#but howard would probably be on the big blog

[woodershloomp]

i think some part of my brain that doesnt talk to most of it has been thinking about @destiny-in-the-universe 's project zero because it keeps coming up and whenever it does, i get the idea of "what if YOU did a multifandom ask blog except its worse and not as badass and more of just a chill thing" and i WANT to but not without destiny's permission because i dont wanna feel like im really copying them??? like honestly thats why i @'d them instead of just saying their name, i feel better about casually doing that rather than doing it in its own message because it feels kinda awkward????????

like idk i enjoyed the whole ask blog thing but two of them are completely inactive and i dont know what to do with the howard one?? (which has been renamed because of the older and superior howard blog) so seeing project zero just triggered a part of my brain like "oh, if you had one like that, then maybe you'd get more traction because more fandoms?!?!?"

idk i just dont want to do it without permission because i dont wanna feel like im copyiing, thats always my biggest worry. i cant just be inspired by something, like i always have to feel like im gonna copy it if i use the inspo.

[fort-cozy-mcblanket]

Hi friend!! :D

Why did you start watching TBBT if you hated it so much? Sounds like traitor behavior to me...

There isn't really a simple answer for this. My history with The Big Bang Theory is long and I don't actually know if I remember everything that happened exactly along the way. The problem with significant moments is often you don't realize they are significant until much later. If I had known how things would turn out, I would have tried to pay more attention.

I first heard about The Big Bang Theory when I was in high school, probably within a year or two of when it started airing. At the time I was deeply in love with Friends and that alone was reason enough for me to not like TBBT; every other sitcom just felt like a poor imitation that paled in comparison. In 2010 I made my first tumblr blog where I posted pretty much exclusively about Friends and I remember feeling so annoyed whenever TBBT gifs found their way onto my dashboard. Another reason. This wasn't fair of me, I know, but that was how I felt.

And I did catch parts of TBBT here and there around this time, but I never found it funny. It always seemed to be Howard saying something creepy or the characters being mean to each other. So I didn't bother trying to watch much more of it. I didn't really know anyone who liked it anyway, so it didn't matter.

But then a few things happened.

I was in college and taking some TV production courses and the professor had us work on recreating some TBBT scenes in collaboration with one of the acting classes. One of the scenes was from The Pirate Solution and I remember being behind the cameras while the student playing Raj read the line, "Okay, please don't take this the wrong way, but I would rather swim buck naked across the Ganges with a paper cut on my nipple and die a slow, agonizing death from a viral infection than work with you," and it was the first time I ever laughed at something from the show. I mentioned it to my roommate later and she said that TBBT did have some good parts. I wasn't exactly convinced but I did start to think a little better about it.

And then, still in TV production class, Mark Cendrowski (TBBT's director) came to visit us and work on some scenes. He was so nice and it was a lot of fun and afterwards I remember feeling kind of bad that I got to have that experience when I don't even care about the show, instead of someone who is a fan. It was around then that I started to think maybe I should give it a chance.

But then I didn't really do anything. A few months before graduating I got really into Bob's Burgers and that was pretty much all I cared about for a few years. In 2014 I started my Bob's Burgers tumblr blog under the username eroticfriendfictions and proceeded to build an even bigger audience under that. TBBT was at the periphery of things. If asked I still said I didn't like it and most people I knew also didn't like it, so life continued on.

I don't know exactly when it was that I first saw Amy. All I know is at some point I was flipping through TV channels and caught part of some episode with her in it. I still didn't like the show, but I saw her and thought, Oh. It's you, you're The Favorite. It's the most conclusive evidence scientists have to prove the existence of love at first sight.

I still didn't start really watching TBBT until around 2016. At that time I was working multiple part time jobs and I also picked up a freelance project that was pretty tedious but paid decent and could be done from home just whenever I had spare time. I wanted background noise while I worked on that and somehow ended up with TBBT reruns on the TV. It then became my go-to and I watched a good deal of the show during my time on that project.

But I still had complicated feelings about it. There were parts I enjoyed, but also parts that I felt were hard to watch. I adored Amy so much, but so many of the jokes from her early episodes boiled down to, 'She never had any friends! She doesn't know how to act because she's never had friends before!! Isn't it funny how she never had any friends!?!' In some ways, it felt like I was being punished for liking her, for not wanting to point and laugh at her. Nevertheless, I kept watching and I was slowly getting won over. I actually got to a point where I started reading Shamy fanfiction. I can remember some of the fics. I can remember illegally streaming The Opening Night Excitation because I hadn't caught it on TV yet.

And then that freelance project ended and I just stopped. I stopped watching and I stopped reading the fics and I went back to Bob's Burgers. I brushed up so close to the TBBT fandom right then, I don't actually know how I managed to prevent it. I felt the fixation forming and somehow reversed it, which shouldn't have been possible for me. I guess I wasn't ready to give up Bob's Burgers yet. Sometimes I wonder how things would have been different if I had.

Fast forward to 2020 and the pandemic. I lost the full-time job I'd had for 2 years and went back to watching Friends for comfort. Threw myself back into it, actually. Started thinking about sitcoms in general and rewatched some others as well. When I got a new job offer a thousand miles away from where I lived, I realized there was nothing holding me where I was and took it. I moved to my new place at the end of 2020, decorated it with all the Friends merch I could buy, and started the new job. And at the end of a long day of training, I found myself putting on TBBT reruns.

So finally, in early 2021, I decided to binge-watch the whole show properly. I had nothing left in me to fight it any longer. There were still aspects of the show I didn't like, but my love for Amy and Shamy finally won out.

And now here I am.

[angel-inked]

WIP Wednesday

This doesn't really have a title yet, nor do I know if it'll be a snippet or part of a full-on fic, but regardless, enjoy Howard worrying over his baby brother

Taglist: @vvkingofgaybisciutsvv @thequeenofthewinter @thedevilshardy @mollybegger-blog @wandawiccan60 @cameleonhardyfan63 @inkwolvesandcoffee @liliac-dreamer @potter-solomons

Darkness fell hours ago, Howard drummed his fingers on his knee nervously, sweat beaded down his broad forehead as if the sun was beating down on him, he couldn't sleep, there was no use trying. He heaved a heavy sigh out of his chest, “Where in the hell are you Forrest?” He murmured into the darkness of the empty barroom. Crickets, nothing but crickets, and damned old hoot owls reached his ears. The time was irrelevant really, they all came and went at all hours, but the absence of the middle brother was killing him, the not knowing made it worse. Shine would ease his nerves, oddly enough something in him thought better of it, instead settling on the half empty pack of cigarettes abandoned at the bar by a drunk patron to mask his quivering lip. Smoke billowed out from his flared nostrils as quick as he inhaled it. If he was wound up any tighter he'd might as well be a gnats’ ass. Another quick draw off his smoldering smoke did nothing for the unease settling in his gut. Leaning his head back, exhaling sharply and watching the smoke cloud drift away from his face, disappearing before it could really get anywhere. The scent of cigarette smoke was nowhere near as pungent as those big fat cigars Forrest liked so well. Nothing could top that, Howard figured. Sometimes he swore he could smell them in his sleep, he probably could too, given that Forrest was known to indulge in a midnight smoke break or two.

[outlanderfandomfollies]

Some Outlander fandom maxims don't hold up too well upon examination

There are a few maxims that are often used on certain Outlander blogs that make me want to grind my teeth when I see them. Unfortunately, they are used fairly often by certain bloggers whom I actually like.

But I think the maxims aren't helpful in the long run and only contribute to some of the tension in the fandom.

Here's a "generic" version of one maxim that is frequently used:

S doesn't need defenders/mommies.

Let's examine this one in detail, shall we?

The assertion that S doesn't need defenders/mommies has always bothered me because it seems a bit (perhaps unwittingly) hypocritical. This is because (at least from my perspective) if S doesn’t need “defenders”–he also doesn’t need “judges.”🤷🏻‍♀️

 And if S doesn’t need “mommies” who defend him, then he also doesn’t need a different kind of “mommy,” one who scolds him on social media.

And please, not all of us who sometimes defend S see him only in positive terms. Many of us, like myself, see some of his flaws. We just question whether it is any fan's place to frequently play judge and jury regarding S--especially as a way of having "fun."

However, I also agree with @bcacstuff that at times those who defend S (including myself) can go too far. For instance, it probably isn't helpful to use absolute terms like "always" in critiques (i.e., it is rare for any fan to "always" behave in any given way).

In addition, the word "hate," (as in "Sam hate") is probably a tad too strong.

The traditional meaning of "hate," when used as a noun is “intense dislike, extreme aversion or hostility.” I'm not sure that that level of intensity is what most fans mean when they refer to “Sam hate.”

In my experience, there are probably less than a handful of people in the fandom who genuinely seem to "hate" S. The majority who critique him frequently appear to be mildly annoyed by his behaviors or to mildly dislike him.

Perhaps better words than “hate” would be “dislike,” “annoyance,” or “skepticism” (of S’s motivations).🤷🏻‍♀️

But even if we are not talking about actual “hate,” there is a difference between  being annoyed occasionally with something that S does, and being annoyed by his behaviors and/or skeptical of his motives at least 90% of the time.😬

Although there are many fans who are balanced in their criticisms of S, on certain blogs, those whose comments skew negative dominate many posts, and negative opinions can often pile on each other.

I know that some bloggers don't think that talking about the general negativity of comments on any given post is offering an "opinion." But it seems to me that fans who do that believe they are offering “an opinion.” Their opinion is that much of the S criticism is petty, overblown, and based on individual biases, assumptions, and/or projections onto S, a man whom none of the “critics” knows personally.🤷🏻‍♀️

I can appreciate that certain bloggers don't want to see those kinds of "opinions" on their blogs, and they have a right to ban them if they want to.

But it is an "opinion" that many share in the fandom. Silencing it on a blog doesn't make it disappear.

Here's another, related maxim:

S is a big boy who can defend himself.

It’s true that S is a “big boy” but I'm not 100% sure he “can defend himself.”

First of all, we know that S is not going to come to any of our blogs to defend himself. (Thank goodness!😱)

But S has also learned from hard experience that whenever he tries to defend himself, it just makes the situation worse.

That’s a lesson lots of celebrities learn. 

For instance, back in July 2017, Robert Pattinson did an interview on The Howard Stern Show where he discussed how there was nothing that he personally could do to combat some of the nasty things that were said on social media about his fiancé at the time (FKA Twigs) or about himself. It appeared that Howard Stern agreed:

Rob: And it’s one of the most difficult things to know how to confront really. I mean, it’s a faceless enemy. If someone came up in the street and said it then it’s one thing, you’d know what to do, you’d know what to say. But when it’s literally just this kind of like this little random name on Instagram. Howard: Some asshole in his basement. Rob: And they are probably like in a different country somewhere. It’s just crazy. It might seem fake to them but it’s definitely, but like it’s real in your life. [...] Howard: I agree with you. I think it is the hardest thing. And as a guy I know we all try to fix things. I know if someone attacks my wife on Twitter or one of these things you get crazy because you want to go Fuck I’m gonna go protect you from this. And you can’t protect anybody from anything. You feel helpless. Rob: And then I feel like you’re feeding it afterwards as well. I don’t want to… I feel like it makes me feel like less powerful if you’re trying to attack… it’s like trying to attack a reflection in the water or something. You just look crazy. Whereas you think the only way to show some kind of strength is like, 'Oh, none of this shit touches me.'

So, in many ways, it isn't true that S or any celebrity can defend themselves without it potentially backfiring.

Here is a video of the Robert Pattinson interview for those who are interested.

One of the reasons some of us would like certain fans to be less quick to criticize S (or at least more balanced in their comments about S) is we know that certain other fans send S screencaps of what is said about him on various social media platforms--including tumblr.

And I do believe that the frequent criticisms of his behavior has had an effect on S's mental health. (I don't think he would have mentioned the effect the negative rumors had on his mental health in his 2020 rant if it had not been true. Mental health issues still have too much of a stigma, especially for men, for S to publicly mention that lightly.)

Furthermore, we know negative comments on social media take an emotional toll on celebrities, because so many have spoken up about it.

Robert Pattinson also spoke about how it isn't easy to ignore the negative comments, and how that interacts with one's self-esteem:

Rob: And even if you think oh you can turn it off or whatever. It’s still like just to know it’s THERE. It’s like if you know that there’s one room in your house where like if you like listen up against the wall, you hear everyone talking sh*t about you in the next room. Even if you don’t go to that room, if whenever you feel bad about yourself, you’re gonna go down there and like start listening to the whispers. [emphasis added]

I realize that everyone is free to set policies on their own blogs, but once in a while, it might be helpful for bloggers to pay attention to some of the criticism about the negativity, rather than just dismissing those criticisms as coming from "mommies," or "defenders."

And it might be helpful if those of us who choose to defend S from time to time were a little bit nicer in how we do so.

[edited]

________________ GIF SOURCES:  01*, 02*, 03*, 04*, 05*,06*, 07; gifs 08-10* were made from this video. *NOTE: These gifs were modified from their original sources. Credit to @louche-laid-back-glory for most of the Robert Pattinson interview transcript. 

[mdhwrites]

Reccomendations for cartoons to watch include: Gravity Falls, Adventure Time, Regular Show, the later seasons of MLP Friendship is Magic (for the sake of completing it and being able to properly evaluate the show), Steven Universe, DuckTales 2017, OK KO, Big City Greens, Star vs the Forces of Evil, Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur, Kim Possible, Hilda, Helluva Boss, Scooby Doo Mystery Incorporated, She Ra 2018, and the Ben 10 franchise.

I actually still have another ask that is mostly this same list but I think Hilda and Helluva Boss are new. Mostly responding because something I find interesting about myself given how ruthless I can be with TOH is that, well...

I probably will never truly be able to be some big reviewer because when I start disliking something, I drop it. That's actually the big reason I'm responding is because there is NO WAY I am watching the like 4+ seasons of MLP:FiM that I didn't watch because I just can't engage with stuff I dislike. I find no joy in it and while I can rant for a couple episodes, it just loses my interest.

I never seek things out because I think I'll dislike them. I just don't think life is enjoyable that way. It's why I have no plans to return to Helluva Boss. I absolutely believe people would potentially send me asks about it with how polarizing it is but I got to the episode when Moxie and Blitzo are interrogated, went "Ah, I see, the two characters I hate the most and don't even find funny (Stolas and Blitzo) are the actual main characters and the pilot was potentially kind of a lie for what the real focus of the show is. I'm out." And I haven't watched an episode since. My brain struggles to click with media after all so why would I bother with media I actively know I dislike already?

I'll comment on a couple others that I have at least had experience with on the list in a minute but since Amphibia, I've watched the first season of Craig of the Creek and think that show is just AMAZING. There's at least one episode I keep wanting to do a blog on just because it exemplifies how much the show understands the wonder of fantasy and childhood without actually being fantastical. I've also seen S1 of SpyxFamily and some of S2 but right now the only streaming service I have consistent access to is Hulu (the Disney+ I was borrowing cancelled theirs to swap to Hulu) and they only have S1 dubbed of SpyxFamily.

I'm hoping to sometime soon actually watch Over the Garden Wall finally and just have been kind of a mess as of late as for why I haven't yet. I've heard only good things, and shockingly few spoilers, and it's about time I gave it a proper shot.

ANYWAYS:

Steven Universe: Watched the first episode and only really liked Greg so just didn't bother watching more. Steven was fine but I actively hated all three of the gems because of how brain dead they were in both segments of the episode. As far as pilots go, I think SU might genuinely have one of the worst I've ever seen for convincing you to like a main cast.

Gravity Falls: I rewatched the first episode recently and went "This is oooookay." Something about Dipper's VA just bothers me. Not like they're doing a bad job but that it falls into an uncanny valley my brain doesn't love. I really wish I could better explain why that show refuses to properly click for me.

Regular Show: I forget why but I've seen a few episodes. It's not bad but I don't think it's really for me. I find Rigby and Mordecai annoying more than anything else. Not awful but I think without it feeling like they're actually meant to be learning something, they fall into the trap Randy and Howard from Randy Cunningham fell into eventually for me where I was like "Okay, assholes can be fun for a while but if that's all you're ever going to be, I don't care."

Adventure Time: I have seen as many episodes where Fiona and Cake show up in that show than I have Finn and Jake. XD I have genuinely liked what I've seen and just for some reason never sought it out. Maybe someday.

Star Vs: I need to give S2 a chance but MAN when I got told they break up Marco and Jackie for NO REASON I lost a lot of interest in the show. I like Marco more than Star, and I've only seen S1, and thought Marco and Jackie's relationship was genuinely really nice and kind of unique. Also knowing it's most people's cartoon punching bag doesn't exactly fill me with enthusiasm for it.

Kim Possible: I remember rewatching the pilot a couple years ago and being shocked by how much I didn't care for Kim. I think the fact that Bonnie is the only one who gives her shit but she's actually just genuinely amazing at everything and liked by most make her just not compelling to me which is a shame because I have REALLY fond memories of the show. I'd probably commit to a rewatch of Danny Phantom first though since it has been just as long since I watched that.

(Weird fact: I was looking at Hulu's unfortunately limited amount of cartoons and saw they had Kick Buttowski of all things which is WILD to me.)

She-Ra: I've seen literally one episode, thought it was good, and definitely is one of the ones I keep telling myself to watch because everything about it seems like it'd be up my alley. These are also my thoughts on Voltron though with how much... less divisive that last season of Voltron is, it's definitely below watching Princesses of Power.

Ben 10: Loved the original series as a kid, tried the first two spin offs that came out and didn't really jive with either but I thought Julie, the tennis girl Ben gets with, was super cute. I know a friend who would LOVE to see me get into Ben 10 and do some reviews of it.

And just as an anime shout out, a part of me is still tempted to give Little Witch Academia another try. Not only is it just an obvious next show for me to watch but it's one I REALLY want to like because I like a lot about it... I just absolutely despise Akko from the like four episodes I watched a good number of years ago now. I thought almost all of the supporting characters were great though.

Just... Consider this my weird, rambly blog late at night about cartoons and the fact that I do wish I engaged with media better. One of the worst elements of it is that I don't engage well with scripted content well if my brain isn't already in an alright place. Like I don't go to television for distraction and cheering me up. I vastly prefer streams for that as I can actually turn my brain off during those normally. It's something I've talked about before and something I'd like to change. Heck, I even at one point had a therapy goal to watch something at least once a week since that'd still be easier than streaming or writing. Whoops. *sigh*

I do also appreciate the recommendations! The reminders are good sometimes since I don't feel like I actually stay in the loop all that well. And since I kind of assume this is the same person who sent a list before, I decided I felt like actually responding, especially because the MLP pitch is an interesting one but man... That's a LOT of Starlight Glimmer I'd have to put up with when just like six episodes of her as a good guy made me want to light both her and Twilight on fire to put them out of their, and mine, misery. That's without me getting into the fact that I just think the characters in general got worse by then, almost like series shouldn't last for that long because finding new angles on characters becomes REALLY HARD (says the dumbass with a series of his own that honestly is longer than he should reasonably plan a story for.)

Again, late night rambling while my brain deals with suddenly snapping out of a hyper focus on a game for three days and doesn't deal with that well. *sigh* Have a good night everyone, take care of yourself and see you next tale.

======+++++======

I have a public Discord for any and all who want to join!

I also have an Amazon page for all of my original works in various forms of character focused romances from cute, teenage romance to erotica series of my past. I have an Ao3 for my fanfiction projects as well if that catches your fancy instead. If you want to hang out with me, I stream from time to time and love to chat with chat.

A Twitter you can follow too

And a Kofi if you like what I do and want to help out with the fact that disability doesn’t pay much.

[averagereviews]

Starfield and the problem in general

Intro

Hello fellow gamers out there in the galaxy. This will be my first ever review I done in the first blog I ever created so dont expect much there, but there is just so much fustration piled up in me about the gaming industry, that I have to write it out of me.

Disclaimer

First thing first, there are far worse games out there than Starfield, but this game was the trigger point that made me do a blog, so I will make a honest review from the game. I will only focus the problems here, as official platforms are not highlight them out enough, and since I did not played the game I cant say much about the story either. My review is based on what I seen from Youtube and other streaming platforms so if you want to hear an in depth version, you might look somewhere else.

But hey, you did not play the game, how can you do a review about it, you might ask the fair question. Well my answer to that, you dont taste poop either to know its gonna be bad. I will belive to my fellow gamers that this game has some potential and has good moments, but generally it is another product that was not created with a soul, with the desire to be good.

Technical issues

First of all lets state the obvious, this game was in development for 5-7 years. In 5-7 years they came out with a core game that can be done in about 30 hours, if you focus on the main story quests only. They used the same engine as they are using since eternity and was out of date already at the time of Fallout 4, so it shows its mark on bugs, glitches and on performance as well. While the game runs on a steady 30fps on consols, the PC version suffers a lot. With an upper mid range setup like an I5-10400F+RX6700XT and 32GB ram + an SSD the game barely runs at 40 fps on ultra at 1080p during city walk and gunfights. This is just ridiculus to say the least, while better looking games like CP77 and BG3 or RDR2 runs way above 60 fps all the time. You might think that it may be my system that is weirdly not compatible with the game, but even better rigs suffer from this.

What is more funny in a bad way, that Todd Howard said in an interview, that they put a lot of effort into optimalization and that you may need a better PC to experience this game to the fullest. I dont know about this guys, for me its just feels as a big fat lie onto my face, as said before, better looking games runs better than this. Its not ugly or anything but more like a buffed up Fallout 4 in space theme. Here is some examples:

While you may find better looking areas, your major part in the game will live with this.

Lazy work

Another point I would like to highlight is the use of AI. It was a bad idea back then at No Man's Sky and it was certanly a bad idea here as well. They put 1000+ planets into the game that was generated by the AI depending on where you land on the planet, and most of the time its barren, empty, lifeless. It feels like they gave out the order to the AI, to use these assets on planets and create 1000+ of them. What you can find on them are most of the time rocks, some creatures put into the area randomly and without any real purpose. And yes I admit, if you would travel to 100 planet you would probably find rocks and barren lifeless areas, but as a gamer its boring. It may be fun and interesting for the first couple of times, but it gets boring to the eye very fast. What I would love to see is more planets with life on it, more vegetation, more creatures, better and meaningfull stuff on the surface or marks of a fallen civilization. And we might see this later like 7 years or so just as in No Man's Sky was very bad at the start and they hammered it until it became a good space exploration game. As of right now however this game is without a soul. Also the harsh reality why they do not changing the engine they use, because they know they can create a base game, with a lot of empty suff, and then rely on modders whom will do the hard work and fill up the empty or missing elements for free. They say its a gamer/modder friendly attitude, but its just about saving money and resources which is unacceptable in my book. Create a good game then let the modders live out their hobby, but do not rely on them to make your garbage playable while only you profit on it.

Marketing vs Reality:

This game was marketinged as a very good space exploration + RPG game where you can freely explore hundreds of systems and planets and find interesting stuff on most of them. While on reality this game restricts you from exploring, since you cant land manually on a planet just everywhere (like in No Man's Sky for example), but you have to choose your landing location from a planet view, then loading screen, and you are there in your 4x4km barren field that you can explore with some point of interest you can visit on foot (Because if they would give you wehicle, then you would realise easier that how small the area they let you "explore") These point of interests varies between "kill some pirates, or creatures", "explore this cave with 3 loot nodes inside" or "scan this or that" "Explore the lab" type of activity. Again maybe the first 10 will be interesting, then why would I want to do stuff like this for hours? Where are the crypt like systems that Skyrim offered with full of interesting puzzles? Where are the npcs that did something in previous games around you? Where are the secrets you can discover? Where is the wilderness? Where is life? Its a game its not a space simulator that offers you the same kind of experience you would do in real life. It should be full of fantasy to sell itself. Again it was marketinged like this and not as "Empty planet viewer simulator 2023"

And after all of this, we arrived to the real problem that is not Starfield's only fault. Its the era where we live and what we get for our money. Im sure some of you have much better gaming rig than me and you dont even have to care what you spend on your 70-100 bucks, but there are people, whom like to do gaming and has to think twice where they put their hard earned money. And this game with many others in my eyes are not worth the full price. The general problem is that developers are probably forced to make the games to deadlines that are way too short. I accept that creating an AAA game is not 1-2 years now, especially if you want to make it uniq in some way. Developers are pushed to their limits, they dont have enough time to create something that has a soul nor they have the time to test the games properly looking for bugs and glitches, and they rely on technologies like FSR and DLSS to avoid the need of optimizing. All because the publishers are not gamers, they only looking for money, they dont care about you people. They put a lot of investment to marketing/false marketing to generate hype, and when they got their paycheck they are happy and get the conclusion, they can sell games this way too, why bother with all the details and polishment? Fanbase will always buy it, defend it, as I encountered this with Starfield too. I asked people, what makes Starfield better than even Fallout 4 if it has so many flaws and missing elements? They could not give me a correct answer. All they said it has a good story and ship and base building is very fun, and modders will make this game better anyways, so I will belive them that story may be better, but again its not up to the modders to polish a game or make it playable, interesting, especially not for free even if this was the general case with Skyrim, Fallout series in the past (except that those games had more content by default than Starfield). In other cases I was immediately banned from some forums for said reason "I was trying to generate flame" Well if asking the hard questions is flame generation then yes I was doing that. Is this what we will get from now on? That companies will sell their leftover soul for more money and the gaming industry will only have 2-3 games per 10 years that are really outstanding and was created with passion? What are your toughts about this? Tell me in the comments below.

[altrockgenre]

My favorite Alt-Rock artists (Part 3)

This will be the final part of my little series of my favorite artists under the umbrella term that is Alt-Rock. For this finale I will be talking about the subgenre that has exploded into my life somewhat recently and has become by far my favorite style of music. This genre that I speak so highly of is Alternative Folk, it combines everything from a smooth angelic rhythm to just being able to resurface memories from my childhood in an instant. It is in my eyes the perfect music for summer break and long car rides. I will talk about my favorite lesser known artists from this genre as I feel they reflect my taste better than the artists who are more popular and already praised for their accomplishments. If it weren’t for this condition that I am putting on myself I would definitely write about Lord Huron, but they are so well known and popular that I am pretty sure anyone will like it so there is no real point in giving the same opinion as everyone else.

Firstly is a pretty niche band that has recently been shown a lot of love from their newly discovered fans, Dispatch. I was initially thinking of gatekeeping this one as it is something truly special that I found all by myself after lots of searching, but I guess my blogs aren’t big enough for me to care that much about it. When I think of relaxing on a beach enjoying the sunshine this type of music and rhythm is exactly what I want to go alongside it. Every song has its own story and feel, from the first few seconds it’s easy to differentiate every song. Their style is very comforting and nostalgic as they usually use very little artificial modifications to their sounds, which gives it a sort of homemade and campfire feeling. Secondly the rhythm I think is what I love the most about them, the songs really sound like a campfire story being told around a group of friends. It is slow but keeps a nice flowing rhythm that carries your soul throughout the whole song. I find it hard to single out their best song for me because they are all so incredible and so unique, but if I were to talk about one it would probably be “Only The Wild Ones”. The lyrics are all about living freely and not being held back by superficial things like living a materialistic and solitary life. The chorus is a perfect representation of this, lines like: “Oh, the riot and rush of the warm night air” and “Stars are up now, no place to go but everywhere” perfectly encapsulates the essence of a free and wild lifestyle. I find this resonates with me a lot because there are a lot of times in my life the desire to just take a break from everything and go out and nature or just somewhere different to let it all go. But the deliverance of these powerful lyrics is what brings it home for me, the spiritual vocals really make it feel like it’s my consciousness saying these things and makes me feel much more emotionally connected with the song. This band wholeheartedly deserves a 10/10 from me, if it weren’t for Lord Huron this group would be my undisputed number one.

Next is a modern version of the folk genre Ben Howard, he is much more well known then Dispatch but that doesn’t mean much in the grand scheme of things as this is entirely my blog and not one of the general population. For me Ben Howard is instead of being on a beach in the sunlight, his songs are more stargazing type of songs. His lyrics and instrumental are much softer and relaxing. The songs are all about a certain feeling or memory and less of a coherent story with a start and end. The focus for the instruments is the guitar work of Ben and the intricate chords and rhythms played. I could honestly do a whole blog on just his style of playing guitar. It brings something to the table that I can guarantee you will never find anywhere else, it is and has been my favorite guitar playing i have listened to ever since my dad showed me Ben Howard. The lyrics and guitar picking are the heart and soul, they are like two lovers dancing together and taking the spotlight. A song that I find to be the masterpiece of Ben Howard is Old Pine. It has a very slow start that really brings your ears along for a ride, in the same sense that you slowly walk in a lake to get adjusted, this way of starting the song sets the tone quickly that it’s not some one and done magic that tries to keep your attention from start to end. The lyrics really scream childhood camping memories with lines such as: “Careless and young, free as the birds that fly”, showing how when we were younger, when days were better, we didn’t care about the small things, we would just go with what was fun without remembering the bad. The impersonation of these feelings is why I love his songs so much, he is able to perfectly represent a key memory in listeners with every melody. I believe that Ben Howard is deserving of 9.8/10, because of how well the songs can bring up memories, but I deducted a few because there is a handful of songs that lack the ability to accomplish this.

[moonchild-things]

Chapter Eleven: Rain Check

Summary: Delphia Odinsdottir is the Goddess of Virtue. While stopping petty fights between her brothers, sparing with her friends, and practicing with her mother, Delphia has visions of the future. However, her once boring, uneventful life as Princess is disrupted by one of the most disturbing visions she had ever seen. Which leads her to run into a patriotic captain in red, white and blue.

Word Count: 3835 

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Yay! An update! I actually got this chapter done and the next few within a short amount of time, which means more Delphia content ^-^ This poor poor woman, we all know what's coming, I almost felt bad having to write it. But it's gotta happen :( anyway, I hope ya'll like it!

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EVERYONE GATHERED AROUND THE MAIN TABLE IN the underground bunkers. Plans had to be made about what to do going forward. Now that they had captured Zola, a larger move could be made against HYDRA. Add in the fact that Schmidt would probably also make a big move now that his lead scientist had been taken. 

“Johann Schmidt belongs in a bug house.” Colonel Phillips said, “He thinks he’s a God. He’s willing to blow up half the world to prove it, starting with the USA.”

“Schmidt’s working with powers beyond our capabilities.” Howard informed, “He gets across the Atlantic, he will wipe out the entire eastern seaboard in an hour.” 

Everyone swallowed thickly at the reminder of that. The tense atmosphere was near suffocating everyone in the room. The Howling Commandos, Peggy, Delphia, Howard, and a few other high ranking officers were sitting at the table. Other officers watched the brief from behind them, holding their breath at every piece of information that was being talked over.

“How much time we got?” Gabe Jones, a member of the Howling Commandos asked.

“According to my new best friend, under twenty four hours.” Colonel Phillips grunted.

Another member of the Commandos, Jaques Dernier then asked, “Where is he now?”

Phillips held up a photo, “Hydra’s last base is here. In the Alps. Five hundred feet below the surface.”

“So, what are we supposed to do?” Jim Morta, a third member of the howling commandos, asked, “I mean, it’s not like we can just knock on the front door.”

“Why not?” Steve asked, bringing the attention to him. From the way that his jaw was clenched and a determined expression was on his face, everyone could tell that he was ready to do anything to defeat Schmidt. With his hardened stare he said, ”That’s exactly what we’re gonna do.”

From his expression and tough tone in his voice, Delphia knew that there was going to be no way to get Steve to change his mind. Delphia wasn’t sure how things were going to go, but she was both anxious and ready to follow him in this battle.

As if Delphia was going to allow herself to be benched during this. It really was the last chance that the SSR most likely had to stop Schmidt. She would be a fool if she didn’t try to get herself involved in it. After all, she has a year worth of vengeance brewing within her that has to be served to the Red Skull. Delphia would usually scold her brothers not to be blinded by something like revenge, but she can’t help herself.

After being subjected to the torture that Schmidt had put her through, killing one of her frist Midgardian friends, and causing so much distress during this war, Delphia felt justified in her pursuit. The only thing was, she had to convince those around her to allow her to go. The most difficult person to convince would most likely be Steve.

So as everyone started to get their battle plans together, she made quick work to approach Phillips. “Colonel,” she started with a strong conviction in her tone.

The man looked up from his paperwork before handing it to someone else, “yes, Ms. Delphia.”

“I would like to help.” It wasn’t a question of whether she was helping or not. She made up her mind and that means she’s going to join them on their venture.

Phillips already knew what that meant and clicked his tongue at her with a critical eye, “I sure hope that you don’t mean to help us on the front lines.”

She tilted her head slightly, “That is exactly what I mean.”

He sighed heavily, “I understand that you want to join in on fighting these HYDRA bastards, but I’m not sure if I can allow you to come with.”

Having him already denying her claim to go with them caused her to purse her lips. This wasn’t something simple like running paperwork back and forth around the bunker like a messenger, she knew that. She also was far too aware of the fact that women were not on the front lines in this war, which she didn’t completely understand, and understood the standards. However, this was by far something different. This involved her torturer and an artifact from her own home. She would not allow herself to sit on the sidelines now of all times! “Have I not proven myself as an admirable fighter? I helped Steve retrieve the captured men of the 107th, I helped train your men in fighting techniques-”

“This is different.”

Delphia’s eyebrows twitched, “you will need all the soldiers you can get to fight this.”

“Are you a soldier?” He asked her simply.

“At times,” her answer just earned her a disbelieving scoff from Phillips. “Either way, I believe I know Schmidt more than any of your men. I can help on the ground any way they need.”

Phillips stared at her for a long moment, taking in her determined stature. “Don’t make this something I regret.” The last thing he wanted was for a young woman to get hurt on the front lines. However, she’s too stubborn to just let this go. He knows for a fact that if she would find a way to the battlefield behind his back. As she has done that previously. It was better to make sure that she was safe within their view than going behind their back to join. Even if she was a bit of a charity case in Phillips' eyes, he wouldn’t want to see her get caught up in this in the wrong way.

As he walked away, Delphia felt herself smile triumphantly. It surprisingly was much easier to talk her way into getting involved in this than she originally thought. She figured she would have to plead her case more to him about joining. Perhaps she had proven herself to him to an extent, or he just knew that she was going to join regardless of what he said. Either way, Delphia was more than happy.

“You’re coming on the mission?”

Delphia spun around at the sudden voice. It was Steve who stared at her with increasing worry growing on his face. She nodded, “Yes. Colonel Phillips agreed with my proposal.”

“Proposal?” He chuckled lightly, “I feel like it was more of a demand than anything.”

She just shrugged her shoulders bashfully, “Well, I suppose that I was going to join no matter what…”

Steve shook his head as a serious expression consumed his face. “Delphia, I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

“I will stay safe,” She stated plainly, “I have done well enough to do that so far.”

He just shook his head in denial, “You weren’t on the field like this, Delphia. 

“I am not a fragile little girl, like you might think.”

“Delphia. I don’t think that you’re fragile.” Steve quickly explained. By no means did he think she was fragile, at least not in the sense that she might be thinking. She’s fragile to him in the way that she was precious to him. So of course he wouldn’t want to have her in any sort of danger. There was a short silence between them as Steve took a moment to build up the courage to say what he wanted. He placed a hand on her cheek, caressing it tenderly. The two stared into each other’s eyes, bright blue clashing with warm hazel. He made sure to portray the raw emotion that he was feeling in this moment to her through just his gaze. “I care for you. The last thing I want is to see you hurt.”

As much as she loved the sentiment from him of keeping her safe, Delphia had heard enough of it. She blinked slowly, “Even when I am away from the prying eyes of my family, I still am controlled. I would not argue with you, if I did not know what I was doing. However, with something like this. I’m not sitting by. I want to fight. I want to fight with you. You will not change my mind.” Ever since she had started to get her visions she had been constantly surveyed no matter what she did. In her home, on her trips(which were minimal), or even while she was in her own chambers. Just to make sure that she wasn’t in any sort of danger at all. Midgard wasn’t completely different, however, she appreciated it to an extent. This was a land that she did not know all too well, so she appreciated being monitored and kept safe. However, something like this was going to be different. Those around her might not like it but there was no changing her mind.

Steve shook his head at the determined expression on her face. He just knew that she wasn’t going to change her mind. Through the way that she was quite headstrong about something like fighting alongside them was something that Steve found quite… attractive. He couldn’t help himself but chuckle, “You’re quite the stubborn woman.”

“You would not have me any other way,” Delphia said, almost playfully despite her serious tone.

“That’s true.”

It was as if a spark was lit just in that moment. With the combination of the largest battle that they’ve had just on the horizon and their relationship developing into something more intimate, the moment seemed right. So the two leaned in slowly before their lips met. The kiss between them was soft and almost awkward, but perfect for them. Steve was slightly clumsy with how he pressed up against her as Delphia was unsure where to put her hands. However, it was still sweet in their eyes. Maybe it wasn’t the right moment for it to happen, as both of them would rather have this romantic moment without the impending fight looming over them. Though it was still wonderful. 

It’s been quite some time since Delphia had her last kiss, but this felt so much different from the ones in the past. Her brothers had scared off most suitors of hers when they were younger, and even now, so the secretive kisses she had gotten in were long ago and nothing too special. Though with Steve… It just felt so explosive, so right to her in that moment.

As they slowly pulled back from each other, neither knew what to say after such a mind numbing kiss. Truthfully, nothing else had to be said. They had explained all of their feelings in that kiss. After all, what else could they say to express their feelings at this moment. So this amazing moment allowed the two to bask in their peacefulness. The calm before the storm, and how splendid that was.

“You ready?” Peggy asked her friend as she primed her weapon.

“For a good fight?” Delphia asked as she smirked, “Always.” She also was given a weapon, as they couldn’t have her unarmed. A small pistol was given to her. Delphia isn’t one for guns or weapons in general, usually relying on her magic when on the battlefield. However, it wasn’t like she could use that here. Last thing she needs is people questioning her abilities.

Delphia waited alongside Phillips and Peggy as they watched from the treeline. Their plan was quite simple and most likely extremely effective. Using Steve as bait to get into the facility, taking out as many men as he could and creating an entry point for the forces outside was impressive. Of course, Steve seemed to make it as flashy as he could. Then again he couldn’t not be flashy in his Captain America attire.

“For a good fight?” Delphia asked as she smirked, “Always.”

The radio that Colonel Phillips had crackled to life, “We’re in, assault team go!”

Phillips nodded his head, “Move out!”

Finally the signal came, and everyone on the outside was ready to fight their way inward. The SSR soldiers all swarmed the base. They fired their guns against the HYDRA agents who retaliated with their own tesseract powered weapons. There were men who were falling on both sides.

“Cut off one head, two more shall…” The soldier started to say but was cut off when Phillips shot him.

“Let’s go find two more!” Phillips shouted out as they ran in. So all the men scattered around the base, finding HYDRA men and killing them. Storming the base seemed somewhat easy as their enemy was not expecting such a harsh ambush.

Just as she was rounding a corner with Peggy and the group of men she entered with, Delphia saw a line of actual fire being shot at Steve. Though Peggy made quick work of dealing with that soldier as she just gunned him down.

Steve blinked and turned to find the group “You’re late.”

“Maybe you were early.” Delphia shrugged before pointing towards the shield wedged in the doorway. “I believe you have to…”

Steve nodded his head, “Right.” He then took off after Schmidt with his impressive speed.

They all came running into the main hangar area. Chaos was everywhere, no matter where Delphia looked. Shots were being fired, bodies were disintegrated, and men were shouting. She knew that her brothers would just love to see such a battle. Well, more of Thor, he was always the more violent and battle-centric brother. 

“Delphia!” Peggy’s sudden voice called out drawing her attention. She turned to find that Peggy was in one of Schmidts cars, Phillips at the wheel, “In here!”

She made quick work of jumping into the vehicle next to Peggy in the backseat. The car then peeled away as soon as she set foot in the vehicle. They drove out towards the hangar to see a large aircraft trying to take off. Also in front of them was their very own Captain America.

Phillips pulled the car up right next to him, “Get in!”

So he jumped into the front passenger seat hastily. The car sped quickly across the hangar to try and catch up with the plane. Phillips then pushed a nitro button of the car, increasing the speed significantly. They then came close enough to the large wheel of the plane thanks to that speed boost. Steve stood up, ready to try his best to get onto that plane at any cost.

“Steven!” Delphia called out above the sound of the wind and engines around them. He turned to her quickly as she pulled him down, and planted a brief kiss on lips. Had he been in a less intense situation, that might have short circuited his mind. Though despite how amazing it might have felt for even the briefest of kisses with her, he had a duty. In his daze he glanced over at Phillips and Peggy. The colonel looked slightly uncomfortable while Peggy appeared smug, as if she had just won a bet.

“I’m not kissin’ you!” Phillips yelled over the wind.

Peggy flashed him a smile, “Good luck!”

With one last lingering look between Delphia and Steve, Captain America climbed his way onto the hood of the car. From there, he jumped just at the last second to grab onto the wheel of the plane. The final battle between him and Schmidt was about to happen, and he was going to make sure that this ended here and now.

As Steve climbed away. Delphia saw the end of the tarmac coming worryingly fast. So Delphia thought quickly. While she had thought she wouldn’t do this while on Midgard, the circumstances called for it. She conjured her seiðr to save the car before it flew off the edge and into the abyss below. She whipped around and allowed white tendrils of brightly white magic come out of her hands that made quick work of digging into the ground behind the car. It effectively slowed the car down and caused it to come to a skidding halt. It was barely just in time as the car nearly tattered off the edge of the cliff. A part of Delphia just hoped that neither Peggy or Phillips noticed her save. That was something that she did not want to have to explain. She told herself when she was first captured by Schmidt that she wouldn’t use her magic in fear that it would just fuel his manic personality and the experiments on her. 

Maybe they would chalk it up to a trick of the eye or their imagination acting up, perhaps. Though if either Phillips or Peggy actually noticed the tendrils that grabbed the ground to stop the car, they didn’t comment on it. That could have been due to the fact that their attention was aimed towards the plane as it flew away.

Delphia stared up and watched as the large plane started to fly away. She could barely spy Steve hanging onto the wheel as it was retracted back into the plane. So the end was starting to begin, and she couldn’t be happier about that.

“We’ve secured the base,” Peggy started to inform as she joined Delphia in the communications room along with Jim Morta. “Most HYDRA soldiers are either dead or surrendered and we’ve started looking over what other weapons that they have.” Delphia didn’t even seem to react much to Peggy’s words as she nodded her head absentmindedly. Her thoughts were obviously focused on other matters. Just by looking at the expression on Delphia’s face, Peggy knew how anxious she was. Though she couldn't say that she also wasn’t nervous about Steve. “He’s a strong man, he’ll come back.”

“I hope,” Delphia said through a shaky breath. A thoughtful expression was on her face for just a moment. She was contemplating on her next few words, but before she could filter herself correctly she just started speaking. “Even during my childhood when I joined my brothers in fighting, I never had the dread of losing someone in battle.” It was true. She knew that her brothers and friends were resilient enough to fight and were quite durable to many different things. However, Midgardians are far more fragile than them. The smallest of things could cause a Midgardian to die. She sighed heavily, “Perhaps that was the blissful ignorance of a young woman not knowing the true consequences of war. This… It fills me with dread.”

To be honest, Peggy didn’t completely know what Delphia was talking about. She had been in battle before? While Peggy would say that she also has while being a field agent, she didn’t think that Delphia was the type of woman to do so. Though some would say the same for her. Even still, childhood? That seemed far-fetched. However, even then she understood the idea of having to come to terms with having to come to terms with the thought of losing people. Peggy had to accept it after brother had passed due to fighting in the war. He was a wonderful man, an amazing brother, brave soldier, and a death that Peggy never knew she would have to experience.

Delphia paced back and forth with Peggy watching her. The two were anxious about Steve’s whereabouts, with Delphia starting to panic only slightly. She had seen in her vision what more or less happened on that plane. Schmidt would be consumed by the tesseract and disappear, leaving Steve the victor. However, why was it taking too long? What had she not seen the other night in her vision?

As she was growing more and more upset, the radio started to spark to life as a voice came through the static. “Come in. This is Captain Rogers. Do you read me?”

“Captain Rogers,” Jim, who was sitting at the radio controls, let out a sigh of relief, “what is your…” 

At the sound of his voice, Delphia rushed over to the microphone and took the man’s spot. “Steven? Are you alright?”

“Delphia!” The tension in his voice disappeared, obviously happy to know that she was safe. “Schmidt’s dead.”

A smile crawled onto her face at that piece of news, “Thank the Norns. What about you? Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay, but the plane…” He trailed off anxiously, “I’m gonna have to put her in the water.”

It was as if a bucket of ice cold water had been poured over Delphia. A crash landing? Even if certain Midgardian technology still confused her to a certain extent, she knew that planes would not survive a crash where he was. Delphia shook her head, “We can find a safe place for you to land. Howard can help, I am sure of it.”

“There’s not enough time.” Steve denied, “This thing’s moving too fast and it’s heading for New York.” 

“Steven…” Her heart started to tighten as the outlook of this situation became more bleak. “There must be something we can do.”

“Right now I’m in the middle of nowhere.” He explained, “If I wait any longer a lot of people are gonna die. Delphia, this is my choice.” Even if he were in the plane, oh so far away from her, he knew that she had to be close to tears, just like he was. The last thing he wanted to do was to die during this war after just having met Delphia not too long ago and admitting their feelings. However, he has no choice. He pulled out the compass with the photo of her. He wanted her vibrant smile to be the last thing he saw. The joy that she brought to him with just a simple look needed to be what would keep him calm enough during this. He called out one last time, “Delphia?”

“Yes?”

“I’m gonna need a rain check on that dance.”

“Of course, you name a time, a place,” Delphia let out a weak, watery chuckle, “I will be there.”

“You got it. You know, I still don’t know how to dance.”

She couldn’t help but smile at the statement, “I can teach you. Even if I am not the best either.” 

“We’ll have the band play somethin’ slow.” Steve said, ignoring his impending doom in that moment, “I’d hate to step on your-'' The abrupt end to his words brought dread into Delphia’s stomach. It felt like a rock weighing her down as the reality was slowly bleeding into her mind.

“Steven?” Delphia called out into the static, “Steven? Please?” Peggy placed a comforting hand on a shell-shock Delphia’s shoulder. She could do nothing but begin to cry. The man that she loved had sacrificed himself for the greater good. How she wished that did not have to happen. She hated this, with all her spirit. She hates being on Midgard, it’s brought her nothing but heartache. All she can do now is hang on to Peggy as the two begin to cry at their loss. The loss of a great man. The loss of Captain America. The loss of the Midgardian man that Delphia loved.

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AHH we're almost there! Only two more chapters to go! After this, technically the next installment in this little 'Revival Universe' of mine will be 'A Change of Heart' which is the Iron Man 1 fanfic that's already got one chapter up. After that I'm thinking of just doing Iron Man 2 straight after and then Thor! Honestly, I have such a big idea of what I want to try and write when it comes to Marvel and these ocs I've created. Is it a little over my head? Perhaps, but that isn't gonna stop me. I love writing!!! Anyway, until the next chapter, my friends!

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[nobrashfestivity]

Really like your blog and your taste in art. Do you collect original art pieces irl? If so, do you have any advice for finding contemporary artists to buy from when working with a limited budget?

Thank you.

I am not going to be much help. I'm an artist and I am poor, so buying anything at all is generally off limits. I have picked up a few things over the years, some Hokusai and Kawase block prints which I found at estate sales, for instance. I do have one Iwase photograph I think i paid 2500 dollars for when I had received some royalty check that I wanted to squander. It's probably worth more now, but It's not going to make me rich.

I know nothing about collectability other than that when i find an artist I think would be great to purchase I recoil in horror that I am late to the party and they already have a sale a Sotheby's. I had a bright idea once to collect South Korean artists like Whanki Kim, whom I dearly love, but his paintings were already worth hundreds of thousands. So there, my taste was in line with a market just 20 years too late!

Practically, I would say that you should subscribe to a service that has auction results and where you can look up if an artists is listed. This way your own education about what is already valuable out there works to your advantage. Just buy things you love and be patient about the value. Save some money (I have never done this) because when something comes up, you'll need to it. I was onto Howard Finster pretty early and my friends have a lot of his work, but even though it was cheap, relatively, I lacked the bank account to make a purchase when it would have been good to.

Look locally. A listed artist from your area will likely have given art to people they know or taught at a local college where people may have picked things up. Use the advantage of where you live to find things to buy. Herman Maril lived nearby and I would see his stuff for sale and it would have been a good buy once upon a time, but I have never been interested in investing.

When it comes to most artists, people don't always realize that it's not just the name of an artist but also the type of work. No one wants the impressionist painting of a a member of the house of commons, they want the flowers or the trees by the river. The academic work of George Bellows isn't nearly as valuable as a boxing scene. Unless the artist is of great stature, you're going to want to understand what the other buyers like. When you buy animation cells you get the one with Mickey Mouse in it.

The thing with art is that if you have these great pieces, then you already won. Never collect anything you don't love, because, how sad is that. value tends to be about trends, but the art market tries very hard to protect that value once it exists. You will never see Christie's auction an artist that is going to perform under market, they would instead simply sell that artist privately for pennies on the dollar thus making cash which they need and giving the collector a cheap painting that increases their overall wealth. This works out well for them both but the catch is you have to be very rich to play in the first place.

Also, be careful of fakes, there are far more fakes than most people imagine and even if it's not fake, if it's hard to authenticate then galleries and auction houses don't want to bother most of the time.

Recently I saw a Simpsons resin figure for big money at auction. But it wasn't a real Simpsons figure, it was in fact, not as good as that, but apparently a masterpiece on the cutting edge of art. I'm not saying I know better or it has no value, I'm suggesting I could never have judged that situation because I dont get the art. Or at least I don't get the relative value of art. If you go Italy there are old master paintings they are practically throwing away. They aren't the big important names so they have little monetary value.

The art market is a sinister, cynical, soul-crushing behemoth which has abandoned even the slightest pretense that originality or even the uniqueness of physical objects has any social or aesthetic value, in favor of a self-destructive and suffocating avidity which has little to do with beauty and everything to do with money laundering. Like many things in this country, it's gone from hiding the fact that it's a scam to saying that scams are cool if you get in on them. As bad as the anointed class control of taste was throughout the 50s and 60s, it's hard to celebrate the fact that some stupid NFT has already sold for double what any Jackson Pollock painting ever has.

As I type this, we have all lost 6 billion dollars by not investing in FamilyGuyJoeRogan coin.

[blueheavensims]

State of the Blogs Address

Well, now. The first half of 2022 seemed to fly by, and I totally forgot to do this thing on time.

I don’t publish “Coming soon…” or “On the horizon..” type posts on a regular basis, simply because plans can change, and creativity waxes and wanes. I can’t commit to something that I won’t even get started until three months from now, because I don’t know if when I’m finally free to work on it, I’ll still have the same motivation. But I do try to let fans (and haters!) know which direction I’m generally headed in every six months or so.

In my personal life, things have been moving along fairly well. Another year, more anniversaries and milestones, more triumphs and setbacks, great mirth and great melancholies (to paraphrase Howard). Nothing extraordinary, just regular life stuff.

I think my biggest accomplishment as a Simmer in the first half of 2022 was making the Tutorial Library its own separate blog, and uploading the PDF documents to WordPress so that they’re directly accessible from the page. Based on the outpouring of support I received on Tumblr and the sheer volume of tutorials being downloaded, I would say it’s been a smashing success. I should have done it long ago.

The meadhall projects were a bit of a surprise. They weren’t originally planned. They were two separate one-off projects. But I wasn’t satisfied with just the original furniture; a proper meadhall should have big tables, places to gamble, places for weary travelers to rest, and so on. So two sets became three, three sets became six, then I added some completely unplanned sets of walls and floors, and here we are. It will probably be wrapped up in two or three more furniture sets. Aside from that, I have big plans for BATG, a few smaller projects, and more clothes conversions. See below for more details —————————————— Vaya, vaya. La primera mitad de 2022 se pasó volando, y se me olvidó por completo hacer esta cosa a tiempo.

No publico regularmente posts del tipo "Próximamente…" o "En el horizonte…", simplemente porque los planes pueden cambiar, y la creatividad crece y disminuye. No puedo comprometerme con algo que ni siquiera voy a empezar hasta dentro de tres meses, porque no sé si cuando por fin esté libre para trabajar en él, tendré la misma motivación. Pero trato de informar a los fans (y también a los haters!) hacía donde voy cada seis meses más o menos.

En mi vida personal, las cosas han avanzado bastante bien. Otro año, más aniversarios y logros, más triunfos y reveses, grandes alegrías y grandes melancolías (parafraseando a Howard). Nada extraordinario, sólo cosas normales de la vida.

Creo que mi mayor logro como Simmer en la primera mitad de 2022 fue convertir la Biblioteca de Tutoriales en su propio blog, y subir los documentos PDF a WordPress para que sean accesibles directamente desde la página. A juzgar por la avalancha de apoyo que he recibido en Tumblr y el enorme volumen de tutoriales que se han descargado, diría que ha sido todo un éxito. Debería haberlo hecho hace mucho tiempo.

Los proyectos de meadhall han sido una sorpresa. No estaban planeados originalmente. Eran dos proyectos individuales. Pero no me quedé conforme con los muebles originales; una taberna de verdad debe tener mesas grandes, lugares para apostar, sitios para que los viajeros cansados descansen, etc. Así que dos publicaciones se convirtieron en tres, tres se convirtieron en seis, luego añadí algunos conjuntos de paredes y pisos completamente imprevistos, y aquí estamos. Probablemente, se acabará con dos o tres juegos de muebles más.

Aparte de eso, tengo grandes planes para BATG, algunos proyectos más pequeños, y más conversiones de ropa. Ahí abajo hay más detalles

————————————— Here’s a brief summary of what I have planned and what I accomplished in the last half of 2022. In production: • Two as-yet-unnamed clothes conversions • 12 new meadhall wall and floor sets • Four new meadhall furniture sets • The last two parts of The Harness of Toil • More Lycan, orcish, and demonic skintones Planned projects: Barbarians at the Gate • Widow’s Wail (a new warpaint overlay box • A series of 3-4 new sets of weapon accessories • Two more object sets to conclude All the Pretty Horses • Separates and teen/child conversions for existing BATG clothes • 3-4 new sets of regular BATG clothes • 3-4 new sets of Bad Witch “Body realism” projects • Estorpajos al Aire (III) • 1-2 additional overlay boxes Clothing conversions • At least 10-15 planned, but subject to change depending on what I feel inspired by

[tellthemeerkatsitsfine]

A while ago, I made a post that said I was going to give my thoughts about the Oscars thing with Chris Rock and Will Smith, and then behind the “keep reading” link, I explained that it was an April Fool’s joke and of course the world doesn’t need my thoughts on Chris Rock and Will Smith. Well, I feel like it should be a joke again this time, because I know the world doesn’t need my thoughts on this one, but I am actually not joking when I say that beyond this “keep reading” link is a bunch of stuff I think about John Mulaney and his various controversies.

I apologize. I just had to write this down here because if I don’t I’ll still be thinking it and I’ll end up talking about it the next time I see the only person I know who has any interest in discussing John Mulaney, and that’s my brother who’s a massive fan of his, and my brother and I just had an argument two days ago because of his refusal to wear masks in public indoor spaces, and I don’t want to have another fucking argument about this. So I’m putting it here. 

Okay. So when all the weird stuff happened with John Mulaney last year, I thought it was very messed up that so many people were talking about it like it was any of their business, and I still think that, but I did have to admit I can understand commenting on it. Because he did have quite a bit of material based around the idea that he was a “regular” guy compared to many celebrities, his wife was not famous, he was not going to make jokes at her expense, he was just trying to live a good family life. I love his “my wife is a bitch and I like her so much” joke, and that joke doesn’t stop being funny just because they got divorced, but it does add context that makes it feel a bit different. And if you happen to be a big fan of John Mulaney and really invested in him as a great comedian, it’s fair to say something about that when he does all that stuff he did last year.

I have seen all of John Mulaney’s specials and think he’s an amazingly skilled comedian, but I would not call myself particularly invested in him. So while I was judging all the people losing their minds over a development in his personal life last year, I tried to think of how I’d react if this happened with a comedian in whom I do have emotional investment – if he were known as a down-to-Earth-for-their-level-of-fame family man who loves his wife and talks about her in his material but only talks about how great she is, and has built some of his comedy on how he doesn’t need a “showbiz lifestyle” he only needs his lovely non-famous wife, and then he suddenly turns around and does something so strongly at odds with all of that. And I have to admit… yeah, if Russell Howard suddenly ran off and impregnated, like, Emma Watson, I would probably at least mention it. I’d love to say I have enough anti-celebrity gossip integrity to just go on posting on this blog as though that did not happen, but I can’t say that. If Russell Howard even impregnates Emma Watson, this blog will be a source from which you will be able to learn that that happened.

But I would try to mention it with lots of caveats about how it isn’t actually our business and it seems like a weird thing to us because we don’t have the context of what was going on in those personal relationships and we shouldn’t have that context because it’s none of our business. And yeah that is going to make it a bit weird if we go back and watch old jokes Russell has made about how much he loves his wife, but just because someone made some jokes based on how their life was at the time doesn’t mean they’re obligated to keep their life that way forever just so the jokes continue to work.

So I tried to keep that in mind when judging the John Mulaney fans who collectively lost their minds on the internet last year. I’m not better than the ones who said, “Well shit, that’s a very fucking weird thing that happened”, because I’d do the same if it were one of the comedians I’m really invested in. But I think I would not take it farther than that, and last year there were a hell of a lot of people taking it much farther than that. Which I know about because my brother is a massive John Mulaney fan, as are a number of my Facebook friends, and they were sharing some really bad examples of people thinking their opinions are needed about the personal lives of people they’ve never met. When I write this blog, I spend some time thinking about where the line is between what it’s okay to say in public discourse about public figures, and what isn’t okay. If I ever get concerned that maybe I’ve gotten too close to that line, I just remember what the John Mulaney fans did last year and then I don’t feel so bad.

Anyway. I maintain that what John Mulaney did last year was his business, and whether or not it was very kind on a personal level (and honestly, we have no idea, it’s possible that if he were a friend of mine I’d hear a side of the story that would make me think he made all the right choices, it’s possible that I’d hear a side of the story that would make me want to stage an intervention, I don’t know, he’s not a friend of mine), it was not worth canceling him or harassing anyone involved or judging people as an outsider or anything else. It was worth saying “Well shit, that was weird” and moving on.

I first saw the stuff about the new John Mulaney story a couple of days ago. I actually thought it was a joke at first and also thought I didn’t care enough to find out what happened, but then I kept seeing people mention it, and decided to look up the actual story just so I can understand the references. And yeah, this one is very notably different than the last one. So different that I shouldn’t really talk about them in the same post, because I don’t want it to seem like I’m equivocating them. I’m only putting them together because this story made me think of the last time John Mulaney was in the news for something besides a really good joke he’d made, and I remembered how my main reaction to that was “Jesus, all the people in the world who do not personally know John Mulaney or his wife need to chill about this”. And remembering that reaction really underlines the difference in reaction this time, because this time it’s… God damn it, they are right this time. This one was a properly shitty thing to do that is fair game to talk about because it’s not a private issue, it’s something he did very much in public, and to the public.

At first my understanding of the story was that he just brought Dave Chapelle out and Dave Chappelle did some regular material, and that would be pretty bad if people weren’t expecting him, especially because statistically a group of people the size of John Mulaney’s audience is going to have some trans people in it. That would be true even if you took a random sample of that number of people, and it’s more true because of the fact that John Mulaney tends to be popular among queer people. Not only among queer people; he appeals to just about everyone. But he definitely is one of the straight cis white dudes that Tumblr has accepted, and understandably so, because he’s a very funny comedian who doesn’t do jokes at the expense of those minority populations.

Taking an audience with trans and other queer people in it, when they’re expecting to just see John Mulaney (or they’re expecting John Mulaney and some John Mulaney-type opener), and throwing at them a guy who’s been in the news for months for being openly transphobic – that’s a bad thing to do to your audience. That’s a bad thing even if Dave Chappelle just did some of his regular material – and by “regular” I mean “stuff that was written to be funny rather than just written to get him into the tabloids for transphobia and thereby boost his ticket sales among assholes” – and then left the stage. Queer people in the audience would still be feeling blindsided by having to deal with this guy who represents so much of the type of hatred they deal with in real life, when they were just trying to watch John Mulaney not do that sort of thing.

But according to the story I read – and I’ll be honest, I read a couple of articles to learn enough so I can understand what people are talking about and that was it – Dave Chappelle actually did a bunch of his homophobic and transphobic material during that set. That wouldn’t have been an accident. That means that at some point, John Mulaney and whoever else was involved in planning this said to Dave Chappelle, “You know how you’re really famous right now for being a dick to queer people? Why don’t you come to my show and spend some time specifically being in a dick to queer people, and then that will make the tabloid news?”

My first reaction to that was holy hell, that is an absolutely awful thing to do to an unsuspecting audience. Because that goes against the argument that people make, doesn’t it? People who say “Well if you don’t like offensive comedy, don’t watch it. No one’s making you watch it.” These are people who had specifically chosen to not watch that sort of thing. If they’d wanted to see homophobic and transphobic comedy, they’d have paid to see a comedian who’s known for doing that sort of thing. Instead, they specifically paid to see a comedian who doesn’t do that sort of thing. And then they got hit with this. I guess technically no one was making them do it, they could have left. If they wanted to be the person who gets up in the middle of a bigoted joke and leaves, with everyone looking at them, knowing it might cause the bigoted comedian on stage to call them out. And if they want to waste the money, and the travel time and babysitter-finding time and whatever else, that they put into the chance to see John Mulaney.

My next thought upon seeing that Dave Chappelle did a bunch of queerphobic jokes to a John Mulaney-expecting audience was – wait, what? Why? If I were emotionally invested in John Mulaney, I’d be a lot more upset on a personal level. But I’m not that invested in him, so I don’t feel personally let down or anything. I’m just confused. What did John Mulaney possibly think he’d gain by joining Dave Chappelle on the “martyr to cancel culture, lauded by assholes” train? Does he need media attention that badly? He had lots of tabloid attention last year, presumably more than anyone could want. And that aside, his career as a very good comedian who performs to massive audiences and can sell any new special he wants to the highest bidder – that’s going very well. He doesn’t need to generate controversy-based articles like the ones being written about him now.

I can understand how Dave Chappelle benefited from becoming a “cancel culture martyr”, because his fanbase has always included lots of the sort of people who love an “edgy” guy who shits on minorities. With the stuff he did last year, he rallied his own base, and drew in more of that crowd. He alienated some of his fans – I know there are lots of transgender and trans-allied Dave Chappelle fans who left his fanbase and wouldn’t pay for his tickets anymore – but he probably gained more fans than he lost. Overall, he got the sort of attention he wanted to advance his career.

But I don’t see how this works for John Mulaney. He’s going to alienate a lot more people than Dave Chappelle did if he goes down this road, because he has a lot more queer and trans and just progressive people in his fanbase to begin with. And he’s not going to bring a lot of new fans in, because the sorts of people who will start watching his stuff just because they love a guy who “stands up to cancel culture” are going to quickly find that John Mulaney doesn’t make nearly enough jokes at minorities’ expense to actually entertain them. So… I don’t see why John Mulaney thought that creating what he had to know – like, 100% definitely knew – would be a media storm would be a good idea.

I realize this whole post has looked at it from a very outsider perspective, and like I said, I can do that because I’m not really invested in him and I wasn’t actually at the gig where I was suddenly blindsided by a bunch of homophobia and transphobia when I’d paid to see John Mulaney. It’s fair and right that most of the reaction to this is about how and why it’s harmful and, on a human level that ignores the tabloids and the cynical career moves, a really shitty thing to do to the people who have made him famous. But most of the time, when someone famous does something shitty like that, I can understand why they did it. How they understood that something resulting from that bad thing, usually the media attention that they expected to create, would be good for them in some way.

I don’t get this one at all. Aside from being awful thing to do, which it was, it’s just deeply fucking weird. John doesn’t make transphobic jokes or statements himself – he didn’t even alienate his fans as a way to stick to his guns about one of his own jokes that he wanted to make. He did it for the sake of… getting to bring a friend on stage? What’s the point of that?

Anyway, those are some thoughts. They’re not thoughts that the world needs, they’re just thoughts that I have. This is a weird one.

Here’s a less depressing thing: I saw Nish Kumar perform his most recent show, Your Power, Your Control, live a couple of nights ago. That show did contain a rant about comedians who run out of funny things to say so they just do Netflix specials where they shit on minorities instead, and that ran was followed by the words, “Fuck Ricky Gervais, Fuck Dave Chappelle” (for a split second I thought Jimmy Carr’s name was going to come out next, probably for the best that it didn’t - for the record I don't think Jimmy is the same as those other two because those two say "these are my actual views, now I'll tell some jokes about them" while Jimmy just does one-liner jokes and has never expressed an actual view in his life, but he does belong in the general category Nish described of comedians who use the cheap trick of shitting on minorities in Netflix specials for attention from the "comedy should be offensive!" types). The only reason I bring that up is as an antidote to any sentiment that might go around about how it’s not fair to expect such lofty moral purity from celebrities as refusing to be friends with other celebrities who are bigoted assholes. It turns out that some people can do it, and it is fair to expect that at bare minimum, comedians do not subject unsuspecting audiences to bigoted rhetoric who paid to see something completely different. Because… because it’s a shitty thing to do, but it’s also just such a weird thing to do. What the fuck, Mulaney?

[angel-inked]

The Wolf Charmer, Chapter 21: Playing with the elements

As the title suggests 😁

*WARNING SPOILERS AHEAD IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN LAWLESS*

Taglist: @vvkingofgaybisciutsvv @thequeenofthewinter @thedevilshardy @mollybegger-blog @wandawiccan60 @cameleonhardyfan63 @inkwolvesandcoffee @liliac-dreamer @potter-solomons

As for now, it was Howard's turn. Forrest stood next to the light brown wolf, giving him instructions. Howard followed along, finding some of the instructions a bit silly, but for the sake of the plan, the middle brother had yet to reveal to what that was exactly, he did as told. Focusing on the deep breathing he was doing with his eyes closed, "Now, envision something that would get a big reaction out of ya." Forrest explained. Howard racked his brain for a moment, and then he thought about that fucking shootout at the bridge. It got stuck on replay in his head, watching Jack get shot, watching Forrest get gunned down not once but twice, and ultimately stabbing Deputy Rakes to death. That event, and finding Forrest layed out on the ground with his throat slit ear to ear, gave Howard more nightmares than his time in the army. Because the people involved meant more to him, he figured. Howard found himself unconsciously clamping his jaws together, heat building throughout his body. He reeled his head back and howled, trying to relieve his tensed muscles. The crackling sound of fire accompanied his howl, opening his eyes. He saw the dead knee high grass from earlier on fire around him. A heavy rain appeared from nowhere, Howard turned and saw Forrest had shifted and was taming the flames with his own abilities. Wait a minute, he thought, where in the hell did all this fire come from to begin with?

Glancing down, he saw crimson red mist pooling around his feet. Looking back over his shoulder to see the tip of his tail had turned into a lit match, it felt warm, not burning, just pleasurable. Well, that's new. With a flick of his tail, the flame went out. The rain dissipated, as did the blue glow of the black wolf's eyes as he and his big brother shifted, "Honestly, I probably should've expected yours to be explosive." Forrest mumbled. "Hellfire," Howard chuckled, "literally." He added. Forrest turned, and Howard leaned back a little to see past him. Jack was sat cross-legged on the ground, picking apart pieces of what dead grass and weeds Howard didn't scorch with his outburst. "Well," Forrest started, "looks like it's your turn, Jackrabbit.". "Alright," Jack nodded, shifting and following the same instructions that Howard did, although without the explosive outburst. Jack bowed his head as an emerald green flowed out from his eyes in a similar way to Forrest' blue glow had, but it waved about like a flag in the wind, the movement similar to Howard's crimson red fire like light. A wave of calm seemed to wash over the area as the grass and other dried up plants around Jack were revitalized. The green glow slowly died out, Jack opened his eyes and looked around, looking like he had either just woke up or was coming out of a trance of some sort. Forrest grunted, looking between his two brothers before checking his watch. "Well, I'd say we'd best head for the house."

[maxwell-grant]

OK, I know this will probably be painful, and I may be a bad mutual for asking but...would you be willing to identify what, in your opinion are the bottom five worst Shadow adaptations, and give a detailed breakdown of why they were so lousy?

Oh christ, okay. I don't think you're gonna get as much of a detailed breakdown for these compared to some of the others, because I take more issue with adaptations that do have good qualities but also big or deep problems to talk about.

For example, I can't include Garth Ennis's Shadow in this list because the comic has a lot of strong points to it, despite a deeply, deeply detestable take on The Shadow's character, where as the rest of the Dynamite run doesn't reach neither the lows or highs of his run. Likewise, Andy Helfer's run has a couple or a couple dozen moments every issue that make me want to tear something to shreds in frustration, but it's also at many points a really good comic with great art and some occasionally very inspired writing. Really, I'd just be repeating myself talking about what I hate in those.

But, fine, let's list some of the others.

I think I'm just gonna have to get the elephant in the room out of the way here, and address that I won't be including Si Spurrier's 2017 Dynamite mini in this list, and I think at least some of you might be angry it's not Number 1 by default. I'm doing this because I intend to one day really revisit it, think about it and it's reception and what it was trying to do, and talk about it on it's own, now that it's been 5 years and everyone has moved on and we can maybe talk about it without kneejerk hatred driving everyone nuts (your mileage may vary on how warranted it was).

I'm also not going to be talking about James Patterson's new novel, because I haven't read it. It seems to be considered a forgettable potboiler by mainstream critics and a resounding failure by everyone who likes the character whether they've read the book or not, and frankly I don't have it in me to learn what the fuzz was about anytime soon, I got my hands way too full as is.

And I won't be including the Batman x Shadow crossovers here, because again, they do have a lot of virtues that put them far ahead of some of the really worst Shadow media, and I've talked enough about how badly I think they mangled The Shadow, which is really the big problem I have with them (well, that and Tim Sale blatantly copying a Michael Kaluta cover, that was really shitty). I don't really hate them anymore, I just get tired and frustrated thinking about parts of them, I said my piece as is. Really, my frustration over this comic is what inspired me to start writing about The Shadow here, so I guess in a way I do owe it at least that much.

5: Archie Comics's Shadow

I think some of you might be wondering why this isn't ranked higher, but to be honest, I don't actually harbor any hatred towards this. I mean, I have to include it, but I find it kinda silly that some people even today actually care about the existence of this comic enough to hate it.

For fans back then? Oh yeah, obviously, but this dropped to such instantaneous backlash that it never really got to live past 6 issues. Really, everything wrong about it can be understood immediately from the covers, and I've actually read the comic in it's entirety to see if there was anything worth taking. I found only a couple of things of note but, no, this really is just a painfully mediocre superhero comic that happens to have a couple of Shadow names in it. If anything, it gets too much credit.

The actual contents of what it is are never going to justify it's reputation, but the existence of it and the disproportionate response to it is the funniest and most enduring legacy it could ever ask for. This whole comic is The Shadow's version of Spongebob's embarassing Christmas photo.

4: David Liss's The Shadow Now

This is another "The Shadow as an immortal in modern times" comic and I think you may have noticed the pattern with those by now. I may revisit this eventually and I do have some moments from it saved for reference, but overall: It sucks, and it doesn't even suck in a way that lets me talk much about it, it's a diet version of Chaykin's Shadow. If Archie's Shadow is a generic mediocre superhero comic wearing The Shadow's name, this is a generic crime story playing beats from movie. The Shadow is an asshole and not even a grandiose or sinister one, he just feels like a sleazy douche in a costume. The art is a 50/50 coin toss between appropriately moody and "Google images with a filter on them", I don't remember anything about the plot other than Khan had a bomb again and he had a daughter, and there were new versions of the agents and the Harry stand-in turned evil and Lamont shacked up with Margo's descendant which, uh, no. I don't really hate this but I really have nothing nice to say about this comic other than Colton Worley's art is nice sometimes. I can't really muster anything else to say here.

3: Invisible Avenger

ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

ZZZZZZZZZZZZ

ZZZZZZZZZZ...

...uuh, wha-

Yeah, I remember nothing about this one other than it's painfully boring and nothing about it, nothing at all, works in the slightest and I drift off to sleep even now trying to give this a rewatch. To be honest pretty much every other Shadow serial not starred by Victor Jory sucks and I don't really have anything to say about them, this one is just the worst of the lot. I dearly wish there was a good Shadow tv series but, if it was going to be like this pilot? Good riddance.

2: Harlan Ellison's The New York Review of Bird

This isn't really a Shadow story as much as it's a Harlan Ellison story that happens to feature The Shadow, but man am I glad that Ellison's "Dragon Shadows" was canned, because holy shit what a goddamn nightmare Harlan Ellison writing The Shadow for real could have been, going purely by the one time he ever touched the character. New York Review of Bird is a purely farcical parody story that wears real, real thin even before "Uncle Kent" shows up, and we get to see in it what is by far the most detestable and irredeemable take on The Shadow ever put on print, and not even in a critique or deconstructive way or anything that could be remotely worth discussing.

I don't hold any particular affection for Harlan Ellison and his writing (despite liking some of it) and I've come to notice the major red flag that is finding someone who looks up to Harlan Ellison in any capacity as a person, and this story in particular really feels like Ellison aggressively trying to channel his jackass tendencies through every line, just him being nasty because he built a personal brand on being nasty. The only reason this isn't Number One is because it's a very short story that saw zero influence or reputation, and thus it only exists as a brief mention in The Shadow wiki, and a brief mention is all it really calls for.

1: Howard Chaykin's Blood & Judgment

I'm guessing most of you already knew this one was in the top spot before I started writing.

I would actually rather not write a big piece on Blood & Judgment, because I think (or at least I hope) it's influence on The Shadow has waned a lot over the years and I would prefer to draw it the least amount of attention possible, but if I HAVE to talk about this, I guess I'd rather just vomit this out of my circuits now instead of giving it it's own post.

I would prefer to use a less unpleasant image on my blog, but if I'm going to talk about this comic, there's no image to better convey it than this drawing of macho asshole Cranston holding a sexualized mannequin at gunpoint. By leaps and bounds, Blood & Judgment is the most misogynistic Shadow story I've ever read. It's ironic that Chaykin justified the rampant misogyny he gave The Shadow with the idea that this is just a man from the 30s would act like, when he admits in the same breath that he never even touched the stories, and he wrote a story more sexist and demeaning to it's female characters than anything, literally anything, written in the Shadow pulps. It's almost impressive even.

I'll paste some segments from Randy Raynaldo's review

In Flagg, he intended to present his own point of view on American society while keeping his work tongue in cheek and acessible. But this vision dimmed, and Flagg had become a vehicle by which Chaykin could play out fetishes and portray gratuitous and stylish violence.

In The Shadow, stripped of the political and social veneer which was supposed to make Flagg unique, Chaykin's sensibilities and excesses become disturbingly apparent. For all of his liberal posturing, Chaykin's work demonstrates zero difference from the same kind of mentality exploited and made popular by similarly violent popular culture icons like Dirty Harry and Death Wish.

More than half a dozen individuals are indiscriminately and violently murdered in the first issue. Although the victims are characters who played major roles in the myth of The Shadow, we feel little sympathy for them, even for those of us who knew these characters at the outset. Who dies is unimportant, it's how they die that is the fascination.

Chaykin uses sexual decadence as a means by which to establish villains, and undercuts this device by making the protagonists as promiscuous as the villains. For all of Chaykin's seemingly liberal leanings, he demonstrates very little sensitivity in his portrayal of women.

Because everything works on rules of three, this comic also follows the pattern with other works mentioned here, as this isn't Howard Chaykin writing The Shadow: it's The Shadow reimagined as a Howard Chaykin character. He looks and acts exactly like Reuben Flagg and the typical macho protagonist of Chaykin's other works, he's a cynical sleaze with an entirely new origin who half-assedly dons a garb to machine gun people, and I already wrote a separate piece on why the machineguns are kind of emblematic of everything wrong with this take.

I understand that Chaykin has, or used to have, a big following of sorts, and I've tried to wrap my head around this for years, but I genuinely still don't get why Shadow fans stomach this comic unless they happen to be Chaykin fans first and foremost, I really don't. Everything, fucking everything Shadow fans hate about modern depictions of the character can be traced right back to this. The parts that stuck and changed the character for the worse, like him being defined as an immortal, bloodthirsty warmonger who got all his skills and powers from a magic city in Tibet, or Lamont Cranston being a coward who fears and hates the Shadow, or his agents being expendable slaves, stuff that has been ingrained into the mythos through this and the Alec Baldwin movie and other comics, to the point that people now think of it as the norm, that it's the baseline of what The Shadow is, and I hate it, I genuinely fucking hate it,

I hate it so much that it's a big part of the reason why I created this blog and why I want so badly to get to write The Shadow, because I plainly couldn't stand not having ways to tell people that this is all wrong, that this is actively shooting down the character's odds for success, and that they are missing out on something really great, because the well has been tainted with garbage that won't go away and everytime I read the words Shambala in a Shadow comic, even an otherwise good or great one, I get just a wee bit cross.

The only semi-redeeming aspects I can think of for this comic is one or two cool moments, like when The Shadow hijacks a concert using his Devil's Whisper or when he tames dogs with a stare. Just breadcrumbs of "not garbage" amidst an ocean of anything but. I hate that talking about why I hate this comic in-length can almost feel like I'm still enticing people to check it out of curiosity, but if you wanna do that, fine, just know this: The worst part of Blood & Judgment, even if you don't care at all about what it did to The Shadow, is that it's boring.

It is a deeply boring comic. If you like Howard Chaykin to begin with, you'll probably like this okay (although even Chaykin fans told me that this is his weakest work and that even he seems to agree). If you don't, I plain don't see what you could get out of this.

The comic itself is just nothing. It's the comic book equivalent of a pre-schooler trying to get a reaction by swearing. It has nothing whatsoever other than half-assed attempts at shock value. The plot isn't there, the ideas are stale, the dialogue is needlessly oblique and comprised entirely of unfinished sentences, interrupted conversations and one-liners without build-up. The characters are all unlikable and uninteresting stooges with no personality, or joyless cartoons. There's no heart or emotion or logic, and it isn't even funny enough to succeed as just an outrageous exercise in 80s excess. There's nothing in here.

I get "why" it was popular enough at the time, a rising star creator penning a modern revival of an old character based on controversy that pissed off the old fans, it's an old story that still gets repeated today. But manufactured controversy is not a replacement for storytelling and it rarely ever exists to benefit the people who actually want to enjoy the stories, it only benefits those for the crude benefit of those who want to sell you something out of the controversy.

I guess they got their money's worth back then.

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

Phew, okay, I did it, I finally vomited out a piece on Blood & Judgment and some others, allright, let's put this piece of negativity behind us now.

[atheistcartoons]

AAI Shenanigans

Look. I understand I’ve been posting about AAI and it’s a deviation from my usual content. I also understand that it’s a very confusing and labyrinthine story, but I’ve tried to break it down as much as I can in this post. 

Who cares?

Atheist Alliance International (AAI) is the only international atheist organisation which has consultative status at the UN and the Council of Europe. They are supposed to be a coalition of atheist groups across the world and to offer some kind of resistance to the many religious groups who regularly make presentations to these organisations. If you are in a country where being an atheist is no big deal, then be grateful for the privilege you enjoy.

What happened?

Well, it's a long story-

NO! What happened, the short version?

It's hard to-

Try. I mean REALLY try to make it SHORT, yeah?

AAI do bad thing. Then more bad thing. Is bad. Can fix. Choose not to.

There’s no need for the sarcasm.

Fine.

In 2017, AAI did not hold an AGM as their bylaws (and the standard practice of any organisation) dictated. This means that for 2018, there was no legitimate AAI board of directors, which is bad.

Every accountable organisation holds an Annual General Meeting, whether it's a private company, a charity or your local football club. The purpose of an AGM is to summarise the activities of the organisation, to elect officers to the board if they have one, to present the accounts to the members and get input from the members on any issue.

In January 2018, Atheist Ireland (AI) and the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF) were asked by members of the illegitimate pseudo-board to help out. They were soon working on a series of reform proposals with the pseudo-board to fix AAI.

In May 2018, the pseudo-board held a pseudo-AGM. Many members did not receive invitations to this pseudo-AGM and the members who did receive invitations tended to be those who were friendly with the pseudo-board. Among other measures, the pseudo-bylaws voted through at this pseudo-AGM meant they would no longer be required to hold annual AGMs and they would no longer be required to present their accounts to the members. Instead of moving towards democratic accountability, they moved even further away from it, concentrating power in the hands of a few people. Moreover, throughout this period, they did not inform AI or the FFRF about any plans for any AGM and continued to work with them as if they intended to reform the organisation. All sorts of demonstrable lies and conflicting statements have been told by the pseudo-board about this pseudo-AGM and how it was constituted.

In February 2021, Michael Sherlock agreed to step down as Executive Director after he used some unpleasant language on his Twitter account.

In March 2021, pseudo-AAI’s vice president, Bill Flavell, and president, Howard Burman, appeared on the Free Thought Prophet podcast and appeared confused and uniformed when asked about pseudo-AAI's accountability and transparency. Later, Lawrence Krauss (probably the best-known person on their Advisory Council) answered concerns about democratic accountability with implications that he had been assured that unspecified measures were being taken behind the scenes to address it.

In April 2021, I was personally attacked in an official pseudo-AAI blog post and a bizarre series of tweets by their blog manager for pointing out that concerns over of a lack of transparency are probably not best addressed by publicly stating that unknown measures are being taken behind the scenes and everyone should just calm down and be quiet about it. In fact the attitude of the pseudo-board to any criticism, including from its own members, was often condescending and dismissive to the point of abusive.

Shut up. You loved it.

Yes I did.

Proceed.

In September 2021, David Madison resigned from the Advisory Council, claiming he never had any input in any of their meetings, but that his photo was still on their Advisory Council web page two weeks afterwards. Maybe their blog manager is incompetent.

In November 2021, an article appeared in Irish political satire magazine, The Phoenix, excoriating the undemocratic and opaque nature of pseudo-AAI. Soon afterwards, Kate Smurthwaite resigned from their Advisory Council, claiming that she never had any input in any of their meetings. Also, the Greek Helsinki Monitor, an internationally respected human rights organisation, publicly castigated pseudo-AAI for failing to invite qualified delegates (in particular the Greek Humanist Union) to their pseudo-AGM.

In May 2022, another pseudo-AGM was held where more qualified delegates were not invited or even informed, accounts were not presented and candidates for positions were not interviewed or approved by anyone. Howard Burman had resigned and David Orenstein had been installed as the new president. Orenstein made the mistake of bragging about his elevation to the pseudo-board the day before the pseudo-AGM. Multiple source confirm that he was being positioned as the next president as early as February. 

The day after this ridiculous pseudo-AGM, the entire Latin-American contingent (including national atheist groups from Colombia, Peru, Guatemala, Mexico and Puerto Rico) of member organisations resigned, citing pseudo-AAI’s lack of transparency and democratic accountability.

In June 2021, David Orenstein resigned as president of pseudo-AAI and Nina Sankari took over. Orenstein has signed an NDA, meaning he cannot talk about his time with pseudo-AAI. A few days later, Nina announced she would resign.

For someone who loves flooding his posts with links, I don't see many here.

Everything I've said in this post is sourced in this document, Atheists Behaving Badly, including pseudo-AAI's own internal correspondence and the testimony of witnesses who were in the room when many of these things happened.

What now?

Who knows. I would suggest that any incoming president of pseudo-AAI must engage the Dönitz Protocol, i.e. immediately resign in the interests of democratic accountability so the organisation can be restructured along the lines of standard practices for that type of organisation. 

Pseudo-AAI has been operating outside the most basic standards and outside its own bylaws for the last four years. Why pseudo-AAI have refused for all this time to have just one legitimate AGM is a mystery. It would be incredibly simple and easy to organise.

You’re not going to keep posting about this are you? You get like four likes on each of them. We just want cartoons with snappy zingers.

I very much hope you don’t have to see any of these AAI-themed posts again. Back to the snappy zingers tomorrow.

[wellthatwasaletdown]

For the harrie because it's clear as day that you are based on that specific ask. So what if HS3 goes platinum that doesn't mean shit lol. Watermelon Sugar did huge numbers and even won a grammy but at the end of the day it was simply a generic song. Harry just kept repeating "watermelon sugar high." How grammy worthy. We have already established and this has been discussed constantly on the blog that he will attain success music-wise but it's not ORGANIC. So even if he does big numbers (which let's be honest the Azoffs will make sure that happens) it doesn't mean the body of work is actually great. Harries will stream nonstop whether they actually like his album or not because they want him to be on top and be able to brag about his success online. So please exit this blog so you don't have to see "our hating" on your precious fave. Sidenote: I may regret it lol but I do plan on watching that Zane Lowe interview whenever it's uploaded on YouTube. That's probably the only interview I plan on watching of his this era (I'm not interested in the Howard Stern one so I'll kindly wait for the cliff notes on this blog if anyone wants to).

I would say play a drinking game and take a shot every time he says Um or hums and haws but you’d be dead in two minutes

[popculturebuffet]

Blacksad: Somewhere In the Shadows Review

Hello you beautiful people! I have a WEIRD relationship with Noir. It’s weird because i’ve never really dived into the films of type, though I really should, But as a kid I absolutely LOVED the tracer bullet arcs in Calvin and Hobbes, where everyone’s favorite hyperactive and imaginative six year old would plant himself as the hero in a noir pastiche.. ironically like myself Bill Watterson was also not a huge noir buff and just relied on Cliches but hey, it worked. 

Still love these. So from fourth grade on it imprinted a lifelong love of a good bit of detective noir. Not enough to you know, get me to read any traditional noir books or watch any noir tv shows or detective procedurals but I still love a good mystery from time to time and some of my favorite comics such as Howard the Duck by Chip Zdarksy and Peter David’s second run on x-factor run on the genre while having fun with it’s cliches. 

I also love anthropormphic animal stories. Dunno why, I just do, so once I found out about Blacksad, a comic that combines disney quality art from a former disney animator with gripping, adult noir that rips your heart out... I couldn’t resisit trying it. Telling the tale of John Blacksad, a cynical private detective and the cases he steps into via gorgeous, straight out of a disney storyboard art, the series is by  Juan Díaz Canales (writer) and Juanjo Guarnido (artist), the latter a former Disney artist who worked on several Disney films, meeting in the 90′s while working on licensed works and hitting it off, leading to this series.  That’s.. really all I could find about the making of the series in English. The only other fact is the series is designed for first release in France, which has a huge comics market, hence the various volumes being called “Albums”, with them later being released in Spain and then english, currently in the latter through Dark Horse Comics, who last year collected the current 5 albums and some side stories into one big volume. And with Dark Horse having infrequent sales including Blacksad on comixology it’s easy enough to pick up all 5 volumes in one complete package on digital for 9 bucks, as it is right now. Seriously I’m not trying to shill for Comixology or Dark Horse, I just love these comics and suggest picking them up. The creators DO intend on new volumes... it’s just both have been busy with other work so they’ve been stuck in development hell since 2013. However given there have always been, if much smaller, the biggest being 5 years, gaps between the Albums, I don’t think the series is dead quite yet and with Dark Horse fully backing it, taking the series from only two volumes getting translated to both translating the first four AND translating the fifth within a year of it’s release, we’ll undoubtly get the next one quickly. The series has also spawned a game, Under the Skin, which i’ll probably also cover some day as i’m dying to play it, but i’m waiting for a sale because it’s around 30 bucks and I can wait. It’s also been nominated for an Eisner three times to no suprise and has had fans in Stan Lee, Jim Steranko, Tim Sale and Will freaking Eisner. Yes the GUY the awards were named after liked the series.  So yeah, I love this series and highly support it, but the thought of covering it hadn’t occrued to me.. in part because I already had three comic retrsopectives going, my looks at The Life and Times of Scrooge McDuck, Scott Pilgrim and New X-Men, and simply because I just hadn’t thought of it till Kevin, frequent patron and comissioner of the blog whose paid for tons of reivews, suggested covering the second Album, Arctic Nation, which has our hero searching for a missing little girl he feels has been taken by the titular white supramacist movement.. and if your wondering “Wait how the fuck does that work their animals”, John is black coded due to his black fur, while the white suprmacists are all Arctic Animals.. a touch I really like as I’d honestly never thought of that as a metaphor but it fits like a glove, especially given that most white furred arctic mamals are pretty agressive looking. So yeah I’ll be covering that one next month for Black History Month, among many other things, but I felt I wanted to cover the series in order and since again, it’s only the second of five and I had a free space on the schedule. So without further adew, join me somewhere in the shadows and under the cut as we enter the world of one John Blacksad. 

We open as you’d expect for a Noir with a heady narration and a murder. John was brought in by Smirnov, the chief of police and an old aquantice who serves as his Commissioner Gordon. Since the victim is John’s ex, he was brought in to see if he knows anything and as you’d expect warned not to look into it further, as John dosen’t buy this was a simple robbery. His response is exactly what you’d expect. 

I mean.. what did you expect? You called him out of bed to see his former lovers corpse, KNOWING he’s one hell of detective, dosen’t give up on things easy, and would probably be curious. For him to say “Cool gonna go smoke some reefer and take in a looney tunes short at the theater, call me when you find the murderer?” Also  this series takes place in the 50s. Because of course it does. 

So John goes back to his office to brood, reflecting that the office feels like the remains of an ancient civlization because “It seems to be all that remains of the civlized person I used to be”. Hell of a line. 

We then get his backstory with the victim, Natalia. She’s a famous actress, who John first as a younger man when hired to investgate some death threats she’d received with a boquet of flowers. John shows off just how good he is at his job in just a few panels. 

IT not only shows in just a few panels just how ferocious our hero can be when needed and how good he is at his job, easily having tracked down the man responsible and scared him shitless without breaking as sweat, but how fucking gorgeous the art is. I meant it when I brought up the old disney comparison, as Steranko even mentioned in his introduction to the collection of the first three volumes how it looks like animation cels on the page. IT’s utterly breathtaking and ONLY gets even more lush and beautiful as the series goes on and perfectly fits the noir stylings with it’s realisim, making it’s animal characters feel utterly human and real while still keeping their animal traits in perfect detail. 

John impressed her, and as we see in the next page under his narration they not only had really steamy passionate sex, and why yes we do see them naked even if the bits are covered it’s still very much nsfw and we saw Natalia’s naked corpse earlier, so that ship had already sailed anyway, with Natalia taking him on both as her lover and her on staff detective and the two were much in love.. until the fame apparenlty got to her judging from the visuals, and the realtionship fell apart. 

Before we move on i’d like to talk about the narration which CAN be a bit overwrought here or there and is a bit overused.. but does have it’s mometns of being utterly effective as with above, contrasting John’s statments about a sucessful job and being hired on.. with the beginnings of his and Natalia’s relationship and their passionate lovemaking. IT’s not BAD and it works for the setting, but it can be distracting, but thankfully the series levels this out as we go and they learned from it so no harm done. Just the kinda thing that happens early in a series life when the creators are getting a handle on things, so no harm done. 

But naturally John isn’t going to take the love of his life, responsible for the happiest days of said life, being brutally murdered lying down and is going to find the bastard who did this. So he goes to an old friend, Jake Ositombe, a championship boxer and Nat’s former bodyguard who he recommended to her. Given we see him knock the shit out of his opponent without the slightest effort, yeah good call. Also yes we share the same name and no it’s not weird to type about another Jake, adventure time sorta.. knocked that out of me. Jake dosen’t know much since she fired him a long time ago as one of her lovers hired private security, and the last one he knew of was a guy by the name of Leon.  John, naturally, easily finds the guy’s apartment, Leon Kronkski, a screenwriter.. but also rules him out as the guy lived in a humble apartment and clearly didn’t have the cash to hire his own hired goons. 

He does find a clue, a matchbook for some place called the Cypher Club.. and another when the man’s sweet  mouse landlady shows up, who John charms by pretending to be Leon’s friend and flashing a big smile, finding out a msyterious man with “big bulging eyes”, took him. This scene also to me is great in subtly showing off John’s skill. While the previous flashback showed how badass he is, shoving a gun down the throat of a stalking wannabe murderer with pure rage in his eyes.. here we see a lighter approach, how despite his serious and dour nature.. he easily slips into being cheery and looking like an average joe off the street. He bluffs the landlady not because the plot says so.. but because like any PI he’s just that good at slipping into whatever roll he needs to get the info he needs. He can be his dour self or a charming happy go lucky guy without missing a beat. 

So with that he goes to the studio leon worked for where his boss.. is a walrus j jonah jameson?

But yeah J. Jonah Walruson wants pictures of spider-man.. moving pictures.. but he can’t film them with his star dead and his screenwriter indefintiely gone, with the same bulging eyed man having told JJ he’d be gone indefintely. Nothing suspicious about that!

So naturally John’s next plan is to find the guy.. who is already after him as you’d expect with both a knife to slash at our hero with and the fog covering him so he can hit and run. But unluckily for him .. well i’ll let john say it...

John  headbutts the myserious snake, who only managed to get his coat before and tries to interogate him.. but gets a quick jab to the gut and the guy gets away. 

We soon meet our big bag, who has a big speech about insects and things being usefufl.. and once they stop being useful.. they become dead and collectable, telling the snake man to back off John.. and sending his right hand man to go take care of the Snake who apparently took something from the office. Realizing his numbers up the Snake Man goes to a lizard bar, picks up a package from a friend and runs out the back, knowing he’s being followed.. and we get some hints there’s also racial tension between lizards and mammials here as the bartender, said friend, has the entire bar circle around the guy preventing him from following our mysterious bulging eyed man. 

Meanwhile John goes to the Cipher Club, a wretched hive of scum and villiany. Given Nat was a glamorous movie star, it’s very clear she was here to hide from something or someone, and the bartnender, a wild pig. 

No not you sweetie. The wild pig tells John leon was indeed here and a local rat, in both senses of the word, offers to take John to him.. though understandably John is supscious of the guy he just met in a seedy bar taking him anywhere except to get some heroin. Did Heroin exist yet? Questions for later. But he’s got a case so he follows. Though suprisingly the guy DOES actually come through and it’s not ENTIRELY a trap: he takes john to a tomb for Noel Krinsok.. an anagram for Leon’s name. Unsuprisingly he’s dead. And also unsuprisingly, two hired goons

Show up. As I said not ENTIRELY a trap but it’s obvious given the rat split moments before that our mysterious big bad knew where john would be headed next, and thus while giving him a clue, also set him up to get his head knocked in. And while John is badass.. these guys are a bear and a rhino,  both stronger, bigger, and with suprise on their size, as well as a tombstone to knock john’s head into. They easily beat him senseless and hope he got the message, though john gives a defiant fuck you before being punched out for it. He returns home, feeling like he’s aged 20 years “But no one respects the elderly anymore”, PFFT, and heads home to his rathole, not literally this time, apartment to lay on his cot and think as he gets some rest. 

And while the trail for Leon is cold. our mysterious murderer accidently tipped his hand: only someone with a LOT of money and influence could make a man disappear like this, and it tracks with what we’ve seen so far. The guy has multiple henchman and despite being a big star with plenty of clout, Natalia had to hide in a dive bar just to get away from him and even THEN clearly wasn’t so lucky given she and her new lover both wound up dead.  But Blacksad has bigger problems.. he wakes up in a jail cell.

Turns out Smirnkov had him arrested.. but for his own protection as the case is getting too hot and while he was late on that front given John’s face is hamburger, it’s clear from his tone and demeanor that while he may of been harsh with John earlier.. the two are old friends, and the Chief is simply worried about him winding up dead, and John takes you know being thrown in prison in stride. Which while not a bad scene it is a BIT suspect that a black coded character was thrown in jail for nothing and it’s treated very lightly and as a simple protection between friends, though given they wouldn’t think of coding john like that till next volume, I brush it off as accidental implications in hindsight. 

Smirnkov though also called John here.. because he needs his help. Since Natalia’s Murder Case is pointing very high up, so his superiors have ordered him to bury the case and as he puts it “the bastards know where to squeeze”. And given in volume 3 we learn Smirnov has a wife and children, it’s very obvious where they squoze and to the volume’s credit while we don’t know that yet it’s VERY clear from Smirnov’s body language they went after some form of family. So while he has to give it up.. John does not. So he brought him to jail to offer a proposal: John goes after this son of a bitch and nails him to the wall.. and Smirnov will FULLY protect John no matter what he has to do.  Now naturally given the rightful reckoning for police that’s been going on for almost a year, this SHOULDN’T play well. You have an officer outright telling an outside party that he and his boys will cover up his crimes. But.. honestly even in that framework.. it still works. That’s because.. the system has failed here. The higher up and more corrupt cops put pressure on the honest and hardworking family man Smirnov to stop a legitimate investigation into a horrible murderer.. because the guy is rich. And even now we’ve seen time and time again how rich assholes effortlessly escape the consequences of their action: How our own president who actively asked other nations to interfere in our election escaped his first impeachment trial, but hopefully not the second, aquitted. How Jeffery Epstien took YEARS to bring down with his years of ellicit parties involving innocent women and children he fucking enslaved. How Bill Cosby got away with all kinds of sexual assault for decades. The rich are often literally above the law in this country, so having a down on his luck detective, who retroactively himself is a minority, go after him with the full support of an actually GOOD police officer who genuinely believes in these people being held accountable but is held back by his family’s safety.. it works. John isn’t able to skirt consequences BECAUSE of a corrupt system.. but because the system’s so broken and slanted in the rich’s favor, that the ONLY option an honest officer like Smirnov has is to go outside it. And when asked WHY he’s doing all of this, Smirnov merley replies

... I got chills, their multiplyin. So John plans to find the bulge eyed snake after a hot shower.. only for the guy to hold a gun to John’s head, having been waiting for him and wave the murder weapon, in a baggie around, the item he had retrieved, feeling John’s trying to replace him as number two. However before he can do anything our snake  pal is shot full of holes by the rat from before, who John dispatches with his own gun. 

So the Snake starts to expire.. but feels a kinship with John “We are nothing right cat? Spent so much time waiting for the right chance and when it happens it all falls to pieces”. The Snake explains his roll in things: He was one of the private security our big bad hired to guard Natalia. But being supscious he also hired the rat to follow her around, and thus found out about her affair, brutally torturing and murdering Leon and shooting Natalia in the head. And we finally get a name as our snake friend tragically expires. 

The snake’s death and tragic dying moments are something I forgot about.. but damn if their not really good writing, taking a character who before was seemingly just a murderous goon.. and comparing him to our hero. Another working class joe, and one who just caught up with the wrong asshole at the wrong time. He easily could’ve been john in another life and vice vers and it’s a good parallel. 

So John’s nightmares finally have  name and he naturally goes to confront the guy since he has an almost literal get out of jail free card. Turns out Smirnov is the richest man in town, and has his own big tower. Huh.. sounds familiar, and John simply sneaks his way up and once Statoc’s guards from before hear him rustling about.. sneaks up on them and clocks both one at at time with a fire extinqusher. 

Statoc warmly welcomes our hero inside, and has the fucking lizard balls, as he’s some sort of lizard himself, to offer John a JOB

I mean he’s clearly lost a lot of his goons and most of them were incompetent. He fails to realize that John can’t be bought, is here for vengeance and has no intention of selling his soul to some rich asshole who killed someone he loved for the creepiest and most asinine reasons imaginable. He says john’s Concisence is why he can’t pull the trigger and that he lacks “cold blood”.. before we cut to the next page, where John’s shot the fucker in the head and left a gaping hole where his lack of a brain was. 

And again what makes this work is the aftermath: John is clearly shaken, having ONLY been able to pull the trigger beause of Statoc’s smug grin and clearly not taking the sight of Statoc’s dead body bleeding out well. And while Smirnov keeps his word, covers for him despite the two guards clearly providing an iron clad argument against john and knoiwng thier blatantly covering this up.. he’s not happy about it. 

This is WHY the narrtive still works. Statoc stacked the law against the bad guys. .but despite this being a necessary evil.. it’s still an evil and subverting teh law at this rightly leaves him not in a great place mentally. John himself isn’t even if he plays it off as otherwise, as we get our final bit of narration and one hell of a closing line. 

Final Thoughts:

Somewhere in the Shadows is a bit rough around the edges, leaning a bit too heavily into the noir pastiche and Blacksad being a harboiled detective, something the next volume would ease up on. That being said.. it’s still a masterpiece, with gorgeous art and masterful pacing. While it’s the shortest of the stories, like those after it the pacing is sublime and never feels like it has any down moments or stuff that could’ve been cut, and the mystery keeps you on edge the whole time. Having forgot a lot of the details since last read I was on the edge of my seat the entire story and loving every second of it. Somewhere in the Shadows is the perfect starter for the series, introducing an important charcter in Smirnov and the noir nature and giving us a case personal to John so we can see who he was before, what he is now.. and what he WILL be for the rest of the series. The moment that MADE him into an even harder man than the one we follows here.. when he took a life in cold blood. A masterful story, seriously check it and the other volumes out, on comixology, in stores, great stuff. Next time we look into john and as I said, he’s taking down some racists and we also meet his sidekick weekly for the first time. As for me tommorow I dive back into my Tom Luictor retrospective but hit pause on our boy for a bit to take care of some of the larger plot.   Until the next rainbow, it’s been a pleasure.