#anyways planetary go my beloved

[artiepoison]

was watching a mcr video essay but had to leave when the guy making the video said that Planetary Go is the worst mcr song what the actual fuck

[edgarbright]

tl;dr Caleb is innocent until proven guilty + the game already told us who is responsible for the house explosion and it's not him

There's been a surge of popularity over the theory that Caleb himself staged the house explosion and it reminds me of how, for months and months, people kept accusing Rafayel of leaving MC to drown in chapter 7--despite MC immediately stating afterwards that it was Rafayel who was in danger, not her. And she also explicitly thanked him for saving her so that she didn't drown! But people still kept accusing him.

MC: "You're the idiot. The whirlpool was obviously a death trap, but you just swam right into it..."

MC, a few lines later: "Anyway, thanks... You were the one who pulled me out of the water, right? Thought I heard your voice before I blacked out..."

I'm excited to learn Caleb's POV of the house explosion incident, because it was his idea to return home and not to keep Grandma waiting! And it was MC who stated he should go inside, alone. They literally parted ways in the worst way: after an argument. Like what was going on in his head at that moment when he first felt the heat on his skin and knew MC was, blessedly, still outside?

Plus what would Caleb have to gain by killing Grandma except MC's hatred? Grandma was already dying!

And I point all of this out because the game already showed us who was responsible for the house explosion in the World Underneath, chapter 6 part 6 of Sealed in Dust: it was the rogue agents from Xavier's Backtrackers working for Ever Group!

Raincoat: "You silenced Josephine and retrieved the research material from back then. Good work."

The "You" here is to the Backtracker, the "hat-wearing man." And we know it is a Backtracker because Raincoat further says: "Your Prince Xavier has been glued to her side watching over her, right?"

And the Backtracker confirms his own association by saying: "Hmph, Xavier can only guard her for so long. He's too busy dealing with his own issues. Don't say I didn't warn you. It's not just Ever who wants her."

Plus the item exchange in this transaction is the research information taken from Grandma's house before the explosion and a drug to help the Backtracker survive longer on Earth. Ever Group, as we know, has a strong hand in the medical science.

Remember the Backtrackers are turning into Wanderers--Xavier already killed one of his men, Isaiah, and later straight-up murders another Backtracker who is in the process of turning (see below). Remember that MC on Philos was used as the fuel in the planetary machine that kept everyone and everything alive. Many of the Backtrackers want to sacrifice her again to save their lives! And Xavier tells them to back off. He's using his sword to make sure they back off. He knows his own people are a danger to her. (How tragic that he brought a danger with him on his expedition to save her...)

So in conclusion, Caleb is innocent until proven guilty, the game already told us the main people responsible for the explosion are Ever Group and the Backtracker rogue agents, and with all the trailers reminding us again and again, we really shouldn't be questioning that Caleb has only ever wanted to look after MC. Caleb wants to be with her! So you honestly can't have your LIs doing unforgivable things like murdering beloved Grandmas, like let's be real here.

Thanks for coming to my Ted Talk! We're less than 3 days until Caleb's homecoming!

[twogeeseinatrenchcoat]

Spaceship Short Stories

Yeah why not. Title is self-explanatory. I'll be bringing back my aborted plan for a spaceship story in favour of this because I want to. Also, I will be changing and retconning past work in this as I go. Don't expect anything to stay the same.

Intro.

This is the official logbook of the Vchern'ixt, or Merchant and Delivery Ship 382. (382-MDS). We are, as our work tag suggests, an interplanetary merchant ship. This logbook will almost certainly be used by the crew, and knowing my crew, will not be taken seriously. I can only hope it will provide actual information, and I will hopefully find the time to add actual updates between the crew entries.

Entry 1: 218-4-7 (Kaylie - Pilot)

First week on the ship! Not much happened this week, few deliveries, some unnecessarily (but fun) dangerous asteroid-dodging. I think everyone else is still getting used to a human in board, they're fairly cautious around me. To be honest, I would be as well! I think their previous pilot was a lot more cautious than me. They've been watching me, though. Curious but cautious. I've tried to make some friends, be nice to people, but it's kinda hard when everyone half expects you to explode at any moment.

Truly, the worst part is that they don't have coffee here. I'll make sure to fix that with the first paycheck I get, Captain said that "you can spend your own money on your comforts. I'll spend the ship's money on the ship." So they're no help. Anyways, paycheck is in two days, and we dock for supplies at Kerroi-825B in... Whenever our orbits get close, so I'll be able to get my coffee then! For now, I'll live with the mimicry that Grömerg makes.

Entry 2: 218-4-10 (Grömerg - Medic, Chef)

My coffee is not bad, is it? I do not know if the taste is as it should be, though it smells like the sample you gave me. I'm sorry if it is [untranslatable]

Translator suggestions: Subpar, worse than typical, less than.

Entry 3: 218-4-12 (Kaylie)

It's not! I just prefer real coffee over synthetic, not a problem with you at all!

Update: finally got my coffee machine! And I remembered to buy coffee beans this time! It didn't take as long as I thought to find the "Human Items" section of Kerroirå Market (Fun fact: that's "Kerroi Market Market in Tychfing), and I was able to grab my coffee making items (coffee ingredients?) In time to not be left behind by the crew! Yay!

In other news, I was able to pick up a roll of duct tape and a knife for our beloved cleaning robot. Now I just have to fit Stabby with a camera to record everyone else's reactions to him. He is now one with the hivemind of Stabbies. Oh, and I grabbed the stuff I was actually supposed to. The boring stuff. It was heavy, but some people helped me load the boxes into the ship!

Entry 4: Galactic Year 218, Standard Lunar Cycle (SLC) 4, Standard Solar Cycle (SSC) 14 [218-4-14] (Ky'tchas - Secretary, Accountant)

Kaylie, what is your new creation for? It has caused several minor injuries, and I don't understand the purpose of the "laugh track." Or the confetti. Why do these only occur when it stabs someone? Are they incentive for violence?

Additionally, I will include the "boring stuff," or our pickup for the next delivery. We have picked up:

14 Planetary Leap Drives, 10 Warp Cores, 2 Wormhole Accessors, 24 Guard-8.6 Androids, 48 Holo-Screen 18.5s, and 36 Extragravitory Flight Suits.

These are important things to record. Kaylie, as the one who ordered some of the parts, you should be the one to relay them to me. As it is, you should have placed the order through me in the first place, since it is my job to place orders and file them.

You're new, so I assume you haven't heard anyone explicitly state this, though the captain should have during your viewing and explanation of the ship. Either way, I expect any further orders to be placed though me.

Entry 5: 218-4-18 (Grömerg)

Kaylie? Is it alright if I make a request of you? Please, I beg, slow down when flying. The food almost did not survive our last warp-jump.

Additionally, Ky'tchas, there is no need to write out the full date. The human knows Standard Time, she is just... odd. I believe she is still on Solar Time, as she will not answer with any other time. She logs days in Standard Time, though, which makes me believe she knows it.

Entry 6: 218-4-19 (Ky'tchas)

Very well, Grömerg. Kaylie, heed Grömerg's advice. Slow down, and fly with less reckless abandon. I had to restart my calculations of profit due to a sharp turn you took around an asteroid. Be more careful, so that you do not disturb your new crew. This is your final warning.

Entry 7: 218-4-20 (Kaylie)

Alright, okay... But dodging asterioids and racing the planets is what makes ship-driving fun! It's just boring if you avoid the asterioid fields and aren't on the edge of burning out your engines.

But okay... if everyone says so, I'll be more careful. Sorry guys! And Grömerg, the food was still great! Also, I'm on Standard, I just... Don't know how to change my watch from Solar...

It's really complicated, okay? I tried, and got stuck on Giryilan Time for... I'm not entirely sure how long in Standard, but it was a long time! Everyone looked at me like I was crazy.

Entry 8: 218-4-22 (Grömerg)

That... was for the [untranslatable]. I... do humans... eat that? I was not aware. I will make more. I had thought the [untranslatable] had eaten it. It appears not...

Translator Suggestion: Violet Bot, Stabber, Stabbing Robot

Additionally, that is a very funny anecdote! I heard Giryil has very short days, yet very long years. I'm interested to hear more about it, I've never seen it written out. How do they measure smaller increments of time?

[bxrningdragxn]

figured I'd make a little introduction post thingie incase anyone new stumbles onto my blog :)

So hi there! I'm Bxrning, I'm 18 and my real name is a secret only the chosen ones may know

I mostly post about pokemon and occasionally about fall out boy

mutuals can add me on discord

wanna know more? click read more! ;3

I'm an introvert, I'm also pretty shy at first but people have told me I'm really loud and energetic around my friends :)

I like to think I'm a pretty chill person? it takes a lot to piss me off lol

just don't be an asshole and we'll get along fine lmao

anyway here's some stuff I like !

pokemon! - my favorite character is Steven Stone and my favorite pokemon are umbreon, delphox and metagross

fire emblem - my favorite game is awakening and favorite character is Robin (I named my oc after him lmao)

Percy Jackson and the Olympians ! - cabin 7 :)

Bungou Stray Dogs - favorite characters are Dazai, Yosano and Nikolai

Fall Out Boy - favorite song is the shipped gold standard <3

My Chemical Romance - Planetary (GO!) is my favorite song, I just love Danger Days so much lol

Waterparks - High Definition >>>>>>>

genshin impact - Tartaglia main (dm for UID)

brooklyn nine-nine - my comfort show istg lol

Good Omens - Crowley my beloved <3 (season two left me in shambles)

there's a lot more stuff I like but these are the big ones

you're still here? cool !

I like to draw but I'm not that good yet lmao

I also adore writing and am working on a story with my ocs :)

I'm learning electric guitar now too !

I speak Dutch, English and Turkish fluently and know a little French

I learnt German in high school but I was horrible at it lmao

I almost never take out my headphones, my spotify is on almost 24/7

You read all that??? Awesome!

I hope you enjoy your stay on my blog! <3

[singlecrow]

H, V, and W, please.

H: How would you describe your style? The nicest thing anyone ever says about my style - by which I mean, the thing people they say that makes me think, yes, that’s exactly what I want to be doing - is that it uses a small number of words to create an outsize effect. I said yesterday that A. always describes it as “laconic”, which I initially didn’t like but have come round to, and another friend describes it as a Japanese painting, with a few illuminating strokes on a broad canvas. That’s the aim, but on a day-to-day basis my intention is clean, precise, warm, and without unnecessary ornament. I remove dead metaphors (i.e., metaphors that already exist in the language, “cold as ice”, “black as pitch”) and any word that doesn’t mean precisely the thing I want. Although I’m also a big fan of the broad penumbra of the living metaphor. See this sentence fragment: A sparkling day in Boston, winter’s steam and smoke.

Do days sparkle? Maybe. I think the word creates a bright blue sky and ice on the ground, but it depends on the reader’s association, and maybe they see unseasonably warm. And, winter’s steam and smoke - either a living metaphor, the idea of confusion, everything obscured, but also, the steam of your breath and of the smokestacks, and the smoke of wood burners.

Nine words, though, for winter in Boston, and honestly I don’t think you need any more. And they scan, too - I try to always make sure everything scans, which is why I walk around my house shouting things like “hey friends can you think of a three-syllable non-exotic fruit”?

of course in my other life I also spend whole days trying to perfect a 9-word sentence. the folk who taught me used to say, use words as though each one were taxed. well. it may have stuck.

V: A secondary (or underrated) character you want to see more of in fic?

I’m going to take this opportunity to talk about Dr Mensah, my beloved! I actually don’t think Mensah is that underrated now, but she was for a long time and mostly gets written about in relation to Murderbot, so here we go. She is the principal human character in the Murderbot books though oddly doesn’t appear as much as you'd think. (Murderbot! long series of novellas and novels about a sentient killing machine who is, very much against its will, becoming a person with real friendships and relationships. All Murderbot itself wants to do is sit around and watch its shows. It’s rough being Murderbot.)

Anyway. Mensah is the very first human ever to treat Murderbot with the respect due to a real person. She never stops doing so. Murderbot adores her and would do anything for her. She is, just by the bye, a planetary administrator - that is to say, she’s the political leader of an entire planet’s worth of people, and I love that all by itself? You still don’t get many women who wield unremarkable power in SFF - by which I mean, she’s not a fairy queen, she’s a duly elected leader who worries about things like security and agriculture. But she’s also just a normal (queer) person, trying to get through this world, with the help of her large and overwhelming family. She’s tired and she’s traumatised, and she lies about that, and sometimes her family are so overwhelming that her closest confidante is a sentient killing machine. But she’s trying. I want fic that digs into all of that! I love her.

W: Do you like more general prompts, or more specific ones?

Specific! you should feel free to send me them (you = all of you).

[tsuki-sennin]

Wow, Adventure Heaven! What a good movie I totally just saw! I liked the part where Moffun showed up and ate an entire box of Milk Duds, cardboard and all~! And the part where Racules spelled his name out in Romaji on a blackboard and it wasn't "Rcules" because goddammit that is fucking bullshit~!

Anyways, time for Episodes 24-26~!

Spoilers, I guess...

-I don't know why you seem so surprised about Dezzy blowing up the planet, Jimmy. I mean, have you met him?

-Gerojim! I missed you, yo!

-Ahhhh, so Tikyuu's already got its core science down.

-Oh!

-Okay, apparently bedrock just doesn't exist in this universe.

-"I will be king! And none will challenge me!"

-Spiders Jeremy comes to play the game!

-Grandpa putting you to bed.

-Jeremy hijacked the intro entirely for himself this time, okay!

-The king is boiling alive, and he hasn't even been coronated for a few days!

-Holy shit, 90%???

-Damn Yanma, do you not have liquid nitrogen lying around?

-...Rita, is there some secret stash of Moffun and Me merch hidden somehwere in this castle that Racules had? Are there Moffun Chunkopops?

-Three cities! For three baskets of crops!

-Oh, Gira...

-Boone...

-"How can you people party when we're all melting?"

-Matsuri, matsuri da~!

-...Tarou-san...

-"I know all about your stupid planetary genocide plan~!"

-Goddamn, Jeremy looks great in that torchlight.

-One of the best staples of any JRPG~! The festival sequence~!

-Gira-sama~!

-Have fun, my beloved peons~!

-Oh my god, the plushie's got his own Akracing (TM) Gaming Chair.

-

-AN ENTIRE SKYSCRAPER

-Oh you motherfuckers hjlkh

-Stupid carnies!

-Lunch time~! Lay it on us, K-Man.

-Utage ja Ohger Jumpscare

-Rita's so adorable in that outfit, holy crap

-"Get out there, boy."

-Dezzy's insight is rather surprising. Forced to answer for crimes he had no hand in while those who put his people there party above them...

-Ohhhh, those are simply lovely parallel effects...

-"I will be the pen that writes my tyrannical legend."

-"Ehh... idk, maybe this whole tyranny thing isn't working out for me."

-Th

-Awww, Douga :)

-Man, looking at the green screen for long is fuckin' with my sense of perspective.

-It's like if George Lucas directed a season of Power Rangers.

-"Oh, hey Jeremy :)"

-Jeremy...

-All this time...

-Big crawfish!

-Po boys for everyone!

-That boy can dig.

-"Anyone got any bright ideas?"

-Fishing!

-Okay, that is smart writing.

-Can't burn somebody already boiling alive.

-Now to plug all these holes.

-Oh Dezzy...

-Oh, goin' full King already.

-Holy shit, he tanked that.

-Idomonarak??

-Ohhhhhhhh

-Family...

-He's just shuffling on...

-And yet he hears nothing.

-OHHHH?

-Everybody!

-"The man who done fucked up."

-Go even further beyond.

-Oh

-Okay, that simple.

-Twenty guys.

-Ah don't worry, I saw the preview, you guys'll find 'em.

-GEROJIM

-DUDE

-"I'll handle this one."

-OHHHHH

-That is devious.

-:O

-Holy shit

-Testing a man's resolve so hard.

-"Serve your king. As the first of the Bugnarok."

-Chosen by the gods.

-Kofuki's unprepared.

-"...I'm starting to regret this idea now."

-King Nerd and his posse ride on!

-I see Himeno's retinue are quite resolute.

-Last meal.

-"My nasty-ass hands ask to be taken! Kuroda! Suzume! I beg of you!"

-Hello, Morphonia~!

-Kabedon

-Ohhhhhh the hug!!!

-"The will to succeed."

-Kuwagon...

-Thump!

-No more sacrifice plays! Only the finest perfect run here!

-Damn

-Boone didn't hesitate for a second.

-It's time for your advent, God King-Ohger!

-That is one huge son of a bitch.

-Long-ass jingle too.

-God descends, and they are a chimeric arthropod!

-Removed.

-Ikuzo!

-This is simply marvelous.

-"On your call, Ant Boy!"

-Ohsama Sentai! King-Ohger!

-Goodbye, Emperor Dethnarak.

-We saved the world~!

-...kinda!

-One last episode for this arc, of course.

-Ah yes, the best solution for racism. Genocide.

-"All the Bugnarok will die too, you moron."

-"Let's meet somewhere nicer. You can even borrow this if you want."

-Sweet prince Jeremy...

-Oh?

-"Hey, Arbiter! Can't arbit with goosebumps?"

-Ohhhhh

-I see...

-Oh crap, Himeno.

-OHHHHHH

-Those're the locusts!

-A pile of dead flies.

-Jesus Christ...

-Oh, already revolting.

-That is messed up, man.

-Emperor Dezzy's got a stummyache.

-Gerojim's a force ghost.

-Oh!

-It's a little guy!

-"Can you help him?"

-Dethnarak...

-I never expected much from him, and yet...

-Goddamn, this is some tragic-ass theming.

-"Get out of here! You stupid dumb animal!"

-They fightin'!

-"Look at how bright and beautiful the sun is!"

-Gira...

-Yep. We would've done the same goddamn thing.

-And we would've kept doing that same goddamn thing over and over again.

-Let it fall, buddy.

-We're doing it good!

-Oh

-Oh fuck you Kamejim.

-"Two thousand years of planning! Stoking the fires of prejudice, killing, stealing, lying, destroying. All down the drain!"

-What the hell is that

-"Be king. Let our people see the beautiful shining sun!"

-Dethnarak...

-Returned to nothing but cinders.

-Jeremy's fucking pissed.

-Time for everybody to play their part once more.

-"Now, what to do with you kids~?"

-Clocked

-Even at his last breath, Kamejim refused to get it.

-Goodbye, stinkbug man.

-The Bugnarok are heretofore recognized as their own domain.

-There's no need for hatred any more. Never there was.

-Man and bug. Hand in pincer, hand in wing, hand in leg.

-No cheer or joy. Just a message made clear.

-"Now, let's make a beautiful new story~!"

-Ohhhhhhhhh

-Ah, yep. Planet.

-I forgot.

-Alienses~!

-Galactinsects, they're called.

-Oh wow, a timeskip.

-WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH FINALLY!

-I'M CAUGHT UP!

-THE CURSE HAS BEEN LIFTED!

[helloenee]

PBS NOVA: Solar System: Storm Worlds (2024)

Full episode available on the PBS page. I have no idea how long it'll stay up. Unfortunately I discovered that not all episodes stay uploaded. Like my beloved Mars episode from The Planets. Noooo.

About the wicked weird weather systems found in our Solar System

I love educational Youtube videos, but you just cannot beat the budget and production value of an actual tv production. The amount of rendering and visual effects must be prohibitively expensive for any one person (or team?) to do.

Cool stuff!!! Space is so cool.

Venus has a thick af atmosphere. The greenhouse gas effect has gone wild and its surface temperature is 900 degrees Fahrenheit. But somehow... its mountainous regions seem to have frost?

The mountain tops are still prohibitively hot for water to even condensate, so it'd have to be some other kind of substance. Scientists still don't know what that substance could be, but they theorize it could be something like galena, also known as lead sulfide. Compounds like galena could exist in vaporized form in Venus' lowlands, only to be carried by wind up to higher altitudes, where they might solidify into a kind of metallic frost.

Isn't that so cool to think about? By the way, we've sent probes to Venus before, back in the 1980s. We have honest to goodness pictures of Venus' surface. Venus' skies are yellow from clouds of sulfuric acid.

Martian dust devils leave dark trails all over the planet. The wind picks up the lighter colored sand, exposing the darker rock underneath.

The dust storms are also the reason the Spirit and Opportunity rovers were able to survive out there for so long. NASA had planned for the Martian dust to gradually coat the rovers' solar panels, rendering them less and less effective. They estimated the battery would last 3 months. But the dust storms wiped their solar panels clean! The rovers could keep going! Thank you, dust storms! Spirit went on for another 6 years, and Oppy for 15 years.

Spirit and Oppy are always emotional stories to tell. Everyone always tears up. And you can't feature Mars without talking about these rovers who helped us make so many discoveries about the planet.

This is what Jupiter looks like in infrared:

Jupiter is radiating heat, remnant energy from its planetary formation. It's this heat that powers the storms on its surface. On Earth, storms' main energy source is the sun. Jupiter... powers its own. (Wickeddddddd. So cool.)

Titan! Saturn's largest moon. What's this? River channels?

Let's give it up for Titan and her oceans of liquid methane which goes on a flash flooding spree across the planet every 29 years! Go Titan!

Anyway, I do love public television programs. Support your local PBS station, etc.

[vordenburg]

So, in editing this stupidly long — 08:56, to be specific — Sera and Manu vid that’s set across the multitimelineverse, I’ve been getting a few more concrete ideas from the footage I’ve maniped together for my current verses, including the convoluted, but dearly beloved (to me), Destroyer of Worlds, which is essentially an AU of an AU, following on from A Quality of Mercy with Admiral Pike making the terrible decision™ to wake Khan after encountering the Botony Bay instead of Captain Kirk, hoping he will join their cause, which… he does, except it offsets an even darker timeline that was never supposed to exist.

From there I’ve basically cannibalised a bunch of “Bad Future” bits and bobs across various Trek and a few other sources with a dash of inspiration from the Mirror Universe as well. But all of that is a TL;DR post for another time.

Anyway, back to Sera and Manu, I was trying to figure out where to put their first meeting and incorporate him into the verse in general — Sera I already solidly have a complete arc for. And now I’m inclined to have it occur after she’s exiled by La’an after their biggest bust up yet (the girlies will stop fighting eventually, but La’an at this point is still forever salty about alt!Kirk with no interest in amends) from the ISS Puget Sound II.

[ Insert that Krinn quote here about pride and downfall being the natural evolution of it. ]

Sera then sarcastic Vulcan salutes her way back onto her shuttle with the intention of going after Khan by herself (third time’s the charm, right?) but a navigational glitch puts her in Gorn space instead.

Enter Manu Noonien-Singh, AKA the planetary nursery MVP, best big brother, Gorn hunter, Lewis Tan looking fine and divine, ritual schmitual, Mr. Brawn and Brains.

He saves her from becoming lizard chow and welcomes her aboard his stolen starship the Wrath, and I figure they have a few adventures of their own together on their way back to Deep Space 19, which is Resistance HQ, since that’s literally the only “home” Sera has left, along with one of the few safe spaces in the Quadrant for non-Humans.

And that’s very much a midway point where they both then get involved on the space station with Admiral James Insane-Middle-Name Kirk, which is awkward for Sera. For. So. Many. Reasons. Even though this James is not the James she pew pew’d with an antique.

Long conversation short with myself, it’s a good solid place to establish more canon with them, and with Manu and Sera both essentially being independent there’s also the capacity for them to go off-station for missions as and when they’re needed.

And then, obviously, at some point, La’an will be back, and that’s where the aforementioned in previous musings Echo/Bellamy/Octavia style arc comes in to play, followed by eventual actual forgiveness instead of their dynamic being teeth clenched teamwork under the mutual agreement “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.��

The sparring scene from The 100 says it all for how I visualise it initially going with Octavia/La’an being like, “No, I will not forgive this murderer for something she did [X] amount of years ago, alternate timeline or not.” And Bellamy/Manu being like, “I’m not justifying it, but who she was then is not who she is now.”

Additional Manu/Sera adventures and notes include:

An encounter with the Augments who inform Khan that not one but two of his descendants are still alive… and both of them are working for the Resistance.

Introducing each other to different beverages: Manu to kali-fal and Sera to tea practice.

Hanging out in the holosuite.

Intimate exchanges of truths.

Manu being captured by the Orion Syndicate and forced into an underground fighting ring. Sera then has to get the green body paint out to infiltrate the arena to rescue him.

Manu imparting his knowledge about the Gorn to Sera, including how to interpret their light signals.

Manu learning about Romulan culture to better understand her.

Manu becoming the one person in the world that Sera trusts implicitly.

Manu thinking Sera’s ears are elegant and pretty.

Rescuing a group of refugees from a Gorn breeding planet.

Sera eventually giving Manu her true name (and heart).

Sera giving Manu a crash course in (old) Earth history, including memes and the best of Toronto cuisine, to make up for his lost youth on the breeding planet.

Sera teaching Manu how to read, write, and speak Romulan, only to be surprised by how quickly he picks it up. (What? He’s good with his tongue.)

Stopping the Serene Squall after they raid a Resistance supply ship carrying essential dilithium for the cause.

Training together and showing each other new moves from their respective fighting styles.

[theburntcity]

Went to see it again - here's my second full writeup. 8th June 2022

Spoilers under cut

I spent my first loop with the potter, Laocoon, Prometheus, Rotwang, Schliemann. I'm not sure what his name is. He started (or, I caught him) at the sake bar. He cleared the bar top and then made a model of the czech hedgehoc and poured blood from a sake bottle on it. Some went on his face.

Then he went around a bit, watched the troy main square for a bit, spoke to Zagreus, who asked him if he "really still believed?" to which he replied that he did.

We went up to the first floor, he went in through the Elysium hotel, where he smeared blood onto the waterfall painting, making the flow of water (and therefore time?) go backwards. He seemed sad about it.

Then we went up to the freaky corridor (freaky corridor my beloved) where he tapped on a lamp - three fast taps on the glass shade, three slow taps on the wall below on alternating sides, and then a swipe across the bottom. Need to check if this is a Linear B letter. He has two egg shaped rocks, one of which is an ocarina or similar - he whistles through it.

He ran into Polydorus up there, warned him he was in danger. Polydorus, a teen, recoiled from the crazy hobo and left. He was in danger. Oh well.

The potter made his way into Polymestor's office, and opened the door to the Moloch statue. I saw the receipt for the statue this time - he definitely made it, and it's definitely moloch. After placing his hands up on the statues hands and prostrating himself onto it (there was fog), Cassandra came in. They looked at each other (recognition of two precogs?) (blighted by the gods) (future knowledge sucks thats why everyone's drinking the waters of the lethe) and then slpit. He went into the Club side of the office, and Agamemnon came into the office side with Cassandra. They danced in a surprisingly non-horny way, while the potter did a ritual with his bottle of blood. Banger of a track this time - i've got to download it. I think it's the schlepp geist one on the playlist. His dance here was animalistic, made me think about the minotaur. (There's a strange absence of Theseus in this play.)

He dashed blood against the window and left - annoyingly he jumped down off the bridge leading out of the office, onto the roof of the sake shop. Luckily I knew where the stairs were and caught him lmao im the best.

Then he walked through the streets, and went into the graffiti hallway, where he drew sigils on the walls (a circle with a cross in, a Y with a line through, an inverted christian cross - again gotta check if these are Linear B or something else. The first one is Earth's alchemical/planetary symbol I think)

Then he went into Neoptolemus' tent, on the endge of Troy, and sketched a snake out of a magazine he kept in his bag. There was a 1:1 with someone else, where he told some sort of story about a giant snake. Possibly eating someone he loved? Not sure - I didn't get the 1:1. There was a lot of arm touching. Anyway then he left to go back to his studio.

The studio only has one door, with the side wall seemingly covering a hole with a roll of paper and tape, but I didn't look in it bc he was there all the time and it seemed rude to fuck up his wall.

Anyway then he carved figurines for like 20 minutes straight. I only stayed cause I had a soft spot. Somewhere in this period, he went into the main square and hung out by the flower cart, only for a woman (later recognised as Persephone) to come out of a fountain? very wet? and confused? Not sure if that happens every loop. It's a very small fountain. I'll put it on the map in v2 I suppose.

This is where I think the loop ended but I didn't hear the reset msuic so I kept following him. After this, he went back and carved for a while, then walked out to the small square, and it turned out he was the hanging guy who Cassandra sees in her first premonition.

Anyway it was at this point i realised i was stuck into loop 2 but I'd missed the beginning. I wanted to catch the Troy finale, so loop 3 I wanted to be in Troy. So I went for a walk. Saw Eurydice offer solace and sake to a greek soldier who killed Polyxena - not achilles or agamemnon. One of the other ones. I also saw Aegisthus performing in the sexy windows in the horrible latex mask. But not for long. It was quite horrible.

Saw the box room, looked inside the boxes. There fully is a dead horse in one. Went back to the Czech Hedgehogs to amrvel, adn then looked for secret rooms. Couldn't find the artemis shrine, the rooms behind the gate thing or the ones up by iphigenia's bedroom :/ I saw a lil bit of clytemnestra and agamemnon but I saw them last time so I didn't linger. Then I went to the bar, bc i remembered I was supposed to meet my friend lmao but she wasn't there. Aremis and Apollo were, they danced to Blue Monday and that was a banger, Artemis was beautiful and having a great time. I'm in love etc etc.

Uhhh then I think it was the end of the loop. I was only a bit sure it was the top of loop 3 so I was feeling time pressure. Spent my third loop with Hades - best choice so far.

Caught him riiight at the start of Hecuba's loop in the main square, and went into his office with a group. He spoke about how he feels when Persephone wasn't there - like the world is fake and flawed. Full of shades. Almost LiKe A ThEaTrE SeT. He used to be a picture in a story book, then he was a camera, capturing the things what went past. He was clearly excited for her return. He also spoke about things starting to feel real again when she comes back. He used the phrase "when things begin to flow". There was a woman asked if she understood but she kept backing away and didn't react, she seemed really worried! Sensible tbh

Then he crossed to mycenae, to caress Agamemnon's head as he descended the ladder, bafore the sacrifice, and to watch the sacrifice from the other side with a lil pair of binoculars. Cute. Then he left sharpish and went back to Troy, meeting up with Persephone and her crowd in his office. At no point did she seem happy.

In there, they played checkers for a short period of time (til it looked like P was going to win!) until Persephone dropped a set of keys onto the board. Outside, Polyxena died; you could see and hear it through the windows. As that happened, Hades had a sort of panic attack in slow mo, and Persephone had a great Laura Palmer Black Lodge Scream Moment. He moved to the window, head in hands and still silently screaming, curled over. She sat next to him, straight-backed. making eye contact with the audience. Shades mill around outside in indistinct shapes in the darkness.

They do a ?tango? is the best way I can describe it, she maneuvers him into parts of it, but he eventually regains his body. They dance in an increasingly-horny manner til he ends up on his back on his desk. She feeds him pomegramate while sitting on him. It's horny but also sad and bad. Idk the vibes were bad in a deliberate way. I feel bad for both of them.

Anyway after he regained his composure and his feet, they unlocked the door (with the Troy Welcomes You! keychain on the wall hooks) and it was time for the Troy Finale.

I had seen the smaller blinding scene before in the club but this finale version was a lot bigger and easier to see. It also had a lot more empty space in it? But same music. Blade vampire club scene track. Fuck yeah.

Slipped out at the end and caught the Mycenae finale too. It's still a bit impenetrable. Artemis had her top off and she's gorgeous holy shit.

And that was the end this time! The bar does now stock whiskey (Dewars scotch) so I'll have to update the map w that too.

Next time I want to see a Polymestor Loop (ideally with beard guy from my first time rather than the black guy from this time - idk i just preferred his nuances) and also see what's up with Clytemnestra's maid.

My friend had a cool 1:1 with the woman who works at Aligheris' (hat shop) in Troy which took her through a lot of locked doors, and through a passage from the Auto shop (to the left of the palladium) to the ticket shop on the other side of the palladium doors. Lots of cool stuff there but I didn't get details.

Misc notes:

there are indeed 2 parallel tunnels from mycenae to troy and they look the same. theyre also shorter than i remember.

then on the troy side it opens out to the strange corner shaped room with clipped gold/bronze metal leaves on the ceiling

then after that is two doors marked palladium but not, that leads into the border control.

then it turns a corner to the right and straight ahead is the neon flower shop. Sexy windows, then DDR to the left of that and then troy is through the next set of doors or off to the right.

the artemis shrine i put on the map is a fire escape I think

there are toilets in troy!

time to learn linear B i guess

It's def got better since the previews. Set design seems neater, and the dangerous crates at knee level have been moved. The sheet maze is way more populated now. the border patrol/DDR hallway seems more full but im not sure. Polydorus now does parkour shit after he dies! Im so glad its better.

[kaasknot]

GAR Organizational Structure (with bonus despair)

point the first: the structure tcw gives us for the GAR is nonsensical. captains are leading legions, a battalion is apparently sufficient for a marshal commander, and generals are, oh my god, leading troops out in the field—the way no general irl actually does, because they are a strategic target and if the enemy kills/captures them it would be a tremendous blow. not gonna lie: Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) is a disaster and should be ashamed of itself. 

i mostly ignore all of the above for my sanity, because 1) it’s more fun to watch jedi waving laser swords around amidst thickets of blasterfire, 2) the whole endgame is to kill them anyway, so who cares if a few jump the gun, and 3) maybe cody just really digs all those cool cats down in the 212th. maybe he runs ops with them whenever he can get away with it. whatever, it’s explainable.

(nothing will ever explain why rex, a junior officer, was leading a whole-ass legion. i cannot forgive. i will not forget.)

point the second: the only hard numbers we have for how big the GAR is are in the repcomm books, which put it at 3 million soldiers. this is. it’s. it's absolutely ludicrously small. to put it in perspective, the united states armed forces alone comprise about 1.4 million active duty personnel in its various branches. that’s ONE military on ONE planet. the GFFA has anywhere from 12 to 70 million inhabited planets. sure, most of them won't participate in the war, but even if you take the lower figure of 12 million, assume 10% are participants (whether as suppliers, victims, allies, or just re-supplied a star destroyer that one time), and take 10% of that as ACTIVE participants, then the number of planets the GAR needs to have a presence on is still 120 thousand. do a little math, and for the GAR to maintain a US-sized presence (which i think we can all agree is plenty large enough to bully a planet into submission) x 120k, the GAR would have to have 170 billion active duty personnel.

if the last number was too small, this one’s too huge. It’s beyond enormous. how do they feed everyone? but consider: the GAR wouldn't have to have the same presence on all planets. some of them might be small, like the rishi outpost. some might not need active policing at all, such as core planets like alderaan. i'll admit right now that i'm extremely lazy and don't feel like crunching the numbers to determine the size of the GAR presence on upwards of a million planets. i'm just gonna say "one billion active duty clones for the war." it’s still hysterically enormous, but it’s a lot more manageable.

my headcanon for the organizational structure of the GAR, using both wikipedia and wookieepedia for reference:

GAR: 1 billion active duty clones (broken down into 10 systems armies)—led by yoda, who is eisenhower

systems army: 100 million clones (2 sector armies)—led by a marshal commander, each of whom is attached to a jedi councilmember (so ponds, cody, wolffe, etc. our beloved cc-2224 is marshal commander of the 3rd systems army.) 

sector army: 50 million (5 planetary armies)—led by a rear marshal commander, each attached to senior jedi masters who are not on the council (so gree, bly, fox, etc)

planetary army: 10 million (5 corps)—senior commander (note: given the unit mobility we see in the show, “planetary” is more a polite request than an actual rule, especially as attrition takes its toll. troops go where they needed.)

corps: 2 million (5 divisions)—corps commander

division: 400 thousand (5 legions)—division commander

legion: 80 thousand (5 brigades)—legion commander

brigade: 16 thousand (5 regiments)—brigadier commander

regiment: 3,200 (4 battalions)—regimental commander

battalion: 800 (4 companies)—major

company: 200 (4 platoons)—captain/1st sergeant

platoon: 50 (5 squads)—lieutenant/staff sergeant 

squad: 10 (2 fire teams)—sergeant

(fire) team: 5 troopers

(“active duty” in this context (the context being slave soldiers) means all clones of age to deploy who are not on medical leave. the total number of cadets of all ages, who are not considered active duty, probably dwarfs this 1 billion figure by like a factor of 978645, which i’m not even going to think about because the sheer logistics of that is staggering. the only reason this army wasn’t discovered sooner is because of movie magic.)

the eagle-eyed among you may notice that several of the formations i’ve separated out (e.g. brigade and legion) are actually the same size irl. in my defense: it’s a billion fucking soldiers! there is no existing military structure on earth that can accommodate a command of that size!! something had to give!!

again, those keen-eyed among you may notice that there are no less than eight different ranks of commander, only three of which are supported by wookieepedia. in my defense: star wars gave us a crappy starting point, and i can only work with what i’m given. either i bump up NCOs to commanding platoons and companies and reinstall our beloved rex as captain of torrent brigade (my soul fucking shudders), or we have to deal with eight different unit sizes all led by officers addressed formally as “commander.”

(it is clone etiquette to address commanders by title and name in mixed company, save the highest-ranking officer, who is THE commander and may be addressed sans name. it is clone humor to fuck with non-clones by sending them on goose-chases in search of “the commander.”)

moving on.

according to wookiepedia, the ranks of jedi are thus:

grand high jedi general—yoda (actually i lied, i made this one up)

high jedi general—the other 11 councilmembers

senior jedi general—all jedi masters

jedi general—all jedi knights

jedi commander—all jedi padawans

as far as i’m concerned those ranks can stay as-is, with senior and regular generals getting scattered throughout the command structure wherever i feel like putting them. it’s not like they make sense as military leaders anyway; they’re last-minute pasties to cover up the GAR’s scandalous bits and make it fit for public propaganda.

of note, there are 12 jedi who sit on the jedi council, but only 10 sector armies. conveniently, yoda doesn’t need to command a sector army, because he commands all the armies. likewise, i headcanon shaak ti doesn’t actually have a command, as she stays on kamino for quality assurance purposes. gotta make sure there aren’t any ethics violations going on.

some may have noticed that fox, despite answering to the chancellor and not to a jedi, is in the “rear marshal” category. i did this (actually @countessofbiscuit did this and i shamelessly stole it) because i (we) headcanon fox not just as head of the coruscant guard, but the head of the CG, GAR military police, and penal battalions. he’s got a big command, too, even if he doesn’t have a jedi to show for it. plus, it makes for excellent intraservice beef if palpatine pushed for fox’s promotion against the prevailing cultural trends of the GAR. (poor fox.)

final notes on this already long-winded and horrific post: seniority within the ranks of the marshal commanders depends on the seniority of their attendant jedi and their own level of experience. e.g. mace windu is the senior-most jedi after yoda, so ponds commands the 1st systems army. however, ponds dies relatively early in the war, so bacara, despite being assigned to the 2nd systems army (i just made that up, i have no idea if ki-adi mundi has seniority after mace), outranks ponds’s replacement because he has more experience. most of this is tacit and doesn’t really affect anything except who sits where at mandatory formal dinners, but it’s also used to justify who’s allowed to eat the last donut—to mixed success.

how DO they feed everyone, though? like, seriously?

[bittercoldbrew]

PLEASE tell me about the alien plant girls im so gay for anthropomorphic fem plants

omg thank you SO MUCH for asking and i apologize in advance for the infodump because i have been thinking about these alien plant people for literal years now, i love them so much. I first started thinking about these guys a little after TFA, because of an oc i was working on for a lil star wars fic that i have mostly abandoned by now--so sorry to the like 3 people who were reading my sidon ithano fic but tlj/tros really killed whatever passion i had for the franchise for a good long time :/ but Mando is great so i've been thinking about them'st again...

anyway i am sticking this under a cut because a) im very attached to these characters and if someone steals my shit i will kermit and b) sweet jesus this got so long, i am so sorry

in the SW universe at least, these plant people (that i still for the life of me cannot settle on an actual name for) were the primary inhabitants of a dwarf planet way out in wild space; they had a pretty symbiotic relationship with a race of sentient insectoid people (basically human-sized bees) who could travel between the planet and their home on one of its three moons (affectionately called the Honey Moon). what the plants didn’t know was that the bees were also able to travel to different planets, and had been doing so for a couple centuries before everything went to shit--but we’ll get to that in a bit.

the plant people weren’t particularly interested in the galaxy around them--they had a decent understanding of astronomy and cosmology, but little cultural interest in journeying to the stars. since the planet was pretty small and distant from the galactic core, it was pretty rare that a visiting ship would even pass them by, and scanners didn’t register them as genuine life-forms separate from the natural flora, so even if someone happened to end up out there it’s not the sort of place anyone would really choose to land. on rare occasions, a pirate or smuggler would try to hide out on what they thought to be an unoccupied planet, and would return to the Outer Rim with tales of mobile, sentient trees and bizarre, organic cities found on some uncharted world; likewise, occasionally a plant person would turn up at the local bar with tales of crashed space-ships and strange aliens that seemed almost like people. neither would ever be taken seriously.

the plants aren’t a particularly verbal people. they understand spoken language (a somewhat-modified Basic, at least, which is what the bees speak hmm i wonder where they picked that up from) and many can talk, but most don’t really bother learning to do so. mostly they rely on an ESP-like combo of pheromones and body language, highly attuned to the point that it’s essentially a kind of telepathy. i think i mentioned in the tags on that post that my character Antheia is sorta kinda a jedi? for these people, force sensitivity tends to manifest as an extra-extra-sensory-perception that causes you to be hyperaware of every living thing in your environment, not just the other sentient ones.

this made her uhhh extremely off-putting as a youth, easily distractable and often disinterested in the other people in the small community she grew up in, where she was already pretty disliked to begin with. there’s quite a lot of diversity among the plant people (a wide variety of skin tones/textures and body types, though few if any secondary sex characteristics; four limbs are most common, though occasionally some have two or more sets of arms; different types of leaves/vines/blossoms/etc in lieu of hair), and though they have a barter-based economy there’s still a lot of classism that’s mostly based around lineage (and thus evinced by one’s appearance and the traits one manifests). to protect (or attempt to bolster) those lineages, prospective parents can apply for a spot in a nursery, where their offspring are propagated and tended--mostly just through infancy before going to live with parents, though sometimes longer, and the very high class have private nurseries that will do all the rearing so they don’t have to.

But, on very rare occasions, certain wild plants will spontaneously develop sentience, and even more rarely will survive on their own long enough to find their way to a community. Hundreds of years ago (or “before the bees could speak”, which is their version of “once upon a time”), these spontaneous growths were revered and cherished, and whoever was first to encounter one would see it as a great honor to be responsible for their care and upbringing. now, with a much more striated society, these “weeds” (derogatory) are considered inferior, feral, dangerous. fortunately for Antheia, the man who found her, tangled in marsh reeds under the light of the Honey Moon, didn’t buy into any of that bullshit. he was a really sweet dad, very attentive and doting on his increasingly-strange adopted daughter; they were very close. but the older she got, the more her unusual ability developed, and the more he realized he was well out of his depth to help her understand that part of herself. eventually, she’s sent away to a kind of temple/convent for other people like her, where she’s trained to hone and control her extra senses, rather than be overwhelmed by them.

many years later, the sudden appearance of several large starships in their atmosphere turns their society on its head. it turns out, the bee-people have been traveling to other planets, forging alliances, brokering deals; they claim they just want to facilitate inter-planetary trade. Antheia is among the first to mistrust these invading aliens and their fleet of well-armed droids who seem hell-bent on mining their planet (which is, apparently, rich with cortosis, which--thank you wookiepedia--is apparently capable of repelling lightsabers and blasterfire alike). She flees her convent, joins up with an underground network of resistance fighters, discovers that her hyperawareness makes her a truly formidable force on the battlefield, and helps lead her people in defending the sovereignty of their home. And then things take a turn for the worse...but we don’t need to get into that right now.

ANYWAY.

my other oc, Shoal, is from the same planet but not even remotely star-warsy; either from a different time period well before the droid incursion, or just like an AU of my own stuff, idk. but she’s great, i love her deeply even though i dont really know what i even want to do with her yet. i mostly just was thinking about what a normal, average person in this world would be like, but then i got too attached. she’s also one of the spontaneous “weeds”, a semi-aquatic plant girl that washed up on a sandbar that occasionally connects a small island with the mainland when the tide is out. she was sort of “found” by multiple people at the same time, since they were making their way across to go trade goods at the mainland market, so to avoid the confusion of who should be responsible for her, she’s just sort of raised by the village as a whole. they name her Shoal, since that’s where they found her (it started as a joke, but then no one could agree on anything else to call her so it just sort of...stuck).

she grows up without realizing that it’s a pretty unusual upbringing. as a teen, she gains the reputation for the island’s best fisher (it helps that she can breathe as well underwater as above, and she’s always been a good swimmer). one thing that’s pretty consistent among all the plant people are their teeth--they all have long, sharp incisors and canines because sexy and also as more of a defense mechanism than a dietary one. they don’t eat much, typically absorbing nutrients from the sun/water/air/soil (mud baths are such a beloved experience, like for the most part they are very dignified people but find them some good mud and they will wallow for days) but when they do it’s pretty meat-heavy. they don’t really enjoy the process of eating very much, especially because they don’t have much gut bacteria so they typically have to swallow some stones to break up their food and nobody wants to do all that. but, at least in the coastal towns near where Shoal grew up, fresh-caught fish is considered a delicacy, and they can trade for quite a lot in return.

as she gets older, though, she starts getting restless. she loves her village, but it’s all she’s ever really known. also, it is so hard to even consider dating when literally everyone your age is practically your sibling, i mean, yeesh. so one day she just packs her bags and says her goodbyes and waits for low tide, then sets off to find her own way in the great wide world. she stops wherever she can, sees everything she can, but eventually settles down working at a tavern in a medium-sized town that’s mostly acclaimed for being a crossroads between bigger and better places. she likes it there, likes getting to know lots of new people and hearing about someone else’s travels more than she actually liked traveling herself. after a few years, the tavern-keeper retires and decides to leave the place to her, and she finds she’s become a permanent fixture in this new community. that’s really all i have for her so far, and i have no idea whether i’ll ever actually do anything with this character lol, but still she is very precious to me so i hope i find a story she’d be a good match for sometime soon.

[thisisthepartwhereyou]

STAR WARS-SPECULATION #2: Rebel or Lost Cause? *May Contain Spoilers*

--- During the course of human history there has been many cases of overwhelming tyranny and opression. It can be as small as the dominion of a single creature, or as vast as an entire world. But as they say, even the cornered rat will bite the cat, and give birth to struggle and resistance. Under these circumstances, a rebellion rises to resist and challenge the rule of the oppressors, despite facing unlikely odds. David against Goliath, the Spartans in the battle of Thermopylae, and when speaking of the Star Wars-sequel trilogy, the Resistance and the First Order.

While one can go on to say that the conflict between the First Order and the Resistance is basically a carbon-copy of the Empire versus the Rebellion from the original trilogy, as we don't go deep enough into the history or political aspects of either group to really nail down their differences to their older counterparts. Though from what I gather, the First Order is composed of the remnants of the empire, who by the time of The Force Awakens (2015) is recognized as an extremist following, though not generally seen as a major danger in the eyes of the government (like a space-equivelent to North Korea?). The Resistance is a countergroup acting outside of the galactic government who sees the threath of the First Order and keeps an eye on their acitivties.

Either way, that is not what I am here to talk about today, as my focus will be directed at one of the most principal characters within the Resistance: Poe Dameron.

Played by the very likable Guetamalan-American actor Oscar Isaac, Poe Dameron is an ace X-wing pilot, an agent of the Resistance and the original owner of the droid BB-8. His actions in the first movie, where he stores important information within his droid, is what starts the whole chain of events for the trilogy, an act which rhymes with the actions of princess Leia in A New Hope (1977). Over the trilogy he is portrayed as a brave, cocky and hotheaded brother in arms. He is a generally well-received character, especially in regards to his bromantic (and apparently quasi-romantic) relationship with Finn, but has over the progression of the last two films been the subject for critique. Not as red-hot of a critique as some other aspects of the sequels, but enough to make you raise your eyebrowns a bit. The main critique being, is he REALLY neccesary?

Don't get me wrong, new members of the Resistance are vital for new movies, otherwise the Resistance might have looked like an old folks home. Poe Dameron should have all the ingredients neccesary to be the posterboy of the the Resistance: he is the member with the most screentime, his actions set off, he is played by a very likable actor and he is a great pilot. But the issue is, while it is all there, it is not really utilized well. The further one goes with these movies, the more one realizes that he is the least developed of the main characters. His role in TFA is minor, he acts as an agressor in a generally disliked sideplot in The Last Jedi (2017), and his part in The Rise of Skywalker (2019), while the richest in content, feels un-earned because the direction of the character is neither clear or given enough development.

So considering that his role doesn't add a whole lot in the trilogy after the first part, was Poe Dameron's continuous role in the sequel-trilogy REALLY neccesary? Objectively, I would have to say no. I mean if a character doesn't have a clear purpose, you either give him one, scale him back or kill him off, so that you can give more room for the other characters. I believe the therm is “kill your darlings.“ With that said, I can understand why one would be reluctant to kill him off to begin with; Oscar Isaacs is the most likable actor ever, something that translates into his performance, and in turn, the character. While Poe Dameron is pretty pointless, he is still hard to completely dislike. This illustrates the power of a talented actor, that he or she can someimes overwin bland or nonsensical writing.

So we have a character that is perfectly likable and who could have been a great addition to the franchise. There certainly was potencial in him, so what could have been done to make the most of it? Well, below are some of the directions I think could have been taken:  

A) Poe Dameron dying in TFA: This one feels appropriate, considering it was the original intent of the moviemakers. As stated by Oscar Isaac's in Business Insider (https://www.businessinsider.com/star-wars-poe-was-supposed-to-die-2016-3?r=US&IR=T), his character was originally supposed to die. While it would be a shame to see a likable character go so fast, it might have solved a couple of issues and added something more to the first part of the trilogy. Besides the fact that it could have added an extra layer of danger to the plot, in that any character could die at any point, it would have also put all of our eggs in the basket of a deserting stormtrooper and a random scavenger. Plus, killing him off wouldn't have made his role in TFA much smaller anyway. Poe not being in the two following movies could have also left much bigger room for the development Rey, Finn and several other characters. Also, to see how the heroism and sacrifice of a single Resistance-member would affect Finn would be really interesting, considering that Finn would have owed his freedom and life to a complete stranger (who was just recently his enemy) that would have died before he could have even had a chance to thank him. How does that make a person who is trying to flee from the battlefield, feel? I can't help but to think of a similar situation in the Green Lantern-comics (DC), where veteran member of the Green Lantern Corps, Abin-sur, crashlands on Earth and gives his power ring to Hal Jordan, a human pilot, before dying. Abin-sur's death had a considerable effect on Hal Jordan, in that besides becoming a new corps member, but became one by taking over the ring of the corp's most beloved and respected members. That is a hell of legacy to live up to, not to mention a massive responsibility. Something like THAT would have been a pretty thought-provoking storyline for Finn.

B) His carelessness has personal consequences in TLJ: In the beginning of TLJ, Poe Dameron disobeys an order to evacuate and instead engages a First Order fleet. This is a foolhardy act, as even though they take down a Stardestroyer, a lot of Resistance pilots die in the process. While it has several consequences within the movie, such as barely having any pilots left for the remainder of it, he himself do not seem overly affected by it, dismissing it as the casualties of war. But if you really think about it, should there not be some resentment aimed at him besides from his superiors, and shouldn’t he feel more guilt? I mean, Rose Tico's sister died in that battle. Wouldn't it have been more interesting Rose and others resent him for his careless actions? This could've been a more likable struggle for him, as he should have been the one to learn that war is not just about defeating the enemy, but saving the ones you love. If he had done this and in the process displayed a sense of leadership in a time of great need, maybe his transformation into a commander in TROS would have felt more organic?

C) Poe goes with Finn to Canto Bight instead of Rose Tico: This one could have worked as a continuation to B. Canto Bight isn't exactly a favorite moment in TLJ, even for the ones who like TLJ. The main criticism being that it is not that interesting of a planetary environment; basically just feeling like a casino with aliens. Another critique is that it felt like a detour that was too disconnected and did ultimately not add that much to the other parts of the movie. One way of making the movie less fragmented, as well as give Poe something better to do, could have been to give him more or less the same role as Rose Tico. Besides further developing his and Finn's friendship, it could have even been a way of putting that awkward kiss in the third act to better use, and confirm some legitimacy to the whole Finn X Poe-ship. While I am not staunch supporter of the ship, I have to admit that it would have been interesting. With that said, I don't think it would have made everyone happy. I mean lets face it, if people get upset about a black dude in a stormtrooper-uniform, one can only assume how they would have reacted to an openly gay or bi character in Star Wars. But at the same time, if people were pissed off at even the good bits in TLJ, why not go all the way and piss off every stuck up parent sitting in the theaters worldwide while you're at it? Certainly would have been ballsiest move ever, especially considering it’s a Disney-film.

D) Poe staying at Leia's side in TROS: As I have written before, the main issues with TROS is messy storytelling and a rushed pace. One of many things that adds to this is by suddenly providing Poe with a backstory while simultenously trying to give him a bigger role than before by having him travel with Rey and Finn. What if they had scaled him down a little, let him stay with Leia as they plan for the upcoming attack? Not only would it have been more powerful for him to be there with her as she passes away, but also motivate him to step into the role of a mature leader more. I realize that this is a little sensitive, as it may have required additional footage of Leia in order to work. Though to be fair, being respectful is one thing, making a good movie is another. And also, if they can remake young Leia for a flashback, why can't they just remake old Leia a bit for some extra material?

Could any of these alternatives have added something good to the movie, or subtracted from the main story? You tell me. No, seriously, tell me what you think, I would love to hear your thoughts on the matter in the comments. Do you have any ideas of your own that could have helped make Poe Dameron the most iconic pilot of the sequel era? Feel free to discuss this with me :) ---

[captainofthefallen]

Earth, moon, Pluto, Deimos?

earth: rivers or seas? RIVERS!! I enjoy the ocean but I’m a whitewater rafting guide. Rivers are wonderful.

moon: do you play any instruments? I do! I technically play the flute, though it’s been a while, I play the saxophone, I know enough about the piano to play a few songs though I cannot sight read on it, and I sing.

Pluto: I’m gonna come back to that one in a second because I’ll probably need to put it under a cut. (edit: tumblr was stupid and put the whole post under the cut. Ugh.)

deimos: if you could go to space, would you? With the caveat that I’m allowed to come back, yes. I love space, I think it’s awesome, I’d love to be able to see the earth from above and the stars with no atmosphere, but unfortunately for me there’s too much stuff on Earth that I like to leave it behind for good.

All right. So.

pluto: is pluto a real planet or fake? I apologize if you didn’t realize you were opening a Can of Worms. I have a Pluto rant, and you have just asked me about it, so here we are.

The short answer: Pluto is a planet and y’all can fight me.

The long answer: I majored in astronomy, specializing in planetary science. I actually wrote a paper on this topic. (Not a scientific study, just a research paper, it was for a science writing class.) There is no scientific reason that Pluto shouldn’t be a planet. I understand the need for the distinction. Pluto was discovered in 1930, and at the time it was closer to a planet than anything else that had been observed, so it was also a planet. (It’s more complicated than that but this is already going to be a Rant I won’t bore you with the details.) However somewhere around the 90s, astronomers started discovering more things like Pluto in the outer solar system. Wonderful! Awesome! More things we didn’t know about in our solar system!

This, however, gave rise to a Problem: are we just going to keep adding these things to our list of planets? What if there are more? What if there are dozens? Hundreds? Are we going to make our schoolchildren memorize 200 planets (this, I believe, is mostly hyperbole, though the number 200 was floated as a guess on how many other dwarf planets might be out there. The solar system is a big place)? Or do we need to start making categories?

We started making categories. The International Astronomical Union (IAU) had a vote in the year 2006 about how to classify Pluto and these new bodies. The vote concerned a) the definition of the term ‘planet’ which hadn’t had incredibly specific parameters up until that point--planets were the round ones that go around the stars, and b) where Pluto and these other bodies would fall in terms of that definition.

The definition is this: In order to be a planet, a body needs to meet three qualifications: It needs to orbit a star. It needs to be massive enough to be spherical. And it needs to have “cleared the neighborhood around its orbit.” [x]

What does that mean? Excellent question. Pluto fits the first two criteria, as do all the other dwarf planets. The third one is a little more vague, and I’m still decently sure that they just came up with something convenient that would disqualify Pluto and the others, for simplicity’s sake. Essentially, what it means is that a planet needs to be the dominant object in its orbit. There can’t be anything else in its vicinity (in relative terms, since everything in astronomy is fuckin huge) that could compete with it gravitationally. Pluto is in the Kuiper Belt in the outer solar system. There are a lot of other objects in the Kuiper Belt, many of which are in and around Pluto’s orbit. Several of them (in the Kuiper Belt, not necessarily on Pluto’s orbit) are other dwarf planets.

If this sounds vague and confusing, it’s because it is! But wait there’s more. If you actually followed my link to the IAU press release, you will have noticed that there was another resolution, something about “classical planets.” This resolution proposed that, instead of removing Pluto from the category of ‘planet,’ there should be subcategories: ‘classical planets’ and ‘dwarf planets.’ This would allow for the 8 ‘classical planets’ to be taught in schools, known by the public in general, etc., while the dwarf planets could be reserved for nerds like myself to research on their own time, but they would still be planets.

This resolution was rejected. Which I understand, I suppose--the wording is vague, what’s a ‘classical’ planet anyway, what does that mean? But I think the idea is sound and could’ve been workshopped. It makes far more sense to have the broad category of ‘planets,’ and then have ‘dwarf planets’ be a subcategory. What doesn’t make sense is to call a series of objects ‘dwarf planets’ and proceed to tell everyone that ‘dwarf planets’ are not, in fact, planets. I asked my roommate about it when I was writing this paper, and she didn’t even realize that ‘dwarf planet’ wasn’t a subcategory of planet. It isn’t. But it should be. It makes more sense.

As far as the science I’ve interacted with, there’s no reason to even make a distinction. If we discovered a dwarf planet in another solar system we would have no reason to make the distinction. Particularly because it’s almost arbitrary. A Pluto-sized planet in a smaller solar system could very well be gravitationally dominant in its orbit. I understand the need, within our own solar system, to make a distinction, but creating a subcategory of ‘dwarf planet’ and then saying they’re not planets is absolutely ridiculous. (If you want an alternative, I saw a term floated, I believe in Mike Brown’s book How I Killed Pluto and Why It Had It Coming, of a plutoid. Which would accomplish several things, first of which creating a category for these objects that doesn’t create confusion, if you’re really dead set on them not being planets, second of which paying homage to everyone’s beloved Pluto by naming an entire category after it. But I digress.)

tl;dr: the fact that they named this category of objects ‘dwarf planets’ and yet insist that they are not planets is absolutely ridiculous and makes no sense. I understand what they were trying to achieve, I can even agree with the need, culturally, for another class of objects in this category, but there are way better ways they could’ve accomplished it. Therefore until they fix it: Pluto is a planet. Fight me.

[kinfriday]

Wandering Hops: The Prep Day

Preparation and testing is the key to knowing how your gear will perform while out on the trail; the idea goes without saying… save that I just said it.

Anyway, moving right along, stay with the tour, and hold all questions till the end. Thanks. 

Now, preparation can come in many forms, from watching youtube videos about gear and its uses, to setting up your tent in your fitness room because it’s raining outside, and you have to heft it tomorrow. 

I’ve done this, dear reader, and as it turns out, an REI Camp Dome 2 fits snugly between the two blue couches perched opposite each other in my den. It’s spacious, roomy, and overall an excellent tent… for everything but backpacking. 

If only it didn’t weigh five pounds. 

But what about the hefting? What do you do when you’re unsure if the weight you are carrying is too much? What’s the solution, when you want to test your endurance, and ability to work with a heavy pack, and a range of gear when you haven’t before? 

For me, that’s what I have Sacajawea Park for. 

Nestled centrally in the city of Longview Washington is a 3.3 mile loop over an artificial lake, created out of ancient geography and modern ingenuity.  The park itself, is quite bucolic, full of trees,  birds, squirrels, and a Japanese garden. The footpath ringing it is wide and only pitches up and down slightly as you go under bridges, or roll with elevation. 

In short, it’s perfect for a morning run, a walk with your spouse, or the carrying of 40lbs on your back to see how you can handle it.  This is essential, and it’s good training as I prepare for the Pacific Crest Trail, as it gives me time to adapt to heavier pack weights. 

Train harder, fight easier, as the saying goes. 

Yeah, I’ve gotten some funny looks, maneuvering with full pack, tent strapped to the bottom, and trekking poles out only so I can  walk in a circle in the middle of the city, but that’s the price I pay to bring you entertaining and thought provoking anecdotes every week. 

It’s a labor of love and quirkiness I tell you.

Longview, Washington is a planned city, founded in 1920 by a Lumber Magnate, the park itself was created four years later, and became so popular with the townsfolk  that a public outcry saved it during the depression from being subdivided into residential housing plots. Today, it is known as the “Jewel of Longview” and it only takes a few minutes there to find out why. 

There, in the midst of a bustling small city is an utter paradise of curated land, filled with the singing of birds, the antics of squirrels, and, I’m told river otters, though I have never seen one. 

I hear they bear grudges.

Moving on.. 

It is one of my favorite easy hikes, and even when I’m not carrying gear and testing weight, I enjoy walking it at least once a week with my beloved.  It’s a wonderful place to talk, share and dream while not stressing about falling off a ledge. 

Besides the scenery, there’s also the solar system walk, which is a thousand yard model of our planetary system that includes Pluto, as it was dedicated in 2001 before Tyson led the charge to demote her as a planet. It’s quirks like those that make the park especially endearing, along with its history as the heart of the town. 

In short, there’s plenty there to keep you interested and moving as you make your circuit around. 

The whole experience is definitely unexpected. Most smaller municipalities don’t go in for the funding it would require to maintain such a large strip of green space. With its winding trails and beautiful scenery, it’s a moment of respite and natural sanity in an otherwise chaotic urban landscape. On either end there are busy roads, with cars whizzing by that only make the longer legs of the journey all the more enjoyable. 

It is an escape, without escaping, and an excellent choice to get out there and decompress when you don’t have the ability to go, or hike further. 

This week, dear reader, has definitely been one of those weeks. As you already know, this post has been delayed a day. That’s because exciting things are happening for Wandering Hops. Soon, I’ll be going further, and bringing you reports from far flung places, including Yellowstone National Park, coming in September. 

But I wouldn’t be ready for it without Sacajawea Park. If you’re ever in the area, keep an eye out for me. I’m the unusual one, making a loop with her trekking poles with a full pack on her back, a fitting counterpoint, to the tank top wearing runners, zooming by as they breathe heavily in their fitness pursuits.  (sources used  www.wta.org/go-hiking/hikes/lake-sacajawea  and www.mylongview.com/Facilities/Facility/Details/Lake-Sacajawea-12)

[floraone]

While I was there, the TenQ Space Museum at LaQua at Tokyo Dome City (craaaaazy place in and off itself??? There’s a ROLLERCOASTER going THROUGH THIS MALL. Like… there is a HOLE in the building FOR THE RANDOM ROLLER COASTER) in Tokyo (duh) held something very special: The “Over the Sailor Moon” Exhibition.

TenQ Space Museum in itself is a pretty great place, interactive like crazy (like seemingly all japanese Museums - how are they better at *everything*?) and telling us the story of space and the solar system in giant video installations, screenings, and in-house research facilities. We get to tune in to every current space expedition and project, follow every life-feed of every probe and sattelite currently scouting for us. …. Something that you will doubtless get made me incredibly excited, astronomy geek that I am. There’s a big screen wall at TenQ with push-updates of every space-project, from all the global space programs and all six government space agencies… and it felt to me a little like sitting behind Ami’s screens in Yugen.

Anyway. The last portion of the Museum is reserved for their special exhibitions, which currently housed our beloved characters. In the first room, they introduced the Senshi - in planetary order of distance to the sun - with a brief written introduction, description of their planets, myths surrounding those, and the ties of those myths to Sailor Moon. Why was the planet Venus likened to Aphrodite, what’s the moon like that Jupiter’s Silver Millenium castle was located on, which deity did Uranus got its name from, etc. etc.

Some special exhibits keep the Senshi company there. The original Myu costumes of the Sailor Starlights, framed Posters for the movies and arcs from the 90s, some original Manga art pages.

The second room is dedicated to two themes. One being the S Movie and Kaguya - including a neat interpretation to the “three Kaguyas” in the story. Luna, Himeko, and the Ice Princess riding her meteor, next to the retelling of the old folklore story of Princess Kaguya that inspired this story. - and the other completely dedicated to the Silver Millennium.

And this last part was I found the neatest in the small, lovely exhibition. They go over what we know of the SilMil in minituae detail, and then they interpret and cross-reference to science. And oh, that’s my jam. How does the story tell the birth of Earth and Moon, how does science, and where are the two similiar? We get a brief tour of the moon, Mare Serenitatis, a little video of Earthrise and the surface of the moon. And we get a brief reminder of how the moon came into existence - recounting the infamous giant-impact-theory of proto-Earth’s collision with a giant massive celestrial body that imploded against what used to be a very, very hot and gassy, unhabitible planet, and not only turned into the moon via gravity and debris, but also cooled down the Earth considerably enough to be able to host the developement of life. And then it goes back to Sailor Moon, takes the image of the Moon as protector of Earth, and asks, what would happen to the Earth without its satelite?

It quotes Queen Serenity, in the Manga, on what the Silver Millennum’s and Lunar royalty’s duty is to Earth. What it is they do.  “Remove the disturbing factors from the Earth”, “Encourage, provide rescue, and guide the Earth to evolve in the best manner possible.” The Moon was there to help the Earth with their evolution. And this is, in a way, pretty damn true. Without the formation of the Moon, there would be no life today on Earth, most likely. And added to that, eons ago, after the formation of the Moon, the two were much closer to each other than today, and scientists believe the stronger tides to be one factor why evolution had to make the leap forward to move from sea to land. Not to mention the asteroids and impacts the moon has been shielding the Earth from for all this - turning the farside of the Moon into swiss cheese while keeping us from harm.

So, the exhibition concludes, calling the Moon the protector of the Earth is a sound and accurate thing to say, from a scientific viewpoint.

It doesn’t stop there, but goes through symbolisms of the moon in Japan and outside, discusses the Silver Crystal in similiar manners as the Moon’s status as Earth’s protector, and over all, for such a small exhibition, it’s the damn best I’ve ever seen - and right up my alley. I even got to walk on a VR moon (in the main exhibition)! (Y’know, just like my Usagi did, in Ikigai ;) Pretty damn cool seeing museums do something like that for real!)

[gwarden123]

I do have some thoughts about how quickly and easily they all get metal and carbon lead for pencils out of the ground and into a usable shape when they textually have not built a kiln to fire pottery in Freedom’s Landing. I feel like Anne McCaffrey has a weird understanding of what is and isn’t an easy thing to make. Like the soap thing (other stories have this problem about what would or wouldn’t be historically accurate in terms of cleanliness). They’re cooking with fire and have meat to render fat from, all these highly educated, highly specialised people (another thing I have Thoughts(TM) on) and yet they have to resort to a plant pod to use for soap instead of mixing fat and ash together to get make a crude, and scientifically accurate, soap. It’s like the way there’s (so far) no mention or concern of agricultural runoff in the water. This is an industrial scale farm (my beloved). Cow shit and pesticides have to go somewhere. Maybe the mysterious Farming Aliens thought of that... But still. What about the sewage waste and pollution around their base camp? They have latrines, so it’s clearly been thought about somewhat. Are they mucking out the shit of... however many people are there? Are they just leaving it in holes to rot?

(It’s good to know I can ruin my own enjoyment of something I’m generally liking)

(To be clear, I’m mostly being critical because the story is this sort of survivalist, planetary colonising fantasy. The fun of this kind of story, like The Martian, is having some degree of realistic detail that the reader can take and feel like they’ve learned something. Like a murder mystery engaging the reader in the puzzle of solving the plot. I do also think some of this might just stand out more when you’ve had to think about them for fics or other creative type projects? Like seeing your own flaws reflected back at you)

The point that I really set out to make, before I got sidetracked, was that it was interesting to see... See, a thing I noticed in some of the newer science fictiony books that I read was that it felt like there’d been a shift from science fiction being written by people with more scientific, technical knowledge and interest, to people with more, I guess literature degrees. People who are into books and stories rather than rocket ships and history, that sort of thing. And this made it so a lot of the character work and plotting was more competent but that the science fiction side was more boring? Like, you’re not going to get something where you can feel just how much the author loves, like, railway systems or astronomy or whatever. And (at least in the books I read, this might not be a widespread problem) it felt like something unique to science fiction had been lost, this passionate love for something completely inhuman and intellectual. Like being taken out of your own life and being captured by the beauty of a flower or the night sky.

Anyway, I’ve been noticing the reverse of this problem with Zainal having zero internal conflict over having been stuck with his people’s oppressed class and seeming to have no urgent desire to call home and get a lift. Maybe having people with literature degrees write books is not such a bad thing after all.