#and just keep remaking it over and over again until i considered the story Done?

[realjem]

neeeeed to sleep but i am instead awake writing to myself about the implications of my ocs meeting their original concepts. augh

[hall0wedwyrm]

reviving this idea because I can't find the original post I made???? okay here we go remaking it with more story.

Jesse is Alex and Herobrine's child. They were separated from Herobrine when he had to flee back to the Nether in fear of rumors of him being back in the overworld were. He entrusted Steve to look after them both, and bid them all farewell.

They don't really remember him, but they have a few memories of Herobrine. He, however, thought about them a lot, and how he misses them deeply. He wished he could have done something different that day, maybe even asking Alex to go with him.

Years Later, after all the events of MCSM, Radar comes sprinting into Jesse's office, saying there's someone lingering around the outskirts of the town walls, and that he hopes they would go and look ("Since... you're the mayor n all... not because I'm too scared to take a peak myself...").

It's Herobrine, who had heard from reuniting with Alex that Jesse had been doing all of these heroic things, and saving the world several times over, and he wanted to see them. He didn't really consider the fact that he had probably scared a lot of civilians who might have seen him.

Here's some other various thoughts for this:

The original Order of the Stone were the ones who made the stories about Herobrine, framing him as some kind of cryptid wanderer. They're all shitting themselves when he meets them (Ivor tells Soren, and Gabriel is like 'isnt that..?????' and the three of them are like OH NOOOOOO)

Jesse's friends don't know about Herobrine too much, since the stories has mostly died out when they would have heard them. Lukas has (Book nerd), but doesn't completely connects the dots until he finds the old tale again and is like ohhhh! and then has no idea what hes supposed to do with this information

Speaking of Lukas, he lets Alex and Steve be his beta readers, and they both just love reading about how admired Jesse is, and the amazing adventures they went on. Lukas asks them to please be honest if they think its bad, but Alex says they just love it so much

They also get to have the first copy of his book when its finished and they keep it on its own shelf in their library

Another awkward reunion is with Romeo and Xara, who also shit themselves when they see him too. Mainly because Romeo had been a menace when they last met, and Herobrine had threatened him to get in order.

Since reuniting, Steve and Herobrine have been catching up about a lot of things, mainly Steve telling Hero about what hes missed in basically everything. They also get to tell him how much they surprisingly missed him (since they weren't super best friends or anything before, it was more of like... a mutual acceptance).

im 100% going to do art for this AU thing with my interpretations and such for the guys. anyway yeah this is my official reviving of this i will be doing more this time (an AO3 story??? nono i have like 3 already idk if i can do another one)

[paragonrobits]

today's thought experiment; applying some of the principles to creating charismatic over the top classic villains can be applied to creating protagonists by just taking the basic idea and applying it a viewpoint character or someone the author intends to be a hero.

In particular, let's look at the concept of the BACKSTORY.

So, backstories are a surprisingly finnicky thing. A lot of store is presently put by the backstory, to the point that they're considered character defining; as an example of how this can be done well, Magneto was originally not characterized as having a particularly notable backstory, and it certainly didn't inform his character as a standard villain with mutant supremacism at the core of his character; it was not until he was written by Chris Claremont that he was imagined as having survived the Holocaust as a child, which has an obvious wealth of resulting implications on his viewpoint, fears and overall motives, both in terms of defining his antagonistic perspectives ('My people will never suffer again, no matter what I must do to ensure it') AND his heroic depictions ('NO ONE shall suffer as I did').

But at the same time, enough backstory can lock a character down and make them feel more limited, or at least prevent you from characterizing them as freely as you could if they didn't definitely HAVE that back story; if you establish Character A as having been from a wealthy family fallen on hard times and you establish a very specific character history and the precise details of how they fell and the structure of that family, its excellent material but it also prevents you from bringing up any ideas that would contradict it. And if you think later on that Character A works better as having always lived a poor and struggling life, obviously that's not an option without retcons or really wacky plot twists that are functionally ALSO retcons.

So, here is my radical point; unless the backstory DIRECTLY feeds into the character's core motivations and direct impact on a specific plot, a backstory isn't strictly necessary.

Among other things, I've found that what's important for a character is what they do in the HERE AND NOW; in the present events of the story they're in. A backstory doesn't have to really exist for them, and I've found it helps just as much to keep it minimalist to inform their character without having too much to limit potential concepts in the future.

Now, this feeds back into the villain archetype mentioned before; they rarely have any real backstory, and this allows them to enact a kind of unfettered charisma that isn't held back by bagagge. Of note, just about EVERY SINGLE classic Disney villain beloved for being fun antagonists has been given a backstory of some kind to justify their attitudes in remakes, and almost without exception EVERY SINGLE one of them fell flat.

People didn't like these reimaginings. The backstories, meant to recontextualize their actions, made those villains lose the over the top charisma that made them so compelling to begin with.

So, therein lies my proposal; flip the script and apply that same premise to your heroes! Do very little with their backstory and make it vague, or even just a few sentences worth, JUST enough to contextualize their general perspective.

You may also consider going the full mile and having your characters initially start out as villains, but who at some point changed their ways. (An example of how this might work, I would suggest looking at Steven Universe's Peridot, the more heroic depictions of Magneto, and the versions of Harley Quinn present in the Injustice setting; these are characters defined by being protagonists, but initially started out as villains whose characterizations wound up inverting.) On that note, I would also suggest inverting this former villain's characterization to give an impression of having them go full circle; as Peridot started out as a cold and callous person with a very subdued characterization, she wound up becoming a high energy and very empathetic person who is by FAR one of the most hammy and dramatic character in a show where people generally show deep feeling by bursting into song. Magneto also surprisingly is an example, despite his original characterization generally not being considered canonical for the most part; old school Magneto of the Lee/Kirby era was a very hammy and dramatic villain in the style of Doctor Doom; ranting on how his MIGHTY POWER will defeat the puny humans and those foolish X-MEN.

Whereas now, Magneto is still very dramatic, but completely inverted; his drama is cold and filled with gravitas, barely speaking above a level tone, and even this threats are calm, even with a faint hint of joviality; when he tortures a woman who has been having the homeless population abducted and converted into killer cyborgs to kill mutants in premeptive defense of human kind, Magneto indicates his intentions by simply giving a gentle smile and saying "Ah, but I CAN make you talk, with this," and reveals a small floating paperclip.

(This final thought might also lean into people liking villains; instead of bending your favorite villains out of shape to justify their actions and attitudes as secretly being the true heroes all along, why not go the extra mile and write your heroes with the same kind of energy you'd give for villains, but legitimately being good? And of course, writing your heroes as former villains who came full circle!)

[mysticdragon3md3]

🥋🌊🫖…….e10

Ranma 1/2 remake ep10

. The changes to the ice skating fight after Ryouga switched in, felt too long, but I think that's SOLEY because i had just re-read the manga and I was waiting for the next story/character beat.

. Which isn't fair to the director. Clearly, the director saw "martial arts figure skating" and had a bunch of ideas that he wished the original manga/anime had done and this was his chance to do a bunch of cool stuff. And it WAS good! Ranma and Ryouga using a strategy that exploits Mikado's womanizing, Ranma and Ryouga again demonstrating the flaws of adhering to gender expectations by feeling bad about fighting Azusa, Azusa getting some solid fighting moves in and landing them, etc. It was all good.

. Though, it also felt like an unnecessary back&forth of the plot momentum. Ranma and Ryouga started, very reluctant to work together, then suddenly they were doing perfect team-ups, then they had to return to fighting each other again, in order to meet the next canon plot beat. It was like that "string of pearls" story structure that videogames use. It ends up making some events feel moot. I felt like the original manga/anime did a better job, keeping the momentum of Ranma and Ryouga's reluctant cooperation, building until it culminated with Ryouga and Ranma really fighting each other, over Akane, until she had to step in. That steady, unbroken momentum from the original manga was really nice.

. Then again, the end of episode 9 was already oscillating the momentum by confusedly making Ryouga agree to skate with Ranma, instead of Ranma just grabbing him and rushing off to continue the duel with the Kolhotz pair, before he could object, as in the manga. It took a while for me to realize Ryouga likely agreed to pair with Ranma, to remove Akane from the risk of being kissed by Mikado. But Ryouga's sudden change of mind, conflicted with the drastic steps he took to interrupt a duel, splash Ranma so he wouldn't be recognized as the previous fighter, jump into the rink, and try to skate with Akane instead. To me, it makes more sense that Ryouga agreed to skate with Ranma, because Ranma grabbed him and ran off too suddenly for him to react. But I tried to let it slide because it is very in-character for both Ryouga and Ranma to put Akane before themselves, especially with some creep repeatedly attempting and repeatedly declaring that he will try to accost her.

. In the end, the momentum was a little messy, but it was in service of adding some cool things. And it was more accurate to the manga than the first, 1989 anime---which made an excuse for Ranma and Ryouga to leave the rink and get to an actual swimming pool…instead of the rink already being atop a swimming pool. And although I love that shot of retro Akane skating down a stair rail, and looking so cool, the manga did make more sense to keep the whole fight in the rink, and I'm glad the remake anime kept to the manga.

. One change I did like about the retro anime, was that it made a clear separation between the figure skating martial arts story arc and Shampoo's introduction. That was a good choice. But considering how Shampoo is SUPPOSED to be just barging into Ranma's life, at any moment he lets his guard down, since he defeated her in China, it does make sense that she would still be doing that. And it's accurate to the manga.

.

Also, I didn't realize how happy it'd make me to hear Shampoo speaking Chinese, so fluently.

.

This episode also reminded me of some gender/genre things I prefer about Ranma 1/2. I like how Ranma is not swayed to enjoy Shampoo chasing him, just because she's pretty. In fact, Akane mentions her beauty more than Ranma. There are so many Harem anime out there, where the guy will secretly have a moment where he actually kind of enjoys a girl being violent or trying to kill him, just because she's pretty, and "oooh, he gets to spend time with a pretty girl focusing her attention on him". I've always loved how Ranma doesn't bother with those cishet wish fulfillment asides...except with Akane, whom Ranma actually likes. And I like how regardless of Mikado or Shampoo stealing kisses from Ranma, he is both times horrified. I hate this idea that people are supposed to be ok with being accosted, if their assailant is attractive and of the opposite gender. And I always appreciate Ranma bucking assumptions that "guys always want girls' attention/groping/etc." I love all the little moments when Ranma 1/2 forces you to acknowledge that some experiences are not gendered, but universally human.

[starlightshore]

Angel’s Lullaby update:

i wrote two devlogs this month.

first: i cover the history of Angel’s Lullaby and the current progress.

second: the plans I have for gameplay

TLDR; Angel’s Lullaby is a Open World Action/Turnbased RPG hybrid. You’ll have a small island to explore with 3 main areas and multiple side-quests. For the demo, I plan only having 1 area finished.

Game progress: eh, hard to put a good number on it. main characters and the main overworld are mostly finished, mapping + main area need planning. i’d say a bit less than 50% done with the demo.

below the read me i discuss game development that i’m not talking about on Gamejolt, but feel more comfortable talking here.

so been working with a friend on remaking (well, rather, i’m helping a little but it’s mostly just him,,, i’m not a skilled programmer but at least i’m keeping up with what he’s teaching me ^_^; so thanks to eternal shine, u rock!) the char_player object to work better for Angel’s. also, aside from the outfit code, this main stuff will be added as a pack for TML’s engine for better functionality. hooray! this includes:

adding arrays and macros to dialogue text

cut-scene system (almost done)

char_player state machine (has a couple issues for Angel’s specifically, which is discussed below.)

(WIP) Gameplay wise, I’m going for a Zelda-Like over-world: you can walk, run and attack. Monsters will be on over-world, you can get an advantage if you strike first. You’ll also need your weapon to move around the terrain or solve puzzles. (potentially will add more to the move-set as you progress, but that’s later in the development to consider)

i made a base-player object to fine tune the animation and add details like optional gloves + boots easier for me to add (gotta get into the headspace of using layers more in aesprite!) I’m unsure if I like the dust effect, but I think it helps the running look speedy and feel different to walking!

honestly all this development should of been done before but i was torn between using TML’s base project char object and remaking my own for ages. (plus, i spent the last few months unsure if i was moving to Unity or Godot) but hey, doing that now. i’ve been mainly working on story so its nice to actually start building the game again! the non-player stuff with naming + intro are already done of course, though will need to be remade as I’ve improved as an artist and with the new cut-scene system I can do this more efficiently.

my main plan is to get a prototype of the first 5 minutes of the game done within a week. ideally i’d like to make a fully-polished prototype within that week as well, but that’s idealistic at best... i’m shooting for 2 weeks, though that could easily become 3 weeks.

none of this will be available to play yet btw, after the prototype, i want to be able to get some feedback (heyo if u wanna be a play-tester hmu) then i’ll get to making it so you can get the first “area” mapped out.

my idea is that the above will be playable in the demo. you’ll have a house (to farm and have chores) explore the local woods and mountain area for side quests and just for fun.

the one main area will be the start of the linear story. the final release you’ll have access to the whole island -within reason. The other 2 areas will be soft-locked until you progress the plot in the main area. while this limits the open-world aspect, i like the idea of holding back the choices until certain parts of the game are established first. then you can run around wild! The second and third main areas are your choice to which to do first -and the plot will play out differently depending on that.

There’s still the obvious No Mercy - Neutral - Pacifist choices in play here as well. I’m limiting the scope of this to have the last 2 areas be different, but the overall plot line stays some-what the same. (if i was being paid, that’d be a different story lmao) but still, all of this will add up and hopefully be exciting to experience.

I really want exploration and the feeling that you are living in this world to be the main get-away from the game. while the most important core of the story lies within The Knight and the Player Character, this is my second biggest goal for the game.

I hope you all enjoy Angel’s Lullaby and are as excited as I am to see it progress! thank you so much for all those who’ve been sticking by me and my stories throughout the years. i’m really hoping for a demo release in 2022.

if any mutuals are intrigued by this game’s potential... i’m up for talking story again once this prototype stuff is finished up with. atm i wanna concentrate on making the core game-play feel good and i’m not worried about the story. but once that’s finished, there’s a lot of story problems -that some have been solved by the open-world structure, but just as many glaring issues have arisen. it’s a pretty daunting story now haha.

while i got a few new team members, I’d like a few more people to talk to deeply over this project. It feels great to spit-ball ideas back and forth! but I also understand people are busy and I’ve already asked a lot from people with the rough draft peer-reviews lmao. i guess i’ll just put this here in the off chance something comes out of it.

[itsclydebitches]

re: that ask you posted a couple days ago about the male and female representation in RWBY, part of what makes RWBY's whole 'girl power' thing ring exceptionally hollow to me is the fact that there are like... no women in positions of real power in remnant. like at all. except the big bad.

winter is second in command to james. glynda is second in command to ozpin. all of the headmasters are men (for no discernible reason, imo; why theodore and not dorothea?). the leader of the ace ops was a white man (and then winter seemed to take over clover's position instead of either of the women of color on the team, and she was still second to james). RWBY is an all girl team, but JNPR was led by a boy despite a girl arguably being far more qualified (pyrrha). the happy huntresses are all women, and robyn had no real power to speak of--she didn't even manage to win the election, because jacques rigged it, and then the council ceased to matter. there was one (1) woman on the council, but she was so inconsequential that i can't even remember her name. (i suppose we're lucky it was the guy and not her who james shot lol) jacques controls the SDC instead of willow, even though he's not even a schnee by blood and actually married into the family for power. (and we don't even know how he got it over his wife.)

and then there's the white fang, which ghira led and not kali--and it's ghira who leads menagerie itself, while kali seems to be a housewife. sienna had five minutes of screentime before being brutally killed and her position assumed by adam, a man. cordovin is basically a one off lackey we haven't even thought about before or since. neo was second to roman. you have cinder, sure, who is a second but to salem, a woman, and raven as the leader of the branwen tribe--but what does it really say about your 'girl power' narrative when the only women with genuine systemic power in your world are villains or antagonists with massive bodycounts??

atla has the same sort of problem--a couple great female characters, but all the leadership positions are men (except the kyoshi warriors, an all girls group, and even then the leader of their island is an old man) and the one female mentor figure also turns out to be evil--but it at least has some great writing to help overlook that fact, and it came out in the mid-00's and so has some sort of excuse of being a product of its time. but rwby didn't even start until 2013 and it's still going and still making these kinds of decisions well into 2021.

where is this supposed girl power, exactly? am i really supposed to overlook the very patriarchal worldbuilding just because the title characters are girls?

That's an excellent summary of the situation, anon, and as with so much in RWBY, it comes down to the full context. Any one of these examples isn't necessarily going to mean much on its own. It's when you look at the pattern that you can start making a case for those conclusions: Why is the show marketed on "girl power" set in a world where men hold the vast majority of that power? And, more importantly, why is that setup not the point? We could easily have a story where that lopsided gender dynamic is the problem that the girls are looking to fix, but... that story doesn't exist. Like the problems discussed with Jaune, the supposed point here exists only on the surface. Dig just the tinniest bit — the above — and you hit on a lot of structural problems with this "girl power" world.

To add just a few details to what you've already said:

Salem indeed has power, but she's never allowed to fully use it. Each volume the frustration with this grows as Salem accumulates more abilities and then just sits on them. From literally hiding out for a thousand years to worries that she won't use the Staff in Volumes 9-10, Salem really isn't allowed to be the threat she's presented as on the surface. And yes, this is absolutely due in part to the "She's too OP and the writers don't know how to let her be that powerful while still having the heroes win" issue, but again, context. That problem doesn't exclude others occurring simultaneously.

Same double explanation with Summer. Yes, dead moms are an incredibly common trauma to dump on a protagonist, but it still left Yang and Ruby with Tai as their primary influence. And Qrow. The uncle becomes the extended family influence while Raven is the absent one/eventual antagonist. It's personal power as opposed to political power, but Tai, Qrow, Ozpin, formerly James... most of the mentors are men. Maria, a key exception, has been ignored in that regard. The story announced that she was Qrow's inspiration, setup her being Ruby's new mentor, and then... nothing. Nothing has come of that. She disappeared for a volume and then went off to Amity and was literally forgotten by the story when evacuating everyone was the finale's whole point.

Like that Endgame moment I mentioned, the Happy Huntresses feel a little too forced to me. Yes, it's the same basic idea as in ATLA, but ATLA, as you say, has a lot more going for it. The Happy Huntresses feel... on the nose? Idk exactly how to explain it. Like, "Here they are! Another team of all women! Isn't this how progressive storytelling works? Just ignore how this is a one-off team of minor characters compared to the world building issues discussed above." And if you're not paying attention, you miss just how insignificant they are, with a side of Robyn being, well, Robyn. The Kyoshi Warriors, at least, are based off of Kyoshi. A woman avatar who is a significant part of their history. That is, presumably, why they're an all women warrior group (but who notably still teach Sokka). The Happy Huntresses are all huntresses because...? There's no reason except that meta "We want to look progressive" explanation. Just like having all the women superheroes team up for a hot second so people get excited and ignore the representation problems across, what? 21 films? Don't get me wrong, I love that May is among the Happy Huntresses. I think including her in the explicitly all-women group was one of the better things RWBY has done in a long time, but the rest is still a mess.

RWBY is arguably about these smaller groups as opposed to systematic power (despite the writers trying to work that in with things like the White Fang and the election. Not to mention the implication that everything in Atlas is fine now that evil Ironwood has died and taken the symbol of wealth (the city) with him. We saw a human holding hands with a faunus after all. Racism and corruption solved, I guess.) So yes, our group is dominated by women... but Whitley is the one saving Nora, helping to defeat the Hound (plus Willow), thinking of the airships, and providing the blueprints they need to escape. Salem is our Big Bad, except Ironwood is the one the volume focuses on. Ruby is our leader, but Jaune is the one leading the group into the whale and getting praised for how heroic he is. Ren does more to shake things up, even if he's painted as the one in the wrong. Oscar gets to confront Salem and destroys the whale threat. Ozpin provides the information they need to evacuate. Meanwhile, when the girls do things in Volume 8 it's almost always followed by a long-stint of passiveness. Nora opens the door so she can be unconscious for most of the volume. Penny keeps Amity up so she can also be unconscious for a good chunk of time. Ruby sends her message and then sits in a mansion. Blake fights so she can tearfully beg Ruby to save her. Weiss, as said, takes a backseat to Whitley (and Klein). They forward the plot, absolutely, but comparatively it doesn't feel like enough.

It's that pattern then, no one specific example. More and more the personal power, not just the systematic power already built into Remnant, seems to be coming from the men. Not all the time, but enough that scenes like the tea drinking moment feel like a part of a much larger problem. Pietro taking control, Watts hacking, and Ambrosius literally remaking her when Penny is supposed to already be in control of herself and her fate. Winter being presented as the active mentor to Weiss, only to turn around and claim that Ironwood was actually responsible for everything. Ruby, Weiss, Blake, and May straight up commenting on how awful things are out there while Yang, Jaune, Ren, and Oscar lead the charge against Salem — with the latter three doing the most to forward that mission (no fear, semblance, cane). As others have only half-joked, Yang's supposedly badass moment was bringing up a mother she's ignored for six volumes and briefly blowing up the immortal woman for a couple of seconds (with Ironwood's bombs). Even Marrow is arguably the most significant Ace Op after Clover. Vine isn't actually a character, Elm slightly less so, Harriet is there to go crazy and try to drop a bomb (notably before admitting to never-before-existed feelings for Clover), but Marrow? He's the one who breaks out. Who is meant to heroically stand up against Ironwood. Who comments on how awful it is that teenagers are fighting and, regardless of how messed up the moral messages are, is supposedly pushing for active change while all the women in his group, including Winter, insist on maintaining the status quo. Look at all these choices as a whole, it makes throwaway worldbuilding choices like "All the Maidens are women" feel pretty hollow. Why does it matter if Amber is a Maiden if she dies in a flashback so Ozpin can struggle to pass on the power? If Pyrrha dies before becoming one so Jaune can angst about it? If Raven is one and then disappears from the story entirely? If Winter has enough power to break Ironwood's aura, but supposedly had no power throughout every other choice she made getting here? If Penny is one, but is continually controlled by men and then asks another man to help her die? It's just really unconvincing, once you look past the surface excitement of a woman looking cool with magic powers.

When you do consider the whole of the story — both in terms of our world building and who is forwarding the plot in the latter volumes, getting the emotional focus, being proactive, etc. — there are a lot of problems that undermine the presumed message RT wants to write. They say, "girl power" by marketing RWBY with these four women, but too many of the storytelling decisions thoroughly undermine that, revealing what's likely a deeply ingrained, subconscious bias.

[garrothromeave]

let’s talk about minecraft diaries rebirth.

and why it’s literally amazing. (warning: this will contain spoilers. lots of them. also, long post ahead.)

i think a lot of people hate mcdr because they were expecting a remake; but the point of rebirth is for jess to rewrite it. it wasn't supposed to be exactly the same.

honestly i went into mcdr with a closed mind. as an og mcd fan, i thought that this was going to suck ass and that i'd rant about how bad it was to my friends later. but actually watching it, i just... couldn't help but immediately fall in love with it.

ik im probably the only motherfucker that likes mcdr, but honestly how could i not? for one, garroth and zenix actually have personalities at the beginning. AND; the villagers? actually amazing. donna made me smile, visher made me laugh and cry, brendan was just bein as good as ever. like... i even didn't despise emmalyn with every ounce of my soul like i usually do?? the characterizations of them were GOOD, man.

and honestly, aphmau like--the way she spoke, her whole thing. it was reallyyy well done in my opinion. she was oblivious to things, but it wasn't overdone and wasn't done in a way to make her annoying. she's a very appealing character in mcdr, a main protagonist i do not mind following along with. her dynamics to the characters are really cool and all very unique.  gonna cut it here so i don’t clog y’all’s feed cuz i got a lot to say :)

the early use of aphmau’s powers was actually pretty cool as well, it also really showed how clueless aphmau really was to everything going on around her. AND UH, THE FACT THAT SHE THOUGHT THAT GARROTH FELT FAMILIAR? GOLDEN. absolutely golden.

AND GENE OH BOY, the early introduction of gene? ik a lot of people are upset about it, but god DAMN i love it so much. his role in the story is very important in original, and i cannot express how much joy this brought me learning that he was actually getting the proper attention for it. and the fact that gene and aphmau were working together?? i mean ik gene was just trying to use her to get back to the "shadow abyss" (pretty pog replacement for the nether, gg) but god DAMN i loved every moment of it. i found their dynamic to be pretty fuckin funny to be honest, would absolutely love to see more of it.

i might be biased considering gene is one of my absolute favorite characters, but i honestly think that introducing gene this early on in the story was a good move. again, he's literally the right-hand man to the shadow lord. it makes you really wonder why he didn't have as much of an important role in season 1 or even 2 of the original mcd plotline. also, we get some of that good-ol-fashioned exposition with seeing early on how vylad and gene interact. vylad’s at a very strange point in the story right now; his motives are unclear, even to the side he’s ‘supposed’ to be taking (aka, a shadow knight.)  another early introduction to a character is zane! this, my friends, is good. really good. i’d say that zane is the main antagonist of season 1 in the original series--and he wasn’t even introduced until like, episode 50. it’s not necessarily a bad thing, but him being introduced this early on really gives the audience a better understanding of what threats are out there and what our protagonist will have to encounter in the future. in the original series, there’s not much explanation as to why lords are disappearing/dying left and right--and while yes, that was supposed to be the mystery of it, having some of that early information is a better move in terms of writing. 

AND IVAN?? BEING A PART OF THE JURY OF NINE?? I COULD NOT HAVE ASKED FOR ANYTHING MORE LIKE GOD DAMN that was a very pleasant surprise i'll just say that, thank you jess :)

and no i did not loop the 4 minutes of screentime laurance got in that one episode haha who would do that i would never do that anyways

SPEAKING of laurance, im so glad jess actually wrote him in this early :) she totally could have just waited for the first time aphmau visits meteli and meets him there, but no! she put him in an early episode. i dont even care if she did it just to shut up the fans about laurance but man that made me so happy seeing him, even if it was only for a bit.

okay i kinda wanna go over the guards real fast firstly; garroth. ignoring how weird the helmet showing emotions is, i really like how garroth is portrayed. he's under a lot of pressure because the village is putting a lot of the blame on him for malik's death, and he's trying his hardest to keep things running. the fact that garroth utterly refused the to take up the position of lord and even got a little snappy about it was actually really cool to see as well. and while he doesn’t have that same “reserved, quiet, observant” feel as the original mcd version of him had, this version of garroth is absolutely awesome. he’s more direct and blunt, is significantly more sarcastic, and isn’t as stiff or as much as a pushover as he is in the original. he even has a sense of humour. also, no homo, but he’s kinda adorable.  plus, the desperation that he goes through during the whole thing is just--it’s really cool to see how hard he’s trying to prove himself and help the village. my rating for mcdr garroth? 9/10. the helmet... the helmet is the main thing throwin me off, i can’t lie. next, zenix. oh BOY do i have a lot to say about this man. first of all, his and garroth’s dynamic is incredible. when i saw how the interacted with each other, my first thought was: father and son. zenix has this immaturity to him that is so fucking fun and interesting to watch, and seeing how garroth scolds him is so fuckin good man. and! seeing how he interacts with the rest of the village... honestly, if jess ever picks this story up again, i would probably cry when zenix (literally) backstabs garroth. HELL, i hope that’s something that still happens, it’d be heartbreaking to witness this character that we’ve come to love hurting his mentor, the man who took him in. he’s just a really good character all in all, and much more appealing than the original mcd zenix. ...except season 3 zenix. no zenix can be better than that one.  either way, zenix is amazing written to be the comic relief and he’s just an all-out lovable character in this series.  finally, dale and brian. yes i’m going to group them up because there’s not much to say regarding them, but i do want to address them. for starters, we have brian; who’s already 16 when the story starts. good on jess for doing that, because in the original aphmau watched brian be born and age INCREDIBLY quick, haha. THOUGH i do feel like there’s a slight connection lost there--one of the hardest things about brian’s betrayal in the original series in the fact that we watched him grow up in phoenix drop. we were there from the moment he was born, to the second he betrayed phoenix drop. BUT OF COURSE, this version is a lot more realistic, so it’s understandable. i just think that if it’s brian who’ll be betraying phoenix drop again (if it even goes down that same route), it won’t hit as hard unless jess really takes the time to grow the connection between brian and aphmau.  as for dale; gotta admit, love it. and like, i think one of the main things about how good of a call it was to make him a drunkard from the beginning is considering how much the village is struggling. the fact that the second-in-command is literally drunk all of the time really conveys the message of, “yeah. this village needs help.” plus, he’s another good comic relief character. i loved seeing molly and dale’s relationship too, it was very funny.  PLUS. we were blessed with a well scene, in which aphmau had to help villagers out of the well. i don’t know about you guys, but that was one of my favorite nods to the original series. i cannot thank jess enough for that, there was a smile on my face the entire time. another amazing thing--visher’s character. instead of just being introduced to this quirky lil merchant who only had one or two interactions with aphmau like in the first one, we got to sit there and really get a feel for someone worth remembering and worth mourning over. we had a reason to be sad over his death, it wasn’t just some npc getting blown up suddenly. this was different, and this hurt.  one of the major things that i hope is to come out of this is for jess to fix the major mistakes she had when writing the first series. she’d expressed how unhappy she was with some of the decisions she made, and i’m glad that she’s getting that second chance to undo the things she didn’t like. this series also gives her a second chance to really, really dig into characters and their motives. like, gimme laurance backstory in better detail. or like, garroth and zane’s relationship from back when they were kids? or how vylad died and who killed him? etc etc. she’s already done an excellent job so far, and i can’t wait to see where this goes. that is, if she ever continues it. god, i wish there were more episodes so that i could seriously let you guys know how beautiful of a series this is. there’s so much i want to say about rebirth, but i think i’ll stop here. i might say some more shit about it later, but if there’s anything i’d want you to take away from this, it’s: give minecraft diaries rebirth a chance. there’s a lot of potential, and this is a chance for jess to really change things for the better! ... but again, that is if this ever is continued. 

[dahniwitchoflight]

KH: What is Namine Really?

See also my other post: KH: What is Repliku/Riku Replica Really? https://dahniwitchoflight.tumblr.com/post/649102821124440064

Since I’m continuing my sudden Kingdom Hearts kick sparked by me rewatching all the cinematics for all the games thus far lately and watching all the story cins for KH UX since that’s gonna be relevant to the next games

I just feel I have to re-make this post about what Namine really is, because calling her Kairi’s Nobody has never made sense from the start when you think about it

When Kairi loses her heart in KH1 in the beginning, her body and soul specifically doesn’t get transported to the world that never was like all other nobodies, it’s stays in the realm of Light because Kairi is a princess of Heart, we know this, we see Riku lugging around her corpse throughout the whole game, we keep tabs on it constantly up until the point Sora gives Kairi back her heart and Kairi is re-completed again

KH1′s lore will state that it’s at this moment when Kairi is recompleted that Namine was born, but from what?

Sora’s Body+Soul became Roxas, they make it clear in KH2 that Sora and Roxas is a half and half deal, and when they go back together Sora is complete again.

But in KH1 the only reason Sora was able to maintain his form, was because his Heartless maintained his strong will

Kairi couldn’t have done the same, because as a Princess of Heart she had no darkness, so she couldn’t have had a heartless form

so if Sora’s Heart = Sora

Sora’s Body+Soul = Roxas

Kairi’s Heart = Inside Sora’s Heart

Kairi’s Body+Soul = An Unconscious Kairi

So literally what is left of Kairi to make Namine?

Consider that Kairi has one thing that Sora does not have, a Heart with a Pure Light inside of her, and not just any Pure Light, the thing that makes her a Princess of Heart, and as of KH3, this Pure Light, one of seven Pure Lights, can and do move on to different princesses

The princess from KH1 are the old holder’s of the Pure Lights, the Pure Lights moved on to different princesses in KH3, while the originals still remain full beings pure of heart even without the Pure Lights, the Pure Lights are just a special thing that exists within them that can be passed on to others

but in KH3′s Kairi’s Pure Light stays within her Pure Heart, now why would that be?

A Pure Light, one that specifically cannot exist inside a heart filled with Darkness

Consider that, way back in KH1, when Kairi’s Heart first entered Sora. Sora had Darkness in his heart just being a normal dude, and the Pure Light could no coexist within it

So when Kairi’s heart enters Sora’s, the Pure Light crosses through Sora’s heart and then is ejected somewhere else, Castle Oblivion, and then continues to exist, as Namine

Consider that even though KH1 says Namine and Roxas started to exist at the same time, when Sora Released his Heart and became a Heartless,

We see Roxas’s origins, and he’s a complete zombie, barely existing at the start of Days

and yet Namine the first we see of her in Chain of Memories, seems to have already existed and already gained her own desires and feelings by the time CoM has even started

The whole game is put into motion, because Namine was manipulated into changing up memories to become friends with Sora and Riku

When you consider the timeline with Days, that would have to mean in a very short period of time

Namine would have to appear in Castle Oblivion, be found by Org 13, grow enough of a personality to want things, specifically, the feeling of loneliness, demonstrate her power to change memories in some way, and be manipulated into starting the plot of Chain of Memories, all while Roxas is still basically a zombie

To me, it just makes more sense to say that Namine existed at an earlier point than Roxas did

All this together, I believe Namine is what happened when Kairi’s Pure Light got dipped into Sora’s Memories way back at the start of KH1

and since as of Days we know a full heart can be seeded by nothing but a sprinkling of scattered memories as it’s origins, Namine’s Heart must have grown the same way

Also, it explains why Namine’s so pure white themed and has blonde hair, that can’t really be explained by a connection to Sora’s heart, because he’s a brunette, and even Ventus’s/Roxas’s hair isn’t as Light as Namine’s

But wait you say, A Pure Light can’t make a person, there’s nothing of substance to even make anything there

But DiZ himself explains that Namine is a special nobody, less then a nobody, less then nothing, the most fleeting of all the fleeting shadows

and then yknow, Vanitas is a thing

If all Vanitas is, is a manifestation of Ventus’s Darkness torn apart from him

Then why couldn’t Namine be a manifestation of Kairi’s Pure Light?

Consider also, that of all the people who could be said to be a part of another person, or a special other half, Vanitas and Namine are the only ones given special unique true names, when everyone else, even Xion, is given an anagrammed X name, from “No. i”

and they are the only beings that come with their own unique color schemes, specifically Black for Dark Vanitas, and White for Light Namine

and the only beings that have unique special powers stemming from their unique origins

Vanitas powers over dark emotions, stemming from how the darkness in hearts contain their negative emotions

Namine with her powers over memories, because shared memories are the pieces of light inside hearts that connect different hearts to each other

and then the final nail in the coffin for me, is during the prologue for KH Union X, when Kairi’s Grandmother is telling baby Kairi about the legends of the age of fairytales, when she gets to the part about talking about the “Pure Lights that exist in the hearts of Children” remaking the world

Namine’s Theme starts playing, ever so briefly, even though Namine is nowhere pictured in this scene or has anything to do with this story

Except, if you consider her Origins as a being made from a Pure Light

https://youtu.be/z6NVTZlqw1k?list=PLPCJnwphQDQcJOkD9OsmxxMHX7YHE4WP2&t=70

and since Namine is still within Kairi for all of KH3, Kairi’s “Pure Light” remains within her as well

So that’s my theory and I’m sticking with it

Namine is thematically and symbolically basically the full opposite of what Vanitas is

A dark flavored Sora made from ripping all the darkness out of a person’s heart

and a light flavored Kairi made from the Pure Light inside Kairi being ejected from a person’s heart

but while Ventus becomes half a being without vanitas, since the darkness is part of his own Heart, Namine can exist outside of Kairi, both being full beings of their own, since the Pure Light is something external that Kairi’s heart held onto for a time, and is something that she can live without *EDIT*

one last thing as well, to do with how Kairi went from Radiant Garden to Destiny Islands and how Namine ended up in Castle Oblivion when she was first born

when BBS Sleep came out, Kairi met Aqua and Aqua cast a spell on her saying “One day when you’re in trouble, the Light within you will lead you to the Light of another”

and people were content to assume this means Aqua is the reason Kairi ended up in Destiny Island’s one day since the spell took her to see Sora/Riku the keyblade duh

but then, Melody of Memory came out, and it was revealed that actually Terra-Xehanort purposefully kidnapped Kairi as a child and he sent her directly to Destiny Islands

so then, what was the point of Aqua’s magic spell?

well, for one, it was cast on “The Light” within Kairi, which this theory posits went on to become Namine

and well, Namine as the Pure Light had to end up at Castle Oblivion one way or another when she was first ejected from Sora and Kairi’s Hearts right?

So what if when Destiny Island’s fell to darkness, and Kairi’s heart went inside Sora, That’s when Aqua’s spell triggered for the Light Inside Kairi, and it sent that Pure Light to another “light” one that Aqua knew: Ventus!

Who at this point was sleeping inside the transformed land of Departure aka Castle Oblivion

Therefore, when Namine was “Born”, Aqua’s spell triggered and she landed somewhere near Ventus’s hidden room in Castle Oblivion

Ta-Dah!

~Things mean one thing in the present, and mean a different thing in the future!~

[itgetsdarksometimes35]

When Two Lonely Hearts Come Together

Warnings: Non con, dub con, witchcraft, demons

Prompt: I am so glad I swallowed before you said that

Word Count:

Pairings: Dark!Demon!Winter soldier x Witch!reader

Summary: Witch reader decides o summon a demon to keep her company

~ indicates a time change

A/N: Wow it’s been a while. I’ll spare you the nitty gritty of finals and work and just say this was a challenge for @what-just-happened-bro​ ‘s challenge in July. Oops. Anyway enjoy! More coming soon ;)

XXX

The Winter Soldier. AKA, the demon of obsession. Every witch you knew avoided contacting his spirit, in fear of the power he possessed. Though nobody was completely sure, his powers could be positive. The risk, however, of him being a negative spirit was enough to deter anyone from trying.

You had agreed with them at a time, but now as your town that housed all the witches of the land burned down as you ran for safety into the woods, you realized you were completely alone. At first, you got by with no contact with others, but alienation isn’t healthy for anyone. Not even a witch.

You were a part of a community that was killed within the span of just a weekend after a local town pledged everyone you knew. You had barely escaped, using your mother's spirit’s warning as a sign to run before the fires even started. You looked back with horror. Witches could do evil, but more often than not they didn’t. Choosing a life of quiet rather than to stir a pot that couldn’t be undone. 

As you sat in the middle of the forest, the home to you for the past 2 years because of the freedom to move as your fear of staying anywhere too long progressed, laying out all the equipment you needed. Most of what you owned burned, but you saved what you could while remaking other necessities. Everything was ready for the séance, you just needed your blood. 

The blood would be a guide for what the Winter Soldier was to cling to. You. You needed a companion, one who would be obsessed with you. The desperation you had sunk to was enough to have your dead friends and mother clawing at your soul, warning you not to do this. You blocked them all out, knowing the only way to stop the pain you felt would be to play a game with the devil for one of his children. A risk that could cost you your soul to be trapped in an endless Hell.

The knife sliced through your hand and you held it over the star that you made in the dirt and out of rocks. You chanted the words you had memorized at the young age of 10, and as you did you felt the wind tousle your hair. Your eyes instinctively rolled to the back of your head as the words dripped from your lips like poison. In the wind, you could hear the sounds of tortured souls screaming for mercy as the gates of Hell opened to release one of their most prized possessions. 

Then, silence. The only thing you could hear was your heavy breaths, and you could feel the sun lowering to make way for the night. You slowly opened your eyes to see the star in the dirt spewed and your rocks clear of any blood you had just painted them with.

He’s here.

Your eyes searched the tall trees until your eyes landed on a man in black. He wore a mask that covered his face and his arm shined in the little light the sky was blessing you with.

You slowly stood up, grabbing the cup filled with herbs and other things to help the demon adjust to the world, while he followed your body’s every movement. You stalked closer to him, wary of his intentions, while showing your hands as a gesture you meant no harm. Who conjures a demon to fight them?

“Winter Soldier. I say your name therefore you hold no power over me. I’ve asked upon your spirit of obsession to accompany me in life.” You told the demon your name and stopped a few feet in front of him. He looked so alive; his eyes looked like you could drown in them. You handed him the cup and watched as he removed his mask to drink it. He grunted in pain before throwing the cup away.

“The fuck is in that?” The words came out rough, his throat sounded unused. 

You hesitated a moment. “Herbs.”

“And?” He could tell you were holding out.

“Crushed beetles.”

The soldier seemed to chuckle. “I am so glad I swallowed before you said that.” You laughed nervously with him, and a quiet beat followed.

“You’re lonely.” 

“Yes.” It wasn’t a question, more a statement, but you still answered it like it was. He still doesn’t move, and you felt so awkward. Now what?

You cleared your throat. “Well, uh, are you going to come from behind the tree?” You tried to smile, make this less excruciating. For once the silence you had lived in all your life was no longer acceptable to you.

“I haven’t seen anyone else since the year 934.” The soldier ignored you as he stayed perched behind the tree. His body was huge, not even the tall pine could hide him from you, though.

“Oh.” He didn’t need to explain the story to you, you knew it well. The Winter Soldier was released by a witch to reign destruction on the village. He killed millions in just one day. The witch was burned and the Winter Soldier’s story was passed down from generation to generation of witches. Some say the witch meant harm, others say it was the demon who decided how those people met their end. That’s why a mystery was connected with him for so long. 

“What do you want?”

You looked to the demon, finding an uneasy comfort in his eyes. “Everyone I have ever known is dead. I have no one left, they are just white lights and voices that dance around my dreams, gone as soon as I open my eyes.” 

The soldier stared at you a bit, considering you, before moving to stand fully in front of you. “So you want me to bring them back?”

“No, their spirits are at peace. All I want is someone to be with me until I can meet them in the afterlife. Your obsession can be me, I just want your company.”

The soldier had never heard anything like this before. Everyone contacted demons so they could do something for them. Who contacts one for a friendship? Something snapped inside him in that moment. He finally felt a calmness at the realization, and he smiled devilishly at the woman. 

You raised an eyebrow in confusion before he grabbed her by the forearm with his metal arm, burning her skin. You howled in pain, the sound of sizzles and pops filled your ears. Smoke rose from your arm. The demon finally let go, leaving a mark permanently on your skin.

“What the fuck was that for?” Demons couldn’t touch humans and vise versa. Not unless you wanted to feel like you’re sitting in Hell.

“You’re mine now.”

You looked at him confused before taking a better look at your arm. There you saw the mark of the Winter Soldier. 

“No, I own you. Like a genie in a lamp, I let you go so you do my bidding now.”

The demon laughed again. “Do you know who you contacted?”

Oh no. Had you messed up? “You’re not the Winter Soldier?”

Again, the demon let out a hearty laugh. “The Winter Soldier replaced the devil a long time ago, darling. I run the show now. And I make the rules.”

Your eyes got big. How could this be? No demon is so powerful that they could overthrow their leader. It’s unnatural, it’d be like God being overthrown.

“N-no, it’s not possible. I banish you back to Hell Winter Soldier.”

“That won’t work on me.”

You tried again. “Go back to the fiery pits from which you came from, leave this earth and all its inhabitants behind. I say your name, Winter Soldier, with power over you as I exile you back to Hell!”

You continued to chant as the wind picked up again, the pits of Hell opening to welcome back their ruler. Only, he isn’t going back. He just stood there, smiling at you. 

“Are you done?”

You shook your head. How is this possible? Before you could pick up the fruitless chants again, the soldier grabs you by the arms and drags you down to Hell with him. You watch in horror as the portal to your world closes before your eyes. 

~

Turns out, the Winter Soldier was right. He ran the underworld. Demons and their victims fell to their knees as he walked by them, bowing to their lord.

You saw fire and destruction, pain painted everywhere. They all cried for the mercy of death, but it fell to deaf ears as their tormentors continued their hatred.

You didn’t burn, you didn’t even feel hot, as you trailed behind the Devil as he pranced around his kingdom. His home was likable to the place a royal family would stay. A huge red castle with black accents here and there. Inside held the same colors. It smelled of ash, yet, it didn’t bother you a bit.

The Winter Soldier led you into a room with two thrones. A man stood near the thrones, metal cuffs around his bleeding ankles. Your eyes widened at him. He had dusty brown curly hair and beautiful brown eyes. He was gorgeous, what did he do to get caught up in a place like this?

“Lucifer.” The soldier nodded to the man and he quickly set his sad eyes down to the floor. Lucifer? As in? “I hope you can help my guest feel welcome, she’s come a long way.” He smiled at you, but you just glared back. The ex devil just nodded his head at his new master.

You were beckoned to sit on the smaller chair next to the bigger one where your captor sat. He turned to you after telling Lucifer to get him and his friend some food. 

“What do you think?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, do you like it? I designed it all myself, it wasn’t easy you know.” He smiled at you, showing you sincere adoration. You could’ve puked.

“It’s Hell.” His face dropped. 

“Obviously, but I think I’ve made it work quite nicely. You’ll get used to it?”

“What? No, you’re going to send me back to earth!”

“How could you be my queen on earth, silly?”

Queen?

“What? No, I can’t be your queen! I can’t stay here forever, I have to die on earth so my spirit can move on in the afterlife. So I can see my friends and family again.”

The soldier shrugged. “They can visit.”

You could’ve shouted. “No, they can’t! I’m- I- This isn’t why I summoned you.”

“Isn’t it though? You needed a companion, I needed a companion. It seems everyone is happy here.”

Lucifer returned with a tray of fruit and the soldier started eating the grapes. “Ugh, I’ve never been able to get used to mortal food. It’s all yours, my love.”

You pushed the tray from you as he tried to hand it to you. “I should’ve never called to you. I should’ve listened to what everyone said, your powers are used for evil. Not good.”

The Winter Soldier rolled his eyes. “Is that what everyone says about me? Because of what happened with that witch, huh? Well, let me tell you what happened. The bitch wanted to take over not only our realm but hers as well. I agreed to help her, but when I killed everyone to turn into demons she no longer wanted to comply. She sent me back to Hell, and that was the day I vowed to never be turned down again. She was the woman who was supposed to be my wife. My first love, and she slandered my name. Well, that’s why the cunt lives here forever, wishing she would’ve never double crossed me. After that, I started my plans to overthrow old Lucifer here so I could make the rules. I come and go as I please, wherever, whenever.” He looked accomplished with himself.

“Except Heaven.”

The soldier laughed so loud it boomed in the empty castle. “Heaven? Aw, you poor thing. You still believe in that place. God left everyone a long time ago, dear.”

That’s it. You had had enough. “Let. Me. Go.”

“Nope.”

“Now!”

“No! Look at your arm, you’re bound to me forever. If you leave my side down here, you’ll burn. As your soul leaves your body it’ll be cast down here with everyone else forever to be tortured. You’ll never get the chance to live with your loved ones. The only way you’ll see them is if you stay with me. I’ll take you wherever, but you will never be apart from me.”

Your eyes filled with tears. “Why?”

“Because I love you.”

~

The Winter Soldier’s hips crashed into yours at a hard pace, just how he liked it. Your moans mixed together in the room as you both reached your peaks together, his cum painting your velvety walls.

He reached up to feel your swollen belly and smiled into your neck. “They’re almost here.” 

You hummed in response. You had been stuck in Hell for the past year. You accepted everything slowly, but surely. Once you did, your husband showed you an unwavering amount of love. He let you see your family and friends, whom you hadn’t seen in years, and he let you travel to different realms. You never wanted for anything. He quickly, with you by his side as queen, took over all realms of the universe. Everything belonged to him, and in turn, to you.

Once you both learned of your pregnancy, you were nervous. You never thought you’d get married, let alone have children. The soldier helped you through it all, though, and your nerves were replaced with true joy as you thought about the triplets growing inside your belly. 

You never knew how much love could come out of two lonely hearts meeting together. 

[tcm]

“Much More to Movie Monsters Than Meets The Eye” By Raquel Stecher

With his latest book Fright Favorites: 31 Movies to Haunt Your Halloween and Beyond, author and horror expert David J. Skal provides readers with the perfect guide for watching spooky films throughout October and the year. The book takes a look at 31 different horror films from NOSFERATU (‘22) to GET OUT (2017). Skal offers insights into how German Expressionism and WWI influenced early horror classics, how Val Lewton threw out horror conventions with CAT PEOPLE (‘42), how DRACULA (‘31) was a financial gamble and how more recent films like HOCUS POCUS (‘93) achieved cult status. If you’re worried that 31 horror films are not enough, don’t despair, as each of these films is paired with a bonus recommendation on a similar theme. Fright Favorites is now available from Running Press and TCM.

Raquel Stecher: Can you tell us a bit about your background as a cultural historian and horror expert?

David J. Skal: I was one of the original “monster kids” of the 1950s and ‘60s, who discovered the old Universal horror classics when they were first released to television, and for a while I couldn’t get enough of them, or of the fan culture they set in motion. I was an avid reader of magazines like Famous Monsters of Filmland, and when I came back as an adult to write about the history of horror entertainment from an adult perspective, it would never have happened without those photo-filled periodicals that engaged and obsessed me as a kid.

RS: In the book you discuss the connection between Hollywood and Halloween. Tell us a little about how that came about and how the two have become so intrinsically tied with one another.

DJS: In the golden age of American horror movies in the 1930s and 1940s, there was no supplemental merchandizing or other tie-ins to Halloween. It was still a pretty homespun holiday. The holiday’s potential wasn’t fully exploited by the film industry until after World War II, when we saw Universal franchising its monster characters as Halloween masks and costumes. In the ensuing decades, October became the major month for horror movie premieres, including studios other than Universal, and all the major theme parks got on the bandwagon, profitably extending their summer seasons with Halloween nights that are almost always tied in to some horror franchise or another, frequently of the slasher or chainsaw variety.

RS: What was the research process like for writing Fright Favorites?

DJS: Over the years I’ve done much more research for my books than I’ve been able to ever use, so Fright Favorites was an ideal opportunity to make use of information and anecdotes I’d never had room for in previous projects. As a result, it took about six months rather than the usual full year I most often devote to completing a book. Although the final selections were mine, the people at TCM are also—no surprise—very knowledgeable about movies with many favorites of their own that I was able to incorporate. There weren’t really any disagreements, just a bit of a juggling act to maintain a balance between the films included.

RS: In the book you wrote “Some early commentators on the medium worried that film might be nothing less than the arrival of living death. It is in horror movies that this pervading sense of the uncanny still speaks to us.” Were studios worried about making horror films? How did Universal's success with the genre affect the film industry as a whole?

DJS: In a way, the film medium itself is the very definition of the uncanny, bringing dead actors back to life, or its convincing simulacrum. This strange fact is always there, staring back at you. And remember, actors themselves have amounted to a species of shapeshifters, slipping in and out of identities in the manner of movie monsters. Film is a dream-like medium that has been irresistibly drawn to the fantastic and the bizarre from its very beginning, at least in Europe. American movies didn’t approach truly fantastic subjects until Universal took a chance with DRACULA in 1931. Previously, American films observed the tradition of explaining away any ghostly occurrence as a criminal conspiracy or ruse. But DRACULA, along with FRANKENSTEIN the same year, became two of the most influential and imitated films of all time.

RS: Stars like Boris Karloff, Bela Lugosi, Lon Chaney Jr., Vincent Price, etc. became known for their horror roles. How did some of these horror stars embrace the genre or how did it typecast them?

DJS: By definition, any “horror star” is already typecast, although some deal with the pigeonholing better than others. I once had the privilege of sitting in on a classroom visit by Vincent Price with a group of acting students who asked him if he resented being considered a horror star and how they could avoid being typecast themselves. He told them in no uncertain terms that show business was already a difficult way to make a living and that being typecast would be the best thing that could ever happen to them professionally. Most horror stars I’ve met or interviewed are grateful for their fame and the attention of their fans.

RS: Many horror stories have been revisited in remakes, new adaptations and re-imaginings. Why has Hollywood been so keen to revisit horror classics?

DJS: Horror is a genre with financial profit baked in from the get-go—it’s almost impossible to lose money even on a poorly made scary movie, which is why so many prominent directors have gotten their start in the genre. It’s a fairly risk-free way to take a chance on new talent. In terms of remakes, if a formula has worked before, why not do it again? Fortunately, the remakes usually veer substantially away from the original stories in ways that keep the legacy of one monster or legend perpetually alive. Horror evolves the way anything evolves—through endless change and adaptation.

RS: What are some of your personal favorite horror films?

DJS: I don’t have a number one, or number two favorite. I admire many films for individual reasons: directors, scripts, actors. People most often ask me what my favorite version of Dracula is. I tell them that it doesn’t yet exist, but it would be a master version of the story edited together from all the major adaptations, with actors from different versions interacting with each other. It would be a huge job, but if done with the right flair would be hugely entertaining and probably bring out important aspects of each version that you wouldn’t notice watching them individually.

RS: Some of the films you feature in Fright Favorites are also considered science fiction classics. How do the two genres of science fiction and horror complement each other?

DJS: Literary horror and literary science fiction are fairly separate categories, but on screen the genres tend to blur together. For instance, ALIEN (‘79) is a haunted house story set in outer space. INVASION OF THE BODY SNATCHERS (‘78) is an alien invasion story that’s also about zombies. Being a visual medium, movies tend to spotlight science fiction’s bizarre and grotesque imagery and end up emphasizing the horrific over the cerebral.

RS: How do horror films tap into the pervading anxieties and fears of their respective eras?

DJS: This is the through-line of most of my books: that horror entertainment amounts to a secret history of modern times, with each new cultural upheaval or trauma setting in motion identifiable kinds of stories and characters. The anxiety and fear need to be processed, but it’s always easier to deal with real-world horror if you don’t have to look at it too directly. WWI tore about human bodies like no previous war, and all through the 1920s and 1930s we looked at one disfigured face after another, even though the films weren’t about battlefield combat. Unprecedented numbers of mutilated men were returning to society, and they were being shunned. Nonetheless, they popped up in our cinematic dreams. During the AIDS epidemic, there was an explosion of books and films about another mysterious, blood-related scourge: vampirism. Repress awareness of an uncomfortable fact, and it will always rise somewhere else in a different form.

RS: What do you hope readers take away from the book?

DJS: So far, the book does seem to be engaging readers who have a general knowledge of horror entertainment but are curious to know more. The most important thing a reader might take away is the simple revelation that there’s much more to movie monsters than meets the eye.

[solacefruit]

Congratulations on the new job!! I left all my gushing for a comment proper, but if you don't mind I have a couple of questions, just because I love this world so much! I'm trying to focus on characters and not worldbuilding or anything that could be relevant to future works, just in case!

Is Firestar still Jake's son in this universe? How did that come about, and does Tallstar figure it out? How does he feel about it?

Have there been any other cases of cats being made elders early? Can you imagine any canon characters achieving that honor?

Why did Deadkit/paw keep his name, as opposed to having a prefix related to his color and being named Deadfoot as a warrior?

How does Pip eventually react to tales of Talltail's accomplishments? To him becoming deputy, then leader?

Thank you again for this journey!

Thank you very much! I’m going to have quite a lot to juggle in the next few weeks, but I do like to be busy, so I’m not complaining. (At least not yet). 

It’s so thoughtful of you to avoid world-building questions, but I don’t mind answering a few if you have them. If anything’s too important, I’m always able to decline an answer. As for what you’ve sent in, I’ll answer all of that below. 

Is Firestar still Jake's son in this universe? How did that come about, and does Tallstar figure it out? How does he feel about it?

Yes, I absolutely believe Cypress/Jake is Firestar née Rusty’s father. I don’t have all the details of Jake’s life post-Talltail set in stone, because I’m sure he went on to live a very full and bustling life, but he definitely met other cats and had litters with them. I like to think Jake adventured until he got far too old and then spent his twilight years in a lap by the fire, so I imagine he probably met Rusty’s mother on one of his many outings. I don’t believe Jake ever knew the kittens personally, although he probably heard about them existing at some point. 

As for Tallstar, I think he would see too much of Jake in Fireheart not to at least suspect a connection there, and I think he would ultimately assume that Fireheart is Jake’s son. But blood isn’t everything--especially to Tallstar--so I feel he’d let Fireheart live on his own merits, rather than just as an extension of a cat that Rusty never met. 

Have there been any other cases of cats being made elders early? Can you imagine any canon characters achieving that honor?

Clan history is very long and winding, and some of it is forgotten. In a way, that’s me saying “probably everything that can happen has happened before, at least once”, and also every clan has their own ways and metrics for judging this kind of honour--but yes, Talltail definitely isn’t the first young cat ever to be anointed an elder at a young age. 

Of course, he might be the first cat of his age to be made an elder for killing a hawk--which is a very rare method of achieving that particular rank, and only exists in Windclan--but I’m sure there have been others in the past who had done great deeds or shown wisdom enough to earn that right in the eyes of their clan. 

Re: canon characters, that feels a little like a trick question! I wouldn’t have given canon Talltail from TR the honour, but my Talltail? Absolutely. So I suppose if I really sat down and considered them all through my writing, perhaps I could think of one or two others, but truthfully there’s no-one that leaps to my mind as a candidate. Talltail is really quite unique. 

Why did Deadkit/paw keep his name, as opposed to having a prefix related to his color and being named Deadfoot as a warrior?

If I’m totally truthful, it’s because it was easiest! It’s the same reason I didn’t give Talltail a new name: it was good enough, and familiar for readers, and it meant I didn’t have to detour the narrative through a piece of clan life that wasn’t really fitting for this particular story--i.e., naming/name-change culture. I didn’t want a new name to distract or distance readers from my actual work, so sometimes I just have to cop it and let Erin Hunter’s bad canon exist in my world, because the immediate character recognition is worth it.

In an ideal world where I didn’t have to consider that my readers are pretty much exclusively preexisting fans of the series reading my work through a lens that’s always in reference to the original canon, most significant characters I’ve written about would have received new names. Background characters I tend to have a little more freedom with and I make full use of that, but even then, it’s still limited within the bounds of what’s digestible as Warriors content, and not a new IP.

For instance, I have a fun little cat conlang I tinker with now and then and have for many years and that, to me, is canon in my world, and it allows me to do some really neat stuff as far as enabling prefixes that aren’t possible in a typical traditional system or Erin Hunter’s garbage canon. In my dream stories, I’m able to name characters after butterflies, and the many parts of a tree, and the different kinds of clouds. 

But alas, because this is fanfiction I’m writing and not just a free-for-all where I remake the world entirely anew and expect readers to do the work of learning its intricacies and language, I usually favour what’s easier for other fans to read and enjoy, rather than what I see as the One True Canon of my world, if that makes sense? I get as close as I reasonably can, but frequently there are trade-offs for accessibility. 

How does Pip eventually react to tales of Talltail's accomplishments? To him becoming deputy, then leader?

She’s ecstatic. I think Pip always saw in Talltail what everyone else slowly comes to know over his years rising to glory in Windclan, and I think she’s proud of him, even though she’s sad that they are apart. She loses her entire mind when she finds out about the hawk, there’s no doubt about that.

[ramblings-of-a-mad-cat]

You say the story of Rescue Team frustrates you? How come?

Rant ahead. Rant ahead about a game I unironically love, but I spend far too much time overthinking the plot of, hence my grievances.

Maybe I just held it to unfair standards on account of playing it for the first time after Explorers of Sky. Which is easily the greatest pokemon game ever made, accept no substitutes. Nah, Rescue Team DX is addicting, the music is incredible as always in these games, and the gameplay has been massively overhauled and made far superior to the original, which while fun, was pretty buggy. And the game does have some pretty cool characters, too. Like...whatever I may yell to the heavens about Albus Dumbledore from HP, make no mistake that he’s an exceptional and three-dimensional character. Same goes for Snape. And that applies to this game as well. 

The main reason this game’s story irritates me comes down to Gengar and Alakazam. Again, they’re very well written characters...but I hate them. I despise both of them. I don’t know what it is, but Alakazam rubbed me the wrong way right from the start. Him and his whole team are so self-important, so arrogant. They condescend the MC and act like they’re the ruling body of the town square. Alakazam goes around telling people that he knows everything. That’s a god complex if you ask me. At several points, the characters make decisions based on the assumption that he is stronger than the MC, which you as a player never get to challenge. (Think of Leon from Sword/Shield, but a million times worse.) The Partner character is so in awe of them, so enamored by them. Yet behind MC’s back, Alakazam knows (or suspects) them to be the human of legend and doesn’t tell them “for their sake.” Which gives me strong Nozomi (SMT IV: Apocalypse) vibes, since later on he ignores all responsibility for having been "complicit" with the MC's secret. 

The Fugitive Arc doesn't make any damn sense. First of all, Xatu claims that the disasters, all of the trouble, are being caused by the Human from the Ninetales Legend. Ninetales later debunks this. When I first played this game, I legitimately thought Xatu would wind up being some kind of secret villain, that he had lied, and that the Fugitive Arc was all started by him. This doesn't wind up being true, and we never get an answer for why he thought the Human of Legend was responsible for the state of affairs, nor did anyone question his being wrong or acknowledge his role in all this. But the one who really started everything was Gengar. He doesn't really annoy me until the Post-Game (I'll get to that) but everyone else's reactions to Gengar's story bother me. He is a known liar, a known trouble-maker who no one likes. It's well known that he has a vendetta against the MC. He has no proof whatsoever of his allegations. And everyone just buys it, despite MC now having a great reputation, because...I guess MC didn't actively deny it? Which the player was given no agency in? And it doesn't stop the accusation from being ridiculous? 

Enter Alakazam. Apparently, everyone held a town meeting that must have taken all of ten seconds, to decide what to do about MC. They held this meeting without MC or the Partner present, because having them there would make too much sense I guess. Team A.C.T. prepares to...I guess kill MC? As well as the Partner, even though they're completely innocent. Before Alakazam hesitates and decides to give the MC a day to run away. Hold on, if he is so convinced that MC has to die to save the world, how do he justify letting them go? I guess the same way he justifies how he "knew" MC was the human of legend this whole time and said nothing about it? He bids MC to run, and throughout the entire Fugitive Arc, his team is the looming threat. Which was quite frustrating for me, already a Diamond Rank and probably higher leveled than Team A.C.T, because I would have been happy to settle things with Alakazam right then and there. It is beyond frustrating that the story denies me this chance. Not to mention, half of the town shows up to say goodbye when MC and the Partner take off. Like...okay, at least half of the town believes in MC. How in the hell is this even happening? Why do we have to flee when so many characters are on our side? When there's no proof? Why is Alakazam's word just considered law? If he “knows everything” how come he doesn’t know that Gengar is human as well, if he could sense MC’s humanity? 

You don't know how badly I wish there was a fight with Team A.C.T. when all was said and done. And the game could have done it, too! Just have it take place at the top of the Mt. Freeze, before Ninetales shows up. They have a skirmish that takes place in a cutscene, but even in the remake - there's no boss battle. Why not? It's not like this dungeon has a boss battle otherwise. Wouldn't it have been a fitting conclusion to this arc? Maybe I'm biased, maybe I just think it would have been cathartic to kick Alakazam's ass, to make him put his money where his mouth is...because again, the arrogance. He demands Ninetales tell him what happened, and that "depending on your answer, I may be forced to eliminate MC" Ah, slow your roll there, buddy. Ninetales already broke up the fight and made it clear that it's not going to happen. You're a guest in their domain. On top of that, Team A.C.T. basically forbids you from going to Magma Cavern to challenge Groudon. As if you haven't just proven yourself capable of braving dangerous dungeons. As if, after they chased you halfway around the world and were proven completely wrong, they have any right to talk down to you or tell you what to do. Again, I so, so wish we could have fought them and taught them a lesson. 

In general, this is a consistent thing with the other characters, following the Fugitive Arc. Everyone focuses on how happy MC and the Partner must be to have their names cleared, (Again, the Partner was accused of nothing. Like, literally nothing.) and no one stops to address that everyone in the Town Square should be falling to their knees and begging our forgiveness for what they put us through. Several of them tried to kill us. Upon returning to the Town Square, Gengar acts like MC is turning them-self in because they don't have any proof, even though he never had any proof to begin with, and it's only after MC is "cleared" by Team A.C.T. that everyone remembers that Gengar is untrustworthy. Reading the words "under the watchful eye of Alakazam" has always made me extremely salty. I don't have much to say about the Mankey brothers but they irritated me as well. Maybe I was just out of patience after the Fugitive Arc but I found myself wondering why we appeased them at all. Initially, we give them the chestnuts because they attack us if we don't. No matter how many times we beat them, they keep attacking if they're told no. I realize it's a staple in Pokemon games to have false yes/no choices, but those are especially noticeable in the games that focus on story. And sometimes the excuses are just pathetic. Meanwhile, the other pokemon continue to treat you as rookies, as kids. You are once again "forbidden" by...um, the other townsfolk, from going on the Rescue Mission until you talk them into it. It's like...guys. You put us through hell. We could have died a dozen times over, because you bought into the mob mentality for no good reason. How does everything just go back to normal after that? 

I don't mind Gengar at first. He's a villain, and a well-written one. He's got a clear personality and there's hidden depth in there as well. He's one of my favorite characters in the game, easily. And all of the stuff he does in the main story? Stealing the mail, manipulating Caterpie, and the stuff during the Fugitive Arc? That weird psychedelic sequence where he's dragging MC down to hell at the end? (Or whatever that was?) All fine by me. He's a villain. He's doing bad things. But sweet Arceus is Gengar annoying in the Post-Game. I wonder if this must be how Merula Snyde Antis feel, over in the HPHM Fandom. Because the MC has absolutely no motivation or reason to help him out. He just demands that they act as his bodyguard, offers nothing in return, and won't leave you alone until you say yes. Buddy, my team has like thirty pokemon at this point and they're all hanging out in the Friend Areas a few feet away. You think you can intimidate me? The only reason I'm helping is to progress the storyline. And throughout this entire storyline, you have to help Gengar even though he hasn't earned it. 

He does not deserve forgiveness, or a reconciliation with Gardevoir. What if I don't want to help him because I don't think Gardevoir would want to see him? What if I think that it would do her no good to see him? He's unrepentant and awful, the story does the bare minimum to suggest that he's changed. Now I will admit one thing: I love the moment that Ninetales first appears, sees Gengar, and simply goes "...What do you want." Like. Like that was the moment that I put it together, before he went on to tell the rest of the story. I love simple moments that make the big reveal crystal clear without needing to directly tell or show the audience. I've always dug that. But everything that happens after that is frustrating. Gengar demands the curse be lifted, despite having no justification to offer Ninetales. He threatens to attack them, but then clarifies that MC will be the one doing the fighting. Excuse me? Why would I ever do that? MC just found out the truth about Gengar, what he did to Gardevoir, and then how he pinned it all on them during the fugitive arc. Gengar, why would I attack Ninetales after this, instead of attacking you? Tell me I don't initiate battle against you right now? Thankfully MC doesn't have to actually fight Ninetales, but they are still forced to testify at Gengar's "trial" and it's a forgone conclusion because no matter what answers you give, it's treated as MC acknowledging his growth and he is forgiven at the end. 

Oh, I’ve just thought of something else. MC isn’t given a reason for why they have to leave the Pokemon world, or why they were able to return. Explorers gave a reason. Gates to Infinity and Super Mystery Dungeon made a whole post-game story out of their reasons. Here? We get nothing. MC’s “role” has finished and so they have to return to the human world. Never mind what they want. Not until after the dramatic moment where they have to leave has passed, anyway. That voice at the end who suggests that we may be able to see our partner again just by “wishing.” Who the hell was that? What did they mean? Look, by Pokemon standards, the Rescue Team story is quite substantial. By Pokemon Mystery Dungeon standards? It’s...probably the weakest story. I mean, to be fair, Super Mystery Dungeon had the endless schoolhouse arc that added up to nothing in the second act. But hell, that was still fun. And I suppose the Fugitive Arc and Gengar’s “redemption” were fun too. Just frustrating as well. 

[captainsuke]

Yusuf should be asleep, he should be wrapped around his husband's body, taking strength from the warmth he's never quite felt anywhere else.

Instead he's in the kitchen, the cool metal grip on his pistol warmed by his hand wrapped white knuckled around it.

He'd heard a noise.

He'd dreamed he'd heard a noise.

It doesn't matter. It's late and the little cottage they are currently calling home is empty, except for his sleeping husband, and Joe, standing vigil in the dark.

(rest of fic under the cut for all you ao3 haters)

There's a small gap between window and wall, and the wind flows through it with a whispering wail. Once all houses creaked and swayed and whistled with the wind, little leaks with pots that were emptied in the morning, a row of fine dust along the window sills and under the doors gifted from a night of wild wind. Now these things are considered nuisances, problems to be torn down and rebuilt new and unremarkable. His heart feels heavy tonight, the feeling of long years catching up on him and curling it's fingers around his soul.

Joe looks out the window of his and Nicky's little Maltese cottage, the moon shines bright enough behind shifting clouds that even the slivers of light allow Joe to see the branches of the apple tree in the front garden sway with the cool night's breeze. Many summers ago they'd laid in the shade of that tree, eating the sweetly tart fruit until they'd made themselves sick. He has a sketch - or eight - of the passing shadows dappling Nicky's face as he'd laid back, full and content.

A memory stacked upon another memory from the days they'd done the same with Andromache, years and years ago, four, five hundred years ago, filling their bellies with overripe apricots after several long hard years of fighting and barely being able to tell if they had even made a difference, let alone actually helped anyone. Even now Joe can close his eyes and see Qýuhn's hair blowing free in the cooling winds coming up along the Peloponnese peninsula. Andromache's fingers sticky with pasteli, her cheeks rosy where she laid them on Qýuhn's thigh. Nicolò, sunbleached and glowing in the golden of light of a Mediterranean sunset.

He remembers retelling the apple story when they'd all met up again, Booker with his ever present flask, Andy sharing long drinks from it, all them tired but smiling, leaning heavily of the heavenly taste of crisp apples and the folly of gorging on enough fresh fruit to upset their stomachs. Because it made Booker laugh. Because it gave them all something to laugh about, to distract themselves from the weather turning and Sèbastien's eyes growing cagey as the winter's teeth started to bite.

Nicky had stoked the cottage's fire til they'd been sweating in front of the tiny hearth, toasty and ridiculous in their undergarments, with thick woolen socks on their feet in respect for the wild weather that battered at the windows. He'd felt happy that they'd managed to turn that haunted look to smiling eyes that crinkled at the edges. Had that moment meant something? Anything? Nothing? Was the glow in his eyes merely momentary? A trick of light and the gleam of drunken eyes?

Would this be the rest of his days? Questioning every moment, desperately searching for where he went wrong, where he should have noticed Booker's pain. Looking for the moment that had been Sèbastien's last straw.

It's funny, Joe can joke, he can laugh, he can make vague reference and yell angry accusing words, he can recite a bit of original poem he's writing as he speaks, but he can't work out how to open his mouth and say the words why did you hurt me?

He's always horribly envied Nicky's ability to put his hurt away, to shelve it for later, or never if he feels it best. Even as he's pulled his hair out in frustration as his other half willfully tears himself to pieces in an effort to find a way to please everyone.

Oh, he knows they're both different shades of Not Dealing Well, both of them like a purpose to distract themselves.

Foolishly, stupidly, for a wild moment Joe wishes for someone else to try for them, to attack them, just so he can slip back into the head space of being a unit, a simple moving part in a machine much larger than himself, Nicky and him working hand in hand, two halves of a whole.

He desperately wishes for that feeling, for anything other than devastated, tearing, hating hurt that sits on his lungs like peine forte et dure, each time he feels like the worst of the pain has occurred he remembers some other occasion, some other memory now colored by betrayal.

He can forgive, he can sympathize, he can hold his brother close and cry for the losses he's suffered.

But anger stabs through at the thought of him not returning that empathy. Like he and all the kin before Booker haven't suffered days of death and nights of death. Day after day, month after month of unimaginable loss, not knowing how to stop it, how to help it, just enduring as time pass uncaring of the pain felt.

He's held Nicky as he begged for the end, for them to finally (please, please, please) be released from the unrelenting years of horrors, just as Nicky has pulled him close while he cried, screamed, wailed for even the slightest chance of reprieve. From the widow with dead eyes and fevered blush, burying her last child and going back to work at the sick houses, for the children with nothing – nothing - yet who could still muster a smile, for Nicky spitting blood, choking, drowning, dying, then coming back to do it all over again. Never ending and relentless.

This is stupid.

He is being stupid.

Awake in the middle of the night, stalking around their Malta house gun in hand, the most unnatural state of himself, but unable to rest, convinced that if he relaxed, if his guard dropped for a moment, he would lose it all.

He places the gun on the table, sits down, there's no peace or answers to be found in an old cottage kitchen by the sea at midnight.

All there is, is the long shadows of moonlight between furniture, the evening dishes neatly washed and drying on the sink, a glass full of pens on the table, Joe's gun now sitting atop Nicky's latest writing attempt. Never long, never complicated, Joe found himself devastated by each small letter his husband left for him, even the three thousand that merely read I love you ♥♥♥♥, he held each one to equal esteem, though Nicky barely seemed to remember writing them, he would just smile and say I was thinking of you.

you unmake me.

you remake me.

everyday

Doodled across cheap lined notepaper, tucked under his dinner plate. They'd shared that meal just a few hours ago, Nicky's eyes had been tired but he'd kissed Joe's curls with a soft smile as he'd served dinner.

A meal that had taken more than half the day to create because if Nicky had the time he found peace in simmering oil and tomatoes, in adding all the extra ingredients that might make an Italian swear but had delighted them so when they'd first tasted them, that now they'd add them to whatever meal they could.

It'd been less than a week and Nicky was already on first name basis with the halal butcher a few blocks away, and many a day they stroll the streets, collecting fresh produce from the little garden markets, stopping by Zakaria's so he could wrap the evening meal with a only my finest cut for my favorite customers and a wink, despite having claimed the same to the little Italian grandmother before them, blushing and waving her hands in a flustered, delighted stop motion.

Joe closes his eyes, feeling suddenly overwhelmed, like his heart would be beat out of his chest, fall out onto the floorboards that they'd sanded and placed lovingly when they'd first started rebuilding this little cottage. Nicky could live his life with just Yusuf and the sea and be happy, but Joe needed people, needed to see people living their lives no matter how mundane. No matter how out of sorts he's been since they arrived, exhausted and devastated from London, Nicky hadn't forgotten that.

And so Nicolò knows the butcher by name, and, in turn, Zakaria's fisherman boyfriend, who stocks the butcher shop with the freshest of catches and shies away from company, with deep sad eyes and ankle bones that jut out like he needs a Nonna to fuss over him.

And so he's befriended the old ladies from the markets who give him unsolicited advice on his roses, on his apple tree, on the lush green vine that flowers bright bursts of color, on how to keep That Nice Young Man He's Always With happy.

And so each of these people is a friend of Joe's as well.

Joe takes one last long look out the window. Daring anyone who might be out there to take the moment. To give him a reprieve from his thoughts.

But the apple trees branches are the only thing moving. Wind rustling leaves the only sounds to be heard over the soft ebbing crash of waves in the distance.

There's no respite to be found tonight, he thinks as he put his pistol away. Part of him aches to remain armed, to keep vigilant, because last time, last time, but he won't walk into their bedroom with a loaded gun in hand. Not tonight when he feels like his very soul has been twisted, not when he still feels as if unseen eyes are watching him.

As Joe closes the bedroom door behind him, eyes open slow but sharp, immediately awake, perhaps awake before Joe came in. His Nicky is a light sleeper, more prone to 3 or 4 hours sleep before waking alert and ready to face the living hours,.

Nicky's eyes go soft, the faintest of gentle smiles curling his lips as he focuses on Yusuf.

“Where are you, my love?” he asks with quiet rasping voice of someone newly woken.

He doesn't know, he feels adrift, but Nicky's hand moves, reaches out and Joe crosses the room to take it as the lifeline he needs.

“What do you need?” His voice is steady and calm and ready to promise anything in his power to Joe.

And Joe feels his heart constrict, he can't live without this man, he thinks wildly

(a flash, a dagger in the dark, Nicolò on the ground, a halo of his blood, his beautiful skull, his precious brains scattered across the floor without second thought)

he wants to know Andy's okay, he wants her and Nile here immediately so he can see for himself that they're safe, he wants Qýuhn in his arms so much it physically aches. He wants her dark humor and her sharp eyes. He wants to hear her screech like stepped on cat whenever something delighted her. He wants Booker snorting into his wine at some stupid joke, he wants to know he's alive, that he hasn't thrown himself into another stupid situation.

In the morning, he thinks, in the morning he'll speak to Nile, her occasional furtive texting isn't quite as secretive as she perhaps thinks but none of them had felt the need to tell her to stop.

In the morning, he can wait til morning to soothe the lies and worries that his anxiety haunts him with. Til then, he threads his hands tighter with Nicky's, lets him pull Joe to bed, lets him rearrange them til he's flat on his back with Joe's head is resting on his chest, Nicolò's heartbeat in his ear.

He keeps a hold of Joe's hand, brings it up to his lips, presses a kiss to where they're joined, then curls it close to Joe and his chest, as if shielding it against the rest of the world.

“You, just you.” Joe tells the darkness.

“You have me,” Nicolò says, his breath, his lips, his jaw moving against Joe's curls.

“What do you need?” He asks again, free hand coming to rest, cradling Joe's head, gently gently he feels fingers move lightly in tiny soft circles.

“Tell me something.”

Joe pulls their joined hands close, presses his own kiss against Nicky's long fingers, holds it close enough for his breath to warm skin “Please. Tell me something good.”

It's a hard ask, he knows, he knows, every good moment of their lives can be tied to a bad one, the past could be a minefield with no directions or signs. But Nicolò rarely shied from a challenge.

“Did I ever tell you of the time Qýuhn demanded to know my intentions with you?”

“But she loved you!” He mumbles against their joined hands.

“Yes she did, but she loved your heart just as fiercely.” Nicky's chest moves against Joe's cheek as he snorts, amused, “We'd had to have been intimate for almost a year by this time, but she had me feeling like a sham of a man standing before the most beautiful man's guardian, offering a pauper's dowery.”

Joe starts shifting to argue but the hand on his head keeps him still, gentle but firm.

“It was good. To be reminded that you had someone else who would fight for your happiness, that my love for you was visible enough to be challenged, a reminder that we both still had family even if it looked very different to what we'd been born with. It'd been nice to know no matter how much I felt I didn't deserve, I'd been ready to fight for the right to let that be your decision.”

“You do deserve me,” the gentle circles on his scalp are making him sleepy but he puts a token argument, the principle of no one was allowed talk shit about Nicky, not even Nicky, one he was always ready to defend.

“Hush, you asked for a story, this is my story.”

“Scusi, scusi,” he kisses Nicky's hand again, “tell your story, tell me how you convinced me that Qýuhn you were worthy of my hand in marriage.”

He swears he can hear Nicky smile in the dark.

“I didn't, Andromache came in and declared they should leave us to make our mistakes and then stab which ever of us was most in the wrong.”

Joe can't help but laugh. “Qýuhn like that?”

He feels Nicky's soft laughter vibrate through his skin, he wants to die like this, in a moment like this, just the two of them entwined.

“No, she called Andy soulless and unromantic, they went outside to spar. We didn't see them again til morning, and Qýuhn never mentioned it again, so maybe Andy had a little romance in her.”

“How have I never head of this story?”

Nicky's answering chuckle is a delight.

“You came back and we had the house to ourselves for the entire night.” The hand on Joe's head flexes, like he wants to hold Joe as tight as he is can but its as much as their position allows. “It was a good day. We were loved, we are loved.”

He wants to crawl inside Nicolò, live forever embraced by his heart, to feel every lung full of breath press against him

“Sleep my love,” Nicky says leaning low to press his cheek against Joe's curls, to place an unaimed kiss to his forehead.

Sleep.

Nicky’s heartbeat is a sure and steady thing against his ear

(a monitor screaming as his lives hand falls limp against restraints)

Joe squeezes his eyes tightly shut then forces himself to relax, to hear the beat that's been by his side for a thousand years. He thinks of crinkles at the sides of Qýuhn's eyes when she grinned, the way she'd look to Joe when she found something fun to share.

He thinks of the way Booker's face grew soft in the late of the night when the game had long ended and everyone had gone to sleep and it was just the two of them, keeping the sleepless night company.

He thinks of the glow of Nile's face when they walked the halls of the National Museum, her excited but obviously knowledgeable commentary, how he itches to draw the lines of her joy over and over til he gets it just right.

He thinks of Andy in Marrakesh, the feel of her ribs reverberating with the force of her laugh as he swung her around. She's mother, weird aunt, odd stranger, honored elder, pain in the ass know-it-all older sister and so many more things he can not think to name, but she's theirs, and it's going to take a lot more than mortality to take her from them.

He swears it.

Finally he thinks of Nicky.

Nicky with long hair in his face, of the ever changing color his eyes across the firelight, of the weight of his body passed out, sated atop Yusuf, of the weight of his body lifeless as Joe pulled him somewhere to revive safely. The heaviness of his gaze and the weightlessness of even his smallest smile. Of his hands as they held Joe together, the gentleness of his touch as he put him back together. Of the unique light in his eyes, the fire that burns brightest when his sword is out. He thinks of words freely given when speech was hardest, he thinks of the uncountable I love you's, the innumerable languages he's learnt just to speak them and hear them back.

He thinks of hot blood spattered across his face and the way Nicolòs eyes would fight to meet his own when the end was coming. He thinks of the tightening of hands before they became unbearably limp. He thinks of the bad deaths, of eyelashes glued together with tears as hes gasped alive and the watery smile that followed. He thinks of Nicky moving, his sword swinging, on broken ankle, spitting blood and still moving.

His head, his heart, his life is full, and sometimes it feels like he'll drown with all that's in it.

Nicky's hand moves from his head, moves to stroke down his spine, long and slow in repetition.

Sleep he says again, his own voice thick at the edge of sleep himself.

Joe hugs a small breath, then slows his breathing to match the deep level breathing of Nicolò asleep. He thinks about the first time they slept like this, arms around each other, tangled and holding tight. He thinks of the countless times he's rubbed his nose against the back of Nicky's neck as he tried to catch just a little more sleep time.

There's a heaviness growing in his limbs as he half dreams of Nicky as he wraps himself around and burrows himself closer to Nicky. Slowly, steadily and then suddenly all at once, the sense memory of nine hundred years in this man's arms lulls him into sleep.

[shadowfae]

1- Not much tbh, just what you've posted, and 2- To be honest I quite like your long answers. It can definitely wait though, you should get some sleep.

Is your warpriest link a constant thing? Does it ever fade into the background? I'm contemplating forming a second link, something happier than my copinglink, and I'm not sure how to tell when to tell when the line of a link vs a persona is crossed when not worn out of necessity.

And the original ask so I have it on hand. I did take a look at your original context, and if you're cool with it, I'll edit this post with a link for those who may find this is a useful answer and need that on hand. Otherwise, it'll stay a mystery.

But yes, it seems like my Sabe experiences would be a useful thing to talk about here. And in order to do that, I need to go over four things: who and what Sabe is, why he exists the way that he does, what that does for me, and lastly what I think he is in terms of terminology and why.

To start, here is his toyhou.se profile, if you want to read more about his actual story and thoughts and whatnot. But I doubt you'll have the necessary context for that, so let me go into it. RuneScape (RS) is one of the oldest MMORPGs in existence. WoW might be older but I doubt it. Basically it's a medieval magic fantasy that's very long running and you the player end up the World Guardian, aka the guy that stops the gods (who are very powerful folks who just don't die of natural causes and typically stand for some philosophy) from blowing the world up because Guthix, the dead god of balance, asked you to. Well, he voluntold you. And that makes you a major chess piece, Elder Gods get involved, it's a big mess.

But before all that happened, back in 2006 when I was introduced to the game and very shitty at it, well. I liked the lore insofar that I've always liked the lore, it was interesting and I liked thinking about it. I didn't have membership and I sucked at playing so I just read the wiki and the God Letters over and over and sometimes the Postbag from the Hedge. Alongside my two friends, we played at being children of the then-triad of main gods: Saradomin, Guthix, and Zamorak.

I liked Zamorak best, but I didn't think his ideas would be the best for society as a whole, so I ended up playing child of Guthix. Eventually we grew up and grew apart but every couple of years I'd go back to RuneScape, read the lore, settle on what choices I'd make if I could play, and think about being the player character. In 2010 I discovered a fic - dawn by khayr, it's on Ao3 and dA - about Iban, son of Zamorak, right around when I was reading Percy Jackson. Cue him showing up as a soulbond and an older brother figure and guiding me right up until the end of sixth grade. Iban got me through the ruthless bullying that would later set the stage for all my major suicidal-ideation and self-hatred for the entirety of high school: even then, I was more stable than I might've been otherwise, because he interfered.

Saradomin stands for strength through order. Procedures and law and diplomacy and war strategy. He was originally kind of a ripoff of the Christian god, but he's grown to be more of an order-over-peace character and is quite well-written. Guthix stands for strength through balance, and has been all over the board in terms of what he's done and will do. He's kind of a dick, actually, but his heart's in the right place.

Zamorak, as you've heard, is strength through chaos and personal strife. It's no "the strong over the weak" or "the strong take care of the weak", it's flat-out "everyone is strong, and just need the right circumstances to tap into it to be the best they can possibly be". Now, his philosophy is kind of more for warriors and scholars, but if you tilt your head, it applies to everyone. Chronically ill folks will find their chaos in fighting to get up every day and maintain a life. Folks in traumatizing, abusive situations find that chaos in their very survival. Scholars challenge themselves and their fellows and their predecessors trying to find the answers they so need. Nobody in lockstep, no such thing as "we've always done it this way."

A lot of human Zamorakians and Saradominist propaganda says that Zamorak is simply absolute evil: and to be fair, when most of that was written, he kinda was because he was based loosely on the Christian devil. Later writing says that they're typically mistaken on that. Zamorak isn't evil. The very first thing he did upon becoming a god was fulfill a promise and lead a slave rebeliion. (The Avernic uprising, if anyone's curious.) He stands for the downtrodden and says "You are never going to get your dignity by going through the motions and trying to peacefully show you're worth respect. Burn some shit down and prove that you won't stand for this bullshit."

Zamorak in a Saradominist's eyes is someone whose banner you wear when you want to be a crazy murderer. Zamorak in a Zamorakian's eyes is the singing voice who murmurs "Get up, this isn't enough to kill you, you can still do this," when transphobic laws get passed or you hear a slur thrown your way on the street.

And as someone who grew up queer and nonhuman, yeah, that resonates, and the older I get the more I think "Guthixian philosophy is best for a society at large, but Zamorakianism for individuals is good." Because Zamorakianism can't really apply on a theocratic level. It really doesn't. It turns into American bootstrap culture and no social services and all that shitty stuff.

The funny thing is that Zamorak himself has no issues helping out if he thinks you need it. (If he didn't, he wouldn't be cool with asking for help, or giving it when he's asked. Which he does do repeatedly so. The man has more kindness in him than people want to admit.) What I do find fascinating is what he thinks of the actions of some of his longtime subordinates, who clearly support him, but I don't think support his actual philosophy. Because if you ask me, he'd side with the downtrodden humans of Meiyerditch, not the vampire lords that treat them like cattle. He's proven that he likes humans, and doesn't see them as unworthy. I do wonder if Jagex will show us what he might do about that.

Either way. Ahem. Over the course of a decade and a half, I keep going back to RuneScape, refining my philosophy and side, thinking again what I would do playing the game proper. About... I want to say five years ago, Jagex opened up the Sixth Age and I finally noticed, and they rewrote every god's philosophy because they wanted every single one to be actually playable. Not just "hurr durr evil" but actually have a logical line of thought. They probably didn't have pop culture paganism in mind, but the gods of RS are incredibly well-suited to it.

Well, I found that out, and immediately went through every god's philosophy, and reasoned my way through it. What does a worshipper of this god look like? What sort of life would they lead? If i apply this to me, what does that look like from that perspective? Do I understand this? Is it comfortable to exist in?

And as it turns out, I understand Zamorak the most, followed a close second by Armadyl, which was quite surprising. Zaros remains incomprehensible and I don't trust like that. (That's another story.) So I thought about it more, and it stuck even when I wandered off to different fandoms and interests. But what happened was that I ended up internalizing it, unknowingly and without meaning to.

It meant that when, two years later, I ended up in a horrific and traumatizing situation, the anchor I hit that held me together was a mixture of being a Devil - I am a fucking God you will obey me and recognize my power - and Zamorak's core philosophy: this cannot kill me, this cannot stop me, this is pure fucking hell and I am going to laugh in the face of death because people are forged in hellfire and I will walk away knowing what I'm made of.

And I was right. Honestly, out of everyone who was there with me, I think I'm the only one that was that deeply entrenched and walked out without trauma. I do not believe I could have done that had I not internalized Zamorak's philosophy. (That isn't to say if the others had that philosophy they wouldn't be traumatized, because there were absolutely other factors I wouldn't know about and some that I do and didn't do them any favours; but I am saying that it saved my ass and without it, I might not have been okay.)

I walked out of that with zero regrets. Zero. Even now, I don't regret a thing. Because it doesn't matter what happened or how much I was lied to or if he deserved my kindness. I know what I perceived to be happening, and I know how I reacted, and when the pieces were down I was stronger than steel, gave kindness without considering the cost, and I walked away unscathed.

How many people can say they've looked death in the eye and laughed? More than there should be, not too many that knowing what I'm capable of when put into pure chaos isn't somehow impressive. Because it is. And Zamorak's words proved themselves, or rather, I proved him entirely correct.

And when I last went back to RuneScape, and thought about it with enough time to put it all into hindsight, well. Aw, shit, he was right. Then vaguely around that time I went back and read Dawn, which was unfinished, tracked down the author and demanded to know how it fucking ended. (She told me and we're still friends like three years later. xD) Then I went back and found my old OCs, and decided fuck it, I'm making my own World Guardian.

So first thing I did was log in and jump over to the Makeover Mage and make myself into a boy. Kept the plateskirt though, I wanted to have the RS equivalent of a limp wrist to prove I'm Very Queer. Then I went about remaking my character. I wanted to make a self-insert, I was old enough to know it wasn't cringey, it was just fun, but I didn't want to use my default avatar with the black hair over one eye and the Chaorruption. I wanted to make a new self-insert based in nothing I was already using.

So I made the most beautiful man I could! Long, dark brown hair, pretty semi-dark skin, looked Kharidian, and then I said fuck it and made him Zamorak's youngest son. Originally, he was adopted when he was young by Iban and Clivet, and suffered serious imposter syndrome when being WG meant he'd never get demigod powers. But as I grew more confident in myself, he ended up getting powers? And then eventually I rewrote his backstory, and then wrote about his mother, and her relationship with Zamorak, and then he had friends like Blaire and Icthlarin (who was also my furry awakening, rip me).

Then with the most recently questline I've been getting a bit more into RS magical theory, and I've been mulling it over lots, and Seanan McGuire's Middlegame definitely helped; and I figured out how I wanted him to handle being World Guardian: it didn't make sense for him to be openly Zamorak's son, the other gods would just target his family to manipulate him. So I had him play neutral openly and Zamorakian to his friends, effectively living a double life.

Then he just looked up one day and said "Oh, by the way, my father won't acknowledge me to keep me safe but I don't know that so we have a very unsteady relationship because I don't know if he loves me", and then Children of Mah came out, and he was all "Oh and I think I just got disowned (I didn't, Zamorak was protecting me, but I don't know that) so my relationship with Zamorak is Fucking Shitty" and he was stuck that way until I figured out how to save their relationship.

It culminated in Sabe not knowing how his Mahjarrat powers worked and guessing, and hating himself for being half-and-half, and missing everything about being a Mahjarrat, and literally you couldn't have gotten more obvious in order to tell me I was having Fucking Issues coming to terms with the fact I didn't have any understanding or knowledge of my own heritage, but whatever, eventually I noticed that.

And as I've been working to understand myself and my heritage, so too has Sabe been doing that with his Mahjarrat heritage. But for the longest time, no matter how I put him and Zamorak in the same room in a scene to try and get them to talk it out, it wasn't working. Something wasn't right. Sabe resented being World Guardian, hated having to betray his family, didn't know if he was wanted, and hated himself for having to kill Mah, the mother of his species.

Not that long ago, a few months actually, he informed me (which is my shorthand for 'I suddenly figured out this happened, and it genuinely feels like remembering that one fucking word you have on the tip of your tongue, I always knew and just forgot for a while') that no, he'd been ripped in two by a hope devourer, brought to his father's stronghold, and Zamorak split his magic between mortal and divine in order to get around his godproofing and heal him. Zamorak's intense worry for his youngest son was what caused Sabe to break down and tell him honestly what was going on and how he was feeling, which caused Zamorak to do the same, and they finally, finally made up.

A week later, I noticed the connection between Sabe's Mahjarrat issues and my Irish issues, and started to wonder if he was a linktype.

I mean... he's a self-insert. He makes the choices I would, the me in the here and now, that I think are best. He's not a person I was and still know myself to be, he's not someone I grow into, he's not living his life beside me like a shadow. He's me, choosing the things I do, because I say so. But he's also me in the things he reflects, the things he struggles with, and things I had zero fucking conscious input on.

Sabe is the person I am when a crisis hits and I have to deal with the chaos. Sabe is the person I am when I need to lead. Sabe is the person I am when I am desperate to be known and loved by those I consider family. Sabe is the person I am when I want to be sure in where I came from, where I will return to, and the things that I will always be. Sabe is a man of darkness who knows the light as an acquaintance and nothing more, who is cruel and careless and kind.

Sabe is a warpriest of Zamorakian philosophy, because it took me twenty fucking years to put into words how I see the world, and now that I know, I will argue them to death and use them to help others. Drakath may have wanted a messiah to share the hivemind with others. Sabe is a warpriest, spreading the word and calling home the broken and the damned. He is the Last Rider, not the last of the Ilujanka but the one who keeps riding towards the chaos and never falls, no matter what.

Some of who Sabe is I have conscious input on. A whole lot of him was unintentional and perfectly reflects me.

So when it comes to terminology... I don't know what he is. A self-insert, yes. A linktype, maybe. A kintype, also maybe. Sabe doesn't feel like my past linktypes, because Sabe isn't always catharsis and comfort. Until he made up with his dad, Sabe was brutal and hurt a lot and constantly yearning for his foundation and slowly going mad. It wasn't fun. I just refused to do anything but see the story through. I was going to get it right. I wanted to see it to the end. I wanted to be the Last Rider, even though I didn't phrase it that way.

But to answer your actual question, of what he feels like when I'm not actively being him out of necessity, desire, and active thought. If it fades into the background.

And like... it can? Sabe as he is, recognized for what and who he is, is kind of a new thing. Sabe as a concept is very old, but Sabe as what he is right now is new, and confusing, and honestly I'm still trying to figure out what to make of it.

Like, seriously. Sabe is Zamorak's son. Am I Zamorak's son? Is he keeping an eye on me as I am? Would he be proud of me? Would he offer his approval of my progress? Does that make me, in some way, the World Guardian?

I have not a clue, buddy. Not a goddamn clue.

So what it means is that I've been paying attention, really. I don't just become strong in times of crisis. I've been trying to do better. Be better. Learn, and listen, and rethink myself. Break out of lockstep, of doing things the way I've always done them. Try to always do better than I did, build habits I like, stop waiting for things to change and just do it. Become the chaos, instead of waiting for it to hit me.

It means I need to live up to what Guthix told Sabe to do. It means being gentler, being kinder, not burning bridges when I'm not sure. It means keeping an eye out for any sign Zamorak's listening, in case I am his son, in case I really have to decide what I'm gonna do about being the son of chaos incarnate.

But other than the questioning, what it feels like is just... what I was already dealing with, just a little more at arm's length and easier to deal with. Once I recognize that his issues are reflective of mine, if I solve his, I have a pretty good idea of how to solve mine. Some of it won't work exactly right - Zamorak will always forgive him for not being the son he expected he might have had, my own parents may not, yay I'm queer and pagan - but it's a good rule of thumb.

It's also just comforting to know that when in doubt, nothing can kill me, because I simply refuse to die. I am World Guardian, I am a demigod of chaos incarnate, all the hellfire in the world can do nothing but strengthen me. And if I present those to myself as unshakeable beliefs, because for Sabe they are, then I'll be okay. It probably couldn't stop most disasters or tragedies, but I got hit by a car, broke five bones, and walked away with a record recovery time, so I mean... I can't prove that I can't die by some accident or tragedy, but you also can't prove that I can. (Trying to do so usually falls under what we call 'murder', and I personally believe I can't be murdered. Only assassinated.)

But really, I think the worst that could possibly happen with a new linktype is that you learn what not to do. It's new, it's scary, it's chaotic, and from where I'm standing, that's the best way to learn.

[blindrapture]

a union-mandated break post

(okay, let’s see if I can type this all over again after losing the post. gotta remember how it all went.)

Hey there, the few mutuals who Like all of my posts, the lurkers who occasionally make their presence known, the lurkers who I also hope are there, and all you folks who come across this post naturally before scrolling on (that’s fine too, please have a nice day! remember to take a deep breath and unclench!). I wanted to make a post giving a casual update.

Things have been going. You know how it is. Time proceeds onwards at a pace that is a crawl to some and fleeting to others, depending on relative perspective. The average of all these observations may be Objective Truth, a hazy mythical and abstract prospect which to this day no living human has ever known (due to the nature of perspective). We still try to know it for some reason, an endeavour which may be “a good thing” or “a condemnation of our species,” but that’s relative too. See above. Still, it is possible to take an approximation of what we figure this average to be and find ourselves (mis)balanced on a knife-edge in between all perspectives. This narrow path, the knife-edge between fast and slow, between good and bad, between ecstasy and despair, seems precarious at times, yet at other times is like a garden, wide and spacious enough to sit awhile. Our perspectives cover this garden from us with the shrubbery of Can’ts and Shouldn’ts, and the way to the garden is fraught with the misty cloud of Look-Like. And yet, ultimately, these shrubs and mists are but prismatic scenery colouring our time on this Earth, a perspective which is easy to see from within the garden. The Earth is brown and grey and immortal, though wearing an impermanent coat of blue and green. One day, we will slip out of our perspectives and return to the Earth, join her mounding’s mass, and that will be death.

So that’s the weather. Sometimes cold, sometimes mild, sometimes wet, sometimes dry, sometimes bothersome and sometimes the only backdrop I could ever want. I’ve been up to the usual, cycling between interests like a bat between haunts.

- The other day I got around to playing Smile For Me, an experience which took me about three hours to more-or-less complete 100%. Really cute game, I fell in love with all the characters, and the budding horror elements made me excited to see where it’d go.

- Currently I’m playing A Monster’s Expedition Through Puzzling Exhibitions, a game often cited in the same breath as Baba Is You and Stephen’s Sausage Roll. I think those two games are puzzle masterpieces, and A Monster’s Expedition is hitting me in the right spot. It frequently fills me with awe, which is impressive considering the game is just a long series of oblong block-pushing puzzles. It has scope, though, and it has the guts to hide that scope from you until you’re able to discover it for yourself. I’ve played for about 10 hours so far, beaten over 200 islands, and yet I feel I’m only getting further away from the end goal. Hard to describe. It’s a good game.

- When I’m done with that game, next I’ll be checking out Spelunky 2. I’ve wanted to try the original for a long time but never got around to it; I picked up the sequel. I know very little about the games (with a rough idea of what gameplay is like), and I intend to keep it that way for as long as I can. I like games that rely on discovery.

- Book-wise, I’m, y’know, reading Finnegans Wake as I fall asleep, occasionally inching through other books too, but my main reading focus at the moment is The Familiar. I went and picked up a new copy of Volume 5, and I found the Volume 3 I had kinda lost for a while, so now I have the full Season 1 again. And it’s been long enough since I read any of them that it’s finally time to reread them. As a unit this time. I am... so happy to be in their headspace. I’m currently in the second act of Volume 1, taking in a lot more details this time (and I do still remember a sense of where the whole plot goes), really cherishing the commitment to physicality and aesthetic. There’s not many authors out there like Danielewski. House of Leaves kickstarted my book obsession, y’know. And The Familiar is about as grand as a project can be. It’s supposed to be 27 volumes, each one 900 pages long, and the design of these books is goddamn sublime. The publisher only let him do the first 5 volumes, which is sad, but luckily those 5 volumes make up a “Season,” so they’re still a whole thing, a complete story arc for each of the nine protagonists, and plenty of secrets and details that give a good sense of the true scope. And did I mention the series is fucking scary? Profoundly so, each new volume weaving you deeper into its conspiratorial web of eldritch coincidences and patterns. The story is full of cats, immortal cats, God-cats. There’s a scientist who keeps a freaky magic orb and is known as Wizard. There’s an Armenian taxi driver who’s one of my favourite characters. And you can probably get all the volumes Used for fairly cheap on Amazon now. ........please, somebody join me in loving this series.

- Creative-wise, I’m working on music as always, putting notes next to each other until I get a result I can do something with. There is one piece that’s definitely done, a collaboration between Lindsay and I, but it’s going into Nine Is God so you won’t hear it just yet. Speaking of, that’s coming along. I haven’t even started making any codes or cool connections yet; I want to finish the... Core of this update first. Let’s be deceptive and call it the Main Blog. I have proven to myself that I definitely can do this; I keep stumbling on new mechanisms I can add, and I have a pretty vivid idea of what the whole thing will look like. It’s gonna be maybe a decent size for a Blog, all told, but it’s the form of the thing that mandates a lot of care. Luckily I have made Viceking’s Graab, so this isn’t the first time I’ve done something this mechanically ambitious. ...look, just. Of course I’m excited to Actually Talk about this thing, but like with the Graab, its nature requires me to keep it secret until players finally discover it for themselves. I like making that kind of thing, I want the sense of discovery, of climbing up a hill only to reach the summit and see an even bigger mountain looming over you that you hadn’t realized was there. Like Frog Fractions, or its sequel, even if you know there will be more than meets the eye you still get surprised and filled with delight. This concept fits neatly into an ARG format.

- Oh, also, I’m super excited for the Braid remake. It’s gonna have a comically thorough amount of developer commentary, and that’s all I want from this world. It’s even coming to Switch!

Media can be used as a tool to assist with the experience of life, and that is the way I want to approach things. I have spent time adapting myself to feel comfortable in these boring aesthetics (of understated puzzle games, thoughtful pretty books, blogs as art) because this means I am less susceptible to getting burned out during contemplation and self-examination. It may seem like a matter of taste, but taste is relative too; it’s not hard-wired, it can be adjusted, it does adjust all the time under the hood. ...I don’t know where to go with this one, other than that I should be careful not to condescend. I am not above anyone, I am confused too. I just.. like confusion and mazes, and I try to speak these aesthetics in an approximation of how I see others talk about theirs.

Right. I think that’s the bulk of it, that’s what I wanted to say today. I hope you are holding on, reader. It’s a wild and lonely world out there, and it’s our world; it’s yours just as much as it’s anyone else’s. You are important to it.

I leave you, mysteriously, with an old Genesis song. It’s called “Can-Utility and the Coastliners,” which is a silly way of saying it’s a song about the myth of King Canute. Sick of flatterers claiming he was equal to God, he went to the sea shore and said “If I truly am equal to God, then let the waves halt at my feet!” They didn’t. An astute demonstration, but it just prompted his flatterers to praise his ingenuity. “But he forced a smile, even though his hopes lay dashed where offerings fell.” I’m not really sure how the story ends. But it’s a wonderful song, starts off very folks-y but quickly takes a left turn down Mystery and Beauty. And it’s freaking Genesis.

See ya.

[aerithagainstabusers]

So I saw Greg’s review of the Final Fantasy 7 Remake and it was so dumb I had to pick it apart so here we go. Spoilers for the remake below

This starts off bad. Immediately Greg is whining that the game isn’t what he wants. He complains about knowing the characters too well which is an absolutely insane thing to complain about. The deaths of the AVALANCHE don’t mean much in the original. You meet them a few times then they die. You have no connection to them

By getting to know them more - like Wedges love for the Sector Seven cats and how Jessie was an actress before her dad became gravely Ill after working for Shinra, they become more human. You can relate to them more and there’s more investment there. So when the fall of that plate comes? Losing them is more impactful than in the original

The battle system can be set to the same as the original in classic mode except you can’t physically attack (that is automatically done for you) so Greg can’t really complain about that. Sounds like he’s mad he died at bosses he didn’t die to in the original

His complaint about Sephiroth is weird. He’s the main bad guy. He needs to show up. With Sephiroth in the OG, you only hear about him a few times while in Midgar, where the remake is set. They need to bring him In much earlier and show Cloud suffering PTSD to understand this guy is a threat.

He also complains about not having a lot to do. And yeah while it’s not as open you have way more to do. The side quests are actually side quests - with the original, the only side quests you really have before leaving Midgar is dressing Cloud up and getting the perfume, tiara, and underwear. Otherwise? You’re stuck doing what the game tells you to do

You might ask “why are you always saying ‘in the original when you’re in Midgar’and I’ll explain that now

This. Is. Not. A. Spoiler.

The creators said from the start it would only be in Midgar and it would be an episodic game. All the promotional materials showed the game only in Midgar. It was obvious that IT WAS ONLY IN MIDGAR. Greg has no right to complain.

Now yes. You don’t have the same free travel but there is more to travel and there’s so much more content to make up for the fact you can’t leave the city. And by doing so, Midgar comes alive. So when you leave? It feels more of a loss and like you are leaving somewhere you have a connection to. Now this was disappointing because I was definitely wanting more. Like I wanted to keep playing in because it was dragging me in. But it was clear from the start and they were transparent with this. Greg clearly wasn’t looking all the things that were coming out about the game since you knew what was going on.

It even says on the back of the box it’s going to be the story in Midgar and that it’s the first game of the remake “project” and would go deeper into the city

Why is Greg surprised and acting like he’s being cheated out?

His next complaint is.... very worrying

Nanaki in the original never acted like a pervert with Aerith. He acted like he was aggressive to lower Hojos guard but that’s a nitpick. But the rest? Holy fuck Greg, STAY AWAY FROM WOMEN

in the remake, Hojo does not have plans to crossbreed Aerith and Nanaki. Instead? He wants to have SOLIDERS repeatedly rape her so she can “breed” and laughs in her face as he tells her all about how he ripped her mother’s corpse to shreds so he can continue to investigate her. There’s only molecules left of Iflana. He also tries to kill Cloud, Tifa, and Barret so he can show aerith their corpses to kill her hope she’ll be saved

But more importantly, Hojo's proposal in the remake is far more horrifying than in the original. He wants her to be raped over and over. Why the fuck doesn’t Greg see this as being bad an as a “P.C. culture” addition? What is wrong with you, dude. How do these things not show how insane he is

The cross-dressing is a stupid complaint. So you don’t get to go to a brothel and watch a small cutscene. Who cares? You get to see Cloud perform on stage at a cabaret and he is dressed up while on stage while you do a mini game. And that isn’t fun? Okay, Greg.

The events he’s talking about by the way? You fight in a Colosseum, you can choose to help Johnny, and/or you can do the iconic squatting game. Then you go to the Honeybee Inn, do a dancing minigame, and perform on stage. 

As opposed to the original where you talk to a man and tell him what dress you want. Do the most squats, Buy some wine at an inn, have a bath with a bunch of men, and give a woman some medicine. The amount of time you spend doing that will take you the same amount of time to do one side quest in the remake. Of course, the original had it’s restrictions because of the platform it’s on, but the remake definitely did go out of its way to expand that and make it feel like you were doing more.

This is a bit more valid. Like I get having nostalgia for the OG game and preferring it and that’s okay! But the Harry Potter comparison ruins it. Also Greg doesn’t seem to realise the difference between a remake and a remaster. The game is being remade. Of course the gameplay is going to change. Turn based games aren’t viable anymore and considering how good the graphics are, it would ruin the immersion. They had to change things like this to make it more modern. Remember, they aren’t just making this for fans. They’re wanting to bring in new people. 

MAJOR SPOILERS BELOW FOR THE REMAKE

SO PLEASE

IF YOU HAVEN’T FINISHED IT

READ THIS NEXT PART WITH ABSOLUTE CAUTION OKAY?

OKAY

SPOILER

WARNING

OVER

I really hope this is just a joke that Zack wasn’t mentioned before he appeared. But considering this is Greg, and how he really doesn’t seem to understand this game, I wouldn’t be surprised if he doesn’t know the significance of this scene. He says later in this article that it took him 24-40 hours to finish the game. Which, if you actually complete it (by doing all side quests, unlocking all limit breaks for everyone, getting master materia etc) it should take you ninety hours. Which makes me think he never went to Nibleheim and saw the cutscene of what happened to Zack and Cloud. Because FF7 is a very quick game if you just focus on the main quests. If you actually dig down deep? You can go way past the timer and have it frozen at 99:99:99. I don’t think he did anything in the original game and just did whatever the game told him to do without looking at anything else.

I really hope this is just a stupid edgy joke because Zack is a well-loved character but you never fucking know with this moron.

I understand his complaints about Nanaki. Nanaki is always in my party in the original so I was bummed you couldn’t play him, but he appears in the penultimate chapter. The writers probably didn’t feel it was worth their while to add him as a party member, and instead, make him a guest who helps.

The Sephiroth complaint is stupid because he’s missed the point. Up until he appears in the Shinra building, he isn’t actually there. Cloud is hallucinating. He is shown as being mysterious and unreachable as Cloud tries to get to him or freaks out whenever he sees an image of him.

Honestly this just sounds like Greg is mad it’s not the exact same as the original.

Which would just be boring, in my opinion.

Y’know what I said about Greg doing what the game told him to do and nothing else? Yeah this is proof. You have an All materia. It’s called ‘magnify’. And unless you didn’t look for treasure or looked at the new materia when you collected it? You would know this is the all materia. The summons in this game aren’t what they are in the original. You can’t use them in every battle and they only come in boss battles or otherwise difficult encounters because in the remake, it’s made clear that they are incredibly powerful. They come to you maxed out. Which he would know if he paid attention.

I will agree with him to an extent about the maxed out materia. Materia is easy to obtain in the remake (Cloud says this to Aerith when she playfully brags about having it), so if Greg had critical thinking, it would be clear that they don’t sell well is because .... well, it’s easy to max out. Everyone is doing it. But I will agree with him that the game is ‘too short’ in a sense, since having Firaga in only Midgar can be problematic for later games. I do have to wonder what they’ll do in the next episodes. Will you have to level up the magic power after upgrading it so Firaga does the same damage in later dungeons as it did in the sewers of Midgar? It would also be neat to physically ride the chocobos through Midgar to make life easier but I also understand why they had the carriages  as it makes it less weird when Tifa suddenly appears in one when she’s going to Don Corneo’s only to never see a carriage in Midgar again, and the loading screen when they ake you from place to place does make it quicker for you to get places.

Still, it would be nice to ride them at some point so I will give Greg this complaint.

Like I said above, if you do everything in the original it should take you 90 hours. If it took Greg 2 days cumulatively at his highest estimate, he’s not completing the game, and he’s not achieving anything.

For comparison, here’s my latest game

As you can see, it’s at 44 hours. I have done all the sidequests (excluding the one mandatory Fort Condor which would add more time on to it but I didn’t want to do that this time around). I have reached the bottom of the crater, however, I have not done anything further and am now focusing on doing the rest I need to do. Like getting to level 99 on everyone, maxing out my command, summon, and magic materia to get the master materia for those three. Or maxing out all four enemy skill materia. Or getting everyone's limit breaks, or beating the weapons. Because these things take time. I could easily run and kill Sephiroth in that run right now. I could finish the game. But as I’m wanting to complete it as much as I can, then I can’t do that. And that’s not me doing a perfect game where you need to get 99 of each item you can (excluding things like the battery where you can only get three of). If you’re doing a perfect game, it takes even longer but honestly, that’s not something I’d say you’d need to do to ‘finish’ the game. That’s only if you want to challenge yourself.

Also might I add, the remake? It takes about 40 hours to finish it (I don’t know if that includes sidequests). This means in one part of a game  is the same length as the original if you don’t do any sidequests in the OG. I don’t know what Greg is talking about by ‘achieving less’. Yeah you don’t go to as many places, but considering this will be in different parts like the original, you do way more in the remake than you do in the original while in Midgar. 

The random encounters are definitely less in the remake. They don’t happen every a certain number of steps. Instead, you stumble across them in a realistic way rather than have a screen transition. It is way more immersive and again, is something that makes the game feel alive. It feels like an obstacle to overcome to get to the next place rather than an interruption like the original game random encounters (which I do love by the way, but it is very much a product of it’s time)

The next part also makes me laugh. He seems to think that because the other game has things finish ‘faster’ means it’s more productive. Which really shows he thinks his channel is great because he does more videos in a short period of time. Which, yeah, on a surface level it is more “productive”, but it’s not exactly exciting game play, is it? 

For comparison. Aerith says in the original that Sector Six is dangerous so she’ll help him out... but it takes about two minutes to go through and the random encounters are incredibly easy. It’s also not explained why the place is in ruins.

In the remake however, Aerith leads Cloud through it as Cloud is unfamiliar with it, and it is more of a challenge to get through, and he actually needs her help to get through the rubble. She explains part of the plate collapsed the tunnel and that’s why it’s such a mess. You get attacked by bandits on the way there and you spend an entire chapter trying to get through sector six, as it becomes the threat and the difficult path Aerith describes in the original. Rather than a place you just pass through with no issue, making you wonder “why the hell is Aerith insisting she goes with me?” outside of her having a crush. 

It’s small details like that which make the game come alive and actually makes you feel like you did something rather than it being a place you just passed through. It takes you longer, but it feels more like an achievement.

No one feels like they achieved something when you leave Sector Six and go to the park outside Sector Seven’s gates. Because it’s just a road to get to where you need to go. Your next challenge is trying to get Cloud chosen as the girl for Corneo but that is optional. I mean, if you prefer that it’s easier to get through as you like just seeing the story than solving dungeons, that’s fine! But this just shows Greg’s ‘quantity is quality” mindset. 

Also, when you climb up the plate to get to the Shinra building? IN the original, you climb up some pipes. The hardest part is the swinging pipe, which is incredibly easy when you time your jump to the squeaking of the pipe. They tell you it’ll be difficult to get to the Shinra building... when it takes you all of five minutes.

The remake has you climbing up the plate and broken buildings, using a grappling gun to get to higher ground when your walking path is done, while you get attacked by Shinra soliders trying to stop you from getting to higher ground when they recognise you as AVALANCHE. While it’s not hard it definitely feels more of a challenge than “climb up this pipe. jump onto that pipe, now climb up another pipe” in the original. And with the Shinra soliders while you can stop them easily, it does make you feel that getting there is going to be a struggle, or at least something that’s inconvenient and it’ll be ‘hard’ because people will try and stop you along the way.

Although I do wish that when you were in the Shinra building, you had to do more sneaking in the higher floors like you did in the original, but at least the game does give you a reason why you don’t need to sneak around. The mayor’s off hand comment about hating Shinra as he gives you a keycard in the original is expanded to the Mayor being a member of AVALANCHE who is actively helping you.

 I also think it's funny he complains about “mundane tasks” when the original game is full of that, too. All JRPGs have it

Basically, this entire review of Greg’s can be “WAHHH IT’S NOT THE ORIGINAL WHY IS IT MAKING ME WORK HARD!” and it’s hilarious