sorry, I mean Tops are the taller, older, more masculine, capable men of the relationship. Ukes- oops, sorry again, I mean Bottoms are the smaller, younger, more feminine, and totally useless women of the relationship. It's painfully yaoi. Gay men in fandom are never given the opportunity to be regular men, because people are too busy turning everything into homophobic, misogynistic fetish porn of our existence to be normal for five seconds.

There's something comedic about how many people in fandom want to say they're progressive, accepting. Safe. How fandom is welcoming of everyone. Look, we've made all this representation! And every time, gay men are sex objects, the women are scapegoated to hell and back, the headcanoned trans men are always skinny white softboys not a single day over 21 maximum, lesbianism is maybe acknowledged 0.5% of the time and largely for brownie points, bisexuals are across the board made out to be overtly horny and often sexually aggressive, fans of color are harassed out of the community left and right, anyone on the aro/ace spectrums is called a freak and a killjoy for not participating in shipping, characters on the aro/ace spectrums are heavily included in shipping content with the excuse of "aros/aces can date/have sex like normal people, too!" with zero regard for what our love looks like, and there isn't a single accepted trans woman headcanon to be seen.

Fandoms are circuses full of dirty little liars with cotton stuffed in their ears and Shipping Culture is a disease.

And if you criticize either of them, the most annoying white liberals you've ever seen will start clutching their pearls because how dare you criticize something that's free?! Don't you know a lack of price point immediately negates any criticism?! Just laughable.

[will80sbyers]

I hope if byler doesnt become canon, the fandom wont start calling the writers and actors names or saying they queerbaited us because we can still enjoy our ship in our fandom without attacking anyone else

Well, I hope the fandom does exactly that instead, not for the actors obviously, they won't be in my line of fire because they go there to do their job and don't decide the story, but if the Duffers really have queerbaited us, because that would be UNDENIABLY queerbait, mind you, the first thing I'll do will be call them out on their cruelty and cowardice

I will still ship byler but I'm sick and tired of writers queerbaiting and being mindlessly EVIL towards queer people and the queer community as a whole, we deserve better and they don't care about any of us if they are capable of the level of queerbait that would be byler if it wasn't endgame

I haven't giffed 60+ parallels GIFs to then let ANYONE gaslight me into thinking I've been just "making it up" myself, the things we're talking about are all IN the show, the level of unnecessary cruelty would be unprecedented.

They would deserve all the criticism coming their way if that was our dark reality :)

Lucky for them Byler is endgame, that's a relief for everyone, isn't it?

[artbyblastweave]

One of your posts had a rec list of zombie media, and one of them was Savageland. Watched it. Even knowing there were zombies involved it’s good. Even better, actually, because you the audience know that there’s something wrong but the characters don’t, or at least they don’t know what you know.

11/10. One of those movies that you have to go sit and think about for a while. I really liked the way it’s presented, the pseudo-documentary style. Also. So much going on. And it really hits because yeah, this feels terrifyingly plausible to happen. And even though it is a zombie story, it’s also got a lot more going on. Just. There’s so much to say about it. It’s a horror story. It’s political commentary. I don’t even know where to start.

Thanks for the rec! I feel like you’re the person for Good Zombie Media, and this is definitely one.

You're welcome! I've had this sense, and a longer post on the topic, that there's this loose trinity of themes from which zombie fiction can draw horror. There's the fear of societal inadequacy, the classic romero anxienty that our society simply isn't capable of rising to the challenge of something sufficiently disruptive, be that zombies or anything else. There's fear of sickness- the horror of being a zombie, of the indignity and helplessness of being reduced to something so base, so at odds with your current desires and morality, or alternatively something so inept- a creature that's basically less capable and competent than a human in every way despite going through the motions. And lastly there's the very straightforward fear of violence- what if there were a bunch of mindlessly-violent human-but-not-quite monsters running around killing the shit out of everything they see? What if all your neighbors all decided at once to try and kill you for no discernible reason? People don't normally do that! That'd be fucked up!

I think that these things can push and pull on each other, fighting for space. For a long time I thought that "fear of societal inadequacy" was fighting for space with "fear of violence," because the more effective a threat you make your zombies, the less meaningful it is when society can't react effectively to them. In the original Dawn of the Dead the fact that zombies are such an underwhelming threat if you've got your shit together is why the authority's dysfunctional response can provide meaningful criticism of our society. In the remake- they're hyperdurable beserkers with a short incubation period and they run at full speed! It doesn't say anything in particular if the army has trouble with that! So more of the horror ends up concentrated in the thing itself, the incongruous violence the zombies enact. Anyway, the long story short is that Savageland convinced me that actually, with proper framing, there's no contradiction whatsoever between a narrative about societal dysfunction in the face of crisis, and a narrative about scary-as-fuck implacable uncanny-valley killing machines.

Go watch this movie

[machineheraldbabe]

arcane's depiction vs. endorsement and why it flopped

~ i think i'm finally ready to complain ~

My general opinion of season 2 is potential squandered. My recent post about Viktor's storyline as an intentional tragedy lets ya'll know that I did, for the most part, enjoy his arc (hot take, I know, and I know lots of people disagree with me, and I fully understand). If he'd gotten the screen time necessary to pull it off, it would have been legendary in my book. But the lack of screen time, even in the case of the season's eventual BBEG, speaks to my greatest issue with Arcane: no commitment.

(Critical) Discussion of Jinx, Ekko, Sevika, Vi, and Viktor below!

Arcane, as a tragedy (I've said this word too many times to count smh), asks the plot, "what is the worst thing that could possibly happen to this character?" and answers in kind. This is why we get Viktor's lost agency until the very end (and like I've said in the past, I completely understand and hold space for those who dislike this route).

If we ask this same question of the following characters, the scope of loss and despair innate to Arcane's final narrative is made very clear:

Sevika: a revolutionary forever devoted to the cause, not the individual, is nominated as an individual to represent the masses in a governmental body that has no interest in her class-conscious ideal.

Ekko: the people's hero in every sense of the word who never sees the fruits of his labor/sacrifice and who goes without the acknowledgement he deserves (more than any other Arcane character).

Vi: the ultimate victim of Piltover police brutality coerced, through grief, trauma, and loss, into working for the system that oppressed her. Even Caitlyn, for all her good intentions, seems incapable of ever understanding this.

Viktor: a genius hellbent on ending the same suffering he endured at the hands of Piltover's oppression has his agency revoked, driving him to inflict the same choicelessness he endured on Zaunite innocents.

On paper, these arcs are devastatingly sensical. And we don't always need happy endings in our stories (I'd sure like them, more often than not, of course). We can and should witness the harsh realities of class oppression if we don't experience them ourselves. The writing team painstakingly crafted and foreshadowed these worst-case scenarios throughout season 1. For example, in 1x07, Ekko being immediately shot at by Marcus at the bridge confirms our suspicions that Piltover Enforcers are a lost cause, not just full of bad apples but internally broken beyond repair. It felt that, despite all the hope, this struggle was doomed, and we were careening toward something dark - "In the pursuit of great, we failed to do good."

Had these arcs been successful, audiences would be confronted with the systemic issues we see today that implicate the physical and mental health of downtrodden individuals on account of lazy, prejudiced leadership. This actively happens. It is actively happening, sans the fantasy of it all. This is where Arcane should have shined: they depict the tragedy of these characters, but DO NOT endorse it.

But Arcane chickens out and the entire thing fails. Here are the Flop Era Spark Notes:

Maddie is the egregious bad apple stereotype that absolves all other agents of the regime. She clearly is not a stand-in for Enforcers at large because, all of a sudden, they're capable of coordinated artillery strikes that are necessary to the defense of Piltover, which the viewer must suddenly and abundantly care about. So glad she died. Also, Arcane, you cannot introduce abject warfare in the last 30 minutes of your show successfully.

Jinx's "revolutionary" plot was a red herring, and Sevika humbly vying for the spot was never delivered upon. They pay lip service to the Undercity organizing, but the scene is interrupted for larger (messier) plot concerns almost immediately. No commitment. No depiction to even refrain from endorsing.

Ekko and the Firelight Tree. Clearly this was set up as a means of showing how Piltover's mistakes were physically seeping into the only sanctuary left in Zaun. Yet this is just...never resolved? If someone has some insights into this, please let me know. No depiction. No discussion about endorsement.

What could Vi specifically gain by aligning with the Enforcers/Piltover? Human connection with Cait, sure, but why return to them in 2x06? Vi's character begged all season for development, but she kept returning to her nonsensical error of her ways (looking backwards) until the very end, and this is basically what "kills" Jinx. This is a nod to her lonesomeness post 1x03, sure, but to what end? Again, why the Enforcers?!? Oh, because now that Cait has been redeemed and Sevika is in Piltover to save the day, there are no systemic issues left to fix? Sure, Riot.

WHY DEVELOP VIKTOR'S ENTIRE HEXCORE ARC OFF SCREEN?I'M ADMITTEDLY BIASED ABOUT THIS, BUT THE AMOUNT OF DISCUSSIONS I'VE HAD WITH VIKTOR NATION ABOUT THE DEGREE TO WHICH HE WAS INFLUENCED/MANIPULATED BY THE HEXCORE (now that we know Sky was a manifestation of his humanity, not her Actual Self) IS DESPICABLE. HIS COMPROMISED AGENCY NEEDS TO BE FRONT AND CENTER AND OBVIOUS, OR ELSE IT SURE SEEMS LIKE RIOT IS ENDORSING THE LACK OF AGENCY IN VIKTOR'S STORY. I shouldn't have to make 1k word posts to explain this. I'll do it because I love him with my whole heart, but still.

I begged and pleaded for months for BBEG Viktor (I'm really proud of my predictions from October), but by introducing a villain/conflict beyond the Piltover/Zaun dichotomy, Riot severed all threads of class conflict that were so rife and exciting in season 1. The proletariat and the bourgeoise will never coalesce like they did by the end of 2x09 without systemic revolution. Sevika is just one individual. Ekko's people need him. Jinx and Viktor are gone. Vi is downtrodden, and we have SO LITTLE to show for it.

In summary, we just didn't get enough explicit explanation of any character development to make Arcane-As-Tragedy successful. They did not stick the landing. The finale leaves us all with various bad tastes in our mouth. Instead of lamenting the harsh reality of oppression, I'm confused about what Riot prioritizes and agrees with, what they aim to criticize, and what they condemn.

I'll die on the hill that revoking Viktor's agency has the potential to be one of the greatest tragic hero storylines I've ever seen, but it's a lonely hill because I'm fighting against the writing team's consistent flops. At least Balayage Viktor was so gorgeous.

shameless self plug for my earlier discussion about the innate political clashes in season 1 that were abandoned for flashy fantasy fights in season 2:

[mixterglacia]

CONTENT WARING: Vivziepop/Stolitz Critical below the cut.

TL;DR- This episode was inconsistent to put it politely. I will not continue such niceties below the cut. You've been warned.

I'm going to start with the good. The jokes with Satan and his...therapist?? are delightful, and considering how awful this episode was, I will take it.

The bit where the rest of the imps are tormenting Stolas felt so good, but I'm aware we're meant to sympathize with poor wittle owl boi can do no wrong uwu. So that missed by a mile.

While it wasn't consistent, this episode had some stunning animation. Kudos to the team, especially those working on the shot where Stolas is lifting his cape in the song. That and the slow turns were beautiful.

Alright let's rip into this.

If the second half of this episode existed in a vacuum, it might have hit its mark. But it doesn't. This is TOTAL tonal whiplash. Completely unearned and obnoxious. Once again, we have the biggest helluverse problem:

I don't want to put in the effort to earn my drama. I am relying on the fandom to fill in the blanks so they cry.

The song is horrendously demeaning and bad. He's belittling him because he's in a place where Blitz can't fight back. You can't convince me that I should go from the tone at the start of the song to the end.

GOD i hate these two. there is nothing appealing left. They are a hollow, pathetic shell of what we were promised. this is "messy" in the way a dumpster is. This isn't some artsy spill of candy. This is trash with glitter poured all over it.

Suddenly we're getting Blitz's "truwe" feelings all dumped on us in the span of a single musical number. This is TERRIBLE. You have been so stingy with any level of development on his end that this feels like a car getting t-boned at an intersection. I guess "self indulgent" is code for "I didn't want to put in effort, i just wanted my OTP." Which is fine in a fandom sense, but this is a SHOW. You have to actually make us believe they feel like that. You have FAILED, and you're still trying to give yourself the prize? Man, you are deluded.

This was total dogshit. This was a rushed attempt to get Stolas in Blitz's house/bed. This was nothing short of MORE woobification of this dumbass owl. HE DID THIS TO HIMSELF. IF ANYTHING, THIS IS A SLAP ON THE WRIST.

He's a privileged piece of shit that is so babied by the writers that even his PUNISHMENT is nothing. So he's banished, but only for a hundred years, which is nothing to an immortal. If you're trying to bring him down to be on par with the imps, you've failed.

He's still going to get his job back in the future. He's still going to have money in the future. He's still going to have power in the future. If anything, you should have had the punishment make him be an imp for those years.

But no. You're so obsessed with him that you've centered the whole plot around HIM. Not I.M.P, not Blitz.

HIM.

This show has become so derailed at this point. Each episode is (somewhat) fine on their own, but you can't sit there and tell me they have any level of consistency. I keep thinking they're going to hit their stride, and they keep failing to do so. This is pathetic.

I'm very close to giving up on this series. Even analyzing it has become a chore. You aren't fun to watch, or make fun of. You're just mediocre.

I so desperately want these shows to have better writing. I want them to have quality and be successful at the same time. But currently we only have the latter and I fear that will wane in time if Vivienne doesn't get her head out of her ass and put in the effort I know her to be capable of. You can't keep coasting off of your pilot fans forever. I implore you to have someone work on the tone and consistency of the helluverse in the future.

Somehow Helluva makes Hotel look like high art, and that's a shame. When it was only the pilots, I truly adored Helluva. It had wonderful characters and great humor.

But here we are.

[murderballadeer]

said this before but like i think too many people are resorting to "kids these days" type arguments about how all teenage girls and young women are stupid idiots who don't know what's good for them and are single handedly bringing about the end of feminism based on a few tiktoks about girl math and being a stay at home girlfriend. yes those trends are concerning but the way to respond to them isn't to write off all girls and women under 25 as incapable of complex thought, in fact that's really insulting to the intelligence of the many, many teenage girls and young women who actually are smart, independent and ambitious.

[randomalistic]

Wait you guys are actually buying Disney products I thought it was a joke

(READ TAGS FOR FULL CONTEXT Sorry it’s long dies

[fluentisonus]

guys I'm going to be honest with you I don't think this is a fair comparison at all

[pikkish]

I'm new to the fandom, just played 2016 and Eternal in quick succession. Eternal's DLC left me really dissatisfied, but I can't really explain why or how. Based on that poll you made, it's clear you've got some Opinions on the writing, so I was hoping you would like to share them? I feel like I need someone to mull over that whole story with. You can message me privately if you wish!!

Hi there! Welcome to the Doom fandom! I hope you enjoy your stay here more than you enjoyed TAG's writing! And you're more than welcome to come yell with me about Doom and its related games any time!

You're more than correct in your assertion that I have some Opinions about modern Doom's writing, in fact, I have quite a few of them. Most of them can be summed up as "the writing is just plain bad," which is probably also the reason you're unsatisfied with it. It's inconsistent, it regularly sacrifices coherence for the sake of something that looks cool for trailer shots, it has a lot of details that very much could be interesting plots but are simply ignored after their first mention, and at least a few more things that I'm forgetting, it's been a little bit since my last playthrough of TAG and these are just the major ones off the top of my head.

Take Hayden, for example. In 2016, he's the classic egotistical, powerful CEO of a major weapons industry, who maybe didn't necessarily intend to get a ton of people killed, but now that he has, he's gonna stick to his guns and insist he's still in the right, this was an unfortunate accident, but what he's doing is necessary, for the good of humanity, can't you see? He's the good guy! He's just trying to make things better! And he's dedicated to this course well enough that he's willing to betray the man who's there to save him, and boot Doomguy back into Hell at the end of 2016.

Then you get to Eternal, and he's inexplicably changed his mind for no good reason? And it's not like he's learned his lesson and has become more humble for it; sure, he got his rear handed to him by demons, and he emphatically states that the creation of Argent Energy is an "unholy union" that "cannot continue," but at the same time, he still acts constantly like he has everything under control and heavily implies that, were he in charge, this situation wouldn't be so bad- as if he weren't in charge when it got this bad. It's like they wanted him to have the exact same attitude (and therefore, ability to deliver dramatic voicelines) as in 2016, but didn't want to commit to him being a villain, so they just went "ok! he doesn't like Argent Energy any more," and went with it, then never felt the need to explain how or why this complete shift in attitude came about. As a result, it feels like Hayden has no clear motive or goals, and falls pretty flat as a character in general.

And then, to take it into TAG, there's the Seraphim, and don't even get me started on how much I hate that that's his name, "seraphim" is the PLURAL form of "seraph," it's like how "Guy" is a real name but then if they decided to name a character "Guys" instead, and it drives me crazy-- whom they go to some lengths to confirm is, in fact, the same person as Hayden, but then, despite the fact that Samur is sick and dying from the moment you revive him, for some reason, Hayden has to turn back into Samur. I suppose there's maybe some indication that Samur and Hayden are actually different people implied by Hayden referring to the Seraphim in the third person through the beginning of the Atlantica level, but there's still never any explanation given for that, whether they are or aren't the same person, or why you need to bring Samur back in Hayden's place.

And then, you beat Samur up, and guess what? He immediately stops being relevant to the plot and is almost completely forgotten. And that's a recurring theme in modern Doom! Olivia Pierce and the Khan Maykr both share the same fate, the moment they're dead, they practically just stop existing. Sure, there's the statue of Olivia in Nekravol, and, like, a single mention of the Khan in one of TAG's codices, if I remember correctly, but personally, to me, both of those feel more like the devs giving you a wink and a nudge and saying "haha hey, remember them?" like it's more of an Easter Egg than them actually having any significance.

And then there's the whole mess that is Davoth. Admittedly, having the Divinity Machine be fueled by his power, and Doomguy being enhanced by that power is thematically appropriate, what with the whole reason Doomguy wins being that he's even angrier than Hell. I also think something like the Divinity Machine and Dooomguy becoming superhuman did have to happen eventually, because how many times can one man singlehandedly beat back the whole of Hell itself before he stops being just some guy? But I don't think it was executed very well.

For one thing, I don't think it was a good move to imply that Doomguy always was some sort of pseudo-god super entity right from the start. Sure, like I said, he did inevitably have to stop being just some guy, but him being just some guy was a good bit of the charm of classic Doom in my opinion. All we knew about him was that he loved his pet rabbit, and was more willing to punch his commanding officer in the face than follow an order to shoot civilians. And yeah, if you take that, and also assume that the story cards are Doomguy's own internal monologue or at least a representation of his attitude, then you can't really say he was ever a blank slate character, but he was still just some guy, and he was relatable for that. And going "well, actually, he was a godling from the very beginning" just doesn't feel very good in my opinion, and feels like a big retcon besides. (And we'll get to more "well, ACTUALLY" stuff in a bit, but first I wanna finish up the tangentially Davoth related stuff first.)

All that aside, if we take it at face value and say sure, Doomguy was always something a little more than human, always destined to become the ultimate warrior, rather than making himself into the Doom Slayer by surviving Hell, then there's still not really any reason for Davoth to have looked exactly like him, beyond going "you-- but EVIL!!" for the drama of it. I think there was maybe one codex entry that says Davoth's whole soul-stealing operation was for the sake of providing his own people with immortality, which is to say, he was fighting to protect his home or something to that effect, so an argument could be made that his looking like Doomguy is an attempt at exploring "this is you, gone too far, this is you if you ever let go of your morals, this is everything you risk becoming," but, again, it's mentioned like... once, in one codex, and never explored or elaborated upon further. If I remember correctly, Davoth himself never even acknowledges this, it's just the codex entry, and he just goes on about how he'll kill Doomguy and destroy everything he ever loved. If they really wanted to make him a sympathetic villain like that, then they should've actually given us the opportunity to feel that sympathy for him. Let me see the people he's trying to protect- is it an idyllic paradise, oblivious to the lengths being gone to to keep them comfortable? A broken, dying people who should have gone extinct long ago, but for this thievery of the lives of others? I know Hell is supposed to be Jekkad, corrupted, and even in theory, that's fine- you could say Davoth's become so ruthless in pursuit of this immortality for his people that he's blinded himself to how it's also destroyed that which he was attempting to save- but you can't really see that. It's still just Hell, not really any sort of remnant of something worth saving.

And speaking of that. Trying to make Davoth a sympathetic villain at all feels like a bad choice to me. Doom is about fighting demons, about carving a bloody war path through the ultimate evil of Hell itself, and about feeling viciously satisfied about doing it. Making it about a desperate man who can't accept that he failed to save what he cared about, and making about killing that man before he does any more damage in attempting to do what he's already failed to do just doesn't feel good the way the rest of Doom does. And beyond that, TAG doesn't even succeed in the emotional gut punch that would come from it, had they managed to make Davoth into an actually sympathetic villain. It's like they're trying to strike a balance between the gratuitously violent and exhiliratingly triumphant feel that Doom is known for, and an emotionally impactful story, and as a result, both end up landing somewhere between mediocre and just plain bad.

I don't have a good segue into this bit except to say it's coming back to the "well, ACTUALLY," thing I mentioned earlier, which is: there are a lot of parts that feel a lot like a six year old kid is just making up the plot on the spot, like, for example, "Doomguy LAUNCHES himself out of a CANNON and he has a MAGIC SWORD and a PET DRAGON that carries him to the MAGIC CRYSTAL in the MIDDLE of the PLANET." Granted, these ones are pretty small and relatively inconsequential in the grand scheme of things, and, yeah, okay, they do look pretty cool. But they don't really... fit? Yeah, it's not like classic Doom didn't have this too, In Doom I alone, Doomguy gets pissed about not getting a reward for beating up the barons, practically just jumps off the side of Deimos, and then finally gets to go home when a secret teleporter just opens beside him after Hell decides he's "too tough" for it. But that all fits in classic Doom, because it's not trying to be a serious, grimdark story. Classic Doom is goofy, and it knows it, and it doesn't try to be anything else. But modern Doom tries so hard to be a very serious, dramatic story and also keep the sillier bits of classic Doom, and- yeah, okay, I already made this point once, but here it is again- it ultimately kinda fails at both as a result.

But then there's the bigger of these, namely VEGA. You spend the majority of both 2016 and Eternal with him as your main companion, and, as far as I can remember, there's never really anything to indicate that he's anything other than what he's introduced as, a sentient AI, created to help manage the Mars base. And then you get to the end of Eternal, and- after basically making you sacrifice him for a second time- with next to no buildup, go, "well actually, he's the god of the bad guys." And I'd complain about that plot thread also being brought up and then dropped with no further elaboration, except they do elaborate on it, and that's basically all that TAG is about. They spend the whole of TAG 1 telling you how VEGA is the god of Literally Everything, and how he made Davoth, then didn't kill him when he started to get out of hand, and aren't you MAD at him, for making all your problems, for being too merciful with his own creation that he loved, and don't you just wanna DESTROY the thing that would give him power again?

And then you get to TAG 2 and they spend the whole time going "WELL ACTUALLY it's DAVOTH who's god and VEGA STILL couldn't kill him and he's been LYING to you this ENTIRE TIME." It almost feels to me like a bad fandom interpretation to justify not liking a character, except worse because they're actually the ones who made the character and wrote the story, and I'm not entirely sure why they intentionally tried to make VEGA a helpful, likeable character, gave him a backstory that arguably makes him more sympathetic than Davoth, and then went "actually we hate him now and are gonna do everything we can to try to make you hate him too."

There are definitely more things I could bring up, like whatever the whole deal with the wraiths and the World Spear is, and probably a handful of other things I'm forgetting, too, but it's getting late and I gotta get up to go to work tomorrow. At any rate, thanks for stopping by and giving me an excuse to finally yell about these things! Feel free to stop by and chat with me about video games whenever you want, I love getting to hear other people's thoughts on these things just as much as I love getting to give my own.

[grimark]

unnecessarily long wall of text tag essay aside, “we all need to be nicer to men so they don’t radicalise and try to kill us” is really not a take i’m in the mood for hearing right now.

[seventh-district]

not even gonna tag this properly bc i don't wanna get Involved but i do have some Thoughts i need to get out into the void so here we go

(aaa quick edit: CW for mention/discussion of Boothill leaks)

[grison-in-space]

okay so I wanted to show @coffee-mage-sans-caffeine some terrible field Beagle stacks, so that they could see how uncomfortable the dogs look, and therefore I went hunting for field rabbit beagle kennels.

I turned up one pet "rare color" breeder and one that turned out to be a breed-specific article from a fucking content mill. Which: Gross. But the third one actually was a field rabbit-hunting beagle breeder, one who had the most good ol' boy [appreciative] blog description of his goals I've seen in a very long time:

Woodpont Beagles are a pack of dual-purpose (show and field bred) hunting hounds located in Southern Ohio, USA.  Some of our female lines now stretch back as many as 16 generations, spanning nearly 40 years.  Hounds from this kennel have been very successful in the past at field trials and shows, although the primary focus the past 20 years has been on pack work after cottontail rabbit or snowshoe hare. 

[...]

Feel free to contact us if this sounds like the type of hound for you.  Not everyone likes the same kind of beagle.  If your interest is field trials, or showing, you may want to keep looking.  If you want good, honest hounds for pack work or gunning, these just may suit you.  Puppies occasionally available.

Like, you know that is an old white man with the most rural of backgrounds and interests. His philosophy is fantastic, mind you, the dogs themselves are a blend of conformation and working beagle lines with the goal of maintaining the best of both worlds, if I wanted a beagle or to hunt rabbits I'd be on that man's doorstep in a heartbeat. I'm reading his stuff and I'm watching very carefully, and I see a post title and pre-emptively flinch:

Immediately what pops into my head is QAnon and hideous right-wing politics have invaded all kinds of circles over the years, and look I was starting to really like this guy, his opinions about working hounds are kickass, and oh no he's going to take time out of his day to make it clear he thinks people like me are scum--what does it read--oh no, oh no, what is it gonna say--

Things You Will Not See Here

Hounds with No Show Blood

Hounds with No Field Blood

Hounds in above ground kennels (i.e., raised on wire rather than being reared on the ground. always. no stacking kennels or god forbid runs.) ...

Yeah. Okay. I can live with this. It's a website straight out of 2013 (or 2003) rather than 2023. And oh, what a breath of fresh air the blog is!

[timegears-moved]

tbh i gotta take back what i said before. totk hasn't really done anything to make me care about this version of zel*nk

[ilikeyoshi]

not to get really deep and personal on tumblr dot com but i think today's therapy session may have been the first ever time i actually felt my mind and my body connect. like. it felt fucking cosmic? the revelation that they were always meant to work in tandem, and that they speak two different languages, thoughts and senses, and that i am their mediator, i am the one who makes sure they both get what they need.

i think this is why it's so common for mentally ill people to "know" their anxiety or depression aren't true to life, that what they're afraid of isn't really happening, and yet the pain persists. because the pain is your body. and your body does not understand words and logic like your brain does. your body needs to have its hand held or its back stroked. your body needs to cry. your body needs to feel and hear the physical sensation of you saying the reassurances out loud, because the words don't translate, but the sensations do. the movement of your mouth, the vibration of your voice.

and if we do not give our body this, then it doesn't matter how much we heal our minds. we have to heal the body too. we have to feel and acknowledge the pain and ask it, "what do you need?" maybe that's a bath. maybe that's lying down and squeezing a pillow really tight. maybe that's screaming at the top of your lungs. maybe that's walking around the block for an hour. whatever it is, it is the body's version of the anxiety and depression and illness. and like the mind's version, it needs to be helped, gently and consistently, until someday it knows that the fear and guilt isn't real.

[complicit-rot]

i haven't been this social & talkative in Years someone drag me out back