#and the stories and mysteries they hold

[orangesnail]

If The Deep Roads has a million fans, I’m one of them.

If The Deep Roads has 5 fans, I’m one of them.

If The Deep Roads has 1 fan, that one is me.

If The Deep Roads has no fans, I’m no longer alive.

If the world is against The Deep Roads, I’m against the entire world.

Till my last breath, I’ll support The Deep Roads.

[doks-aux]

William refusing to definitively gender his own fursona because maybe he just doesn't have the vocabulary to express a nonbinary identity but also definitely to leave room for customers to assume the Spring Bonnie character is Fredbear's love interest.

[thatscarletflycatcher]

Thinking again about the darknesses that lurk underneath the surface of Sense and Sensibility (I have talked before about how Edward despite being the eldest is subjected to what we can argue is emotional and financial abuse by his family for years, and how the Dashwood women are disinherited on a whim of their great uncle), and this time specifically about the Brandons.

We get so little about them, and what we do get about them is all bad:

This lady was one of my nearest relations, an orphan from her infancy, and under the guardianship of my father... At seventeen she was lost to me for ever. She was married—married against her inclination to my brother. Her fortune was large, and our family estate much encumbered. And this, I fear, is all that can be said for the conduct of one, who was at once her uncle and guardian. My brother did not deserve her; he did not even love her... I have never told you how this was brought on. We were within a few hours of eloping together for Scotland. The treachery, or the folly, of my cousin’s maid betrayed us. I was banished to the house of a relation far distant, and she was allowed no liberty, no society, no amusement, till my father’s point was gained... My brother had no regard for her; his pleasures were not what they ought to have been, and from the first he treated her unkindly.

Mr Brandon Sr is shown to us as being a greedy man, a bad administrator of his estate, and a cruel father. His first son seems cut of the same cloth, and his pleasures were not what they ought to have been is one of the most, if not the most sinister line between all the Austen novels. But there's more about him!:

Her legal allowance was not adequate to her fortune, nor sufficient for her comfortable maintenance, and I learnt from my brother that the power of receiving it had been made over some months before to another person. He imagined, and calmly could he imagine it, that her extravagance, and consequent distress, had obliged her to dispose of it for some immediate relief.

The Brandons were married for two years; the colonel returns to England and starts looking for her 3 years later. Young Eliza was then a 3 year old toddler. We are obliquely told that Brandon cut all ties with his brother:

It was a valued, a precious trust to me; and gladly would I have discharged it in the strictest sense, by watching over her education myself, had the nature of our situations allowed it; but I had no family, no home; and my little Eliza was therefore placed at school. I saw her there whenever I could, and after the death of my brother, (which happened about five years ago, and which left to me the possession of the family property,) she visited me at Delaford.

Eliza is now 17, so the eldest brother died when she was 14, which is 16 years after his marriage with the older Eliza. In that period of time, he managed to squander the whole of her fortune, and put the estate in debt again, as we are told earlier on by Mrs Jennings:

Poor man! I am afraid his circumstances may be bad. The estate at Delaford was never reckoned more than two thousand a year, and his brother left everything sadly involved. I do think he must have been sent for about money matters, for what else can it be? I wonder whether it is so. I would give anything to know the truth of it. Perhaps it is about Miss Williams and, by the bye, I dare say it is, because he looked so conscious when I mentioned her. May be she is ill in town; nothing in the world more likely, for I have a notion she is always rather sickly. I would lay any wager it is about Miss Williams. It is not so very likely he should be distressed in his circumstances now, for he is a very prudent man, and to be sure must have cleared the estate by this time. I wonder what it can be! May be his sister is worse at Avignon, and has sent for him over. His setting off in such a hurry seems very like it. Well, I wish him out of all his trouble with all my heart, and a good wife into the bargain.”

We know the Bennets, with five daughters, and without a saving mindset, still manage to live very comfortably with 2000 a year, and if they had had any mind to save money, they could have provided all five of them with decent dowries/money enough to keep them out of poverty when their father died if they were single. It is clearly not that the money isn't enough, or that Delaford is an unproductive estate; in fact, it is described to us as almost paradisiac:

Delaford is a nice place, I can tell you; exactly what I call a nice old fashioned place, full of comforts and conveniences; quite shut in with great garden walls that are covered with the best fruit-trees in the country; and such a mulberry tree in one corner! Lord! how Charlotte and I did stuff the only time we were there! Then, there is a dove-cote, some delightful stew-ponds, and a very pretty canal; and every thing, in short, that one could wish for; and, moreover, it is close to the church, and only a quarter of a mile from the turnpike-road, so ’tis never dull, for if you only go and sit up in an old yew arbour behind the house, you may see all the carriages that pass along. Oh! ’tis a nice place! A butcher hard by in the village, and the parsonage-house within a stone’s throw. To my fancy, a thousand times prettier than Barton Park, where they are forced to send three miles for their meat, and have not a neighbour nearer than your mother.

One interesting character, though forgotten because only mentioned in passing, is the Brandon sister. On one of the quotes above we get that she's in Avignon for her health, and we know her husband is wealthy (and probably abroad with her) because it is his estate that the planned picnic is for:

A party was formed this evening for going on the following day to see a very fine place about twelve miles from Barton, belonging to a brother-in-law of Colonel Brandon, without whose interest it could not be seen, as the proprietor, who was then abroad, had left strict orders on that head. The grounds were declared to be highly beautiful, and Sir John, who was particularly warm in their praise, might be allowed to be a tolerable judge, for he had formed parties to visit them, at least, twice every summer for the last ten years. They contained a noble piece of water; a sail on which was to form a great part of the morning’s amusement; cold provisions were to be taken, open carriages only to be employed, and every thing conducted in the usual style of a complete party of pleasure.

It is implied that Brandon and his BIL are in very good terms (and we know he's not afraid of cutting ties with bad relatives), and one can safely guess that at the very least he cares enough about his wife as to have her travel for her health. Another guess can be made about her getting married about 10 years before the events of the book. Whether she lived at home before that, or was at school or somewhere else, it isn't said.

But this way you can feel there's a parallel in a way, between the Brandons and the Tilneys: a greedy, cruel father, a son that follows on his steps, and a younger brother and sister managing the toxicity as best they can. Talking about this with @bad-at-names-and-faces, she brought up the idea that in that scheme, Cathy would be Eliza (if it wasn't her not being an orphan, or a rich heiress, and how that connects with Austen's line about Cathy not being born to be a heroine at the beginning of Northanger Abbey). Certainly part of it is the romantic gothicness of the Brandon backstory, united with NA's commentary on Gothic tropes, but to me it drove home with even greater force how such a situation would break a man; losing Cathy that way would have definitely broken Tilney, and if we had met him 14 years down the line, would he have appeared to the unacquainted much different than Brandon appeared to the Dashwood sisters?

[front-facing-pokemon]

[starflungwaddledee]

What Starstruck Dee theory have people made that is your favourite?

there have been quite a lot, and i genuinely love them all!

early on i think the most popular theory was that she was possessed or had been possessed at some point, most likely by dark matter. she actually debunked this theory personally, but i think people just assumed she was lying! 😂

my favourite part is not any one theory, but watching a shift in thoughts over time as more things are revealed, and seeing people share theories/work together in comments and reblogs. i like the "OOHHH WWWWHAT...!?!" moments a lot; whether they are a reaction to my storytelling or to other folks' detective work!

early theories revolved around how she was weird for a waddle dee, or at least a native of popstar. despite my never explicitly confirming anything to the contrary, theories have now broadly shifted to assuming she is not from popstar at all, and most people do now generally agree she's not really a waddle dee.

i don't recall exactly who first came up with each theory (though some big players are @the-void-is-a-disappointment who did a huge amount of early deetective work and encouraged me to build it as a story for solving, @shibuya-toasted-with-extra-cream, @graycoin and @jojo-schmo) and i'm not sure which of these theories are still held by anyone

but here a few of my favourites, roughly in order that they started appearing...

♻️ she's a total mimic species like kirby or void, copying things around her either by intent or by accident 🗑️ similar to above, but she's an incorrect copy or a "beta" mock-up type of a waddle dee 🧚 that she was just born different, like a fae changeling, and might have been hidden away when young as a result 🕰️ she is something totally inorganic and/or mechanical, created by or like the clockwork stars or stardream, perhaps wish contingent 🥇 sometimes attached to the above, she was created to serve some sort of Greater Purpose. she might have failed at it or been flawed, and was subsequently discarded on popstar 🌠 a dozen and one wildly different things connected to the "falling star that hit her". alien life form on the meteor transferred into her on impact. infection by intergalactic bacteria/dark matter. simply massive concussive trauma that fucked up her signature (back when we thought that was the only thing wrong with her). the star was magic and fused with her. she hatched from it and is literally a star herself. probably missing some here. 🪐 waddle dee from a different place/planet. this one is quite a sensible theory, given that we do see many quite different dees! 🤍 she is a fragmented piece of void/void termina. this one in particular i know is @shibuya-toasted-with-extra-cream 's ongoing theory and she's put in a lot of really cool work towards it! ⚔️ she's somehow connected to the heroes of yore. this theory i think has only started popping up since galacta knight has become a reoccurring visitor in her storyline and we've started asking questions about her familiar looking magic spears, but you can certainly 1hko @moonverc3x with this one 🧿 she's connected to the matters. sometimes soul, because it's sometimes star themed and lacks a token representative. where as a connection to dream might link her to fecto forgo/fecto elfilis in some way (a creature also well known for a catastrophic meteor attack). i've also seen folks confident that she's connected to heart matter as well, probably again due to everyone's favourite grumpy swan showing up

this is all i can think of or locate right now, but there's been a pretty wide range of things. i feel there has been a rather interesting transition over time from "she's a messed up waddle dee" to "she's probably connected to a universal superpower of some kind" which i am genuinely really really thrilled about?! 😂 what a glow up for a pathetic little wawa!!!

i'm also personally really fond of seeing how people's existing biases influence what they can find and draw connections in. for instance: i know @jojo-schmo loves the forgotten land and elfilis, and digs into those connections and draws out some really cool stuff because her knowledge is already so specialised! i think this is the true highlight of working on this story for me, people theorising and engaging in the lore, and laser pin-pointing things that tie into our personal faves-- the way we tend to do with kirby lore as a whole-- is such uninhibited delight

i sincerely hope people will enjoy where starstruck's story does go, in the end!!

[logwire]

The Blue Tale: 'Found Treasure' Through Her Eye

[e-louise-bates]

So I'd kind of forgotten that there's a new adaptation of The Seven Dials Mystery coming out at some point, because while I adore Hugh Laurie's Why Didn't They Ask Evans as having managed to capture the exact right tone for Christie, the majority of adaptations of her books to come out in the last several years have fallen flat for me (not that they're bad, per se, they just don't have the right feel to me), and I haven't been able to tell if this one is going to capture the right playful-but-not-silly tone of Seven Dials or if it is going to try to be grim or if it is going to veer off into parody, so I basically shrugged my shoulders and forgot about it.

HOWEVER, I just saw that Martin Freeman has been cast as Superintendent Battle, and I am INVESTED in it now. He is the PERFECT casting choice for Battle (how many other actors can pull off impassiveness-that-still-conveys-personality? NOT MANY), and now I am desperately hoping the rest of this lives up to his casting and this falls into the Why Didn't They Ask Evans camp rather than any of the others.

[bookshelf-in-progress]

I've had an odd nostalgia for the Once Upon a Time series of mediocre short-novel-length fairy tale retellings. I've been wanting to read the retelling of "East of the Sun, West of the Moon" from that line.

The trouble is that there is no such book.

Which makes me want to write it.

Unfortunately, the only straightforward traditional retelling of that fairy tale I want to write doesn't fit with that style.

But thinking about it got me excited about that old idea all over again.

[ancientgreekyuri]

Rewatched millen/nium actr/ess recently and have the desire to slightly change the Aznerine backstory yet again.....

[empressofthelibrary]

Y'know, knowing this website, I should have expected the Knightriders tag to be full of people drooling over the acrobat jester with zero lines

Setting that aside, it was a very good movie about the line between feeding the soul vs feeding the stomach, and how and where you find the balance. My only hangup was that Alan shouldn't have left Julie at that house. I wanna see her show up on her own bike later and join for real.

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

this rewatch of sdmi has so far been a combination of skipping around and watching straight through from the beginning, and my feelings are increasingly that shaggy, daphne, and marcie are precious and oh my god someone please get these poor kids away from everyone else in this cast

[spotaus]

*It seems you managed to stumble across a unique trio...

Decided to do a silly lil doodle of my favorite Dopple-trio! :D on the surface I feel like this'd be a daily occurrence. Kale is the most normal of the 3 of them, but I wanted to draw her and Paps having a cute lil conversation. (More ideas below the cut!!!)

Pretender regularly interacts with humans (his disguise slowly recovers, and he continues to mostly abstain from his old habits) and usually appears as "human" as long as he's out. Sometimes in public I feel like ppl would be willing to talk to him, and he's always quick to make it clear that to get to his family people would have to get past him. (Also I think in their neighborhood/town everyone gets increasingly confused because he regularly goes, "Yeah, that's my Kid" some days abd other days he's like, "That's my little sibling" and it's just that he's her guardian and the terms are kinda interchangeable because it's easier to use them than explain the whole situation lol)

Pretender also has no sense of fashion. He's always so close to a neat outfit then takes the wrong turn before he exits his closet lol.

Paps stays in skeleton form (at least for the first few years) even tho it's dangerous, because his human disguise is awful and makes K uncomfortable. Instead he trains genuinely with Undyne and Tender to properly figure out a human shape over about 4 years. Eventually he does have a human disguise, but he's contented in his monster form too.

K I can't say a lot for (beloved @oodlesndoodles is who designed/owns her!) But I'm pretty certain that she'd probably still wear her one monster-style outfit sometimes if only to show her solidarity with her family, or just to mess with people on the streets 🙏

Also:

I love the idea that someone talking to them would take in this info and be like ???????

Last Notes: Human!Pretender is one of my favorite blorbos ever to doodle! His hair texture is probably the most satisfying thing ever! Paps keeps miraculously looking good for this AU??? I've never been able to draw Papyrus before??? Idk what changed, but I love him! And KALE! K my beloved I have struggled so hard to doodle her well and usually fail but I think I did it!!! I love her sm...

[florafaunaandeldritchhorrors]

one very annoying thing about being into MTG lore is that so much of the conversation about MTG lore is driven by people who... are not reading it. many of whom are not even reading the u/Owl-Prophet-Librarian summaries. which isn't their fault, exactly, because Wizards should've known better than to reveal the killer right after laying out the mystery to most of these people for the first time, but like... the reason you are not engaging with this mystery set is because you sat out the main mystery and you are not following the meta-puzzle.

[buff-electra-truther]

the Starlight Express Alumni Podcast is fascinating because you have

-multiple stories of people accidentally falling into roles that suit them perfectly, in very different ways

-Reva Rice basically never got hurt and one of the only times she did was OFF SKATES when she fell down the stairs

-Dolan Jose REALLY wanting to cover the “girl components” and being SO excited to at least be Wrench

-the mental image of a 6’6 Vegas Showgirl looking guy as a couples therapist

-the perpetual challenge of casting Poppas lol this constantly comes up in different Stex interviews

[pinkpuffballdude]

it's so so late which means this isn't a fully formed thought, but like. I absolutely adore how cool Kim Kitsuragi is, coupled with the fact that he's such a bad detective. I'm wandering around Revachol like "hey maybe we should investigate this car that busted a hole in the fence of our crime scene" and he's like "mmmmmm I don't think that's related but alright". that's the one I keep thinking back on cause at the time it was so glaringly obvious that it was Super Related, tho now in hindsight he could have been lying, but he just keeps doing this. "oh I don't think it's related but this is your case." like bro? yea the harbor is related, that's where our suspects came from, we need to investigate for a motive my dude? just. he's SO cool and sleek and polished and formal and so, so, so bad at this. shoutout to him picking the wrong stance for shooting down the body.

[divinedeathbed]

just had the vivid thought of instead of doves whole family thing with her original story, instead have dove be Shane V's daughter? And that led me to think about Dove flirting with John and John all uneasy about flirting back (even though he'd want to) bc yknow. Boss's daughter.

I wonder if she'd have some type of easy job in Shane's company. And ofc Dove would use this for evil against John. Being all scampish around him when no one's looking. John fearing for his job but also loving the thrill of putting his hands on her and feeling her up in a forgotten supply closet

Just so fun to think about this for me hahahafnfb I'd never rewrite her to have this lore but bbrr