#be nice I haven’t read much of the run yet so his character has 1000% evolved since the third isssue yk

[speed-do-be-forcing]

Wow. I haven’t used this blog in a while.

Just a mic check informing you guys that I still do exist I just forget this blog exists sometimes.

I’ve been reading some comics recently like the Spectre and boy oh boy I can’t wait to write blurbs about The Spectre and Danny.

I just read a Spectre comic where he tries to enact vengeance for this ghost that’s reliving its death moments over and over and forgets that a ghost can survive on things other than rage (he’s the literal embodiment of God’s Wrath so he’s excused in this misjudgment). He goes to intact vengeance and in doing so makes a good man who’s innocent yet jailed hang himself. He persecutes the right person (the apparitions sister) and THEN realizes that he can’t avenge this ghost because he did all those things in the name of vengeance and she doesn’t run on wrath or anger.

So with that, imagine The Spectre trying to innact vengeance on the killers of the unjustly death of Danny Phantom and inadvertently killing Jack and Maddie Fenton and having the Phantom hate him forever

@stealingyourbones

[savrenim]

okay so looking at tma fic in general and tma time-travel fic and the various ways they decide to resolve things has given me an idea for a time travel fix-it fic premise that, like, I almost certainly will never write because way too many writing projects but it is Haunting me so I need to blab about it somewhere 

so clearly the way that the ‘time travel’ / ‘knowledge of the future’ bit works is that Jon stumbles across a book that he assumes is a Leitner but then there’s no name in the front cover so he opens it proper and oooh this is weird but it’s too late the compulsion has set hold and and reads it, oops

the experience of reading it is the experience of fuck-it-feels-like living the entire timeline of the show up through the end of episode 160

(actually all the way through When Jon Finally Dies if he ever does but the important bit is he gets that knowledge of the timeline)

(the book is channeling the power of the Ceaseless Watcher, it’s all about knowledge, although very specifically in my brain this book is something that future!Jon and future!Martin constructed and sent back, which still tracks because hey Archivist is an Avatar of the Watcher. it’s just important to me that this is active action as an attempt to prevent the apocalypse and not dumb luck)

so Jonathan Sims now knows his future and because I have strong opinions about memory/ personality/ what makes a person, has arguably just been replaced with his future self.

‘oh fuck’ Jon says 

‘I ended the world so I gotta fix this’

but how does he fix this, because oops Elias is still stupidly powerful and is going to notice if anything is up so he can’t act weird 

but he can’t bring anyone else in on this because he doesn’t want to Curse Them with such Angsty Knowledge 

he is acting a little bit weird, Martin notices that he’s acting weird because he is now being nice to Martin 

‘this cannot be how the universe exists, Jon is always mean to me,’ Martin goes. ‘like I want the universe to exist this way but Something Is Up With Jon and it would be selfish of me not to investigate just because Jon is actually being nice to me’

Martin stumbles across the book and reads it too

‘oh fuck’ Martin says and immediately goes and talks to Jon and Jon has terrible selfish mixed feelings because he missed his Martin but also didn’t want Martin to have to go through everything he went through but also now Jon is not alone in trying to figure out how to alter this timeline without Elias noticing 

(’wait what gave me away,’ Jon goes)

(’you were being nice to me,’ Martin goes)

(’fuck I really do need to be meaner to everyone don’t I,’ Jon goes. ‘it’s just really hard I’ve had Character Growth and I don’t want to be an asshole again’)

(’well suck it up you’re going to blow our cover,’ Martin goes. ‘maybe you should have thought of that before Being An Asshole.’ he immediately feels bad at Jon’s Very Sad Face. ‘you weren’t actually that much of an asshole you were just under stress and prickly and didn’t realize that the people you weren’t appreciating could be people that you would lose and now you do and that’s fine but you gotta still treat them like you’re an Asshole.’)

(’fine,’ Jon goes.)

so now they’re trying to figure out how to stop Elias 

but also their main priority is to stop Tim and Sasha from dying at this point and they kind of figure that Elias doesn’t know the timeline and as long as he’s getting what he wants which is naive Jon stumbling through interactions with Entities and getting marked but not killed, he won’t suspect anything, and he doesn’t know Tim and Sasha are going to die so that at least is something immediate they can fix 

‘I want to murder Jonah,’ goes Martin 

‘you are super valid but also Gertrude tried that and was 1000% more badass than any of us and she ended up dead so maybe we should concentrate on saving our friends like we’ve got a few years to figure out how to do that,’ goes Jon 

‘fine,’ goes Martin 

Tim and Sasha notice that something is up, OBVIOUSLY, because Jon was weird-nice for like a week and a half then is weird-mean like he’s actually trying to be mean and hates it, and has gone from brushing off Martin all the time to pretending to brush Martin off but obviously secretly pining 

he also gives off feral apocalypse energy

Martin meanwhile is pulling this all off perfectly 

he fooled Elias and Peter and everyone else back when he was faking out the Lonely, he can handle this

Elias does notice Jon acting weird and thinks this is a soap opera workplace romance gone wrong but because he hasn’t seen all of it as Jon and Martin have been very careful to be using Martin’s Lonely powers when they want to Actually Talk and make it look like they’ve just casually wandered off when Elias isn’t paying attention to them so Elias doesn’t actually look like anything is up, he calls Jon in for a ‘performance review’ to make sure 

(Martin has Lonely powers and Jon has Archivist powers from the future and they can both feed off of the long terrible fears that they remember from the horrible horrible lives and deaths they and the entire world had in their own timeline, just give me this I need a plot device that can explain why they can Actually Talk to each other while not being able to use the tunnels) 

anyways Elias starts his performance review and pokes about Martin

‘um yeah,’ Jon confesses. ‘I um had a very awkward conversation with Martin because it seemed like he was being nice to me and I asked him about his feelings and he Confessed to me that he Liked me and I was caught by surprise and was thinking about it for a few days because idk nobody ever Likes me but then came to my senses and um but also it’s totally inappropriate because I’m his boss and I told him and we’re trying to forget that the conversation ever happened and just go back to concentrating on the statements’

‘you seem very nervous right now,’ Elias goes 

‘please do not report me to HR,’ Jon goes looking appropriately mortified and trying to remember everything Martin has been coaching him about lying by telling people what they want to hear. ‘I know I should have rejected him immediately it just caught my by surprise that he would actually Say It To My Face people have been saying a lot of honest things to my face it’s very weird and I know that I shouldn’t have run away from that conversation and acted Weird for a few days but I did come to the Correct Conclusion I am very devoted to this job and don���t want to do anything but this job and didn’t do anything with Martin we just had a conversation and I’m really trying to do a good job here and please don’t fire me’

‘nope you’re good that’s fine concentrate on your job,’ Elias says, quite satisfied that his Archivist is developing truth powers very quickly 

Tim and Sasha are not so easy to fool

Tim and Sasha find the book

Sasha, who worked in Artifact Storage, is Actually Smart and goes ‘dON’T READ THAT’

Tim reads it anyways

‘oh fuck I die stopping the apocalypse’ 

Tim doesn’t seem to die from reading the book and doesn’t seem to change except for being given this foreknowledge but Sasha is Smart so she doesn’t read it. Tim does fill her in on her future.

‘oh fuck I die when a weird worm-lady attacks? and don’t even get to help with the apocalypse? that’s bullshit.’

they start their own little huddle conspiracy 

which Martin immediately finds

‘nO YOU GUYS YOU GOTTA BE MORE CAREFUL TALKING ABOUT THIS STUFF’ Martin explains the future and methods of communicating without Elias watching, which is mostly him subtly hiding them in the Lonely

(’why do you and Jon have secret special powers that’s not fair,’ Tim goes)

(’because we went through literal hell??? and also didn’t die??? idk maybe if we keep you from dying you will also get special powers but seriously Tim they are very evil these are Evil Powers we don’t want them they just kind of happened to us in the process of trying to survive,’ Martin goes.)

‘so what is the plan,’ Sasha goes. ‘like besides us not dying how are you actually going to deal with the real apocalypse’ 

‘well we want to kill Elias but we haven’t figured that out yet because he’s watching our every move perfectly and if we’re not acting like he think we should act he’ll dispose of us and start again with a new Archivist,’ Martin goes. 

‘okay but like in your story there is a part where Peter Lukas personally escorts you to the panopticon and tells you to kill Elias/Jonas and you go no and Elias wins the bet,’ Sasha says. ‘what if you just murder him then, he says he wasn’t going to stop you and if he tries you’ve got another Avatar backing you up’

‘huh we didn’t think of that,’ Martin goes. ‘why didn’t we think of that. I swear there is a Very Good Reason we didn’t think of that. um. uh. there’s also the problem anyone working in the Archives will die if he dies unless they are powerfully enough connected the Ceaseless Watcher which is like. MAYBE Jon.’

‘W H Y did you not lead with that,’ Tim goes

‘yeah I really agree you should have led with that,’ Sasha goes 

‘this has been a very stressful time and we have been doing our best and right also everyone can quit they just need to blind themselves to do it,’ Martin goes. ‘or I guess pledge allegiance to a different evil god but that is really unpleasant you have to sacrifice fear to it or you starve’

(’okay why did you not lead with--’ Sasha goes. ‘I’m starting to really see some benefits for being an evil fear-monster,’ Tim goes. ‘Like we could be ethical evil fear-monsters. like ethical vampires. only scare really shitty terrible people who deserve it and, like, scare but not kill.’)

(Martin looks like he is about to cry.)

(’okay maybe not p l e a s e stop making that face I cannot stand your puppy-dog-but-also-on-the-verge-of-tears eyes,’ Tim goes)

(Sasha stops death-glaring at him as Martin looks slightly less like he is about to cry.)

‘so everyone loves rituals what if we, like. construct a secret ritual. that you’re saying Jon is dumb powerful chosen one Avatar right so let’s just, like. switch over being the ‘Heart of the Institute’ from Jonah to him. big proper paperwork ritual passing on of ownership claiming his position as Jonah’s heir or something,’ Sasha says 

‘that seems like just the sort of bullshit that might actually work. Sasha you are the smartest person in the world and I’m pretty sure the apocalypse wouldn’t have happened if you had survived the Prentiss attack,’ Martin says 

‘actually honestly Gertrude wanted you as her replacement that sounds very true and is probably why Elias didn’t choose you,’ Jon says. he has entered the room at this point as he was curious where literally all of his assistants had wandered off to. he does actually have work to get done the Archives are A Mess and Martin has been gone at this point for far longer than it takes to Make Tea so he figured something might be up and if there’s one thing he’s good at, it’s finding Martin in the Lonely

‘real rude to not let us in on this,’ Tim goes. ‘also are you SURE this is not a weird Leitner fucking with you’

‘we’ve obsessively kept track of the things that are supposed to be happening and they’re all happening on the right days and stuff,’ Jon goes. 

‘okay so let’s stop like two apocalypses and not die,’ Sasha goes. 

the rest of the fic is everyone subtly not-so-subtly trying to recreate the exact timeline while also making events Less Terrible while also trying to seem Not Too Competent 

because this is a fic there’s gotta be adorable ridiculous fluff so everyone decides that the Cover Story in case Elias thinks people are acting weird has got to be Jon and Martin starting to secretly date 

(Jon and Martin are in absolute h e l l over this and it is a hilarious comedy of errors because they didn’t tell everyone else that they got together they both decided that was too private so everyone else is aggressively trying to actually matchmake them through this all and they’re now too embarrassed to drop the act because Sasha has been giving them hell every time they have accidentally withheld information from her so it’s like. three layers of fake dating.) 

(Elias decides all this drama is simultaneously the funniest thing he’s ever seen but also kind of a Bad Distraction and is subtly trying to break them up but doesn’t want to mess with things too much because he is Very Impressed with all the ‘progress’ Jon is making)

(Jon who is a complete badass and is mostly desperately attempting not to reveal all his powers)

(there are also a lot of different things that can go various ways. like do Basira and Melaine still join the Institute? I think they all read the book and make Informed Decisions about their futures but I have not decided yet what those Informed Decisions are. Daisy learns how to control Hunt powers without it overwhelming her, because Tim is totally right about it being possible to be an ethical fear-monster although as Jon and Martin can draw from the fear of the apocalypse-world they don’t really need it so it’s just a question of whether or not I want to give everyone else cool powers. we’re in a fix-it fic everyone gets cool powers without terrible consequences Because I Say So)

(Elias doesn’t give them trouble over this because he is delighted that he’s kind of collecting avatars of other Entities because it makes it really easy to make sure Jon has marks and he thinks this is his genius plan going even better than expected) 

we get to episode 158 

Martin really wants to dramatically kill Elias i m m e d i a t e l y but is waiting for a walkie-talkie signal that the ritual above is going as planned so he stumbles through all of the dialogue the same 

“Then do it. Kill him and help me save the world.” Peter goes 

Martin pauses in silence because oops there’s really not that much more Avoiding he can do

“No” Martin says.

Elias starts to laugh. 

The Signal Comes Through

‘fUCK YEAH,’ Martin says. ‘F I N A L L Y. I am murdering him and I’m saving the world but this isn’t for you, asshole, and Imma deal with you next.’

stabbity stab 

it’s very satisfying 

‘okay but what do you mean it’s not for me, you’re supposed to sit in the chair and help me look for the Extinction?’ Peter goes 

‘nah fuck that I’m from the future and I do what I want that was me stopping the Jonah Magnus’s final ritual,’ Martin goes. ‘you really think I fell for that Extinction bullshit you aren’t nearly as good a liar as you think you are, you stay right there and we’ll decide what to do with you when everyone gets down here it’s Jon’s Institute now and we’re both very pissed at you’

Peter tries to escape into the Lonely 

it Does Not Work as Martin has More Angst than Peter to draw from so is Way More Powerful 

everyone gets down there 

ritual worked nobody died!

‘okay but why DON’T we try to look for the Extinction.’ Sasha says. ‘that seems to be a pretty important thing to stop.’

at this point everyone agrees Sasha has the best ideas 

have I mentioned that every single female character is very gay for Sasha

quite frankly maybe Tim too

Sasha is a Badass and this fic portrays her as Gertrude Robinson’s Rightful Heir 

she Deserves Good Things

and she is Gonna Stop All Future Apocalypses so actually going through with Peter’s plan is maybe not a terrible idea 

they do the thing but in a careful way that traps no one in the chair and get the info

the Extinction is still very stoppable 

there are lots of ways but honestly the best way to do it is to manipulate humanity into actually Being Better and not being on the brink of extinction 

‘this is my Institute now let’s use it to fucking save the world,’ Jon goes 

and they use all their knowledge and power to go from being a massive conspiracy about causing the apocalypse to being a massive conspiracy about bringing kindness and preventing wars and stopping the rise of fascism in politics and poking humanity from behind the scenes into something Better that can Rise Above its fears 

and everyone lives happily ever after 

but yeah this entire fic is around the premise of ‘what if the actual fix-it isn’t Change Everything To Stop Bad Things From Happening it’s Keep Everything The Same Until We’re Handed The Opportunity To Stab Jonah On A Silver Platter And Then Take It’ which I have yet to see a fic do and oops that kind of grew away from me there but anyways that’s it that’s the fic

[leafsoared]

welp. i saw it. and..... it was certainly a movie. *le sigh*

OKAY. I got out of this movie about 45 minutes ago, so these are just brain farts. but here we go.

WHAT I LIKED:

ben solo / kylo ren’s arc. because he actually... had an arc. i liked that he died?? it made sense. it worked. i even cried! (i loved the moments at the end when he was just ben and adam played it so differently than he had up til then and yes. good. like that moment when he’s fighting the knights of ren?? and the awkward little shrug he does before kicking their asses??? it was the first moment in the trilogy i thought ‘oh yep that’s han solo’s kid.’ and he actually got to smile an honest to god smile?? he was a flawed, fucked up character who, imo, was one of the most original choices the whole trilogy made. to have an antagonist like that. 

speaking of han solo. the WAILING noise i made....

i thought what they did with leia was as good as it reasonably could have been. and yes i wept like a tiny child. and the fact that she and billie lourd got a moment was lovely (and billie basically wearing leia’s endor outfit in the final battle made my heart grow about 14 sizes)

MERIADOC BRANDYBUCK!!!!!! he had like 6 lines but my baby was there and he was good. at least rose got to hang with SOMEONE cool...

chewie and the medal. was it blatant pandering? yes. was i okay with that? yes i was.

dark rey looked badass.

i mean rey was generally just the baddest of asses and i appreciate that the other characters recognized this and were like ‘yep we’re just gonna follow her it’s all good.’

trio banter! i was never that committed to the idea that they needed to be together because i don’t think even the first film really set them up as a trio the way the OT set up theirs, but... the chemistry was good! they had jokes! poe doesn’t like bones! who knew?

BABU FRIK IS MY NEW BOYFRIEND. he and baby yoda need a roadtrip spin off show where they zoom around the galaxy being polite to people

SPACE HORSES AND BADASS LADIES RIDING THEM.

rey’s lightsaber’s cool. 

WEDGE. ANTILLES. that was one i genuinely was not expecting and i sat bolt upright in my seat. (i know that ‘resistance reborn’ has something to do with this but i haven’t finished reading that yet so.... oops?)

the luke/leia flashback was a bit uncanny valley (especially on leia) but it was nice to see

ummmmmm..... i’m starting to run out of things i liked because there was so much that was just.... meh. a lot of nice moments in a big old pile of bland, unseasoned oatmeal mush.

WHAT I DIDN’T LIKE:

welp. the rest of it? I MEAN. there were so many good ideas or good moments or good characters that then.... got brushed past so quickly we hardly got a chance to get to know them!

this movie had about 87 macguffins. honest to god it felt like watching someone play a videogame where in order to complete one quest, they have to do about 12 mini quests to collect random items. the locations were all gorgeous! but they felt! pointless!!!!

Fucking. Palpatine. I’m not necessarily against the idea of palpatine being back. but they didn’t??? establish it????? ever?????? not even in TFA???? i mean, tfa had about as little world building as was humanly possible to include so maybe that’s not a surprise....

i’m so angry about the rey reveal. regardless of one’s feelings about some of the choices in tlj, the idea that rey wasn’t from some special bloodline was so good. she was just her own person. she was strong with the force and what made her special was what she chose to do with it. not because she had some legacy in her dna that she had to fulfill or defy or whatever. she was an ordinary person who could do extraordinary things. but nope! she’s palpatine’s granddaughter apparently! because if you’re gonna pander to fan theories, why not just choose the stupidest one???? the audience in my showing audibly groaned. 

and of course there’s no explanation about WHY he was back. or how. he just was. zooming around on his big ass space cherry-picker. 

i liked zori (sp?)! but like jahnna (sp???) we barely got to know her. her existence in the movie was so fleeting it was like the studio went ‘well let’s have poe flirt with his ex who looks like a member of daft punk so the sjws will stop asking for finnpoe!’ again. she was fun. i liked her. i even think she and oscar isaac had chemistry (though OI could have chemistry with a brick wall). i just wish there had been a POINT to her. honestly she’s a character i might totally take up as a muse....

SPEAKING OF POE. so.... he has a sketchy criminal background now? ugh. he had sketchy background just so they had an excuse to go to sketchy planet, not because it was particularly enlightening to his character.

i know star wars dialogue has ALWAYS been clunky, but this felt especially clunky??

finn yet again had nothing to do. jj tried to retcon the wrong aspects of tlj. what he should have fixed was finn’s storyline. what he did was ruin rey’s. and rose tico’s. fuck you jj for sidelining her. and like???? the idea of finding a whole bunch of fellow first order defectors??? WAS SO GREAT AND THEY DID ABSOLUTELY NOTHING WITH IT. GGAAHHHHHH.

anyway, i could keep nitpicking, but honestly one of my biggest problems was that it just.... had no stakes. i mean, technically there was a lot at stake, but the movie rushed through it so quickly that even some of the genuinely nice character beats felt hurried and there wasn’t time given to just feel them. the big tension didn’t feel like the culmination of anything except this single movie. like yes this film was more like tfa than tlj, but it didn’t even do justice to that movie! the beats of this film all were so much like rotj, there was no suspense. there were no sacrifices beyond what you could see coming 1000 miles away. it just felt like an inevitable avalanche of meh thundering to its conclusion. i hate to say this bc he’s my fave of the ST, but poe maybe should have been shot down in that last battle???? so at least the big climax felt.... serious? bc the only sacrifice was a character from the comics that only a fraction of the audience will care about. 

speaking of that..... I WILL NEVER FORGIVE JJ FOR KILLING SNAP WEXLEY FUCK YOOUUUUUUUUUUU SIR.

anyway. my sour feelings were summed up by the last line of the movie. i so desperately wanted rey to answer the question ‘rey who?’ with something like “rey. it’s just rey.” like she’s done a thousand times before, but this time, saying it with contentment and acceptance. instead we got “rey skywalker.” i wanted to see a young woman who, having learned about her past and freed herself from it, chose to just be herself. no other legacies, no other baggage. she was just rey. being who she was, choosing her own path for herself. but instead she’s hitched to a different legacy that’s not even really hers. i get what they were going for with the jedi legacy and luke and all that and i’m sure some people will love it. but it was such a disappointment to me.

this trilogy - which has things i do genuinely love! - just felt like an ill-planned exercise in corporate greed that didn’t actually have a vision for what it wanted to be. it didn’t want to be anything but a rehash of movies we’ve all watched already. i feel like bobo the fool for expecting (hoping) for something more but. welp. 

[hellzyeahthewebwieldingavenger]

About your issue

Hey, I checked your thoughts on Marvel Comics 1000 and while it was nice to see, though I noticed you have some big issue here. Your problem with Zdarsky calling his panel of Iron Man to be the most obnoxious even though it was mostly just Iron Man over the years going backwards from suit to man. That’s it. Just representing who Iron Man was. And honestly, there was nothing obnoxious about it. I mean, filler yes, but, the rest of the things in that issue was filler from Whitely, Simone, DeConnick, and a few others. Calling this thing from Zdarsky shows you have some sort of hatred for this guy. Sure, he might not give you the most favorable stuff like Life Story. But,the guy has proven to be a great writer with his run on PP:SM, his story with Norman, the time travel thing, The Tinkerer, Sandman, and the final issue. The stuff with Peter and his younger self was nice. And his Two-In-One was really brilliant as is his Invaders and Daredevil. Yet, you seem to be more hard on the guy based on some issues with Life Story(which I have debated with you) and other stuff. You also seem to judge him based on one work of Sex Criminals even though it was mostly Fraction and Zdarsky had done the art yet never gave into Two-In-One, Invaders, and Daredevil. And now I see you be harder on the guy based on a few panels of Iron Man even though that was nothing compared to a few others. Infact, you also judge him more based on his work in the previous issues of PPSM from # 2 even though the ones before issue # 6 we’re not that favorable to many. So going back to that just kinda seems redundant on criticizing a guy for his past faults who then improved later on.  Really, it seems you have some sort of issues with the guy even though A) He’s done some great work on Spidey even on the 616 universe making them in character compared to how you see in Life Story B) has made some hard hitting stories C) Has improved since then. And D) Has started making the character strong again before guys like Sean Ryan, Nick Spencer, Donny Cates, and Tom Taylor came along(Tom being the more Problematic). So, Really. What issues do you have here? 

“obnoxious even though it was mostly just Iron Man over the years going backwards from suit to man. ”

That is why it WAS obnoxious. There is no story there. There isn’t an attempt at a story.

“ That’s it. Just representing who Iron Man was. ”

You know DeFalco and Frenz represented who Thor was but actually had a beginning, middle, end, dialogue and something beyond ‘this sure is Iron Man and these sure are his outfits’. It doesn’t say anything about Tony beyond he is Iron Man which like...yeah, thanks I know.

“And honestly, there was nothing obnoxious about it. I mean, filler yes, but, the rest of the things in that issue was filler from Whitely, Simone, DeConnick, and a few others.”

I don’t recall their stories off the top of my head but if you are right then that doesn’t legitimize Zdarsky, it just means there was a lot of bad filler in this book. But at least they had some dialogue and were making some kind of point.

“Calling this thing from Zdarsky shows you have some sort of hatred for this guy.”

Don’t make presumptions.

I don’t hate him personally.

I hate the work of his I’ve read for Marvel and the fact that this is yet another example doesn’t change that. He’s just wrapped up a big Spider-Man story after a big Spider-Man run so obviously he’s a writer I will single out on a Spider-Man blog moreso than Gail simone who’s never written for Spider-Man that I know of. But I singled out Ewing too.

“Sure, he might not give you the most favorable stuff like Life Story. But,the guy has proven to be a great writer with his run on PP:SM, his story with Norman, the time travel thing,”

No he didn’t, that story wasn’t that impressive and it included BS like Peter’s sister. His run on Spec was more bad than good especially regarding all the team up crap, his sister and Jameson.

“The Tinkerer, Sandman, and the final issue.”

How the fuck is basically associating the Tinkerer with aliens again, an idea so dumb that Lee and Ditko never mentioned it again and later writers actively retconned out of the character’s background good?

How is doing the same story Paul Jenkins did over 10 years earlier (and better I might add) proof he is a good writer?

“The stuff with Peter and his younger self was nice.”

A broken clock is right twice a day.

“And his Two-In-One was really brilliant as is his Invaders and Daredevil. ”

I’ve not read that so i can’t comment. Different writers are better fits on different characters.

“Yet, you seem to be more hard on the guy based on some issues with Life Story(which I have debated with you) and other stuff.”

No I’m more hard on the guy due to Life Story and his Spec run, and whilst you have indeed debated the points with me, the points I’ve seen (I’ve not gotten around to all of them yet) haven’t held up to objective scrutiny.

“You also seem to judge him based on one work of Sex Criminals even though it was mostly Fraction and Zdarsky had done the art yet never gave into Two-In-One, Invaders, and Daredevil. ”

When did I ever once judge Zdarsky on Sex Criminals? Provide a link showing that I did that?

And frankly i can only judge him based upon the works I’ve read. The works I’ve read have been his spidey works which have generally been bad.

“And now I see you be harder on the guy based on a few panels of Iron Man even though that was nothing compared to a few others.”

See above.

“Infact, you also judge him more based on his work in the previous issues of PPSM from # 2 even though the ones before issue # 6 we’re not that favorable to many.”

He still wrote them. They are still bad. They are still therefore part and parcel of something i can judge him on. And frankly issue #6 itself was the worst issue he did period.

“So going back to that just kinda seems redundant on criticizing a guy for his past faults who then improved later on. ”

Improving later on would entail not insisting Spider-Man has a super secret sister, not having a clusterfuck for issue #300, not pushing on the PeterxGwen ship, not doing...pretty much anything in Life Story.

“Really, it seems you have some sort of issues with the guy even though A) He’s done some great work on Spidey even on the 616 universe making them in character compared to how you see in Life Story ”

I respect you believe he’s done some great work. This doesn’t change the fact that he has at best done like 2 or 3 decent-good issues. you are giving him the accolade of ‘great’ for stories that don’t fit that descriptor. Sandman’s swan song inherently can’t be a great story because we’ve seen it already!

“ B) has made some hard hitting stories”

Like what? Because from where I’m sitting the only thing Zdarsky has managed to hit is my wallet for Life Story.

“C) Has improved since then”

Going from crap to less crap isn’t much to write home about.

“And D) Has started making the character strong again before guys like Sean Ryan, Nick Spencer, Donny Cates, and Tom Taylor came along(Tom being the more Problematic). So, Really. What issues do you have here? ”

LULZ...no he didn’t.

He absolutely didn’t.

Making the character strong again is what Spencer was doing.

Spencer was reconstructing the character and mythos surrounding him.

Zdarsky simply wrote him LESS badly than Slott.

Please explain to me what Zdarsky did at all that made the character strong again?

Because all I can see to even hint at that is his final issue which is playing in the ballpark of Slott’s final issue anyway.

Zdarsky’s lasting contributiong as of right now is having Peter and Jameson act toxically out of character. THAT is his legacy at the moment!

In contrast Spencer has like 99% of the time written him properly and fixed sooooooooooo much shit Zdarsky either didn’t or broke more, like his stupid Black Cat story, or his stupid FCBD issue with MJ, or Jameson, or his sister, or insisting upon the Gwen ship or doing alien, time travel, wacky sci-fi crap that generally doesn’t belong in Spider-Man at a point in time when we’d been having YEARS of that shit.

Now I am absolute going to reply to your other comments at some point, but know this.

I’m not going to stop criticising Zdarsky when I feel it’s warranted and if you have such a problem with that either don’t read my comments about him or unfollow me. It’s your choice.

[thealphabetmurders]

for the emo music asks, could you do 13 with moxiety or 42 with logicality, pretty please?

Of course I will, @mystrangedarkson, I appreciate you sending me a prompt. However, you included ‘or’ in your ask; as a proud bisexual, the question must be asked: why not both? 

Moxiety: Miserable at Best; Mayday Parade 

Warning: There are discussions of abuse and manipulative/toxic relationship and a neutral mention of Deceit. 

Logicality: It’s Almost Halloween; Panic! at the Disco

Warning: Takes place at a ‘haunted hospital’ set, mentions of psych patients and gore (nothing descriptive) 

Send Me an Emo Ask Prompt

Moxiety: Miserable at Best; Mayday Parade

Virgil paused his music and dried his hands, making his way to the door where he heard a knock. He was not expecting anyone, so this was highly unprecedented. Nevertheless, today was a good mental health day for once, so he did not mind talk to a neighbor or politely declining a door to door salesman. What he did not expect was who was actually at the door.

“Hey, Virge,” Patton smiled weakly, pulling his baby blue sweater over his hands. Virgil made an attempt to fix his hair, but to no avail.

“Hey, Pat… It’s been a while,” Virgil said, meekly. Patton just nodded, awkwardly standing at the door. Virgil could have hit himself for being a terrible host, “Uh, come on in,”

Patton stepped through the door and took off his sandals. He was wearing pale yellow chinos to compliment the oversized sweater. His golden curls were just as unruly as ever.

“Uh, you got new glasses,” Virgil pointed out.

Patton chuckled, “Yea, I sat on mine on a plane a couple months ago. Roman said the round glasses compliment my face shape better,”

Virgil inspected the glasses further and found the normal paternal life behind Patton’s eyes was extinguished and waves of sadness were now swimming behind Patton’s beautiful emeralds.

“You redecorated,” Patton commented, sitting down on the leather sofa.

“No, I didn’t. Logan did all this interior designer stuff. What I did at first after you….” He trailed off and Patton awkwardly shifted on the couch, “What I did apparently looked like, and I quote ‘hell’,”

Patton weakly chuckled at that, “I am sure it didn’t look that bad,”

Virgil shook his head, “In retrospect, Logan was right. I will never be an interior designer. I know I am good for something, I just haven’t found it yet,”

Patton hummed in response, but didn’t say anything. The awkwardness was thick and heavy in the air, the only sounds present were the humming of the radiator and the dripping of the sink that Virgil did not turn off completely. Patton was playing with a loose thread on his sweater, the uncomfortableness of the situation present on his face and body language.

“What are you doing here, Patton?” Virgil finally asked, not daring to look at the other man, “We haven’t spoken in 9 months,”

“I’m here because I miss you, Virge,” Patton said, his voice cracking slightly. “I- And I wanted to say that I am sorry that I stopped talking to you, I- I- I couldn’t,”

“Why?”

“Alex and I are no longer together,” Patton said, and Virgil finally looked over at Patton. A single tear silently streamed down his cheek and he fiddled with the ends of his sweater, “When I moved out of here 10 months ago, Alex and I were solid. But then… He only allowed me to talk to Roman and Logan. I couldn’t talk to you, I couldn’t talk to Remy, I couldn’t even talk Dee, and he’s my brother,”

“Patton… That’s no ok-”

“Let me finish. Everyday was like that. I had to respond to their texts in less than 15 minutes or I get 20 phone calls. Everyday was another jealous rant and another privilege taken away. Eventually, he cut off communication with Logan after he read my texts to him about toxic relationships. I just had Roman who had to walk on eggshells with every conversation. Everyday without my friends or without you, I felt miserable at best, but Alex made me happy, I thought. He loved me and gave me gifts and attention and it felt nice being someone’s priority, rather than an afterthought,” Patton sniffled and rubbed his nose with the sleeve of his sweater, Virgil ran to the kitchen to grab some paper towels, “Thank you. I thought I was happy, but life just got so much harder. My definition of happy turned from the feeling of genuine happiness to making it through a day without bursting into tears. The hardest part of living was just taking breaths to stay. It wasn’t until 4 months ago that I left, because Alex snapped and hit me, in the face, and that was my limit,”

“Patton I-” Virgil tried to blink away the tears that were forming in his eyes, “I am so sorry, I shouldn’t have given up trying-”

“I stopped talking to you, Virgil. Do not put this on yourself. I have been working for a couple months to come to terms with what happened. It was an abusive relationship. A very toxic, manipulative one, I am trying to rebuild the relationships with everyone who I cut off. Dee still needs some time, but it is nice to have Logan and Remy back in my life again,” Patton sighed, and cleared his throat, “I tried for a couple months to feel okay again, to feel normal again, but there was one glaring thing that was missing, and that was you,”

Virgil’s eyes widened, “Me?”

Patton chuckled sadly, “Yes you. Virgil, you were my best friend before my relationship, my roommate. I need you in my life, ‘cause nothing feels like home, because it felt like you’re a thousand miles away. You are my home, Virgil.”

Virgil sighed and jumped a little when he felt Patton’s warm hand on his cheek, rubbing away tears that he didn’t know were forming.

“I have got to say Pat, my life without you, it has not been easy,” He chuckled slightly and Patton softly smiled, “It got really hard to be okay. Like, I love Logan and Roman, but they aren’t… You. They don’t have your warmth or your kindness or your intuition and neither of them are in tune with their feelings at all,”

“When will they stop pining and just get together?” Patton quipped.

“I have no idea,” Patton chuckled softly out of his nose and Virgil continued, “The point is, I have missed you more than you know, more than anyone does probably. And, I know things may be hard right now, but I promise that you’ll get through it,” He took Patton’s hands in his, “ I can’t wait to see that spark back in you, because compared to your eyes, nothing shines quite as bright,”

Patton looked down at their hands and sighed, “It has not been easy, not at all. I had to get a restraining order, go to a lot of therapy, take time off work, but I am much better now. I don’t think I will ever be the same, that is unreasonable to expect, but I just hope that my experience can help others,”

Virgil smiled and shook his head, “God, you are incredible. I don’t know how someone as kind and sweet as you can actually be real,”

Patton looked at Virgil, lovingly, “Thank you, Virgil,” Patton lifted up Virgil’s hands and softly kissed them.

Virgil’s heart was beating out of his chest and his cheeks felt like they were on fire. He didn’t like to be bold or brash very often, nevertheless, his emotions were running high wire and he cupped Patton’s cheeks like something precious and placed a soft kiss on his lips.

The kiss was wrought filled with bittersweet emotion and longing, the kind that long distance lover have when the are parting once again, when you kiss after making up from a fight with your betrothed, or when you have not seen your best friend in 10 months.

Virgil pulled away, eyes wide, “I am so sorry, Pat, I didn’t if that was-”

Patton grabbed the back of Virgil’s neck and pulled him in again. Patton’s hands were sweaty and warm and his lips were as soft as pillows against Virgil’s slightly cracked lips and constantly cold hands.

Once they parted, the room was full of sweetness and love, one that you could only experience. Virgil’s hands were still cupped on Patton’s face and his hand was still on the back off Virgil’s neck. They pressed their foreheads against one another, their breaths entangling with each other and they rode their high of love.

“Wow. I missed the lips that made me fly,” Patton said.

Virgil frowned, “That was our first kiss,”

“Let me be romantic,”

Virgil chucked in response and softly kissed Patton again, getting addicted to the feeling of his lips on Patton’s.

“Virgil, do you mind if we take things, kind of slow. I am still kind of hurting so I want to wait before we do anything like labels or those things, y’know,” Patton bit his lip, and Virgil chuckled, his heart melting at the adorableness of the other.

“I would wait 1000 years for you, Patton. Take all the time you need,”

Patton gave a small laugh and kept smiling, “Do you think we could keep kissing?”

“Of course, my love,” The pair reconnected and the fire behind Patton’s eyes was beginning to rekindle into its former flame.

Lyrics:  I know I am good for something, I just haven’t found it yet; without you, I felt miserable at best; The hardest part of living was just taking breaths to stay; ‘cause nothing feels like home, you’re a thousand miles away; compared to your eyes, nothing shines quite as bright;  I missed the lips that made me fly.

Logicality: It’s Almost Halloween; Panic! At The Disco

Patton squealed and Logan parked the in the makeshift gravel parking lot and Patton unbuckled and leapt out of the car before Logan even took his keys out of the ignition.  

“Patton, please wait,” Logan cautioned, “I am the one with the tickets,”

He huffed and made his way back to his boyfriend, hugging his left arm as they walked, “Sorry Lo, I am just so excited for this haunted house. Roman is going to do such a great job,”

Logan sighed, “Yes, Roman is a talented actor, so I am sure he will do an adequate job,” Logan softly kissed the top of the shorter man’s curls as they walked up to the ticket taker, ripping the tickets in half whilst in character.

“I do not know why I have to participate in these absurdities,” Logan stood in line and Patton untangled himself from Logan’s slender arm.

“We are here to support Roman. And Virgil, he is the one running the sound effects for the attractions,” Patton told.

“Joy,” Logan deadpanned. They approached closer to the ticket taker as the sky turned a nice golden and orange color, beautifully complementing the falling leaves in their wake towards the house. “I do not agree to participate in these absurdities,” He repeated.

Patton huffed, “Well you agreed to date me and I wanted to go. And isn’t making me happy reason enough,”

Logan looked down at Patton’s pleading eyes. His already wide green eyes accentuated with his round rimmed glasses. Logan couldn’t help but have his expression crack at Patton’s adorable shtick.

“Fine, I will attempt to have a good time for you. But I refuse to pretend to be scared for the actors like Roman requested,”

“You do not have to pretend,” Said the ticket-taker, dressed in a low, graveling voice, “It’s almost Halloween,” The ticket-taker shouted so the line would hear, “Everybody scream! It’s almost Halloween!”

The line erupted into a ear splitting shriek, and Logan just rubbed his temples in response.

“Have fun in there..” He handed them back their ticket stubs, “If you dare,”

Patton bubbled, “We will!” and the same time Logan droned, “We won’t,” Patton gave him a harsh glare and Logan flashed a small smile at the man, thanking him as they went into the park.

The park had 3 separate haunted houses ‘experiences’ you could go through, but Logan and Patton were only going through the Haunted Hospital experience, which is what Roman and Virgil were working.

They waited in line making easy conversation, Logan explaining in detail the psychology behind the ‘fight, flight, or freeze’ response present and humans, and Patton asking if he could hold Logan’s hand because he was already scared.

“You are ridiculous,” He gripped Patton’s hand and he giggled and the pair (along with 5 other people) entered the haunted hospital as a very friendly psych patient explained the rules (ei. Don’t touch the actors, emergency exits are on every floor, keep the line moving).

They entered the first floors, the pair at the very back of the line. Patton gripping Logan’s hand very tightly as the actors did their best to moan and groan and scare the party involved. They scared half of the party, but the other, taller half remained ever so stoic. The walked up the stairs to the second floor, where they were surrounded by dismembered arms and legs and many patients in what looks like a failed surgery.

“Did you get your shots this year, sweetie?” A nurse whispered-shouted in Logan’s ear and snapped her latex glove very aggressively, which left Logan unfazed, on the other hand, Patton yelped quite loudly as automated thunder rolled in the background.

Logan turned to Patton, “Seriously, that scared you?”

Patton shook his head, shaking slightly as they made their way off that floor and up to the next, “I have always been frightened by the sound of rubber,”

“The sound of rubber? Really?”

“Don’t be like that,” Patton fretted. They waited on the steps for the door to open to the next level, “Isn’t there anything you are afraid of?”

Logan shrugged, “Maybe seeing a devil in the corner in candy apple red; but in general I am fearless, and therefore powerful,”

They entered the third floor when they were greeted by manic hair and loud screams from the actors dressed as psych patients. A couple were singing songs from the great American Songbook and coloring the wall, which Logan had to admit was quite creepy.

The two were almost out of the room, Patton shaking in his boots and Logan bored, when a patient came up behind them, holding a chainsaw , “And now we’re gonna teach you to do the trick or treat!” He laughed and turned it on, laughing maniacally.

Patton screamed and jumped behind Logan, who was now standing between Patton and the chainsaw, rolling his eyes. “Seriously, that didn’t scare you?” Patton asked, shocked.

“There is no chain on that chainsaw, it cannot hurt me,”

The actor turned of the chainsaw and sulked away and Patton moved out from behind Logan.

“The only scary thing here is the gross misrepresentation of mental illness,” Logan preached.

“Right? That is what I have been saying,” A familiar voice over the intercom said, and the two looked up at the sky and frowned.

“Virgil?” Patton asked. A door opened to the left of them (Patton jumping slightly) and Virgil came out of it, dressed in all black.

“Virgil, oh no, you are ruining the great immersion,” Logan straight-faced and Virgil rolled his eyes.

“What you said, Logan, is what I have been telling the director of this whole thing, but I am a techie so they won’t listen to me, I am glad I am not the only one who sees how damaging even small scale misrepresentations can be,” Logan held up his hand and they two high fived. “How is the hospital so far for ya? Scary?” He asked, raising an eyebrow.

Patton responded with, “Terrifying!” at the same time Logan said, “Not in the slightest,” which made Virgil chuckle heartily.

“I am not surprised by those responses in the slightest. I have to get back to it, but I’ll see you both at Roman’s tonight, yea?” The pair nodded and Virgil saluted at them and went back into the room.

They went through one final floor, which was a potpourri of everything they had already experienced mixed up in one final ball of scary. For Patton, at least. This floor did make Logan feel the most uneasy, but not scared.

“I can’t believe you didn’t get scared by anything.” Patton moped as they made their way down the stairs, back out to the common area. “I’m sorry you didn’t have a good time and it was kind of a waste,”

Logan rolled his eyes, “I may have not gotten scared, but that does not mean I was not highly entertained. Besides, I got to spend time with you, Pat, and that is never a waste of my time,”

Patton squealed, “Awww, thank you Logan!”

“I do like Halloween though, so I am glad we are here,” Logan bopped his head to the song playing in the courtyard.

“The monster mash is playing, you’re moving to the beat, and you never dance!” Patton shimmied with excitement.

Logan smiled fondly at Patton and grabbed his hand, “C’mon, let me buy you a candy apple,”

The two stood in line, Patton animatedly talking about anything and anything that scared him and Logan listening with hearts in his eyes.

They were almost towards the front of the line when Logan felt cool metal pressed against his neck and heard a gravelly voice whisper in his ear, “Boo,”

Logan yelped and jumped away from the offending perpetrator, dropping the cash for the apple in the process. He looked and groaned as he saw Roman standing there, dressed as an undead doctor, clapping delightedly.

“Oh my, gosh! I got you, Logan! I actually got you!” Roman squealed with delight and held out a hand to high five Patton, who was equally excited.

Logan scoffed, “You barely got me,” He adjusted his glasses and smoothed out his clothes, trying to gain his composure back.

“You dropped all your money and yelled, I am chalking that up to a win,” Roman announced.

Patton gave him a disapproving look, “C’mon, let Roman have this one, do it for me,”

Logan groaned, “Fine. Roman, you did it. You scared me,”

Roman clapped his hands together and spun around, “I am so glad because I am supposed to be in there acting and left my post for this. See you tonight!” Roman yelled as he ran off.

Patton waved at him as he ran away then turned his attention to Logan, smiling widely.

“What?” Logan asked, fondly.

Patton said nothing as he giggled and hugged Logan, spinning him around in the process. Logan couldn’t help but chuckle slightly as he hugged Patton back. Yea, he loved Halloween.

Lyrics: It’s almost Halloween. Everybody scream! It’s almost Halloween!; Maybe seeing a devil in the corner in candy apple red; And now we’re gonna teach you to do the trick or treat; The monster mash is playing, you’re moving to the beat.

[littlemisssquiggles]

Hello! How do you think everyone will individually react now that they know this information about Ozpin and Salem? (Including Maria just for fun xD)

Oscarand Ruby, our two smaller, more honest souls willmost definitely feel the most sympathy for Oz out of everyone. Oscar willprobably feel terrible for those times he acted resistant towards the call toadventure after he witnessed for himself that reincarnating and being forced toimpose on the lives of others was not something Oz wanted to do in thebeginning. 

I’d like to believe that the only reason Ozpin---well Ozma onlydesired to come back was out of his need to see his beloved Salem again. Hecame back for her and in the end…she turned on him. Destroyed their home.Killed their children. I still can’t get over the fact that Oz had kids once.It’s something I’ve wondered in the past and even speculated it in one of mymusings but now…seeing that it’s canon, it makes it more heart-breaking.

Iwish we had gotten more moments of Ozma interacting with his baby girls withtheir coloured coded dresses and their bobble heads on top of their lollipopbodies. (Seriously I love RWBY and the CRWBY are knocking it out of thepark with the fantastic work they’ve put into V6 so far but if I had to nit-pickone minor detail about this episode is that they still needto improve on their models for little kids in RWBY. 

It’snot bad in some shots but in this shot here where Ozma is sneaking hisdaughters out of the castle, the size of the blue daughter’s head bothered meso much in terms of proportions. My inner artist was perturbed. 

Iknow, design-wise, little kids characters tend to have bigger heads to emphasisetheir child-like features but…this one was quite jarringto me mostly when you compare it to the size of the youngest daughter’shead. So they will need to work on that some more, just shrink the head size abit or at least keep it consistent.

Ilearnt in a character design class that younger characters have bigger headsand proportions which get smaller as they age. So it’s just that one thing).But resuming what I was saying, Oz had kids he loved who died and being forcedto relive everything again through Jinn’s illusion is probably going to hurt deep for Oz. So I wouldn’t be surprised if Oscarmentally hugs Ozpin or shows his own remorse over all that’s happened tohim---seeing his lives. I think after this, Oscar will have more respect forOzpin and will be a bit more willing, not to mention curiousas to why he was picked as Ozpin’s newest successor.

Ruby will be most understanding,as expected. While the other girls, like Yang and Weiss might focus on the factthat Oz never told the truth about Salem being unstoppable, Ruby will onceagain focus on whatmatters---finding a way to stop Salem. Just because Oz wasn’t ableto find a way doesn’t mean there isn’t one, right? 

Not to mention that, Rubysaw Ozpin’s life. His family. His pain. Clear as day. If anything, she will bethe one to get it the most out of the group outside of Oscar and a part of mewishes she’ll be the one to step forward and just…hug Ozpin---technicallyOscar but the hug will be for Ozpin---Ozma apologizingto him for everything he had to go through. All his agony. All the times hefailed and tried to help. Did his best to help. She’ll get it.

Blake will surprisingly getit too. As a matter of fact, I kinda have this jokewhere Blake will relate 1000% with Ozma since she knows what it’s likemost of all to have a former lover --someoneyou loved and once believed shared your ideologies--- - turn on you and becomesomeone heartless. Blake will see Adam Taurus mirrored in Salem and will feelit for Ozma after what she did to their family. You can tell in the flashbackthat Ozpin did not want to fight Salem. He practically looked at her with anexpression that read “Please don’t do this, my love!” and yet… Salem still attacked him.

Ozmaclearly didn’t want to fight but Salem shot first forcingOz no choice but to retaliate. Salem’s ideologies bought Ozma to hisultimate choice of running away from it all and hopefully start over and BLAKE WILL GET THAT SO MUCH because shedid the same thing.

Qrow I’m not so sure aboutbut I think his reaction will be positive too. Seeing that Oz was a once an alcoholic in his life at some point too when he decided tospend it drinking his grief away---this would probably justify to the Branwenman why Oz never really used to pull him up much for his alcoholism. I thought that wasnice touch to Ozpin’s past cause it helped me to see a relation between him andQrow.

Weiss andYang, Ibelieve, will still be the only two on the fence a little. I don’t want Weissto be suspicious, if anything, she’ll be unsure---questionable mostly. Yang willprobably be pissed the most because she’ll realize that what her mom said aboutOz was true.

Lastly,Maria will most definitely bethe one to amusingly break all the awkward tension with her sharp as a knifewit and comedic timing. Thoseare my thoughts on that.

Onan entirely different note, this is probably just me bitching here but…what isthe CRWBY’s deal with pussying out onmaking their establishedromantic pairings kiss? In thehistory of RWBY, the only documented kiss has gone to Arkos. Does a character’s deathneed to be foreshadowed in order for them to earn a chance to kiss their love interest?

Salem and Ozma were lovers who got marriedand fucked had kids and I ain’t seeone sweet kiss from this tragically beautiful couple. 

Even if RoseGarden becomes possible, are we ever going to see them kiss on-screen? I haven’t seen such lack of kissing between couples in a series since Power Rangers. The hell.

Our only hope lies in Renora tobreak this horrible endless cycle of no smooches. 

 ~LittleMissSquiggles(2018)

[monarch-boo]

talking for a really long time about how i ripped the model

could be used as a tutorial maybe, unless this is a mess to read, which it probably is

continued from this post

ok so why is it a pain in the ass you ask? well there might be a faster method to doing what i'm doing but i haven't found it, this is the fastest method i have figured out

starts out simple enough, extract the character's model as .odd with OpenIV, go into 3ds max and then on the openformats tab hit 'import single' under the .odd header and grab the .odd i exported, wait a bit for it to finish, then run the xnalara script by mario_kart64n (i partially use that because i'm intending to put these in xnalara in the first place but also because things like fbx or dae result in messy looking skeletons for some reason, while the .mesh.ascii exported with the script keeps it neat) and hit export and put a name and location, then wait a bit for that to run (i get some error messages but i disregard them because it seems to export fine regardless and i haven't had any problems)

but for characters with their cutscene models at least (i haven’t checked out their in-game ones and i don’t plan to) every. separate. piece. has it’s own skeleton (when i say "piece" i mean the things that are actually meant to be separated, the things that you see as separate parts in the model viewer of OpenIV or SparkIV. that distinction is important for a reason that i'll get into in a bit). well thankfully not actually separate armatures if that makes sense, it's still all part of one armature, it's just that every part has it's own entire body's worth of bones. it doesn’t automatically merge these upon importing or anything, it actually just tacks (###) onto the end, a unique 3, sometimes 4, digit number for each duplicate of the bone. so like let's give a random example in regards to like... tony in his suit or something. his hands are not parented to the same arm bones as his sleeves are weighted to. for example if i try to move the clavicle bones, which should, in a model with a clean skeleton, move the entire arm, the sleeve moves with "Char_L_Clavicle(404)" whereas the hand moves with "Char_L_Clavicle(494)". every piece of the model just has it's own entire skeleton's worth of duplicate bones.

my way to fix this (yes, it has to be this way, because none of the other model programs i have are able to just merge bones on a whim like this, xnalara kind of has a way but it's a bit tricky for me so this is actually the easier route) is to: 1. take that .mesh.ascii i exported 2. export THAT as a .pmx (i import the .mesh.ascii file into blender then immediately export it to pmx with pymeshio, without touching/deselecting/moving/resizing anything of the imported .mesh.ascii. for some reason if you alter the model in any way then exporting to pmx winds up moving every bone to where the mother bone would be in mmd? like in the center of the floor y'know. but if you just export the fresh unaltered .mesh.ascii import as pmx it keeps the bones intact) 3. put it into pmx editor and go through the easy yet long and boring process of renaming every. single. duplicate. bone. name. to match the first one, which is as simple as deleting the (###) off the end of all the names, however it takes an incredibly long time because, at least in regards to tony, there are well over 1000 bones, the vast VAST majority of which are those duplicates that need to be renamed. like when i say vast majority i mean that now that i've gotten through and merged all the bones there's literally only 108 bones in total now. even though it's just some quick clicking and backspacing it still took me like 20+ minutes to get through the whole list renaming them. 4. save a copy now just in case i need a backup, then hit edit>bone>merge bones with similar names (E>B>M) 5. now i can save THAT and put it back into blender. 6. it merged the model itself into one object so i go into edit mode, make sure everything is selected, then hit P and click separate by material. now it's back how it should be.

then comes the (minor) issue with the materials, this happened all the way back when i exported the .mesh.ascii from 3ds max with the xnalara script! the script, when it exports it will break up objects/materials into even more pieces, which if you're getting a model with all the alternate clothes like i am with tony then you have already have a ton of pieces in the same place as it is, well now they are broken up even more so if it wasn't kinda hard to grab one specific article of clothing or something off the character before, it is now. BUT thankfully it's actually a much easier fix than it looks like at first: each broken up chunk of each body part/article of clothing are actually relatively close to if not right by each other in the objects list.

so what i do, this is the stage i'm at right now with tony, is that after i merged the bones in pmx editor and put it back into blender and separated the materials into their own objects again, i go through the outliner in blender, using the little eyes next to them in the outliner, hide the armature just so that i can see the objects clearly, then i go and hide all the objects, and then starting from the bottom of the list (you could probably start from the top but i'm just already at the bottom so) i start to unhide objects one by one until i've revealed a whole body part or article of clothing or whatever, then i select all of those (shift+click their names in the outliner) and hit ctrl+j, then rename this merged object to clearly label what it is

then there's still multiple materials for one object, which i don't need, so i'm just going to go into edit mode again and in the material tab just hit "assign" on the first material there, and remove the others, also rename that first material into a clear label just like the objects

then after THAT i have to apply the textures to each material, then i just have to add the numbers on the start and end of each object according to this tutorial, then i should finally be ready to do the final export to xps and test it out in xnalara! i'd also like to rename the bones to whatever the common naming convention for xnalara models is so hopefully the models i rip can be used with pose data, but since the skeleton is nice and clean now that should be super easy.

also i am going to back this model up onto my external drive i m m e d i a t e l y because while i have the hang of the method now it's still too much time and pain in the ass if i have to remake the whole thing if something happens to it

[ohscorbus]

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child: Saturday 16th June, 2018

This isn’t a super long recap, just a couple of little things I really loved (mostly about act four) and wanted to gush about! By which I mean half of these points turn into rambling headcanons and this is actually well over 2k words long. I should probably apologise now... *whispers* I have a lot of feelings, okay?

Act Three, Scene One

“So we can continue our work together?” “We can” - It’s always been difficult to imagine Scorpius ever being the Scorpion King, and Jonathan’s Scorpius even more so. Yet today I truly saw the Scorpion King on stage for the first time. It was so jarring. Jonathan has such a baby face. His Scorpius is the definition of precious. Yet when he lowered his chin and his voice as he spoke to Umbridge, their was a flash of something. It was dangerous and sinister. It only lasted a second or two each time, but it was there. It was frightening how he could slip into that, but a relief that he couldn’t hold it. It’s not who he is but clearly it’s there within him.

Act Three, Scene Twenty

Jonathan was so great to watch in the torture scene today. He was getting so angry with Delphi. I love the way his voice dropped as he spoke back to her. He’ll stand up for himself and defend his friend even if it kills him. That anger, that fight inside of him… in the most unexpected turn of events, it’s Jonathan’s Scorpius who I can see the Scorpion King in the most. (Or at least aspects of him. It doesn’t seem like an impossible jump anymore.) He may look like a sweet sunshine child but make no mistake, he’s a Malfoy and he’ll protect what’s his at any cost. For example, despite having been tortured several times himself, the second Delphi goes to raise her wand at Albus to hit him with a crucio, Scorpius immediately leapt up and tried to get in between them despite being bound and injured himself. There was zero hesitation here. Even when he stumbled, he got straight back up and moved towards him again. It was a selfless act as well as one of pure defiance against Delphi. I was beaming with pride. Now this is the Scorpius people don’t see. The one Scorpius wishes his dad knew about. It’s sad because this is Scorpius. It defines so much about his character. I hope Draco learns about it one day. I also hope Albus acknowledges it at some point. I don’t know how you even go about thanking someone for doing that. But if anyone can, it’s Albus. Oh! Also, imagine Albus and Draco talking about Scorpius one day and Draco thanking Albus for looking out for his son or something. But then Albus being like, ‘Me??? He was the one who protected me.’ Now that’s a conversation...

Act Four, Scene Three

“My geekiness is a-quivering” - (Jonathan is still saying geekiness not geekness ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ) Scorpius was flailing so hard he was at the point of passing out. Bless him. So Albus comes running over and stands in front of Scorpius and says, “Scorpius, breathe”, and as he does, he’s raised his hands up and slowly lowers them in hopes Scorpius will breathe out in time with him. He did, and it was brilliant. He had those breathing exercises ready to go which makes me believe this isn’t the first time he’s had to do this. Amazing. Such nerds. I LOVE THEM.

Act Four, Scene Eight

"You know about Delphi?” - So right before this, the boys are asked where Delphi is and Scorpius tries to respond but struggles. You see, Jonathan’s Scorpius has a bit of a stutter and he tends to restart his sentences and stumbles over words. I love it because it adds a whole new layer to Scorpius. This nervous, lonely kid who’s bullied and gossiped about by children and adults alike, and now he has this to deal with too. What’s worse is that none of the above are going to help him overcome his problem either. If anything, they exacerbate the issue. The contrast between him and his dad is also interesting. Draco is such a Malfoy, a real smooth talker. I’m sure watching his son grow up and struggle with his speech must have been difficult for them both. It’s another hurdle they would have had to overcome. But anyway, back to my point. When Scorpius was trying to talk here today, Draco stood next to him and just like everyone else, was eager to hear what was going on. This is vital information! But when Scorpius started to stutter, Draco started nodding his head along with him. Not in anger or out of frustration, but in an encouraging kind of way. I couldn’t tell you what happened much after this because I was lost in a world of headcanons. Of Draco’s concern, of Astoria’s support, and of their joint effort to help him in any way they could. I have no shame in admitting that it had me in tears. I haven’t seen Draco acknowledge his son’s stutter before and I never realised how much I needed it. This tiny little thing said so much about their father-son relationship. Especially since it was after their hug. It was like getting a glimpse into their lives outside of Hogwarts. 

This is what I adore about James Howard. He takes those few and far between moments in the script and adds so much richness to it. He’s a true blessing to this play.

Act Four, Scene Nine

This is such a weird thing to notice but I myself am weird so here goes… you know in St. Jerome’s when Albus is asleep on the pew while Ginny and Harry are talking? Well Albus is always completely still, but today Joe moved slightly. I think he was simply readjusting his head (books don’t make good pillows whatever Scorpius says) but it made me think of an old ‘what if?’ I had. So once upon a time I suggested that maybe Albus wasn’t actually asleep in this scene. He’s merely pretending and ends up listening in to his parents conversation. I don’t think he is, but can you imagine if he was? Albus listening to his dad talking about how he does love him specifically. That he loves him to such an extend he understands how you could repel the spell of death (a spell Albus has now witnessed firsthand). His dad listening to his mum for advice just as he himself probably has over the years. Because ‘dad is pretty complicated’ so I’m sure he’s had many conversations with her about him over the years. Again, I don’t think he is listening in but reading/watching that scene with that in mind makes it super interesting. The later scenes too. Albus awkwardly looking at his dad after the ‘there’s plenty of things you’re good at’ line. Albus would understand what that’s about. It isn’t ‘right’ but he would finally see that his dad is trying. Then Albus standing up for his dad to Draco. He doesn’t quite know what he’s doing either but if his dad is trying then so can he. They share a small smile after this by the way and it warms my heart immensely. As does Hermione and Ginny knowingly smiling at each other and Harry.

Talking of ‘what if’s,  you know in Deathly Hallows when Hermione falls asleep on the sofa and Ron on the floor and Harry sees them in the morning and they’ve clearly fallen asleep holding hands? Well... imagine this with Albus and Scorpius in the church. Albus is on a pew and Scorpius has collected every single cushion he can find to make a bed on the floor beside him (he’s too tall to fit longways on the bench). Imagine the adults finding them some time later and noticing how their arms have fallen, clearly meaning they were at some point most likely holding hands. Now that’s a conversation I’m sure either of them want to overhear right now. Because it isn’t about that.

It doesn’t stop Ron saying ‘bloody hell’ as he stumbles upon them. Or Hermione’s knowing smile. Or Draco’s initial internalised panic before he’s overwhelmed by relief at his son’s happiness. Or Harry experiencing déjà vu and not knowing what to do about anything. Or Ginny smacking Ron as he boosts about his love potion while she tries to contain her own delight. Because she knows right now, this doesn’t mean much more than two best friends holding onto each other for support (and probably out of fear the other will disappear as soon as they close their eyes). But she’s got a feeling it probably won’t stay this way...

Act Four, Scene Ten

So while Ron and Draco are winding each other up in the church, I decided to watch Albus since this act is Joe’s strongest. He did not disappoint. When Ron first said ‘zap her’, Albus looked across at him and smiled and nodded along. His face screamed ‘yeeeah!’, he was clearly very onboard with this ‘masterful’ plan. But then Draco laughed at the plan and pointed out it’s flaws and Albus turned to look at him and instantly changed his allegiance. He stopped getting excited over Ron’s plan and looked far more serious and started nodding along with Draco. I absolutely LOVED IT. I loved it because you got to see two sides of Albus so clearly. Because there’s aspects of Ron and Draco in his personality. He’s impulsive and funny, yet all dry humour and pure resourcefulness. (His plans are spectacular when he puts his mind to it.) So it was brilliant to watch him flit between the two so quickly.

Personally, I think these two influence Albus a lot. Or at least have in the past and will do in the future. They’re important to him. I think the way Albus runs up the stairs towards Ron in the other timeline when he’s frustrated by Harry says a lot. It makes you wonder how often he’s done that. Gone to his uncle Ron for sweets and a joke because they’re easier to ask for than support. It’s a thing they do. A code. Then of course Draco’s influence will come much later. I have no doubt about that. They’re so alike and have common interests. Although right now he’s probably just 1000% aware he no doubt blames him just slightly for dragging his son into this. He wants to make a better impression (he’s Scorpius’s dad after all) and besides, Albus is a Slytherin. He understands Draco’s logic over Ron’s Gryffindor style plan any day. (It must be nice, having grown up surrounded by Gryffindors, to finally be around an adult Slytherin.) But yeah... to see Albus stood in between these two and connect with them both was everything.

Act Four, Scene Eleven

“You’ll always be an orphan. That never leaves you.” - From the angle I was sat, I could see Scorpius perfectly over Harry’s shoulder for this line and oh boy was that interesting. So as soon as Harry says this line, Scorpius instantly looked at Harry and the look on his face broke my heart. Now I know he’s not an orphan, but it was like he was understanding that the loss of his mother was a pain that was never going to go away. It’s something that will stay with him forever, and that’s something he’s going to have to process. I feel like deep down he knew this already but hearing Harry Potter confirm it out loud clearly affected him. It only lasts a moment before he remembers where he is and what’s happening. He then quickly broke his stare and looked down at the ground. It was such a fleeting moment but it said so much about Scorpius. I guess with Albus not talking about her much and the topic being one Draco can’t seem to broach with him, having it said so plainly in front of him gave him no choice but to face it. But then after everything he’s just gone through, maybe it’s an approach he won’t hesitate so much over in the future?

Act Four, Scene Twelve

“And there’s nothing I can do to stop him” “That’s not true” - Draco’s line was said in a slightly different tone today but that’s not what threw me. It was the fact Draco flicked his robe back and reached for his wand. I have never, ever seen a Draco do that before and I was in shock. (Or at least never so aggressively? That’s what caught my eye. The forcefulness with which he did it.) Because what could he have done? Gone after Voldemort himself? I could understand that on some level. For his childhood and for how it’s still affecting his son’s life. But then Scorpius reached over and put his hand on him and said, “Dad, now is not the time”, and he stopped. It was like it hit him where he was and who he was now. You could see the effect Scorpius has had on him. His whole body changed as he realised what he instinctively wanted to do and what he needed to do where totally different because he was different now. (I wonder how that felt? Having those feelings take over so quickly. I wonder if Scorpius has similar fears with the Scorpion King? I wonder if when/how Draco and Scorpius discuss this?!) The fact he then spends every second of the rest of this scene holding Scorpius so tightly in his arms to comfort him tells you everything you need to know about who Draco is now. This is how this man protects his son, by putting his needs first. Nothing shows how much he’s grown like this scene does.

While it was a super interesting choice for this scene, I’m not sure I could take it every time. My heart stopped beating for a second there. I mean, let’s face it. Draco would no doubt lose a duel against Voldemort. But I guess that glimpse of the old Draco was intriguing. But orphaning his son is not an option. Revenge, fear, justice. Those instincts mean nothing compared to what his son means to him.

I have to say, it reminded me a lot of Albus. Albus is headstrong and fuelled by his need to defend Scorpius during the torture scene, yet one gesture/word from Scorpius and it stops him. That parallel is fascinating. I’ve always said those two are more alike than they realise right now. But once they get to know each other they’ll be a force to be reckoned with.

Act Four, Scene Fifteen

“That heart is a good one” - As Harry said this, he pointed at Albus’s heart and a second later, it was like Albus realised what his dad was saying and instantly got a little bit embarrassed by the compliment. He quickly zipped up his hoodie and turned round away from his dad to hide and Harry laughed so much. Albus, realising everything is surprisingly okay between them, turns back to face his dad and gives him a shy little smile. It was adorably sweet. My heart...

The Harry and Albus hug at the very end hit me right in the feels. Harry reached his arm round Albus’s back and Albus looked down at his dad’s hand on his shoulder and smiled. He then rested his head on his dad’s shoulder and pretty much tucked himself into his chest. They both looked so happy. Harry then put his other arm round Albus and brought them into a proper hug and as the lights went down, I cried like the little girl that I am. These Potters have a lot to answer for.

[lifeisjustanotherstory]

W/c 21/01/2019 - the week in anecdotes and not-shower shower thoughts 

Monday

Aytaj went to Milan for the weekend. MILAN. Beats my weekend. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I just found out that “Royals” by Lorde came out 6 years ago this year, and time suddenly seems to have flown past. I mean...6 years? Really?! It’s probably been a year since I heard the song, and listening to it feels very nostalgic. The Youtube playlist moved on to “Team”. I used to like a particular chorus in that song - and still do - it lent itself to story ideas, and great character adventures in my head. I need to write again soon - it has been too long. 

We live in cities you'll never see onscreen

Not very pretty, but we sure know how to run things

Livin' in ruins of a palace within my dreams

And you know we're on each other's team

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Waiting for allocation of tasks from the US team. Currently have to chase Chase for our scoping file. 

(chase Chase...once you hear it, you can’t unhear it...)

**************************************************************************************

Tuesday

I wore my jumper on Tuesday, as I had planned. Getting up early, I hadn’t thought much of not seeing the brand logo on the front - it crossed my mind, only to be replaced with the thought of catching my train.

I went through the day - a good 95% of it - before one of the Managers called me as I made my way to my locker to put away my things for the day. Her name is Amy, and she lives near one of the towns that my train stops in on my way home.

“Deepa? I think your jumper is on back to front.” I lifted up the item of clothing in question, and to my deep embarrassment I was faced with the jumper’s label. I nervously laughed and headed to my locker as she made her way out to the bathroom. I was walking around with a silver pheasant on my back all day.  

Mortified doesn’t cut it.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I accidentally put Sahil’s coffee cup in my locker yesterday and now he’s got a huge white label on it, with his name in block letters. Oops.

But at least he’s sitting next to me again. Or maybe that’s just because I always let people use my chargers. 

**********************************************************************************

Wednesday

I’m trying to make my way up the stairs without stopping, which causes me to huff and puff (no houses are blown down, however), go red in the face and get a pain in my lower abdomen. No pain, no gain eh. Anyway, my eyes met Jasper’s on the way up, and we exchanged “Morning”’s. He knows I come in early, and vice versa, but we never seem to interact any more than that.

Anyway, he held open the door for me on the 10th floor, which I felt was very considerate. He didn’t have to, but he heard me coming (granted, I wasn’t that loud) and waited. I can’t say I’ve heard all good things about this guy - but his action today spoke a lot.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Finally relented and chose to get a breakfast from the canteen today. Still haven’t decided whether I’ll expense it though. Mushrooms were my favourite kind, wide and flat - like I’d never seen before, the egg nicely poached and the beans tasty. The sausage was all the more succulent for the guy forgetting to charge it to my total bill, which came in at a round £3.00.

Back up in the audit room and I was in mid-conversation, with my breakfast box hanging dangerously close to the edge of the table. Indeed, if not for Fahim’s hand, it could have ended up on my (suede) dress or on the floor. Credit to his reflexes for saving my day.  

*******************************************************************************************

Thursday

My dad remarked that the jumper I chose to wear today doesn’t have a very obvious logo on it. What cruel irony is this?

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Did 11 year old me ever think of her 21 year old self deciding to take a 6:11 train, instead of the 6:20, just so she could catch some z’s onboard? #10yearchallenge

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Aytaj offered me some of her chocolate. It’s milk chocolate with a hint of toffee, but it looks like dark chocolate. Azerbaijani chocolate has exceeded my expectations. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Had to reach out to a guy from our Swiss team in order to get some accounts that the UK team needs. No need to fear - Emanuel is here (!!!)

He is also up for the weekend because let’s be real, as if that isn’t what everyone is thinking.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Oh my gosh, just filled up my bottle and that is some.fresh.water.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I enjoy sitting next to Aytaj. No one else would have such fun trying to solve an IT issue. Or have cool client names (Sandwich, Hong Hong...and my personal fave; Jing Jing). Or laugh about their half-eaten chicken leg on the floor. (Thankfully, it was in a box). 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Managed to return the favour to Aytaj and gave her a chocolate biscuit. Matt H had one too. 

******************************************************************************************

Friday

Does Nick even know my name? Of course, there is no reason for him to address me by it when it’s just the two of us in the audit room. 

He promised not to rub his fancy breakast in his face as he left the room to go the restaurant. We’re approaching banter stage. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Fahim looked shattered, and I told him as much.

Me, over Skype; You look so tired

Fahim: my face speaks 1000 words about my tiredness lol

Me: Where’s a painting emoji when you need it?

Earlier we’d gone to get drinks from another floor today. I remarked that I don’t drink coffee, and he was really surprised. Shocked indeed. I must be one of the few people who don’t in this job. Coffee is like water for the majority of finance professionals. (I jest, but I have honestly seen people drink as much coffee as water, if not more.)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Sahil knows I get in early, so when someone said that I’d need to go and do something at 11:30am, he joked and said “That’s like evening for her.”

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

“Deepa, who you Skpying?” I could feel my stomach fall as I heard Jits ask. “You always put on your privacy screen when you’re not doing work?” I wasn’t Skyping, I was updating this blog. My thoughts will live on, as I hope them to, in this manner. Even if my currently healthy sleeping pattern doesn’t make it. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Nick (Dorn as opposed to Daws) asked Jits which song the line “It’s electrifying” I was. I responded “Greased Lightning” without a second thought. Jits remarked that it must have been a favourite of my parents’ in their teen years. He wasn’t right about them liking it - but they were both 19 at the time of its release. Wow.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

Watching a comedy programme and I just sat through the comedian mentioning the word ‘cunnilingus’ without any change in my facial expression whatsoever. I deserve a pat on the back for making it. Thank god my parents didn’t ask me to explain what it was...

******************************************************************************************

Saturday

Four months till my exams, with busy season yet to really start for me. Cripes.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Attempted to read. Attempted being the key word here. Made my revision timetable though.

A bit sad about my lack of weekend social life over the next few months, as if I even had one to miss?

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Steak was worth forgoing my nap for. Only just. It’s been too long since I’ve had pure meat like this. I don’t think I could ever be a vegetarian.

Asked for a different kind of salad and got served the wrong one, only for them to bring a new one instead! Free salad, yay! (Green leaves are gr8, what)

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

This new car is too clever for us. One tyre goes under the set pressure and it sets off a warning sign in the car. Ignorance really is bliss.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

To write or not to write, that is the question.

******************************************************************************************

Sunday

Lifted my stuff off the floor and found Ayana’s letter underneath.I’d completely forgotten about it. It’s nearly a month after she sent it to me, and she deserves a lengthy reply. I’l take it in my bag to work and draft a reply to write next week.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Revision is going rather fine, if I do say so myself. Of course, I am not even one day in. Time will tell. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - 

You know when you can sometimes taste what you had earlier? My cod liver oil capsule obviously broke on the way down, because my mouth has just been flooded with a fish taste. If someone kissed me right now, would they taste it?

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I wrote, and it was liberating. 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Less than an hour to bedtime and the first edition of a week in anecdotes and not-shower shower thoughts was a success. Here’s to next week and many more.

Deeps 

[s2he-gamewalkthrough]

Part 12: In the Clouds

The part of the game where Tensho has to complete some finicky and very specific game requirements to progress the story.

If you don’t know what this is about, please refer to this previous post.

[Any new comments by me will be designated by brackets.]

[Oof, this chapter’s one of the messier ones... I’ve cleaned it up a lot from the original LiveJournal post, but it still jumps around a lot in places. Apologies for that.]

Before I get on with the plot of the game, I found some upgrades!

Tensho:

Lv 2 --> 3:

Tenka:

Second listed item, Lv 1 --> 2

Youzen's:

First listed item, Lv 1 --> 2

First listed item, Lv 2 --> 3

Second item listed, Lv 1 --> 2

Second item listed, Lv 2 --> 3

[I uh. Really hope these combinations are still correct as I am unable to test them out in the old saved game I have. I highly recommend upgrading paopei/weapons whenever you can because it helps to make all future battles significantly easier.]

Oh, I forgot to mention before, but you should have gotten a few equipable items by now. Those are marked with stars (in the item description) in the inventory menu:

You can equip them to characters by selecting the third “word” in the menu screen:

Some equipment items affect certain stats, while some I guess negate status ailments. If you don't know Japanese, then finding out the effects pretty much comes down to trial and error. (I won't be listing the specific effects of all the equipable items--Sorry!)

Cavechan was nice enough to translate the character stat screen for us in part 1, so that should be a big help when you're messing around with equipment. (Thank you again to Cavechan!)

In the end, I had to equip Tenka with an item to boost his attack because it was pathetically weak.

Also, I've recently found out that you can't use HP-restoring potions on doushi/senin. I have no idea why this happens. This means that if you want to heal these characters while in a dungeon, you have to use a character that has a healing move. Man, that's going to be annoying in a pinch.

Anyway, time for more level grinding in the Houshindai!

I will only be unlocking two senins in the Houshindai today because the monsters on the lower floor are getting harder and harder to beat.

Another of the Juunisen, and In Hon's master. His name's Seki Seishi. (Also, he apparently talks A LOT.)

I also unlocked In Cho's master! (Kou Seishi)

Their bonus is:

They both sell things for something other than cash. One seems to sell potions while the other just sells combo upgrades. I suppose it’s decently useful?

While training in the Houshindai, I messed around with some of Youzen’s new moves.

After having beaten Chou Koumei (yet again), Youzen can now transform into him (4th move, second option.)

Sadly, you only have one attack Chou Koumei (a whip-like attack) and it frankly sucks because it does such a small amount of damage. I think this form is balanced out with all the supporting moves you have at your disposal, though I admittedly never utilized Chou Koumei’s form much.

And oooh, the 60 EP move (unlocked from the cutscene between Youzen and Gyokutei) allows Youzen to go into yokai form!

His ultimate attack (costing 40 EP) does A TON of damage.

(For reference, I was only doing about 1000 points of damage with Tensho and Tenka at this stage in the game.)

Anyway, time to head to the new location, finally. It looks to be someplace up in the clouds?

Hmm, that kid looks familiar...

Hey, it's kid-Tensho!

...Wait, what?

Yeah, this is actually all just an illusion. Those treasure chests scattered about are actually real, but you’ll have to find a way to get to them yourself because... Well, you’ll see why soon enough. 

After the short convo, kid-Tensho beckons you to follow him, and he’ll move a few steps along some kind of invisible path. You have to follow kid-Tensho’s steps EXACTLY. Otherwise you'll fall off the clouds (Hitou saves you from falling to your death) and have to re-do the path all over again. This “invisible path” is ridiculously long, which is why they included a guide in the form of kid-Tensho. You have to follow him about six times. You can save at any time in this area; so if you're the type that has trouble following an exact path, then you might want to save in the middle so you don’t have to keep restarting all the way at the beginning if you make a mistake.

Also, don't follow too closely behind kid-Tensho, otherwise you might accidentally walk ahead too far when he turns. This happened to me many, many times. [I’m not going to give a guide on how to grab any of the treasure chests in this area, because honestly; I haven’t been able to figure out how to grab most of the chests myself.]

After all of that trouble, Tensho finds himself in a quant little village in the clouds. (It's actually a small village on top of a very high mountain, if you've read the manga.)

I'm going to just say this now for lack of a better place to bring it up: when you exit, you'll immediately leave the place. (You won't have to go through the invisble path in reverse or anything.) But you'll have to do the walkway “puzzle” again every time you try to visit the village. Really quite annoying. The next time you arrive, you'll be given three options on how to do the puzzle--slow, medium, or fast. This refers to how quickly kid-Tensho walks along the path. If you have amazing memory and want to save time, then you can choose the medium or fast option. I always go with slow, because it's the turns that get me...

The cameos in this village include:

The Village Chief guy with a strong aura.

And surprisingly, an un-possessed Chuu Ou. I have no idea how he got here or even what he’s doing here, but I get the feeling Shinkyohyo had a hand in this somehow.

And of course, there’s Taijou Roukun (a.k.a. Roushi) sleeping amongst the sheep.

[Alright, this part... You’re supposed to talk to Taijou Roukun but he’s not an easy guy to get in contact with, as he’s almost always asleep. Even now I still don’t know the EXACT requirements on how you activate the next part of the game’s plot, but I have figured out a rough guideline... sorta.

Talk to EVERYONE in this location ONCE.

Yes, even the sheep. But ONLY once. If you talk to the same sheep twice by accident, the next cutscene won’t activate. This is an extremely specific set of requirements, I know.]

After having talked to everyone and every sheep ONCE, go up to Taikou Roukun and try talking to him. After the usual sleeping noises Roushi makes, Tensho will say something.

I "think" after doing EVERYTHING you possibly can do, Tensho figures it out and does the same thing Taikoubou did to talk to Roushi... Sleep.

No BGM plays in this mini-cutscene. That means important stuff. Too bad I can't read Japanese. You're given two different dialogue choices in a row. I don't think it really has much effect on the storyline, but I don’t have any real way of confirming that (due to my lack of Japanese language knowledge). 

[I have no idea what this says but it’s probably important.]

In case you're wondering, I just went with the first choices for both “choose your dialogue” moment in the convo with Roushi. In this game, the first choice tends to be the better one, it seems.

After that mini-cutscene...

Hey, you're--!

Nentou Doujin! (By the way, his BGM is AWESOME.) Talk to him, and you’ll get treated to a loooong conversation. After that, leave Taijou Roukun’s place. The dot over Mount Kongrong’s location should be flashing, and all your party members will be gone. Don’t worry--this is only a temporary thing.

To continue the plot of the game, you'll have to bring Soushou along to the village in the clouds. (His room is the back right one, on the first floor.) Then head back to talk to Nentou. I can’t remember if it was ever officially confirmed (or if I’ve already mentioned it in this guide), but Nentou is Soushou’s master.

After another long convo, Soushou stays behind, I guess to train under Nentou. You get the rest of your party members back here.

Like master, like disciple.

BONUS MATERIAL TIME (a.k.a. some extra stuff that I didn’t know where to put so it’s going in this post whoop whoop)

At this point in the game, some locations on the overworld have changed a bit. If you go back to the water cave area (the one with all the arrows), you'll find Sengyoku and Dokouson there now.

I have NO idea why they're even standing here. Maybe to guard the place? Maybe because Sengyoku thinks that it's a romantic spot?

Anyway, if you want to initiate a rather humorous scene; first have youzen transform into this:

Second, talk to Dokouson.

In case you're wondering who Youzen just transformed into, it's Hekiun, one of Ryuukitsu's disciples.

Dokouson starts drooling over her and his wifey gets mad.

There’s some pounding noises and the screen shakes.

You can also now find Mokutaku and Kintaku at the old battlefield area.

It took me a long time to figure this out, but Tenka’s “action button” allows him to bust through certain walls:

Apparently the one-off “Tenka as a construction worker” joke from the manga was so funny to the game creators that they included a special face portrait of Tenka in a hardhat.

Anyway, if you head back to Tensho’s hometown after finishing the Taijou Roukun cutscene, you’ll be given a lot of dialogue choices if you talk to the villagers. This doesn’t seem to do anything too important. 

But if you choose the second dialogue option on one of the old men, he begins frantically running around the whole town. It's... somewhat amusing in a morbid kind of way.

The old dude freaking runs at the speed of light. I had to block him like this to get a screenshot of him.

Going back to Genshitenson's place briefly...

A grave has been built for him. I think Hakutsuru built it?

Inside Geishitenson's hut, if you look at the right pot at the back of the room, Hitou will say something. THIS IS IMPORTANT. He doesn't do it when you look at the other pot (on the left) so you know something's up. We will return here later.

[That’s all for this post. I hope you guys enjoyed it, despite it being a bit of a mess.]

To be continued.

[creepygamerpasta]

Hello! A conversation with my mother the other day inspired me to write this post on some guidance for when your hobbies are not liked and may be actively disliked by someone you are close to. This post is for everyone <3

My mother hates video games.

(Okay, technically there are a few she finds entertaining to watch someone else play, but it’s a reaaalllly short list. She hates playing games herself. Even mobile games.)

I, however, inherited my father’s love for video games (more than him, I might even say) and absolutely LOVE all the parts that go into them. Everything from writing to coding and character design, tropes and gameplay itself… *chef’s kiss* I’m in no way an expert in any of these things, but I love hearing, reading, and otherwise experiencing all of it.

As you can probably tell, this strong Interest of mine could never make it on the list of The Interests for my mother, not even if we could make a top 1000 list for her. Hell, we could probably make a top million list, and video games would still be absent from it.

First thing to keep in mind (always keep this in mind): just because they don’t like the Thing, does not mean they hate you. People have different interests. I know, I know, it’s really hard because… how could someone I know and care about not like this Amazing Thing? But I promise that they don’t hate you just because they don’t like the Thing. They probably have their own Thing they like, and you might not even like it. But that’s okay.

Now, most people would probably tell you to avoid what the other person dislikes and stick to Things that both parties enjoy. This isn’t bad advice. My mother taught me how to crochet, and even though I’m most certainly a novice, she enjoys seeing what I make, and I enjoy making stuff. That’s an example of a Thing we both like and can talk about/interact over. We both like writing (she is able to actually do it way more than I am though haha), and we’ve been trying to look into submitting short children’s stories and poems for a magazine. Yet another Thing we can do together.

But sometimes, you just have to talk about or show the Thing. I get it.

Try to figure out exactly what they don’t like about the Thing.

I’ve found the best way to do this is to be direct. Go ahead and ask them point blank what they don’t like or why they don’t like your Thing. It’s a lot easier and faster that way. They may not give you a good answer at first (“because it’s stupid!���), but if you keep pursuing it, you’ll get a more informative answer. If they seem to get more distressed, saying things like, “I don’t want to talk about it,” or “I just don’t, okay?!” then, it’s probably time to back off. Sometimes people don’t like the Thing for a specific reason that is a really serious reason, and if that’s the case, you should back off.

This is a very non-serious version of why someone may not like your Thing, but let’s say that you loved baking lemon cake and always wanted to share with a friend. The last time they ate lemon cake, however, they threw up really badly and haven’t been able to have it since. This doesn’t mean that your lemon cake is bad, but they just can’t have lemon cake. It’s better to just not give them lemon cake.

Here’s an example of figuring out what someone doesn’t like about the Thing you like:

It could be as simple as this (TW SPIDERS): my mother thinks tarantulas are cute and adorable. She thinks they have the most beautiful blue eyes and are wonderful, shy little creatures (except the deadly ones of course, stay away from those). She would tell me about how she and her brother would let them run over their legs as children because they were numerous where they lived. Me? Hell to the eff NO. The only spiders I like are African Jumping spiders (think Lucas the Spider if you’ve seen those videos) which are tiny, harmless, and, most importantly, stay away from me. I’m not arachnophobic per se, but I do not like random spider pictures coming up on my dash on any platform, and if I saw a tarantula in real life, I would put as much distance between it and me. Even the ones in Animal Crossing freak me out because yes, spiders really are fast, and I don’t like that.

So clearly I don’t like seeing spiders. How could we ever bond over this? Now, when it comes to something that could be a phobia, yeah, you should avoid it if someone has asked you not to talk about it (my partner has actual arachnophobia, so we don’t talk about spiders unless I forget and have to be reminded). But you know what doesn’t freak me out? Sharing facts about spiders. My mom and I can fact share all about different animals, including spiders, and I won’t get freaked out. My issue with her Thing is the idea of seeing one or feeling one, but I can talk about them.

For the Thing in question (video games), my mom doesn’t like the pointlessness of them (gasp). She doesn’t like when you have to do a mindless task, and she doesn’t like it when video games eat up your time when you’re supposed to be doing stuff you promised you’d do or spend time with family, etc. I know exactly why she feels this way (let’s just say that when my father hyperfixates especially on video games, it gets really extreme and really detrimental).

After you figure out what they don’t like about your Thing, figure out what they may like.

Remember earlier when I said my mother likes writing? Well, that translates to video games! She may have zero interest in gameplay, but she does like funny, story-based or focused games. She could care less about the graphics, background of epic plots, or why it’s so cool that this particular Voice Actor is voicing this character, but she loves the “stupid” funny games because of their writing.

I do watch Markiplier videos in her presence (she likes his voice and narration skills - apparently, he reminds her of my brother?), and sometimes, she pays attention to them. Cue West of Loathing and Manual Samuel. Two games that have a lot to offer but are probably not considered “serious” games (I don’t like the idea of a serious vs. casual gamer or video games btw), and they are meant to be funny. She howled with laughter and would actually ask me to rewind parts she missed of the video.

My mind was blown. But… but she hates video games? But not all parts of video games.

So okay, she likes goofy games with funny writing. Seems like this could work. While she will be lost during most of my chatter about video games, she does like watching the games with me that are funny, so there’s a shared activity we can do.

And finally, empathy for the other person AND yourself.

I don’t mean to imply that you don’t have empathy. If you’ve read this far, it’s probably because you don’t want to hurt people or you want to understand why people don’t like your Thing.

Having empathy does not mean forcing yourself to like their Thing, and it doesn’t mean hating your own Thing. All it means is understanding that they do not like your Thing (or that you don’t like theirs) and that that is okay. If you’re ever unsure about if they are up to hearing or participating in your Thing, go ahead and ask! Here’s something you can try saying:

“Hey, do you mind if I talk to you about (Thing) for a bit?”

“Do you want to do (Thing) with me?”

My dear mother never revealed that she hates video games to me until I was older (at least middle school). She knew that I loved them, and that she would never feel the same way about them, but she didn’t want to crush my little dreams when I was a small child. I’ll forever be thankful, but if you really, really don’t like the Thing of another person, it’s better in the long run to let them know. I felt awful when I found out that all those years I had been talking about a Thing that she had zero interest in and actually disliked. As I’ve explained already in this post, we’ve since come to common likes within the Thing, but still.

But what I do admire about her in this case is the fact that she knows she will never love my Thing the way I live my Thing. She knows that she has zero interest and actually has animosity, but she isn’t a d!ck about it. And that’s what’s important.

And what’s also important is that I explain nicely and focus on the parts she likes when talking about video games.

And if you don’t want to hear about or do their Thing, here are some gentle but clear ways you can decline:

“I’m busy right now, but I would love to hear about (their Thing) later.” - only use this one if you actually do want to hear about it later!

“I’m not a huge fan of (specific part of Thing), but if you wanted to talk about (different part of Thing that you don’t mind/other Thing they really like), I’d love to hear all about it.”

And sometimes, you just really can not listen to the Thing ever because of serious reasons:

“I know you really like (Thing), but I really can’t stand it. I would still love to talk to you, but can we talk about (a different Thing they like/shared Thing)?”

“(Thing) really bothers me. I can’t talk about it, but why don’t we do (other Thing)?”

The important parts are to acknowledge that the other person loves Thing, even if you don’t. And they should treat your Thing with respect, too! They don’t have to like it, but they don’t have to slam it.

If you’re ever unsure of how to treat their Thing, go ahead and ask. This is a case where being clear and direct is definitely the best course of action!

And like I said at the very beginning, just because they don’t like your Thing does not mean they don’t like you.

[the-desolated-quill]

Nightmare In Silver - Doctor Who blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. If you haven’t seen this episode yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Neil Gaiman writing a Cyberman story? What could possibly go wrong?

...

Fucking EVERYTHING!

I... You... Wha... What the hell happened?! This came from the same guy that wrote The Doctor’s Wife, Coraline, The Sandman and American Gods? This piece of shit came from him?... THIS?!?!

Look, the Cybermen are very precious to me. They’re my all time favourite Who baddies due to their timeless themes and limitless potential. Which is why it breaks my heart whenever I see them mistreated like this. I mean... Jesus Christ!

Nightmare In Silver picks up where The Crimson Horror left off with those two kids blackmailing Clara into getting a free ride in the TARDIS (yeah, that didn’t make sense in and of itself. The girl Angie says she’ll tell her dad that Clara is a time traveller, but what are the chances of her dad actually believing her? Come off it!). Normally I despise children (both in real life and in fiction) and this episode very handily reminds me of all the reasons why. God I hate these brats! The little boy (Arty I think his name was) is this big wooden dork and Angie is quite possibly the most spoilt, arrogant, ungrateful little shit I think I’ve ever seen. She’s travelled to another planet in a spaceship that’s bigger on the inside, and what’s her reaction? ‘Oh this is so boooooooring! Oh Clara you’re so stupid! You always spoil everything! I want to go home!’ Oh go fuck yourself, you moaning little bastard! What’s worse is that these kids don’t actually play any sort of role other than needing to be rescued. You know characterisation has gone seriously wrong when their personalities are actually improved by Cyberfication.

Speaking of which, let’s talk about the new Cybermen. While I do prefer the RTD Cybermen in terms of design, these new ones are quite cool. More robotic looking this time around and I’m fascinated by the suggestion that at this point in their history they’re less cyborgs and more biomechanical, converting flesh directly into metal. It’s been a running thing that each new Cyber design in the series represents another advancement in their evolution, and this feels like a very logical leap to me. I also really like the Cybermites. Much prefer them to the Cybermats, which I’ve never liked. What I really don’t like however are the superpowers. My jaw hit the floor when that Cyberman started running at super speed like the Bionic Man, not just because the effect looks like shit and there’s no way Angie would have survived being hit with such speed and velocity, but because it’s a leap too far. Same goes for Cyber body parts detaching and operating by themselves, as well as Cybermen being immune to lasers and upgrading themselves so that they can’t be electrocuted. They’ve effectively become an army of Cyber-Supermans. They can just do anything now. They’re way too overpowered to the point where it all starts to become laughably absurd, and because we no longer know what their limitations are, they become more vague as a threat, and therefore more dull. (Also how come the Cybermen never use their super speed ever again? That ability could have come in useful multiple times).

Actually I tell a lie. They do bring back one limitation from the classic series. It’s... hmph... their weakness against gold.

For those of you who don’t know, in the classic series they introduced the idiotic and nonsensical idea that the Cybermen were vulnerable to gold because it’s a non-corrosive substance that can clog up their breathing apparatus and suffocate them. First of all, since when did Cybermen need to breathe? Second, what does being non-corrosive got to do with clogging up anything? And third, why specifically gold? Couldn’t you clog up their breathing apparatus with something else? Like water for instance? And it just got worse and worse when it developed from gold suffocating them to gold just affecting them in general. Despite being bulletproof, apparently you can kill a Cyberman with golden arrows. Rubbing Adric’s gold badge on the Cyberleader’s chest plate in Earthshock was enough to hinder it, and there was one really low moment in Silver Nemesis where the Cybermen were destroyed by Ace using some gold coins and a slingshot. It’s quite possibly the most embarrassing aspect of Cyber lore and it makes me cringe whenever I think about it, so you can probably imagine my relief when the Cybermen first arrived in New Who back in 2006 and there wasn’t a single mention of gold anywhere.

Now imagine my horror and disappointment when the Doctor is able to briefly incapacitate the Cyber-Planner inside his head by slapping a golden ticket on his face. And somehow Gaiman managed to make it even worse by implying that cleaning fluid can have the same effect. Yes. Cleaning fluid. So the Cybermen are an unstoppable force that will not rest until they’ve hunted you down and converted you, and you should be very afraid of them... unless you’ve got a bottle of Toilet Duck to hand, in which case you’re basically fine.

Yes the Cyber-Planner makes its first appearance since The Invasion way back in the 1960s. It’s no longer a brain inside a giant metal apparatus however. It’s now a Cyber hive mind/network that assimilates other beings into its consciousness, mostly children in order to use their imaginations for military strategies. Until it catches sight of the Doctor that is and tries to assimilate him. Which leads to quite possibly the worst thing about this episode. Mr. Clever. 

The Doctor being cyber-converted could be legitimately frightening, seeing this manic, warm hearted adventurer become a cold, calculating menace. Unfortunately that’s not what we end up getting. Instead we end up getting more of Matt Smith’s goofy bollocks. Mr. Clever (ugh) is just too emotional. He’s not his own character. He’s just the Doctor but evil. What’s even weirder is that the Cyber-Planner talks about how emotions are useless and that everyone is better off without them whilst it’s displaying emotion. It’s really inconsistent. I was astounded by the number of critics at the time praising Matt Smith for his performance because I honestly thought it was one of the worst things I’ve ever seen. Watching him yelling and gurning his lines like an insecure pantomime villain was just embarrassing, and it shows a complete lack of understanding of who the Cybermen are (and I don’t just mean the whole emotions thing). As I’ve said numerous times in the past, the Cybermen aren’t evil like the Daleks. They’re altruistic foes. They honestly believe what they’re doing is helping us. That’s what makes them so frightening. By making the Cyber-Planner the default cackling baddie who’s evil just because, it makes the Cybermen less interesting and, as a result, less scary.

Speaking of actors giving bad performances, Jenna Coleman, I know you’ve been lumbered with a really shit character, but can you at least try to deliver your lines in a manner that isn’t smug or smarmy. Every single line has this air of snugness about it, which is irritating in and of itself, but there are occasions where it becomes really inappropriate. There are Cybermen about to breach the comical castle and the kids are in danger, and yet Clara is wandering around without a care in the world. Um Clara, shouldn’t you be panicking? Just a little? And there’s one really shocking moment where one of the soldiers informs her that someone has died, and Clara doesn’t even so much as react. In fact she’s surprisingly glib about the whole thing. I don’t know if it’s bad acting or bad directing. All I know is somebody fucked up. (Also I could have done without the bit at the end where the Doctor describes Clara as a mystery inside an enigma wrapped in a skirt that’s a bit too tight. Just... ew).

Beyond that, there isn’t really a whole lot to discuss. The theme park setting is nice, but we don’t really get to explore much of it. Jason Watkins is always good in everything he’s in, but he’s barely in this before he gets converted and is left to stand silently in the background with the kids. In fact the whole thing feels really rushed and under-developed. The punishment squad could have been interesting to explore, particularly in the context of the setting. It’s 1000 years after the Cyber Wars. The Cybermen have become the equivalent of mythological bogeymen, and now this rag tag group of failures and rejects are about to come face to face with their worst fear. The return of the long thought extinct Cybermen, now more powerful than ever. Think of the drama you could wring out of that. Instead they barely get a look in. They’re just a bunch of nameless redshirts that we don’t give a shit about. Same goes for Porridge. Warrick Davis gives a decent performance, but his character just isn’t very well developed. You could have expanded his character greatly. Given him a whole arc with him coming to terms with the horrible decisions he made in order to end the Cyber Wars (wait. He’s over a 1000 years old? Well I suppose if Liz 10 can survive well past 300 years in The Beast Below, I guess it’s possible) and finally reaccepting his position as Emperor. Instead it just feels like he’s going through the motions. He never actually changes or evolves. He just returns to being Emperor because... the script said so.

Nightmare In Silver is bad. Like Revenge Of The Cybermen/Silver Nemesis bad. The plot is weak, the characters are under-developed, the kids are annoying, the Doctor and Clara are still just as obnoxious as ever, and they completely botch the Cybermen. I pity anyone who tries to write a Cyberman story in the future after this disaster.

[courage-a-word-of-justice]

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card-hen 1 | Gakuen Babysitters 1 | Idolish7 3 | Zoku Touken Ranbu Hanamaru 1 | Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san 1 | Miira no Kaikata 1 | Death March 1

The debuts for the winter season keep coming, but we’re almost at the end of them with this post.

Cardcaptor Sakura: Clear Card 1

Note I don’t have any prior experience with Cardcaptor Sakura aside from 1 volume of manga and watching the show in passing while other people were watching it, plus knowing about a few spoilers and the show’s reputation as a seminal magical show show…then in more recent days, I finished 2 episodes of it (in fact as of the day I’m typing this, I finished episide 2 today!).

This OP makes Sakura look like later-stage Sailor Moon, and I think that’s the point.

Where did the bear in Syaoran’s hand go when Sakura hugged him?

Eriol! I don’t really know much about him, and I knew I should’ve known about him before starting this, but…it was a bit of a shock to see a character I technically haven’t seen the debut of with my own eyes.

I get the feeling these are the “two bears” from the prologue OVA…

Emails! In the world of Cardcaptor Sakura! Wow, I feel old…and I didn’t even grow up with her.

Hot dang! Gimme dat bishie (Yue)! I knew he was coming, but…I still don’t really know how he came to be!

Wow, this Yamazaki kid spouts such rubbish! I’m looking forward to seeing him in the main series now.

It’s pretty obvious I need to watch the original before understanding this fully, so I’m putting it on hold.

Gakuen Babysitters 1

I’m here for my Ume and Nishiyama. I’m not particularly good at dealing with kids, especially younger kids, but this doesn’t make me run for the hills either.

Ryuichi involves the kanji for “dragon” and Kotaro has the kanji for “tiger”.

That man with the hat is so not sketchy…

I’ve never heard of NAS before (but I have heard of NAZ through Idolish7).

That joke Saikawa told actually worked! These shows may all be middling this winter, but I’d be happy with even some of them on my docket. I’ve been pleasantly surprised more often than not that I haven’t found “stinker of the season” yet.

The comedy for this show’s really on point, although the overall design is a tad lackluster.

K-Kamitani?! Apparently Ume-chan’s character is Hayato Kamitani, so that’s how Ume got involved, so to speak. This sudden intro of 4 kids works on a story scale, but not in a way any person can process without pausing the video (or getting individual intros later).

Well, there are those individual intros I was asking for. Spoke too soon.

It’s actually kinda sad and quite telling how independent Kotaro is. (I still find it extremely hilarous Nishiyama – whose first name is Kotaro - didn’t voice Kotaro, although from a practical standpoint I understand why.)

Usaida has such bedroom eyes, it’s hard to ignore (because they make him look like En)! Dangit, I want my En back!

This brings back memories. My mum used to deal with kids all the time, and of course I was in the background for some of the shenanigans.

Dragon puppet symbolism, eh? (see the dotpoint a bit back about Ryuichi’s name)

As soon as this guy (who kinda looks like something out of Haikyuu) started demanding Taka come with him, I screamed. That character doesn’t seem very Ume, but…uh, it’s Ume. Gotta deal with it. Now that I listen to their voices properly though, Ume does have a “big bro” voice and Nishiyama a “earnest young man” voice.

Oh dear. Taka’s imprinted on me already, and I don’t even like boys that age.

I haven’t felt a genuine sense of danger from any of these winter shows until this one, so it seems like it’s one of the strongest debuts. Then again, CCS was my frontrunner before this and YuruCamp the second best, so I guess I can’t talk, eh?

Gah, I feel like I wanna cry now. That is a strong premiere!

I have a real problem with how anime tears come out in globs. Then again, I’m too much of a crybaby, as my notes can attest…so I guess no arguing here.

Should it be “Chairman” or “Chairwoman”???

Tsundere grandma. Now there’s something I thought I’d never think in my life…

Oh, I didn’t realise earlier but Taka = “hawk” and Hayato = “falcon man”. Animal jingoism at its finest!

Whoo, that was a real nice debut. I thought I was too old for this stuff, but it’s a keeper!

Idolish7 3

It’s a good thing I chose to cover episodes 1 – 2 so I won’t have to do them now.

I didn’t notice Nagi getting all huggy there with everyone in range (the first time, at least).

In case you don’t know from all the other idol shows, the centre is the one in centre stage. They’re often seen as the leader, so it’s a very important position.

This song can’t be anything but Monster Generation! Woohoo!

Wow, I haven’t seen one of those “watch from a distance” things in a while. Makes me nostalgic.

“Ichi” would probably refer to Iori, right? (He has the kanji for “one” in his name.)

Wowee, Nagi’s entendre…is really thick. Like pudding.

I agree, brothers can be so strange…

“…spoil me sometimes.” - Laying on the entendre thicker than custard here, Iori!

These boys are so into their Magical Kokona. I want in now.

Tamaki really is an En-chan…En-chan! Come back! (But why does Tamaki have no socks???)

These ED outfits are so elaborate! Ooh! Imagine a gender-swapped cosplay of them, that’s be great!

Who’s that on the edge of the ED video though? (You can see something hopping up and down.)

Zoku Touken Ranbu Hanamaru 1

Can we please just call this “Hanamaru 2” like Crunchyroll? “Zoku” just refers to a continuation…anyways, I got Hanamaru season 1 done last year while dealing with Katsugeki, so…here I come, sword boys!

Didn’t Hanamaru get a dub, by the way? Why would you dub this? For me to criticise it? The Touken Ranbu fanbase is kinda small…

W-Wait, did they just write Yams out of this season? Yams is the protag (if not a protag) here! What did Ichiki do now to deserve this???

It was getting too hard to jump through the proxies to play Touken Ranbu as of late, so I deleted my DMM account. Even still, the sword boys have multiplied since I left! Yikes!

Wow, unexpected 1st person bit there, Kashuu/Masuda. I thought I told the industry to stop doing that…

Exposition wave…I don’t need this wave, but I guess anime-only fans might. Carry on, Heshikiri.

So this multiple Konnosuke thing wasn’t a Katsugeki-only gag? Oh dear, my head’s spinning…

I don’t think I noticed, but Kashuu uses a brush (and not a specialty brush provided in the lid of nail polish). Probably because in Touken Ranbu, plastic isn’t much of a concept…

I still appreciate how Kashuu was this Saniwa’s starter. Makes me feel warm and fuzzy for my own TR days…

Photos are a nice way to recap. After all, 1 picture speaks 1000 words.

Wow, Shishiou’s a real chibi compared to these tachi. But Shishiou’s a tachi too…

Dang, I’m jealous. These bros were around when I was a TR player, and I missed ‘em! Dang Kebishii drops!

So that thing really is a nue. I could never see it on Shishiou’s card, y’know.

Hmm…considering the bros are new swords, the Saniwa’s strategy is to level up them up using the younger bro as leader (remember, the leader gets more experience). I see…

A “pincer attack” is a V shape, so the description fits the Crane Wings formation…

I can’t say I wasn’t impressed by Akashi just then. Come to think of it, he didn’t have any battles in Hanamaru’s 1st season.

A double attack suits a pair like this, of course!

Oh my gosh, they even got two dfferent voice actors for the Konnosukes! LOL!

Hanamaru’s EDs kept changing and it seems like they’ll continue to change, eh? This one looks quite spiffy.

The style of this ED doesn’t look like Hanamaru at all. It was probably done by the original illustrator for the swords.

It’s a great return to form for Hanamaru! I’m sold!

Karakai Jouzu no Takagi-san 1

Another day, another long title…plus this show I would’ve passed on, if not for that resolution…

Michiko Yokote is on a lot of shows I watch. I don’t really know what her influence is, but it seems she’s genuinely competent at what she does.

So…uh, Gendo pose anyone?

I think the teacher is the best part of this. I’ve been a bit of Tonari no Seki-kun, and the pull of that is the sheer ludicrousness of what Seki does with his stuff. However, there didn’t seem to be any intervention aside from Yokoi (I think that was her name)…

Nishikata’s reactions are just way too easy to read…

Well, that was okay, but it’s definitely a show to binge all at once. On to the “on hold” pile it goes.

Wait, but they missed a segment (the 100 yen segment). Gotta skip forward…

I didn’t get any laughs out of that show at all, but it’s still a decent school SoL.

How to Keep a Mummy 1

I have absolutely no experience with this manga, mind you…aside from seeing this tiny mummy on Comico…

Wow, if the mummy can fit in his shoe…how big is it?

The translation of “ready” is surprisingly ganbaru, and there’s a “but” mentioned in the Japanese title missing from the English. Also, “ready” has sexual connotations I’d rather not pair with a tiny mummy…I’d say the translation of the episode title should be something more along the lines of “White, Round, Small, Very Wimpy But [Also] Tries Its Hardest” (“It” being the mummy and not Pennywise…).

Is Dracula even public domain right now? (Does anyone care about the intellectual property of a classic vampire novel anyway? Because I sure don’t.)

Can we please start making jokes about how Sora’s daddy got him a mummy? It may seem childish, but I’m tempted to now.

This mummy is so adorable, I think it even beat out the kids from Gakuen Babysitters! Geesh, I’m spoilt this season! It completely set off my moe senses, and I don’t even have any!

It imprinted on him! Oh wow!

The mummy doesn’t even have a mouth…how can it spit things-oh wait. That’s the joke, isn’t it?

Come to think of it, crybaby characters ae few and far between. However, between this and Devilman…er, Crybaby…they’ve suddenly become popular…I guess?

It’s like a harem, only it’s between a dog and a mummy. Why I never…

One of the best things about anime is that you can learn about other cultures through the things included offhandedly…like that molokhiya thing that Sora mentioned. Apparently it’s a Jewish vegetable of some sort.

Do mummies get jet lag too? I was just thinking how Comico stories, with their full colour and yet simple design (to allow for downward scrolling and intake by the eyes) are perfect for anime.

I listened to the show with volume for once…because Tazuki seems to be the guy voiced by Keisuke Koumoto…and I think I was on the money there. Plus, Sora’s VA really sells the delivery of jokes (although he seems to be voiced by a woman…?)!

Yamanba…like Yamanbagiri’s namesake. The mountain hag, right?

Yep, I was right on the money with Tazuki being Koumoto. Kamitani Tazuki, it seems his name is…

This dance ending’s kind of cute, too. It’s a keeper!

Death March 1

(looks at title just above this dotpoint) C’mon. There’s no way I’m going to repeat “Death March to the Parallel World Rhapsody” over and over again for at least 11 or 12 episodes…by the way, I’m here because I was reading a KonoSuba novel and saw an ad for this, just in time for the anime…

“SADA”, my butt…

I love how they almost replicated Windows 8 in this show. Or is it 7, or 10? They don’t show the taskbar, which is the main visual difference between 8 and 10, but either way the Windows replication without being sued is really something…

This OP’s gonna make me dizzy someday…

Classes, eh? So that means Suzuki’s working with an OOP language. Plus you can see Cortana on the computer as the mention of classes goes by, meaning that person’s on Windows 10.

UML.

By the way, Satou is a fairly common name in Japan…at least to my knowledge. But Suzuki is a pretty common one, too, hence the mistake.

The client? Unless Suzuki is referring to the client as in the program, it could also mean the client as in the person/group who wants the game made. Considering what he says though involving a call, it’s probably the latter.

That’s the second show with a lost kid in the first episode. It seems a bit trite, don’tcha think?

According to his phone map (flip phone!), he’s in Akihabara.

FFL…eh? Google says there are multiple Final Fantasy games for Android, meaning I’ve probably thinking of Fire Emblem Fates (which doesn’t match), and there’s no such thing as Final Fantasy 50 (L in Roman numerals) yet.

That’s the second time they mentioned work/daily life being a death march. Can we not???

Come to think of it, Suzuki looks like Nobuaki (King’s Game), which doesn’t bode well for either show.

Apparently you can get Facebook Messenger for Windows 10, which I didn’t know…

“…being a corporate slave.”

C’mon! This ain’t the Animatrix, but still, if you’re trying to make stuff look technological, at least make it look a bit better.

Third time they’ve mentioned “death march”.

It might just be Houseki no Kuni’s fault, but this CGI is really janky.

Welllll…at least it looks like a game.

Welllllllll…at least they knew where to put their money for some sakuga…

This running through fields scene is either a homage to Every Anime Opening ever, or Pokémon. I distinctly remember it being in Emerald’s opening animation, at least.

Dude, if you want to look for a wyvern, do it from the ground where you won’t get injured, dumb Satoo.

Does this look a lot like Berserk (2016) with all its CGI knights…or is that just me?

Zena…? I might be showing how old I am with this (or how much I scour the internet), but…by any chance, do you mean this gal instead?

I think I’ve had enough of this flip for now, so I’m putting it on hold.

[anxmalxnstincts-archived-blog]

CALL OUT POST (POSITIVITY)

So, I’ve seen and heard here lately that there are some negative call out posts showing up in newsfeeds.  First of all, stahp it.  There’s enough negativity going on in the world, we don’t need it on here.  Second of all, what kind of person writes a negative call out post?  Someone who is desperate for attention.  The only kind of call out post that does anyone any good is when it is based on facts and it is a warning to protect people from a predator.  Stop writing them.  Stop being assholes to each other.  Seriously.

Since there’s been some negativity around the site, I wanted to do something positive for a few people.  I’m not excluding anyone in particular for any reason.  These are just people that stand out on my dash on a regular basis that I want to love on.  Also, note that these are not in any particular order.  And just because you’re not on this list does not mean that I don’t love your blog, even if you write the same character.  I love all of my followers and all of the folks I interact with for different reasons, so please don’t take anything personally.

So without further ado:

@outlawiism  - HOLY HELL.  1,000% QUALITY BLOG.  Look, I know I’m biased because Lucy is like... my best friend, but seriously, if you aren’t following her, you are making the biggest mistake of your life.  She loves Peter so much and I sometimes wonder if she is secretly Peter Quill in disguise (and if she is... HOLY FUCKING SHIT I’MFIRENDSWITHPETERQUILL).  Every word out of his mouth in threads is pure gold and everything he does is so ridiculously in character.  Also, I want to point out that Lucy is seriously a wonderful person.  She is fiercely loyal and she’ll have your back in every situation.  She’s also not afraid to call you on your shit.  (And that, my friends, is the true definition of a best friend.)  It doesn’t matter what kind of a day she is having, Lucy is there for you, ready and willing to listen to every problem you’ve got.  AND... I just want to take a moment to acknowledge her writing.  WHATTHEACTUALFUCK?!  WRITE A BOOK, LADY.  YOU TOTALLY COULD, OKAY?  I’LL BUY 20 COPIES.  Chickadee, I appreciate you.  <3  Give this one a follow right-this-bloody-minute!

@wholemeasure - Okay, so I’ve never written with this person, but I follow them like a hungry dog following someone that has food.  The knowledge that they have of Frank is crazy-ridiculous and it’s obvious that their love for him runs deep.  Like, bone deep.  Molecularly deep.  Atom deep.  It must be in the very fibre of their being to love Frank.  The comic panels they post and the comments they make are usually hilarious or extremely insightful as to who Frank is as a person and not just The Punisher.  I don’t care if this person is responding to threads or making ooc posts.  Every single post is about Frank or Jon Bernthal and it always brightens my day (or breaks my heart, because let’s be honest... Frank has had it rough) when I see it.  I can’t speak on a personal level as to what the mun is like, but from what I can glean from the ooc posts and ooc asks, they seem super sweet.  You should totally give this person a follow!

@handofhonor - This lady is the first person from Tumblr that I’ve ever met in person.  Since we live so close, we still occasionally go out for lunch or dinner.  Megan is a really nice person and super easy to get along with.  You could probably talk to her for days about Ned and she’d never run out of things to say.  It’s obvious that she loves the character... and the fandom.  (Seriously, if you ever have a question about Ned or even ASOIAF, GO TO HER.  She usually has the answer or she knows how to find it.)  You can tell that she loves Ned just in the way that she writes him.  He’s generally such a stoic character and  Megan really opens up the window so you can look inside his head and see what’s really going on.  If you love Ned Stark or the ASOIAF fandom in general... or you just want to make a good friend, please give her a follow!

@fatefleer (moved to futuredreamt?) - I wanted to call this person out partially because I love her OC, but also because of her perseverance.  Seriously, where do you get your willpower from?  It’s a hard, cruel world on Tumblr for original characters, okay?  And Ella hasn’t given up yet.  Go you!  Seriously, you need your own cheer squad.  It’s really hard to get traction here with original characters and even I sometimes wonder if it’d be better to just pack up the blog and just go back to writing in Microsoft Word.  The only reasons I haven’t given up here yet is because of Lucy (outlawiism) and the fact that I’m too invested in this character to give her up.  So, hats off to you, Ella.  (Also, she’s a really nice person to talk to!)  Follow her right now and give her some love!

@itsaboutsurviving - Where the hell do I start with this one?  Maybe on the fact that WOLVERINE MUST ACTUALLY BE SITTING BEHIND THE COMPUTER WRITING ALL OF THE STUFF ON THIS BLOG BECAUSE WHATTHEACTUALFUUU-?  Chantal is a super nice and super-inclusive person.  She tries to write with everyone.  And I’m not kidding about the whole ‘must actually be Wolverine behind the computer’ thing because everything that she writes can easily be read in Logan’s voice.  Without a doubt, this blog is 1000% quality and if you aren’t following her, what the hell are you doing with your life?  Seriously?  (P.S. She can also be found over on @thisbecoming )  Go give her a like on both blogs.  You won’t regret it.

@sheslikeyou - Little Laura!  This cute kid is perfectly characterised by Betty.  Kate just wants to snuggle Laura and be all ‘Mine!’  She would adopt this kid if she could.  Seriously.  And Betty is a really sweet person.  She’s easy to chat with and though she’s been away for a while, she should be back soon!  I love that she works with me on my lack of knowledge about the Spanish language.  I research what I can, but I also know that if I’m not sure about something, I can go to her about it.  Her writing is superb and I love how much she goes into this kid’s head, especially considering how silent Laura tends to be.  If you want to interact with Laura (x-23), follow her!!!

@viriidescens - STRAWBERRY!  (I giggle every time I type your name.)  Okay, first of all, this is a quality-fucking-blog, yo.  Ber takes Gamora seriously.  This character is not one to be toyed with.  This is the ASSASSIN.  GOTG really softens up the character and Strawberry brings her back to her true self: the zen-whoberis who had to fight just to save her own skin under Thanos’ “care”.  She’s not just a ‘mom’ to the group.  She’s dangerous and reckless and she’ll kick your ass ten ways from Sunday if you piss her off or give her the stink eye.  Ber clearly loves this character and I’m so glad I follow her!  You should follow her too!  Give her some love!

[miss-m-calling]

Fandom 5k letter

Requests:

Adult Wednesday Addams -- Wednesday Addams

American Gods (TV) -- Laura Moon/Mad Sweeney

Cabin Pressure -- Carolyn & Arthur & Martin & Douglas

Moonlighting (TV) -- David Addison/Maddie Hayes

Dear writer,

Hello and thank you for writing for me. I’m very excited to read whatever you come up with.

I do give more or more detailed prompts for some of these canons than for others – that’s not because I want some more than others, but only because for some I get lots of ideas, for others I’m more “waves arms all over the place give me more of XYZ I love in canon!!” I hope whatever I put down sparks your creativity, and feel free to reach out through the mods if you have any questions! My likes and DNWs are all the way on the bottom of the letter.

Without further ado…

Requests:

Adult Wednesday Addams

Wednesday Addams

Genres: Action/adventure, Canon-style plot, Humor, Slice of life, Worldbuilding

I belatedly discovered this webseries, and it resurrected (see what I did there?) my love for Wednesday and how the Addams Family canon runs on the endless possibilities of this loving, happily eccentric family being 100% true to themselves and the world just having to deal with it. The show was everything I never knew I wanted till I watched it, the perfect blend of Addams-macabre and cozy slice of life with bonus Wednesday navigating the world alone, without always knowing her family will back her up, and it made me crave more of adult Wednesday’s mini adventures in LA. For this canon, I’m good with gen or, if you want to write that, more of Wednesday’s adventures in dating guys who really aren’t up to the challenge, and you can absolutely have Wednesday interact with OCs I haven’t listed as part of a pairing. I’m keeping the prompts pretty short, just to (hopefully) pique your creativity, as I expect I will love any way you make these or any similar scenarios play out:

-Wednesday goes to IKEA

-More of Wednesday’s interactions with the nice interns at her receptionist job. Maybe they invite her out to happy hour, or to the beach or a club. Or maybe we get to eavesdrop while they shoot the breeze on their lunch break, possibly over barbecue-chicken pizza from CPK.

-More of Wednesday’s gigs. She already babysits and walks other people’s dogs, what else might she do for extra cash that would be both really common and seemingly ill-suited to Wednesday, except she totally makes it work for her? Cat sitting (especially if the cat belongs to someone incredibly rich whose house is full of secrets – and expensive things for the cat to knock over), driving an Uber/Lyft, becoming an AirBnB host, catering/server, working the late shift in a New Age/occult supply store where none of the woo is real…?

-Or, alternately, Wednesday finds a career that is perfect for her, in which she can have success and respect. What ever could that be and still fit into the non-Addams world?

-Wednesday tries speed dating

-Or, she runs into Brian a.k.a. chains guy (I cackle with glee every time I rewatch the bit when he tries to kiss her at the pet store) a third time – how does it not go quite as he wanted or expected this time?

-Wednesday’s family comes out to sunny, plastic, image-conscious LA to visit her and make sure she’s doing alright. She gives them a tour of the city, and LA will never be the same again.

-Wednesday takes an evening class, or goes back to school part time, or enrolls in an online degree program

-Wednesday takes a road trip, alone or with her apartment mates/colleagues/Brian/strangers she met for carpooling purposes. Bonus points if you work in real roadside attractions, or tourist traps, or famous sites/landscapes.

-It’s Dia de Muertos, and Wednesday goes out to celebrate and soak up the atmosphere. It may or may not live up to her expectations.

-If you wanted to get a bit meta and/or enjoy playing around with different formatting, what does Wednesday’s Tumblr/Twitter/Facebook/Tindr look like? Or, Wednesday gets tasked with updating company social media at her receptionist job, and she does it with her own special flair.

American Gods (TV)

Laura Moon/Mad Sweeney

Genres: Action/adventure, AU - canon divergence, Canon-style plot, Character development, Getting together, Smut, Worldbuilding

Let me preface this by saying how much I appreciate that you are willing to write for an ongoing canon! I love this pairing, and while most of my prompts are basically the same ones I’ve used in exchanges before S2 (which I am watching) started airing, let me assure you that I am 1000% fine with your fic getting jossed, or including a divergence from what we already know or how things happen in canon. You can work with the canon -- or as much of it as we have by the time you’re done writing -- or diverge in a way that works for your story. Really truly honestly it’s all fine since you are writing for an active canon, and I really truly honestly appreciate you wanting to tackle this! Canon divergences and canon-flavored-if-not-entirely-compliant stories are my jam, so please don’t feel anxious as the canon keeps unfolding, nor pressed to keep up with S2 if you can’t or don’t want to watch it right now. (I tried to keep S2 spoilers to a minimum in my prompts, but there are some spoilers.)

So *clears throat*

I ship it. Yes I do. They had me at “gimme-my-coin-dead-wife”-flicks-him-into-wall. The snarky road trip was the best thing I never knew I wanted until it happened, and I adored every second of it. They’re both such assholes and so fascinating, even if they start to mellow toward each other a bit toward the end of S1, and all the gods/magic/resurrection stuff swirling around them begs to be explored further. Also I love love love how their dynamic is about equal parts spikiness, pathos, and humor (they’re funny! and the canon doesn’t shy away from putting them in ludicrous situations), and it weaves seamlessly between those three. Plus she’s half his size yet can and does beat him up with literally one finger, and then there’s the angst of he having killed her, feeling really guilty about it, and then bringing her back.

Please give me either missing scenes from the road trip (if you can work in a divergence, that’s great - for example, I like Salim, but if you want to have him boot Sweeney and Laura to the curb and go off on his own, or Sweeney to boost his taxi before Salim catches them, or whatever else to have those two alone, go for it!), or a S1 divergence (instead of going to Ostara, they go where? to see whom? about getting Laura resurrected) or something about these two post-S1/during-S2:

-Laura discovers (how? you decide!) that Sweeney gave her back the coin after their accident – whatever happens next, some punching may be involved.

-Wednesday’s big war finally comes, and “don’t you dare die on me, you asshole” is a line either Sweeney or Laura (or both) might say to each other.

-Laura asked “What does Wednesday have to lose?” and the answer is…? (Yes, give me that sweet poetic justice. One possibility, though not remotely the only one, but as of S2E3 Laura is technically a god-killer...)

-On a similar note, Wednesday told that luckless cop that Sweeney had been against the big gods’ war from the start, and while Wednesday lies, Sweeney definitely seems to be participating out of a sense of obligation and lingering guilt over the war he ran from long ago, rather than lust for a good fight or even a dominant death wish. What if he decided to hell with Grimnir and his war and his having Sweeney kill random people? I’m guessing Sweeney too drank three glasses of mead so he can’t back out without dire consequence - but he does have a fierce, dead woman in his corner.

-They go to some as-yet-unnamed old god (feel free to bring in whatever mythology you want) in order to bring Laura back to life. Between Sweeney’s mouth and temper, and Laura’s mouth and temper, it doesn’t go well. Now one or both of them are in big magical trouble with a pissed-off deity and have to get themselves/each other out of it.

-Things happen and Laura finds herself in the position to throw Sweeney under the bus but also help/save him, and while he knows it’s only karma, he can still be pissed about it - how do they navigate this?

-Laura gets fully alive again, but traces of her (un)dead state remain – what are they, how does she cope, what price did she/he/they have to pay for her resurrection, and how does their relationship change? I’d especially be curious how it would work if they’re already a sorta-maybe-item and *then* she’s alive again and it’s weird in a new way.

-For reasons I’ll leave up to you, Sweeney and Laura have to stay put in a single place for a while and end up essentially cohabiting, regardless of what their relationship is at that point. Take “cohabiting” as literally or as creatively as you want -- in any case, I’m sure it will be marvelously disastrous and amazing.

-Slight or major AU from the opening of “The Ways of the Dead”: Laura has hitchhiked with Sweeney instead of going off in a huff with Wednesday, or she otherwise gets to New Orleans sooner, and she and Sweeney tear up the town together. Gimme bar fights, carnival shenanigans, backstage craziness with the Christian rock band (Sweeney seems to have a backstage pass on a lanyard around his neck when Laura finds him)… Maybe they even cross the paths of some loa and it doesn’t get all angsty (for what it’s worth, I think the reason the sex magic didn’t bring Laura back to life was because she couldn’t accept the truth(s) revealed during the astral-plain sex – see how she defaults straight to “this is all Wednesday’s evil plan” the morning after – not because the loa fucked them over as Sweeney said). They were actually getting along nicely in those first couple of scenes, only ribbing each other a little while still being their grouchy selves, before they got to Le Coq Noir. I wouldn’t have minded seeing some more of that.

-All the old gods hide their true appearance to an extent. A situation arises in which Laura sees Sweeney’s true, or at least old, self (I’m thinking of his surprise!poignant monologue about when he used to be a king, and the glimpse of him in full Celtic warrior mode in the S2 teaser). Or Wednesday’s war ends in victory, meaning the old gods again get belief, worship, and sacrifices. How does Laura, the ultimate skeptic even when she’s on the other side of the mirror, react? How does this new knowledge and new reality change her opinion of/attitude to Sweeney? Or to flip that around, if Sweeney were again relevant and believed-in, would that actually change his bad attitude and fix his issues (my guess is it would be complicated)?

-The power of names: for all his “dead wifeing,” there comes a time when Sweeney (has to) call her by her actual name, and that’s a tricky moment for them to navigate. Or, Mad Sweeney is almost certainly not his actual name, since true names have great magical power and so must be kept secret; Laura discovers or learns his name, from someone else or from himself; what does she do with that knowledge? Or, Sweeney gets to say “cunt” in a situation (sexual or otherwise) where, not only does Laura not peel his lips from his gums, but she finds that she can’t object, even though she knows that he knows that he’s getting away with it.

-So far in canon, it’s pretty clear that Sweeney has a lot of complicated but sincere feelings for Laura. But Laura is still pretty focused on Shadow (or rather her idealized vision of Shadow and what their relationship might yet be), whom she seems to equate with her own lost-maybe-to-be-regained life, although she’s starting to soften toward Sweeney as she realizes he’s doing things for her that are not all about getting his coin back (and her sparring match with Wednesday in “Muninn” may finally force her to accept that her relationship with Shadow died alongside her and Robbie on that road in Indiana). Tell me the story of how Laura stumbles her way to starting to feel more complex, maybe kinder or softer, really annoying for her blunt-force-trauma-personality things about Sweeney and about the notion that her dynamic with him is different from the way she tended to use men for her convenience without really letting them in in the past. Also I’m pretty sure that even if they felt the same – or sorta in the same ballpark – about each other, their relationship would still run on a lot of conflict, and I would so be here for it.

-On that note: in “Munnin” it also becomes clear that Laura has, without realizing it herself, started to rely on Sweeney. The “I trusted you” line made me think, whoa she’s too mad to catch herself doing it but this is huge for Laura, and the fact that she goes off with Wednesday (!) basically because she’s mad at Sweeney because she thinks he’s prioritizing his debt to Wednesday over her… Yeah, I would like to see that explored some more and/or to see Laura and Sweeney get to a point where they trust each other and rely on each other, and know it and accept it, however difficult the getting there and being there may be for them.

-And since I’m on the subject of Laura, you know how she’s not actually an abrasive bitch all the time to everyone? And when she is, the people on the receiving end of it sometimes richly deserve it, and anyway it’s refreshing to see a female character who doesn’t bother flirting and accommodating others for the sake of social harmony? As much as I enjoy watching her rip into people (ahem, Sweeney), I also love it when she acts differently, like her genuine interest in getting to know Salim and her joy in seeing him again in S2, or her running passive-aggressive battle of wills with Wednesday, or even her general disaffection and numbness in “Git Gone.” Her beginning to feel sympathy for Sweeney and her anger and disappointment when she feels let down by him are a part of that, and I’d love to see all that explored more. Nuance! Give me all the nuance and seeming contradictions in both Laura and Sweeney’s characters!

-My perfect AG spinoff would basically be Sweeney and Laura tooling around America, looking to get her resurrected (whether they succeed or not is up to you), stealing ever more ridiculous vehicles, arguing/fighting and having those pesky moments where vulnerability and genuineness creep in – and fucking. So yessiree I’d be down for porn, including “it’s technically necrophilia/zombiesex” porn.

-All the petty, ridiculous ways in which Sweeney’s bad luck manifests itself make me laugh (can’t help it, won’t even try), and I’m down for more variations on that theme.

-If you wanted to throw in some worldbuilding, maybe something exploring living death. Magical bargains. What kind of favor did Sweeney do for Ostara that would be worth her bringing someone back to life as repayment? What other powers might Sweeney have (he doesn’t seem on a par with someone like Wednesday and Ostara, nor is he really a god, more a mythological being/kinda-deified former-mortal)? How long can a dead wife keep going before she’s “soup”? What other superhuman abilities might dead!Laura have? Can the dead do magic? What even are the rules governing and the limits of different beings’ magical abilities?

If it helps your inspiration, you can find some of my meta and lots of tag-burbling about these two here. I have read the book though I remember it only in bits and pieces, and while I prefer the show characters and the fact that they get thrown together, you can use or riff on book material if you want. With reference to one of my DNWs, for this canon, describing Laura’s physical decay is totally fine. Also, Shadow/Laura don’t interest me except as a part of Laura’s backstory (so if your story wants to include Laura figuring out or having already figured out that pinning all her hopes on Shadow to make everything right is unrealistic, unfair, and not how it works – by all means, go for it!), and Shadow/Sweeney interest me not at all.

My one canon-specific, really strong DNW for this pairing is this: I’m not into Laura being Essie’s reincarnation/descendant or – as fanon suggests and canon hints she may be – some sort of reincarnation of Sweeney’s wife from back when he was a king in old Ireland. Reincarnation/“new love looks like old love”/“lost love found again” plots bore me, and I don’t enjoy ships that hinge on characters being somehow destined to be together. Characters having agency is my jam as much as canon divergences are. Or if your fic really needs to go there, please please please don’t dwell on the Laura-Essie-Sweeney’s-wife-of-old thing, a brief mention would be more than enough. I’m certain Laura would have neither time nor patience for the notion that Destiny Fate and All That Jazz threw her together with ginger minge, and even if it were technically true, she’d still want this relationship to work on her terms – and Sweeney obviously has a problem with Laura’s cheating, her relationship with Shadow, her personality (though he also recognizes they’re alike in many ways), and all that maps onto his anger and sadness over becoming irrelevant over time, so it’s not just about Laura. So yeah, let them be their own (grumpy, spiky, dysfunctional) people, and let Laura’s dynamic with Sweeney not be shaped solely by his past and his issues.

Cabin Pressure

Carolyn Knapp-Shappey & Arthur Shappey & Martin Crieff & Douglas Richardson

Genres: Action/adventure, Canon-style plot, Humor, Slice of life

I just want more canon-y stories with their loopy humor and their weird yet loving family dynamics among the crew. Shenanigans in mid-flight or in the tedium which precedes and the tiredness which follows them. Someone smuggles (knowingly or not) an exotic animal on-board, legal, security, medical and/or slapstick chaos ensues. A mechanical, passenger- or smuggled-goods-caused problem arises and is solved during a journey. More games played on board GERTI. Playing around with a specific destination, like in many episodes, would be a plus. If it helps inspire you, my favorite episodes in terms of tone and content are: Douz, Gdansk, Johannesburg, Limerick, Ottery St. Mary, Uskerty, and Xinzhou.

For this canon, I prefer gen with maybe, if you want to go there, some Douglas/Carolyn on the side. That’s a ship I always thought had potential – they understand each other very well and trust each other... some of the time, but they’re both also snark-masters, tend to look down on anyone not as smart or quick-witted as they (Arthur being the sole – occasional – exception), and are really good about keeping their defenses up against other people. But I requested the gen group, and I definitely want the gen group – please don’t feel pressed to write the ship, that’s just a wild suggestion I threw out there.

Moonlighting (TV)

David Addison/Maddie Hayes

Genres: Action/adventure, AU - canon divergence, Canon-style plot, Established relationship, Getting together, Humor, Mystery/procedural, Slice of life

I osmosed tons about this show over the years but didn’t get around to watching it myself till recently. And then I loved it much more than I thought I would! Yeah, sure, some of it’s dated, and some of it’s ropey in terms of how the characters interact ( all the casual sexism and battle of the sexes stuff are very 80s indeed), but the chemistry! the banter! the funny! the shiptease! Gimme!

I tried to come up with lots of prompts, but ended up with a list of stuff I love about the show – and would love to see in fic – with some prompts mixed in. Hope it helps! Basically, give me as much of the show’s “flavor” as you can, and I’ll be happy.

My two DNW requests for this canon would be: please ignore everything that happens post-S3 (so if you want to write Maddie/David in the aftermath of their resolving their UST, please go ahead with the canon divergence of your dreams, I bet it’ll be a million times better than canon), and please don’t have secondary characters (Agnes and Herbert, or Maddie and David’s relatives and exes) hijack the story. They can be in it, but I really do want a David/Maddie story, despite the canon sometimes sidelining them due to behind-the-scenes shenanigans.

Prompts/likes:

-all the banter, wordplay, innuendo, puns, comic repetition

-arguments – those long, explosive, funny, overlapping, always hilarious fights they have

-breaking the fourth wall – yes, please. In canon, they often seem to know they’re fictional characters but ones that exist in the real world, with studio lots and such. Do they now know they’re characters in a fanfic of fictional characters that also exist in the real world, or something even more mind-screwy?

-David calling Maddie “blondie blond” – it just makes me laugh – and Maddie calling him “Addison” when angry but “David” when worried or when shit hits the fan

-random cultural nods – off the top of my head, canon referenced Spanish poetry, objectivism, American realist drama, Dr. Seuss, Shakespeare, of course all the Hollywood tropes and genres; go high or low culture, go famous or obscure, even if I don’t know the reference, I want it! Ditto if you decide on a plot that parodies and pays homage to a cultural landmark story (The Silence of the Lambs? Much Ado about Nothing? A Hitchcock movie? Something else?), I’d love it!

-speaking of: I love the pun-tastic episode titles referencing everything under the sun

-all the canon-era detail which both takes me back and jars me with how much things have changed: people smoking in public buildings, seeing someone off at the boarding gate, dial and push-button telephones, VHS rentals, no cellphones/internet, all the 80s fashion and permed hair… Throw it in just for kicks or weave it into the plot (e.g., they’re following someone and only have a paper map and their own faulty sense of direction to help them)

-casefic – I love the silly plots (and chases! All the chases!), which often combine really gruesome outcomes or real violence with slapstick. I’d be especially tickled if you wrote a plot that starts out silly and seemingly innocent (e.g., they get “hired” by a kid who lost their homework) but ends up deadly serious, or vice versa

-I also love the flashes of really dark humor, usually provided by David snarking about plot developments, though my favorite example remains the intro to S3E1, with David assuring his sick mother that they’ll sweep the Emmys, and then they lost big time and we see a title card saying that the mom died on Emmy night. What can I say but: ROFL

-Maddie and David are really pretty terrible detectives, but they always manage to solve the mystery – or a solution falls into their laps – and I’m here for it

-Blue Moon almost never seems to take on actual paying clients – what else might David and Maddie do for much-needed cash? Bodyguards, extras on a movie, professional consultants on a movie (probably a really shlocky, C-grade production being filmed in the middle of nowhere), dance marathon, talent contest…

-all the shippiness before the UST becomes RST – in canon they slow-danced in a bar, they slept side by side on a plane, he’s snuck into her house multiple times when he was in trouble, etc. etc. etc. The sky’s the limit!

-maybe they get together in a different way than in canon and/or they have a relationship that departs from canon? Or how about if they resolve the UST as they do in canon, but then find a way to be both partners and lovers, without getting so wrapped up in what they each think the other one should be that they spoil everything? Basically, could they be mature enough to have a relationship that works for them both, or be friends with benefits, or hell even break up but remain each other’s most important person (and maybe still have sex occasionally)?

-tropes – the canon plays with so many tropes, you could too! Some suggestions: there’s only one bed, undercover as lovers/married/client and bodyguard, waking up married, any variation on Lady and the Tramp you can think of (including David having to pretend he’s a class act while Maddie has to play the slob, for a case or because of a situation with their families or…), they get zapped by a mad scientist they’re surveilling and swap bodies, etc.

-road trip! Oh the possibilities...

-playing Twenty Questions or another game during a boring stakeout, and personal revelations come spilling out

-Maddie’s experience as a model proves key to cracking a case, whether you want to make the whole story a riff on the world of fashion (The Devil Wears Prada parody, anyone?) or use that as a surprise plot point

-they get tangled up (again) in international espionage and go on a globe-trotting adventure, either chasing a MacGuffin or being chased – basically, get them out of Los Angeles and their relative comfort zone, and send them Indiana Jones-ing all over the world

-the show often makes 80s-typical mean jokes about Russia and the Cold War – what if a case took Maddie and David to the Soviet Union in its last years? Give me all the culture clashes, David being obnoxious and Maddie trying to be diplomatic, all the vodka, chases down frozen streets and over the frozen Neva River, dodging the KGB, sneaking around behind the scenes at the Bolshoi or Kirov Ballet and winding up on stage…

-when they visit a “rough” dive bar in S1, there’s a whole scene of David teasing Maddie to show tough-girl attitude, and she quips that she can’t wait till he has to accompany her to a high-society event. Um, yes please!

-they attempt to date like a regular couple, and stuff keeps getting in the way – whether they go to the opera/ballet and a fancy restaurant, or a basketball game and out for beers, or they try a quiet dinner and a movie at home (or all of the above!), canon-like complications keep interrupting. But then again, the ridiculous way they work is what brought them together in the first place. Bonus points if the fish-out-of-water partner ends up getting into the other one’s date-activity of choice, while snarking all the way.

-David has been to Maddie’s house multiple times – including to sleep over, both platonically and not – and they’ve both crashed at the office, but what little we see of David’s place, it seems to be a bachelor pad/hovel with a large yet mysteriously unfurnished living room. Maddie visits David/comes to spend the night/hides out with him from villains, and shenanigans ensue.

-canon often resolves the clash between David’s opportunism, happy-go-luckiness, and cockiness, and Maddie’s gentle idealism, worrywartness, and romanticism, by having David “win.” That can be funny, but what if the plot gave Maddie the right a bit more?

-I’m honestly not that into smut for this pairing - a fade to black, something implied, something referenced, innuendo, maybe brief flashes (heh) of what the characters think about/imagine/remember work much better with the canon’s overall tone, I think.

Likes:

I love pre-canon, canon, post-canon, canon-divergent, and missing-scene stories. I love character-driven and plot-driven stories equally, and I love fics which mix humor and angst/serious business when appropriate for the canon.

I love stories about characters at work and play, group dynamics, family dynamics (including constructed families), professional partnerships, friendships, alliances, rivalries, intimate couples (new lovers/first times as well as long-term/established couples), UST-ridden couples who are not just UST-ridden but connected in other ways too, etc.

I love irony, snark, humor as well as angst arising from the characters rather than the plot crowbaring it in, linear, non-linear, and 5+1 stories, hopeful endings, happy endings, bittersweet endings, worldbuilding, spiky characters who keep their jagged edges and spikiness in adversity as well as when their lives are going well, square-peg-in-round-hole characters, characters who are their own worst enemies as well as those who can get over themselves when the occasion calls for it, characters with conflicting values which may or may not be reconciled/resolved, characters who treat each other with respect and as equals even if they hate/annoy/can’t stand/love to dislike each other.

I especially love workplace stories (this can mean anything from an actual workplace/casefic/procedural setting to anything that revolves around the canon world in which the characters live) in which the characters are competent and dedicated to the job, and while they may not be exactly friends and they may well irritate one another, they still manage to rub along to get the job done and maybe even grow to care about one another (much to their surprise and sometimes reluctance/discomfort). Or, if they can’t get along, show me why not and what’s preventing them from finding common ground.

In terms of ship dynamics, I love (where it fits the characters) banter, competitiveness or antagonism shading into attraction (this tension need not be resolved), oh-god-why-did-it-have-to-be-you-what-did-I-do-to-deserve-this, bickering yet loving couples, faithfulness, characters who are serious about their romantic interests, characters who think they are much better at flirtation than they actually are, characters forced to work together only to prove much more compatible than they initially assumed, fics which mix an exploration of characters’ professional and everyday lives with shipping. A dynamic I cannot resist is shipping a couple who are incompatible in some important way (they are ideological enemies, cop and criminal, spies from opposite sides, one betrayed the other or they betrayed each other), and while they love and want each other they’re also not willing to change sides or surrender/compromise their identity for the other’s benefit, and how they might (or not) make their relationship work anyway.

I don’t have any very specific likes for smut, other than smut fitting the characters – show me how their canon dynamics spill over into the bedroom (or other place of congress). I also like sexual scenarios that subvert expectations a little and surprise the characters themselves (e.g., the person who’s usually quiet or more passive taking charge, the more aggressive person goes with it possibly snarking or commenting on it as long as they can). And I like sexual scenarios that contain an element of competition, antagonism, oh-god-this-is-a-bad-idea-but-we’re-going-for-it-hammer-and-tongs, not wanting to admit feelings or show vulnerability except oops it happens anyway, whether the characters acknowledge it or not, or just people getting way more into it or being more affected by it than they thought they would. When it fits the characters and their canon dynamic, you also can’t go wrong with we-both-wanted-this-for-forever-and-now-we-both-know-it-so-here-we-go-diving-in-headfirst. For het and/or slash, oral, vaginal, anal incl. pegging, manual (ifyouknowwhatImean) – it’s all good. You can go as veiled or as explicit as you like, but please avoid excessive medical jargon – I don’t find a lot of mention of “penis” or “clit” sexy.

DNWs:

MPREG, A/B/O, knotting, D/s, kinks, incest, underage, genderswap/genderbent characters, xeno, non-/dub-con, torture and abuse (this and non-/dub-con can be mentioned if the story needs it, but please don’t dwell on it in loving detail or subject any of my requested characters to it), dwelling on bodily fluids (mentions of gore/blood and come are fine), toilet humor, character bashing, issuefic, gender/sexuality/race/ethnicity/religion/ability/identity headcanons, unrequested ships, soulmates and soul marks, major character death (unless it’s canon), serious illness or injury, pregnancy and children, holiday or wedding setting/theme, secondary characters shipping the main pair like it’s their job, reference to RL current events, 1st/2nd person POV, AUs which have nothing to do with canonf

[aurimeanswind]

Friends and High Places—Sunday Chats (7-9-17)

I’m in the sky. Yes, I can fly and write at the same time. No, but really, I am currently on my flight back home from Austin because apparently Sunday Chats don’t stop for NOTHING. Not since I missed a couple weeks in a row, because apparently people miss this when it’s gone. So let’s chat.

Friends from Far Long and Far Away Places

This weekend was incredibly special for me. Though I’ve definitely mentioned her on Sunday Chats before, today she gets a big dedication. It’s story time.

A little over three years ago my would-be friend Jazz started following me on Twitter because of a mutual love of Game Grumps. Some DMs later we’d be chatting back in forth together ever since August of 2014. It’s not often for me to have someone kind of ethereal, who you can hold a conversation with for almost three years without ever meeting them, but Jazz was that person for me.

It’s been a long time, and I often referred to her in my head as my “pen pal”. Sometimes you can meet people by total happenstance, and it all started with her DMing me about what I went to school for. From there, I found one of the best friends I’d have in my life, and like I said, a near-continuous conversation with the same person for almost three years.

I’m very privileged in this life. For a number of reasons, but one such is that I always try to avoid taking for granted are the folks I have befriended on my journey through writing and gaming. Jazz is a friend I made almost entirely separate from that, separate from any specific community or event. Separate from any one moment and almost entirely through luck and serendipity. It was just a lucky mutual follow.

This weekend I took a trip to Austin so I could finally meet her in person. It’s a trip I had been playing around with for a long while and decided to book on the same weekend as RTX so that I’d be able to see some other friends while I was in town.

I’m lucky that Jazz was totally okay with me selfishly wanting to take up her time and spend plenty of one-on-one time together. What did we do? Well, we talked of course. But more so, I listened. I got to sit and listen to her stories, to her life, about her friends, her opinions, her experiences, and just like that, the continuous conversation that’s already been going on was championed through this weekend. We even sat and watched her favorite movie of all time, Clue, which I had never seen before, and is really pretty great.

Listening to her, I can’t begin to convey to you all, you wonderful Sunday Chats readers, how incredible a person she is. She is fierce. She is strong. To me, she is power embodied. She is inspiring. She takes no bullshit, she is protective, and she is a total and complete badass. To list all the things I admire in her would be to carry on for far too long, and considering she is probably reading this, I’m sure she’d be suuuuper embarrassed if I did, but I’ll try and keep it succinct.

She’s an award winning journalist. She’s incredibly witty, smart, and balanced. She is an excellent conversationalist. She is maybe the funniest person I have ever met. She is gorgeous and has a fire that burns on the inside and out. She’s one of my best friends. She was even kind enough to listen to me rant on about my life, my troubles, and things I’ve never told anyone else in my life, because I can’t help but say too much around her.

I’d count her amongst three that I depend and rely on truly and completely. Through this last month and a half, where my depression has been incredibly troubling and I’ve been in one of the worst places of my life since 2012, she has been an endless resource of support and comfort, even though she herself is has been through the ringer. She inspires me, makes me smile, and reminds me of how lucky I am to be here.

There are truly only three people in this world I can speak so highly of. She is one of them. I know it’s incredibly sappy, I know it’s a weird thing to splooge about in a massive public post, but I feel like I’ve brushed this friendship to the side like it’s some big secret, this distant friend from the internet. If she will proudly brag about me to her friends in the anticipation of my visit, then guess what? I’m gonna do it to my wonderful readers on my way out of Austin.

Thank you Jazz, for your support, for letting me be a part of your life, and for being an inspiring, fierce, and unendingly kind and caring badass.

Love you lots, J.

What I’ve Been Working On

My workflow is still pretty stilted. I think there is definitely something I’m held up on, and while I’m writing every day with insistence, I don’t know if it’s a help or a hindrance at this point. I’m playing around with getting to the 1000 day mark, which should fall sometime in this coming December, and then stop writing for a little while. We’ll see where things go and if any projects lift off the ground between now and then, but tentatively, I want to throw that out there.

I’m restarting a piece I was working on a long time ago on Overwatch, and I’m retouching up my first Case Study. I’m going to reshoot the first episode of Case Study, and now that ExtraLife is out of the way and I have a super nice new computer, I’ll be able to edit video ago. I’m definitely very concerned for the process, since I’m more than a little rusty, but I’m excited to see how it turns out. I need to reconfigure a few things about how I shoot the show, but I think it’ll look pretty good and sound great.

I also wrote a few one-off blog posts this week, which you can read HERE. One was on the Fourth of July, and the other was after watching the first episode of Netflix’s Castlevania series.

What’s on Tap

Overwatch

Yo I’m still playing Overwatch

I think i am generally winning a bit more now

That new character Doomfist looks pretty goddamn awesome doesn’t he?

I really like Overewatch still. It’s now pretty much all I play until I get into Nier Automata and Splatoon 2.

Castlevania Netflix Show

I have now watched all four episodes of the first season of this show. And it is, in my humble opinion, fantastic.

It definitely has a bit of a Game of Thrones vibe, in that it feels like a lived in world that has an established history, but it doesn’t boggle itself down too much in character names and family houses.

It just jumps into a world and it’s first episode, which is all about setting up Dracula as a villain, is just absolutely fantastic.

The rest of the series is about Trevor Belmont, the protagonist, who ends up being just as interesting as Dracula, but has a much longer arc, and seeing him slowly evolve as a character is really great.

The show is definitely gory and brutal, which I expected, and I think with the artstyle and the animation it does it super well. I was definitely a bit triggered by the graphic scene of *spoilers* someone being eaten. But y’all know that’s my weird specific phobia, whatcha gonna do?

The way it ends leaves me begging for more, and it’s already apparently been renewed for a second season. I cannot wait for more of this show, and I am totally hooked. I really recommend it, because it is a very good interpretation of the Casltevania universe and the way its tropes and ideas, like the whip, are conveyed into visuals, is fucking awesome.

Tomba 1 & 2

So I finished Tomba 1! Yay! I’ve been replaying that after finishing Alundra

Tomba is a great game! I think for the first time I ddi every last one of the quests in the run, all 130, which was a ton of fun.

I started Tomba 2, which was in the big switch from 2D to 3D, and it actually still looks pretty great.

For a 3D game from that era, it’s definitely super chunky and blocky, but the characters are very distinguishable, and it is 100% fully voice acted. The voice acting isn’t amazing, but for the time period it’s actually relatively stellar!

Tomba 2 is just such an amazing Metroidvania/RPG/Adventure game. I cannot recommend it enough.

Zelda Breath of the Wild

Oh look at this one cropping back up. I decided to get the DLC before shipping off to Austin this weekend, and it was a great idea.

Though I haven’t really dipped me toes in any of the new content, using the new map feature, I’ve been able to explore the areas I missed before. In my initial 110-ish hours I was uh… surprisingly thorough, let’s say. But goddamn.

I still have a few shrines left, 17 now, I believe, and I really want to find all of them. I have yet to consult a guide.

Questions

As always you can get your question in Sunday Chats by replying to my tweet on Sunday afternoons with the hashtag #SundayChats in it!

Hrm. I really like them as they are, I’ll be honest. I don’t think they’re necessarily perfect. I think, and I had a recent conversation about this with Jazz actually, that the effort to make Snape a redeemable character all at the last minute felt a little forced. It worked for me, but I think if you wanted to make it really believably, for everyone, folks like Jazz who really hates him, you could have layered it out a lot more. We get a little bit of it in book 5 and the rest in book 7. Now I think the opposite works super well for Dumbledore, where you kind of learn about his troubled past in book 7, and it works so well because you can clearly tell he is aspiring and working toward redemption so much throughout the rest of his life. The kind of breaking down of his character in the final entry of the series hits so hard because we get to see that so well reflected through Harry.

I think there are plenty of characters that could have been fleshed out. I honestly would have loved to just spend more time in that world, more time in the classes, more time learning the history, but I don’t think that is a thing that would have worked in this story, Harry’s story, specifically.

I also haven’t read Cursed Child yet, still. And I’m still maybe a little concerned it’ll ruin a bit of the magic for me. I really enjoyed Fantastic Beasts though, in spite of its issues.

I mentioned it a little bit above, but yeah, I thought it was fantastic. Just the character work specifically worked so well for me. There was a lot of attention given to make Dracula such a sympathetic villain. Even though it’s essentially a trope we’ve seen before, I think it’s used really well, because beyond the incidents that set up his villainy in the series, we get this nice little glimpse at his past distaste for humanity. It leaves you with questions about history, ones that don’t need to be answered, but you want to be, which are always the best questions because consulting them in your mind engrosses you even more in the world.

And good god is everything about the last episode just fucking perfect.

This is a really hard one. If that’s something you’re going through, I’m sorry. It isn’t easy. I am someone who has never been broken up with, I am the break up-er. Not that that’s something to brag about, which I’m not, I just want folks to know the position I’ve been in.

I’ll say this, and please hear me out on this. Assuming things didn’t end with cheating or murder or physical/emotional abuse, assuming it was a thing where it was distance, fighting, anger or animosity, or just things not working out, remember this: empathy. Whether you’re the break up-er or the break up-ee, I think it’s really important to remember that the other person is a human being, and what’s more, they’re going to handle this in their own way. Intimate companionship is really hard to manage and it’s not a one way street. If both folks aren’t on the same page, it’s just not going to work out. This doesn’t mean you need to pocket blame, or hate the other person, or look for reasons why things aren’t working or didn’t work out. In my history, the moment you’re really questioning whether things are worth continuing means you at the very least need to have that conversation with your partner.

They’re human and you need to respect that. I don’t think either person should lob insults or take enjoyment out of a breakup. Again, we’re excluding the worst case scenarios here.

I think you should take a deep hard look at yourself, at your feelings, and genuinely ask yourself: do I still want to be friends with this person? I know for me the answer has always been no. I need that distance because being close to them would either fill me with guilt or pain, or just a general concern that the other is in pain any time they’re around me. That’s what’s worked for me, but if you or the other make that decision, I really believe you need to respect it.

To kind of top it off here, I think a lot of distance can do a lot of good. Stop checking their social media, unfollow/unfriend/or even block them if you need to. Get them out of your view and focus one what you need to do to get yourself in a stable and happy place again. You both need to do this, you both need to figure out how to make yourselves happy without the other again, and that’s not easy, but that’s the best advice I can give.

I know that’s pretty contrary to a lot of modern advice of be friends, be cool, be amicable, but I just don’t think that shit happens really. I’ve seen it, I’ve seen it myself, but it’s very hard, and it’s very rare, so don’t be afraid of opting for the easier choice. Do what’s best for you. Take care of yourself.

Haha, well this is hopefully my last trip for a hot minute. I don’t know. I don’t want to make any promises. This most recent trip to see a friend was special because I had never actually seen them before, so it was really important for me to meet them and spend time there. The next one? I really don’t know. I think I need to spend some time figuring some of my own shit out now. I have a lot on my mind lately and a lot of things I want to start and get done.

Oh, and very little money.

Ahh this is a really hard question.

I like the standards and the fast food burgers. I could go for any. But the best burger, that’s tough.

I’ll say this, I take my burger a very specific way. One, it always has to be a cheeseburger. If it’s not a cheeseburger you can just leave thank you. I always take my burger with Lettuce, Mayonnaise, and Ketchup. I know, it’s a weird combo, but it’s the best. I got it from my older brother Brady, though his included a tomato, which I just don’t fuck with, so that is my perfect burger wherever I go. I sometimes throw grilled onions on there if it’s an option too.

I don’t know if it’s my all time favorite, but there is this eastern chain near me called Cheeburger Cheeburger, and their 1/3 pound burger with my chosen toppings on it was really good. Their bread was always super flakey, and they were real-ass thick burgers too.

As a general style of burger that I love, you can’t go wrong with a good patty melt. My go-to usually if I’m at a new diner.

So my friend told me to listen to this song and now that I have, I see why. I know a bit of the story behind it and it is very... powerful. I mean, it’s hard to imagine the girl that did Tik-Tok is doing this song years later, but I think it really is reflective of her and her soul and her pain.

I thought it was really beautiful. I thought it was very poignant.

This is a tricky one. I’ll say I have two. I really love the triggers nowadays. Obviously the Switch does not have analogue triggers, which is unfortunate, but I get it what with it being a handheld console as well. But man do those Xbox one and PS4 triggers feel reeeeeal good. If i had to pick a specific one, it’d be the right trigger, because it usually does the shooty-bang-bang in the video games.

Outside of that, you can’t go wrong with the bottom face button. Usually jump, or hit, or fuck-up, as I like to call it. That’s A, or B, or X, depending on which controller you have, and it’s a rad button. Don’t futz with it.

Having been in Austin all weekend I have not gotten the chance to see Spider-Man Homecoming, but after hearing the words on it, it has skyrocketed up my must-see list. I may even go to see it tomorrow morning before I go to work. Goddamn do I want to see it. I did see Clue this weekend though! That’s a great movie!

But really, Peter Parker is like, my legit hero. I loved him as a kid. He is for sure my favorite Marvel hero, and probably my second or third favorite superhero in general, behind Superman and Batman, depending on the day. I wanted to be a photographer when I was younger, before I wanted to be a doctor and then enthusiast press, so when I found out that Peter Parker was a photographer too, I thought it was even more rad.

Did you know that the Polar Bear is the largest land carnivore? Or land predator, one of the two. When they stand on their hind legs, Polar bears can measure over 12 feet tall.

Polar Bears are fucking. Awesome.

The vacation was incredibly helpful. Being around someone who has been helping me get through such a troubling time in my life and also just sleeping in and relaxing was so, so helpful.

Of the Clue characters, it’s so goddamn hard to choose. I almost want to say Mrs White because of her absurd monologue in the last ending alone. I don’t know if I’ve laughed that hard like… ever. Good fucking god. Like holy shit.

I also just love Mr. Green because of every absurd physical thing he does in that movie, and Tim Curry is incredible. Just incredible. They’re all great, but those are the three standouts for me, I’d say, with maybe Mrs. White taking it.

Trevor is the villain in Clue. Though I see him as more of a Mr. Body character, who is playing everyone behind the scenes. He is the villain because he loves his power too much.

Jesus Christ Roger. I can only wonder what the people who don’t know you but only see your tweets in Sunday Chats must think you’re like.

I have never seen Grown Ups 2, nor do I think I ever want to. It’s an infamously bad movie, from what I understand. I mean, there is a podcast about watching it every week for an entire year that is literally called “The Worst Idea of All Time”. Also I take great offense to being compared to David Spade and I’m not 100% sure why.

I can’t speak to Star Ocean 3, but I loooove replaying old favorites. You can see from what i have on tap this week that I’m going and playing Tomba 1 and 2 as is. Those are two very old games, and while a little rough around the edges and certainly not perfect, they hold up for me quite a bit.

I think there is definitely a level of nostalgia that can get you through certain things. Like, when I went back and played Tales of Symphonia again within the last few years, it’s a lot less dynamic and fun than I remember it being. The voice acting is also a whole lot worse than I remember it being too, but I still really love that game. I still finished it and played it through to the end. I am someone who regularly goes back and replays games, and just like gaining something from a movie on a second viewing or reading a book through again, you’re almost guaranteed to get something new out of it. If you’re open to the idea of something maybe not holding up as well as you remember it doing, than I say go for it. Just don’t let that be all your time like it has been for me recently.

I think it totally is. Especially if you have an emissary of that nostalgia to boot. For example, I think Tim Gettys really reps the Crash games as far as nostalgia and looking-back-love is concerned.

I think knowing where you’re at with something is also super big though. Like, are you into 3D/2D platformers, or more importantly, platformers from that PS1 era? Because Crash Bandicoot sure as shit is one of those. I went back and played the first Crash again recently and I know it’s not a super great game. I just know that in my heart of hearts. But I also remember really liking Crash 2 and 3, especially 3, and I want to go back and see those two very much. I have yet to get back into the N-Sane trilogy, but I’m excited to, and I think I’ll get a good amount out of those later two games. Just set yourself up with the right expectation and know that if you’re trying to specifically “buy into someone else’s nostalgia” that you need to see those games through the same scope that they did.

This is a mean question. I mean honestly, if I could hangout with you every week you know I would.

Okay real answer time. It’s probably that fucking Mrs. White monologue. You hyped it up to me while we were watching it but good fucking lord. I cannot overemphasize this: it was solid gold.

Also, I want it to be known that Jazz was fucking saying the words along with the movie as we watched it, and multiple times I had to stare at her until she stopped and then apologized. She has seen that movie waaaaay too many times.

Spelunky and Overwatch. Both are incredibly well made and I’ve been revisiting both time and time again, with months of distance between play sessions, and they have not let me down.

Okay, well I’m not about to sit here and make some declarative statement like that. I think for me, yes, it is my favorite Zelda game. It even beats out A Link to the Past, and if you want to know specifically where I’m at with it, you can read my review here: http://irrationalpassions.com/review/the-legend-of-zelda-breath-of-the-wild/

I think to deny the ingenuity, courage, and grace by which Breath of the Wild is executed would be incredibly inept of any video game player out there. I understand that a lot more folks than I have issues with it, many of them being hosts on my very own podcast. I get it. I get that the story isn’t 100% there for them. It really was for me. I get that the gemaplay doesn’t seem as new and original to them. It was for me. I think Zelda refines and executes on ideas barely even approached in other video games, and it does it with grace, style, and little to no issue. Especially in a post-performance-patch world, it is something incredible.

I think there is an argument there. I don’t know if I am even the one to make it though.

At least... not yet.

The Checklist

It’s all about MBMBaM for me this week. If you’re not familiar, My Brother, My Brother and Me is one of my all time favorite podcasts. In fact, it’s my favorite non-video game podcast. I love and adore it, and I think you should go listen to it. When I’ve been depressed recently, I’ve just been re listening to old episodes of MBMBaM and it’s made me very goddamn happy.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/my-brother-my-brother-and-me/id367330921?mt=2

I also started watching Polygon’s Monster Factory this week, and hoooooly shit is it funny. In this series, McElroy brothers and Polygon staff Justin and Griffin McElroy make horrific creatures in video game create-a-characters and go ham with them. I’ll provide my favorite episode so far (not that far into the series), which is probably the disaster that Fallout 3 became pretty much immediately.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LHBzVTCO3nM

I sat and listened to Nick Scarpino do a couple of great one-on-one GameOverGreggy Shows this weekend in my downtime, and I can’t pick between the two, so I am just linking both.

Overcoming Anxiety - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=taPC2fOx5BY

Brian Altano - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QD8W-kpK3ew

Okay. I’m done. I’m writing this at home, finishing everything up, formatting, and then posting. I know it’s posting super late, and I’m sorry about that.

I have a melancholy weight with me now. It’s time to start looking ahead and I really don’t know what’s ahead for now. Both exciting, but right now, I find myself more anxious than excited. It’s a somber note to end Sunday Chats with, but it’s an honest one.

But hey, thanks for reading, and do me a favor, eh?

Keep it real.