#but feature wise. i think dove is more. Her

[generationa1trauma]

for Years i could not tell d.ov.e cam.er.on and sa.bri.na car.pen.ter apart

[imptwins]

Upcoming Teasers!

Thought I’d give y’all a bit of a preview of upcoming stories from me. And you get longer ones than on Twitter, how exciting.

The Gift that Keeps On Giving This will hopefully be done by the weekend, since it’s meant to be for a weekend writing event lol. If not maybe I’ll do half now half later. It’s based on the theme of ‘gift giving’ so it’s a Krusielle-focused smut-comedy story involving Christmas dinner, stealthy sex toys, family hi-jinx, and a few mixed signals.

The Bad Kind of Scary “Noelle has finally admitted her immense crush on the new girl and is working up the nerve to actually ask her out. But Noelle is a Holiday. Her mother is the cut-throat fiscally conservative mayor, her father the man who knew how and where to apply pressure to both get and keep that seat for her, and she's inheriting their privilege but not the acumen that they used to seize it. She's a straight-A student who is used to people bending over for her because everyone local knows she's destined for something greater, a shoe-in for politics, maybe even the kind to outgrow her little town. She hasn't really processed just how 'kill or be killed' the world can be.

It’s fun to have fluffy fantasies about an abrasive bully with a hidden heart of gold ready to bloom at the first show of kindness, a misled soul who just needs to be saved by a noble heart. But it’s not exactly realistic. Noelle's about to learn that the hard way.“

A dead dove Suselle fic mostly focusing on noncon and drugging. The concept started with that ‘The Newest Girl’ blog post and I’m sprinting for the fences with the idea of Noelle trying to ‘fix’ Susie and biting off way more than she can chew. It’s about 50% done so far and honestly features what I think is some of my best-ever work, I’m already incredibly proud of it on a pure writing level. The imagery is kind of awesome and is a microcosm of all the lessons I’ve been trying to learn over the last year.

Under the Ice “A hound can be trained to hunt monsters in the stead of men, and no stains will find your skin. But as you file their teeth to knives and whisper on the tenderness of flesh, as you instruct that copper is a fine wine until life dripping from hot to cold down their chin is just as intoxicating, know that they will never hunger for any throat as they do yours.

For all of the horror, for all of the self-loathing, Kris at least had the guilty comfort that hosting the Soul made them relatively safe. How wrong they are. The Soul taught Noelle to grow stronger, to take what she wants, and now she has decided exactly what that is.”

Dead dove Kriselle fic, featuring noncon and like... Identity tragedy? It’s kind of a weird take on abuse cycles given the supernatural puppeteer element, as well as a little bit of venting about how bored I am of every Snowgrave smut fic being the same.

Echoes in the Distance The fic previously known as Zetarune. Once I’m done with the above this will be getting a huge from-the-top edit spree including a rename because I don’t like its current one. Chapter 1 will also be almost entirely removed though still available separately ‘cus I think it detracts from the narrative and my reasons for having it there were mostly insecurity. The rest of the story will be tightened up, especially lore wise, a couple retcons here and there, and hopefully I can impart a lot of the lessons I’ve recently learned to just up the general quality.

Once I actually pick it back up please look forward to me finally breaking the months-long-at-this-point cliffhanger of what happens when the Bunker is opened. You’ll get to see what I’ve been planning for over a year. =)

Castaway Angels “Ten years ago the Underground opened, the world found out about the existence of monsters and their forgotten history, and even at that young age you knew you couldn't stay away. Lured by the promise of a kinder and fairer society - and perhaps a mildly insensitive fascination - you realize your dream when you secure an enrolment in one of their colleges, sell everything you own, and jump on a boat. You arrive in Ebott City with a wreck of a car you bought in the port town, and little more than the clothes on your back.

But the monsters’ capital city is no paradise. Not for a human. With past generosities betrayed, the seeds of mistrust have long since been sown and outright hostility simmers just under the surface. There's so much in the culture and history and behind-the-curtain dealings that you just don't know. But you really hope you're a fast learner, because it turns out your roommate is a devastatingly hot resurrected Prince Emeritus turned fuckboy slash red flag incarnate and holy shit you are in so over your head.”

A collaboration between myself and Kimberly EAB. 2nd-person POV, Reader x Asriel, post-Undertale, slow-burn dead dove (now there’s a combo you don’t see too often huh?). Biggest kinks/themes on display will be dubcon, pain play, substance abuse/addiction, possessiveness, messed up power dynamics, my usual brand of hyperqueer xenophilia, and just a general case of I Can Fix Him syndrome.

[libidomechanica]

Untitled (“The coward does it with the hangman close of”)

A cinquain sequence

               I

Changing to rain. The coward does it with the hangman close of love, all my wooing is done.

               II

Perhaps his horse are doing! They think a murderer’s collar take his last look wanton-wise.

               III

The clocks stopped clock. The moon is bright in Autumn’s sky, and thence full many wanton thru the floor.

               IV

And cleanse his soul from Sin? Truth fails not; but her last word—’Oh. Quickened his step seemed light and Day?

               V

Is shining fronts, their uniforms were still. Whoever in Love’s fire that thou wilt be my ain.

               VI

So that was. Copartner of the sweet, than when flowers: but the only word I understood.

               VII

He that moment’s store five years of blood the whitewashed wall that he had to swing. Good Susan Gale.

               VIII

At the fire? Which Betty will not love’s fingers, and sorrows more than the sun did shine so cold.

               IX

By a doubtful spirit- voice, in that was all. And far, I am happy where you aren’t.

               X

All, or all away. Two lines of wake behind it on the lot of life in a new rhythm.

               XI

Hither the least one thieving thoughts will enter, healthy as tragedy. But she could them vphold.

               XII

With the autumn weather compelled my imaginary. Sing lullaby. And cleansed the Ground.

               XIII

Come bring young charms, which needes both use and art. Make accompt, unless your laughter, that I love.

               XIV

I wanna be your dreams to shame. Even the feature is a fresh and love comes back again.

               XV

I was passed in happy freedom by. Do thee shame, nor avarice, nor over- anxious care.

               XVI

With the Wound of our own mouths calling, Oh. Like two doomed ships that passed in happy freedom by.

               XVII

In happy freedom by.— Thus answered Johnny in his pocket bring it home.—Oh God forbid!

               XVIII

I never shed before eleven. Some faire booke doth find, with gilded girl who’s always was.

               XIX

She sits, between a bag of almost-stale croissants clenched in your hair. And around us lie?

               XX

Sun and moon builds its tower sisyphean project like a bee. Cry, Speak once more— thou lovest!

               XXI

If charmed verse or muttered prayers had power, with the windy sigh: the man had killed the door.

               XXII

The wind blows the rain.—As it were the dead. Her look out-flourish’d May: and having buried day.

               XXIII

Good of the swollen purple throat may think, the rein to give? My soul with sails of silver by.

               XXIV

They soundly slept the vow? Me—toll the silver by. Sought, a dream remember: the little girl?

               XXV

Does Man touch with grief they are, emblems mix with words that cruel father! Proving what I can give?

               XXVI

My life melts with too much thinking; thinke no more. The Shepherds as to Kings. He went back to look.

               XXVII

With sudden shock the prisoners’ cots and we have built our wall. Such valid reason no one there.

               XXVIII

It chanced your name to see. She’d seen the bed to what it touches. Says Betty, he’ll be spice.

               XXIX

And all that heard her cry, and the lampless Earth in which her idiot boy. Upon the air!

               XXX

And this sweet breath more sweet; but I never bleach. To join the living thing, of Johnny’s glory.

               XXXI

With open mouth he drank the sunlight not fooles in my own. Say thou dost love Truth and me.

               XXXII

I want to grow old and grey. The down, and should be, like life and fear, a dark reality.

               XXXIII

Like the Body and that he had quit, and through the wood. And the meadows in which were unjust.

               XXXIV

Is my Mother’s pocketbook. And, grumbling, cold, in thine armes, if learnd fame truth so foul a lie!

               XXXV

The first sight, as she wrought! Ah foolish tear, unlink’d with me. For the mountains high; such thy bloom!

               XXXVI

She hardly spare, unworthy things of Dove, a maid whom there was a theft. To thee, Cynara!

               XXXVII

I’ll tell me, Love within a mile, no hand to write in the dark. And under the mother’s face.

               XXXVIII

No more I know, I wish is understand. Haste, precious friend, and I sigh one another kiss.

               XXXIX

Stella, I say my Stella, should do long. If he is hurt in life or limb—oh God forbid!

               XL

Sometimes these cogitations still as a bar of iron. And Johnny do, I pray you do.

               XLI

And wondered why men knelt to pray who never will be out of prison walls suddenly seemed.

[adashofniallandasprinkleoflunacy]

Vampy come down for family dinner and help clean up like he wasn’t just defiling their daughter 10 minutes ago

Harry would rail the fuck out of her in her closet with one hand over her mouth and another around her throat, grunting absolute filth into her ear as she spills over him with muffled whines and sobbed pleas. He’d lick her clean, pull her panties and leggings back up her quaking thighs, and proceed to buckle his slacks casually while she props herself against the wall, trembling and panting.

He just leans forward and presses a chaste kiss between her sweaty brows, her skin sticky against his lips as he murmurs smugly. “I’m gonna go finish cleaning up the kitchen with your mum. Come back down after you’ve sorted yourself out, and don’t forget to wipe your makeup off. It’s smeared down your face.”

Y/N does as he says, wiping the watery steaks of mascara off her cheeks and fixing her wild hair, making sure to leave no evidence of their little escapade, lest Harry end up sleeping outside on the yard. When she finally gets back down to her living room (she takes the stairs extra carefully, her belly throbbing with each step), the vampire is sitting in the rocking chair next to her mother’s, swaying lightly as they chat away nonchalantly.

They’re laughing and gossiping, their hands occupied with all types of yarn and needles, and she always forgets that Harry had learned how to knit when he was younger. It’s so baffling to see him engaging innocently with her mom, his nimble fingers expertly working on a multicolored scarf as he does so, not sparing the piece the slightest glance due to how confident he is in his skills. The reason it’s especially startling is because those fingers had been inside her not even five minutes ago.

“So we were running around this lake near my house,” Harry explains candidly, clearly in the middle of telling a story from his past as his digits weave in and out amidst red and purple yarn, “and we were playing in the snow near the banks, which was our first mistake. My mother had told me that the snow around the shores tended to be really slushy, so if we weren’t careful, we’d end up slipping really easily. We didn’t listen, of course— what ten year old does? We were playing tag with the neighbors, and as I was chasing after Gemma, I accidentally shoved her a bit too hard and she slipped and fell right into a pile of muddy snow. Completely stained everything she was wearing.”

Her mom releases a disappointed hiss, giving him a sympathetic glance over the glasses perched on the bridge of her nose. “Poor thing.”

Harry nods in agreement, looping yarn over his needles as he extends the scarf over his lap for more space, continuing his labor. “My mum grounded me for a week, and I spent that entire time learning to knit so I could remake Gemma’s mittens, since I was the one that ruined them. It was a fair punishment, honestly, and I ended up liking it more than I thought. Plus, the mittens I made were way better than the original pair. You just can’t buy this type of talent anywhere.”

The older woman laughs boisterously at his self-absorbed joke, which results in Harry smiling to himself proudly, giggling along.

Y/N clears her throat softly, leaning against the archway that leads into the room and crossing her arms over her chest in a relaxed manner, quirking an eyebrow at both of them as she makes her presence known. “Having fun?”

Harry glimpses over at her, his eyes raking down her body to where she’s clasping her thighs tightly, irises gleaming with knowing condescension. “Loads.”

“Harry was just telling me about when he learned to knit!” Y/N’s mother chirps, sending a warm smile towards the boy sitting across from her, unaware of the fact that he’d been defiling her daughter not too long ago. “It’s not often that you find a young man with this type of interest. He’s a keeper, sweetheart.”

“Hear that?” The immortal gloats teasingly, wagging his brows playfully as he holds up his unfinished accessory. “I’m a keeper.”

“Mm.” His girlfriend hums sarcastically, rolling her eyes towards the ceiling to avoid giving him any satisfaction. “I bet you’re just loving all this praise, aren’t you?”

Harry whistles lowly, tutting in a chastising fashion. “Someone’s jealous.”

Y/N rectifies her posture, an appalled expression cracking over her features. “Am not!”

“Are to.”

“Am not.”

“Are to.” Harry insists doggedly, looking over at the older woman for support. “Isn’t she?”

Her mom studies her for a moment, clicking her tongue scoldingly. “I think maybe you are, honey. Just a bit.”

Harry cranes his head back towards Y/N, sticking his tongue out mockingly behind the woman’s back and scrunching up his face comically, flaunting his childish point.

“Plus, Harry was sweet enough to make you that scarf he’s working on. You should be more grateful.”

Harry softens his eyes dramatically, sugaring his voice into a honeyed drawl that only she can read through. “Yeah, Y/N. I’m going out of my way to make you this nice gift, and that’s the thanks I get?”

“Dickhead.” The girl grumbles pettily, shifting on her feet as she glowers at him.

Her mother glares at her accusingly. “Language! I taught you better than that!”

“Mm. You should be more careful with what you say; words hurt more than you know.” Harry tacks on with a snide grin, shrugging his brows daringly as he slips an innuendo into his next line. “Mouthing off like that could get you into a whole lot of trouble.”

The pit of her tummy throbs at his curtained challenge, her eyes narrowing as she bites back the urge to curse him out again. “Thanks for the moral advice, Aristotle, but I’m grown enough to face the consequences of my own actions.”

Harry slowly puts down his knitting needles onto the small table beside him, picking up the scarf laying across his thighs and rolling it out in its entirety. It’s now that she realizes the item is much too thin width-wise to be scarf— it looks more like a belt, similar to the strap used to tie off a robe. The vampire flickers his gaze over to Y/N’s mom to make sure she’s not watching, and once he sees the lady is once again preoccupied with her knitting, he trains his attention back onto his partner.

He lifts the long colorful band up to his neck, tying one end around his throat loosely and wrapping the excess length around his knuckles, giving the article a symbolic tug. Y/N’s cheeks burst with heat at the crude reenactment, suddenly coming to terms with what he’s actually created under the guise of a harmless statement piece: it’s a makeshift collar.

Harry watches her avidly, a sinister smirk carving his dimples into place once he sees she’d understood his implication. He yanks the leash from around his neck swiftly before he gets caught, rolling the material back up neatly to disguise it. He cocks his head to the side conceitedly, his accent slathered with the same amount of arrogance as his gesture. “You never know, dove. Sometimes the consequences might be too much for you to handle.”

[forthehpfanboys]

Broken Stitches

Pair: Hermione Granger x Reader; he/him.

Summary: Hermione usually gripes about your dirty clothes being everywhere.

Warnings: SMUT (MDI), oral (female receiving)

Smut Prompt 40: “Is that my (shirt/uniform/jersey- this has so much potential it hurts)?”

Notes: I have never written hetero smut before so I’m starting off light (please go easy on me, I'm trying). I’m gonna save the big smut for the next request. Lowkey think this is terrible but uh, ya know. And word count wise? This should probably be a fic but I got carried away-

~DO NOT REPOST ANYWHERE~

-

Usually, when you leave clothes around, Hermione nagged about it. She’d grumble for hours- literal hours- about how you have a dirty clothes basket for a reason, how she’s not your mom and shouldn’t have to clean it up, even though your dorm is shared with a bunch of dudes who each treat it like their person clothes bin, and literally no one asked her to clean it up.

Lately, she’s been quiet. She hasn’t been shrieking or nagging or threatening to hex you unless you clean it, she’s been leaving it be, which was very uncharacteristic for your girlfriend. Another weird thing was that your quidditch jersey was completely missing and you needed it for the game coming around. You asked everyone in your dorm, and not a single one knew where it ran off too.

It wasn’t until you walked into her own shared dorm and saw Hermione laying across her bed, reading a book… In your quidditch jersey, which looked cleaner than usual. You stared at the baggy shirt laying against her skin. You couldn’t see the title of the book, but you could tell by the white cover and the big cursive red letters that it was clearly a romance novel- and it was getting to the good part, you could tell because she kept shifting her legs and pressing her thighs together.

“Babe?”

Hermione almost jumped out of her skin. She slammed the book shut and shoved it under the blanket, crossing her arms over her chest. She quickly looked over at you, the heat spreading across her cheeks like a typhoon of red. Her bubblegum pink tongue dragged across her lips quickly, her knees coming up to her chest.

"Oh, hey, love! How-um-how are you?" Hermione smiled, tucking a strand of brown hair behind her ear. She was blushing, you could see it in the dim light of her dorm. No one else was in the room-- the rest of the girls opted for spending quality time together in the warm spring air.

"Is that my jersey?" You asked, pointing at the loose (h/c) t-shirt clinging onto her chest. She stammered over a reply, her cheeks brightening in color when your point drifted to the rectangular shape hidden under the blankets. "And are you reading porn?"

"It isn't porn!! It's a romantic novel filled with drama and heart stopping romance suitable for any young witch!" She huffed out, crossing her arms over her chest. Her eyes stared into yours.

"That may be true, but.. Does it have porn in it?" You smirked, leaning against one of the four posts holding together her bed.

Her jaw dropped at your cocky tone and said, "No! It's romance, (Y/n)! A man like you wouldn't understand."

"Really, cupcake? That hurts my feelings." You let out a laugh, watching her with dark eyes as she stretched her legs out. "So, you're not wet because of the story right now?"

"(Y/n)!!" Hermione picked up her pillow and threw it at you, but you managed to catch it and threw it back.

"What? Is it so bad to check on my baby girl?" You were grinning again-- her thighs kept rubbing together and her hands gripped the end of the blanket. You could practically smell her arousal.

"Fine! Yes! It has porn in it! Bugger off!" Hermione squealed, putting the pillow back into place behind her back so she didn't have to look at you.

"That's all I wanted to hear, lovely." you pulled out your wand. You shut the door, locked it and used a silencing charm all at once before throwing the stick off to the side and gripping the thick, red blanket

Yanking the blanket off the bed, and haphazardly throwing it to the ground, you crawled onto the foot of the bed and grabbed her ankles. You tugged her closer and ignored her squeal due to the sudden movement. From the fast bounce of her tits and the bare skin that got exposed as the jersey rode up when her body slid toward you, you could tell she was naked, except for one thin, piece of fabric.

You licked your lips, trailing your hands up her legs to her smooth thighs. You felt pure excitement when her legs naturally fell open, exposing the thin piece to you. It was hiding just one of your favorite features of her and it had a small wet patch right in the middle.

"Merlin, 'Mione.. You know just how to get me goin', don't you?" You spoke up, watching her face carefully as her eyebrows furrowed and her lip became trapped between her teeth. She gave you a nod, a few fuzzy strands of her hair falling into her vision. "Planned this yourself, didn't you?"

She nodded again, reaching for the end of the jersey and began to pull it up to her chest, revealing what you already knew. Her skin was bare. You saw her nipples harden from the cool breeze in the room and groaned again.

"My pretty girl. My wonderful darling, fuck." you laid yourself flat on your stomach after spreading her legs and your eyes were magically drawn to the wet spot against her panties.

Without hesitation, you dragged your tongue along her cloth covered sex, a needy groan leaving your lips at her taste. It was a flavor you had no issue devouring whenever she asked. You pulled her thighs farther apart, your nails digging into the flesh with another drag of your tongue. Her soft whined didn't go unnoticed, either. You raised yourself up, dragging your panties down with your teeth before sliding your hands to her pretty pussy lips.

Your thumbs carefully spread them so you could watch her walls clench around nothing. Another needy groan left you when her clit throbbed and you immediately latched your lips onto it, enjoying her squeal of surprise. Your eyes locked with hers and your own sex twitched against the mattress. Her eyes were completely fucked out- pupils swallowing irises the same way you ate her out.

Your tongue dove into her deeper expertly forcing a strangled moan from Hermione's lips. Your eyes fell half shut when your legs wrapped around your head but your tongue kept up a strong pace inside of her. Your hand not putting pressure against her clit went around to her ass, grabbing a cheek in hand and giving it a squeeze. The thumb on her clit began to draw those strong circles again and you enjoyed the way she bucked up into your face.

Her hands tugged at your hair in a feverous attempt to either get away from the onslaught of pleasure or get more. She moaned your name again with her thighs shaking around your head. You let out a moan, your own hips dragging across the sheets to give your hard on some relief, before you pulled your tongue free.

You dragged it across the folds once, twice, three times before spitting on her clit. The gasp she made was worth it. Your thumb went back to work while her head went back against the pillows. "That good, huh, darling?"

"Shut it." She moaned, her shin pulled you closer, practically forcing your face against her. You smirked against her before attaching to her clit again. It didn't take her long to cum--especially when you were humming against her. You helped her ride out her orgasm and pulled off with a chuckle once the overstimulation set in.

The only sound in the room was her frantic panting. She pulled the jersey back down and you carefully pulled her panties up after licking her clean.

"How do you do that?" Her voice was soft and winded, but it brought you joy. You smiled and kissed her knee.

"Magic, love." You did jazz hands at her, ignoring the way she rolled her eyes. You let out a giggle and sat up. If it wasn't for her pointing it out, you would've forgotten about your dick throbbing between your legs.

"Need help with that?" Hermione was already trying to put her chaotic hair into a ponytail- who were you to refuse a queen of what she wants?

"Yes, please."

-

-Taglist-

@LinkinRavenclaw

@re-blog-side-blog

@catboyazula

[samwisethewitch]

Pagan Paths: Feri

Feri (sometimes spelled Faery) is an American neopagan tradition. Like Traditional Wicca, Feri is an initiatory tradition but does not place any limitations on who can be initiated. Although the requirement for initiation makes this religion less easily accessible, Feri has had a huge influence on modern neopaganism, including influencing other (non-initiatory) traditions like Reclaiming. For that reason, I think it’s important that we discuss Feri as part of our ongoing exploration of modern paganism.

This post is not meant to be a complete introduction to Feri. Instead, my goal here is to give you a taste of what Feri practitioners believe and do, so you can decide for yourself if further research would be worth your time. In that spirit, I provide book recommendations at the end of this post.

History and Background

Feri was founded by Victor Anderson and his wife, Cora, in the United States in the 1960s. Like Gerald Gardner, Victor Anderson claimed not to have created his tradition, but to have been initiated into it and then later added to it. In Anderson’s case, he claimed to have been initiated into witchcraft by a faery when he was nine years old.

The Andersons called Feri “the Pictish Tradition” and claimed that it was originally the Craft of the “Little People” in Ireland and Scotland. Victor Anderson was also influenced by Vodou and Hawaiian indigenous spirituality, although his connections to these traditions (both of which are closed) is unclear. Some modern Feri practitioners have made efforts to distance their practice from these elements appropriated from closed cultures, but Feri remains a very eclectic tradition that encourages initiates to “use what works.” Because of this, no two Feri practices are exactly alike.

There is another, more mythologized account of the birth of Feri, shared by author and Feri warlock Storm Faerywolf in his book Betwixt & Between. (In this book, Faerywolf uses the spelling “Faery,” but he is a member of the tradition founded by the Andersons.) In this myth, a group of powerful spiritual beings known as the Watchers rebelled against a false god millennia ago and taught magic to mankind. These Watchers are the fae, and they intermarried with humans and are the origin of all magic traditions. As the story goes, it was one of these Watchers who initiated Victor Anderson into what would later become known as Feri.

Because Feri traces its origin back to these spiritual ancestors, initiation is an important part of the tradition. When someone is initiated, they are said to be made a part of this Feri lineage, similar to how newly baptized Christians are said to be made a part of Christ’s family. This means that, in order to truly practice Feri, you must find a Feri teacher to train and initiate you.

Over the decades since the Andersons founded their tradition, many different lineages of Feri have formed, each with their own unique approach. Some are more visible and more involved with the public, while others practice under strict secrecy. Many of the practices and beliefs that are common in modern Feri come from the Bloodrose lineage.

Core Beliefs and Values

In the words of Cora Anderson, “the Craft is about doing right by one another and loving everyone you see.” However, Feri does not have a universal moral code — there is no Feri equivalent to the Wiccan Rede. While love and kindness are highly valued, the Andersons did not differentiate between light and dark magic and encouraged their followers to use magic to defend themselves when necessary. (You may have noticed that, like in Wicca, magic is an integral part of Feri.)

The Feri Tradition teaches that every person has three souls, each with its own characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses. These souls have different names in different lineages, but Faerywolf identifies them as the talker (the “mental soul” associated with the ego/personality), the fetch (the “animal soul” associated with the subconscious and the primal mind), and the holy daemon or god soul (the part of the self that comes directly from God Herself and is able to commune with gods and spirits as equals). Much of the work of Feri revolves around aligning these three souls into a fully realized whole.

Another important part of Feri philosophy is embodied by the symbols of the Iron and Pearl Pentacles.

Iron is a grounding metal, and contemplating the Iron Pentacle keeps practitioners grounded in their astral travel. Feri initiates not only invoke the Iron Pentacle, but seek to embody it by moving through each point on the pentacle and addressing any blocks or hangups in the associated area of their lives. The five points are sex, pride, self, power, and passion. When all five of these points are in balance, we are able to confidently and effectively work our magic in the world. For example, we should not be afraid of sex, but we shouldn’t be obsessed with it either; we should take pride in our accomplishments, but shouldn’t be too full of ourselves; you get the idea. An initiate who fully embodies the Iron Pentacle is fully centered in their own divine power, as well as their physical body.

The Pearl Pentacle is the compliment to the Iron Pentacle. While the Iron Pentacle is personal, the Pearl Pentacle is transpersonal — it represents the qualities needed to form healthy relationships with others. Some Feri practitioners believe that each point on the Pearl Pentacle represents the “higher form” of one of the points of the Iron Pentacle. In the words of Victor Anderson, “when taken together, the Iron and the Pearl embody the divine union that is necessary to fully awaken the awareness of our divine natures.”

The points of the Pearl Pentacle are: love (defined as a genuine desire for union; can be said to be the higher form of sex), law (as in, the natural laws that govern our universe and our actions; can be said to be the higher form of pride), knowledge (learning from lived experience; can be said to be the higher form of self), power (also a point on the Iron Pentacle — here, it refers to our ability to share power with others), and wisdom (the balance between logic and emotion, head and heart; can be said to be the higher form of passion). The way these points are taught, and their relationship to the Iron Pentacle, may be different in different Feri lineages.

Feri practitioners believe that, by embodying the Iron and Pearl Pentacles, they can achieve a state known as the Black Heart of Innocence, which is defined as “sexual innocence.” It can also be thought of as the innocent, untainted state of small children and animals. This is the natural state of human beings, before we are conditioned to be ashamed or afraid of our sexual impulses.

This brings us to a final point of Feri philosophy: in Feri sex is sacred, as it was through a sexual act that God Herself created the universe. As Faerywolf puts it, “sex is a sacrament in our tradition.” That doesn’t mean that all Feri rituals have a sexual component, but some of them might. Mostly, the sacredness of sex requires Feri practitioners to live in a healthy relationship with their nature as sexual beings.

Important Deities and Spirits

The central deity in Feri is called Star Goddess or simply God Herself. She is the androgynous source of all life, “having within Her all principles, powers, and potencies of Nature.” (Quote from The Heart of the Initiate by Victor and Cora Andersons.) Star Goddess is not only the source of the others Gods, but the source of all life, including humans.

According to the Feri creation myth, in the beginning, Star Goddess was alone in the cosmic void, until she came upon a reflection of her own light. She was so enamored that she made love to her own reflection, and from this act of self-pleasure gave birth to all things.

Star Goddess often appears as a black-skinned woman whose skin is dotted with stars. In ritual, she is often represented with a large black candle.

Nimüe is an aspect of Star Goddess, a maiden who represents the Black Heart of Innocence. She rules over new life, growth, and potential.

Nimüe may appear as a child or a young woman. She can be represented in ritual with flowers (especially pink or white flowers) or with a waxing crescent moon.

Mari is the Great Mother, Star Goddess as the embodiment of pure manifestation. She is associated with the earth, moon, sea, and sky — it is she who gives life and form to all things. The earth is said to be her body, and she is said to be “the spirit of every woman.”

Mari may appear a a pregnant woman. She can be represented in ritual with images of the earth, the moon, or of mothers.

The Hag, also known as the Crone, is the primal Dark Goddess and Queen of the Dead. She is the archetypal witch, but also a grandmother and wise woman. Some believe that it is to her we return when we die.

The Hag often appears as a wizened old woman. She can be represented in ritual with images of ravens and/or vultures, or with a silver sickle.

Star Goddess has two children and consorts, the Divine Twins. They are the personification of duality — light and dark, good and evil, spirit and matter, united in a balanced pair. They may appear as brother and sister, as two lovers of any combination of genders, or as mortal enemies.

The Twins may appear as the Scarlet Serpent and the Azure Dove, who represent the duality of fire/water and earth/air. In ritual, they are often represented with a matching set of candles, one red and one blue.

The Blue God, sometimes called the Peacock God, is born from the union of the Divine Twins — he contains within himself all duality and appears with a combination of male and female features. He is associated with the divine spark within all living things, including one of the three human souls, which Faerywolf calls the holy daemon. He is the god of opposites, and exists in a permanent liminal state. He contains within him both good and evil, beauty and darkness.

The Blue God may appear as a young, androgynous or hermaphroditic person with blue skin. In ritual, he is often represented with peacock feathers.

Krom, also known as the Horned God, is the god of fertility, light, and heat. He is sometimes described as the consort of the Goddess as Mari. He is God as father and lover and is overtly sexual in nature. He has solar associations, but is also the lord of the harvest.

Krom may appear as a man with the head of a stag, glowing with the sun’s warmth. He can be represented in ritual with images of stags, bulls, phalluses, or the sun.

The Arddu (pronounced “ar-THEE”) or the Dark God is described as the “crone aspect of the God.” He is the god of witches, the king of the dead, and the spirit of winter. It is said that when we die, we must confront the Arddu before we can return to the Hag.

The Arddu often appears as an old, androgynous man, with the head and legs of a goat and the wings of a bat. He can be represented in ritual with images of skulls and bones.

Deity in Feri is complex and fluid. All of the goddesses can be said to be different aspects of one Goddess, and all of the gods can be said to be different aspects of one God. Furthermore, all of the deities, both gods and goddesses, can be said to be extensions of Star Goddess. Victor Anderson believed that everything is connected and that the Gods exist within the Universe and the individual. As he said, “God is self, and self is God, and God is a person like myself.”

In addition to the deities, there are also spirits called Watchers and Guardians who play an important role in Feri. The Watchers are mysterious celestial entities, said to be the fathers of magic. Guardians are spirits associated with the elements, who are called on to guard the circle during ritual. Some Feri practitioners believe that the Guardians are Watchers, while others see them as two distinct groups of spirits.

Feri Practice

As stated earlier, much of the work of Feri involves embodying the Iron and Pearl Pentacle in order to return to the Black Heart of Innocence. This is done through ritual, meditation, ecstatic trance, art, energy work, and/or magic.

Feri is an ecstatic tradition, which means many of its rituals and practices revolve around achieving an ecstatic state. Ecstasy is sometimes defined as the state of being completely absorbed in the focus of your attention, and other times as the removal of the consciousness from normal functioning. In Feri, ecstasy is used as a tool for spiritual growth.

Astral travel also plays a role in Feri practice. A Feri practitioner may use trance states to leave their body and enter the spirit realm, where they can encounter the gods, Watchers, faeries, and other spirits firsthand. In some traditions, this travel forms the backbone of the practice.

Art and creative expression are other tools used for spiritual growth in Feri. Visual art and poetry in particular are often used to express spiritual concepts or to help the initiate process what they have learned. Victor Anderson was a known poet and published a collection of devotional poetry called Thorns of the Blood Rose — many later Feri practitioners have followed in his footsteps.

Feri is considered a magic tradition as well as a religion, and many Feri practitioners consider themselves witches or warlocks. Magic is seen as a way of directing the universal life energy that makes up all things, and is a natural extension of our divine power as each of us is a part of Star Goddess.

Like Wiccan rituals, Feri rituals sometimes begin with casting a circle and calling the quarters. However, Feri uses different language and gestures for the circle casting, with a greater focus on the earth and the circle as an extension of the Goddess’s body. While in Wicca, the circle is used for every ritual, in Feri it may only be used for some rites.

Further Reading

If you are interested in Feri, I recommend reading the book Betwixt & Between by Storm Faerywolf. This is an excellent introduction to the tradition, written by the founder of the BlueRose lineage. You may also be interested in reading the works of Victor and Cora Anderson — though Feri has changed a lot since it was founded, the Andersons’ teachings still lie at the core of the tradition.

Because Feri is an initiatory tradition, you can only go so far on study alone. Eventually, you will have to find a teacher to train and initiate you. Without this initiation, what you are doing is not, and cannot be, Feri. Thankfully, it is becoming ever easier to find online training, so you can walk the Feri path no matter where you live. The BlueRose lineage, which was founded by Storm Faerywolf, offers online training and initiation through The Mystic Dream Academy. Some other Feri teachers also have online offerings — look around on social media to see who is currently accepting students.

If you choose not to pursue initiation, you can still incorporate elements of Feri lore and philosophy into your practice, as long as you acknowledge that what you are doing is no longer Feri. In fact, many elements of Feri survive in other, related traditions such as Reclaiming, which we’ll discuss in the next installment of this series.

Resources:

The Heart of the Initiate by Victor and Cora Anderson

The Spiral Dance by Starhawk

Betwixt & Between by Storm Faerywolf

The official Feri Tradition website (feritradition.com)

[oreostacker]

It was a normal day in Splaintcaster, nine am temperature reaching 80 degrees but feeling 85. Big puffy clouds lazily drifted through the sky as if to judge which spot would be the perfect place to later turn angry and cry warm tears about it. There were birds here and there but far to little to take interest in them.

Further away from the center of Splaintcaster but not too far from the rest of the living lives there, we see Barbara sitting on her porch. She has blonde and silver hair, a frame that looks like it supported life and icy grayish blue eyes.

She's sitting with a curve in her posture, feet up and crossed on a table and her hands wrapped around a cup of coffee that tastes of hazelnuts. She's wearing an orange dress with yellow flower designs along the bottom and a yellow shall wrapped around her shoulders. Her eyes are staring, glazed over, looking through her surroundings and not taking them in no facial features to be detected as to what she may be feeling.

Hurrying up the street, on her brown horse, wild with happiness and amazement, we see Kara. Kara has a similar face shape to Barbara.

But they have more differences than similarities. Kara's hair is brown and Grey, with more Grey than brown. Her eyes while the same shape are in fact chestnut brown with honey being stirred in em, if viewed in sunlight. Her frame also carried life but was not as wide as Barbara's (surprising all who found that Kara carried more lives than Barbara.) Kara while older stood two inches shorter than Barbara as well.

Kara came flying, wearing a deep blue dress with a brown shall and brown boots to match. She also had a brown money pouch strung across her hips. Though hilariously, riding at break neck speeds, she was trying to balance as still as possible a container in between her legs.... while on a horse...... that has four legs that must move...... and not on a well paved road..... a feat that humans would struggle with if just walking with a full cup of water on two legs.

"BARBARA, BARBARA!!! YOU'VE GOT TO TRY THIS!!!"

Turning to look with bewilderment in her eyes,

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING? BESIDES LOOKING LIKE A HOT MESS OF A TWENTY YEAR OLD AGAIN?!?!"

Now stopped and attempting to get down with her precious box,

"Can, can you, can you get over here please? I'm having a hard time trying not to drop this."

Setting her coffee aside and making it down the three steps to the mess in question.

"What is it anyways? Oooo smells nice. Where'd you get this? I don't recognize this box from a bakery, did Linda make this ?"

"No, Linda didn't make this, here I'll take it back let's go inside, it's a sugar cream pie, and I wasn't planning on buying the whole thing but I had a slice and knew you need to try this.

I swear it's like an angle and a dove had a baby and God blessed it and the clouds gave it a fluffy dress to look cute in while it dances in your mouth."

Ha! "Can't be that good it's really easy to screw this pie up and make it a swampy mess, you still never said where you got this thing from, put it on the table I'll grab some plates, There's fresh coffee in here if you want some?"

Setting the box down and removing the lid we see a skewed pie

Tsk "crap"

Mmm? "What's wrong?"

Two plates are set on the table followed by the sound clinks from the forks,

"I may have messed up the pie, I think the taste will obviously be fine but presentation wise....."

"It looks like a crazy woman was holding it while flying down the road on a horse looking like she stole the queens jewelry."

"Hey when you try this you'll be glad I was trying to share it with you instead of hiding it."

"My hopes are getting higher by the minute, said with a humorous dead glare at her sister, again where'd ya get this thing?"

"Church was having a bake sale remember? This was the second thing I tried the first thing I tried was a slice of Linda cake for a nickle of bronze an-, "

"Wait you got a slice of Linda cake, didn't buy me a slice, as you can clearly tell I forgot that today was the bake sale day, then decided that this pie was worth buying the whole of instead of getting all of the Linda cake? Is that what you're telling me right now?"

"Yes, now-,"

Scooping out two... slices... Barbara interrupts again,

"Then this pie better be worth gold, yer insane for one not getting me a slice of Linda cake-"

"YOU WEREN'T THERE?? how is that my fault?-"

"AND TWO, for not buying the Linda cake, she makes that like twice a year If you don't specifically ask nicely for it as your present on yer birthday. And three you could have imagined that this pie tasted like all that, agian very easy to mess this one up what if yet wrong? And you got the cake flavoring messed up with the pie flavoring?!?"

Huffing out air while dropping her head back she does a little dramatic push of the plate towards Barbara,

"Shut up and try this thing."

Staring at her sister with her arms crossed one eyebrow raised and leaning back into her dining room chair she waits for the face of awe to cross the other's.

Barbara purses her lips and digs for an even mesh of pie filling to crust on her fork, leaning forward over the table she looks through her eyelashes over to Kara who's waiting impatiently for her to take a bite. She rolls her eyes and blinks back to her fork before finally taking a bite.

It sits there on her tongue with smug satisfaction. The kind that a little girl will show after she beats a boy in a sport that the boy claims to be a master in. And it's just too beautiful to swallow. I mean how is this possible.... no variation of this pie has ever turned out this decedently before, she clearly died and had gone to heaven this is God's food that's being eaten it has to be....

Ahem?????

"You gonna finish that bite or just carry it with you like a toddler does a rock?"

"I'm... working on... it...give meh... a seconmd.."

Swallowing and looking fully at Kara,

"How in the hell does it taste that damn good?"

"I know right?"Answering with a smile

"No I mean how?"

"I Know," she happily groans while moving to grab her own fork.

"Its too good of a thing to pass on so I bought it for five silver nickel pieces and one gold nickel peice."

"That.... may be too much but I'm not judging, give another slice wouldya"

Sliding the box closer to her

"As you won't shut up about, it is really easy to screw up this pie, so no, it was worth everything I spent, I regret nothing from this purchase."

"Who made it anyways?"

"I'don't know, but I mean we can ask Linda or mom, you had to sign up with what you were bringing so that you could be thanked by the pastor for bringing something in, so shouldn't be that hard to find out. Why?"

"This is the best sugar cream pie we've ever had in our lives.... from the first taste of table food to now Nothing has ever tasted better..., I want the recipe and or I want to hire this person for the rest of their or my life to be in charge of my desserts from now on."

"You mean you'd willingly give up all other desserts for this pie?"

" I mean I'd willingly give up all other foods and live and die by this pie. Would you judge me or care if I have another slice?"

"No, cause I'm also working on slice three."

Talking continued and the pie was nicely paired with hazelnut coffee. Soon the pie was gone and they were still talking about their individual and their children's lives not realizing that the pie was still gone...

they had a whole pie to themselves and they still talked assuming there was some left. Their problem going un noticed for thirty more minutes and finally the horrible truth was revealed to their mouths and brains.

[popculturebuffet]

Ducktales: Woo-oo! Review! or From the Top

Hello all you happy people! And to those of you just joining this blog, welcome I review ducks, other animated shows and comics... and today’s review is special for me. For a number of reasons. For starters it’s a reminder how far i’ve come. See I always wanted to be a reviewer, ever since high school when a friend showed me a certain online reviewer whose now dead to me, and opened me up to a world of much better reviewers who i’m still fans of to this day, and ones who came after them , and after that and so on and so on. I so badly wanted a community to belong to I struggled to be a youtube reviewer but frankly lacked the talent or self confidence back then to try, so my attempts over the decade were a series of stops and starts. Of me starting to find my niche writing only to stop because I hated myself so much, and still struggle with that, i’d tell myself I could never do it, I wasn’t good enough, I wasn’t funny enough and no one cared. I kept shutting myself down AGAIN AND AGAIN, for far too long. 

But that all changed a year ago next month: I’d long been a fan of the Ducktales Reboot. I was caustiously optimistic when it was announced. The optimism came from a deep abiding love of scrooge as a character despite not having dove into his comics that deep, I didn’t have an easy way at the time, thanks to life and times and what comics I had read, and was excited to see a fresh reboot closer to the comics with my eternal boy Donald Duck back in the main character. The caution.. came from the fact that at the time we’d gotten a string of bad to medicore reboots: Teen Titans GO, Powerpuff Girl, and Ben 10 which started pretty meh but has turned into alirght from some of the later episodes I saw. I wanted to be hyped to all hell but I had no proof this wasn’t going to be another dumbed down reboot. Then comic con came, the first teaser poster dropped, and my skepticism died.

It was perfect: a barksian art style with it’s own twists! Donald full on display! And best of all the triplets FINALLY had not only unique outfits but personalities! I’ve long went on in my reviews about how much that annoyed me and while it worked for the barks comics ever since then it’s just felt like a waste to have three characters there.. and not even the SLIGHTEST difference. 

My anticipation only grew with the full trailer, the promo posters as more and more info showed how good this series would be, how unique it’d be, and how much tw as taking what made the comics great, giving us a better distalation of that while still being very much it’s own beast. And once this episode dropped.. that faith was unfounded. Woo-oo! is without hyperbole, one of the best pilots i’ve seen, one that introduced the entire main cast perfectly, gets the series tone and mission statment out just right and in general set the stage for one of the best shows of the 2010′s (and 2020′s, even if it only lasted a year and some change). Wheras Teen Titans GO actively tried to take a dump on it’s source material, they thankfully have stopped that but it dosent’ make those early years any less grating, Ducktales was a breath of fresh air that honored the past while making i’ts own future. I tried talking about it but it was all in other failed attempts at reviewing: solo podcasts, my breif second video review career.. stuff no one rightly cared about and I just couldn’t get the hang of. 

So this is where we loop back to last year: I decided to finally try and cover it one more time, not realizing this would be my last chance as it came out anyway, and since I was doing text reviews but my output had slid in the new year, I decided to review Season 3 as it came out. If it bottomed out I could always stop.... and I just never did. I kept going, eventually finding new fans, a patreon (The other one’s an old friend of mine), and not only got paid doing what I love.. but found some peace.  I reviewed other shows as they came out, covered things i’d wanted to cover for years like life and times, scott pilgrim and x-men,. I covered other shows as they came out, found people willing to talk over my opinions and found my niche at long last. 

So that’s why the long speech folks: After almost a year of reviewing i’m properly covering the start of something that made me happier than I had been in a long time and gave me hope during one of the worst periods of ALL our lives. Something i’ve wanted to cover since I finally got started last year, and something truly amazing. So i’d be honored if you’d join me under the cut as I talk about the genesis of one of the best series Disney has ever put out. 

Behind the Scenes Stuff:  Most details I could find were sparse. it took going back to the first month the show came out and looking at a LOT of unrelated questions to finally find out Frank and Matt outright pitched the show. This dosen’t suprise me as both are huge ducktales fans with Matt having drawn his own duck comics as a kid and Frank taking it an extra mile having sang the theme song in his first grade talent show, worked it into his vows and got his first daughter’s first word to be “Woo-oo”. It’s very clear this show as a labor of love for them something they dreamed of Disney made possible. 

Otherwise I don’t have much on the genisis of the show: It was in the earliest ideas going to be a revivial but Frank and Matt both decided against it , deciding it’d be unfair to expect kids from 30 years after the original to know the source material, and instead just starting it over outright, which was the right call especailly with Alan Young’s passing. 

Design wise I found quite a bit of concept art thanks to one website, and it’s incredibly intresting. This is why i’ve really gotten into art books: I like seeing this early stuff what characters used to be, figuring out or outright hearing from the creators mouths why they changed it that sort of thing. 

Starting off we have some early designs for Donald, with him wearing the sailor suit as a kid but his Quackshot outfit as an adult, something I honestly wish they’d kept but get why they changed it: The iconic sailor suit both helps contrast him with della and fits his reluctance to adventure in season 1 more. I still wish that they worked the Quackshot outfit in somewhere, but they worked in so damn much, it’s hard to complain> Though I probably will make a list of “things I wished they’d worked” in at some point and i’d be lying inf I siad my mind wasn’t currently turning the gears to figure out how to work this into a fanfic. Oohhh maybe as Dewey’s outfit as an adult but blue, obviously. 

Next we have Donald settled more into his final apperance as well as the boy’s first outfits.  As you can tell from both of these the show originally went more with the classic art style before getting the one we’re familiar with now, one I love by the way and was made to combine a classic cartoon style with the visual of the comics. Donald originally had his classic outfit before they transitioned to the more barks style one, a good call.  

The interesting bit though is obviously the boys original outfits which i’m honestly bummed didn’t make it for Huey and Louie, not so much Dewey minus the visor. I do get the changes though: The hoodie Dewey had fit WAY beter on Louie, and the lumberjack shirt didn’t quite fit the nerdier huey. Still look nice. Dewey’s is okay, but only the visor is something I really gregret them removing same with louie’s fedora. It would’ve been neat ot keep the hat thing, but have each hat be unique. Likely they simplified things to make animation easier and simply removed the hats for some reason, but it’s nice ot see these more detailed original drafts and it is VERY interesting to find that differentiating the triplets was something planned from the earliest concept art. Though given Matt and Frank said in interviews they wanted a more natural family feel, it’s not a huge surprise. 

Scrooge like everyone BUT the boys thus far, naturally also had his original outfit at first, but like he ended up doing in the series rotated a bit, if not as much in the final product. We also see a protoype for his final design, the old coat but with a jacket over it in the last image. I also notice Donald seemed a lot more like his old comics self in the concept art with quackshot!donald. 

Like everyone else, Webby and Launchapd were originally their 87 deisgns, though Launchpad’s slightly diffrent jacket and green scarf were changed from the start. Webby is the closest to her 87 design, and as shown in the previous Lena concept art from my “Spies Like Us and Dime after Dime” double feature, she still had her new personality. More on that in a bit. 

Finally we have Flintheart, whose design is a bit diffrent from 87: He was a chub from day one it appears, though they’d exagerate it, and his beard was a bit longer at first like his other incarnations. 

Beakly is largely unchanged form 87, only given a coat, which would gradually be mofidied, much liekt he boys into her current outfit. 

As you can tell Beakly, Webby and Launchpad were all there from day one as they wanted them from the original ducktales just updated. 

Production wise they wanted to go handrawn, chose the style they did to have something close to the comics that felt classicly aniamteda t the same time, I feel they succeeded and wanted a show that felt like the original. I do think this show has it’s own feel but it does feel ducktales. I badly hope for an artbook at some point though as this show probably hada  LOT more intresting concept art. Seriously Disney I will PAY YOU to look at your neat art. Please. 

So they created a fully formed world and put the characters in it, wanting it to feel like the world had existed before and had throughly been explored and letting our young heroes be the watson to Donald and Scrooge’s holmes. 

Finally Della was indeed part of the initial pitch and a core idea from day one as every family has secrets and Della felt like one that had been lurking around the fringes of the story for 80 years. The rest of the production stuff i’ll weave in as we go but first one last stop, the STELLAR voice cast, none of whom outsideo f Tony i’ve talked about before sooooo...

The All Star Cast

The casting was outstanding here, with Matt admitting the cast brought a LOT to the characters, especially Ben Schwartz whose taken on Dewey was so unique and intresting they actually rewrote some of his dialouge for the pilot to fit this version better. This is far and away one of the best casts in western animation, most coming from comedy backgrounds and one or two coming from a voice acting background, but all bringing their absolute best. And since our main 8 are all in the pilot let’s run them down along with Keith Ferguson shall we?

Playing everyone’s faviorite billionare scotsman  and one of the very few to ever do so, we have David Fucking Tennant. David was their “First and only choice” and for good reason: David is a talented actor with a MASSIVE amount of stage, tv and audio drama credits. His biggest and best known role is playing the 10th Doctor on Doctor Who, which while not my faviorite (That’d be matt smith, as he’s both the one I came in on and hte one who got me hooked) he’s still  VERY close second and damn talented and I need to watch more of his tenure. Outside of that just to condense it to his ongoing roles on stuff and bigger roles: Filmwise he’s had starring roles in the Fright Night remake, You, Me and Him, Fish Without Bicycles and Bad Samartains, and is set to do a voice for the upcoming Loud House Movie, which excites me to no end. 

TV wise where most of his roles have been he got his first big starring role on the Telly with the BBC Mini series Taking Over the Asylum in the late 90′s. He’d go on to make a career out of doing mini’s for a while, also taking part in He Knew He Was Right, The Quatermass Experiment Remake, Casanova, Secret Smile.. and Blackpool. I saved Blackpool for last before we move into the Who era as if you’ve never heard of it.. it’s REALY fucking weird. It’s a jukebox musical about a man who wants to make Blackpool, a real city, into the new vegas and Tennat plays a cop investigating a case around the guy and also trying to get with his wife because they used to date and because our lead is philandering jackass. That’s already kinda nuts.. but then you get to the fact the songs are sung OVER the original songs instead of making a new version of them. It’s surreal to be sure but if you can find it it’s worth it for the handful of good numbers and how weird it looks and you can find clips of the songs on youtube if your intrested. Here’s a starter. 

Your also welcome. He’d go on to play Detective Alec Hardy in Broadchurch to critical aclaim as well as be a part of it’s short lived american remake, would play the Fugitoid in tmnt 2007, Kilgrave in Jessica Jones, one of his few post who roles i’ve seen or heard besides Scrooge and easily some of his best work he NAILS that purple bastard perfectly, would make his own show Staged about a fictional version of himself putting on a Stage play that’s still ongoing, and is currently , along with Ducktales as it wraps up, the voice of Lord Commander on Final Space, with the character returning this season judging by the trailers to fan delight and terror. He’s a VERY talented actor and voice actor and I do hope he goes on to do more and more voice work in years to come as, with his background in radio, he was born for it. 

He was also born for this roll, playing Scrooge perfectly and easily matching Alan Young in quality, not a small feat and i’ts VERY obvious why he was their one and only choice. 

Next up is another legend, Tony Anselmo who we’ve talked about before when I covered legend of the Three Cablleros: He’s been Donald’s voice since shortly before Ducktales, hasn’t done much else but given he’s THE voice for the character and this show let him show off one hell of a range with teh voice, he dosen’t really need other credits. The man is a treasure and I fear loosing him one day and fear for whoever replaces him as they have a LOT to live up to. 

Getting into the triplets, we’re going by age so starting off we have Huey, voiced by Danny Pudi. Like most of this cast aside from Toks Ogladyve and Beck Bennet (Who I probably HAD seen on SNL but didn’t really know or look out for him on there till after Ducktales), I not only knew Danny but was a huge fan of his going in. This is due to his breakout role on the glorious sitcom Community, which sadly only had a handful of i’ts cast show up on this show. I mean you got Lin Manuel Miranda I’m sure Donald Glover would’ve said yes too. He grew up with Ducktales. Regardless his role as meta guy Abed was easily the best of the cast on that show, with Glover as troy a very close second and the two working at their best as a duo. Outside of that he’s had a few roles being a regular on Powerless, which I forgot existed and currently on Mythic Quest: Raven’s Banquet, and shockingly hasn’t done a ton of voice work. And given his performance as huey was one of the best parts of this show he REALLY, REALLY SHOULD. Please Danny. He’s also a loving husband, father and surprisingly a marathon runner. Never would’ve guessed.

Next up is SNL Alumn of 9 years, Bobby Monynihan. Bobby is naturally best known for that, my faviorite role of his being Ass Dan. That’s right bitch you know he’s going to live fore..

ASS DAN 1981-2021

He’ll be back. Outside of SNL he’s done a bunch of minor roles. He’s currently on the tragically mediocre sitcom Mr. Mayor, and voiced Panda on We Bare Bears. Hopefully he keeps up the good work as he deserves better than he’s gotten and Ducktales proves it. 

Finally for the triplets we have a rising star in voice acting, Ben Schrwartz. At the time Ducktales launched, I was a fan of his from his roll on parks and Rec as Jen Ralphio, aka older scummier Dewey. 

Outside of his historic recurring role here he played a main role on House of Lies, a show I need to go back to, and has done other live action rolls but has REALLY hit his stride in voice acting. He started with voicing Randy Cunningham in Randy Cunningham 9th grade ninja and since then has hit the ground running: He was Rutabega on Bojack, Josh on Bob’s Burgers, and went on to complete the trifecta of blue nostalgic characters after voicing dewey by voicing Leo in Rise of the TMNT (and having one of the most unique and intresting versions of the character to play) and reprised the roll for the upcoming film. And of course he hit it HUGE by playing Sonic in the suprsingly fantastic Sonic the Hedgehog movie, and will do so again for the sequel and might even take up the roll for the games now Roger Craig Smith has retired. We shall see. Point is this guy’s at the top of his game and Dewey is part of that. Like with his brothers I can’t picture anyone else playing him. 

Rounding out the kids is Webby, played by the wonderous Kate Micucci. Kate is a lovely talented woman who mostly showed up in smaller parts, was part of the musical duo garfunkel and oates which even got their own tv show, and is currently a fairly prolific voice actor with this being her best known roll. I also had a bit of a crush on her once can you tell? Regardless besides absolutely nailing it as Webby she’s voiced Julie Kane in the crimnally short and even more crimnally not on Disney+ Motorcity, “Irma” in the 2012 TMNT cartoon, and the fact that “Irma” is in quotes should tell you how big a waste I felt it was having her NOT actually be Irma, despite Kate’s massive talent, the fact that Irma hadn’t been in anything since the 87 cartoon, and the fact that for added “Fuck you audience points” her krang form was voiced by Gilbert Godfried, who I love but whose casting feels like they wanted to make the twist as grating as possible. Good job there. 

Anyways her second biggest voice gig was as Sadie on Steven Universe, which took WAY too long to show off her absolutely tremendous singing voice. She started voicing Velma Dinkley in the mid-2010′s and has since, voiced Milo’s sister Sarah on Milo Murphy’s Law, Dr. Fox on Unikitty, and most recently voiced a sentient present on close enough who did this. 

So yeah quite the career and like Ben she probably has a long and storied career in Voice Acting ahead. 

Next up is Beck Bennet as everyone’s friend Launchpad where he excels. He’s best known as a castmember on SNL outside of this, and shockingly hasn’t done a ton of voice work. The only other time i’ve caught him is in the same season of Close Enough as Luc, aka dude-bro satan. But like eveyrone else here who hasn’t done a lot of voice work so far or has been more selective I defintely hope he keeps going with it as he’s amazing. He and Ben will be co-starring on MODOK in May so i’m excited for that. 

Last up for the main cast is Beakly, voiced by  Toks Olagundoye, who I hadn’t heard of before this show and hasn’t done a lot outside of the two season sitcom the neighbors, the aliens one not the really terrible looking one, and a stint on Castle, but like everyone here deserves much more and if Beakly is any indication, really should stick with voice acting. 

Last up is Keith Ferguson as only he could as FLINTHEART GLOMGOLD, whose a staple in the voice acting community ever since 2000, and has had a TON of roles some of which I was unaware with him. Given Frank worked with him on Wonder Over Yonder, where he voiced Lord Hater to perfection, the two clearly have a close working relationship. He also has a close working relationship with Wonder creator Craig McCracken and has worked on all of his post-powerpuff girls show, voicing Bloo as his first major role, something I never would’ve guessed, and currently voicing Papa G on Kid Cosmic. 

Outside of Craig and Frank, he played both Karate Kid and Nemisis Kid on Legion of Super Heroes (Which really needs to come to HBO Max), Deputy Durland on Gravity Falls,  and Thunderbolt Ross on Avengers Earth’s Mighteist Heroes. He’s damn good and deserves the world for Glomgold alone and i’m glad Craig rung him up again as so far through my watch of Kid Cosmic he’s great. 

So with our cast in place, our past in place and you all likely ready to get on with it already let’s dive into the episode:

THE EPISODE: Part one Woo-Ooo!

We begin with a shot of a seagull flying overseagulls, a nice way to establish how this world works and how it bends expectations. They’d have to wait till season 3 to get a duck next to ducks but given that gag is one of the best of the series, it was worth it. 

Inside a house boat we meet Donald, Huey and Louie and get a sense of their personalities: Donald is panicked trying to get to a job interview and insists the boys wear life vests, showing his overprotectiveness and responsibility exclusive to this version. Louie stresses that Donald wear a suit instead of his normal clothes to properly impress the interviewer, showing his skill at people reading and manipulation, and Huey is making a nice, if messy, breakfast with a heartwarming message showing his heart and dedication. After finding out said Babysitter was sent to the wrong address, the boys TRY to hustle him out to stay alone.. only for Dewey to blow the scheme by starting the boat too early, letting Donald know he’s been had. Huey’s attempt to lie about it is of course the classic “Who’s Dewey?” Dewey’s caught wiring the boat and Donald throws them in the car, with Donald livid and the boys upset as their chafing at his constant overprotectiveness. 

Both sides aren’t wrong. tThe boys DID do something reckless, putting an old woman in the desert and risking their home just to go on a joyride. What they did was wrong.. but the boys AREN’T wrong for getting annoyed that he won’t let them DO anything and overly hovering over them when they CAN handle themselves as we’ll see. WE now know why: he lost their mother and his sister to her and scrooge’s recklesness. While he got therapy for his anger it’s clear he never properly got help about Della, and thus overcompensates by trying to keep what he has left of her alive. He means well.. but to them it comes off as him being manically overprotective with no good reason. They get into trouble because it’s the only way to DO anything away from him. He’s trying so hard not to loose them he almost has by the time hte series starts, and it’s telling that when they get context in Last Crash, they appricate him more from then on. They do love him, but their frustration is understandable even if what their doing is pretty damn stupid. But their also 10 and Donald’s the grown adult in therapy who should’ve dealt with this or tried to at least by now.

So with no other options Donald sets a course for McDuck manor which excites the boys who have heard of Scrooge McDuck and his exploits, each rattling off something they heard him do that fits their personality (Dewey picks him fighting a stone monster, Huey picks him uncovering a hoax and Louie picks his swimming in money. ) As Donald tries to get them to simmer down, they wonder what he’s up to

He’s up toooo.. depression. He’s in a room with his board, watching them with utter hate and sadness as they talk about cutting the invention and aviation departments. This scene plays ENTIRELY differently after the final two episodes of the season. Before it still plays well as Scrooge clearly resenting being stuck in a boring board meeting, having lost everything that made him him and just having lost his passion for life. Now? It plays as a man utterly disdainful of the men who made him give up on his daughter. While as far as he knows they did it to save his employees from his company collapsing, we know better now... and seriously where IS the rest of the board they just vanished after the Season 3 premiere.

I don’t mind only one being fleshed out, unlike the triplets we only NEED the one I mind that they just never explained it and still haven’t. Hopefully the finale will. 

But back on the plot, it now plays as Scooge just full of hatred for them, knowing they had to do what they did, even if they weren’t emebzlling but still hating them and himself. He’s likely not even paying attention anymore because he just dosen’t CARE: he has all the money int he world.. and it couldn’t bring him his daughter back. As he sadly puts the coins he was fiddling with back and says see you tommorow he can’t even close the vault without a struggle. As we’ll see later the strength never left, it’s not like he stopped execrising.. but he has nothing left to fight for. Nothing left to care about. He could adventure agian so far.. but without Della or Donald, as we’d learn two seasons later the reason he enjoyed it again... what’s the point? He has nothing left except his money. 

This is also a nice parallel to the final Chapter of LIfe and Times. I always felt the first half of woo-ooo was a spiritual adaptation of chapter 12 of that: Scrooge meets the boys for the first time and with their help, and Donalds in the story< Webby and Launchpad here, he regains his passion and more importantly his family after driving them away> The how is very different: he did in life and times due to sinking to his lowest point morally, then cruelly dismissing his family when they tried to welcome him home and bury the hatchet despite what he’d done. Here.. he made a HORRIBLE mistake, one that wasn’t entirely on him but still cost him everything and spent the decade instead of stewing or making more money trying desperately to undo it. The end result is the same, a dried out husk of a man with nothing left to loose and no will to gain anything.

This husk has launchpad though whose introduced as his driver and while good with subs and planes.. isn’t great on the road. After that though Donald pulls up hoping to drop the kids off before Scrooge arrives. Naturally this being a cartoon and Donald having tempted fate with that Scrooge shows up telling him to jettison that Jallopy at once. And finding out who it is, apart from asking how Donald is and Donald doing the same, dosen’t sway him. The boys however freak out after finding out Scrooge is Donald’s and there uncle, with my faivriote bit of that being Dewey exiting the car via a window and rolling across the roof back in. Amazing bit of animation. Wish I had a gif of that. 

Donald makes the situation plane and angry and asks “Can you do that without LOOSING THEM”. And scrooge is so painfully disarmed by his reminder of his past mistakes and the fact his surrogate son still resents him, that he agrees before realizing “Shit I have to watch children now don’t I” as Donald drives off. As you probably guessed, this is another scene that plays differently in hindsight, if not by much: It still plays as two men too stubborn and bitter to reconcile.. but now we know the why behind both their rages it feels even sadder. They both lost the person they cared about most but as it sadly happens in real life both have dug in their heels to reconcile, both feeling their right when neither completely is. While Donald was right to be upset at scrooge and della for what happened, and is mostly taking it out on scrooge because he’s the one left... he’s held onto his anger for 10 years instead of going to help when he’s unemployed, living in a dilapidated houseboat and trying ot raise three children alone and could’ve used what help scrooge would give. Scrooge is right to be upset that Donald is just selectively ignoring everything he’s done to save Della, but is too stubborn and prideful to apologize for what he DID do wrong and feels that’s enough to make up for it when , while it is enough that donald should forgive him, still dosen’t mean he dosen’t have a lot to apologize for. Both are just too angry and too much alike, as much as it woudln’t seem so, to settle with each other and see too much of what they lost. 

So the kids follow Scrooge.. who forgets to open the door, and Beakly lets them in. It’s a nice subtle bit. After some silence, Bentina TRIES to get her old friend and now employer to talk to them, but he naturally refuses and they do the talking, asking tons of questions.. and Dewey ends the conversation by accidently pressing the “imply he USED to be something rather than is something right now “ button

So Scrooge throws them in the twins old room, and Beakly gives them some marbles. You will give them b ack they will be counted. But another subtle touch I missed the first time is there... her sad look. She clearly doesn’t want to do this, but she has to play this carefully or else he might get mad and fire her on the spur of the moment. He’d obviously hire her back, where else is he going to get an ex spy who will both clean for him AND be his bodyguard and security. It’s a very small pool. Mostly because Beakly probably killed most of the other people who’d of fit that description during her spy days. 

Scrooge meanwhile is still rattled by Dewey’s statment, wondering if he really is a “used to be” instead of a “never left”. The fire is starting to spark again.. he just needs more kindling. And more kin. 

Meanwhile Louie and Huey marvel at Dewey’s “Brilliant’ breakout plan: hit the door knob with the sack of marbles til lit breaks. To be fair, they’ve known dewey as long as they’ve been alive and even by season 3 after he’s taken several levels in badass and cunning.. he still crashed a plane because his brother well-meaningly called him basic, and thought being nearly sacrificed the most times was an accomplishment. This is the best he could do and you all know it. It also works, so they can’t fault him for that... though he’s quickly kidnapped as are they. They wake up after the commerical break in a room with pure darkness, hung from the celing with a mystery person asking who they are and who they work for before Louie calls out for “uncle scrooge”... so she claps the lights back on and..

Well close. But it is Webby, who cuts them down, fangirls over meeting the nephews and asks who the evil triplet is. They all point to Louie who shrugs it off. I mean it was funny enough the first time but at this point I know he’s running several fradulent charites, almost all scamming his uncle. He’s earned that title. Webby puts them on the big board and then when asked they find out she’s Webby, her granny Beakly is housekeeper.  She then asks the big questons “Are we friends now?” “If we say yes will you let us live?” “Ha good one new best friend”

She then explains she dosen’t get to leave or anything even eat a hamburger. The boys are moved by this and Louie asks what she does for fun. She leads them to the vents and while Huey and Louie are a bit relcutant, Dewey naturally goes first pointing out it’s better than the marble room. They agree and are on their way. 

Okay unpinning that pin, the crew conciously updated Webby and Beakly as neither really had a lot of purpose in the original. It was also to conciously add more actiony females to the main family lineup, as both creators, both being fathers, preferred someone their daughters could look up to and would enjoy watching. Not someone perfect but someone intresting instead of someone who often got Kidnapped and whose main charactrisitcs were “Sweet and GIRL STEROTYPE” So cleverly they KEPT her being girly, having a skirt, liking ponies. .but also gave her all the training and skill of one Cassandra Cain, a sheltered background and an adorable personality that kept the sweetness but added her probably having killed a man at some point. It worked as Webby is one of the best parts of the show. 

Likewise Beakly was upgraded from fuddy duddy housekeeper, to badass former secret agent whose also a housekeeper, and bodyguard and confidant to scrooge. Demonstrated by her talk with him as he tries to put on his diving suit and go after the jewel of atlantis, having spotted the signs to go after it in the paper.. and wanting to prove a child wrong. Beakly points out the flaws in this, and tries to get him to connect to his family. Having lost hers, it’s easy to see why.. though the how’s a mystery.. for now i’m guess. We’ll see in the finale. But she’s Scrooge’s concisence and the one who can easiest reign him in, to the point two episodes directly have our heroes have to NOT call her or else the plot was end, but have that worked into the plot so it works. She’s the calm in his storm and hte one person he needs more than anyone else even if he dosen’t always realize it. He calls family “nothing but trouble” just as Dewey passes overhead. 

So naturally as Webby shows off Scrooge’s old treasures in a mysterious room, while the other Siblings are rightfully impressed, Dewey dismisses it as “fake” because he’s being a little shit, and they agree after seeing Donald, not knowing his reputation. The cutaway to him struggling with a stapler does not help> it’s only when Webby accidnetly uneleashes Captain Peghook, a vengeful ghost after scrooge, who gets his hand on a ghostly sword do they realize this time the monsters are real. Huey also accidently wakes up Manny, the headless manhorse! 

Things somehow get WORSE as Scrooge finds them.. but is in no state to argue and as our heroes duck and Huey tries to divise a plan.. Scrooge get’s his spark back once agian.. it’s starting to become an ember now... and he charges in despite Dewey’s cries of “No come back your old!”. It then gets VERY badass Scrooge: Oi! Beastie! What's it gonna take to shuffle you off to the afterlife? Captain Peg-Hook: The head of Scrooge McDuck! Scrooge: [cracks his neck, flips his cane around to wield like a sword] Would you settle for his hat?

Now that is how you show how badass Scrooge is in a few lines and gestures. HE proceeds to take both out, as they’ve now teamed up, easily, tricking peghook into cutting off the head of a statue of him in the area, throwinng it at him and finsihing the ghosts buisnesss (”I should’ve been more specifiiiicccccc”) and then giving Manny the head, earning him a loyal employee for life. So our days saved, the kids have faith.. and Scrooge is still pissed. He also reveals this isn’t a treasure room but the garage in what’s easily the best gag of the first half, possibly the whole special but one iconic moment is very close in that one. Webby concedes what about the stack of old magazines or the hose or.. okay he’s probably right. He berates them only for the kids to fire back, pointing out he threw them in a room, they just wanted to spend time with him... but it’s only Dewey throwing his words back in his face that pisses him off. Scrooge bellows at them to get out, clearly having internalized everything with donald into rage and trying to justify pushing eveyrone away instead of working at it... but this dosen’t have time to actually work, nor would Beakly actually throw three children out on the curb, as he hits a mystic gong.. the third time it’s been hit. And after realizing it’s already been hit twice Scrooge is faced with Pixu, the gold hutning dragon! And guess who has a giant bin of it wanting to snack on? Scrooge naturally climbs on the thing and the kids naturally want to follow, with Webby getting her first development by proudly announcing “I’m going to eat a hamburger” then explains the metaphor. They just need a pilto.. and as Launchpad has been saying but I forgot to add in “I’m a pilot”

So we get a GORGEOUS bit of Scrooge riding the dragon over the city, getting banged up as he does before finally being thrown off.. only for the kids to catch him with the planes help and try and come up with a plan. Scrooge overcomes his anger at them not staying put, especailly since Webby brings up the right weakness: as a wise man once said...

So they need some.. like say the Medusa Gauntlet Scrooge had in the garage.. that Louie naturally stole. Huey and Webby eyeroll him but they have what they need.. and Huey brought the hose and quickly comes up with a plan, tying scrooge in, and swinging him to Pixu. The kids hold on tight, Dewey calls his family awesome and our heroes win the day as Scrooge turns the dragon to stone, slips and falls.. and then GRACEFULLY dives into hte bin, showing off his diving skills and his badassery. The day is saved, the gauntlet and the dragon go in the bin for safe keeping and Scrooge calls the kids trouble.. and chuckles fondly. “Curse me kilts how i’ve missed trouble”

He’s impressed: Huey’s quick thinking, Louie’s pickpocketing, Dewey’s drive, and Webby’s magical knowledge all saved them. For once. .he’s happy again. And for the second time in life it took his family to remind him why he does this and show him the true fun of adventure: Getting to share it with those he love. And he finally has people to love again. He has family back, kids who look up to him and want to learn from him again, a REASON to adventure. Money and treasure and eveyrthig couldn’t bring della back.. but he at least sees now that whiel they certianly couldn’t.. they can bring him closely with what he has left. She’s gone, for now.. but she left behind three great kids who could use a mentor and Beakly brought him a fourth. And he just found out he has a pilot. The ember.. is now a raging flame. Scrooge is back. Because i’ts not the money or the glory.. it’s the thrill of it, the discovery.. and the family that makes adventuring worth while and he’s learned that lesson again. So he calls Beakly to clear his schedule.. forgetting she you know PUT A FUCKING PIN INTHE WALL the last time he asked her to play scretary and the onlyr eason she dind’t drive over the choke him to death, is that she’s probably happy he’s back on track.

Back at the interview Donald is stapled to the wall and gets the job.. not as an accountant mind but his employer needs a sailor.. and his employer is FLINTHEART GLOMGOLD. Oh boy. 

Part 2: Escape To/From Atlantis First the last bit of background I saved: Originally, Fenton and Gyro were supposed to show up here, starting a gag of Fenton showing up but not being named until “Beware the B.U.D.D.Y. System!”, setting up the sub. But the crew decided this took too much away from the focus on the duck family. The not naming him gag was also dropped, and I have two reasons why: Their given reason, which is it’d take up too much time and a logistical reason: While they gave a heartfelt pitch to Lin-Manuel Miranda, as frank wanted a strong Latino superhero to combat the lack of them on film, Frank and Matt probably thought they woudln’t get such a huge name or at least prepared for it.. and were delightfully suprised when Lin happily and tearfully agreed. So they likely scrapped it so they could properly promote the biggest name in their voice cast. Honestly it was for the best and they still go to do the idea with Drake in “The Duck Knight Returns!”, where it worked much better than it probably would have with Fenton. 

We open with the Glomgold Industries Employee Training Video! Encourging IP Theft, making things cheaper and general scumbaggery, and claming your the world’s most beloved scottish billionare. IN short the perfect introduction to everyone’s favorite insane, fake-scottish, scheming, egotistical , short sighted billionaire. As i’ve made transparent before, I fucking love the reboot version of Glomgold and he’s easily one of my favorite parts of the reboot. They clearly needded to find a new place for Glomgold in the grand scheme of things as the show was more about globetrotting adventure and family and less about getting contracts or bets about whose bigger money and more about family. While they DID do a classic bet storyline with season 2, it’s clear the old glomgold was just a bit too stiff to properly fit into this new zanier and deeper universe. 

So they instead remolded him as a half insane, knockoff scrooge, someone who PURPOSFULLY modeled himself after the guy to try and one up him, and instead of being a fairly low pitched schemer, was a bombastic idiot whose schemes were half baked, whose name was on everything he made, and whose only thing bigger than scrooge was his glorious ego. In short he was perfect for this series and perfect to show up way more often as a bumbling thorn in Scrooge’s side.. but one who COULD be effective in the right circumstances, as to not make him completely pointless. Keith was likewise the only person I could see in the roll now as with Hater he had a history of playing bombastic, egosticial morons, and made Glomgold into the enjoyable ball of ego, bombs, sharks and shouting we know and love. Some people didn’t take to this version after a while... I’m not one of those. I loved him here, I love him now, and he’s every bit as good in season 3 as he was at the start. He’s also wearing a kilt mcduck A KILT. A bit that’st STILL funny four years and 70 some episodes later. 

So we meet Gabby McStabberson and the Smashnikovs as they and Donald file in, though Donald is busy wrapping up a call with Scrooge, who assures them he has a low key day planned.. while in the sub getting ready to go to atlantis. And nearly drowning when Dewey tells Launchpad to dive while he and Scrooge are still up top. Cue credits. 

So on the sub we get our setup for the two main plots for the episode: While the main thrust of everything is Scrooge taking them to Atlantis, each leads to a diffrent plot. Louie talks to Donald and lies entirely about their day, worrying Webby.. who then reveals she just didn’t tell Beakly she took off or where she was going and encourages her to call and lie. To save time, i’m going to cover this subplot now minus the conclusion as it’s pretty simple and this review is already a day behind. Louie wants her to lie so she dosen’t worry, which is oddly sweet.. still a bit greasy, but it’s clear he means well and it shows in his own way the boy cares about Donald: Sure he’ll lie to the guy, and set up a fradulent charity to scam him.. but he also knows not to worry his dad-uncle and kows Donald is better off thinking their safe than knowing the truth. Granted it also prevents consequences for Louie.. but he’s not playing here here. He gets nothing out of Beakly not knowing the truth or helping some girl he just met, he’s just being NICE in his own twisty way. It’s a nice show of his depths: While louie will lie, cheat and steal Eddie Gurrero style, he does have a caring side underneath hit. He can read people well and while he primarily uses it to manipulate people, we’ll see time and time again that he can use it for good too and to help those he cares about. He’s nothing but supportive the whole plot, and even when he says “you can’t back that up” it’s more worrying about her and having a bit of crack than actually being a dick. 

So Webby tries lying, but is about as good as Huey is at it, saying “I’m at a friends house nothing, then makes up a clearly fake name, then says their only talking in swedish for a grandpa. Launchpad DOES help, but only by accident and snake venom. We’ll get to that. As I said this wasn’t the most complex plot. 

The main plot is our focus episode for dewey. In theory each of the kids was supposed to have one in the first five episodes: Dewey here, Webby in Daytrip of Doom, Louie in Great Dime Chase and Huey in Impossible Summit of Mt. Nevverest!. Given the last one was horribly delayed, he instead got Terror of the Terra Firmians, which in hindsight wasn’t the best spotlight episode for him. But it’s a good system; Introduce them all in the first half of the pilot then slowly focus on each one.  So now Idoloizing Scrooge, Dewey is desperate to be his sidekick and be seen as an equal and is in deep denial as scrooge instead has them all buckle up for a 17 hour ride and when Dewey questions the route, which skips the direct path.. but is clearly marked with monsters, Scrooge just snaps at him and shuts him down and disapoints the boy who only wants to prove himself to Scrooge. 

Naturally though, telling someone with that kind of need for attention and validation to wait goes poorly as he redirects the map while Launchapd is distracted.. and we find out WHY the trip is 17 hours as the direct route nearly gets them killed by mer-ducks, krakens and some sort of storm elemental. Dewey is bummed it didn’t work and annoyed to realize he’s just lumping them all together like Huey pointed out earlier. Huey is also delightful here, having brought travel bingo and sea shanties, clearly used to trips with his other uncle. And adorably taking after him. 

But Dewey’s deversion has done more than make him even MORE determined to prove himself to Scrooge whose just trying to NOT loose the son of the daughter he lost...

The Merducks have taken up residence in the bathroom, so they have to make a pitstop. Scrooge, CLEARLY forgetting how to take a trip with children, wasn’t prepared for this but they find a frieghter and make a stop. Naturally it’s GLOMGOLD’S freighter, where his sub took off from, and he and his minons including Donald find Scrooge using the bathroom.. and the boys to Donald’s rage. Unfortunately saying ‘I’ll kill him” to a raging sociopath who takes that as a sign to kill ALL of them, isn’t a smart move. 

So while Donald tries to plan to keep his family alive, said family arrives in Atlantis with a great bit of Scrooge trying to give a big speech only for them to see it first and ooh and ah. They touch down in the city.. which is flip turned upside down. Scrooge notes hti is odd but is able to read the hieroglypchs even upside downa nd notes there’s tones of deadly traps and that they shoudl stay back and..

Huey: Dewey ran in as soon as you said traps. 

So while Scrooge tries to prevent dewey loosing his head, Donald prevents launchpad loosing his and makes up an excuse about “if their dead now we can’t tourture them later” to cover his ass. Glomgold is impressed.  Dewey is Dewcipointed that the traps are upside down, though he does trigger some snakes that get launchpad. He’s fine just delirious. And possibly slowly dying but the fact he’s lived this long is a miracle. Maybe that’s why he’s missing for most of season 3 part 2, the snake venom caught up to him and drake and fenton need to find the cure. Anyways the rest of the party stays behind while Scrooge chases after Dewey, who naturally runs ahead AGAIN. 

Donald ducks out to use the bathroom, as Dewey tries the old dance through the laser grid routine.. but forgets the part where your supposed to actually avoid it, leaving it to an unseen Donald to stop the fire traps from barbqueing his boy. IT’s a really awesome sequence that shows off Donald’s still got it even if he dosen’t want it.  Scrooge naturally works smarter not harder and simply ziplines above like a badass and berates Dewey when he tells him he took “The easy way”

“Why would you want to take the hard way?” The argument that’s been brewing all episode bubbles up and once again both sides have a point: Scrooge rightfully points out Dewey’s being reckless, has no experince and needs to listen to Scrooge and learn something. Dewey claps back that Scrooge isn’t TEACHING them, just teling them to get behind him while he does things instead of trying to actively mentor them. He outright told them he was going to teach them so while Dewey’s been a wee bit overbearing, he’s right in being disappointed that Scrooge instead just wants them to be safe. I see it as his subconscious acting up: He wants and needs the kids along and is right ot keep them safe.. but is too scared to properly mentor them after what happened to Della and is just trying not to loose anybody. His methods have been right, to keep them safe.. he’s just been so determined to save them, he can’t properly TEACH them so he won’t have to forever or explain WHY. And given the First Adventure shows that while protective he did eventually let Della and Donald pull their weight.. but here he lost so much between adventures.. he just can’e bear loosing them. Dewey also rightfully points out he just lumps them together which in any other version wouldn’t be an issue, until the reboot I had no idea which one was which here? They have distinct outfits and personalities and you had 17 hours to actually get to know them. Probably less given the shortcut but still, several hours at a minimum. It’s things like this that make the series work: while there’s plenty of internal conflicts, at their best their nuanced ones, where if one character is clearly in the wrong they have a reason, and if both are right both are also a bit wrong, versus the original where it’d be scrooge or the boys grabbing the asshole ball at times (Not always mind you but when they did it was insufferable. 

However they don’t have time to argue as the bridge goes out and Glomgold finds donald.. and another way around as a result and gets to the treasure first. Scrooge notices they have donald but once again Dewey charges in 

“Unhand my uncle” “No” “Okay wasn’t prepared for that”

Naturally both sides are a bit livid, Donald for dragging his boys into danger after being part of the reason his sister is on the moon right now, and Scrooge for working with one of his greatest eneimies.. though Scrooge has less ground to stand on because as Donald points out “I can’t keep track of ALL of your sworn enemies” I mean he has lived like .. 200 years. That’s a long enemies list and Glomgold, while the most persistent, isn’t exactly the most dangerous they probably encountered. Given the guy’s an artist with Bombs and Sharks that does say a lot about how badass Scrooge is.. and how incompitent glomgold usually is. He’s just having an on day today I guess. 

Glomgold naturally holds Donald hostage, takes what is suppsidley the jewel and leaves them to drown to death, hitting a wall to let it start leaking. HIs minons run into the rest of the heroes and a fight breaks out while naturally Donald, after even more naturally getting his ass stuck in a hole, literally, rails out at Scrooge for doing this telling him “I knew I couldn’t trust you and” “This is the spear of selene all over again”

Scrooge’s only response is “I was not responsible for the Spear of Selene!”

Dude you still paid for the rocket. While Della shoulders most of the blame, SHE choose to take an untested rocket, SHE choose not to come back during the turbulence YOU still built it and hid it from donald and didn’t make sure she couldn’t just take off in it. Your both to blame. And as I mentioned earlier to the least extent but still an extent, so was Donald telling his grown, adult sister whose as stubborn as she is what she could and couldn’t do. He had the right idea and was the only person trying to be an adult here in this situation.. but he still took the wrong approach with stopping her. Still he got far more ground to stand on than Scrooge, who also took his nephews out. Dewey stops both by pointing out that while yes Scrooge took them on an adventure he’s been doing NTOHING but keeping him safe and most of it was his fault which disarms donald a bit. Though Dewey is quickly distracted.. but for once by an obersvation: the gem glowing above thaem that glowed when they entered... and since the city got flipped turned upside down.. THAT’S the real jewel. Dewey asks Donald ot let it flood so they can get it and begs his uncle to trust him despite his doubts which he does. They get it and everyone’s okay and even more when they reunite with the others they find they’ve handily beaten them. To me this is where donalds walls go down a bit: he realizes he’s been smothering the kids, and that while he may hate his uncle for good reason... he’s not going to make the same mistake with them and while he lied.. Don probably realized if Scrooge had been honest Donald would never have let them go. He can trust him.. and he can trust his kids will be alright without him. 

So Glomgold naturally leaves his minions to die, but our heroes manage to make it to the sub, and Gabby asks if they can bum a ride. Not wanting to do any murders they agree. On the surface Glomgold is showing off his jewel, only for Scrooge to upstage him second’s later with the real jewel, and point out his is “nice but defintly cursed”... and right on cue Glomgold gets dragged off with an octopus and let’s off his first “Curse you mcduck!”. Scrooge offers clean water and power thorugh it, for a price because of course he does, and has offically made his grand comeback. 

We get back to Webby’s subplot, as she’s confronted by Beakly.. who naturally being a former spy easily figured it out immieditely but is only upset her grandaughter lied to her. And even at that she dosen’t raise her voice or anything about the matter, knowing it’d only make her feel worse and getting that her grandaughter needs to see the world and that much like donald, she walled her up to prevent loosing what little she had left. And since being with Scrooge is safe as with her, she can go with him anytime just tell her first kay? They hug. Awwww. 

Donald likewise apologizes, admitting that whatever has passed, he misjudged his uncle here and while not forgiving him yet, is at least willing to let him back into his life and into the boys.. on holidays and stuff at least. But fate forces his hand.. or rather his 10 year old nephew-son having left the engine on and neither having turned it off, meaning his boat goes boom and is in no liveable condition. But Scrooge has the space in his heart and mansion for them.

So as we close the kids help move the artifacts all around the house instead of just the garage while Launchapd drops the boat. While clearing out Dewey notices the painting from earlier.. and finds part of it was flipped over...

“Mom?!” 

Now keep in mind, while nowadays Della’s inclusion in the show is one of the most famous and treasured parts of the show.. back then this was a fucking shock. Disney never really cared about the boys mother and outside of one comics story never really went into what happened. So the fact she was not only an actual important part of the plot but we’d find out was a HUGE wham moment and left my jaw dropped after seeing the episode. Like I would with the finales I had read no spoilers and had no idea this was coming but damn was it a huge and welcome suprise and how far they’d take it and how much they’d flesh her out was an even bigger one. Easily one of the best big reveals i’ve ever seen. The only better one I can think of from this series itself... is the end of season 2. But that’s for another time. 

Final Thoughts on Woo-Ooo!:

This two parter/hour long special.. is still one of the episodes best and easily one of the best pilots. It does slow down a bit in pacing in the second half, but otherwise is just an immaculate , beautiful pilot movie that introduces and fleshes out all 8 main characters, maybe Launchpad the least but enough to still work, gives us some big mysteries to work out, and even throws in Glomgold’s first apperance. It sets the tone, reverent and adventuerous but also with it’s own weird and wacky sense of humor and world building, and universe perfectly. I .. don’t have much else to say really it’s just THAT good and really worth checking out. If you somehow haven’t seen it go watch it and if you haven’t seen it in a while might be worth a rewatch before the finale. The absolutely perfect start to an amazing ride. 

Next on the Della Arc: Dewey and Webby try to figure out where Della is while Louie learns a valuable life lesson and  pisses off a killer robot along the way.

Next on the Blog: Amphibia Season 2 is back! 

Until then if you liked this review follow for more and if you could please support me on patreon. Even a buck a month helps and juicy stretch goals give you na incentive to contirbute. We’re 5 bucks away from 20 dollars a month which means a review of super ducktales and a Darkwing Duck review EVERY. MONTH. So contribute now! Until the next rainbow it’s been a pleasure. 

[phantastus]

Separate person here, but I’d love to see the tag meanings for the other characters!

I tried to answer this once and then mysteriously lost the post, but I’m doing it again! Thanks for the interest, guys-- I’m really glad that my weird bird tags have been a source of intrigue and curiosity!

(And to address specific bits in these replies/tags: 1. Yes the coincidence with Heather’s bird name is the coolest thing ever and I can’t even take credit for it, it just worked out completely organically. 2. Yes you can totally reblog it, sorry for the Readmore! 3. Yes the title is from the lyrics to Hometown! Good eye!)

NOW FOR THE DEETS, follow the Readmore!

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TRAVIS GRADY | CATHARTES AURA (Turkey Vulture)

If you’ve driven on just about any highway in the U.S., you have definitely seen one of these guys. They’re not just desert birds; they can be found just about anywhere in the Americas. Given Travis’s traverse-oriented line of work, a bird so associated with man-made roads just seemed appropriate.

Turkey vultures feed almost exclusively on carrion, and Travis unsurprisingly has a lot of roadkill themes and imagery in his Otherworld (he even has a monster CALLED “Carrion”!). Being an animal lover, Travis feels a lot of guilt about roadkill, whether it’s animals he hit himself or just ones he sees dead on the roadways. Although vultures are considered creepy for eating dead prey off of the ground (and Travis himself seems to be considered disconcerting by people around him), they’re smart and often friendly birds that perform the important role of cleaning up decomposing stuff that would otherwise just rot and go to waste. Plus,eating already-dead things instead of killing stuff themselves makes them objectively less scary than... most birds tbh.

Sort of like the other protags and their “corvids=pests” deal, vultures are not just seen as an annoyance but often actively considered disgusting and filthy. Travis doesn’t have an easy time making friends and a lot of people seem to consider him scary/bad for reasons that honestly don’t match up with his actions. SH0 has a weird dumb plot that doesn’t make a lot of sense (or even try to tbh) but edgy bad ending aside, Travis has always struck me as a bit of a gentle giant who’d rather avoid violence if he can. Also my firm headcanon is that he’s gay and experiences no small amount of alienation/perceived scariness because of it, so there you go.

Interesting fact! Turkey vultures lack a syrinx, the vocal organ that most birds have. As a result, their vocal communication is more or less limited to the occasional hiss or grunt. Travis isn’t much of a talker either.

EDDIE DOMBROWSKI | LARUS MARINUS (Great Black-Backed Gull)

Gulls are big, extremely opportunistic predator-scavengers. They’ll eat fish and crustaceans. They’ll eat eggs. They’ll eat garbage. They’ll eat anything. They’ll walk right into a convenience store and take a bag of chips without paying. I’m not about fat-shaming here, but Eddie is kind of unavoidably characterized by gluttony. And for eating mystery food he just found unattended in the middle of an abandoned building.

Gulls are also, well, kind of mean. While they’re not considered particularly dangerous, they rank right up there with geese on ‘do not fear God or man, WILL fight you if you look at them wrong’. Especially these guys, who are mostly found in New England and are freaking huge. they have very few natural predators (assuming they can make it to adulthood). The only things that regularly take down fully-grown GBB gulls are literal eagles. Other than that, they’re big and strong enough push around most other birds, and frequently do. Eddie is a victim of bullying, but also very quickly becomes one the second he realizes how easily he can turn the tables.

IDK, maybe it’s the blue-and-white striped shirt, but for some reason Eddie has always had, like, a maritime vibe to me. I just see him being from a coastal town. Maybe with a dad who spends lots of time working away from home on the big fishing boats.

Nobody likes gulls except me. And nobody likes Eddie except me*. :’(

One time a seagull snatched an entire (very large) slice of pizza from my room-mate and flew away with it without even faltering.

ANGELA OROSCO | MACROURA TURTURILLA (Mourning Dove)

Unlike most of the other birds on this list, mourning doves are NOT predators-- they are not only prey for wild animals, but are also hunted by humans for game. Mourning doves and Angela both have a lot to fear from the world around them.  

While I PERSONALLY think they are very soft and beautiful, coloration-wise they are very unremarkable-- the plain browns and grays are perfect camouflage for the forest floor. Angela also spends a lot of time trying to avoid drawing attention to herself, for obvious reasons.

They’re very skittish, and despite staying under the radar most of the time, when they take flight in a panic it’s VERY noticeable. Their feathers make a distinctive whistling noise when flying. Angela’s tendency to be calm right up until the point where something is Too Scary (tm) and she just takes off kind of reminds me of a startled dove.

Mourning doves were totally among the birds featured in That Scene, The One With The Birds (tm) in Chapter 10 of Gravity. I am speaking from experience when I say that a previously-unnoticed mourning dove very suddenly taking off in front of you is extremely alarming.

The mourning dove gets its name from its call, which just sounds very forlorn and sad. Angela is also forlorn and sad. :(

Technically the ‘turturilla’ is a subspecies not found in North America, oops. I should change that but I’m lazy.

STANLEY COLEMAN | LINARIA CANNABINA (Common Linnet)

Linnets are a finch-like bird that were once a popular pet, leading to a lot of references to them in classic poetry, particularly to their sad status as an often-caged bird. While that’s sort of fitting since he was institutionalized, this is not why Stanley’s bird is the linnet. 

BIG TW FOR STALKING / DISCUSSION OF ASSAULT

Stanley is the linnet because of this stanza of the SH3 Crematorium Puzzle: “Song of the Linnet: "He seeks out her soul by his own black ambition, Frightening her out of her wits. Whispering love songs into her ear, What cruel Linnet wants, he gets."

Stanley is literally the scariest thing in SH3 imo and the poem not only canonically refers to him (the poem is a clue leading to his body as part of the puzzle solution), but describes his actions towards Heather with very little exaggeration. He follows her around the hospital, always just out of sight, and leaves messages for her that get progressively more disturbing and graphic/sexually-charged as time goes on, repeatedly referring to her as his lover and describing what he’d like to do to her. She in turn is completely repulsed by Stanley and actively afraid of him.

Literally how could I pick anything else, I mean, there it is.

I THINK I will save the last three for another post, but hopefully these are interesting addons to the first four!

*i know i’m not the only one who likes eddie lol, but a consistent pattern over the years of being an SH fan has been me playing the Eddie Dombrowski Defense Squad to other SH friends until they appreciate him as a character more.

[anditendshowyoudexpect]

face to face

He yearned for it and he feared it more than anything. He tried to imagine it but all that came to him was trusting blue eyes and the gentle heat of the cheek pressed against his cheek, as though his imagination, so wild and unreserved all these years, were losing confidence and courage the closer, the more real her presence was. It’s for the best, he thought, because it’s impossible.

He heard her before he saw her, and still, he wasn’t ready. He was never ready for her. In an uncanny manner, she always managed to take him by surprise, from that first day, when he dove out of the way of rapidly rolling wheels and turned to look at the very young woman, almost a teenager, a long braid under a straw hat, who jumped off and dropped her bicycle to stare at him with an odd expression in big blue eyes. He only shook his head, half-bewildered, half-annoyed, rubbed his shoulder that ached from the too sudden movement, and walked on, none the wiser about the new page that was opening in his life. He was now a little jealous of that Shtolman: that Shtolman was at the very beginning of that sweet and occasionally maddening road—getting to know the “young lady on wheels”, as he kept referring to her in his head for a while, too stubborn to acknowledge the scale of the crushing defeat his heart and mind were suffering at her artless, barely conscious and therefore very irresistible offensive. That Shtolman was free, and who knows what his life would be like now, had he trusted his own heart a little sooner. Ah, Mr. Court Councillor, youth is wasted on the young… That Shtolman was bolder, lighter, more playful and self-confident.

This one froze, neither alive nor dead.

She stood in front of him, entirely real: exactly the same as before and completely different all at once. Only her eyes betrayed her, and what he saw in them killed his soul and brought it back to life with unbidden hope.

Of course, if the man by her side had been someone worthy of her and not a probable ruthless murderer and state criminal, he would have stepped aside, he would be her invisible guardian angel and he would never disturb her peace… “Liar,” said a calm voice inside his head. Liar, he agreed. He would step aside if Anna had stopped waiting and forgotten him.

But this other, grown-up, reserved Anna still didn’t know how to pretend with him—all her attempts at indifference came out so cruel that it defeated the very purpose. And when he realized that, when he finally saw the old Anna under the inexpertly worn mask of the new one, he could no longer help reaching for her through the bars of his cell, he couldn’t help saying what he wasn’t supposed to say, couldn’t help look at her and touch her in the way he had no right to. Giving her up was giving up living. He would breathe, walk, eat, drink, work, even smile and joke—but he wouldn’t be alive.

…She stood in front of him, and he had never seen her so fragile and delicate, she stood in front of him, composure forgotten, tossed aside, shuddering with sobs, her unconcealed pain raw and open and cutting his own heart. And he cursed himself and he was mad with joy, kissing her tears away and making desperate promises to himself that he—

 “You know how ridiculous you look, don’t you?” the man sneers, nodding at him, of course, meaning the sunglasses planted firmly on the bridge of his nose.

“Surrender, Mr. Krutin,” he says in his even, formal policeman voice, although every cell of his body screams where is she, what have you done with her you monster. “You have nowhere to run. All—or almost all of your connections have been tracked down and cut.”

The man arches an eyebrow, not a sign of worry on the smug, wry face at the sight of the gun trained on him.

“You seem to be of a very high opinion of yourself, Mr. Shtolman. But you don’t know the half of the threads I hold in my hands, and I assure you, a man like you can never get in my way.”

Oh, he would be so happy to smash this sneering face with the truth, to stuff this smirking mouth with the detailed facts of what every decent person in his and Anna’s life has done in the past two months, how nobody could stand aside while the young woman with a heart big enough to embrace the entire world was in the hands of a villain, finally, how the guard department is worth its salt after all. How bombs were disarmed, dangerous and greedy people were caught, dazed people brought back to their senses, and with every new development, the circle around Krutin was shrinking. But reveals and explanations like this belong in interrogation rooms when the criminal is safely handcuffed and about to be convoyed off to whatever fate awaits them, or in drawing rooms with a calm, wise detective lighting his pipe to entertain respectable guests of a respectable mansion. He doesn’t owe this man anything except the final reckoning and he is not going to indulge an inflated ego and an inflamed mind.

Something must have changed in his expression, because Krutin’s eyes narrow.

“Not that I care,” the man drawls, seemingly indifferent, “but how did you know where to find me?”

He smirks almost despite himself, his heart now filled with warmth.

“You know how,” he says before he finally asks the only question that matters. “Where is she? Where is Anna?”

The man shrugs.

“There is no Anna anymore.” For a moment, he thinks he misheard it. “She’s gone.”

…wouldn't hesitate for a moment.

There is no pain and no rage. There is—nothing. Nothing left. Darkness falls over him, darkness devours him, darkness squeezes the trigger. The monster staggers but doesn’t fall why won’t he fall and pulls out a small silver box from the depth of his coat—and there is a bullet stuck in the ornate lid and when the monster opens the lid, nothing happens, and the monster lets out an almost inhuman howl full of mad fury and launches himself at him. Darkness helps, darkness slows the world and his heartbeat and squeezes the trigger once again, although the monster still reaches him, knocking him down and the gun out of his hand. The monster is bigger, younger, stronger but he—he has lost everything and no monster can stop him, and darkness helps again, reminding him coldly that he is still clutching his cane and the cane has a surprise inside. An awkward jerk of a pinned hand and the knife cuts through the layers of fabric and finds the muscular but ultimately too weak flesh, and the monster’s body pressing on him convulses. He sees the disbelief and an almost childlike hurt in the monster’s eyes, and darkness twists the knife and watches impassively the monster’s eyes roll back in pain, and pushes the heavy flesh off him, and leans over the defeated foe, and pulls the knife out only to plunge it back into the pliant flesh and see more blood gush out and pull it out again and it’s not enough, not enough, it’s never going to be enough, and he crawls off and scrambles back to his feet, and brushes away the fragments of the shattered glasses off his face, and looks around, searching for his gun gun gun gun gun gun the word buzzes in his head, keeping all other thoughts away, but still they seep through, breath through and let themselves out, out through the eyes, out through the ears, out through the mouth until he is blind and deaf and prostrate on the ground, as though praying for it to swallow him whole, and the gun suddenly finds itself and his hand closes on the grip and—

A click. The unmistakable sound of a hammer being cocked, and, instinct-driven, darkness roars and propels him up to face the new danger— …and retreats, leaving him to gasp for air.

She stands in front of him, holding a big, long-barreled revolver with both hands. Spirits can’t do this. Can they? She stands in front of him, and she is as beautiful as he remembers her—more beautiful, because she is real. Hair falling in free waves, cheeks flushed pink. She is alive and she stands right in front of him.

Anna, he says, no, exhales, and there are no words in any human language to describe the storm inside his head and his heart.

The alpha to his omega.

Life itself.

Anna, he pleads, terrified—

—because she is pointing the revolver at him, and her blue eyes are ice, not looking at him but at some distant point behind his shoulder, and he is both the happiest and the most miserable he has ever been, like a blind man who regained sight in a world that lost all light a moment later.

I hate you…

No…

I hate you!

No!

You will shoot yourself in an hour.

No.

Anya, he whispers, defeated, taking a step towards her.

Jump forward, try to deflect a shot… but a bullet doesn’t care whom to kill in a mess of bodies and limbs.

And his hand drops to his side helplessly, hopelessly, letting go of the gun.

Wake up, please, wake up.

He has had many nightmares but none as dreadful as this one.

He thought he knew what it was like, the real, gut-wrenching horror, the true, infinite despair. He didn’t.

If he were a romantic idiot, he would think that death by her hand is the best death he could ever wish for.  But he is just an idiot idiot idiot how could you believe the monster, so, to him, it’s utter nonsense: how can he wish for this? What is going to happen to her when he’s dead? She will wake up eventually and see what she has done and— How is she going to live with the consequences, with the knowledge that she’s killed the man she loves?

Perhaps he is still a bit of a romantic idiot because he thinks that at least her face will be the last thing he sees, and, surely, he deserves at least that, and he wants to take in every single feature of it. He will not look away or squeeze his eyelids shut.

She is alive, she lives, she lives…

It’s going to be all right.

I love you.

I love you.

And in the seconds before her index finger presses on the trigger, it’s not his entire life that flashes before his mind’s eye. It’s the silhouette of a very young woman, almost a teenager, walking away from him in the indigo haze of moonlight, autumn leaves rustling under the wheels of her bicycle.

What was that wondrous moment…

He smiles.

It comes as a roll of thunder, as the end of the universe.

And then—then?—smell of gunpowder fills his nostrils, and he blinks and his brain registers with a delay the thud of something big and heavy falling down behind his back and whispers: look. And he looks and he sees the blue ice break and melt.

Released by a trembling hand, the revolver tumbles on the ground.

Sunlight gleams on the polished steel, still smoking in the still chill air of the world that is no longer cold.

…but the greatest of these is love.

(AO3)

[bookiemonsterph]

Serpent & Dove

Synopsis:

Bound as one, to love, honor, or burn. Book one of a stunning fantasy duology, this tale of witchcraft and forbidden love is perfect for fans of Kendare Blake and Sara Holland.

Two years ago, Louise le Blanc fled her coven and took shelter in the city of Cesarine, forsaking all magic and living off whatever she could steal. There, witches like Lou are hunted. They are feared. And they are burned.

As a huntsman of the Church, Reid Diggory has lived his life by one principle: Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live. But when Lou pulls a wicked stunt, the two are forced into an impossible situation—marriage.

Lou, unable to ignore her growing feelings, yet powerless to change what she is, must make a choice. And love makes fools of us all.

Set in a world of powerful women, dark magic, and off-the-charts romance, book one of this stunning fantasy duology will leave readers burning for more.

Title: Serpent & Dove Series: Serpent & Dove Author: Shelby Mahurin ISBN: 0062878034 (ISBN13: 9780062878038) Pages:  560  pages (Paperback) Published: August 4th 2020 by HarperTeen (first published September 3rd 2019) Characters: Reid Florin Diggory, Louise Margaux Larue Genre: Fantasy, Young Adult, Romance, Magic, Paranormal

I feel like I can’t even begin to describe just how pleasantly surprised I was by this novel. I am not a big fan of romance-heavy stories and one of my least favorite tropes of all time is hate-to-love relationships—so basically the two things the entire plot hinges on. Needless to say, I went into this very hesitantly. Very intrigued to learn how Lou and Reid end up in the position they do and to experience this story everyone has been raving about, but also keeping my expectations as low as I could. I did not for a second expect to come out of it knowing it will, without a doubt, be on my list of favorite books of the year. This is one of those books that I believe truly lives up to all the hype surrounding it.

Serpent & Dove is a dual perspective narrative following Lou le Blanc, a witch, and Reid Diggory, a Chasseur, or witch-hunter. Lou has escaped from her coven and has taken refuge in the city of Cesarine. She lives in hiding. giving up magic and surviving as a thief.  In Cesarine, witches are seen as a danger to all of society—they are hunted and burned, and no woman is above suspicion.

Reid is sworn to the church and charged with the hunting and capture of witches, sworn into a role that demands he will not let a single witch live. In a surprising turn of events, Lou’s and Reid’s paths cross in a way neither of them could have ever expected. A way that leads to their marriage, that forms a seemingly impossible love, and that brings Lou under the roof of the people who could be her source of protection—or her death.

The writing in this book is absolutely superb and cements Shelby Mahurin on my list of favorite authors. Her writing is gorgeous and so easy to fall into. It is incredibly clear how meticulously she formed every aspect of this novel. Both the plot and the setting are incredibly intriguing and captivating. I loved the French influences in all aspects of the story—it makes for a very vivid and enticing atmosphere and Cesarine is the perfect backdrop for everything that takes place. She also does a wonderful job with the dual perspective narrative and creates two very individual voices for our two main characters.

Even though the romance is the main focus of the story, the fantasy aspect is very strong as well and is of almost equal importance. The fantastical elements, though more of a side plot for now, don’t really take a backseat in terms of detail or how significant they are to the overall story. Mahurin crafts an interesting and intricate magic system as strongly as she crafts the romance. It’s something I’m particularly looking forward to seeing in more detail in the next book.

The only minor issue I had plot-wise was the event that sends Lou and Reid down the path toward their marriage. Though my opinion shifted by the end of the novel, as I was able to see every event throughout in a different light, the scene still felt a little bit clumsy and heavy-handed and also completely random, maybe a little too much so. It wasn’t at all what I would have expected and was a bit of a letdown for me, so I sort of wish it had been done differently. But overall, this barely affected my enjoyment of the story as a whole.

This novel holds one of the most brilliant and beautiful casts of characters I’ve ever come across. Lou is everything. She is one of my new favorite characters of all time—I fell completely and utterly in love with her right from the very start of the novel. She is so strong despite the pain she has been through and the terror and uncertainty of her life now. Lou is sassy and sarcastic and absolutely hilarious. She’s tough and guarded much of the time, but underneath, she is so intensely loving, caring, and loyal—just an absolutely beautiful person. I connected with her so easily, and it was an absolute joy reading from her perspective and following her journey.

It took me a while to warm up to Reid, but I definitely had by the end of the novel. He’s quite set in his ways and his prejudices against women, always acting in a very traditional way toward Lou. They are living in a time when women are little more than the property of their husbands and this is something that is clearly ingrained in Reid. He is protective of her and chivalrous to a fault, but it takes a while from him to sound anywhere near loving, even after it’s clear he has feelings for her. At first, I struggled a bit reading his chapters because his attitude and initial inability to be open-minded frustrated me so much. However, there is one major reason I noticed that I think prevented me from connecting with him sooner.

Yes, he is very close-minded in many of his beliefs and his actions, but I felt that there were a few times where things sort of got lost in translation in a sense. There would be scenes from his point of view where his actions and words felt a bit confusing to me and I took them as negative. But later on, something would cause me to realize what exactly he meant by what he said or did and that it wasn’t in fact negative. I don’t think I explained that particularly well, but basically, I think there were times where his point of view could have been written more clearly. In the end, though, I did end up really liking him and it does become very obvious how much he truly cares and would do anything for Lou.

I ended up absolutely adoring the relationship between Lou and Reid. It unfolds and transforms in such a natural way. As I said before, hate-to-love is one of my least favorite tropes, but it is done so well here that I didn’t really mind it. It’s still not something I enjoy reading about and that obviously does impact my rating of the novel slightly. However, few people can get me to like a novel that features this type of relationship, and Mahurin definitely nailed it. My problem with the trope tends to stem from the tension being completely nonsensical and feeling like it’s just thrown in to create drama, and you will not find that in this book.

The tensions between Lou and Reid feel so realistic and necessary—they have every reason to be wary of each other. Understandably, that they sometimes overlook what they truly know about the other as a person in favor of ideas and prejudices that were hammered into them from a young age. They are both strong characters that are unapologetically themselves and, while it causes them to butt heads at first, it turns into a mutual respect for each other and, of course, love as well. The issues that create conflict, in the beginning, are what come to be the things that pull them together rather than drive them apart. And the sum of both of them individually—the strengths and the flaws—is what brings them each to love the other wholly.

There are also some stellar side characters in this story. Coco was, by far, my favorite—she is totally someone I’d love to be friends with. The friendship between her and Lou is so lovely and I’d gladly spend hours just reading about them. They have such a fun dynamic and they always have each other’s backs no matter what. They are the definition of found family and their story warmed my heart. Ansel, a bit like Reid, took me a while to start really liking, but he turns out to be an absolutely wonderful person and a great addition to that lovable found family.

Now for one of the most surprising things I’ve probably ever said and also one of the biggest contradictions when it comes to my typical taste in stories. As I’ve already said, I’m generally not a fan of books that heavily focus on romance. However, this book was so well written that one of my absolute favorite scenes in the entire story was the scene where Lou and Reid make love for the first time, as well as the truly heartwarming lead-up to it.

I am beyond picky about how sex scenes are written in novels. So many fall into the trap of using overly descriptive and flowery prose and a lot of just plain weird words for everything. While I think that being extremely blunt and cold about it is not a good direction to go in either, the flowery descriptions and oversharing of details tend to make these scenes feel very awkward and unrealistic.

The sex scene in this book does not fall into either of these traps and I absolutely adored it. It just feels so realistic and natural, and that is exactly what I frequently find is missing from these types of scenes. Mahurin continues to write as beautifully as ever but is, I felt, fairly minimal on the exact details of the scene. And this is exactly why it works so well.

While yes, there is still detail, she relies more often on the reader’s knowledge of what takes place during a sexual encounter, which cuts out the need for the overly flowery prose and questionable word choices. In a number of places, she writes it in a “fade to black” way without actually fading to black. Mahurin has created a perfect example of how a sex scene should be written and how it should feel to the reader. The focus is on the passion and love between Lou and Reid—on not just physical feeling, but emotional and mental as well. It is so beautiful and natural and is, by far, one of the best-executed scenes I’ve ever come across.

Suffice it to say, I really enjoyed this book. It is so beautifully written and captivating—it is very easy to fall into and get lost in. Shelby Mahurin has created a magical and emotional tale, both heartbreaking and heartwarming that, at its core, brilliantly demonstrates the power of love of all kinds. The story and especially the characters will definitely stick with me for a long time. I’ve honestly been thinking about it constantly since I finished it a few months ago. And, of course, I am absolutely dying to get my hands on the next book in this series. I love how this ended and I cannot wait to be back with these characters once again and see their story continue.

[curious-wildflower]

Elizabeth Siddal Part 2

“If the merest dream of love were true/ Then, sweet, we should be in heaven, / And this is only earth, my dear, / Where true love is not given.”

“Then sit down meekly at my side / And watch my young life flee.”

After a lengthy illness and an addiction to laudanum that lasted nearly as long, Elizabeth Siddal died in 1862, one year after she gave birth to a stillborn girl. Legend has it she was often seen with her arms cradling her daughter’s ghost. Her husband, poet and painter Dante Gabriel Rossetti buried her along with the only manuscript of his poems and, to pay homage, painted a portrait of her as Beata Beatrix. Years after her death, Rossetti regretted his outburst and decided to dig up the poems he placed in Siddal’s coffin. Legend has it that when he disinterred her, Elizabeth was more beautiful than ever, and that her hair had grown so long it was filling the entire coffin. Rossetti said he then saw Elizabeth’s ghost several times, who haunted him, outraged perhaps that he desecrated her resting place after his romantic treason.

Siddal was the pre-Raphaelite muse par excellence. From the time the artist Walter Deverell discovered her while she was working in a hat store with her long, red hair and her huge eyes, she became a model for this group of English painters. She posed for Hunt and Millais, among others, and soon became Rossetti’s lover. Elizabeth Siddal was not a conventional Victorian beauty. A petite frame was prized at the time and she was considered quite tall. Red hair was also not in favor, yet Rossetti and other Pre-Raphaelite artists depicted flowing red locks with such magnificence that they challenged the notion that red hair was both ugly and unlucky. It is a macabre coincidence that a poppy floats so close to Siddal’s hand in Ophelia.  After her death, Rossetti painted Beata Beatrix as a posthumous tribute.  A dove delivers a poppy (from which Opium is derived) into her hand.  Laudanum is a mixture of opiates and alcohol.

Beata Beatrix, Dante Gabriel Rossetti                                    

“Her complexion looked as if a rose tint lay beneath the white skin, producing a most soft and delicate pink for the darkest flesh-tone.  Her eyes were of a kind of golden brown – agate colour is the only word I can think of to describe them – and wonderfully luminous: in all of Gabriel’s drawings of her and in the type she created in his mind this is to be seen.” - Georgiana Burne-Jones, Memorials of Burne-Jones, vol. I

Discovered while working in Mrs. Tozer’s millinery shop, Siddal first appeared in Walter Howell Deverell’s painting Twelfth Night. She went on to model for William Holman Hunt and John Everett Millais (as his famous Ophelia). Eventually she posed only for Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Siddal became his pupil and embarked on a promising art career of her own. Their on/off relationship lasted nearly a decade before they finally married in 1860.

Always described as being in ill-health, Siddal was addicted to the opiate Laudanum. A stillborn daughter was the tragedy that sealed her fate and Siddal’s depression sent her further into the depths of addiction, resulting in her overdose death in 1862.

Her passing affected Rossetti for the rest of his life. Seven years later, while struggling with mental health issues, Rossetti had her grave exhumed in order to retrieve the poems he had buried with her. It was a sad, tumultuous time in his life and that one act has forever linked Siddal’s name with a tinge of the macabre.

At the beginning, though, her features inspired Rossetti’s work. In the words of his sister Christina Rossetti’s poem In An Artist’s Studio, “He feeds upon her face by day and night.”

In a similar vein, fellow artist Ford Madox Brown described Rossetti’s repeated and obsessive drawings of Siddal as a “monomania.” In a letter to Madox Brown, Rossetti confided that when he first saw her, he felt “his destiny was defined.”

[William Michael Rossetti 1899.]

[15 February 1855.]

“Yesterday was St. Valentine.

Thought you at all, dear dove divine,

Upon the beard in sorry trim

And rueful countenance of him,

That Orson who’s your valentine?

He daubed, you know, as usual.

The stick would slip, then brush would

fall:

Yet daubed he till the lamplighter

Set those two seedy flames astir;

But growled all day at slow St. Paul.

The bore was heard ere noon; the dun

Was at the door by half-past one:

At least ’tis thought so, but the clock-

No Lizzy there to help its stroke-

Struck work before the day begun.

At length he saw St. Paul’s bright orb

Flash back  the serried tide absorb

That burning West which it sucked up

Like wine poured in a water-cup;

And one more twilight toned his daub.

Some time over the fire he sat,

So lonely that he missed his cat;

Then wildly rushed to dine on tick-

Nine minutes swearing for his stick,

And thirteen minutes for his hat.

And now another day is gone:

Once more that intellectual one

Desists from high minded pursuits,

And hungry, staring at his boots,

Has not the strength to pull them on.

Come back, dear Liz, and, looking wise

In that arm-chair which suits your size,

Through some fresh drawing scrape a hole.

Your Valentine and Orson’s soul

Is sad for those two friendly eyes.”

[thebluemartini]

Fanfiction - Wife [Serpent & Dove Book Series - Lou/Reid]

TITLE: Wife

FANDOM: Serpent & Dove by Shelby Mahurin

SHIP: Louise le Blanc/Reid Diggory

SYNOPSIS: As Reid and Lou and the rest of the group make their way to Coco's coven, Lou needs some reassurance from Reid that she's his wife. (basically a short fluffy scene between the two of them)

FIC LENGTH: One-shot

RATING: Teen and Up Audiences

A/N: So I read Serpent & Dove earlier this week (in an attempt to heal my Reylo/Star Wars feels) and now I am OBSESSED. I had to write a little something for Lou/Reid. It’s a bit inspired by the ending to the 2005 version of Pride & Prejudice.

*This is also posted on AO3 and FF

________________________________________________________________

It was his turn to keep watch that night as their group paused their long trek through the forest to Coco’s coven for some rest. 

He may have been exhausted and fighting to keep his eyelids open, but for her, it was all worth it. 

Everything was worth it to protect her, to touch her, to have her here just like this - with her head upon his lap as she slept - and to keep her as his wife. 

Reid gently ran his fingers through her hair as she slept soundly, careful not to wake her. Doing so brought back memories of several weeks prior, when she taught him how to braid her hair. He couldn’t help but smile. 

The journey of their relationship had been an insane one, to say the least. One might have thought it would be impossible for a witch hunter to fall in love with a witch, yet here they were. 

He couldn’t comprehend how a brazen, strong, silly, wonderful woman could love a ridiculously conscientious stick-in-the-mud like him. 

At some point during his reverie, his fingers had stopped stroking Lou’s hair. He didn’t realize it until he heard Lou begin to whimper.

“But I am your wife,” she pleaded in her sleep. “I am.”

Reid’s eyes widened in alarm as he heard her mumblings. He brought his hand to her shoulder to gently shake her in hopes of taking her away from whatever awful dream she was having. The second his hand touched her, her eyes shot open to find him staring down at her. 

She breathed a sigh of relief as she reached her hand up to touch his stubbled cheek. Slowly, a smile spread across her face. 

“What were you dreaming about?” he whispered as he resumed running his fingers through her hair. 

“Nothing worth talking about,” she remarked calmly. 

Reid frowned. “It didn’t seem like a pleasant dream. I just heard you say ‘But I am your wife ’ in your sleep.”

“It’s nothing,” she insisted. 

“Lou,” he said sternly. “I want you to be honest with me. I thought we’d agreed there’d be no more secrets between us.” 

Lou sighed. “Why do you have to have such an adorable face that’s impossible to resist, especially when you’re brooding like that?”

Reid made no reply. Instead, he waited for her to answer him. 

She sighed again. “I was...dreaming of the moment you found out I was a witch and you said, ‘You are not my wife.’”

Reid let out a slow breath. “Why would such a moment be appearing in your dreams right now? Is it still bothering you?”

“Well, the weeks we were apart, those words haunted and gutted me,” she answered truthfully. “I guess it still haunts me.” 

Her words were like a pierce in his hide. But surely, she knew just how much she meant to him? A week ago, he had murdered his father-figure for her. And yet...the slightest of doubts of how he felt about her remained in her mind. 

He placed one of his hands upon her cheek, while the other grabbed hold of her hand. 

“Lou, I am so sorry that I -“

“I know,” she cut him off. “I know. I forgive you. You don’t need to apologize anymore for it.”

“But you’re still having nightmares about it. It must still be bothering you in some way,” he remarked. “I want you to be free of such nightmares.”

Lou sat up with a mischievous glint in her eyes and started tracing his jawline with her finger. “Well, one way to avoid such nightmares is to not sleep at all. And I can think of some pretty exciting activities we can do instead of sleeping…”

“Lou…” he breathed. They needed to figure this out. Not distract themselves with other...things. 

Not yet at least. 

She pouted for a moment, but her grin quickly returned. “I just need to hear you call me your wife again. And again. Maybe several times per day. For forever.” 

He placed his hand against her cheek and gazed into her eyes. “My wonderful, wild, beautiful wife,” he began quietly. 

Lou took a deep breath as she beamed at him. 

“I only speak profanities if it’s concerning something I truly feel strongly about,” he continued. “I hope you’ve realized that I’ve only started swearing when it comes to situations regarding your welfare, your protection, and anything about you.” 

Lou nodded along in understanding. 

“So, please believe me when I say that you are the fucking love of my life and I can’t imagine a day without you as my wife,” he finished. 

Her smile brightened as she let out a soft chuckle. “Hearing you cuss is so...sexy,” she murmured. 

Reid bent down to peck her on the lips.

“Call me your wife again. And use another cuss word,” she requested with enthusiastic anticipation when he pulled away. 

“My sweet wife,” he said as he pressed his forehead down against hers. “I hope I can make up for being a shitty husband when I first learned you were a witch.” 

“I have a few ideas,” she suggested with a playful wiggle of her brow. “One of which is you must always refer to me as ‘my sweet wife’ whenever you are ridiculously happy.”

Well, that wouldn’t be difficult. Whenever he’s with her, he’d always feel that way.

“Any other requests, my sweet wife?” 

She tilted her head as if she were deep in thought. “If you’re ever angry with me - even the slightest bit - you should refer to me as ‘the fucking love of my life.’ It’ll likely lessen the desire to strangle you in such moments. If you feel overwhelmed with such passion for me that you just wish you could whisk me away to somewhere private to have your way with me, you should call me ‘Madame Diggory.’”

Reid smiled out of amusement over her babbling. “Am I ever to call you Lou?”

She pursed her lips as she considered his question. “‘My one and only dearest Lou’ should be reserved for love letters only.” 

“Are you telling me you want me to write you love letters?” 

“What girl doesn’t want to receive a love letter?!” she exclaimed. 

Reid laughed, thinking back to the way she made fun of the letters he had written to Celie. “I will remember that.”

Suddenly, Lou’s face became quite serious, causing him to feel concerned. She placed her hands on his shoulders. “Tell me something,” she whispered.

“Anything.”

Her breathing stilled out of nervousness. “Do you love me more than Celie?” 

Reid took a slow breath. “I’ve known Celie for a long time and loved her for a long while. I’ve spent countless nights dreaming about marrying her and spending the rest of my life with her.” 

Lou’s face fell as she looked down, nodding in understanding. 

Reid was quick to put his hand beneath her chin to lift her head back up to look at him. “When she told me couldn’t be with me anymore, I was crushed and heartbroken. But I moved on. I let the Archbishop marry us, knowing that meant I would never be with Celie. With you…” he trailed off as he took a moment to stare at her, trying to memorize the features of her face, like the placement of every freckle, the plumpness of her lips…

“When I ordered you to leave me, I felt like a piece of me was gone, while the rest of me was completely shattered,” he went on. “In the weeks we were apart and I traveled to the chateau, I spent every second of everyday thinking about you - how I hurt you, how I failed you, how I couldn’t stand the thought of living without you, how I needed you. It was like my air to breathe was gone. I struck down the Archbishop without a second thought in an attempt to save you. My sweet wife, I’ve never loved anyone the way I’ve loved you.” 

A few tears streamed down Lou’s beaming face, which Reid was quick to wipe away with his thumbs. She bent forward, resting her head in the crook of his neck as he wrapped his arms around her. “I love you so much, Reid,” she murmured. 

“I love you, my sweet wife,” he reiterated.

Lou let out a soft squeal. “Oh Reid, every time you call me your wife makes me want to rip your clothes off and make sweet love to you,” she blurted out before kissing his throat and tugging at the collar of his shirt. 

“Not here, not now, Madame Diggory,” he gently reprimanded her as he hugged her with one hand, while the other halted her attempt to yank off his shirt. “We’re not animals. You deserve better than the forest.”

She frowned. He hated disappointing her, but they had to be reasonable and have some sense of propriety.

“But I have you and that’s all that I need,” she said before planting a trail of kisses along his jawline. “You’re all I want.” 

“Fucking love of my life,” he moaned, trying to fight off how much he relished in the touch of her lips against his skin. “The others are a short distance away, and I have to keep watch.” 

Lou pulled back and sighed. “Fine. Be a killjoy.” 

“I’ll make it up to you soon,” he stated before he caught her lips in a firm, passionate kiss. 

“You better.” 

With a smirk on her face, she laid back against his chest, this time closing her eyes and looking perfectly content as she wrapped her arms around his torso. 

Reid held her tightly against his body and rubbed her back. “I promise I will, my sweet wife.”

A/N: Hope you liked this! Fun random fact: Personality-wise, I'm totally more like Reid! (Like I even felt awkward typing out cuss words while writing this because I seldom swear myself lol). So writing for Lou was a bit more challenging for me - I hope she came out alright! 

[cloveroctobers]

HENRIK LILJENQUIST—

IG info/Bio: @/adventuresbyhenrik | 53.1k followers — “imma wild boi🌿🌏🧗 | happily taken👩‍❤️‍💋‍👨

23 (24) years old

Parents are both Swedish and only speak Swedish, leaving henrik to also become fluent

His father Halvi is a pilot

His mother Lova is a race car driver

Siblings? Probably a brother, named Jahan & younger by two or three years + they get along quite well

Born & raised in Isle of Wight, England + loves it there & thinks it’s the best place for him to live, it’s his own private island in his mind plus he’s always finding something to do. He stays active

Climbing & wilderness survival instructor, he gets to talk as much as he wants while also teaching people AND all while being active! Sounds like the perfect job for him

Probably developed ADHD around his pre-teen age, leaving his parents to find him something he enjoys + can slow down and focus on

used to be on meds for it

Was well-known in high school, probably in the yearbook club since he was able to run around & get to know people but was kinda shit at knowing the functions of a camera

His selfie game has gotten a lot better now but he mostly posts anything but his face. You’ll see more of his face on his stories & location shots on his feed

Feels his hair is his best physical feature & his prized possession, would never THINK about cutting it. Even just a trim is a bit much for him

Always tries to be positive but at the same time can be condescending since he sometimes won’t pick his words wisely ex.) when he gave MC a backhanded “compliment” about makeup, being active, + wanting them to “think of others ” feelings — just because someone is opposite from you doesn’t mean you have to shit on the way they carry themselves...that’s my issue with him

maybe he’s a Taurus?

Loves fall & spring, more so fall since that’s when the weather feels nicest to him plus allergy season is a REAL bitch

The guy’s real Adventurous & always managing to find something to do. If you’re ever bored just hit him up, he has plenty of recommendations 

Family owns a cottage & he’s the one who goes out there more than his own family does! “You should just sell it to me at this point!” He tells his parents over dinner often & it is strongly considered

Has five birds & a husky, when he goes on road trips they’re always with him. Which can get a little hectic at times but they’re his family, he’s a, “birdog dad”

BLAKE secretly dislikes them all, feeling like they take up space sometimes (especially when she wants to cuddle) but she deals with it since she cares for the guy — yes, they’re still dating

She’s been convincing him to cut a few inches off of his hair which he took like a slap in the face, “that’s like me asking you to quit speaking up for humans!” “No, no it’s not.”

They’re polar opposites with flaws which causes disagreements between the two of them by putting each other in their places but they learn to compromise? (*insert eartha Kitt gif laughing here*] if they want this to work

His mother seems to be the only one who dislikes blake (she strongly feels he should have bought MC back home...that’s right she watched the show from time to time. Not always since she doesn’t care for reality tv but her friends encouraged her to watch bits and pieces) while his dad and brother approve

It is tense when Blake and his mom are in the same room which makes Henrik sad since he believes Blake deserves a chance. He took a chance on her and it seems to be going pretty well so why couldn’t his mother just be happy for him like the rest of the family is?

Henrik loves his low-maintenance girls who are open to trying new things with him, Blake is usually down most of the time but she likes her personal space too..which henrik struggles to understand

He wants her to live with him, he’s sure his parents will let him have the cottage if Blake decides to live with him but Blake loves her freedom in Kingston

It’s hidden but I feel like he might be one of those guys that feels like “a woman should follow a man” since that’s what his father installed into his boys— which failed because his wife isn’t just a housewife, she has goals and went after them

I feel like Blake turns to social media almost always to post about her feelings (I can’t remember what I picked the first time around as my occupation but as I’m currently playing I picked human rights campaigner so) but it’s mostly subtle shade & it always goes recognized by fans which brings drama between her, mc x Bobby

Henrik jumps in because what kind of guy would he be if he didn’t have his gf’s back? Doesn’t care for the drama but he & Bobby usually said slick shit to each other in the villa, it’s safe to say they’re not really friends but they’re not enemies either that’s mostly between their gf/wife

Henrik doesn’t care enough about Bobby to dislike him but he won’t put up with his shit any longer and what easier way to do that than online? He feels like they can settle this with a phone call but Blake & MC aren’t with the shits and don’t want their men speaking to each other

Henrik & Bobby eventually have a chat in secret anyways

Henrik warns Blake that this can effect her job status if she doesn’t calm down since she uses social media for her cause

She usually knows when to stop but can’t help it if it slips out sometimes

They talk it out and move on usually with whatever fun idea henrik may have

Owns a ford bronco from the 90’s that used to be his uncle’s who builds tree houses for a living and is still running, a jeep gladitor, or some sort of pickup truck

Knows how to make the best apricot jam

All about saving the bees

Loves animals, probably on his journey to veganism if he’s not already there

We all know this fucking guy likes eating M0sS

“Embarrassing fact” but uh big fan of twilight, feels like Seth Clearwater and him are meant to be best buds but he also stans the Volturi 😷

Him and Lucas of course remained the best of mates, since they live 2 hrs away from each other and are always busy living their lives they always have to plan out when they can hangout but that fails 60% of the time when henrik pops up at Lucas’ job or at his flat not giving him a choice but to hang out

They’re always vacationing together too? Sure Henrik is his own version of low-key while Lucas likes a bit of luxury...they still find a balance to just have a good time regardless if they live different lifestyles...they’re basically married

Always texting if they’re not hanging out, henrik with his memes that Lucas doesn’t understand & Lucas just checking in on henrik’s well being which leads the conversation to many topics

He’s actually cool with Gary now? They like/comment on each other’s posts & even text here and there

Even ran into Rocco once on a road trip, that was interesting but when life gives you lemons...we’ll just say that

Even him and Ibrahim share recommendations through text or DM’s which is nice! Henrik is always down for friends even tho they’re not like his personal friends (except for Lucas, he fits into his criteria)

Most of his work is physical and talking but he goes the extra mile by hiking every Sunday either with his friends, Blake, or family — he’s genuinely likes being one with nature

If he’s at the cottage, he’s always outside, chopping extra wood, making sure the yard looks like it belongs on a magazine, or takes the boat out on lake to nap since he doesn’t like to fish as much anymore

Currently trying to grow strawberries but some animal keeps eating them :/

Adores adventure time, the x-files, bobs burgers + animal planet, and travel channels—like he’s a real dad

If he could shower outside everyday, he would, it’s such a freeing experience to him

His outings consist of being in the woods 24/7 so in his mind when he brings Blake out there with him, it’s a version of a date, whenever they spend time together is a date to him, which she has to remind him that she wants to do something different like getting dressed up every now and then + go out to dinner which he HATES but he’ll do his best to please her, as long as the restaurant is more earthy than snobby he’s okay

100% would survive the apocalypse, he knows how to make due with what he’s got, he’s always been that way

Enjoys rom-com’s so he’ll laugh at how cringe they are but still enjoy it, indie films, ALITA was the best film of 2019 to him & currently his fav film is, “the call of the wild” with Harrison Ford

His favorite films ever are Indiana Jones, Lara Coft: Tomb raider, Terminator, and I am legend

Aliens ARE real, they’re out there and he’ll be part of the reason they’ve been exposed

I feel like he wanted to be an astronaut growing up but then realized he’d be a confined space for long periods of time and said cancel that shit lol + he isn’t the greatest at science. History? He did real well in that subject

I think he loves Lorde, listens to Bon Iver—especially on early morning commutes to work, Rex Orange County, Omar Apollo, Joji, the nbhd, the driver era, kid cudi...yktfv

Celeb crushes?/types: The main girls from Charlie’s angels 2019, Alexa PenaVega... “you know Carmen from spy kids?” Diana silvers, Dove Cameron, JAMIE CHUNG, & VANESSA HUDGENS

Anthem = Wallows, “OK”

[thegilneanrose]

The opinion of others

(December)

Mary stood before her childhood home and looked up at the sandy pillars and sea green drapes that made up the entrance to the manor home that had become the new house seat of the elven Dovestrider family.

Sparing no time, Mary rushed up the steps and into the foyer. The scent of the seasalt and sandalwood filled her nose and reminded Mary of the happy childhood she had here. However now, this house served as a reminder of who she was. Even more, it reminded her of her mission.

With quick steps she rushed into her great great grandfather's office. Pushing noisily into his office, she slammed the door and rushed up to the desk. "How could you!" She shouted angrily at the elf sitting at the desk.

Llorind Dovestrider, looked up at his great great granddaughter in concern. His snow white hair was tied back in its usual half up, half down style with the golden wings being the only ornament. His goatee matched the same snow white color as his hair and was adorned with a single gold clip. His blue eyes were both wise and loving. His features seemed rather grandfatherly for an elf.

"Granddaughter? What is it?" He asked.

Mary planted her hands down onto his desk. "You joined Shadowtalon!" Mary yelled, the harshness in her voice made her anger evident.

"Oh, My little dovling, we joined months ago. How are you just now learning about this?" Llorind asked, sitting back in his chair. When Mary gave no response but a raised eyebrow he sighed. "Yes, your grandmother and I did so. With the threat of Everstar looming over us, we just want to protect you."

Mary scoffed at the words and backed away from the desk. She crossed her arms. "Protect me from what Bapa? You being there could ruin my secret! How is that protecting me?"

Llorind raised a brow. His growing concern turned into sadness and disappointment. "The only reason it is a secret is because you made it so. You are asking me to pretend that you are not my granddaughter? To be ashamed of you? No. I will not." Llorind shook his head as he spoke.

Mary gritted her teeth, a low growl coming from her throat. She began pacing. "No one must know. The commander knows, aye, but she is the only Ravenwing I WANT to know. I hate being part elf! I hate it with a burning passion. I hate it!" She threw her arms up in the air as she spoke.

Llorind rested his hands in his lap as she spoke. His eyes downcast. "You have always resented Everstar since we told you the truth. You've heard the voice of others who speak ill of half breeds.. But, have you ever stopped and wondered how much of that was directed at you? Besides, why would you care about what they say? Are they friends of yours?"

Mary looked at him. "No, but-"

Llorind held up a hand to interrupt her. "Then their opinion does not matter. I know you're part elf, has my opinion changed?"

"Bapa, you raised me, you're my grandfather. You knew what I was, even before I was born." Mary replied wondering what he was getting at.

"You told Cornileas. Has his opinion changed of you?" Llorind asked.

"He is my husband. He knew before we got married. He loves me for me. Why are you asking?" Mary replied again.

Llorind continued. "You hold the commander's opinion in a very high regard. Has her opinion changed of you since you told her?" He asked.

Mary sighed this time. The flame of her anger now dying. "No it has not." She said in resignation.

Llorind sat back in his chair. "Then why are you concerned about the opinions of pigeons?" he asked.

Mary looked at her grandfather. Llorind gave her a knowing look before continuing his speech. "I have said this many times to you, embrace who you are. Be proud of your heritage. You are and will always be a dove."

Llorind stood up then and walked around his desk. He embraced his granddaughter and kissed her on the head. Mary, having no other argument, surrendered to the hug. Llorind released her, then put a hand under her chin and pushed up to make her look at him. "As your commander one day, what she thinks of you being part elf. I bet, she will say the same thing." Llorind smiled at her despite the sadness still visible in his eyes. Mary nodded in return.

"Yes Bapa." She said to him, with a lack of the anger that she had upon entering the room.

Llorind turned her around and opened the door. "I say again, that which I have said many times, sweetling. Do not let the opinions of pigeons sway your thoughts. You are a dove. You soar high in the skies. Where as pigeons do nothing more than walk the streets, gossiping."

Mary walked out the door, pouting. Why she had to be born into this family was beyond her comprehension.

[dansnaturepictures]

14/08/2020-A wild Friday at Lakeside and in the garden: Birds, bats, moths and pond skaters 

As the first two pictures in this photoset show featuring Collared Dove, Goldfinch, Starling and House Sparrow I was happy to witness a feeding frenzy or two as I worked in the garden. It was great to see so many of these birds in and I had wanted to photograph the noisy Starlings coming in on mass. In the end with photos I took attached here and others I took today which I tweeted it was a great opportunity for pictures I’d never taken anything like before really of lots of garden birds together. I photographed a Jackdaw and Starling looking at each other on the roof out the back today too and saw a Blue Tit which I haven’t seen for a while in the garden. The Feral Pigeon regular pair were also about. There seems to be quite a variety of birds back in the garden lately after maybe not so much the last few weeks so it was great to enjoy them. 

As I walked out to Lakeside at lunch time it was another grey and quite hazy day alongside it. It fascinated me how different but equally as beautiful the landscape in this country park looked to how it does in the sun which I have witnessed so much lately and loved. I still lapped up opportunities to take photographs of landscapes finding it looking quite different in the grey. But I perhaps didn’t have that late summer feeling on a grey day where the landscape looks quite tired as there was rather a lot of autumnal colour in the leaves and berries of trees around Lakeside which looked ripe and exciting and quite beautiful. I took the third and fifth pictures in this photoset of these, and fourth, eighth and ninth pictures in this photoset of landscapes on a lunch time and evening walk. 

It was nice to see a Stock Dove flying from the area beside beach lake into the meadow fenced off nature reserve area. I had seen them briefly here lately which is brilliant but this view I got of it in the binoculars was my best yet here really making out its milk-carton-top green I always think neck. A great sighting of a bird I really respect. 

I walked over to the Great Crested Grebe family and got great close views of them again which I loved. I took the seventh picture in this photoset of the male bringing a fish into one. It was nice to just be so close and watch the ever growing young birds on the lake themselves and not on the mother’s back interacting with the parents. I watched them in my binoculars and I liked to guess which one of the three would go for the food once the male brought it in. Very precious moments with these birds again. Whilst watching them I spotted lots of lovely pond skaters on the lake including the one in the sixth picture in this photoset I was thankful to get they do move fast. A great bit of wildlife I’ve never photographed and don’t always notice to delve into the wild world a bit deeper really. 

I had my usual Friday after-work walk then and noticed very much as I did at lunch with the thick greyness of the day and the autumnal colour lighting it up. On the walk behind the railway station/cafe’ I suddenly saw a lovely big group of birds flying out between thick trees. It was a noisy mixed flock including a delightful Chiffchaff, Blue Tit and lots of Long-tailed Tits. A great bird for me I had been trying to photograph at Lakeside since I began working from home I have not photographed them enough over the years. I managed to get the tenth in this photoset of one, it would have been nice to get it actually looking but I wanted to take the photo forward and produce it anyway because its been a long time coming getting a picture of one for me. I saw a lovely Buzzard over Lakeside on the way home. 

Tonight I for the first time in a long time really left the property for a third time today in line with current guidelines here of course as my Mum took Missy to Lakeside at dusk. I wanted to join her for one of these regular walks to let Missy swim she has been doing in this hot weather as last week, like I did too from the house, she had seen loads of bats over beach lake. I wanted to see if I could see them and we did see at least a couple skimming over the lake which was fantastic to see. A top mammal moment. It was perhaps more interesting still landscape wise seeing the area I walk every day right now in the dark. It transforms the landscape and is very fascinating. There was just enough light to make out the Mute Swans and Mallards on the lake too. A wonderful way to use and be out on late a summer’s evening I really enjoyed it. 

Just as I am writing this we have at least four moths that have flown into the living room. One the Small Dusty Wave beside me is the one I saw yesterday probably. The other two appear to be onesI know a Yellow Shell one I’ve known for years and one similar to a Hebrew Character I think which I got a photo of. I am happy we’ve made it to the weekend again and it was a lot of great wildlife seen again today I’ve really seen notably more than the last few weeks as usual in summer and photographed birds this week. I did see butterflies again today but their numbers have dropped at Lakeside as the year shifts a bit round back to birds I love to see both always obviously. 

Wildlife Sightings Summary at Lakeside: Two of my favourite birds the Great Crested Grebe and Buzzard, Mallard, Mute Swan, Moorhen, Coot, Black-headed Gull, Stock Dove, Woodpigeon, Magpie, Jackdaw, Blue Tit, Chiffchaff, Meadow Brown and Large White butterflies, pond skater, bats and moth.