#anyone else here a brian wilson fan

[gamora-borealis]

sometimes you just have to listen to the music of the beach boys (brian wilson) to feel alive again

[sugar-petals]

Can u introduce yuzuru to us the caro way?👀

so you want to know about the one and only. ♡😌

yuzuru hanyū (25) of sendai, japan: the most beautiful ice prince with a heart of gold.

….an artist clearly not of this world, he’s been sent to us from another realm. 19 world records, two olympics won, dubbed the greatest figure skater of all time. and the most precious bean on top of that.

but let’s start from the beginning, shall we ♥︎

so, want to spot yuzu on the ice? use this checklist. slender silhouette, an even slimmer waist, feather-like outfits (he sketches those himself; the fandom lovingly calls him swanyu), soft blushy face. he has great androgyny.

outside of performances, you see him either with a deer’s gaze or the brightest, biggest eye smile. also, he’s usually found sitting with his wife: 

which is the ice 😄 these two are together forever. you can discern yuzu from a mile away by how he treats his working ground. 

there is a purity to him. you’d not guess that this is one of the most ardent athletes if you didn’t see what’s around his neck after competitions. the guy’s cuteness is as compelling as his skating technique.

look for it: yuzu’s face is super suave and rosy up close, even after his most energetic performances. some men are handsome, others pretty, he is both. 

even acoustically, he’s hard to miss. applause is all around, and he’s highly expressive. if you see a crying young man getting the high score, that’s yuzuru hanyu. you’ve not seen more beautiful happy tears.

and score reactions, anyway:

so, aye loves, the rumors are true. a cutie-pie off the ice, animated, a real unabashed meme — yuzu is easy-going, talkative. cheery, cheeky, one of a kind. his facial expressions are a league of their own.

if you thought this is the sort of guy who watches cat videos, you are correct 😄

yuz-uwu hanyu, everybody:

his undoubtedly feline behaviour is often unexpected, it stands out with its adorableness, too. a sweetheart par excellence. 

and, how else could it be: vice versa, the big beast on the rink. he’s cutesy, dorky, very well-spoken in daily life, but when it comes to skating, his seriousness escalates. you blink once and suddenly hanyu is a bedazzling, strutting lion :’D his performances stun with confident elegance.

he becomes full of ardor, drama, and focus. you’d never suspect so much fire burns in him. a showman and ambition icon, hands down. 

his skating is dynamic, perfected, and emotional. if you want to see art and the extra mile, tune in when hanyu competes.

the downside is; more light, more shadow. it leaves him crawling on the ice afterwards. yuzu performs so hard, it’s worrying.

he delivers it all. you won’t believe it:

this guy is an asthmatic.

the symptoms aren’t as bad as they used to be, but there are still regular attacks. he said that he’ll never take it as an excuse and often recalls how he started skating because of it. he’s a badass, extremely inspiring. yuzuru defies all limits, including gravity. his jumps have legendary status. 

off the rink, you guessed it: he turns into a wholly different person. 

it all dissolves completely when he’s dorking around again. 

don’t let it deceive you, he’s the no other option than first place type. he could not be any more decorated with titles, he achieved the grand slam in all competitions as of 2020. and still, king of sportsmanship hanyu is respectful and smiley towards all colleagues and never lets anyone feel left out. especially when it comes to his juniors (e.g. yuma kagiyama, 16, below) which says a lot about him.

he bows in every direction before an audience, too. lower than a 90° angle, even. this is more polite than any existing formality in japan.

talk about audience: i introduced fellow japanese skater shoma uno last week, who’s more uncomfortable with social contact and aggression. yuzu, extrovert he is: the exact opposite. he withers away with no people and competition. he’s befriended rivals, had crises over not having someone who could challenge him. when a competitor retires, he’s the one crying in their arms (e.g. with team mate and bff javier fernandez from spain below).

beside his competitive spirit and princely wow factor, hanyu is popular for his winnie pooh tissue box that he caresses, squeezes, and carries everywhere. he loves good luck charms & rituals, pooh is the most important one.

fans throw pooh plushies on the ice after his performances because of it. since it’s gotten so intense, yuzu recently started cleaning them up himself on top of the flower girls for the upcoming skater who could get delayed otherwise. (more about what happens with the piles of plushies later.)

so, the burning question is. 

what made yuzuru hanyu emerge so outstanding an entertainer? how does someone causing so much uproar become like that? it’s not just what kind of appearance he was given, although he really looks his part to a T. you don’t have to be an insider to see it right away.

like literally to a fault. and you can tell the way his blades sound on the ice is different. it’s soft even if he does the most hardcore quadruple jumps. i think it’s because his drive to do this is a higher one, hanyu has an altered relationship with the ice. where his devotion comes from has a more severe reason so, massive trigger warning. 

this is no exaggeration: yuzuru is considered a hero to the japanese. a survivor of the earthquake 2011, he narrowly escaped the collapsing rink in his hometown on that very day. he’s often talked about how the ice shattered underneath his feet and it was the moment that defined his life forever. he could have been dead by the age of 16. his motivation has been set ever since. this man is compelled by something bigger, that’s why you hear it and you feel it. he wants to skate not just for himself but others and seize every day. 

much of his copious charity work — that’s where all the pooh plushies go — went to mend the consequences of the tsunami ever since, he’s looked upon as a great hope in japan. the minister gave him the people’s honor award in 2018. 

now you know why yuzuru has such a fanbase and treats the ice as sacred, you see it in every gesture. his manners are without a single flaw, he helps staff repair the ice after performances. 

you might think it’s odd, but he honors the ground. he’s invested in the integrity of it. that’s why he’s the best skater. it’s gratitude and the will to live fully.

he hates to fall on the ice, he hates to damage it. alongside his feathery weight, that’s why the sound he makes while gliding along is so tender. 

i think that’s also why hanyu’s signature element is the ina bauer. it doesn’t rely on brutal force, instead this element slides across the rink like a swan. yeah, oh my god.

it’s his most well-known dramatic move. the way he surrenders into it. 

hanyu’s back arch and perfect split allow him to do elements no other male skaters can. his biellmann spin, for instance. i know, it’s ridiculous.

and those are just two elements of dozens and dozens. hanyu is a kinetic wizard. i highly rec this record-breaking delivery of his olympic program. in front of his home crowd! he’s just… mind-boggling. i live for his smiles here.

exceptional skater, exceptional mentor: it’s time we look at another puzzle piece that made yuzu the way he is. the masterful brian orser is hanyu’s beloved coach. missing gold by just one mistake at the olympics 1988, brian is now committed to give others what he couldn’t have— successfully so.

orser took the ice prince to gold twice, this hasn’t happened in 66 years. brian is the nicest and most supportive pooh carrier and yuzu’s utmost rock. hanyu’s talent rests safely in these hands.

he gets strict about punctuality lmao! but other than that, his guidance is gentle. canadian he is, brian’s courteousness mixes well with yuzu’s politeness. their bond is strong. as. hell. 

brian picked up yuzu from rock bottom several times. most fateful being hanyu’s accident with a fellow skater during competition warm-ups nov 2014. they collided at a high speed, it was unspeakably nasty. yuzu got knocked out for half a minute and had grave breathing problems but still decided to skate on with what later turned out as an almost-concussion. brian was the most worried ice dad in the world that day.

yuzu cried and crouched and bled like mad and my heart has been broken ever since. i hope he never suffers like that again. promise me you don’t search up the video, it’s a harrowing watch like a stab to the chest. sadly enough, hanyu’s body has still been a notorious wreck, esp. ankle issues regularly give him a hard time 😔

it hurts like a bitch with every jump landing but he takes meds and still manages to win, god knows how. sometimes even with crutches on the podium. at his worst, he’s still the best, it’s a tragedy.

he’s been recovering, or always is, but he pushes himself through injuries. his ambition and perfectionism are boundless. the cause is more important to him than his well-being. this is not an easy guy to stan once you see how he sacrifices and self-destructs. so, it’s good someone protects him. 

mostly from himself because nobody has profoundly surpassed hanyu. he has let himself no choice than to contest himself. not even health, only age can stop yuzu. i think that brian understands this ‘curse of a genius’ effect. his mere presence can make hanyu say these rare words:

his two other coaches contribute to that. tracy wilson (left) has proven to understand his playful side the best while ghislain briand (right) helps yuzuru deal with his fears. so you got 3 people taking care of the golden boy. brian once said: “he is very sheltered” and you can see it’s true.

yuzu eased into learning english and communicates well with his coaches. like with everything, he studies hard and often forces himself to speak during interviews to practice. his skills are astounding. his speaking voice is also very soothing, very amicably low and high alike. yuzu is highly intelligent. he always says something eloquent and interesting.

now, privately, hanyu is very much like you’d expect someone so devoted to skating would be like. he doesn’t go out, has no social media, can’t eat nor sleep very well. no cameras allowed during practice. it figures he is attached to winnie pooh, think about it. in the cartoon, pooh is someone who sleeps, eats, and engages with friends plenty. 

these are the things hanyu can’t do, doesn’t have time/energy/incentive for. he is barred from balance in life but can at least admire this little carefree plushie for it. especially because pooh represents eating lots while yuzuru doesn’t have a good relationship with food (he says it doesn’t go well with jumps etc.), hanyu lives vicariously through him. 

what’s more, you have to see how he throws himself onto others and never wants to let go, yuzuru is extremely cuddly. 

to the degree that mere social customs can’t meet how much he really needs. so, what else can he resort to, he loves mascots and plushies. it’s how the tale goes in japan generally, tough work ethic, high responsibility, high pressure, so people turn to cute fluffy things.

he always fondles pooh’s head, even pretends he’s come to life so he has someone to snuggle with. i think that his isolated lifestyle doesn’t help. so, he gets his affection at least there, you can see how happy it makes him. and again: he does this all for charity.

that’s why fellow skaters are so important to hanyu. it really brings out his social spirit and comforts him best, it’s so wholesome. i’ve not seen someone react so relieved to being embraced, like he’s not been touched for months. skating this, skating that. at the end of the day, hanyu wants love.

as he once said, what motivates him is to express himself in the first place. hanyu is a romantic. it’s written all over him. it reflects in his music choices, his elegant motion, how he designs his outfits:

… and how thoughtfully he talks about marriage. he has big plans for starting a family and coaching after he retires. i won’t be the only one squeezing lucky charm pooh in my imagination so it turns out well for him. please make this heart of gold heal and see all his wishes come true ♡🐻

[sports-balling-blog]

NFL hot(ish) takes for 2020 (AFC edition)

FOOTBALL IS BACK…if you ignore high school football and college football and soccer football but we’re ignoring that! So here we go my 2020 power rankings

AFC West

4. Las Vegas Raiders- lead by everyone’s 17th favorite starting quarterback and the rest of the silver and black are in for a long year stuck in the AFC West and not making moves themselves. Just add this season to the broken dreams that pave the strip…at least y’all have hockey?

3. Denver Broncos- John Elway must have really been hoping he could make lightning strike twice and bring Aaron Rodgers to the mile high city only to be stuck with a combination of Drew Lock and Teddy Bridgewater to see through the season instead of you know drafting a quarterback. There is too much talent *cough cough Von Miller cough cough* for the Broncos to be a complete disaster but you guys are dangerously close to Kyle Orton/Tim Tebow territory.

2. The S̶a̶n̶ ̶D̶i̶e̶g̶o̶ Los Angeles Charges- much like everyone else I’m pretty high on the Los Angeles Chargers (of Anaheim) after seeing the team’s second half of 2020 and Justin Herbert. It’s finally looking like the rebuild will yield results but we have one last question for the team will they have more wins than fans in So-Fi this year?

1. Kansas City Chiefs- shock of all shocks the back to back AFC Champions with an MVP QB and hall of fame coach will repeat as division champions. While it should be a cake walk to their seventh straight playoff appearance (and sixth straight division title) it’ll be interesting to see if they did enough to keep pace with the other top teams in the AFC.

AFC South

4. Houston Texans- HAHAHAHAH do I really need to talk more. Everything this last off season seems to have been the incorrect move more Huston especially the whole deshaun Watson situation. At least on the bright side at least no one can claim you’re tanking.

3. Jacksonville Jaguars- the Trevor Lawrence era has officially began. Too bad it’s going to start like the Minshew/Nick Foles era ended, with lots of losses. That much is clear when they chose to pander to Florida Gators fans by hiring Urban Mayer signing Tim Tebow instead of actually improving. To the three Jags fans out there be glad the Texans are in your division.

2. Indianapolis Colts- ahhh the Colts and injuries quarterbacks can you name a better tradition? The Carson Wentz era In Indy will have to wait a good chunk of the season to get started in Ernest given the newly acquired QB will miss up to 12 weeks. There’s certainly enough talent there for the Colts to stay in wild card contention and not fall in with the other two teams listed above.

1. Tennessee Titans- I don’t think there’s anyone quite as happy to be in Nashville as Julio Jones is. After years of trying to get out of Atlanta this falcon is free and here to help a titans squad looking to capitalize on the teams back to back playoff appearances.

AFC North

4. Cincinnati Bengals- congrats bengals you’ve found your franchise savior! Now you just need to scrap him off the turf every other play. And to add insult to (hopefully not another) injury AJ Green left to the Arizona desert after a decade. There’s still a long rebuild ahead bengals.

3. Pittsburgh Steelers- WHAT? How can the team that went 11-0 to start rank third? The Steelers are a long way from being one of the NFL’s top teams and the end of last season especially the game against Buffalo showed it. This year there’s no easy schedule for the black and gold to pray on. While everyone else in their division got better at least to a small extent Pittsburgh just got older and slower.

2. Baltimore Ravens- It will be an interesting season for Lamar and the Ravens and we’ll get a good taste almost immediately as they take on Kansas City in week two. The defense is there for sure a deep playoff run the only question is can the receivers include new addition Sammy Watkins can stay healthy and productive enough for the offense to match that pace.

1. Cleveland Browns- hard to believe the browns went 1-31 not very long ago. Cleveland looks like a completely different team these days boasting what looks to be one of if not the best defenses in the league especially after adding Clowney. Making the playoffs will be the least of the browns problems the only question is how far will they go. The way this team is built I’m guessing far.

AFC East

4. New York Jets- Zach Wilson is here after some rather uneventful years with Sam Darnold at the helm, but more importantly Adam Gase is gone! You’re Free! While the Jets won’t have much to show for it this year I think mean green’s perpetual rebuild sneakily took a turn for the better. We might have to stop calling them the butt fumble in a few years.

3. New England Patriots-yeah I know it feels weird for me to put them here too, but let’s face facts the Patriots are no longer a Super Bowl caliber team. The 7-9 record last season speaks for that. Its rather unlikely that lightning will strike twice in the form of Mac Jones right away. Give it a year or two and we’ll see where you are.

2. Miami Dolphins- another AFC East team looking at a bright future without Adam Gase! Brian Flores has done a great job righting the ship of state and now the dolphins look primed to build on last season and make a playoff appearance! Unfortunately the AFC is too too heavy for you to really do much there but good job none the less!

1. Buffalo Bills- another long suffering team now enjoying great success this time with Josh Allen. The Wyoming Alum looks to lead what will be one of the NFL’s best offenses past the AFC title game and into a Super Bowl this time. Their first since 1993

Playoff time!

1. Kansas City Chiefs- I don’t think they’re leagues better than the other playoff teams but when you’re looking for your fourth straight AFC Title game appearance I’ll give you a bit of a pass.

2. Buffalo Bills- not much to say here the Bills are a talented squad who are going to be successful.

3. Tennessee Titans- the regular season may be kind of a mixed bag for the Titans when it comes to record (obviously not too bad) but I think the playoffs is where this team will come to shine.

4. Cleveland browns- four feels too low for this team but when you look at who’s above them it’s kinda hard to disagree with it.

5. San Angels Chargers- look at you Chargers fan! You’re in the playoffs maybe you can make some magic happen.

6. Miami Dolphins- after coming so close last year you can loose in the first round just like in 2016.

7. Indianapolis Colts- just like last year you get to play Buffalo first and just like last year you won’t get a second game.

All in all the AFC is really a three team race. While I think I best team in general is the Chiefs I’m going to go out on a limb and say that Tennessee represents the AFC.

[thefanficfaerie]

There are still plenty of songs if anyone else would like to participate. 

Here are the rules:

1. One person per song. There are 100 songs so no doubling up this time. Send in an ask with your character and song.

2. You are allowed to pick more than one song. You are allowed to create anything you want. Story, social media edit, mood board, etc.

3. Characters I allow are:

Steve Rogers x Reader Tony Stark x Reader AU Bucky Barnes x Reader Stucky x Reader Jim Kirk x Reader Leonard McCoy x Reader Rafael Barba x Reader Stony, Stony x Reader McKirk, McKirk x reader Bruce Wayne x Reader Ransom Drysdale x Reader Robb Stark x Reader Chris Evans x Reader

4. If you pick a song, please complete the challenge. I have had many take a prompt and then not complete it. If you need an extension, please let me know. I will happily give them or if you cant do it let me know so that I can add it back on to the list.

5. I will leave the list open up to the last week of April.

6. Due date will be April 30 cause thats my birthday month!!!

7. Any questions let me know. AND HAVE FUN. Songs are below the cut.

1980s

Summer of 69 by Bryan Adams

Everything I Do, I Do It For You by Bryan Adams @ladyideal Leonard McCoy

Manic Monday by The Bangles

I Want To Dance With Somebody by Whitney Houston @becs-bunker

Push it by Salt N Pepa

Whatta Man by Salt N Pepa and En Vogue

Danger Zone by Kenny Loggins @beccaanne814

Alone by Heart @annathewitch​ Leonard McCoy

Who Will You Run To by Heart

Pink Houses by John Cougar Mellencamp

Jack and Diane by John Cougar Mellencamp

Here I Go Again by White Snake @captain-rogers-beard Tony Stark

Like A Prayer by Madonna

Papa Dont Preach by Madonna

Livin on a Prayer by Bon Jovi @thats-what-i-call-british​ Bucky Barnes AU

You Give Love a Bad Name by Bon Jovi @thats-what-i-call-british​ Tony Stark

Hungry Eyes by Eric Carmen @catmom1978 Leonard McCoy

1990s

Perfect Fan by The Backstreet Boys

No Diggity by Blackstreet @thatesqcrush Rafael Barba

I’d Do Anything For Love by Meatloaf

Nice and Slow by Usher

Who Will Save Your Soul by Jewel @thatesqcrush Rafael Barba

Dreaming of You by Selena @themusicplayedherlife Steve Rogers

One Headlight by The Wallflowers

Save Tonight by Eagle Eye Cherry

She’s So High by Tal Bachman

The Sign by Ace of base

Don’t Speak by No Doubt @nekoannie-chan Steve Rogers

Underneath It All by No Doubt @locke-writes Rafael Barba

I’ll Make Love To You by  Boys II Men

On Bended Knee by Boys II Men

A Song For Mama by Boys II Men

Un-break My Heart by Toni Braxton @littlecrazyfangirl-98 McKirk

Kiss Me by Six Pence None The Richer @bohemian-barbie Steve Rogers

Hold On by Wilson Phillips

Livin’ La Vida Loca by Ricky Martin

Say You’ll Be There by Spice Girls

Wannabe by Spice Girls

Where’s the Love by Hanson

I Will Come To You by Hanson

One Sweet Day by Mariah Carey

Barbie Girl by Aqua

Bitch by Meredith Brooks @socie Steve Rogers 

The Boy is Mine by Brandy and Monica @fandomoneshots-imagines Tony Stark

Back at One by Brian McKnight

Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Deep Blue Something @locke-writes Tony Stark

My Heart Will Go On by Celine Dion @thats-what-i-call-british Bucky Barnes AU

My Way by Usher

Truly Madly Deeply by Savage Garden @wondersofdreaming Chris Evans

Say My Name by Destiny’s Child @grantsgorgeousgirl Tony Stark

Come on Over Baby by Christina Aguilera @just-the-hiddles Chris Evans

What A Girl Wants by Christina Aguilera

I Swear by All-4-One

Last kiss by Pearl Jam

The Hardest Thing by 98 degrees

2000s

Penny & Me by Hanson @xemopeachx Rafael Barba

You Raise Me Up by Josh Groban

Beautiful Soul by Jesse McCartney

Sk8er boi Avril Lavigne

Try Again by Aaliyah

Case of the Ex by Mya

First Date by Blink 182 @locke-writes Steve Rogers

The Anthem by Good Charlotte

She’s a Rebel by Green Day @locke-writes AU Bucky Barnes

More Than That by The Backstreet Boys

Fighter by Christina Aguilera @sleep-depiravation Jim Kirk

All About Us by t.A.T.u

All The Things She Said by t.A.t.U

All For You by Janet Jackson

All I Have by Jennifer Lopez

If You Had My Love by Jennifer Lopez

Love Don’t Cost a Thing by Jennifer Lopez @bohemian-barbie Ransom Drysdale

Daughters by John Mayer

Your Body Is A Wonderland by John Mayer @avintagekiss24 Steve Rogers

Survivor by Destiny Child

I Knew I Loved You by Savage Garden @thatfanficstuff AU Bucky Barnes

Thank God I Found You by Mariah Carey

Unpretty TLC

No Scrubs TLC

My Everything 98 Degrees  

Oops I Did It Again by Britney Spears @thats-what-i-call-british Steve Rogers

Toxic by Britney Spears @madpanda75 Rafael Barba

Stronger by Britney Spears

The Two of Us by NSYNC

This I Promise You by NSYNC

Trouble By Pink @kaunis-sielu AU Bucky Barnes

Walk Away by Pink

Always On Time by Ja Rule

Angel by Shaggy

Girl on TV by LFO

Hanging By A Moment by LIfehouse @sippingchai AU Bucky Barnes

Here Without You by 3 doors down

Hips Don’t Lie by Shakira @thatesqcrush Rafael Barba

Ohio by Bowling For Soup

Summer Girls by LFO

Where Is the Love by The Black Eyed Peas

Wherever You Will Go by The Calling @mrsrafaelbarba Rafael Barba

3 am by Matchbox Twenty @locke-writes Bruce Wayne

My Immortal by Evanscence @secondsineternity Stucky x reader

[lovemesomerafael]

MASTERLIST

Law and Order SVU and Captain America (Well, really Bucky Barnes)

Is that a strange combination?  I feel like that’s a strange combination.

One-Shots

Law & Order: SVU

A Little Too Undercover (Sonny Carisi x OFC.  Smut-ish) Also on AO3

No-name smut (Mike Dodds X Reader)

Under the Influence (Peter Stone x OFC  Smut)                  Also on AO3

Pathetic  (Rafael Barba x Sonny Carisi   Angst, pining, feelz)   Also on AO3

Afterlife (Rafael Barba x Sonny Carisi   Angst, feelz, I don’t know)  Also on AO3

There For Each Other (Rafael Barba x Sonny Carisi  Angst, hurt Sonny, how they started dating, married Barisi, Smut)  Also on AO3

Bucky Barnes (and his sidekick, Captain America)

Here Goes (Angst, pining, you decide if they’re best friends or Stucky, works either way)  Also on AO3

Multi-Chapter Works

Destroying The Planet To Save It

Also on AO3

(MCU)  There’s a new threat to Earth, and it’s up to the Avengers to find and stop it.  (Steve Rogers x Sharon Carter, Bucky Barnes x OFC, Sam Wilson x OFC, Bruce Banner x OFC, Clint Barton x Natasha Romanoff, Tony Stark x Pepper Potts)  Story, smut, fluff, angst, violence 

Others Like Me   

Also on AO3

(Captain America Movies)  Bucky Barnes is abducted by a new reincarnation of Hydra.  One of his captors helps him escape.  Bucky never thought he'd meet anyone who had been where he's been. But she has. Steve's suddenly not the one who can help Bucky the most to deal with his tortured past. And Steve's not happy about it.  (Bucky Barnes x Steve Rogers, Bucky Barnes x OFC,)  Smut, fluff, angst, violence.

El Amor Todo Lo Puede

Also on AO3

(Chicago PD, Med, Fire, Justice, L&O SVU)  For those who like a lot of story with your smut.  Starts in Chicago, goes to New York (Peter Stone x OC, Greg “Mouse” Gerwitz x OC, Rafael Barba x OFC).  Has alternate happy endings.  Smut, fluff, angst.  

It’s Complicated    

Epilogues:  Surprise Party      Expectations

Also on AO3

(Law & Order SVU)  How does “hate at first sight” become “where have you been all my life”?  (Rafael Barba x OFC)  Story-driven, with smut, fluff, angst.

Cinderella of Chicago 

Chapter 1  Chapter 2 Chapter 3  Chapter 4 Part 1  Chapter 4 Part 2  Chapter 5

Also on AO3

(Chicago Fire, Chicago Med, Chicago PD)    Brian “Otis” Zvonecek meets a great girl at a fan convention, but they get separated and she disappears, leaving behind part of her costume.  Lots of story.  Fluff, light smut, little bit of angst.  (Brian “Otis” Zvonecek x OFC)

Becoming Mike

Also on AO3

(Law & Order SVU)  Mike Dodds had no idea when he took the job at SVU that he’d be blindsided by meeting Sonny Carisi.  Falling in love with Sonny means Mike will have to find the courage to figure out who he is, and what he wants.   Lots of story, smut, angst.  (Mike Dodds x Sonny Carisi)

No One Else  

Chapters 1-6    Chapter 7       Also on AO3

(Law & Order SVU)  Detective Sonny Carisi falls helplessly in love with OC Kate Kinsella.  But when his dreams begin to come true, they realize there is no way to stay together, so they say goodbye.  Until years later, Assistant District Attorney Carisi tries a case in which Kate is a witness, and they realize it’s  never been over, for either of them.  Story, smut, fluff, angst, pining.  (Sonny Carisi x OFC)

Best That You Can Do

Chapter 1   Chapter 2   Chapter 3   Chapter 4   Chapter 5   Chapter 6

Also on AO3

(Law & Order: SVU)  Possibly WIP.  When Chief Dodds sees his son, Mike, with his staff member, OC Kaitlyn Myers, he realizes she's perfect for him.  He's right. Within hours of meeting in Chief Dodds' office, Mike and Kaitlyn have a wonderful, steamy night together. Things are looking great until the next morning, when Mike makes a HUGE mistake. But Chief Dodds doesn't know that. So he goes ahead with his little matchmaking scheme...  Smut, Fluff, Angst, Pining.  (Miike Dodds x OFC)

[romancandlemagazine]

An Interview with Brian Cannon

This is probably a pretty obvious statement to make, but there’s more to music than just the music. Things like melody and chords and all that are fairly important, but there are a thousand other factors that help turn a song, track or album into something more than just a bunch of sound waves smacking into your ear drums.

Record sleeves are one such factor — and not many have created quite as many stone cold classics as Brian Cannon.

As the man behind the infamous Microdot agency, Brian was responsible for looking after the visual side of both Oasis and The Verve, as well as designing covers for bands like Suede, Cast and Inspiral Carpets.

Here’s an interview with him about doing graffiti in Wigan, his trademark ‘in-camera’ style and the logistics of putting a Rolls Royce in a swimming pool…

Maybe an obvious first question – but how did you get into designing record covers? What were you into when you were growing up in Wigan.

I specifically set out to design record sleeves, because I was a fan of punk rock. I was 11 in 1977, when I first got into it all.

Do you remember the first time you saw ‘punk’?

I’m the eldest in my family, so I didn’t have the influence of an older brother – but I did have an older cousin called Tony who was 15 at the time — and when you’re 11, that’s a massive difference. I’d heard about this phenomenon from Tony, and then I saw the Buzzcocks on Top of the Pops — and to actually see it in the flesh — it blew me away.

Why do you think it had such an impact on so many people? Was it because it was so different.

Exactly, it was totally different. At that time, Top of the Pops was your barometer, and glam rock was pretty much all you had — things like Sweet and Mud — long hair, flares, platforms and mad outfits. But then all of a sudden you had these lads who looked like your mates, with short hair and tight pants, making this fast, aggressive music. And I loved it.

How did this lead into doing design?

Me and my mates thought, “We’ve got to get a band together.” So we met up at my mum’s house in Wigan, and I realised instantly that I couldn’t play guitar. I just couldn’t get my head around chords.

But I’d always been good at drawing. My dad was a fantastic illustrator, far better than me, but the opportunities for illustrators in Wigan in the 1940s were zero – so he worked as a coal miner and never did anything with it. But he was very much in favour of me doing drawing, and he always encouraged me.

And with punk, if you looked at the graphics and the visual identity, it felt like it was in reach. I think that was the point of it. Before punk, bands were like creatures from another planet — but with punk, the whole process was demystified – the man in the street could get involved. That was a massive inspiration to me.

So I married my love of the music with my talent for art, and thought that I’d become a sleeve designer instead.

It’s interesting how even in your early teens you knew exactly what you wanted to do.  

I remember doing this art foundation course, and the tutor was going around, asking us what we wanted to do when we finished our education. He came to me and I said, “I want to design record sleeves.” But straight away he said, “No, no, no – you can’t be so specific, you need to get a job in graphics and learn your way.”

I was almost derided for it – because not only was I going to do record sleeves, but I was going to go freelance from the get go. I think anyone can do it these days, because you just get a laptop and then you’re a graphic designer all of a sudden. But back then, not only was there no social media and no internet, but the equipment required to do the job of a graphic designer, the forerunner to Photoshop, cost £300,000. It was this machine called Quantel Paintbox.

What was that?

It was a computer, about the size of your house, with less power than your mobile phone. It was way out of my reach — I could hardly afford a paper and pencil.

What did you do then?

This punk style was really stark, with high contrast black and white, degraded imagery, and it just so happened that if you photocopied an image over and over, it went like that. And that was handy, because all I could afford to use was a photocopier.

There was a little print shop at the bottom of Library Street in Wigan, and I’d be in there all day, with a scalpel and a tin of glue, putting these things together in the shop – and that’s how it all started.

How did your first sleeve come about? Was that the Ruthless Rap Assassins one?

Yeah — I did a graffiti mural on the side of a warehouse in 1984, and it was noticed by a guy called Greg Wilson, who was a very influential DJ at that time. He’d thought to himself, I’m going to see this New York style graffiti in London or Manchester or Birmingham at some point, but he couldn’t believe it that he’d seen it in Wigan. He sent word out on the street that he wanted to meet whoever had done it, and I was summoned to his house. We ended up becoming friends and I did this sleeve. And then off it went from there.

What happened next then?

I then met Richard Ashcroft at a party and got chatting, but then The Verve got signed and I didn’t see him for another two years. I ended up bumping into him in a petrol station at six o’ clock in the morning. He said, “Wow, you’re that sleeve guy. We’ve just been signed – do you want the gig?”

So I went to London to have a meeting with Virgin, who The Verve were signed to. Vigin obviously had some big London agency lined up to do this work for The Verve, so they were horrified when Richard Ashcroft said he wanted this unknown student he’d met at a party in Wigan to do the artwork. But they were cool enough to think, “Well, this is what the band wanted.” And then after the first single came about, they were like, “Sorry we doubted you.”

What else were you doing at that time?

On the back of doing the stuff for The Verve, Suede got in touch. And then I met Noel Gallagher. I used to have an office in Manchester on New Mount Street in the same building as the Inspiral Carpets office, and I got chatting to him in the lift about trainers.

What were they?

They were a pair of adidas Indoor Super. I took my mother to Rome for her 60th birthday, and I found these trainers in some tiny backstreet shop.

Wasn’t the Oasis logo based roughly on the adidas logo?

The original was kind of the adidas font – but we binned it, because with the adidas font, the ‘A’ is just like an ‘o’ with a line on the side, so it just looked like ‘oosis’.

I did the logo in ’93, and then their first album came out in ’94. After Oasis it went buck-wild... Ash, Cast, even Atomic Kitten… it was mental.

Was it hard to keep up with it all?

No, because if you think about it, even a busy band back then would only put out three singles and an album out per year – so even if you’ve got five bands a year, that’s only twenty jobs a year. Mind you, it was labour intensive as there was no Photoshop.

I was going to ask you about that. As a lot of your images were done without Photoshop, ‘in camera’, how did you go about getting them? Creating an image like the Oasis Be Here Now cover doesn’t look easy.

This is a very important point to make. Because it was all shot on film – we didn’t have the luxury of looking at the back of the camera and seeing what we’d got. We had no idea what we’d got until we got the photos back from the lab. Imagine putting a Rolls Royce in a swimming pool and realising the photos weren’t exposed correctly.

Before the shoot, there’d be a massive process of research and preparation, so when the day comes, nothing was left to chance.

Were you given free reign with all this?

Yeah, it was a beautiful situation. With both The Verve and Oasis, the record companies just let us get on with it. All they did was pay for the bills. And that was great, because we knew what we were doing.

A lot of the Oasis ones are particularly complicated. What was the hardest one to pull off?

Putting a Rolls Royce in a pool was pretty tough. Finding a pool that someone’s going to let you put a Rolls Royce into was the hardest part. And then we had to find a Rolls Royce that wasn’t worth £50,000 – because Oasis weren’t that rich. It was a scrap Rolls Royce, with no engine in it, but it still cost us £1,000 to hire it. And then we had to get a crane and dangle it in.

How many shots did you take of that one?

That one was ridiculous, because like I said, we didn’t have the luxury of seeing what we’d shot. For that shoot there was something like 30 odd rolls of film, with 36 exposures on each roll – so it was almost a thousand frames of something that’s really just a still life. That’s excessive.

We stayed there that night, and then we got the films processed in London. Then there was the wait, like an expectant father.

How did you work out which was the best one, when you had a thousand pretty much identical photos to look at?

It was like snow blindness. We’d start with the obvious non-starters, and whittle it down and down. It was a very laborious process of elimination, but we didn’t know any other way.

Do you think this real life, ‘in camera’ method of creating these really detailed images helped elevate them a bit?

By that point we could have easily Photoshopped it, but we just did things for real because it was our trademark, and I enjoyed doing things that way. We started doing it that way out of necessity, because we couldn’t afford computers – but even when we could afford them, we still did things the real way as we preferred it.

And it must have been more fun that sitting around staring at a computer.

Yeah – I loved it. Just to see a Rolls Royce in a swimming pool – it looked amazing.

What about the Definitely Maybe cover? Obviously now that’s talked about as being one of the best record covers of all time, but were people saying that when it was released?

No, they weren’t. It’s all very well saying things with the benefit of hindsight. It’s just been voted as one of the top 70 record sleeves of all time – and do you know what? I’m not going to rain on my own parade, because I think it’s a great sleeve — but had that been for a band you’d never heard of, it wouldn’t be in the top 70.

I suppose there’s a lot that’s tied in with that. The memories that come with it and everything else – it’s a full package. What was the story behind the Definitely Maybe cover?

It’s an anti-band shot. That was the idea. There’s a Beatles album called A Collection of Beatles Oldies (but Goldies!), and on the back there’s this shot of them in this dressing room in Japan. And I just loved the fly on the wall nature of it – none of them were looking at the camera. And whilst it looks nothing like Definitely Maybe, that’s where the inspiration came from.

That documentary style?

Precisely. The band are having their picture took, and they’re all watching the telly.

It’s designed to look candid, but what was the reality of it?

It was incredibly staged. It’s too perfect of a composition to just happen. We positioned everyone very carefully. Even the still on the television was specifically chosen – it’s the shot in The Good, the Bad and the Ugly where he’s got him by the face. It was paused on VHS. That’s how meticulous it was.

A lot of your sleeves are photography-based. Was there a particular reason for this?

My favourite record sleeves, with the exceptions of Never Mind the Bollocks, are photographically based. I just think it’s the best way of doing it. And that’s why, in the cases of both The Verve and Oasis, there’s very little intrusion with type or logos.

With The Verve, the logo would be in the shot, and with Oasis, the logo would be in the top corner. We’d spend ages coming up for the idea and staging the shoot, we didn’t want to ruin it by plastering a logo in front of it.

It seemed like there was definite styles for each band you worked with. Your covers for The Verve always had real text in the photo. Was that a faff to do that? Setting the letters on fire on the Storm in Heaven cover looked tough.

Yes, it was. I had the letters made by a steel fabricator in Oldham, and covered them with this cladding that street jugglers use when they’re juggling fire, and then poured paraffin onto it. The only downside was that the letters gave off loads of smoke – and because we were in a cave, it just wouldn’t clear. We were having to wait about half an hour in-between each shot for the smoke to clear.

Where did the idea for that one come from?

I’d never seen letters set on fire and photographed before, but I just thought it’d look good. I do a lot of lecturing at colleges, and I always say, much to the chagrin of the lecturers, that you don’t have to explain everything away. Some things you just do because they look good – there’s no further explanation required.

Very true. Maybe a tough question, especially considering what you’ve just said… but what makes a good record cover?

What makes a good record? You just know, don’t you? There can be a thousand reasons why one might be bad, but I can’t think of one reason why one will be good. There’s no formula to it. It’s down to the individual too – it’s all opinion.

What do you think the purpose of a record cover is? Is it marketing, or is it art?

I don’t think it’s a marketing tool — I’d regard it as a bonus for the fans. I don’t think it sells records. I’ve bought the odd record because of the sleeve, but then again, I’m a sleeve designer.

Were the covers always influenced by the music – or sometimes did you just have an idea you wanted to use on something?

No — that never happened. We were quite vehement about that. Every sleeve was like a bespoke suit, cut for that particular piece of music.

From what I’ve read, you weren’t just some guy in an office sending off designs to the bands – you were involved with the bands a lot more, going on tours and things like that.

I was of the opinion that the more I got my head around what the band were into and how they thought, the better the visuals could be… and hanging around with a rock and roll band is good fun. I toured American with both Oasis and The Verve, but it was mad, because I was the only person on the tour-bus who had nothing to do.

What was it like being around those bands when they suddenly became massive?

It was all a bit weird really. Anybody will tell you this – the best bit of any band is that bit when they just start taking off. The best bits are when it’s still pretty innocent.

Did you have a few people working for you by that point?

Yeah – but it was never massive. At Microdot’s peak, there was five or six of us. In the late 90s we started branching out into all sorts of mad stuff. We were running night-clubs, we were publishing magazines, we were managing bands… at one point there was talk of importing Volkswagen Beetles from Mexico.

A brilliant idea.

I’d gone to Mexico on holiday, and I kept seeing these old Beetles. They were still making them there, and we’d worked out that if we shipped them back to England, and even if we turned them right hand drive, we could still make £2,000 on every one we sold. If we sold 500 of them, we’d make a million quid.

We were all set to go, but Volkswagen head office in Germany had told the Mexicans they couldn’t sell us the cars, as they reckoned it’d harm the Golf market in the UK.

But it would have been mint.

I know. So we then tried the Brazilians as they were making them there too – and this was so Microdot it was untrue. On the street in Shoreditch where we had our studio, there was a little café called Franco’s that was run by a Portuguese family. Now they don’t speak Spanish in Brazil – they speak Portuguese, so I went in to Franco’s one day and I said I’d give the man who worked behind the counter a tenner if he’d come to the office, and speak down the phone to Volkswagen HQ in Sao Paulo. He did it, but it still didn’t happen.

What do you mean by things being, “so Microdot.” Was there a certain attitude there?

Absolutely. The reason why it was like that was because I didn’t have any experience of working in an agency. I had no idea how things should be done — we were just making things up as we were going along.

It was bonkers. When we moved to London, we had enough money from Alan McGee to buy this computer, and to set up a studio in Shoreditch. But in this mad rush to move to London, I’d forgotten that we needed somewhere to live, so me and Matt, the lad who worked with me, had to live in the studio. There was one room, and a toilet, and we lived in there for four months. We had a couch that you could take the cushions off, and we’d take it in turns every night – one of us sleeping on the couch, one of us sleeping on the cushions on the floor.

And we could party hard, because we knew that the only person we had to answer to the following day had been out with us previous night – there was no way Noel Gallagher was going to ring us at nine in the morning, because we’d just left him at seven in the morning. There’d be occasions when a client would turn up, and there’d be somebody asleep on the floor in the studio.

Nowadays you do all sorts of stuff – and amongst various design bits, you’ve been photographing northern soul nights. How did this come about?

That was a massive project for me. It started in 2012, when the renaissance was under way. A friend of mine from Wigan said that I should go along to this club run by these kids who were into northern soul.

I was very aware that when you take photographs of people dancing in dark rooms, they just look like statues at a wedding, but I wanted to get some soul or some atmosphere into the shot, so I thought I’ll use an off-camera flash.

I went to this club-night with my mate John, who was going to be my lighting guy, holding my flash in his hand, at a 45 degree angle to me. But when we get there, his phone rings — his wife was pregnant and her car had got a puncture — so that was my lighting gone. So I just put the light on the stage or on the floor, and worked around that, and the results I got were astonishing, purely by accident – I got these massive long shadows, cast from behind.

I suppose that comes from the same place as your record covers – you’re a fan.

Absolutely. Growing up in Wigan in the 1970s made it kind of inevitable to be a northern soul fan.

Alright, I think I’ve pretty much ran out of questions now. Have you got any wise words or anything to finish this off?

Never give in.

[fromtheringapron]

Reviewing Google Audience Reviews of WWE Raw

One day, I searched Monday Night Raw on Google for reasons even unbeknownst to me. What is it out of boredom? A sliver of hope that I’d discover Raw had been canceled and replaced with a rebooted Prime Time Wrestling? I don’t know, but I did stumble upon some treasure in my aimless journey: Google Audience Reviews of Raw! This is apparently a new feature to Google. It allows people like you and I to give our baseless, uninformed opinions on any TV show at any time. Isn’t the Internet great?

But, man, if that wasn’t good enough, the real treasure are the reviews themselves. Such an intriguing look into the jaded, ignorant, infuriating, hilarious, and naive group of folks who make up WWE’s fanbase. The thing about the Internet, for better or worse, is that it gives a platform for all sorts of people to voice their opinion, even on a silly wrestling show. However, I’d like to think that also means it gives me the platform to give my opinion on their opinion. There are countless Raw reviews in this new section of Google, but here are a few that have really caught my eye:

Review #27: The AEW Truther

Okay, I’ll start out by sussing out some bullshit: All Elite Wrestling has a lot of promise, but we need to stop with the narrative that they’re going to be breathing down the WWE’s neck right out of the gate. They haven’t even put on their first show and don’t have a TV deal. In addition, outside of the diehard Internet fans and wrestling journalists, the casual fan who tunes into Raw isn’t going to give a fuck about AEW, mainly because they haven’t heard of it. So, no, “us Pro Wrestling fans” aren’t just going to turn to that. Again, it’s got potential and the excitement over it is valid, but I can’t help but feel the ones hyping it up the most will be the first to voice their disappointment when it doesn’t match even a fraction of what they expected.

With all of that said, I absolutely agree with this fan on the egregiousness of WWE putting an actual fascist dickhead and a convicted rapist into their Hall of Fame, especially when there’s inexplicably more rage geared toward the likes of Koko B. Ware and Torrie Wilson getting inducted, two people who were company employees for several years. I’m usually never the one to be up in arms over who gets inducted in the Hall of Fame because it’s a fake hall for a fake sport at the end of the day, but I do earnestly believe the focus should be on the workers who clocked in the hours.

Review #352: The Benoit Truther

Look, even though many will disagree, it’s okay for you to think Daniel Bryan sucks. Everyone has their own unique set of faves and least faves, and yours is no less valid than anyone else’s. Consensus in the fan community is boring, anyway.

Well, within reason anyway, because I’d like to think that the probability of Chris Benoit rotting in Hell right now is something we can all agree on. And, honestly, still listing Benoit as the greatest of all time feels wrong on a deep, moral level. The dude did some great things in his career, yes, but that’s besides the point. That doesn’t cancel out that he murdered his wife and son. Is defending the name of someone who will always be associated with a slaughtered family a hill you really want to fight on?

I don’t want to make it seem a comment like this is totally uncommon. It’s not much different from the various Youtube comments that linger on to this day about how Benoit should be inducted into the Hall of Fame. It still infuriates me though, largely because it feeds into the cesspool of Benoit apologia that’s only swelled since that fateful weekend in 2007. It’s the kind of language that words Benoit as ultimately a tragic figure whose poor brain was so damaged that his crimes were practically unavoidable, an explanation that wouldn’t be afforded to him if he weren’t so widely regarded by smarky wrestling bros. And that’s a bunch of shit.

The first half of the review isn’t so bad, which is why I didn’t include it. Maybe this fan just isn’t aware of what they’re saying, and I get that, but intentions can only go so far with me. The scariest part though? 78 people found the review helpful. The most of any review I’ve seen so far.  Fuckin’ balls.

Review #658: The Anti-Bullying Crusader

Okay, so I kinda love this. It’s such a nice reminder in a time where kayfabe is long dead and the WWE roster, regardless of heel/face alignment, will post pics with each other out in the town on social media that there are still fans who eat all of this shit up. I obviously know nothing about this person, but the review conjures up the image of an ornery senior citizen sitting ringside ready to whack those dastardly heels with a cane.

The bullying argument is hilarious. We all know WWE’s anti-bullying campaign Be A Star is hypocritical, disingenuous bullshit, largely birthed out of Linda McMahon’s failed run in politics. Like, how many of their storylines involve and normalize bullying? How many times have guys like The Rock and John Cena engaged in homophobic and misogynistic taunting on-screen over the years? There’s nothing wrong with informing your younger viewers on why bullying in real life is wrong, but you can’t deny the WWE has certainly trivialized the message. 

And it’s even more ridiculous when someone stops watching because of all the fake, scripted bullying on the show. Honestly, my friend, what are you expecting out of a wrestling product then? Bobby Roode vs. Heath Slater in a Handshake Contest? Also, this fan has been watching since they were five years old, no doubt remembering a more innocent time where Steve Austin would give the Stunner to someone who completely didn’t deserve that. 

I also love the last line. After bashing Raw for its bully-enabling platform, they at least concede that the ladies are killing it right now. Such an encouraging feminist stance!

Review #229: Everyone Had Fun and Nobody Got Hurt

Um, what? I do get what this fan is saying in the sense that, yes, wrestling is just play fighting, but “their policy of no violence”? Do I need to bring up that Roode/Slater handshake battle for the ages? And the wrestlers may sell fake injuries on TV all the time, but they can sustain injuries that are real as hell and carry some severe long-term repercussions. I feel like I’m being way too harsh, but come on now. If you’ve been watching since 1999, you’ve probably seen plenty of guys take unnecessary, dangerous bumps that shorten their careers. Watching even a small bit of Mick Foley’s work can probably tell you that.

With that said, I do love the refreshing stance in loving wrestling because it’s scripted. People usually hate on wrestling for that reason alone, largely because the business has historically gone to great lengths to make it seem real. It’s great to have someone who basically says, “You know, this is scripted bullshit and I’m okay with it.” And honestly, girl, I feel the same way. We need more people like us.

Review #44: Garden Variety Lapsed Fan #15,712

This certainly is a take. I can’t comment on what it’s like in other fandoms, but so many wrestling fans love to engage in the narrative that WWE stopped being good a long while ago and the current product is the worst it’s ever been but because they’re such a diehard fans they’ll stick around until it gets good again and willingly suffer through all of it due to the innate goodness in their hearts or some shit. The only difference in each of these arguments is that the date of the tipping point always changes. There are fans right now who’ll tell you WWE circa 2019 is the worst it’s ever been, but this was also true back when I first started traversing the Internet back in 2004 or 2005 and fans then were talking how that period was the worst it had ever been.

With that in mind, I find this review a bit refreshing in the face of Attitude Era truthers, who’ll repeatedly tell you wrestling, and seemingly all of pop culture, stopped being good sometime in the early 2000s. But as we near closer and closer to 20 years since that era ended, the more likely we are to see younger fans who have no real nostalgia for it. It won’t be long until we hear more and more talk about the salad days of Roman Reigns, Braun Strowman, and others. This fan says WWE stopped being good in late 2016/early 2017, which obviously wasn’t that long ago. I’m sure some fan daydreaming about the days of the Monday Night Wars would find this completely baffling.

It begs the question: when exactly was the WWE good? Has it ever been good? I don’t think any one answer is the sole correct one. None of these perspectives are invalid by any means. Every era of wrestling has had its pros and cons, and everyone has their own set of standards on what they consider a quality wrestling product. And, to be real, I don’t want to excuse the WWE of their shitty, at times irredeemable, booking and creative decisions. Fans have been driven away for numerous, valid reasons over the years.

But there’s that whole notion that nothing can ever bring back those early feelings of puppy love, and that’s just as true with the way wrestling first captivates you. Perhaps the constant frustration with present day WWE is partly the inability to rekindle what first hooked you in and never being able to recapture that feeling because, well, it’s simply not possible.

Review #788: Our Savior

We are not worthy of this review. A true diamond in the rough. So many good bits here. The prediction that Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose will compete in a “no holes barred” match, which sounds like something out of a Sean Cody wrestling parody. The invention of the “Tang Tang Championship” featuring the likes of “Pop Scott Dulson and his tag team partner." The referring of Baron Corbin as not only “Barry Korgan,” but also as “Brian Corbin.” The passage that merely says “All winding.” The passage that merely says “Bobby Lashley.” That it’s not even a review of Raw, the TV show, but more a comment on the existential nihilism we feel in the Trump era.

I’ve never seen a review that makes no sense but also says so much. I love the complete refusal of punctuation marks. Who needs those archaic things, anyway? It just makes it all one, continuous thought, a stream of consciousness that could make even James Joyce blush. I also dig the experimentation with spacing. After all, why do we need to just one space? Why not several? It’s important to give our thoughts the space they need and this fan understands that. Plus, it makes for poetic reading.

The review ends on an ominous note, with the fan’s last message being “My name Matthewhisee.” Is this meant to be a threat? A coded message of some sort? Matthewhisee, if that is your name, please let us know more. The world needs your insight. Oh, and to the 7 people who found this review helpful, you are the vanguards of the resistance. Bless you all.

[sunnyupsidedown]

And. They. Were. Roommates.

Summary: Outsider POV of Post-Canon Andreil.

Read here on [AO3]

Sue paused and replayed the clip one more time. Her eyes tracked the movement of the striker as he lofted the ball towards the net. The ball was deflected, the buzzer sounded signaling the striker’s team’s loss. Sue stopped on the close up on the opposing team’s goalie.

Perfect.

She hit control-shift-3 and saved the screenshot under Andreil proof #147. Upon close comparison of Andrew Minyard’s facial expressions when Neil Josten attempted a goal to when anyone else attempted a goal, there was an obvious difference. The flat line or slight frown was always the same but the way his eyes squished slightly when Neil attempted goals alluded to a deeper relationship than just old college teammates and professional friends.

Sue opened another tab in her browser and pulled up the post-game interviews. Neil and Brian McFarland, another striker, were in charge of fielding questions.

“Mr. Josten, how does it feel to be on the same court as your former college teammate Andrew Minyard but this time as opposing teams?”

“It feels refreshing to have a challenge from time to time,” he said with a cocky quirk of his lips.

Trent directed his next question to Brian and Sue tuned it out. They talked strategy, training, and upcoming games for the next few minutes.

Sue knew things about exy but that wasn’t really what interested her. He brother played in high school and then went on the play at a class 2 school in college. She never picked it up herself. She preferred the solitude of running to team sports.

The next question solely directed at Neil drew Sue’s attention back in.

“Though Andrew blocked your last shot, solidifying their win, you scored on him earlier. What’s the trick to getting past the infamous goalie?”

“Well Trent, Andrew is good, almost perfect I dare say, but one too many scoops of ice cream makes a player slow.”

Trent’s expression froze in confusion.

Sue’s heart froze in her throat.

Neil grinned at the camera.

Brian looked absolutely delighted. He leaned forward towards the reporter’s microphone and said, “Thank you Trent. It looks like that’s all we have time for. The showers are calling.” Brian looped his arm around Neil’s shoulder and the two strolled away from the cameras.

The camera panned back to Trent as he smoothed his expression back to newscaster blank. “Folks that was Neil Josten and Brian McFarland. Strikers for the Lansing Lions...”

Sue stopped the video. There was a lot to unpack from the video. She was going to have to be quick in analyzing if she wanted to be the first to post about it online. But first. She leaned back in her chair and pulled up her instant messenger. “Laura,” she typed, “Did you see the latest Josten interview?”

“Your footwork is sloppy.”

“Hello to you too Kevin,” Neil replied. “Thea. It’s always a pleasure.”

Kevin and Thea took the last two seats at the table. Brian could hardly contain himself sitting next to The Kevin Day. Number one striker in the league. Two-time world championship MVP. The literal Son of Exy himself.

“Neil I think he’s broken.” Andrew’s voice drifted through Brian’s fog.

“Brian? Brian.” Neil rolled his eyes. “Oh god not another one. Kev’s ego is big enough.”  Neil snapped his fingers in front of Brian’s face. Brian startled and looked away from Kevin Day. “Dude, Brian. I know it’s Kevin Day but trust me, before our food even arrives you’ll be over it. He’s not that interesting.”

“Yeah pretty boring,” chimed Andrew.

“I don’t know how you do it Thea.” Neil said.

“Well he is good at exy... among other things...” Thea said and brought her hands together in a crude gesture.

“Fuck you guys.” Kevin glared. “So Brian,” Kevin directed his gaze at him. Brian straightened in his seat. “What did you think of today’s game?”

The question felt loaded under Kevin’s intense gaze. It didn’t help that Andrew, from the opposing team, was there as well, silently sitting next to Neil, fiddling with his straw wrapper.

“Uh, well we’re still a little rough in a few places and will need to work on them but overall it wasn’t that bad of a game.” He repeated what he said to the reporters and judging by the frown of Kevin’s face it was the wrong thing to say.

“Yes but—Andrew!”

“You’ve already reached your limit on how long you can talk about exy for this meal. Pick a new topic or shut up.”

Kevin frowned at Andrew. Brian was secretly thankful. The conversation moved on to the FBI crackdown on mob activity from last month and the upcoming blizzard warning affecting most of the east coast.

Brian blinked and tried to follow the exchanges around the table. He couldn’t keep up. When Neil asked if he wanted to grab dinner with a couple of his friends that were at the game, Andrew was the least of the surprises. He wasn’t expecting Kevin Freaking Day with his fiancé and teammate Thea Muldani. Brian suspected he was sitting with half of the future Olympic exy team. Thank god the waiter came for their orders before Brian could say something stupid.

--

“Room’s all yours tonight Brian,” Neil said after paying the tab. “I’m staying at Andrew’s tonight.”

Brian raised an eyebrow. “The plane leaves first thing tomorrow. You gonna make it?”

“Don’t worry.” Andrew threw a casual arm around Neil’s shoulders and steered him towards the door. “He won’t miss it.”

Brian shrugged and waved as they parted. They must have had a lot of catching up to do since they’re both on professional exy player schedules. Brian wished he was still in contact with his college roommates, but those were bridges that have long ago collapsed from neglect.

Brian zipped his coat up to help shield against the cool Seattle night. He waved at Kevin and Thea as they got in a taxi and began the short walk back to the team’s hotel.

Besides the stuff about Neil’s father, not much was known about him. Neil was in his first professional year out of college and still getting his feet under him, but he was slowly opening up to the rest of the team. He started joining the team on drink nights and even came over for dinner to meet Brian’s wife and kid once. It was nice to get to know some of Neil’s friends for a change, but for some reason tonight, Brian couldn’t shake the feeling he was fifth wheeling on a double date.

The goal flashed red again as the buzzer called the end of the first half. The Lansing Lions were down two to their rivals the Detroit Ducks. The season was still early. The game was more a scrimmage than anything serious, but the stadium was still packed almost half and half with each team’s colors.

Tracy tapped her fingers on her leg from her seat in the press box. Neil was out early in the game due to injury. Brian was doing his best to hold fort. The striker to replace Neil was fresh out of college and was a little rough around the edges. Tracy didn’t know why they kept their goalie in when their defense was in shambles and every shot at the goalie, deflected or not seemed to bring the team’s moral down another notch. The Duck’s offense usually wasn’t as good as they are currently but a change in the coaching staff seemed to be making a large difference.

Tracy picked up her pen to jot the thought down for the post-game interview. Her excitement deflated the moment she opened her notepad and saw the note she left herself earlier. Mocking her from the top of her notepad, bolded, underlined, and circled, less she forgot like she already did, were the words “Relationship. Questions. Only.”

Sometimes she wanted to murder her boss.

“Are you familiar with the term RPF?” Her boss had asked leaning into her office earlier that day.

Tracy shook her head.

“I just found something interesting I want you to look into. What do you think the first thing that pops up when you google that Neil Josten guy?”

Tracy frowned. She wasn’t sure where this was going but she had a bad feeling. “Uh well probably the thing with his father from a while back.”

“Right, well the second thing?”

“Exy scores?” she guessed.

“No! That’s the thing,” he said like he just discovered the next big scoop. “The next result is a fan blog. The topic is theories on if Neil Josten and Andrew Minyard are in a relationship. I want you to find out tonight in the post-game interview.”

“Sir, the post-game interview is for asking questions about the game.”

“Other people can ask those questions. This is what people want to know. I want this answered in your next article.” He left no room for further protest by leaving her office.

When Tracy graduated university with a degree in journalism and mass communication, she didn’t expect to become a sports writer. She had dreams that took her across the world to report truths like her idol Anderson Cooper. But student debt had other plans and her abundance of experience reporting college football lead her to a job covering professional exy.

She didn’t hate her job. Far from it once she figured out how the sport worked. She actually enjoyed exy more than she enjoyed football. The game was interesting, the players weren’t too difficult to work with on most days, and the pay was decent. But it wasn’t for her. Five years was a long time to be at a job she didn’t want. Maybe it was time for some change.

Ten minutes slipped by in a blink of an eye. Both teams shuffled back onto the court. Tracy noted the Lion players. It looked like they were going on the defense with their defensive dealer Amber Sunderson being subbed in. The strikers were the same. One of the backliners was subbed out for Tori Wilson and Andrew Minyard was now in the goalie box. Interesting choices. Tracy scribbled in her notepad out of habit.

The game resumed and the longer it went the more obvious they were at a stalemate. Fifteen minutes in, there were attempts at the goal from both teams, but no scoring.

The referee blew the whistle for a time out. The Lions subbed out the green striker for Neil Josten and the other backliner. The change was immediate. Minutes after being put in, the Duck’s goal lit up red with a fast pass from Andrew up the court to Neil. The back and forth continued and Neil scored again bringing them to a tie. The mood of the game shifted again. Penalties left and right on both sides. Amber was subbed for their offensive dealer in the last ten minutes. Andrew blocked another goal and shot the ball to Neil. The fans began the ten second countdown. Neil caught the ball, dodged two backliners, and launched a successful pass to Brian. Brian tripped on a backliner and as he fell he shot the ball towards the goal.

The final buzzer rang. There was a split second of silence while the entire stadium held their breath. The Ducks’ goal lit up red and the world erupted in noise. The Lions bunched together in celebration, clacking rackets and slapping helmets. The Ducks grimly filed out of the court to their locker rooms.

Tracy was vibrating. Second hand adrenaline pumped through her veins, a grin stretched across her face. Her mind ran away with questions.

What was Brian feeling when he scored the game winning goal?

How was team cohesion different being on the defense in the second half when they were mainly an offensive team?

Was Neil’s arm alright?

The Ducks were a different team from last season with this being their first season with their new head coach. Their offense was stronger than before and this game showed it.

Tracy gathered her stuff. If she didn’t hurry she would miss her chance for an interview.

Her phone buzzed. Checking the message, she frowned. It was a text from her boss. All the excitement from the game drained. Her face pinched in frustration but she didn’t slow her pace. She might as well get it over with.

--

Neil and Andrew stopped in front of the press wall and waited expectantly for the questions to begin. Tracy did her best to convey her regrets in her eyes and asked the first question.

“There are rumors going around that you two are an item. Care to shed some light on the situation?” Tracy felt slimy just from voicing the question out loud.

“Oh. This isn’t like you,” Andrew replied immediately. “I normally like you.”

Tracy did her best the keep a pleasant smile on her face while she held her recorder up.

“You’re serious?” Neil piped in. “Nope. Not happening. Next question.”

Tracy refused to let out the built up sigh in her chest and flipped a page in her notebook. “In an interview with Kevin Day last week, he mentioned going out on double dates. Do you two go with him and Thea Muldani?”

“Hmmm, thank you, next.”

“From being former college teammates to now being professional teammates, how has your relationship changed?”

“How do you even come up with these questions? Next.”

“Um, it has come the attention of some of the fans that Andrew is often seen around your apartment Neil. Could there be some sort of special relationship going on?” Tracy hated how each question was asking the same thing but from different angles. Interviewing was supposed to be a conversation with questions as gentle guiding points. Her boss was an idiot.

“Do you have any exy related questions or is this all just for the sake of gossip? Like I can give you the stuff I usually say to those reporters, but I haven’t as a courtesy to how you usually are.”

“Are you being blackmailed?” Andrew asked. “Blink twice for yes.”

Tracy let the sigh escape now. “Just one more. Are you two roommates?”

Neil rolled his eyes. “Well yeah. Anything else?”

Tracy wanted to cry with joy. She got some type of answer and if her boss didn’t like it he can come out here and interview them himself. Tracy flipped the page in her book again and reached the end of the list of horror.

“If you don’t have anything else, we’re gonna go hit the showers,” Neil said and began turning away.

“The Ducks typically lack offensive strength but it seems like they brought it to the game this evening. What do you two think about the Ducks’ new play style? Are there any plans in place to accommodate for the change?” She burst out before she missed her chance.

“Ah yes. Finally, an exy question.”

--

Tracy slumped through the lobby barefoot, high heels dangling in her hand. She never really understood why people wore heels to sporting events. Athletic event should require athletic shoes for everyone, not just the athletes.

It was late. She didn’t mean to get sidetracked drafting the next day’s article. The only ones left were the custodians. She made it out into the cool autumn night. The stars hid behind the overcast sky. She walked carefully to avoid rocks and glass to get to her car in the reserved parking lot. Halfway there she paused when she noticed someone else was still there. Sitting on a car more expensive than what she made in three years was Neil and Andrew.

Neil sat with one leg pulled up and one leg out. In his hand was a cigarette that didn’t look like he was smoking. The surprising thing was Andrew. He was leaning on Neil’s shoulder. The clouds parted and Tracy could see that he was asleep.

Neil looked up and their eyes locked. His eyes, blue and icy were not quite a threat but not nearly nice enough to be a warning. Slowly as to not disturb Andrew’s slumber, Neil brought his index finger up to his lips for silence. Unconsciously Tracy did the same and Neil smiled. It was something cold and terrible. Different from the face he put up in front of crowds. More private. The real Neil. The boy who was on the run for nine years before his demons caught him. Tracy read the stories; she saw the news.

She held back a shiver and quickly made her way to her car without looking back. Her boss was going to have to deal with the normal exy questions or she was going to quit on the spot.

“Well Marcus that’s about it for the introductions. The rest will be handled as they come up. For now, here’s your office. It’s shared with the other interns. You can decorate your space however you want. I’ll leave you here to familiarize yourself and to go over the athletes you’ll be helping with. I have a call I have to make, but I’ll be back in about thirty minutes to give you a tour of the facilities and maybe we can catch the team finishing practice.”  Sarah turned and left Marcus in the cramped, little office.

He sat in his new chair. The office had two other desks that were in various states of disarray. He didn’t know if his office mates were in or not but he currently had the place to himself. He grinned in excitement. He was finally taking bigger steps towards his future goals. The application process for the internship was rigorous but as he examined the folders on his desk, he knew it was worth it every hoop he had to jump through. His desk was spotless except for the small stack of folders. The top four were blue. They were the athletes he would be working with for the next year. He opened the first one.

Tori Wilson was the backliner from Ohio State University. She’s been on the team for three years and she frequently donates to local Women shelters.

Evan Smith was twenty-four and going into his second year as a striker for the Lions. Most of the charities he liked to work with involved children.

He flipped over the next one.

Andrew Minyard. Marcus paused. He sounded vaguely familiar but he couldn’t quite place why. He skimmed his bio and flipped to his final blue folder.

The last one he did actually recognize. It was such a big news story that it made it out of exy news and onto mainstream news. The blue eyes of Neil Josten stared back up at him and Andrew’s position clicked into place. They were collegiate teammates and now on the same professional team as well as two members of the winning 2012 US Olympic team. Saying he was a little star struck would be an understatement. He had no idea why Sarah thought he would be qualified enough to help with the public relations for two big name players like them. He could only hope he wouldn’t mess up and end up dead in a ditch somewhere.

“Are you ready for that tour?” Sarah popped her head in and Marcus almost dropped his folders everywhere.

“Yeah sure let’s go,” he replied setting the folders down on his desk.

--

Sarah took Marcus around the facility. On the way she gave historic tidbits on the Lions and told stories of some of the players she’s worked with in the past. Eventually they entered a room with a few couches in a circle, a mini kitchen in the corner, and doors lined on both sides of the room.

“This area is the team room. They mainly use it to hang out or have team meetings. In the corner over there is the fueling station though there are more options available in the cafeteria which I will bring you by later. This room connects to the men’s and women’s locker rooms. The locker rooms both have an entrance to the court but the team typically meets in this room before heading out to the court. The door over there leads to the film room also known as the video game room. Do not challenge Amber to Mario Kart. No matter how good you think you are, she’s better.” Sarah’s spiel was interrupted by some stomping coming from the court doors. “Ah they must be done. Brace yourself Marcus.”

“Wha-”

The doors to the court burst open as one of the players rushed through. “Get back here Evan! I will make you eat those words” followed him along with a bout of laughter.

Evan looked around briefly before his eyes landed on Sarah and Marcus. “Hide me!”

Sarah smiled and pointed to one of the rooms.

Evan ran for cover.

Soon after another player walked through the doors. Her helmet was off and her long brown hair was coming undone from her braid. Her eyes scanned the room like Evan’s did. “Where is he?” She bit out.

Sarah smiled and pointed to the same room and the woman stormed over. “Sit down Evan Taylor Smith. Only cowards run.” There was a betrayed scream and the door slammed shut. Moments later the telltale Nintendo Wii startup noise blared.

“That was Amber Sunderson and Evan Smith. Trust me, whatever Evan did, he deserved it.” Sarah explained.

The rest of the team trickled in. Marcus spotted Tori in the mix. Her hair was shorter than her profile picture.

The players gave quiet greetings to Sarah and curious nods to Marcus. When it looked like the whole team was in Sarah cleared her throat. “Listen up kiddos. This here is Marcus and he’s the new PR intern,” Sarah paused and Marcus waved. “Please leave a good impression and be on your best behavior for the rest of forever.”

“Oh Sarah you know that’s impossible,” one of the players said while some of the others laughed. “Evan already ran through here didn’t he?”

“Well, don’t scare him off. Wilson, Minyard, Josten. Front and center.” Tori stepped forward. The rest of the team cleared out heading to the fueling station or the locker rooms.

“Where’s Minyard and Josten?” Sarah asked after a moment.

“Minyard’s probably trying to peel Josten off the court,” Tori answered with a shrug. “It was one of those practices.”

The court doors opened again and the two shortest people Marcus has ever seen passed the age of ten walked through. Marcus towered over them. Tori and Sarah towered over them. Marcus’s nine-year-old cousin would tower over them. Marcus did his best to keep his face neutral.

The two walked closely together. Neil looked to be explaining something but Marcus’s two years of his major’s language requirement wasn’t enough to understand his German. They automatically stopped when they got by them.

“Hm, who’s this?” Neil asked.

“Hi, I’m Marcus. The new PR intern. I’ll be working with you three and Evan in the future.” Marcus stuck out his hand to Andrew who was closest.

Andrew stared at Marcus’s outstretched hand, but didn’t take it.

Marcus shifted his gaze to Neil.

Neil stared back without doing anything.

Someone snorted in the background.

Marcus slowly dropped his hand. “Okay.”

Tori took pity on him and reached out her hand, but it was too late. It already spiraled into awkward. “It’s nice to meet you Marcus,” she said with a pleasant smile. “Don’t mind these assholes.”

Marcus shook her hand. “Thank you, it’s nice to meet you too.”

“Well we won’t hold you guys up here. Gotta finish the tour. We’ll see you tomorrow for the photoshoot with Make-A-Wish. Okay?”

--

Working with Tori, Evan, Andrew, and Neil wasn’t as bad as he thought it would be. Well. Working with Tori and Evan was always a pleasure. Neil was hit or miss with the shooter being legally blind and shooting in the dark at a target a mile away, but he was agreeable, excited to participate in events. Things only went south when someone asked about his father. Which despite the incident happening over five years ago, was a topic that came up far too often. And Andrew… difficult was not the correct term to describe working with him. He attended events and stayed for the required time but nothing more, answered questions in the most efficient ways possible, posed for pictures with a considerate distance between himself and the others. There existed an air of hostility around him that was impossible to penetrate. It made Marcus a little nervous like he was back in college walking home from a late night study session through the sketchy neighborhood because it was the quickest way home. He’s been mugged once and he survived. He could handle Andrew.

Marcus looked up from his computer screen after hitting send on his last email of the day. He leaned back in his chair, popping his back. His two office mates already left for the day. Marcus started closing windows on his computer to shut it down. His eyes landed on two folded shirts sitting on the edge of his desk. The shirts that Andrew and Neil were to wear at a charity event they were attending early the next morning. The shirts Marcus was supposed to give them before they went home for the day. Marcus checked his watch. They were long gone.

Marcus mentally went through his options. They were going straight to the event and it was an early start tomorrow with a little drive so it wouldn’t be reasonable to ask them to stop by the office to pick them up. Sarah was going with them so Marcus couldn’t just give it to them when they got to the event. Sarah lived thirty minutes in good traffic the opposite direction of Marcus’s apartment. It was currently rush hour. Neil lived in Marcus’s general area. He could drop the shirts off at his place. Now that Marcus thought about it, so did Andrew. But who was scarier to call?

After figuring out that Andrew had a sweet tooth and was more amiable towards events that either revolved around sweets or had copious amounts of them on the food tables, working with him was easier. He even found out that it was possible to bribe him with sweets. Tomorrow’s event involved lots cake and ice cream.

Neil picked up on the third ring and gave Marcus his address.

Traffic was light that evening and Marcus was parking in the drop-off section of Neil’s apartment in no time. “Hey Neil I’m downstairs,” Marcus said into his phone.

“Okay I’ll buzz you up. Fifth floor. 505. Door’s open. Don’t let the cats out.” Neil abruptly cut off and the door buzzed.

Marcus found his way upstairs. He knocked gently on 505 before turning the knob to open the door. Immediately a ball of fuzz ran for freedom. Marcus blocked them with his feet. The cat looked up at him, meowed, then sauntered off deeper into the apartment. Another cat sat perched on a side table and followed Marcus’s movements as he walked down the short hallway to the rest of the apartment.

The hallway emptied into a kitchen and living room area with an island separating the two. The kitchen was spacious with granite countertops, light wood cabinets, and matching stainless steel appliances. He walked in and had to choke on a laugh. Neil was grabbing something from one of the cabinets and he was standing on an honest to god step stool. The worst part was that it wasn’t tall enough; it was essentially a step stool so he could climb on the counter easier. Marcus did his best to keep a straight face. The muscles in his cheeks strained to keep his laughter in.

“Hey Marcus. You can set the shirt on the island.”

“Okay, do you mind giving Andrew’s to him tomorrow?”

“Hm, yeah,” Neil said while climbing down with the mixing bowl he was grabbing.

Marcus let his eyes wonder for a moment. The apartment was nicer, cleaner, more decorated than Marcus expected. There were side tables, lamps, pieces of art, things that Marcus couldn’t see a man like Neil putting thought into buying let alone arranging. On the counter, two plates were set up. The drying rack by the sink held mugs, bowls, and silverware in two’s. Marcus suddenly felt like he was intruding, but curiosity pushed him to ask anyway: “Do you live with someone?”

“Mhmm, he should be back soon,” Neil said. One of the cats from earlier rushed back towards the entrance. The front door clicked open soon after. “Oh speak of the devil.”

“King. Don’t you dare.” Andrew Minyard stopped the cat from bolting out the door. In his hands were a couple grocery bags. He looked up and their eyes met. “Marcus.”

“Andrew.”

“Why?”

“Shirts.”

Andrew nodded and set the groceries on the counter.

“Well, here are the shirts. Event starts at eight sharp. Don’t be late. I’ll see you when you’re done. Bye.” Marcus didn’t exactly run out of the apartment, but he didn’t want to be there longer than he should be. It was their private life and he didn’t want them to feel forced to share something they weren’t ready to share.

Marcus knew. The entire team knew. They weren’t very subtle, but somehow the general public had yet to pick up on it.

Marcus had no idea how to handle the information, besides the obvious of not saying anything. He had to stop in the hallway. They had cats together. Neil Josten was in the process of making cookies. For all Andrew liked sweets, Neil avoided them. There was a photograph, the details flooded Marcus’s mind now that he was out of the apartment, of Andrew and Neil hung up in the hallway. Andrew was actually smiling.

He was calling Sarah before he knew it. He could hear car horns in the background when she picked up. “Sarah. They’re roommates.”

She paused on the line with a little laugh. “Oh yeah. They are roommates.”

Neil scrolled through his Facebook feed mentally planning the next time he’ll be free so he could visit Dan and Matt.

The bedroom light switched off signally Andrew’s arrival. It was 9:30pm and his weekly crime show just finished. The room was still illuminated by a lamp on the night stand, a silent argument Andrew would never win about having a lamp and the overhead light on at the same time.

Andrew walked over and pushed Neil back to his side of the bed. He sat up against the headboard, a book in his lap and reading glasses on his nose. Neil moved back over.

After catching up with the people he cared about, he switched over to check his Snapchat. He had a couple notifications from Allison, one from Matt, one from Team Snapchat, and several from Nicky. He clicked through and replied with photos of his ceiling. On Nicky’s last snap was a picture of him and Erik wishing them a Happy National Boyfriend’s day.

“Hey Andrew. Yes or no?”

Andrew side eyed Neil. Neil tried to hide his grin. “Yes.”

Neil sat up next to Andrew and pulled him to his side. “Say cheese.”

Andrew didn’t smile. Neil did for both of them while he planted a light kiss on his cheek. Neil pulled away and started typing a reply.

“Five seconds.” A hand grabbed the top of his phone. Neil typed faster.

“Three... Two...”

Neil selected Nicky, the top option, and hit send.

“One, junkie.” Andrew slipped the phone from Neil’s hands and pulled him into a real kiss.

Marcus scrolled through his Tumblr feed liking and reblogging at speed. It was late and he hated his need to get to the bottom of feed every night before going to bed. He didn’t even follow that many blogs but the ones he did follow posted frequently. At night. When he’s trying to go to bed. He paused his scrolling to open a snap from his old college roommate. He replied and decided that he might as well reply to all his snaps and finally get rid of the little red notification that has been plaguing the aesthetic of his phone screen for weeks. He was already an hour passed when he should be sleeping so another thirty minutes wouldn’t make much of a difference.

There was something new by Neil’s name. They’ve never snapped and he didn’t think he would start now. Marcus clicked on it and a photo popped up. It disappeared before he could fully comprehend what he saw. Where the icon was a replay icon appeared and Marcus clicked it again. It was a snap of Neil kissing Andrew’s cheek wishing some people named Nicky and Erik a Happy National Boyfriend’s day. Which was fine but Marcus didn’t know if it was supposed to go on whatever new function Snapchat had released. The public didn’t know that they were an official couple yet. Marcus had no idea how they haven’t figured it out. Though he supposed that most interactions with the public were exy games and stiff interviews. The media would have a field day. Marcus could already see the masses of emails he’d have in the morning.

Marcus checked the snap from Team Snapchat and relaxed. Only people who followed Neil could see them. So friends. Why would anyone follow someone if they wouldn’t follow back anyway?

Sue startled awake when her phone went off. It didn’t feel right. She just went to sleep so there was no way it was already morning. She heard her roommate groan and turn over. A moment later, it clicked into place. It was her ringtone and not her alarm. She quickly picked up her phone only to pull it away from her ear when Laura shrieked.

“Laura, what the fuck? It’s…” Sue squinted at the red light of her roommate’s alarm clock. “It’s 3AM. I have a test in the morning.”

“Sue! This is important! Check your Snapchat! Then call back!” Laura abruptly hung up.

Sue blindly navigated to the app. The white light burned her eyes. She didn’t have any notifications. Sue was going to punch Laura the next time she saw her. She scrolled down her contacts just in case and froze when she saw something next to Neil Josten’s name.

Sue sat up so fast she got vertigo. She followed Neil the moment she knew he had a Snapchat. He didn’t follow back and she didn’t expect him to, but at that moment, she was glad she did.

She clicked on the circle next to Neil’s name and screamed.

Brian checked his watch again. Neil was late to their morning lift session and Neil was never late. “Hey Evan, have you seen Josten?”

“Josten and Minyard were called in by Sarah this morning,” Evan replied without looking up from texting on his phone.

“Oh, why?”

“Didn’t you hear? Check your Snapchat.”

“You know I don’t do social media.”

“Oh yeah.” Evan tapped on his phone some more before handing it to Brian. “Here. There’s a new function on Snapchat called Stories and this was posted on Neil’s this morning. Probably by accident.”

Brian took the phone and snorted. “I bet they’re having fun right now.”

“Lol you should have seen Sarah’s face; she looked so stressed.”

Tracy set her briefcase down in her office. She frowned at the dust covering her desk. She was only gone for a month. She left her office to hunt down some paper towels.

Her last scoop took her away overseas. Between investigations, she was able to travel around the area. She got to try new foods, learn about the culture, make friends with some of the locals. It was exciting and she loved each and every moment.

When she got back to her office, she could hear the sound of her personal cellphone’s ringtone softly chiming through her briefcase.

“Hello Sarah. It’s been a while,” she said picking up the phone.

“Hey Tracy.” Sarah’s voice sounded a little frantic. Paper could be heard shuffling in the background. Someone was screaming? Tracy wasn’t sure.

“Everything alright over there? You still working with the Lions?”

“Yeah. Are you in town? I’m gonna have to call in that favor.”

“I’m in town. Just got back yesterday. What’s up?”

“You know Neil and Andrew right? They finally came out. Kind of. I’ll update you when you get here. They refused an official press conference but agreed to an interview on the condition that you did it.”

Tracy raised an eyebrow. “Me?”

“I know this isn’t your thing anymore, but they insisted.”

“Uhh…” Tracy remembered the cold smile that stretched across Neil’s face that night in the parking lot. It haunted her dreams some nights when the temperature dropped outside. But she also remembered the careful way Neil moved around Andrew’s sleeping form, the soft way he cradled his head with his arms. They were people like the ones in her articles at her new job. It wasn’t going to be about exy like her previous articles about them. It wasn’t going to be about rumors and gossip like the article that made her quit. It was going to be about their truth. “Yeah. I can do that. I’ll be over in thirty minutes.”

[AO3] [Extra content]

[shy-violet-soul]

The Box in Room 11

Characters:  Sam & Dean Winchester Rating: E for everyone Warnings: bittersweet fluff Word count:  1,600-ish A/N:  I think the first time I fell in love with these brothers’ history was 1:18, when Dean gave up his Lucky Charms for Sammy.  His too-grown-up sacrifice broke my heart.  Baby Sammy’s smiling, innocent offer of the prize in the box melted the broken heart pieces.  And that moment kickstarted the muse.

A huge thank you to the awesome SPN fic writers who showered some beta magic on this!  Thank you, thank you @crispychrissy and @thesassywallflower!

Supernatural characters belong to CW and their creators.  This is a work of fiction.  Please do not repost without my permission.

Dreamstime.com by Kjrstudio, & creators (I searched & couldn’t find owners, sorry!)

There’s a box in Room 11 that is precious to both the brothers.

One of them knows about it.  One of them doesn’t.

While scrounging the nooks and crannies of the bunker, Dean found the old trunk in the storage room.  Sturdy, sizeable, it smelled soothingly of cedar as he centered it carefully at the end of his bed.  In one corner sat the old baseball glove Bobby gave him as a boy.  The leather was scuffed, worn shiny in some places, a bit cracked in others.  Tucked underneath it was the only yearbook he ever got - junior year, 1995, Shadyside Tigers.  His dad’s US Marines cap lay upside down, a medal engraved with ‘New York State Youth Association - Wrestling Champion’ inside it with the red and blue ribbon carefully folded.  His first fake ID’s rubberbanded together - ‘Brian Wilson, Bikini Inspector’; ‘William Greer, IRS’; ‘Robert Palmer, CDC’.  The antique pocket watch Pastor Jim gave him when he turned eighteen, the 1988 ‘Sports Illustrated’ with Elle McPherson he stole from a guy’s locker in the 5th grade, a handful of prize tickets from a county fair he’d taken Cassie Robinson to rounded out the collection of mementos from his younger years.

And there was the box.

The old ‘Bank Note’ cigar box looked ordinary.  Unremarkable.  If you lifted it to your nose and sniffed deeply, you could still catch a whiff of bitter tobacco.  It had been carted around for twenty-odd years, shoved under dirty socks, ammo, and a crumpled sandwich bag of matchbooks. The odd scratch here and there, the ragged corners spoke of long handling.  As beat up as the box was, it held Dean’s most priceless treasures.

Nestled dead center in a place of honor lay the very first treasure from decades past.  Fort Douglas, Wisconsin.  Nine or ten year old Dean, already a world-weary parent.  Another night of dad leaving them alone.  A dumped out bowl of Spagetti-o’s, and the sacrifice of the last bit of Lucky Charms he’d saved for himself.  And Sammy’s first gift - the coveted prize in the box.

To anyone else, the little plastic car meant nothing.  To Dean, it meant the world.  Their childhood didn’t include many frivolities.  Crayons weren’t allowed in the backseat after the melting incident; their dwindling plastic soldier army had seen some troops go AWOL; and the Legos not in the vents had been lost in dribbles in countless motels and fast food stops.  The boys knew better than to ask for anything.  But Dean had watched Sam stare at the Hot Wheels cars and super hero action figures stacked up on the endcaps of Gas n’ Sips across the entire midwest.  At his young age, he couldn’t name the feeling that put a knot in his belly at the sight of little Sammy going without even a toy.  So, a car, hot rod red, with wheels that shot it forward when you rolled it backwards?  A prize of the highest degree.  And little Sammy had given it to him.  So, it had been the first treasure in the box.  

A few months later, he’d been ready to pound on his baby brother when he’d come out from showering to see every bowl, cup, and plate in the puke-green kitchenette filled to overflowing with Corn Flakes from the brand new box.  As Dean drew in a breath to threaten the little runt’s life, Sammy had smiled with dimpling delight as he trotted to him with outstretched hands.  His pudgy little fingers offered up a genuine Starbot robot, complete with punching arm.

He’d tried to insist Sam keep it, but the little twerp turned those puppy dog eyes on him and he caved.  He covered up his true pleasure by gruffly ordering him to clean up the mess.  Too grown-up to show how happy he was over a toy, Dean waited until Sammy was asleep before carefully placing the little grey plastic robot in with the red car.

Months passed, filled with shorter pant legs and outgrown, too-tight shoes.  The collection in the box grew, too.  A color-changing spoon from a box of Trix.  A yellow, rooster-shaped bike reflector from another box of Corn Flakes.  A box of Rice Krispies produced a baking soda submarine.  And, their personal favorite, a ghost detector courtesy of Apple Jacks.  He couldn’t remember how many days they’d spent laughing over that thing.  

But Dean never forgot the unabashed joy on his little brother’s face whenever he presented him with a new gift.

Every once in a while, when Dean reorganized the chest contents or was searching for the beef jerky, he’d open that cigar box.  One long finger would stir through the trinkets, mouth quirking in a soft smile.  Each one held a memory that he hoarded up selfishly.  But one - one was particularly special.

Sam had just turned ten.  He could remember the glint of the dollar coins in the sun as Bobby flipped them to him, one right after the other - five whole dollars for a birthday gift.  Even now, he smiled again as he remembered the excited astonishment on his little brother’s face.  After hours on the road and a stop at Gas n’ Sip, John had installed the boys in a motel room before leaving to chase down a lead.  Dean had kept his shower short, hoping to see if this motel had cable before bedtime.  The scene that greeted him at the wobbly kitchen table gave him pause.

Six boxes of Cracker Jack sat scattered across the dented, scratched surface.  The caramel-popcorn treat had been poured into an elephant-shaped cookie jar from the counter. Dean stepped closer, popping a few pieces into his mouth as he glanced at his brother.  He and his dad were big fans of the sweet & salty snack, but Sam - not so much.  Dean took in the tiny plastic bags and scraps of torn paper strewn about the boxes, a couple of plastic bead necklaces, a sparkly pink hair clip, and a couple of rub-on flower tattoos scattered about.  Sam, studiously wiping at something over the sink, still hadn’t noticed his brother.

The gangly kid had nearly jumped out of his skin when his big brother asked what in tarnation he was doing.  His smile had been all triumph and glee when he’d presented the object: a metal badge pin, etched with ‘Special Police’.

“It’s for you!  Here!” Sam chirped.  Dean blinked at him in confusion.

“Do you mean that you bought six boxes of something you don’t even like for this?  Where did you get the money?”  The dimples disappeared as Sam stood wordlessly.  That knot in his stomach, now familiar after years of it, hit Dean anew.  “Your birthday money.  Sam, Bobby gave that to you for YOU, you beanpole!”

“I know that, Dean.  And I spent it how I wanted to.”  Again, he offered the pin to him.  “Here.  I had to get more than one box because my odds at gambling suck, remember?”

Dean didn’t move, couldn’t move.  This small gesture made his birthday gift to Sam seem small and worthless; what normal ten year old kid wanted a three-pack of Bic lighters, anyway?  

A deep sigh from Sammy snapped his attention back to the present, and he watched as his little brother dropped his hand to his side.

“Look, Dean.  I saw this little kid at that last diner wearing this pin.  When I went to the john, I stopped and asked him where he got it, and he said from a box of Cracker Jack.  You’re always talking about how Dad’s a hero, better than a police officer.  And, well - you’re MY hero.  Better than dad.”

“Don’t say that!”

“Well, it’s true.  You’re the one who’s always looking out for me.  And I really wanted you to have this.  So, when Bobby gave me the five dollars, I wanted to try to get this for you.  Please take it.”

Dean stared at the shiny pin, carefully taking it in his hand.  Mistaking his reserve for disgust, Sam hurried to speak.

“I know you’re a grown up, it’s dumb, you don’t have to keep it -” he blurted out, moving to snatch it back.  His big brother leaned it out of his reach, smiling past the lump in his throat.

“Thanks, Sammy.  I love it.”  

The ten year old returned his smile, relief relaxing his shoulders.  After a moment, his grin widened.

“Besides, let’s just look at this as birthday cake!  I can use one of the lighters as a candle!” he chattered out as he waved a hand at the overflowing cookie jar.  

Dean could still see Sam’s smile in the wavering glow from the lighter, and him always having one of those birthday lighters in his pocket weeks later.  He could hear the laughter from both of them as they gorged themselves on the Cracker Jack. He remembered making his dad turn around because he was sure he’d left the can of salt on the nightstand when really he went running back to get the badge pin he’d accidentally left in the drawer.  

After a childhood lived out of duffel bags and a crowded trunk, the Winchesters still struggled with the concept of personal possessions.  Even after living in the bunker for some time, it was hard to break a decades-long habit of living ‘temporary’.  Most of their favorite belongings still ended up centered around the hunting life.  That life had taught painful lessons about loss that would have sent stronger people running for a hermit’s existence, decrying any and all reminders of a past overrunning with tragedy.  

But not the Winchester brothers.  They still relished their happier memories.  Little bright gleams scattered like lucky pennies amid the darkness of their years, giving them something to hold on to and drive from.  

Some of those memories lived in a box.   A box that one of them knew about, and one of them didn’t.

A box in room 11.

[gamora-borealis]

I was tagged by @gameoras. Thanks!

rule: tag ten followers you want to know better!

tagging (only if y'all want to): @howlingdawn, @grootguardians, @zivitz, @stupidestrevenger, @mxrvel-peter-parker, @marvel-fan-queen, @shaysh180, @hopevandyke, @starksparker, @milanotapedeck, and anyone else who wants to!

name: callie

star sign: cancer

height: 5′5″

what’s your middle name: gale

put your itunes on shuffle. what are the first 4 songs that popped up?

iTunes??? What do I look like, an Apple Stan?

For years I used Google Play Music instead of iTunes (like back when I used to actually purchase music). So here is my Google Play Music library on shuffle:

I Don't Want Your Millions Mister by Dan Zanes

Mean by Taylor Swift

Where I Come From by Passion Pit

Let's Pretend by The Plain White T's

And here is my Spotify library on shuffle because Spotify Premium (student discount woo!!!) is mostly all I use now:

One More Night by Bob Dylan

I Just Wasn't Made For These Times by The Beach Boys

For the Benefit of Mr. Kite! by The Beatles

Rebel Rebel by David Bowie

grab the book nearest you and turn to page 23. what’s line 17?

I'm too lazy for that. I do have a huge bookshelf full of books; However, I haven’t read most of them because when I have free time I waste it and I am never motivated to read even though I love books.

have you ever had a poem or song written about you? 

Hahahaha no.

when was the last time you played air guitar? 

Idk but I was probably listening to Jet Airliner by The Steve Miller Band or Sunshine of Your Love by Cream when I was.

who is your celebrity crush?

Chris Pratt, Zoe Saldana, Evangeline Lilly, Tom Holland, Diego Luna, and John Boyega.

what’s a sound you hate + a sound you love?

I guess I don’t like noises associated with chalkboards (which were being used in my university department until a few months ago!) and I love music with all my heart and soul.

do you believe in ghosts?

I believe in visions, angels, and demons, but not actual ghosts.

how about aliens? 

Oh yeah. I mean at least in the form of bacteria somewhere in the universe, but more sophisticated beings could be out there.

do you drive? 

No, I’m lazy and haven’t finished the mandatory online program for my license or learned how to drive.

if so, have you ever crashed?

Part of the reason I don’t drive is that I was in a crash as a passenger a couple years ago that gave me bad anxiety about driving or even riding in a car. I’ve gotten a lot better though.

what was the last book you read? 

School killed my personal reading habits. The last book I attempted to read was a biography about Brian Wilson called Catch a Wave. I did read a lot of plays for school last semester. The last play I read was Sweat by Lynn Nottage.

do you like the smell of gasoline?

Maybe a little bit, but no not really.

what was the last movie you saw?

My dad made me watch Pretty in Pink because of nostalgia and I hated it (although Ducky was great – he deserved better).

what’s the worst injury you’ve ever had? 

It’s between breaking my arm and dislocating my knee cap.

do you have any obsessions right now? 

Lately it’s been Guardians of the Galaxy, the MCU, Bob Dylan, and learning HTML and CSS. Star Wars, Star Trek, The Beach Boys, Blondie, and M*A*S*H are always in the mix somehow.

do you tend to hold grudges against people who have done you wrong?

Nope! Forgiveness is good for the soul and makes the world a better place.

in a relationship? 

Hahahaha nope. I've never even been in one. It would be nice to be in a relationship but I'm not actively looking for one.

[renaramblesaboutcomics]

Wednesday Roundup 29.11.18

Another week another grab bag of comics in what might be one of the highest rated weeks of the Roundup since I started over a year ago! But how does everyone hold up? How do they all compare? I’m asking for dramatizing’s sake but genuinely there’s nothing in this week that isn’t immensely enjoyable if they even remotely pique your interests. GREAT week for comics, everyone. GG.

Tesladyne’s Atomic Robo, Image’s Black Magick, DC’s Super Sons, IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Ghostbusters II, IDW’s Transformers: Lost Light

Tesladyne’s Atomic Robo and the Spectre of Tomorrow #2 Brian Clevinger, Scott Wegener, Anthony Clark, Jeff Powell

There is a certain amount of dry wit and scientific community knowledge that is instrumental to getting the full experience out of the clever writing and deceptively simplistic design of Atomic Robo, and for the past few months I’ve been making a solid attempt to evaluate these comics and Robo himself based on the entertainment received without much of that. And, in all honesty, the more I’ve looked into this the more I wonder if that’s the wrong approach for “unbiased” evaluation to begin with. 

For example, I’ve been very firm on my description of Usagi Yojimbo as being one of those great comics that only gets more and more enriching as you grow a personal interest in history, Japanese culture, and mythologizing -- it’s far enough removed from our actual realities and accessible enough that I recommend it to people who don’t have those interests, but I find that those interests add so much more to the experience. The simple designs, the consistency, the way the narrative is built in episodic spurts more than long form narrative -- those are all reasons I can in good faith recommend these comics to people outside of niche interests, but those niche interests add so much to any reading that it’s difficult to really express why anyone would want to read without so much as acknowledging it. 

That all said, this particular issue continues that same level of quality and intrigue, but also rewards the emotional investment you may have in the characters involved. PersonallyI relate a lot more to Robo’s sense of self-exile and reclusive depression which only causes more and more problems to pile up far more than I’d have ever thought I would, and I don’t think I’d be alone in that. There’s also the long time readers’ reward in seeing consequences to that stollen crystal from Doctor Dinosaur’s island ages ago. All great stuff which is only more greatly emphasized by the creative use of familiar real world scientific organizations and entities wrapped up in this bizarre and surreal reality of Atomic Robo.

Image’s Black Magick (2015-present) #9 Greg Rucka, Nicola Scott

Sometimes the real value of storytelling lies less in identifying the complete package and more in being able to identify the way it weaves multiple elements and even genres at once to provide a new kind of satisfying narrative. And it’s in that way that I think Black Magick has so quickly become not only one of my favorite Greg Rucka and Nicola Scott comics, but one of my favorite recent publications in general. 

Black Magick follows a noir-style crime drama in structure, but its embrace of the supernatural and, especially, in witching stories provide the sort of edge that makes the tiredness of the former genre feel fresh even in the heavily saturated market for procedurals we have currently, while the latter feels completely reborn from that small but influential boom we felt in the 90s. I have never been closer to re-marathoning The Craft, Practical Magic and Charmed outside of the Halloween season. But each new issue of Black Magick brings me that step closer.

This issue also happens to follow the very specific to this week trend of leaning heavily on emotional stakes to really pull itself and its characters above even the thickest of genre settings however, and Black Magick specifically manages that while maintaining an incredibly tight hold on Rowan’s perspective. Which is fascinating because on reread you really realize how much the POV shifts away from Rowan and onto the other characters and their subplots but in reflection it all feels like it’s only in service to Rowan’s main story more than anything else. 

Nicola Scott continues to prove she is perhaps the most gifted and, really, the most prolific of comic book artists in the modern era and I maintain that seeing the true extent of her talents is best assessed by reading this comic and just allowing yourself to be blown away by it all.

This issue also gets major props for introducing a familiar. Good, comic. Perhaps not as action filled or breathtaking as the last issue which was a nail biter from start to finish, but most certainly deserving of those 4/5 stars. 

DC’s Super Sons (2017-present) Annual #1 Peter J. Tomasi, Paul Pelletier, Cam Smith, HI-FI

If you’re one of those people -- and let me absolutely clear that it is more than understandable to be one of these people -- who find super pets and the absolute general ridiculousness of a storyline that involves super animals in any capacity with a timeline that makes no sense and the only real dialogue that matters being literal growls barks and yips, this is not an issue worth your $4.99, you’ll hate it and be annoyed with people like me screaming from the rooftops that you should buy it and read it and love it. And that is completely and utterly fine and reasonable.

I am not fine or reasonable, however, and this is literally the most rewarding $4.99 I’ve spent on a comic in ages. Because no joke there were several times while I was liveblogging this issue both on my main blog and to my friends in PMs that I was literally in tears crying with laughter because

because

Holy shit guys.

In recent years a continued criticism I have carried for superhero comics is that there is a huge tone problem, in that there is a genre’s worth of tones and atmospheres that could be played off of to give at least each individual book if not each individual issue its own feeling and its own intrigue that would set it apart from the rest of the line that given week. DC, especially, has contributed greatly to this tone problem because as I’ve said many times, there was about five years there where even the color palettes for their comics had no variation between them. And it was maddening. 

So to have something goofy, to have something different, and to have it be fun, enjoyable, full of twists and turns, and not so damn determined to take itself beyond seriously, it makes this comic throwback feel like a breath of fresh air in the most necessary of ways. 

And I should be clear, I don’t mean that this comic is for everyone, or that Super Sons as a comic in general doesn’t manage to strike that cord a lot since it really is one of the most enjoyable comics DC has put out in years, but this really felt like a treat, an additional, ridiculous, hilarious story set so far apart from what’s come before. It’s greatly enjoyable. Genuinely deserve of my coveted 5/5 stars. 

IDW’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Ghostbusters II (2017) #5 (of 5) Erik Burnham, Tom Waltz, Dan Shoening, Charles Paul Wilson III, Luis Antonio Delgado

We finally come to an end of this second giant mashup of Ghostbusters and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, truly the sort of framework and pairing that is as old as time, and I get to reward everyone’s patience with me reviewing these for a month an a half straight with some final thoughts of sorts. 

I compliment both of these writers quite a bit for their respective contributions and the absolute mastery they both have shown for the voices of their respective franchises, but as this week is pretty well summed up with Rena Waxes Philosophically And Is Old, I think both of our times are better spent here by pointing out something a bit different that really came together with this issue. And that’s that for how pitch perfect these writers are for capturing the long expected voices of these beloved characters, the real remarkable compliment I can give them is how they have uniquely captured and redefined these voices to really make them their own.

Despite how much my childhood might have desired these team ups (and believe me, it so did) the fact is that these interactions and these relationships are utterly a modern invention, and what could easily fail outside of the concept states instead flourishes with us here specifically because they are sticking to their guns and not always angling for the obvious route with these interactions. That’s what makes all of this so fascinating and so rewarding as a fan.

In comparison to the predecessor, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles/Ghostbusters II does not have as tight of a storyline with a steady but consistent pacing and understanding of where it’s going. But I think because that set up was taking care of in the original these five issues allowed for more experimentation and more concentration on character development and fun scenarios. So if you’re far more invested in character interactions and in comics taking full advantage of the outrageous and unique tone of its medium, there’s probably all the more for you to enjoy with this compared to the first. But at the same time, it would be lying to say that the main driving plot and stakes, with Darius Dun’s ghost and the Fast Forward Evil Turtles-lite trying to harvest souls in a complicated and underused concept didn’t come off as overall a bit weaker than the original.

All that said, ultimately this comic is a joy for fans and it seems to be aimed quite specifically at that audience either way. And in that case I have to give it my highest regards.

IDW’s Transformers: Lost Light (2016-present) #11 James Roberts, Jack Lawrence, Joana Lafuente

Ever since the last arc of James Robert’s parent series, More Than Meets the eye, there’s been a few gaps in the concept of what happened on the Lost Light during and after the mutiny, whether or not the crew saw the Rod Squad’s las message, and especially curious to people like me who can’t help themselves but love our affable and entirely flawed co-Captain Rodimus, what was his final request for his burial and what not since we saw the rest of the crew’s.

And in the second part of this “Mutineer Trilogy” that we have for Lost Light, we are at long last getting our answers to many of those questions. And for a reveal that was a year coming, the Lost Light manages to pack all the twists, turns, and punches that we could hope to expect! 

It’s fascinating to see Getaway’s sense of grandeur when it comes to himself, his plans, and really the whole driving force with the mutiny, but I really find that where Roberts’ writing and where we as readers get the most out of is the interesting and very layered sense that Roberts has for the lore of the Transformers. It feels like every subtle piece of dialogue, whether it concerns lore and mythology of the universe or not, is really weaved throughout with a submersion in this fictional culture. And that, especially, is really revealing here. It’s a very rewarding way to handle lore and I greatly appreciate it. 

One that does make me apprehensive with the turns Lost Light has taken most recently, however, is that moral grayness sometimes feels really blurred with a light take or even somewhat forgiving light given to what are undeniably and outright stated as fascist and genocidal elements of the Transformers’ past, especially Megatron. Having this issue completely dedicated to Getaway’s perspective while tackling these themes doesn’t really help because he is most egregiously one of the most villainous and traitorous characters the series has tackled, but while it feels like he’s only using the aghast feelings of the crew toward Megatron, ultimately he’s the only one who gives a speech against Megatron’s past of genocide and fascism while also taking over in the most truly reprehensible and fascist ways possible himself. This is further blurred by having some very topical buzz words like “fake news” uttered by Getaway in a... lbr pretty nonsensical way in-universe, but then have him going around imprisoning or hideously killing all of the crew which doesn’t agree with him.

I’m basically waiting for Roberts to fully address all of this in the story but right now it feels very much like “both sides are extreme and bad” mentality that, given Roberts’ politics and statements irl, I don’t think is what he ultimately wants this story to be coming away as, but I’m nervous and would like for things to tread lightly considering the current environment. 

ALL of my apprehensions and concerns out of the way, this is still a fascinating and ultimately fantastic comic that I really truly enjoy and would love to see more of because if Roberts’ Transformers is guilty of anything it’s definitely guilty of raising my expectations and setting that bar so high because of how good and how complicated and interesting all of it ca be in the right hands.

Hey there! We finish up another pretty fun, if not quick, week in comics with lots of stories and characters, and another pretty great time from yours truly. And if you enjoy these write-ups or anything else I do whether it be the Roundups, my Rambles, my personal creative projects, or you’re interested in my upcoming podcast, you can help contribute through donations to my Ko-Fi, Patreon, or PayPal. For as little as $1 per project, you make all of this possible.

You could also support me by going to my main blog, @renaroo, where I’ll soon be listing prices and more for art and writing commissions.

RenaRoo Ko-Fi | RenaRoo Patreon | RenaRoo PayPal

[placetobenation]

As many of you are aware, WWE Network is pretty packed with all sorts of content. And as you may also know, we here at Place to Be Nation love long term, in depth projects. So, as part of this initiative, members of the PTBN Staff are choosing programs at random and after watching each program, they will share their thoughts, notes and recommendations with our readers. So, settle in and enjoy this epic ride through wrestling history!

The British Bulldogs – Coliseum Home Video 1986

Run Time: 87 Minutes

Why Calum Why???: Given that the ballots for GWWE Tag Team are now open, and NXT UK has now hit the WWE Network, I thought it would be fitting to go back and look back at two of the pioneers of both offerings.

Best Segment

You want me to do what?

Aaron George: Mean Gene Okerlund and his stubby fingers introducing this shit show. He excites us by declaring this is the first Coliseum Home Video to profile a tag team before promising us SINGLES matches featuring top opponents like JIM THE ANVIL NEIDHART! He then teases us with the climax of the Bulldogs winning the tag titles. It feels like it’s going to be an “awesome” tape, and this bald fuck does an adequate job hyping it up.

Brian Bayless: Seeing the Bulldogs win the titles at WrestleMania was the best moment in a category without too many candidates.

Jacob Williams: There weren’t really many non-match segments on this tape. I’ll say the classic post-match celebration when the Dogs win the titles. That’s the Bulldogs, not the Moondogs.

Calum McDougall: Eh… it has to be the workout segment by default. Out of all of the segments on this tape, this one was definitely the best.

Dave Hall: The Bulldogs’ workout. This was the only segment on the program. It was interesting to hear a little about how the workout helped each man develop their body, and how it benefited them in the ring, Sadly, it was also a little plodding.

Best Match

MASHUP!

Aaron George: I guess the six man tag. I mean I never thought I’d vote for a match featuring Lou Albano AND Luscious Johnny V, but here we are. It’s about 85 percent stomping, but it’s at least not Anvil and Davey Irish whipping each other for ten minutes. It’s the only match that wasn’t clipped to pieces and the crowd was hot. It wasn’t good.

Brian Bayless: Bret Hart vs. Dynamite Kid was the best match on this tape. It took place at the Capital Centre on Landover, MD on 9/14/85 and was shown on the 10/8/85 edition of Prime Time Wrestling if you care to seek it out elsewhere. Dynamite’s snap suplex was like no other and he always had strong chemistry with Bret in the ring. I also thought the match against Big John Studd & King Kong Bundy was fun for a TV match.

Jacob Williams: Ironically, the best match on a tape centered on an amazing tag team was a singles match between Bret Hart and Dynamite Kid. There was a crispness to the moves and selling that you don’t always see in mid 80s WWF. I liked how Dynamite used Bret’s offense against him, and at one point hits Bret with a brutal knee drop to the face. It wasn’t an all timer, but a fine match, especially given the context.

Calum McDougall: By far the best match is Dynamite Kid vs Bret Hart. I thought that this was fantastic, it was incredibly smooth apart from one or two missteps, including a really bad looking one where Kid tripped over Bret and took at dive into the ropes head first! Those aside, you could see these two had clashed a ton before, and they certainly delivered here.

Dave Hall: Dynamite Kid vs Bret Hart. These two got to bring a little of their Stampede history to the WWF. The early stages had some good counter wrestling from both men, and the finishing sequence was quite good, leading to a roll up from Dynamite for the win. This match demonstrated why they were the better technicians on their teams, and in the company, but sadly they were not given the time to make it a classic. The post-match beatdown by Bret was good as well.

Most Cringeworthy Moment

Gene, you are NOT the father.

Aaron George: Gene Okerlund ogling the hipless gym rat. I don’t know what it was; the clothes, the spandex, the 80s hair? Perhaps the formless body as she pushed her way through an interview to pick up a dumbbell? Who knows, but Gene was on her like a drunken Bruce Hart on a discarded Bret Hart singlet.

Brian Bayless: Gene Okerlund tried but the segment at the gym almost put me to sleep. The Bulldogs were definitely a team that got over in the ring rather than on the microphone. Dynamite speaking was never a good thing.

Jacob Williams: The proprietor of the gym was so robotic and unnatural in her interview with Gene. She would just randomly change her tone from word to word and pause in strange places. For any Simpsons fans, it was very reminiscent of Smithers’s turning on his computer.

Calum McDougall: I don’t know if this technically counts as cringeworthy however the steady decline in announcing made me wince. You start out the cream of the crop with Jesse and Gorilla, then move on to Gorilla and Lord Alfred Hayes who were inoffensive. But it falls off a cliff to the point where you’re left with Vince McMahon, Ernie Ladd and Bruno Sammartino and I was ready to watch it on mute. The only word to describe this is urgh!

Dave Hall: The workout segment ends with Mean Gene “lusting” over a woman in the gym and walking off. It made him look like a dirty old man, and leaves Davey Boy with the microphone in hand to end the segment. It looked out of place, and totally scripted, and really felt like it was designed to give Vince McMahon a laugh more than the viewer at home watching.

Funniest Line/Moment

CONCENTRATE!!!

Aaron George: I’m still laughing at Al Wilson dressed as a greaser.

Brian Bayless: I guess by default it was Okerlund trying to hit on a woman at the gym then getting yelled at by Davey for not concentrating.

Jacob Williams: Gene completely drops his interview to perv out on a random woman at the gym, only for Davey to chastise him. “YOU SEE GENE! YOU CAN’T LOSE CONCENTRATION!” I think Gene has other priorities, Davey.

Calum McDougall: My favorite moment is Davey Boy explaining the Bulldogs training regime without uttering the word “steroid” once! What a consummate professional that man is!

Dave Hall: With the program basically devoted to in-ring action and no interviews, the funniest line has to lie in the hands of the commentators, but most of the commentary was focused on the action. Two lines in commentary stood out enough to make me chuckle. In the Dynamite Kid vs. Bret Hart match, Gorilla said (and Lord Al repeated) “…Blowing it all to pieces by the Dynamite Kid”. Then in the six-man tag match, Jesse hit a pearl of a line when he said “A lot of guts from Albano… literally.”

Highlights

What On Earth Is This???

Aaron George:  Jesse and Gorilla arguing about the tenor of Nikolai Volkoff’s voice. And Minute 87, when I could finally shut this off and get back to my life.

Brian Bayless: The chemistry the Bulldogs had in the ring made them a great team and we saw their combination of speed, strength, and technical ability. Plus, matches involving Bret Hart and Greg Valentine were entertaining.

Jacob Williams:This might sound shocking, but the Bulldogs really carried this. It was fun to watch both Davey and Dynamite match after match and see how they really brought a unique style to the WWF. The six-man tag, including the manager shenanigans, was fun. Bret and Dynamite bringing the Stampede show to WWF was cool to see, and you could see a glimpse of what singles heel Bret could be. Valentine’s multiple appearances were welcome, as he gelled well with the Bulldogs.

Calum McDougall: The Hart Foundation series of matches were great, then it falls off a bigger cliff than the announcing did! This is the only thing I can think of that I liked on this tape.

Dave Hall: A lot of solid in-ring action throughout the program. Seeing the Bulldogs wrestling Bret Hart and Jim Neidhart in singles actions that early in their careers was really good. The Davey Boy Smith vs. Greg Valentine was solid and well-worked. The match against Studd and Bundy was short, but also highlighted that the Bulldogs were thinkers who could adapt in the ring. I also liked that just about every match had a different finish, showing that the Bulldogs can pull wins out of anywhere. The finish to the Moondogs match was especially spectacular.

Lowlights

MASHUP!

Aaron George: Where to begin… not one match held my attention. Not one. They all bored me to tears, including the Bret Hart/Dynamite Kid encounter that should have been great. Everything else was either a dreary mess or clipped to shit. It’s ALL matches. They told us at the start that we’d see the Bulldogs reach the mountaintop at WrestleMania II, and we did see it, two minutes of it. It’s legit a decent match, it would have been the ONLY decent match on the whole tape. WHY ARE THERE SO MANY SINGLES MATCHES ON THE TAPE DEDICATED TO A TAG TEAM??? Why does Davey Boy Smith invent the sharpshooter in a match with Greg Valentine? I thought Bret said Conan the Barbarian taught him that??? Is it possible that Bret is a fucking liar? Why does Dynamite win all the singles matches and Davey always loses? Dynamite fixes his tights after every single in-ring movement. Is that why Davey fixed his jeans every five seconds during his spectacular 1999 run? Also the Kid starts every fucking sentence with “I’ll tell you something Mean Gene,” before speaking till he ran out of air. Moondog Spot’s selling can only be described as preposterous. Jesse upsets me by outright lying that he’s never seen anyone get out of the camel clutch. IT’S IN THE DAMN INTRO MIXED IN WITH THE OUTLANDISH CLAIM THAT COLISEUM HOME VIDEO TRACES IT’S LINEAGE BACK 5,000 FUCKING YEARS. I’ll say one thing: they have a lot of balls comparing themselves to Roman gladiators while Chief Jay Strongbow is dancing around the screen. This whole thing was awful. Thanks Calum!

Brian Bayless: The Bulldogs vs. Dream Team Tag Title match from WrestleMania 2 was clipped to show only a few minutes of the match, which is lame because it would have been the best match on the tape. The gym segment lasted longer and that was a bore. The Davey vs. Anvil and the match against the Moondogs were not particularly exciting. Plus, why feature a match where Davey loses clean like he did against Greg Valentine?

Jacob Williams: Sheik and Volkoff controlling most of their match wasn’t particularly engaging. The camera missing the finish of Bret/Dynamite was unfortunate. Neidhart in singles competition can almost automatically be stamped in as a lowlight. The Bulldogs having to make the Moondogs look threatening was weird.

Calum McDougall: Right, here we go!! Why do you have Mean Gene open the video but then let Gorilla and Johnny Valiant do the hosting of the tape?! What is the point of putting out a best of tape and have two of the matches ends in loss for the guys you’re highlighting?!?! And the clipping of some of the matches was baffling. I get that you want to sell the Mania 2 tape and the Bulldogs/Dream Team match was the best match on that show, but either put the full match in, or nothing at all!

Dave Hall: Very few. Sadly the first match between the Bulldogs and Shiek/Volkoff was a little clunky, and there were multiple clear missed spots by both Shiek and Volkoff. Then the “title defense” against the Moondogs was slow and drawn out. The Bulldogs should have been made to look more dominant against a team that was essentially now a preliminary team. I also found it annoying that the one match that had the potential to be the best of the program, the title win at WrestleMania 2 against the Dream Team, was cropped to the last two minutes.

Wild Card BABY!!!

Wrestling!

2018 Bigot Award For Misgendering: Lord Alfred calling Dynamite the “Dynamite MAN.” Bigot. – AG

Best Tidbit: The Dynamite Kid refused to drop the Tag Team Titles to Iron Sheik & Nikolai Volkoff and would only do so for the Hart Foundation.

Best Heat: I’d never seen trash thrown into the ring BEFORE a match even starts! Nikolai Volkoff was a heat magnet with the Soviet national anthem in this one – there was so much garbage in the ring that they didn’t even bother to clear it, they just wrestled in among it. – CM

We’re Not On Steroids … Seriously: During the workout, Davey Boy mentioned on 3-4 separate occasions how they train two hours a day, seven days a week. It really felt like they were trying to justify their growing physiques and counter any claims that they may be using synthetic substances to assist their muscle growth. Davey Boy got noticeably bigger during the matches from the start of the program to the end. But this would be understandable if they “Train two hours per day, seven days a week”. – DH

Donald Trump Memorial Hair Award: The ref in the Bret/Dynamite match. Same fucking hair. – AG

Random Fact I Learned: Apparently, Clint Eastwood was mayor of a California town. – JW

Whats The Point?: Captain Lou Albano! I know that the Bulldogs weren’t amazing on the stick but why anyone thought the Captain Lou would be a good fit is beyond me! Why would anyone want Albano to be their manager at this time unless they needed rubber bands at short notice? – CM

How To Win Wrestling Matches:  “We will work out and act like men.” – Dynamite Kid sometime in 1986. – AG

Final Thoughts

Why tarnish my good name?

Aaron George:  This tape made me like the British Bulldogs less. I’d rather watch outright garbage than this boring mess. RATING: 0/10

Brian Bayless: I was let down by the tape but when it was released there was not that many great opponents for the Bulldogs as the tag team division was not at its strongest. If it was released a year later there would have been more options against better teams. I thought it sucked that their match at WrestleMania 2 was reduced to clip form but for the time it did showcase the Bulldogs uniqueness as a tag team. However, this does not hold up well today. RATING: 4.5/10

Jacob Williams: This tape was a bit of a disappointment, through no fault of the featured team. It was more average than horrible, but I had really high expectations because the Bulldogs are such a great team. Unfortunately, they were dragged down by some of their competition in this collection. It was a little weird having all the best matches be something other than straight tag matches. I can’t help but think they must have had a few better tag matches taped that could have made this a classic. RATING: 6/10

Calum McDougall: I’d like to take this opportunity to apologize to the guys for putting them through this. I did not like this. I thought this was going to be a great compliment to the GWWE Tag Team project and NXT UK as I’d said, and it was looking promising, but  went downhill really quickly. There was a genuinely great match in Kid vs. Bret, but then it seemed like the promising matches were cut to shreds in the editing and the bad matches were there in all their glory. Again, who puts two losses on a best of tape?! RATING: 3/10

Dave Hall: This program felt right down the middle. Nothing really stood out as great, and nothing stood out as really bad. Everything really felt like it was just middle of the road. It was good that the Bulldogs were showcased against multiple opponents, and had a series of different finishes, but no one match really reached any heights. RATING: 5/10

And we are out! Where will the Network Adventure travel to? Which Coliseum will be conquered next? Which of these assholes will quit the project in an indignant rage??? Find out in TWO WEEKS!

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Getting Torched by Ryan Fitzpatrick – Ten Takeaways from Buccaneers 27, Eagles 21

Listen –

Sometimes you hang 41 points on the Patriots in the Super Bowl.

And sometimes Ryan Fitzpatrick hangs 402 yards and four touchdowns on you.

Sunday was one of those days for the Birds, a day where the opposing quarterback carves up your secondary and then has the audacity to show up at the podium looking like a cross between Conor McGregor and two of the three members of ZZ Top.

I guess that’s the glass half empty part, the fact that the Birds were torched multiple times by a guy who is actually a backup quarterback. The Eagles lost Jason Peters and Mike Wallace and missed a field goal and just didn’t seem like they were ready to play.

The glass half full outlook would focus on a second-half comeback that fell just short. Nick Foles showed some good things and some bad things as he finished with 334 yards and a touchdown pass. Zach Ertz and Nelson Agholor looked like their normal selves as the rest of the offensive pieces struggled to impact the game.

And of course we’re still looking at the return of Carson Wentz and Alshon Jeffery, maybe this week for Carson, which will go a long way towards getting this team back to where it needs to be.

So I’m not gonna do the knee-jerk “woe is me” thing and lament a road loss that really could have been a lot worse. I’m not gonna do that after week two. Let’s pull up our big boy pants and look at the game.

1) No safety help

Let’s just start with the first play of the game, when DeSean Jackson smoked the Birds on a 75-yard touchdown.

I don’t have the all-22 video yet with the super-wide angle, but what happened here was that the Eagles actually started in Cover-2 and disguised a corner blitz:

What you’re looking at here is that Rodney McLeod comes down to pick up Mike Evans, since Ronald Darby (yellow circle) is blitzing. Malcolm Jenkins slides back into the middle portion of the field and Jalen Mills stays on DeSean, so really they slide into Cover 3 with a single-high safety and Jenkins is responsible for helping over the top.

I’m really not sure why Jenkins tried to undercut that route, or why he came in so shallow. He told reporters after the game that it was his responsibility to cover the middle third of the field.

2) More secondary breakdowns

The second touchdown can mostly be blamed on a poor tackle attempt from Darby, though Jordan Hicks got beat in coverage.

I’m not sure if Hicks was to blame for the third score, or if McLeod was responsible for Chris Godwin here, but you can see Hicks turn around and look at McLeod after the catch as if to say, “I thought you had him?” –

I’m not sure whose responsibility that is there. Corey Graham is also in the mix as the Birds are in dime here trying to match up against Tampa Bay showing trips right with a receiver on the left and Jacquizz Rodgers coming out of the backfield.

This game did remind me a bit of the Seattle game last year, not because Fitzpatrick was scrambling like Russell Wilson, but because the Eagles do have some coverage issues when teams send out four and five receivers at a time and keep their quarterback upright without extra blockers on the line, which is what happened in the play above.

For what it’s worth, Jim Schwartz doesn’t speak after games, so we’ll hear what he has to say on Tuesday. As far as specifics on each play, the players didn’t really get too much into that. Maybe we get some more from them later in the week as well.

I’m not sure anyone in the secondary had a great day, though Jenkins deserves credit for the big forced fumble and I do think Mills was on the receiving end of a facemask on the fourth quarter matchup with Evans where he was flagged instead:

Lmao pic.twitter.com/uKy5XoeK9I

— Brian Coulter (@PhilaBCoulter) September 16, 2018

I guess both guys were guilty of an infraction there. Looks like a pair of facemasks.

But anyway, Mills is a 7th round draft pick, so I don’t know what people expect of him. He was elevated to a starting role on a Super Bowl winning team because Leodis McKelvin and Nolan Carroll and Byron Maxwell were not the answer. Jalen has had some good games and some bad games, but to expect him to be Ramsey instead of Mills is not accurate.

3) Don’t blame us

People say the defensive line didn’t do enough to pressure Fitzpatrick in this game, and maybe that’s true. They finished with eight QB hits and two sacks, which is about half of the 15 hits and 4 sacks they put up against Matt Ryan last week. Fitzpatrick was a little more uncomfortable today after the Saints barely touched him last week.

But in reality is that the line was fine, and limited Tampa to 43 rushing yards on 22 carries. Only 9.8% of Tampa’s 436 yards came on the ground, and the irony of the Buccaneers hitting quickly on some of their scores was that they gave up the time of possession battle to the Eagles by a 12 minute gap, holding the ball for just 24 minutes compared to the Eagles’ 36.

Point being – the defensive line was relatively fresh throughout the game, even in the South Florida heat. And they DID make Tampa more or less one-dimensional, holding the Bucs to just one rushing first down on the day. If you’re looking for a spot where the defense could have been better, Schwartz could have dialed up more pressure or come up with different ways to get to Fitzpatrick and/or make him uncomfortable.

4) Play calling

Ups and downs from Doug Pederson, who didn’t use nearly as much shotgun this week.

Here’s what I wrote down on my notepad while my dad and uncle and cousin yelled at the TV:

44 passes out of the shotgun (a lot in the 4th quarter while chasing the game)

7 passes from under center

13 runs out of the shotgun (including the direct snap to Agholor)

8 runs from under center (two quarterback sneaks and the option/toss to Smallwood)

(two more under center sets were wiped out due to a holding and tripping penalty on the second drive)

So I think Doug mixed it up pretty well. I don’t know why Nick Foles wasn’t pushing the ball down field more, but I have a strong hunch that the departure of Mike Wallace really took away the Birds’ ability to stretch the defense. Shelton Gibson should theoretically be able to do that, but he finished with zero grabs on two targets.

As far as run/pass option, I only noted three or four instances where they might have used it. Again, I’d have to go back and look at the film to watch how the line sets their blocking schemes on those plays, because it’s very hard to tell when a play actualyl has a run option vs. just being a simple play-action motion. I feel like the Eagles got away from their RPO package on Sunday and showed more play-action coming from under center sets.

5) Personnel decisions

Sort of going hand-in-hand with the above entry, I wasn’t huge on the running back rotation. I am, of course, biased towards fellow Mountaineer Wendell Smallwood because I’d for him to do well, but I need to see more of Corey Clement as an offensive staple. I don’t care what he does on special teams; I need Clement to carry the ball more than six times per game. And if Jay Ajayi was okay in the second half, then get him back out there, too. This feels a lot like the early parts of last season, when LeGarrette Blount wasn’t getting enough snaps and the Eagles were trying to figure out what exactly they had in the running game.

Also, here’s a picture of me searching for Dallas Goedert on Sunday afternoon:

Josh Perkins is a fourth-string tight end behind Ertz, Goedert, and the injured Richard Rodgers. Kamar Aiken is a sixth-string wide receiver behind Jeffery, Agholor, Wallace, Mack Hollins, Gibson, and maybe even DeAndre Carter. He was just re-signed to replace Markus Wheaton, who was signed and then waived after week one. So I don’t know what the fuck the Eagles are doing with the receiver depth chart right now, but obviously the preseason means jack shit since Goedert and Gibson both looked more than capable out there and are now invisible.

RE: the Perkins playing more than Goedert, here’s Martin Frank at Delaware Online:

Pederson gave a convoluted answer about why that was the case, basically saying he wanted to adjust just one role instead of several once players like Wallace and Ajayi left the game.

“Listen, it’s a complex thing when you start moving bodies around,” Pederson said. “And without getting real specific with the game plan … one part that goes down, then you have to adjust everybody else.”

And more Pederson via NJ.com:

It’s complicated because you (the media) don’t know the plan. When you don’t know the plan or the formations, where we move guys and have guys specifically in the game plan, when one guy goes down, it shuffles the whole thing. So we can keep it real consistent by just moving one part and many parts.

Yeah, I get it. I guess. You’ve got some young/new guys out there who might not be 100% comfortable with the play book or even ready for a too much pro-level action. And Perkins used to be a receiver back in the day before he converted to tight end. So if you’re not ready for Gibson, Goedert, or Carter to step in, you give the snaps to Perkins and a veteran like Aiken instead.

Shrug. Guess we’ll get more from Doug on that later.

6) Whiff

Remember how some Eagles fans used to call Asante Samuels Asante “Samuels” instead? Kind of like Alshon “Jefferies.”

Anyway, Ronald Darby paid homage to the former Eagle corner when he totally whiffed on what seemed like a rather straightforward tackle on the second Bucs touchdown:

Not a great effort.

HOWEVER –

Credit where it’s due. He did a really nice job later on Jacquizz Rodgers in the open field on that 3rd and 4 in the 4th quarter. I will try to give credit where I can if I’m gonna rag on a guy for something else.

Here’s Asante in all of his glory:

via GIPHY

7) Fumble?

It didn’t mean much at the time because the Eagles looked like they were cooked at halftime, but they lost a possession on the Nick Foles fumble that looked almost like a forward pass to me.

On the play, the ball travels about five yards forward as Foles gets cleaned out by Kwon Alexander coming unblocked through the line:

.@kwon knocks the ball out of Foles on this hit. Play ruled a fumble. pic.twitter.com/QVZKxzrYxg

— AllThingsBucs (@AllThingsTBbucs) September 16, 2018

Am I blind? Am I missing something here? Even if he’s being tackled that looks like forward motion from the arm and the ball clearly travels forward.

Maybe they just didn’t see anything that could conclusively overturn the ruling on the field. It’s hard to say if the ball is spinning out of his hand at or during the tackle, or if he still has control of it as his arm goes forward, but it definitely looks like his elbow is at least parallel with his body, which would suggest that he’s coming forward with it.

I don’t know. I really don’t know.

8) Doug’s best call?

Going for it on 4th and 1 in the second quarter, for sure.

I also didn’t have a problem with him going for it on 4th and 4 on the first drive of the second half? Why not? You’re down 20-7 at that point and you’re looking at a three and out to start off the quarter, so you might as well take the risk from midfield. You’re trying to get back into the game instead of punting to a team that can find the end zone with one deep ball.

I know a lot of people were talking about the clock management in the 4th quarter, but I honestly didn’t have a problem with Doug running the ball there. They saved three timeouts and still had the two-minute warning with Tampa starting their final drive at 2:41 on the clock. You still needed the defense to get a stop, and they didn’t get a stop, they allowed two first downs and committed a neutral zone infraction.

9) Doug’s worst call?

I didn’t like the 3rd and 11 draw play before halftime. That felt like something out of the old Andy Reid playbook. That’s not the aggressive Doug Pederson we saw in last season’s NFC divisional round game against Falcons.

Also wasn’t a big fan of the screen he called on the final drive of the second quarter, after the drive featuring the draw play. The Eagles had just connected with Ertz on a big play down the right sideline, then Doug went with a screen that lost five yards and forced the Eagles to burn their second timeout.

10) The Barber Brothers

I gotta be honest; I didn’t hear ALL of the broadcast because I went home to watch the game with family, so I didn’t entirely focus in on Kenny Albert, Ronde Barber, and Tiki Barber.

I did laugh when they tried to cut to Dean Blandino early on, which was derailed by technical difficulties. As a general rule, I think all Dean Blandino hits should be derailed by technical difficulties.

One thing I do like is that double box on reviews, where they play a commercial in the big box on the right while keeping the field camera in the small box on the left. It doesn’t necessarily add anything to the broadcast, but it keeps me attentive and makes more sense than cutting out entirely, which causes people to get up and walk to the fridge or whatever. It’s a way for them to shove another commercial into the game without totally ditching the action.

As far as Tiki’s outfit, he  kind of looked like a mix between fly fisherman and coal miner. I couldn’t really hear his hits, but Ronde I thought did fine. I didn’t sense much homerism from him, if any. He even said “maybe I was wrong” on the pass interference non-call against Agholor in the third quarter, so good on him for being cool and not attempting to bullshit us.

I also swear I heard one of the trio pronounce the word “Aliquippa” as Ali-queepa, which was weird, but I have context for that line. I also have no desire to re-watch Fitzpatrick slicing and dicing the Eagles like Joe Montana.

But we’re gonna have to to. The all-22 coaches film should show us why the Birds’ secondary struggled so much.

The post Getting Torched by Ryan Fitzpatrick – Ten Takeaways from Buccaneers 27, Eagles 21 appeared first on Crossing Broad.

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The Triumphant Return of Vertigo

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The most influential comics imprint of all time is back in full force, as DC kicks off a new era for Vertigo.

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Interview Marc Buxton

DC Entertainment

Sep 4, 2018

Vertigo

Sandman. Fables. Preacher. Lucifer. iZombie. Y, the Last Man, Transmetropolitan, 100 Bullets. The Books of Magic. These are just some of the titles that have forged the legend of Vertigo.

Since the late 1980s, Vertigo has been DC’s imprint for cutting edge, mature comics that defy limitations and genre. Some of the greatest voices in comics, including Neil Gaiman, Garth Ennis, Grant Morrison, Brian K. Vaughan, Brian Azzarello, Ed Brubaker, Peter Milligan, Jamie Delano, G. Willow Wilson, and so many more have walked the razor’s edge of Vertigo and through daring and constant experimentation, have broken the barriers of traditional comics and crafted the future. But for the past few years, the Vertigo output has been sparse. Yes, there have been cool projects here and there, but even the most ardent Vertigo supporter would have to admit that the flame of Vertigo has been burning low.

That’s all about to change with the roll out of seven new Vertigo titles that will reignite the brand and remind people why Vertigo is the go to place for new ideas and innovative talent. We checked in with Vertigo Executive Editor Mark Doyle for a breakdown of all the dizzying new ideas that will soon be infecting the unsuspecting comic book market.

Just so you know, I’m a big Vertigo head from years back. I spent my formative years wearing eye shadow and black nail polish because of Neil Gaiman.

You too?

That being said, why is now the time in this busy marketplace for a DC Vertigo relaunch and rebrand?

It’s the 25th anniversary. Once something has been around for a while, it’s time to look at it and say, “What’s working, what’s not? What do we like about this? What don’t we like about this?” That’s kind of the catalyst to all this. And, it also felt like it was the right time to look at the kind of stories we were doing and reevaluate things.

The last few years, the Vertigo output has been small. Quality but small. I just finished Death Bed, I enjoyed Motherlands, and Of course you’ve had Astro City rocking because that book is just the best. How did you go from those few titles into a complete Vertigo relaunch?

I came back to Vertigo in spring 2017. We restructured the editorial team. There were a few editors who were already here and we brought in two other editors and me. In restructuring, we sat down and said, “What are we doing? What do we like? What aren’t we doing? Where do we want to relaunch?”

If you remember, July of last year is when we teased the idea of “8-8-18.” Because we knew at that point we were relaunching the entire line and Sandman Universe. We knew that’s where we would do it. That was us planting a flag and saying, “Hey, we might be sort of dormant for the next year, but we’re going to be putting some things out but keep your eyes out on this date because big things are coming.”

That gave us the time, and, honestly, I’m grateful for the company for saying, “Take a minute, take a breath, figure out what you want to do and then go from there.” The next step after planting that flag was: let’s sit down and talk about what we want to do, what type of stories do we want to tell? What do we want to publish? What are we excited to publish? What are we a little bit scared to publish? From there, let’s find the talent to meet that criteria.

To you, what makes a Vertigo creator in 2018?

It just has to be someone with a voice with something to say.

I don’t think you’ll argue with me when I say what’s going on in comics right now is because of the influence of Vertigo, because of Preacher and Sandman and Transmetropolitan and Y and 100 Bullets and everything. That kind of made the book market. That led the way. Do you feel a sense of  responsibility to plant the flags now so people in 2045 will look back and be like, “Yup, we’re here because of Vertigo.”

One hundred percent. And responsibility is the right word. That’s what I feel when I walk into work every day. I, like you, love Vertigo. I found Vertigo at a time that mattered the most to me. I take it very seriously that it’s my job to carry that torch and tell stories for a new generation of readers. That’s the goal.

Why the rebranding of DC Vertigo? Why add the DC to the already established brand?

It’s part of an overall publishing plan. I think the company is making some great moves to go from DC Comics to DC Publishing with different books aimed at readers of different age groups, styles and tastes. It makes sense to be a part of that.

Obviously Vertigo’s bread and butter has always been the book market, are there any plans to try to keep increase the single issues’ presence in the direct market? How are you going to get those Wednesday warriors to support the single issues?

That’s a good question, and it’s an ongoing conversation. It’s a lot of stuff we’re doing that I can’t talk about yet.

One of the things we’re doing is that, rather than look at them as two markets we’re trying to look at it as creating a cohesive campaign with a message. The books are so diverse; you can’t just sell the books to the same person. It’s more about, how do you sell each of these books individually? How do we reach a potential audience that each one of these books have, and make sure that the message is clear from the periodical and direct market and trade market and book market. Make sure we have all the teams in the room together creating one cohesive campaign.

further reading: Sandman - The Essential Horror Comic of the 1990s.

The other half of it is, really, we have a lot of really smart plans from the digital side and house ad side. We want to engage the creator’s fan base. We have creators bringing in eyeballs from other media and other aspects of this business and reaching out to them.

How does Warners look at the Vertigo label knowing that you gave them iZombie, you gave them Lucifer, you gave them Preacher? I think every fan knows Sandman is the next Lord of the Rings waiting to happen, you just have to get the right visionary. 100 Bullets is one day going to take the world by storm. Does Warners look at Vertigo as an IP machine away from the superhero genre? 

Yes, I think so. I am part of those conversations, but, look, at the end of my day, that’s not my job; my job is to make great comic books. That’s what I love to do. Look, I’m a total cinephile…I read comics because I want to read comics. I make comics because I want to make comics.

Right, I don’t think anyone wants to read a comic that is obviously a failed TV pitch. The Walking Dead was a great comic. No one had any idea that this could happen, and that’s why this happened.

Exactly, and I’m not looking at anything we are publishing now or developing now as anything that’s like, “Well, this would be a really expensive TV show so maybe we shouldn’t use aliens or spaceships.” I can’t do that. Anything that limits the creator, I’m not interested in. At the end of the day, that’s someone else’s job. I could make a great book. And  look at the things that have been developed. The comics are an inspiration.

Right, I don’t think when anyone was reading Mike Carey’s Lucifer they said, “You know, this is going to be a really good police procedural one day!”

Exactly.

Talk about genres, other than Hex Wives from Ben Blacker and Mirka Andolfo and American Carnage by Bryan Hill and Leandro Fernandez, these new titles seem to be exploring genres outside Vertigo’s sweat spots of dark fantasy and crime. Is this a redefining of what DC Vertigo could be or can we expect more classic Vertigo books after the initial roll out?

I love all genres and I’m happy to explore them all. I’ve never thought of us as being about this genre or that genre, to me it’s always been about telling great stories and creating new characters. To do that, you have to be open. My hope is that we continue to grow and people see that we can do anything and everything. Historical fiction, romance, non-fiction…whatever. If it’s a great story it belongs here.

Let’s talk about each one of the new Vertigo books...

Border Town by Eric M. Esquivel and Ramon Villalobos

When a crack in the border between worlds releases an army of monsters from Mexican folklore into the small town of Devil’s Fork, Arizona, the residents blame the ensuing weirdness — the shared nightmares, the otherworldly radio transmissions, the mysterious goat mutilations — on “God-dang illegals.” With racial tensions supernaturally charged, it’s up to new kid in town Frank Dominguez and a motley crew of high school misfits to discover what’s REALLY going on. (September)

This seems like the most ripped-from-the-headlines type of new Vertigo book. Talk about the genesis of this project.

This sounds like I might be dodging the question, but honestly, when the pitch came in it was one of those pitches, I was like, “Yes, one hundred percent, yes!” It was a one page pitch at the beginning, and it just clicked.

But here’s exactly how this book got put together. It started when editor Jamie Rich was talking with Eric Esquivel. Eric had pitched a few things over the years. Jamie is editing the Batman books now, but he was here at Vertigo when I started, and we developed a lot of stuff together…Eric pitched a lot of stuff and nothing was clicking. Then Jamie went to Eric and did what good editors do which is say, “Pitch me the thing that only you can write. Pitch me the thing you can’t do anywhere else.” Eric regrouped and he came back with Border Town.

And here’s an interesting genesis, in between Jamie getting the pitch from Eric, Jamie moved over and did the Batman books full time, the book moved over to editor Andy Khouri. Andy loved the pitch, and immediately came back with Ramon as the artist. It was just sort of this combination one editor talking to a guy and being passed along and evolving. Watching them work together is incredible. There was this great moment where Jamie read it and thanked us because it was amazing.

There were some early disturbing, angry responses to this book including some disturbing stuff around San Diego Comic-Con, how do you deal with the risks surrounding such polarizing issues as you enter this new Vertigo line?

I mean, look, I don’t take any of this lightly, but, I look at it as, if someone is talking about this in a good way or a bad way, we’re doing our job right. We should be making books that elicit a response one way or another.

Right, you’re not doing Richie Rich.

Right. No. It goes back to your earlier question: What’s a Vertigo creator today? A Vertigo creator today is someone with a voice. And, Erica and Ramon have something to say. It’s my job to help them tell their story. If someone has a problem with that then don’t read the book, because frankly, I don’t want you anyway.

Hex Wives by Ben Blacker and Mirka Andolfo

“The women are too powerful. They must be tamed.” A malevolent conspiracy of men brainwashes a coven of witches to be subservient, suburban housewives. But it’s only a matter of time before the women remember their power... (October)

This seems like the most classic Vertigo style book of all the new titles. Was there a conscious choice of including a classic supernatural style Vertigo book?

Yes and no. We sort of started with the big picture top down question of what genres we want to do. But it wasn’t buckets we had to fill. It wasn’t like I kept hitting the pavement until I got a witch book. It wasn’t like that. But when it came in from Ben, you felt it scratching some itches. Not only did it feel like a classic Vertigo book, it felt very present. It felt like, “Oh yeah, with this set up we can absolutely explore some interesting things that we can explore right now.” Ben is just so genuinely interested in the process of everything… it really comes through in the work.

American Carnage by Bryan Hill and Leandro Fernandez

In this thrilling crime saga, disgraced FBI agent Richard Wright, who is biracial but can pass for white, goes undercover in a white supremacist group believed to be responsible for the death of a fellow agent. (November)

Bryan Hill has been killing it on Detective Comics. This book seems like it’s in the same zeitgeist as Spike Lee’s new film and the Vertigo classic Incognegro. What drew you to this book?

I think what I liked about this book is that it was a crime story. There was a high concept pitch to it. You’ll see when you start digging into it; it’s just an incredible, complex crime story where you have a hero that’s walking into a world thinking, “I get this. I can do this. I can subvert this.” Everything seems black and white and then everything changes once they get wrapped up in it.

Goddess Mode by Zoë Quinn and Robbi Rodriguez

In a near future where all of humanity’s needs are administered by a godlike A.I., it’s one young woman’s horrible job to do tech support on it. But when Cassandra finds herself violently drawn into a hidden and deadly digital world beneath our own, she discovers a group of super-powered women and horrific monsters locked in a secret war for the cheat codes to reality. (December)

This seems the most experimental of the new line. What makes this a perfect part of the Vertigo launch?

I think experimental is a good word. I think some people might turn their nose up at experimental, but I think good things come out of experimental. Again, it was the guiding light on all these books. Is the talent someone who has something to say? When Andy Khouri brought me Zoë, I said, “Yes, that’s a great idea.” That’s one of the things we said from the very beginning, “Let’s bring in people who aren’t doing comics but could make great comics.”

One of the amazing things about all these people we reached out to, you start with a pitch of, “Hi, I’m an editor and Vertigo,” and we don’t have to do the full pitch because talent is like, “Yes, stop right there. I’m in.” All of these creators knew DC and Vertigo and was like, “Yes!” That was a really cool response. This was something that came out of conversations with Neil Gaiman and working on Sandman Universe.

One of the observations he had was that it was amazing working with the creators he was working with, the writers and artists both, all these people who grew up reading and adoring his work. I worked on the Batman books, and when you called people to work on Batman, they’d lose their minds. A similar thing happens with Sandman and the Sandman world… that’s a very cool thing to see. You have a whole generation of people who’d rather do a Sandman book and a Vertigo book.

Talk about working with the co-creator of Spider-Gwen Robbi Rodriguez. He seems to know what the readers want before the readers know it.

That’s a great way to frame Robbi. I’ve known Robbi for a long time. I first met him in San Diego about five hundred years ago, and he had a self-published book. This was like 2010. He was looking to do some stuff. I worked with on a Vertigo book I did called F.B.P. We did that book, we hit it off.

As I was developing the new Vertigo books, he reached out to me and said, “Hey, I’m going to be wrapping things up on Spider-Gwen, I’m looking for something else. I feel like a challenge, I want to come home to Vertigo. What have you got?” At the same time this pitch was being developed with Zoë and it seemed like a natural fit. He did a book called Frankie Get Your Gun. It’s funny you say Robbi is ahead of the curve, because this book was Mad Max: Fury Road before Fury Road. He knows what people wants before they want it.

High Level by Rob Sheridan and Barnaby Bagenda

Hundreds of years after the world ended and human society was rebuilt from scratch, a self-interested smuggler with a price on her head is forced to traverse a new continent of danger and mystery to deliver a child messiah to High Level, a mythical city at the top of the world from which no one has ever returned. (2019)

Forgive my ignorance. I’m not familiar with this creative team. 

It doesn’t surprise me that you’re not familiar because Rob comes from a different world. Rob comes from the music world. He was the artistic designer with Nine Inch Nails for years. He did concept designs and album designs. Web design was all Rob. He has this interesting aesthetic, but he always loved comics and is an interesting storyteller in his own right. When we reached out to him, he was like, “Yes, I’d love to do a Vertigo book.” Again, that was Andy Khouri coming to me and saying he thought of a person outside what we do but he likes what we do.

Barnaby worked with Andy on a book he first edited when he came to DC called Omega Men with Tom King. If you go back and look at that book, you’ll see what a terrific world Barnaby does with terrific characterization.

Safe Sex by Tina Horn and Mike Dowling

A dystopian sci-fi thriller about a ragtag team of sex workers fighting for the freedom to love in a world where sexual pleasure is monitored, regulated and policed by the government. (2019)

Safe Sex seems like it could be the sleeper hit of the line. Why should this book be on the readers’ radar? And please, tell us about how this book came about.

This book should be on readers’ radars because Tina is a great writer. She is another person that came outside of comics. She has this incredible podcast called Why Are People Into That?

In this case it was editor Amedeo Turturro who came to me and said, “Here’s an interesting person who never did comics.” I said, “Yes, we should reach out to her.” She immediately got it; she immediately got Vertigo and she had this really great, very relevant, very present pitch, but at the end of the day, it’s a story about love. It’s about people who want to love each other despite the world that’s around them. You frame all that in a dystopian heist narrative and I’m like, “Yes, great, I’m in.” But when you work with someone who’s never written anything before, you say let’s try a sample script to see if they do it. And she really nailed it. Early on, you can tell if someone is missing it, but she totally got it in terms of pacing a page and an issue, she got it.

further reading: Brian Michael Bendis and the Future of Jinxworld at DC

I agree with you, it could be a sleeper hit. It looks great, too. With comics like this, it comes down to what does it look like. But here, there’s a definite tone to the world. It feels like a superhero book even though it’s not a superhero book.

Second Coming by Mark Russell and Richard Pace

God sends Jesus to Earth in hopes that he will learn the family trade from Sun-Man, an all-powerful superhero, who is like the varsity quarterback son God never had. But, upon his return to Earth, Christ is appalled to discover what has become of his Gospel and vows to set the record right. (2019)

From The Flintstones to Prez to Snagglepuss, Mark Russell is a writer that creates hits in the most unexpected places. Talk about working with Mark and what drew you to Second Coming.

It was a great pitch. A good pitch is when someone pitches you the first line and you can see what the next ten issues will be. Going back to what Vertigo means and what we want to be publish...one of my favorite Vertigo books before I got to Vertigo was Preacher. I always though Vertigo was a place that was not afraid to attack institutions and satirize things. I think that the world needs that. I think you need to hold things up and say, “Look at this people. Should we be doing this?”

The top line of Mark’s pitch was funny, but once you dig into the story and characters, you see he’s incredibly real and honest and just wants to explore what it means to be a good person. He pitched two characters that represent two extremes of the spectrum and that’s where great drama comes from.

Any plans to incorporate classic DCU characters into the new Vertigo like the imprint has done in the past like Joe Lansdale did with Jonah Hex, and others did with Creeper, Haunted Tank, Deadman, hell, even Sandman.

The short answer to that is, that’s when I take off my Vertigo hat and put on my DC Black Label hat. That’s when people come to me and say, “Listen, I have this take on this character in a darker format,” that’s when we talk about Black Label.

from Books https://ift.tt/2wHyZaP

[yahoo-puck-daddy-blog]

What We Learned: The Marc-Andre Fleury contract is inexplicable

There’s no doubting the importance Fleury has to the organization as a sort of goaltender-slash-spokesman, but it seems they put the latter title first in signing this contract. (Getty)

I have been trying to wrap my head around the deal Marc-Andre Fleury signed with Vegas since it was first announced.

There is not a universe in which it makes any kind of sense.

For one thing, the Golden Knights signed Fleury a year early, and coming off a career-best season in which he dragged an otherwise not-great team to a Cup Final. As a general rule, you don’t want to pay guys who get bad teams to places no one thought they could go the kind of money commensurate with reaching those levels.

It should be obvious to everyone on earth that Fleury is not as good as he was in the regular season or playoffs. This was a .927 season — the highest of his career by a decent margin — followed by a .927 playoff that was much, much more impressive before he totally melted down against Washington. That kind of outsized outlier performance screams “Beware,” but George McPhee refused to heed that call.

Instead, he shackled his club to a goalie that, while popular in the city and among his teammates, is signed until he’s well past 37 years old. At a $7 million AAV.

To be fair to both sides here, Fleury has almost inexplicably gone .920 over his last 200 regular-season games, and .920 goalies have to get paid, but they don’t have to get paid a year early when you’re only bidding against yourself, and they absolutely shouldn’t get paid through their age-37 seasons. The fact of the matter is that it’s quite likely Fleury turns back into something resembling his career average, which is right around the league average.

And to give a little more credit to both sides here, the money probably doesn’t matter that much because if Vegas hasn’t changed its plans for building slowly through the draft, trades and so on, then you gotta spend money on somebody, and the top line, plus Paul Stastny, plus Fleury seems like a perfectly fair place to do it.

There is, of course, no use arguing whether the money or term are good. Neither are. Everyone knows that. You can’t justify paying a career-average goaltender $7 million dollars for his age-35, 36, and 37 seasons. Full stop. Unless this guy is Dominik Hasek — and he of course is not — this is a nonsense signing.

Maybe people won’t notice so much if Fleury doesn’t perform well next season — or any of the three after that — because Vegas isn’t likely to keep having the kind of offensive success it did last year, but even if you’re getting better-than-average goaltending, it won’t be so much better that Vegas can reasonably sustain the success it had last year. They probably won’t come close.

That likelihood creates a lot of problems, not the least of which is that we don’t know what the fan support in Vegas looks like when the team isn’t any good. Not that they haven’t cultivated a solid base or anything here, and not that people don’t love Fleury in particular, but if this team finishes in the bottom-10 next year, the year after that, etc., will people keep showing up? Fleury was always going to be the poster boy of the franchise, regardless of how he did last season, so now just as everyone else seems to have increased their own internal expectations for how good this team can be going forward, this contract might do the same for Fleury.

Again, if he’s average, or worse, at some point in this contract, one wonders how the revelation that this was a bad contract is actually taken. People in this sport are willing to throw all but the absolute very best goalies under the bus, and this particular goalie now has an untradeable contract.

More to the point, though, the issue is that Vegas just put Fleury into a tie for the third-highest goalie cap hit in the league. He now trails only Carey Price and Henrik Lundqvist, and is dead even with Tuukka Rask. I don’t think anyone on earth would confuse Fleury’s career numbers with any of those three players, and Lundqvist, a guaranteed first-ballot Hall of Famer, the best goalie of his generation by a good distance, is the only one who signed in his mid-30s.

I guess the primary reason I don’t understand this contract is that it didn’t have to happen. Vegas wasn’t under any type of time crunch to sign him before a certain date (well, I guess technically July 1, 2019, but they had dozens of weeks) and seem to have wrung no type of hometown discount from getting out in front of this issue now. They bought as high as humanly possible on a goalie who, unlike another recent goalie signing in Connor Hellebuyck, isn’t likely to maintain even previous levels of performance. Everything after 34 or 35 is a total guessing game. Guys can go from great to bad in a single offseason. And put simply, they often do.

So it’s difficult to say what Vegas was doing here, except making a PR signing now, on an otherwise quiet day for the league. There’s no doubting the importance Fleury has to the organization as a sort of goaltender-slash-spokesman, but it seems they put the latter title first in signing this contract.

What We Learned

Anaheim Ducks: Why would you turn to Adam Henrique to spark your offense? He’s perfectly good but 50 points seems like his absolute ceiling.

Arizona Coyotes: The Coyotes faced what could fairly be considered “undue backlash” for that Hossa trade. Like, I get it because they trade for dead money a lot but they got a good player out of it and it doesn’t really matter. Stop bailing out Chicago, sure, but whatever.

Boston Bruins: The idea that the Bruins would shake up the defense, perhaps by trading Torey Krug, does not seem well-considered.

Buffalo Sabres: Gotta keep locking in those 2015 BU Terriers.

Calgary Flames: I easily can see the Flames being a very bottom-of-the-barrel playoff team next season, for sure. Not quite certain where that actually gets them, but they could do it in that division. For the record, I can also see them missing by a dozen points.

Carolina Hurricanes: Yeah when you put it this way: Adding de Haan and Hamilton to your blue line is a pretty good upgrade for just about anyone in the league.

Chicago: I really hope Corey Crawford is over all his health issues but man, imagine what happens to this team if he isn’t. Yikes.

Colorado Avalanche: Speaking of which, Grubauer being a 1b in Colorado seems pretty good but also who really knows?

Columbus Blue Jackets: That’s some nice value for Oliver Bjorkstrand. He seems like he could turn into a very useful forward.

Dallas Stars: Yeah, sure, the Stars should trade for literally everyone. Why not.

Detroit Red Wings: Really wonder how much more room Anthony Mantha has to grow here. Another 24-goal season would be a nice resume-builder.

Edmonton Oilers: Well, “impressive” is one word for it.

Florida Panthers: We’re at the “I’m writing about AHL depth signings” part of the summer already? Good lord.

Los Angeles Kings: This headline is the reason the phrase “don’t put the cart before the horse” was invented.

Minnesota Wild: Yes they absolutely have hit their ceiling. Definitely.

Montreal Canadiens: The Habs keep signing first-round picks, which isn’t a bad idea because they tend to be talented players, but also: Ehhhh.

Nashville Predators: Haven’t seen much this summer to convince me shouldn’t be the Cup favorite again this year. Doesn’t mean they’ll win but this is a great team despite having no additions.

New Jersey Devils: Oh come on.

New York Islanders: Get ready for Barzal to have way too much expectation heaped on him in the next few years. Good luck kid.

New York Rangers: Imagine thinking there’s a “right” guy to be your enforcer who isn’t “nobody.”

Ottawa Senators: No, don’t do it Brady!!!

Philadelphia Flyers: Stop getting your hopes up about prospects based on rookie camp performances. Come on.

Pittsburgh Penguins: Giving Daniel Sprong a chance to actually play at the NHL level seems like a good idea. He was ridiculous in the AHL last year as a rookie.

San Jose Sharks: Jeez there are a lot of jokes to make here.

St. Louis Blues: Ah yes I have to agree: The Blues’ recent failures are definitely Vladimir Tarasenko’s fault.

Tampa Bay Lightning: Brian Bradley being on the Lightning’s Mount Rushmore is absolutely indefensible.

Toronto Maple Leafs: The Leafs keep making nice, cheap signings and that’s what you gotta do if you have a bunch of expensive elite players.

Vancouver Canucks: Hard to put yourself in the mindset of being a coach who has to run a mess of a team for the full 82 knowing you’re not coming into the playoffs.

Vegas Golden Knights: Important to get out in front of those high expectations now.

Washington Capitals: Totally have my popcorn ready for that Tom Wilson deal.

Winnipeg Jets: Mark Scheifele is great but he would never ever get anything resembling a John Tavares contract.

Gold Star Award

That Phil Danault contract is like a Magic Eye puzzle. You really have to not think about it to see the reason why it’s a value.

Minus of the Weekend

Rest in peace, Ray Emery. Truly awful news.

Perfect HFBoards Trade Proposal of the Week

User “Jokerz89” is an agent of chaos.

Something along the lines of Krug, Backes, Lauzon, Senyshyn, and a 1st for Nugent-Hopkins and Klefbom

Signoff

Well Seymour, you are an odd fellow, but I must say: You steam a good ham.

Ryan Lambert is a Puck Daddy columnist. His email is here and his Twitter is here.

(All stats via Corsica unless otherwise noted.)

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Tampa Evens Up; Jeff Skinner; Tom Wilson; Andrei Vasilevskiy; Defence Shot Distribution – May 18

We had a pretty lopsided game in Washington on Thursday night in favour of the Capitals. Unfortunately for Washington and their fans, this was a scene that has played out often in the playoffs over the last decade: dominate the opposition and lose.

A late third-period goal from Alex Killorn just as a penalty was expiring gave Tampa Bay a 3-2 lead, a lead they would not relinquish, adding a late empty-net goal for the 4-2 win. After falling behind at home 0-2 in the series, the Lightning won both games on the road to even things back up at two.

This was an outstanding game from Andrei Vasilevskiy. He faced nearly 40 shots and some of his saves were of the 10-bell variety, particularly in the third period. More on him a little later.

These types of games happen. Sometimes you just tip your cap (no pun intended, honestly) to the opposing goaltender and move on.

For what it’s worth, Nicklas Backstrom looked fine in his return, but Evgeny Kuznetsov was given significantly more ice time. This is nothing to be overly concerned about given Backstrom hadn’t played in a while and it’s doubtful he’s anywhere close to healthy anyway, but I wonder if this trend might continue next year. It’s nothing against Backstrom, he’s still a wonderful player. Kuznetsov is just that good, though. Maybe it won’t be a significant change, maybe they’re just close to even. Wondering aloud, over here.

Though Ovechkin is known for his goal-scoring prowess, this pass to Evgney Kuznetsov on the team’s second goal of the game, a backhand cross-ice sauce that fell right on Kuzy’s tape, was sick:

Kuznetsov ties it for the #allcaps , Ovechkin and Wilson assist pic.twitter.com/PD9FADW9Pf

— Shayna (@hayyyshayyy) May 18, 2018

That’s not Erik Karlsson-To-Mike Hoffman, but it’s pretty good.

*

Tom Wilson may not be a fan favourite outside the Washington fanbase but there’s no denying one thing: he had a monster fantasy season in multi-category leagues. Putting up 250 hits, 51 blocked shots, and 187 penalty minutes while being able to chip in 14 goals and 35 points is a very, very good year. Even in standard ESPN leagues where hits aren’t counted, he had so many PIMs that he was still a top-50 forward.

That brings me around to 2018-19. What do we do here? If he can replicate this season, there are no issues with drafting him as a top-100 player.

The big concern is his usage. He was a nice surprise on the top forward line at five-on-five and that slotting got him nearly 16 minutes of ice time per game. Does he get that slotting again? Jakub Vrana has played so well these playoffs he’s forced a reluctant Barry Trotz to eventually move him into the top-6. Andre Burakovsky is still a very talented forward who’s been battling injuries this year. If he can right the ship in 2018-19, do those two forwards push Wilson down the lineup?

Maybe not. Maybe Trotz decides that it’s best to lengthen the lineup and use one of Vrana/Burakovsky on the third line with Eller/Connolly (or whomever) to give them three more balanced scoring lines. Wilson is also an RFA and is undoubtedly going to get a raise on his $2-million that he made last year. Will that factor in?

Wilson’s upside is capped. He’s just not that good offensively without significant help and he won’t get anywhere near the top PP unit barring injuries or severe underperformance by that unit. He can be a Patrick Maroon-type where 15-ish goals and 40 points is a good year. With the peripheral stat stuffing, that’s more than enough. As long as he stays in the top-6, it’s more than doable.

*

By now, we’ve all seen quotes and rumours that there may be some big changes coming to Carolina this offseason. I think we all assumed that would mean a defenceman or two moved, but another name has appeared:

Bob McKenzie on Jeff Skinner: “The feeling is he will almost certainly be traded.”

Full quote from the Bobcast: pic.twitter.com/PHOKZFHne8

— Platinum Seat Ghosts (@3rdPeriodSuits) May 17, 2018

This does make sense when you think about Jeff Skinner only having one year left and maybe the team doesn’t want to commit to him beyond that. It is kind of sad in a way, though, as the franchise failed to advance to the playoffs in any of Skinner’s eight seasons. A waste of an elite scoring talent. Carolina’s loss will be someone else’s gain.

This is a guy either Alberta team should be targeting.

*

There was a good read by Joe Smith over at The Athletic a couple days ago on Andrei Vasilevskiy. They basically talked to current goalies like Henrik Lundqvist and Ben Bishop as well as former goalies like Brian Boucher and Kevin Weekes on what made Vasilevskiy so good this year. Most of the praise came down to two things: athleticism and footwork.

I have no way of really proving this but my thought has always been your goalie needs to be the best athlete on the team. When you look at elite goalies over the last 20 years like Dominik Hasek and Tim Thomas, they were what some may say is unconventional but they used their athleticism to their advantage. Carey Price (before the injuries) did the same even though he was technically very sound. Regardless, being a great goalie is about making saves you’re not supposed to make, not about stopping 50-foot slapshots from the point. Hasek, Thomas, and Price could all do this. Vasilevskiy does it as well.

This is a mea culpa. Last summer, I wrote a couple times that I wasn’t sold on him but reading the opinions of others and watching him more this year has changed my mind a bit. Goaltending is a fickle thing so he could very well be a .910 goalie next year instead of .920. But when I read what is being said about him, it’s hard not to think he won’t have a very successful career. It’s easy to forget he doesn’t even turn 24 years old for two months.

Now, if Tampa could fix that penalty kill…

*

For those reading my Ramblings this week, thanks! Also, you’ll be reminded that we’ve been talking about shot rates across the league.

On Tuesday, the discussion revolved around rising shot attempt marks at five-on-five and how this affects goal scoring. The basic premise is that with the rise in shot rates, the middling totals are become a little devalued, as are guys with middling goal-scoring totals. The most important thing to note is that the number of players with over 200 shots on goal or 20 goals at all strengths has risen a lot over the last few years.

Yesterday, we covered forwards specifically. Shot rates are increasing everywhere except the absolute top tier. Despite more shots in the NHL this year than in recent seasons, the elite forward shot totals at five-on-five didn’t increase. Rather, the elite shot seasons disappeared. There were still excellent seasons, and more crossed the 200-shot threshold at five-on-five, but the 220+ seasons were not there. The league-wide shot increase led to more shots in the middle but not at the very top.

Today, we look at defencemen.

While the forwards may have been nitpicking a bit – does anyone really care if Alex Ovechkin lands 219 shots instead of 226? – the defence shot distribution is a whole other ball game. It’s changed to a much greater degree than it has for the forwards.

First things first, here’s what the distribution looks like for defencemen at five-on-five in each of the previous five seasons:

Let’s go through a few things.

In 2013-14, the mean shot on goal total for forwards at five-on-five was 79.26, which rose to 83.54 in 2017-18. That represents an increase of 5.40 percent, which means the average forward is landing 5.40 percent more shots on goal than he was four years ago. Fair enough.

In 2013-14, the mean shot on goal total for defencemen at five-on-five was 51.32, which rose to 63.38 in 2017-18. That represents an increase of 23.50 percent, which means the average defenceman is landing 23.5 percent more shots on goal than four years ago. That is a lot.

That’s not a nitpick, either. Each season from 2013 through 2016 saw mean shot totals between 50.8 and 52.4 among defencemen. That has exploded each of the past two seasons with the mean in 2016-17 being 57.11 and of course last year was 63.38. While forwards are shooting more than they have in recent years, defencemen are just racking up shots.

Keep in mind that this is shots on goal and not just shot attempts. These are shots taken by defencemen at five-on-five on which the goalie has to directly make a save. This isn’t defencemen shooting around shinpads for a deflection or missing the net on purpose to look for a backdoor goal.

Also, unlike the forwards, elite shot totals from blue liners are becoming more readily available. You can see the 2017-18 season stretch further to the right than any previous year in the graph above but the numbers really tell the story: over the past five years, there have been 16 instances of a defenceman with at least 160 shots on goal at five-on-five, and seven of them came in 2017-18.  Four of them came in 2016-17, with the other five spread over the three previous seasons. The elite shot totals from defencemen has been increasing rapidly over the last couple years. So, again, unlike the forwards, not only are there higher middling totals, there are more elite totals as well.

Now, it’s a matter of what to do about the elite guys. Brent Burns continues to be far-and-away the best volume option. Dougie Hamilton was often among the top, and still is, but he’s got company now in guys like Seth Jones and Darnell Nurse. There are other young stars like Zach Werenski and Ivan Provorov who could be knocking on the door soon. Don’t forget a healthy Erik Karlsson. If Hamilton can’t consistently separate himself in the shot department as he has over the past few years, how much value does he really have above everyone else? Unless Calgary fixes that power play.

The devaluation of the non-Brent Burns top shooting options on the blue line is just one of the interesting fantasy angles here. What does this say about the increase in goal scoring if defencemen are shooting so much more and yet goals are still going up? Is it time we start viewing certain fantasy defencemen as if they were a fourth forward on the ice rather than a defenceman?

There is a lot more to dig into in the coming months. This doesn’t even start going into the power play production which is so critical to fantasy value. All the same, the way hockey is being played in the NHL is changing rapidly and with it is the way we should be valuing certain fantasy options.

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-jeff-skinner-tom-wilson-andrei-vasilevskiy-defence-shot-distribution-may-18/