#but i already thought of a coherent plot… well it happens i guess

[ritoryb]

Personally, I am an advocate for very tall Guts!Galea. Like, at least around as tall as some of the Machina like Vanea and Egil.

OK… yeah i think that's a pretty sick idea… can do!!! i… will be honest i have no idea how tall the machina are so i guess around 2 metres? dunno. im the worlds biggest fake xenoblade fan. one of my mutuals is also making her tall ^_^

(that said im horrendously inconsistent at this kind of thing lol i've rarely done sequential work except in my BRAIN…)

by the way i kind of thought thé machina just have really big hats so they're kind of just like… idk. six foot to me. i have no clue if they're supposed to be more

[doctorofmagic]

BLOOD HUNT PREDICTIONS (and spoilers!)

Okay, I see everyone is struggling to keep it cool because of what just happened today in Blood Hunt #1. But honestly I'm very excited to put the pieces together (also very HYPED!!!). So here are my thoughts (and my friend Red's, thank you, my darling) on what we gathered so far through clues, covers and solicitations.

Obviously, spoilers.

Well, first thing I'd like to establish is that people will probably feel lost if they haven't read the last Blade volume. Thankfully, yours truly did! Which means I can provide some context:

Just recently, Blade released an ancient evil called the Adana by accident. To make it up for this mistake (which would lead to the end of the world, basically), he had to embrace his full vampiric powers by drinking Dracula's blood (they're in a kinda complicated relationship right now, not friends nor enemies but necessary allies). That also meant that he was corrupted by its evil.

Plus, as I said it many times, Blade has a deep respect for Stephen because of the Montesi Formula, which resulted in the extinction of all vampires. Yes, Stephen did it once, and I'll get back to it because I think it's REALLY important.

Since we established that Blade might be corrupted, let's move on to the next topic.

Is Stephen dead?

My best guess is "not really".

In Blood Hunt, we see that T'Challa sacrificed himself to protect Cap America Sam and the rest of the Avengers who survived the first strike. But is T'Challa gone? Luckily, I follow Farid Karami on twitter and he posted a few inks he did for Black Panther: Blood Hunt. And guess what? That's right, we'll about to have vampire!T'Challa!

Besides, we all know that the next Doctor Strange issue will feature Wong and vampire!Stephen. What we didn't know was how Stephen would fit in the plot, but thanks to the variant cover I posted last week, we do now: he'll be guiding his allies via his astral form.

Now, how can the Sorcerer Supreme deal with the vampiric threat? It was shown that Stephen and Clea are looking for the Montesi Formula again.

For those who don't know, the Montesi Formula is a spell from the Darkhold that can wipe every single vampire off the face of the Earth. Stephen already used this spell once when he fought Dracula (and Blade was there, hence the respect he holds for Stephen). Unfortunately for them, Wanda has just recently absorbed the Darkhold within her body as a way to gain autonomy from Chthon (as seen in Darkhold: Alpha and Omega). Besides, Wanda was captured by the Bloodcoven, which means she can't do much right now. In addition, as hinted by Blade himself, she won't use the Montesi Formula, mostly because the character can't be involved in another kind of genocide (thanks, Bendis). And that leads us to the next topic.

Who could do it? The very one character who would overcome morals on behalf of his people, the same one who already appeared in the first issue: Doctor Doom. And if we think about it, he has two advantages already: 1) he's second in line to be the Sorcerer Supreme, and 2) as already established, he'd do anything to protect his planet and, most importantly, Latverians.

It's also important to reiterate that an astral form is not as powerful as the body+soul. With Stephen's strength limited, it's not that crazy to imagine that he could pass the mantle to Victor for a limited period while they find the spell. "Why not Clea?" I don't know. It's already established that managing the power of two sorcerers supreme is extremely hard and draining. Could be another reason as well. I'm just trying to find a coherent train of thought through this variant cover here:

Still, we're left with a very important dilemma. We have nice vampire allies in current comics: Brielle (Blade's daughter) and Soldier and Reese from the Midnight Mission (Moon Knight), the three of them being characters to be featured in the tie-ins. Well, not to mention Stephen and T'Challa, and maybe some more to be turned in the next issues. This is why I don't think the Montesi Formula will happen. Jed won't kill THE Black Panther, let's be real. So what's next?

We're expecting a plot twist at some point, and Blade will have an important role here. He's set to have another solo title this year, probably following the consequences of his actions. But there's a high chance someone else is involved. Let's check this panel once more:

Atlantean rituals.... Where did we hear about it before? That's right, Sorcerer Supreme #11!

During the old age, Varnae become ruler of the vampires and was brought back by Marie Laveau in modern age, fighting Doctors Strange and Voodoo. His last appearance traces back to Blade when he and his friends confronted him. Frank Drake sacrificed himself in an explosion to kill Varnae, and that's the last time we hear about him.

But see how the pieces come together? Blade, Stephen and Varnae. It makes sense that things would center around these three. And this is why I'm very excited. It's not a surprise that I love Blade and Stephen's relationship, and all these elements would make a wonderful drama, one that I'm really looking forward to!

Overall, I'm not worried about status quo or anything like that. I know things will work out in time, and seeing so many of my favorite characters involved in an event written by McKay only makes it better!

And that's it! Feel free to add your thoughts on this post! And see you all next week with Doctor Strange #15! 👀

[creative-frequency]

WIPs from 2024

It feels like nothing has been normal since covid times, by which I mean its one thing after the other and there is never time to write anymore like I used to :(

The other day I was reading through all the stuff I've never posted anywhere. And boy there is a lot. So I'm doing a bit of inventory and thought I'd at least share some snippets.

Inquisitor!Cal Kestis (Star Wars) x Reader: Party Time

The 4th part of the Inquisitor Cal series. It's missing like two scenes and it haunts me every day.

“Just being with you is soothing… I guess that’s ‘cause you’re not trying to murder me.”

“What if I am?” you ask slyly but your voice wavers in rhythm with Cal’s advances.

He pauses briefly, but quickly continues dragging his lips across your neck.

“Then I’m already dead,” he murmurs right next to your ear and shivers course through you.

→ Part 1 here

Thanatos (Supergiant Games Hades) x Reader: Hades Modern AU

There was a wild period of "let's play Hades for 6hrs a day" last summer, so this modern AU started to form.

“Thank you…” you huff and look up.

Ice slithers down your back. (Probably actually rain water but the freezing effect is the same.)

It’s Thanatos. His eyes widen in evident surprise.

You don’t know which one of you is more shocked to see the other. You should have realised sooner he would also be living in the same building. That would have given you at least the edge of mental preparation for this particular instance.

Though, no amount of mental preparation could have prepared you for the sight of him in casual clothes. The god of death is wearing a short leather jacket on top of a grey turtleneck and jeans. Your mouth hangs open.

“Oh, hello, uh, Lord Th-Thanatos,” you fumble to form coherent words and struggle to keep the shopping bags from falling.

“Do you need a hand?” he forgoes the platitudes, though you see his brows furrow at the title.

“Please. My arms are killing me,” you say and grimace. May the god of death take you, indeed. If you could be less obvious, that would be great. “Figure of speech… sorry.”

Thanatos gives you a look of silent judgement and holds out a hand to help with your burdens. Grateful and biting your tongue to keep more frogs from hopping out, you offer him the bag filled with cleaning products and home textiles.

Poe Dameron (Star Wars) x Reader: Hotline Combo

I swear this has been sitting in the drafts for like 5 years. One day. Set around the Resistance animated series.

“Well, you won’t like it,” you say and let out a short laugh. Kaz shoots a dubious look at you. “I’m here to take you home.”

It’s almost cozy arguing with your younger brother again. It’s not a yelling competition you’re having but an endless circle of animated, pointless arguments and a lot of waving hands. It’s a family trait.

Just before the fourth round starts, the door to Yeager’s office suddenly opens. You don’t know the man who steps inside but your initial thought is damn you’d like to.

Kaz’s face lights up. “Poe?! What’re you doing here?” It’s difficult to say if he or the ball droid is happier to see the guy.

Diluc Ragnvindr (Genshin Impact) x Reader: Wine, Grapes and Fire

I'm ashamed to say that this is like 8.5k long and almost done with a clear plot etc. I just never had the inspiration to actually finish it. Maybe when Mihoyo gives Diluc some love..... Basically you take on a part-time job at Diluc's bar and accidents happen that lead you to discover his secret identity. Diluc is not happy.

Just when you’re ready to start pleading for help, Diluc walks in as if nothing happened and joins you behind the counter.

“How are we doing today?” he asks suspiciously casually. If you didn’t know better, you’d think he was behaving apologetic.

“Three Laughter and Cheers to the lady in blue dress and Barbato’s Boon to the gent in green hat,” you say curtly and move past Diluc to gather empty glasses from tables.

You’re almost impressed how quickly Diluc mixes the drinks for the waiting customers and the line by the counter disappears.

“Can we talk now?” he asks half-aloud as you get back.

“Sorry, that’s not on the menu,” you reply with your best customer-service-oriented tone.

He frowns and folds his arms over his chest. The usual black coat lies discarded at the back of the bar again and his biceps are super distracting.

Alhaitham (Genshin Impact) x Reader: How to Distinguish Dreams from Reality: A Study by the Acting Grand Sage

Sumeru lore is so interesting but such a pain. You're Tighnari's cousin and studied together with Alhaitham. When he takes on the job of the acting grand sage, he needs someone to assist him. He totally has no ulterior motives.

“According to this, all extra tasks and their conditions will be agreed to by word of mouth?” you ask. Talk about being lazy in drafting the paper. This sort of thing would not pass in Liyue.

“It’ll keep our options open.” Alhaitham shrugs. “It’s as much for your benefit as it is for mine.”

He is correct, of course, but you don't feel great about agreeing to something without knowing what the “extra” in the job actually entails. You chew your lip, thinking of adding clauses to curb some of the most… colourful work scenarios that could come to pass.

“And this is valid until you return to your work as the Scribe?” you ask slowly. A fixed-term employment and afterwards you will be able to return to your own research.

“In the minimum, yes. There is a high possibility I'll still require an assistant for a time before all matters are settled.”

“I see.” You take refuge from Alhaitham’s stare by reading the contract again.

“Look, with Lesser Lord Kusanali back and several missing Sages, it’s impossible to know what the situation will be even next week in the Akademiya. I trust that we’ll be able to settle any issues that arise within the work matrix,” Alhaitham says confidently.

He sees you still hesitating and you notice an almost imperceptible half-smile on his face. “You won’t have to agree to anything I ask of you outside the regular Scribes tasks,” he says in an overly neutral tone.

“I know,” you reply quickly, biting your lip and still skimming through the short text on the contract. Your free hand automatically moves to pacify your tail from lashing back and forth. Alhaitham’s gaze follows the motion and he clears his throat.

“Ready to sign?” he asks.

Connor | RK800 (Detroit: Become Human) x Reader: Pillow Forts and Chicken Noodle Soup

Human Connor AU, from childhood friends to lovers. Circumstances force you to move in with him and that's good cause there is a lot of flu going around.

“I won,” you declare breathlessly.

Connor snorts. “You literally fell to the floor.”

“Well, I don’t wanna sleep in your bed. God knows what… you’ve…” No, don’t think about him like that. It’s just Connor.

He arches a brow in question, but you stop talking and clear your throat.

“I’m on the couch,” you repeat.

Connor draws in a sigh that doesn’t quite reach the intended exasperation.

“Fine, then. But we could always make a fort and sleep there,” he says in a tone that’s filled with amusement, but there is something else too. Maybe a hint of hopefulness?

As kids, you often used to build pillow forts. Damn, you used to stay nights at each other’s place every week. No wonder everyone asked you if you will marry him when you grow up. The memories warm your cheeks and you smile at Connor.

“Maybe not tonight, but I’ll hold you onto that.”

“You better,” he says and paces off to find sheets for you.

[carigm]

Today Millie had a fan panel in which she answered that her ideal ending would be Mike and El getting married and Will being happy and confessing to Mike (lol) and ofc the Stranger Things fandom kicked up the old Byler vs Mlvn war once again, regardless of the fact she doesn’t write the show. But I want to break down some points here about things I’ve been noticing today, but also for a while and that I think need to be discussed. Keep reading if you want.

I’ve seen a lot of hostility towards Byler and Bylers on Twitter lately, saying we’re delusional and don’t know what we’re talking about. This always seems to be the go to argument even tho it’s all in the narrative. Today it got really bad after Millie’s comments and even people that were merely disagreeing with her opinions got called everything from delusional to misogynistic.

IF the Duffers suddenly decided to ignore everything they’ve carefully crafted and put into their narrative that doesn’t make anyone delusional, it just makes them terrible writers. Who would be doing a great disservice to all three characters involved in the love triangle.

There’s been an insurgence (on Twitter) of so called “Will stans” who seem to be completely fine with the idea of mlvn being endgame because “Will can just get another boyfriend” Not only is this insulting to what the writers have already established for Will’s character but it’s also a defense and endorsement of the worst kind of lazy/bad writing that could graze our screens.

The Duffers CHOSE to tie Will’s character arc to Mike’s and El’s.

How do you expect them to undo that and create a well fleshed out character that’s deserving of Will, in 8 episodes that we know are not just gonna be dedicated to Will’s supposed love interest, because there’s a shit ton of stuff to resolve?

If this was the route the Duffers were going for, they could’ve clearly given Will a love interest last season (like with Robin) or two seasons ago (like with Dustin) And yet somehow, people think it would be totally okay for Will to get the most meaningless romance of all time as the writers ignore the same story they’ve created.

Another point I’ve been seeing a lot from these people is “Mike won’t come out. Let it go. He’s just a very unlikable character” What does that say about the quality of the writing and content you’re willing to consume then? You’re okay with characters being poorly written? And please someone explain to me how Mike’s actions, especially in S4, make any sense unless he likes Will.

The more people try to simplify this story the more plot holes and inconsistencies it creates.

The funny thing is that a lot of these “Will stans” used to be Bylers themselves but are so deathly afraid it won’t be endgame that they’ve started to use the same rhetoric mlvns use every day to justify what would be atrocious writing.

And this next thing might be controversial but I think it needs to be said.

So many people on Twitter have hit those who disagree with Millie’s opinion today with “y’all are misinterpreting Millie’s words” and let me tell you, no one has. She’s been saying the same stuff for forever and quite frankly she’s never had a coherent thought about Will. Which is fine, at the end of the day that’s not the character she plays. However, I haven’t forgotten how last year (at another panel) she was asked about Byler and said it was just a reflection of Finn and Noah’s friendship and that was what people were seeing…

Whatever the fuck that means, I guess.

Again, I’m not taking her answer today too seriously cause truth be told she’s been saying some version of this since she was around twelve, and has even at times said she was joking about it. If a wedding were actually happening she wouldn’t be able to say it cause I’d literally be a spoiler, even if she doesn’t have the scripts yet or doesn’t know I’m sure there’s things that would be off limits for any actor to say at this point.

But this defense squad that formed today begging for us to not misconstrue her words because “she really cares about Will’s character” is laughable.

Her answers regarding the topic of the love triangle have been anything but nuanced. If she doesn’t want to get into it or address it, that’s fine. It’s her choice.

But of course, mlvn stans are gonna take her answers seriously, as well as those who are now “Will stans” who basically ship mlvn too.

And to me there’s a fundamental flaw regarding the ship wars in this fandom, which these people don’t seem to grasp. At this point, it isn’t so much about “which ship is better” but “which outcome isn’t violently homophobic”

That’s it.

I don’t care how much you ship mlvn, this is the undisputed truth here.

But when your lead actors act like it’s not a big deal, it’s no surprise the fandom doesn’t give a shit.

I can only hope the Duffers were smart enough to see reason and were able to write the only outcome that won’t set television back around 10 years or so.

And hopefully one day, when S5 is out, we can get a more in depth and honest conversation with the actors about all of this.

As for me, I’m gonna lay low and not give much of a fuck until we start getting those Reddit leaks, which were very much accurate for last season. I’ll take a peak at those, and depending on what they look like, I’ll stay around or dip completely.

If you read all of this, thank you.

[skaruresonic]

I'm reminded of the split opinion on whether Sonic Gens and Mania are suitable "first games" for people who want to approach the series.

I personally don't think so, because the appeal of those games is precisely revisiting old levels in a new format, with a new design: you're not going to get the subtle jokes as a newcomer (and Mania can get very obscure with it). But some do think they're nice pastiches for newcomers to at least get an idea of Sonic's history as a franchise, and it helps that they're both solid games.

I assumed Shadow Gens would be the same, but you make a good point, because this game has an actual story. For veterans, it's more of the same thing, if you know Shadow's story this adds very little new, and it's mostly a repeat of what he already went through in ShTH. But newcomers who want to learn more about the cool black hedgehog from the new movie would still be confused: why did Shadow become a hero? Who is Black Doom, why is he obsessed with Shadow, why does Shadow hate him? Let's not even talk about things like Mephiles' boss fight lol. (although personally I find Gerald's mention of the time portals of '06 rather cute)

So I guess this game is for veterans who just want to soak in the Shadow vibes once more, but this time with Good Writing™

If you based your knowledge only on the information provided by SxS Gens - so no supplementary material, no Dark Beginnings, no manga, no movie, no paratext - you would learn the vaguest and broadest strokes of maybe two games, SA2 and ShTH, at most. But nothing specific.

Everything else would just come off as garbled nonsense. Hell, it appeared that way to me and I've been a Sonic fan for (checks notes) 22 years. God I'm old.

I approached this game not with my purist hardhat on (though that wasn't always the case given some lines here and there lmao) but from the perspective of a newcomer who knew nothing about Shadow's past. If everyone was going to argue that this game's existence is necessary on that basis, I thought, how well would it perform as an introductory piece?

From that perspective, I don't think the game does a very good job in giving us a crash course on Shadow's history. Gerald and Maria do nothing - I hate to say it but they're ultimately window-dressing. They don't accomplish anything that, for instance, a posthumous diary or recording could have just as easily provided.

(Tbf, the NPCs in Gens also pretty much did nothing but cheer Sonic on, but it's not like, given this sheer gravitas as seeing your dead loved ones return to life via the power of timey-wimey shenanigans.)

I was actually surprised at how little plot progression there is, given my previous expectations of there being, you know, a coherent story. The plot doesn't really kick in until you've completed 4 out of the 6 available levels, and by then you've pretty much halfway done lol.

Shit happens in weird, patchwork, nonsensical ways. We get boss fights for characters that don't matter but not a boss fight against Sonic, AKA the guy we play as in Gens proper and in a context that echoes a game dynamic where we get to fight each character as the opponent. Shadow is the ultimate life form who gets his ass handily kicked by Sonic. Maria has a delayed response at the news of Shadow's heritage; she's not instantly shocked the first time, but when Gerald says it for a second time she suddenly becomes distressed. Omega claims they showed Metal "mercy" at the end of Heroes, despite questioning whether he should destroy Metal or Sonic to prove his strength. We have to fight Mephiles even though he doesn't matter because reasons.

Characters appear who aren't relevant to the plot, but are given the screen treatment as though the game expects the player to know who they are and why they might (or might not) be relevant.

---

Who is Black Doom, why is he obsessed with Shadow, why does Shadow hate him?

>>gets Silent Hill 3 flashbacks as Black Doom waxes poetic about "possessing" Shadow

---

Let's not even talk about things like Mephiles' boss fight lol.

No. Let's. :P

Mephiles' boss is one great big time-wasting in-joke that amounts to an MCU-esque "Well, that just happened." I can easily see newcomers mistaking him for one of Black Doom's minions or something, especially given that his boss arena is found in a cave under Chaos Island and not in Kingdom Valley. Because the latter is where you find Metal Overlord instead.

Yeah, this would definitely confuse newcomers.

As I've said before, the game does the "don't think about a polar bear" thing by bringing up the matter of Shadow's blood, only to backpedal immediately afterwards with "his blood doesn't matter, I swear." At times I felt like I was playing Parasite Eve with talk of mutations and what-not.

And like, sure, the game does stress that Shadow determines his own destiny, but if that's the case, why bring up his blood eighty million times? Why turn it into a friggin' gameplay mechanic? The guy turns into a squid FFS

Oh, and I forgot to mention: the light of God that shone down on IDW!Sonic during his Sermon on the Rock also shines down on Maria when she tells Shadow the reason she gave him his name. Just in case you couldn't get The Symbolism. Very subtle, much cinematic, felt like I was playing SA2 all over again.

[historicallyaccuratecheese]

So uh...that thing I said about my tma hyperfixation slipping recently? Well, I wasn't lying, but...holy shit, if it didn't come back quicker than I expected! As I'm sure many of you are aware, they recently announced a live performance happening in London surrounding Hill Top Road, and...I am so ridiculously excited for it. Now that I've booked my tickets, I am wholeheartedly back on the listening train and set on finishing it before October 30th next year.

As I have said in current my pinned post, I don't think I'll be continuing to write down all of my thoughts for every episode, both because I don't have the time or energy, and because I want to start using this blog for pleasure more and just post about whatever thing's on my mind. That being said, I finally got back into the podcast with MAG 87 (a bit of a weird new start, I know, but...whatever), and...I definitely have some things to say about it! So uh...yeah, read beneath the cut if you want to hear a bit of that! :)

But first, I'd just like to give some brief thoughts on MAG 85 and 86. Unfortunately it's been quite a while since I last listened to them, and I don't really have much motivation to go back and re-listen, since I'd like to keep things moving forward, so...a lot of my hyper-specific thoughts have evaded me. That being said...I thoroughly enjoyed both of them!

MAG 85...despite being extremely frustrating to form any coherent thoughts about, was an absolutely stellar episode! And I mean...being confusing is kind of the point so I can't complain that much. Like, it is entirely impossible for me to decipher this one, I can't tell if it means fuck all or is the most important thing ever, but...whatever, it was good! It's no secret at this point that I really like all of the stuff surrounding The Spiral (particularly a certain distorted door man...), so this was obviously a great time for me and was stellarly written. I did find quite a bit of intrigue in the post-statement though, namely Georgie....I mean, bless her heart, but holy shit she needs to re-think her dating life, and also what is seemingly the reveal of the name of one of Gertrude's late assistants. ...Eric Delano. At first I didn't think much of this name reveal, I mean, I assumed we'd learn more about him later, but the intial reveal doesn't tell us much. However...for reasons I'll explain later, I recently reffered back to the transcript for MAG 62, and...wouldn't you know it, Mary mentioned an Eric back there, one that both she and Gertrude are familiar with. I have no idea what his connection to the former could be if there really was one at all, but uh...based on the context he's brought up in, I'm guessing that his death had something to do with whichever one of ✨the horrors✨ he was devoted to (likely The Eye if he was indeed an archival assistant, but...then again Gertrude's alliegance to it as The Archivist can still be questioned so I'm not saying anything conclusive for the time being), and the "what's left of him" remark means his death was...probably a bit of a slow build. Anyways...all very interesting.

Now, as for MAG 86...holy fucking shit. As far as I can tell this one if quite infamous among the fandom, and...yeah, I can certainly sympathize! I really don't think I have much more to say about the statement that hasn't already been said, but just...wow. It's another example of a statement that doesn't really seem connected to the overarching plot, (I mean...there are some similarities between the monster in this episode and Maxwell Rayner, but I feel like I'm supposed to read into that more than the two almost certainly being extensions/servants of the same darkness power, plus if we assume that the Rayner body swapping theory is true, and that he only does so when the current one is starting to get really old, and specifically targets children for hosts, then like...why is he possessing an adult? Why was he outside of a body for so long? This is a really long section inside parentheses holy shit.) but it is just...so incredibly memorable and terrifying. The way that throughout the entire episode, it builds up its concept of a monster that is one with the darkness of night itself and only encroaches towards when you aren't conciously hiding from it underneath a blanket, but then at the very last minute completely subverts this idea by revealing that its patterns were just a farce meant to lure Benjamin into a false sense of security...it's genuinely haunting. And of course "The blanket never did anything" is a quote for the ages, like...just wow. (Also the way it left a noticeable stain on him reminded me of Void from Hollow Knight but that's off-topic).

Otherwise though, this episode had a lot of great non-statement content! While I am...still absolutely terrified by the prospect of Melanie working at the institute now, along with her blatant naivete and denial (although granted I'm thankful that she's much more open to investigating what the hell is happening than Season 1 Jon was), I really liked her reading the statement here. Lydia Nicholas does a great job making her read sound different from the statements Melanie gave herself, I mean...she genuinely sounds horrified by the end which like...same girl. I also love how she says "marker" at the beginning and end, it's such a small but charming detail that highlights how she's still used to her old way of looking into and documenting the paranormal really well. Also, somewhat off-topic but...WHY THE HELL DOES ROBIN PATTON SOUND SO MUCH LIKE GEORGIE'S SHITTY DATE?! Like...I was so prepared to learn that Georgie got mauled by a shadow monster upon listening to MAG 87 but...nope! Genuinely...what was up with that? Uh...regardless, we also have Tim who...I found to be VERY interesting in this episode. Firstly...the line "Who am I even sad for?" was just...an absolute gut punch. It's no secret that anything regarding the inherent tragedy of Sasha's character is enough to make me cry, but like...despite my occasional frustrations with him, it's stuff like this that makes me feel like...just, Tim Stoker, they could never make me hate you. But outside of that...something is absolutely up with him.

I just...find it so weird that he seems to almost instantly recognize what happened when Melanie starts talking about the two Sashas, like...how is it that HE seems so understanding of what's going on when she, the only person other than Elias who was able to see through the facade, really isn't? I mean, sure, there have been a few statements about The NotThem before, but only one of them actually had the archival assistants involved in any follow-up, and I mean...Tim is like the office diva who's just here for shits and giggles! ...That's an overexxageration, I'm sure he had his reasons for joining the institute that'll be revealed in the future, I'm just saying he's absolutely the most lax person here, albeit the way in which he's lax has changed over time. But like, why does he, of all people, remember this singular statement that he looked into over a year ago at this point in the timeline? I mean, I guess he did take a bit of an interest in the table when it was delivered to the institute, and was also the one to tell Jon about the delivery, but...Jon himself didn't even clock that the table and The NotThem were inherently connected to one another until after reading Lawrence Moore's statement and hearing about how Adelard Dekker bound the thing, so why should I expect Tim to be any better? Just...what is the deal here? On top of that, I found it really interesting how he just...stopped reading the statement and went on a rant at the beginning. As far as we can tell, statements seem to...draw people into them in a less than normal way, likely explaining why they portray the person who gave it while reading out loud, and why they seem so shocked and breathless when they stop (except for Jon but granted he's been doing this for a while whereas Martin and Melanie are new to this). The only other exceptions to this are Elias, who's method of reading "Alice Tonner's Statement" were...unique to say the least (and is also a practically confirmed to be claimed by The Eye like Jon while the archival assistants might just be touched so...there's also that), and Gertrude, who is...admittedly a bit of a mystery, but if we go with the assumption that as The Archivist she was also claimed by The Eye like Jon and probably all before her, and take some of her, um...fiery machinations into account, then...yeah, I feel confident in saying there was probably a bit of resistance to all of this spooky archive shit on her part.

So then, what's the deal with Tim? I mean, I once proposed the idea that "statement begins" is a sort of paranormal trigger phrase that draws people into the statements as an explanation for why Gertrude, a character who doesn't say that, seems so unfazed while and after reading a statement, but...this episode actually deconfirms that notion, because Melanie doesn't say it and still comes out uneasy. So...Tim not saying "statement begins" probably means very little. I mean...I guess it also felt like Melanie was getting drawn in over time so...maybe the fact that Tim didn't even start the actual story has something to do with it? Well like...my point is, this and the instant understanding of what happened to Sasha is enough to make me feel mighty suspicious of Tim. Like, I don't think he's some evil villain or anything but...I mean to say that he's shifted from "just some guy who got stuck in this whole mess" to "someone who might very well have a much bigger stake in the lore and narrative than I initially thought". And like...I know Season 2 Jon was an insane bastard who was not to be trusted but honestly...I also kind of think it's weird Tim came to the institute despite there being no history in paranormal studies on his record. So...what do I think's going on with him? Well...I think he very well might have some sort of connection to The Stranger. I don't get the sense that he's actually working for it or is in on The Unknowing or something, because even thought deceit and false appearances is kind of The Stranger's thing from what I can garner...Tim seems pretty genuine in his confusion. If not, then "Who am I even sad for?" would have significantly less weight to it. But...I just wonder if maybe he's been touched by it beyond just being decieved by The NotThem, and...maybe that has something to do with his past. It would explain why he recognized what was going on with Sasha after hearing Melanie's account (I am...very tempted to say that he lost someone to The NotThem before, but...I don't know how you'd expand on that given that the thing is currently rotting in an underground ditch. Sure, it's not actually dead and could theoretically bust out at any moment, but...eh...we'll see), and mabe also why he was able to seemingly tear himself away from the statement, since The Eye and The Stranger seem to be VERY naturally opposed, maybe more than they are to any other one of ✨the horrors✨, except for MAYBE the darkness because The Divine Host's insignia is literally a closed eye. Ultimately...these are just two relatively small details and I'm making a lot of assumptions based on them, but...I really feel like something interesting is about to happen with Tim. I mean, I really hope so, I've said before that I badly want to see more about his character get revealed so that I can form a more clear opinion on him, but...I'll just have to wait and see.

And then finally, something that really surprised me...Melanie and Jon meeting up! This was a delighful surprise, not only because I love their interactions with one another, but also because...it's really interesting plot-wise. Firstly, we got some more information on Melanie getting "sort of shot" (it's been months and I still have not stopped thinking about that). Apparently she was shot in the leg...by a ghost. Oh...homegirl is so haunted by one of ✨the horrors✨ and it is not even funny anymore. I don't really have much to say about this reveal, other than that...I'm very intrigued by it and hope she makes another statement of her own soon. Because uh...that sounds important. Anyways, I think the most interesting thing here is the deal made between the two of them. Melanie helping Jon out with gathering additional resources is very intriguing...kind of, I mean, I'm writing this post-MAG 87 so I already have a decent idea of what her doing this for him might do...and given the context I kind of hope she doesn't help him with what he's trying to do because I prefer my archivist raw and not cooked but...we'll get to that. But uh...otherwise, I am EXTREMELY interested by the fact that Jon has...supposedly told Melanie everything. Like...I desperately need to listen to MAG 88 right after I post this just so that I can hopefully see the fallout of that conversation at the institute. Like...will they learn about Sasha, Leitner, Elias, Gertrude, ✨THE FUCKING HORRORS✨?! Just...how do you reveal all of that to the new girl at the institue when meeting up at a café, and better yet, how do you expect her to share all of that information with her new coworkers she barely knows at a place where they are constantly being watched by a guy who probably doesn't want them knowing that?! And like...how the hell do you "start with Sasha?" Like, I have genuinely tried imagining that conversation between Jon and Melanie in my head multiple times (i swear I am a normal person), and...I just cannot make that work. Like Melanie, I'm sorry, but Magnus Institute Lore 101 requires that you start with the worm lady, okay? Just...wow...how is that going to go down? Anyways...those are my main thoughts on MAG 86! ....Yeah, the disparity in stuff to say between this and MAG 85 is kind of laughable. I swear I like it, I just...cannot write anything coherent about it. Regardless...onto the main event!

But before that....just one little thing I recently realized regarding the episode "Hide and Seek" namely its title. Not only does it refer to The NotThem chasing Jon, but...I just realized that The Stranger "hides" and The Eye "seeks", but in this episode, the seeker is a manifestation of The Stranger and the hider is a man claimed by The Eye. ...God damn that is really clever.

So...MAG 87. ...I would say I was surprised that definitely not Elias Bouchard managed to find out where Jon was hiding Gertrude's tapes but...I'm not. Because. Come on. Man...I just realized how unfortunate it is that right after Basira gave him that gold mine of information, he was forced to leave all of that knowledge behind. ...Yikes. Anyways, uh...I guess I should start with the statement here! Let's get the obvious out of the way. Sebastian Skinner you will always be famous. Put this man right next to Joshua Gillespie and Karolina Górka and let them form the most powerful polycule in human history because OH MY GOD I LOVE HIM. King and patron saint to all neurodivergents across the globe, he deserves all the riches he could ever desire. Yeah...despite all of the genuinely unnerving imagery and lore revelations in this episode, I have to say that Sebastian alone makes this one of the funniest episodes in the show by far. The man is LITERALLY asked to unclog human flesh from a sewage pipe in a creepy building in the woods by a very creepy woman who offers to FLENSE him...and he is just completely unfazed by and oblivious to the whole situation. I just...I can't get over that. In fact, he is so unbothered by it that Megan is GENUINELY APPALLED by it, but also so ammused that she calls over a servant of a completely different member of ✨the horrors✨ to LAUGH ABOUT IT, and then calls him back, not even to neccessarily kill him, but just to rub it in his face how actually scary things are. Just...absolute comedy gold, I love it. I will remember this man always, and it is actually kind of heartbreaking that he did not survive in the end if Gertrude's comments are anything to go off of (also yes hi Gertrude I missed you :D).

Outside of that though...yikes was this a freaky one. I mean, really only the second half if I'm being honest, the first part was still hilarious. Just like...so much disturbing imagery. The way he describes "Megan" burying her plastic hands into his skin, how Jude Perry just cruelly laughs as he cries out for help, and then a workshop filled with a bunch more of the sentient mannequins from MAG 83 skinning a bunch of severed heads, it's just...ugh! Same goes for Megan's face slipping away and Jude burning his shoulder right as it seemed like she was going to let him get away, just...yeah, very disturbing statement. Overall I really liked it, good mix of comedy and horror that builds the plot surrounding The Stranger, The Unknowing, and...surprisingly The Lightless Flame up really well. And speaking of which...

The best part of this episode for me is definitely all of the new information it gives us and the way it pushes the plot forward, both in the statement and the comments made by Gertrude and Jon. In general, I feel like Season 3 has done a great job at pushing the plot forward so far, even if it's felt a bit slow for me due to my hiatus. Firstly, I'd like to discuss what we learned about The Unknowing, because...wow. Now, Jon says that he believes The Unknowing is a "ritual" and...yeah, there probably is some truth to that. Now, I do still think that the destruction of The Magnus Institute probably plays into The Unknowing, both for reasons that I've discussed before, none of which have been debunked here as far as I'm concerned, but also because this episode confirms that while The Stranger is definitely the one leading the operation, other members of ✨the horrors✨ have the potential to get involved as well, namely what we now know is called "The Devastation". Amazing name by the way, I especially appreciate its existence because it was getting annoying having to differentiate between "Lightless Flame" as in the power and "Lightless Flame" as in the cult. Now, I know that Gertrude kind of suggests it is possible that Jude Perry (who uh...yeah! Really cool to get a new named freaky person here!) was just here for shits and giggles, and I mean...to an extent she probably was given Sebastian being a guy that exists, but let's assume that she actually is working with agents of The Stranger on The Unknowing. Now, as far as I can discern, there...really doesn't seem to be much that would make The Stranger and The Devastation natural allies when you look at things through a thematic lense. Like, compare this to The Vast, the isolation power and the darkness power, all of whom are allied via Daedalus, and you have clear thematic correlation. The Lukases, Fairchilds and Divine Host are working together because of the loneliness, size and darkness of space. Meanwhile, The Stranger and The Devastation don't have much in common...except for a common enemy. ...Or rather, seperate enemies that are allied with one another. Yeah so...The Stranger hates The Eye and The Devastation hates The Spider, and it does seem like The Eye and The Spider are allied in a number of places. Now, according to Gertrude, The Lightless Flame had...plans of their own that recently "went up in flames" (she actually said that by the way, I never thought I would hear her tell a joke), likely due to the loss of Agnes as we can tell she was definitely important to her given all of her "destiny" talk. Er, on that note, I guess I should mention that it's entirey possible that Jude Perry is the only member of The Lightless Flame allied with The Stranger, since all of the other named ones (Agnes, Diego and Arthur) are....very very dead, while she is implied to still be out there. Regardless, this makes me think that her and/or The Lightless Flame's involvement with The Unknowing could be a sort of...next best option. Like, maybe their plans involved getting rid of The Spider, but since Agnes' death has left them in disarray, their siding with the member of ✨the horrors✨ who seeks to take down The Spider's bestie. And...the best way to do that is probably through wrecking the institute. So uh...yeah, I definitely think that The Unknowing will involve destroying the institute, but...I have reason to suspect there's more too it than just that.

My reason is...well, Gertrude was actively trying to stop it. We know that she and Leitner tried to burn down the institute, or at least the archives, right before her death, so if The Unknowing only sought to do the same thing as her...why would she try to stop it? There has to be something else it seeks to achieve, and we have...at least an inkling of an idea of what that might be now. But um...on the note of Gertrude wanting to stop it, there's that! We now know for certain that Gertrude was not just fighting against The Eye from within the institute, but also The Stranger as well...which makes me think she was probably fighting against all of ✨the horrors✨, if the fact she was against two immortal enemies is anything to go off of. I also think this episode debunks the idea that she was secretly a servant of The Devastation due to her tendency to burn and explode, both because of what I just said but also because she talks about Jude Perry and The Lightless Flame in a way that makes her seem...on a different side from them. But like....that doesn't make her whole character any less bewildering to me! Hell, I think this makes her MORE bewildering! Not only do I not understand how she was able to even attempt doing so much damage to The Eye when she, as The Archivist, was presumably claimed by it, but like...how the hell was she going agaisnt EVEN MORE?! How is she just..able to fight against every side in this war between eldritch abominations, especially when her only known allies were three assistants who all died horribly, and an old librarian who while definitely powerful, is implied to have met her relatively late into her life? Even Michael, a character whose only discernable goals are to cause chaos, look hot while doing it and sit back and watch the world burn is at least aligned with The Spiral (albeit seemingly more by nature than by choice or experience). And like...better yet, WHY?! What motivated her to join The Magnus Institute and start fighting all of these things? My best guess is that she, like Jon, was motivated to join due to prior interest in the paranormal, and only learned that the institute was just as paranormal as everything it's been studying later on. The only discernable difference is that while Jon came in search of knowledge, I think she might have come in search of blood, but like...that's not a lot! Just...god. "Interesting" does not do this character justice. I love this arsonist grandma so dearly but like...I need her secrets now. And the funny thing is, I'm not even done talking about her yet! But...for now, back to The Unknowing.

So there's a few more details regarding it I want to point out. Firstly, it seems almost confirmed that while The Anglerfish and its minions, Breekon and Hope, Jude Perry and at least for a time, The NotThem, are all actively involved in The Unknowing, The Other Circus is the main organizer of the event, which makes sense as it does seem to be The Stranger's equivalent to the groups like The Lightless Flame and The Divine Host. (Mentioning that, I...kind of wonder if The Divine Host is involved here as well? I mean, not only are they seemingly aligned against The Eye, not only do they share some thematic similarities with agents of The Stranger, but...they've also been planning something for a while. There's Natalie Ennis' mention of a plan "three-hundred years in the making", which just so happened to have a part of it enacted...presumably not long before Gertrude's death. ...We'll get to the timeline shenanigans in a second. But uh...they also recently had their plans sold out to Section 31 by...who is most likely Elias, a guy who has expressed his desire to stop The Unkowing, albeit somewhat nonchalantly. Regardless, uh...we know that The Other Circus is in charge of this whole thing, but namely...somewhat by the name of "Orsinov". But...seemingly not Gregor Orsinov, the ringmaster from MAG 44, as Gertrude refers to this Orsinov with a "her" pronoun. Assuming that this is not a continuity error, then this likely means whoever is running The Other Circus is not the same person as Gregor, but rather a relative, spouse or even child. ...Preferabbly not that last one as I do not like the image of someone who is unlikely to be a normal earthling procreating. Alternatively, uh...congrats on the transition I guess? I know that sounds like a joke, but...it is worth noting that considering The Stranger is like...the shapeshifting one, a change in gender is not impossible here. Ultimately I'm fine if they go down that route, I just...don't hope they would frame that change in gender as an inherently scary thing? But...eh, I have faith in Jonny not to do that. Either way, there's some interesting directions they could take this in. Gertrude also mentions that Orsinov has...a world they wish to bring about. ...THAT doesn't sound good at all. I think this is pretty definitive proof that there's more to The Unknowing than I initially thought, and that it has much larger implications than just the destruction of the institute. I also assume this would be where the "ritual" aspect Jon alludes to would come into play, although I don't really know how to interpret that dialogue at the moment. Other than that...well, we know that all of that skin will somehow play into The Unknowing, and that there will also be "dancers" there who are wearing that skin. I assume these dancers are probably the various sentient(?) mannequins that agents of The Stranger have been producing, as "Megan" does seem to be wearing skin herself. This...also might explain what the deal with Sarah Baldwin and Daniel Rawlings is. I've thought since MAG 54 that the original humans who stumbled into Old Fishmarket Close were skinned by The Anglerfish, and that skin was given to monsters who serve it. Now it seems very likely that The Anglerfish's victims are actually "dancers" in their own right, so that's cool! I mean, it's terrifying, but it's cool! Uh...The Unknowing is seemingly fast approaching, which...yeah, definitely makes sense, I would be surprised if it didn't at least attempt to succeed this season honestly. And finally...this isn't from Gertrude's comments, but I didn't know where else to put it, but uh...we know that The Stranger also goes by the name "I Do Not Know You". ...I just thought that was neat.

Now, there's one last aspect of Gertrude's presence in this episode that I would like to discuss, that being...the timeline of her death. Unfortunately, my only real flaw with this episode is that it has quite a few, not plot-collapsing at all, but still pretty frustrating continuity errors that muddle the timeline a bit. ...Or does it? Because upon further thinking, I actually realized, what might seem like an impossible timeline...could actually be a clue. ...Yes, I am fully aware I probably sound a little crazy just by saying that. But first of all...well yeah I am crazy, we've established this before. But secondly, if it does turn out that these are just continuity errors...honestly like...whatever. I would prefer it if they weren't but I won't be super upset if Jonny made some minor mistakes, especially since he otherwise does a remarkably good job at keeping track of a timeline that is often not delivered to us in a chronological order. Now, there is one detail that I really can't rationalize being anything other than a mistake, and that is Jon saying that this tape was recorded a year or so before Gertrude's death. That is just...blatantly not true, as this statement was recorded in April of 2015, and Jon had been The Archivist for a quite a while by that point. Ultimately though, this doesn't really matter, especially since MAG 33 kind of established than any continuity error said by Jon regarding a statement can be explained by him being a little bit dumb on occasion. And by a little bit dumb I mean he smashed the table I'M STILL NOT OVER IT I KNOW YOU HAVE CHILDHOOD TRAUMA ABOUT SPIDERS BUT SERIOUSLY WHAT THE FUCK?! But otherwise...well, it's a bit complicated. This isn't the first time that we've gotten conflicting statements regarding Gertrude's death. In MAG 25, we're told that she died in May 2015 on the same day screams were heard from Hither Green Chapel, but in MAG 40, Elias tells her she died, or...at least went missing, in March. This means that this statement could either take place a month before...or a month after she died, and...I actually think either one could work. Stay with me. Let's start with the easiest assumption, that being that she died in May.

If this is the case...well, there's really not much to say. This statement was recorded a month before she died, end of story. As for Elias, well...he was the man who killed her, and we can say without a shadow of a doubt that he lied in the statement he gave after the Prentiss incident. The only problem is...I don't know why he would lie about the date of her death specifically as that seems kind of disadvantageous, but...I can just chock that up to him being a silly guy who does what he wants. Alternatively, you could assume that Gertrude went MISSING in March, but actually died in May, but...that wouldn't really explain the blood in the archives (although it's entirely possible that detail was another lie), and on top of that, wouldn't explain why Jon had her date of death recorded as being in May when she was only confirmed dead when Martin found her body in the tunnels in July of 2016. So...yeah, it's not perfect, but there are workarounds to this line of thinking. But...what if we take an alternative line of thinking, one that is less likely but a bit more fun? What if we assume that this statement was recorded a month...BEFORE she died?

You see, I've just been thinking...there has to be...SOMETHING more to Gertrude's death, right? Like, sure, it made sense for the whodunnit mystery to be concluded in Season 2, but like...her death is such an important catalyst in the story, and I find it way too hard to believe that it's as simple as "Elias shot her because she was trying to burn down the archives". (Oh uh...and this doesn't really connect to what I about to put forward, but I have to wonder...why did it take Elias so long to kill her? Like, she was working against The Eye at least since the late nineties, and he should've known about this because...well, you know. Unless gaining all-knowing powers from his patron took over 20 years, but like...I find that unlikely. ...Why did he wait?) I just...feel like there's more too it. And uh...you know how I mentioned I went back to the transcript for MAG 62? Yeah...you might see where I'm going with this. I went back there because in this episode, Jon mentions the page of the skin book that Gertrude got from Mary. Now, he very quickly disregards this as being at all connected to The Stranger (while also commenting on how confusing this all is, which....you and me both buddy), and I have to agree with this. While I am implored to raise an eyebrow at how all of the human heads that were being harvested for skin in the workshop here were hung on the same stuff used for Mary's book, we know that the book connects to a seperate member of ✨the horrors✨ called "The End", and while ✨the horrors✨ do collaborate with one another, we've never seen a Leitner that's connected to more than one of them, the same principle applying to artifacts and claimed people. But...I don't think the book being mentioned here has to be a throwaway line. If you recall MAG 62, Mary gave Gertrude a page of her book. Now, the page already had writing on it, seemingly implying that someone's spirit had already been bound to it. But...then I remembered that Mary seemingly bound herself to the book...and that's when I had an idea. For a long time, I've wondered how Mary could've possibly done what she did, but then I realized...is it possible that she removed chunks of her skin before dying, did all the spooky writing and incantations, and THEN overdosed on painkillers, which ultimately resulted in her being bound to the book? Because if that's the case...what if the same happened with Gertrude? Because like...Gertrude is shown to be familiar with the smell of burning skin in MAG 62, so like...what if she had pieces of her skin removed at some point, and then Mary used those pieces to create the page that she would then give her later on? Then, if we assume Elias killed her in March, this resulted in Gertrude being bound to the page as a ghost, therefore explaining how this statement was recorded after her death? This would also explain her mysterious remarks about needing to recover and being unable to stand, because she would be adjusting to a new state of being! (Side note, can I just say that I thought Gertrude sounded like...noticeably more aged here? I don't know if that's just a result of me not having tuned in for a while but if it isn't...great job Sue Sims, you really sold it well :). ) Now...all of that said, how likely is this?

Honestly not very, this is kind of crack. Plus, there are a number of very easy alternate explanations to these mysteries. The remark about burning skin could come from an earlier encounter with The Stranger or The Devestation, and honestly...it is entirely possible that Mary got help from Gerard when being bound to the book, because not only was he suspected of killing her, indicating he might have been at the scene, but all of the statements where he seems to be on bad terms with her take place after her death in 2008, so...yeah. It's very likely that the death in May thing is the case, or that...all of this is just one big jumble of continuity errors, which is honestly fine! But...eh, I like this idea quite a lot. Alternatively, I could argue that she's a ghost similar to the Archivist seen in MAG 53 but...that's pure speculation. Well, whatever the case, I just hope that there's a bit more to Gertrude's death and the circumstances surrounding it then what we've been given so far, because...I think there's a lot of untapped potential there.

Well...to wrap all of this up, I'd like to discuss some of the stuff Jon said. Firstly, he mentioned how weird it is that Gertrude was recording tapes all the way up until she died, along with how strange it is that only a small handful of statements were actually transferred, at least...as far as we're aware. I...honestly have to agree with this, but I think I have a decent enough idea as to what the deal is here, but it's not perfect. For a good while now, I've assumed that Gertrude intentionally kept the statements "disorganized", so that her successor would get all of the information they need as quickly as possible, and I think a similar thing might be going on with the tapes. All of them cover pretty important stuff, MAG 53 giving insight into The Eye and the institute, MAG 62 showing us some pretty important events, MAG 44 and 87 both tie back to The Stranger and The Unknowing, and MAG 77...uh...well look, there's probably no way she could've known that The NotThem would infiltrate the institute, especially all those years ago, but the tape does give us a clue to the existence of a statement from the ever-mysterious Adelard Dekker, and given how that statement has gone missing for unknown reasons...I think it's probably pretty important? Granted this theory isn't perfect, I mean, why would she be recording a statement that gives information regarding The Other Circus when she says in this very episode that she's surprised The Unknowing is something...like...actually worth worrying about in the present? And why would all of these tapes be buried alongside her in the tunnels...unless Elias put them there...which...ok that actually checks out. Anyways, this line of thinking isn't perfect but...I think something along these lines makes sense. The second point of intrigue to me is uh...Jon's plans. Which...oh boy.

*DRUMROLL PLEASE*....

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, BOYS AND GIRLS, HORRORS AND MICHAELS, GIVE IT UP FOR ANOTHER ROUND OF "NEW PLOT POINTS IN THE MAGNUS ARCHIVES THAT ARE REALLY EXCITING FROM A STORY PERSEPCTIVE BUT TERRIFYING WHEN YOU CONSIDER HOW MUCH IT'S GOING TO SUCK FOR ONE OR MORE OF THE CHARACTERS!!!" 🎉 🎉 🎉 🎉 🎉 🎉 🎉

So...Jon...ever-knowledgable and sane...has decided that it's a great idea to try and track down Jude Perry. You know, that lady who sets people on fire? I just...look, Melanie, if you know what's good for you, which I know yo-...actually nevermind you went to India fully aware that you might get murdered by ghosts, which you almost did, so...no. But if you have gained the ability to know what's good for you, which I hope you do, then you will NOT help the smelly man track down the professional arsonist. Like...dude?! Hello?! Like, I know the situation is dire, I know The Unknowing is a rapidly approaching threat, and I know that after BPM and the flashbacks to your childhood trauma you've accepted that there's really no way out of this mess, but like...damn, this is not a good idea! Not even Season 2 Jon would do this! Don't get me wrong...I think this is super exciting, not only because I have a particular bias towards the stuff involving The Lightless Flame (...mostly Agnes but shhhhhh), but because...this is EXACTLY what I wanted Season 3 to do. Finally getting out there in the world and actively trying to find all of the shit from the statements. It is...extremely dangerous and terrifying, but...also very exciting. I don't want to get my hopes up too high, after all it is entirely possible that Jude Perry has moved far out of Havering, or has even died at this point, but...man, if we could actually HEAR a member of The Lightless Flame speak...I might actually lose my god damn mind. Well...I'll just have to wait and see.

And finally, the ending of this episode. ...Yeah, that's genuinely terrifying! Hearing the calliope music slowly creep in, and then getting Jon's genuinely horrified reaction...it's so unlike what I'm used to so far, it comes at such an unexpected moment...and my jaw was genuinely left wide-open at it. That's uh...that's not good. Jon...I think you have a bit more to worry about than just police now. Oh, and just because I haven't really mentioned it, um...yeah I absolutely adore Georgie! She kind of has a very similar appeal to that of Basira for me, being a really down to earth and real-feeling character in a world filled with people who, while I absolutely adore them, are objectively freaks of nature. And while I do still think I like Basira a tad bit more, if only because I just feel like I know her better, I actually think Georgie is a better example of this trait! She's just a really friendly and supportive friend to Jon who has...unfortunately gotten a bit wrapped up in this mess, and...yeah, what can I say, I find her very endearing and hope to learn more about her and her past with Jon. I will say, I do find it a tad bit frustrating that Jon is pushing her away and refusing to get help from her, especially when he kind of resolved to stop doing that at the beginning of the season, and ESPECIALLY because she is the exact kind of person he needs at the moment, but granted, I get the sense he's doing this more out of care for her than suspiscion or malice, and I mean...yeah, I'd also be hesitant to tell her...all of that. And also...holy shit the statements really ARE an addiction allegory! Jesus Christ...Jon, what the hell is going on with you right now?

Well uh...yeah, that's all I really have to say! I was definitely surprised by how much I managed to write here, and I'm very happy that my tma fixation has seemingly circled back around earlier than I expected! I hope you enjoyed reading this and that this new kind of format worked well, this was certainly much less of an investment of time and energy for me at least, and I had a good time with it! Like I said, I'm not going to be dead set on writing about every detail of every statement anymore, and lengths of posts I do write will probably vary either do to time or how much I even have to say, but...this should be a decent example of the kind of format I'm going for! Anyways, I'm...probably not going to listen to MAG 88 just yet because it's late, so I'll save that for tomorrow morning! Anyways, it's nice to be back on tma, and thank you very much for reading all this! :)

[spotsandsocks]

Okay Spotty, Spotty pleaseeeeee 😭 actually genuine question because I'm honestly in awe of you and your talent but do you have any advice for writing long fics?? Or what is your process?? Because you always seem to be posting chapter after chapter of a new multi chapter masterpiece and I just asddghhjkllll?!?!?!

I WISH TO LEARN FROM THE MASTER 🙌🏼

Big love xx 💕😘

Oh my darling meegs! What a message to get!! I might have to frame it and take it out on the days that I’m feeling down about my writing.

First off thank you, thank you thank you , secondly master is definitely not what I is! 😂 but I appreciate the appreciation and I’ll admit I do seem to have kicked out a lot of words in under three years 😉

But seriously here’s my thoughts on your question. Got a bit long so under the cut.

No idea. That’s the honest answer which is obviously no good to anyone but let’s have a think about it together and see what we come up with…

I guess one thing will have to be I’m old 😂 well let’s say older 😉 and that means practice even if I’ve only been writing for three years. I”m going to sound big headed here but I think I’m pretty good with words in a lot of different contexts, I get compliments at work for reports and emails, especially how I explain things (written and verbal) to the people and children I work with. I’ve been doing that for 27 years and that’s got to help right?

I just wrote a line in author buck fic “make words dance across the page for a living”

When I’m writing it does feel like that… again with the fear of sounding cocky I’ve always been quick when writing anything, I don’t think first then write it, the words just come out, for example I have no idea where this sentence will go or finish. There is very little planning in my head about anything. I was that annoying person who finished exams early because I just threw up ideas on the page and they managed to fall out coherently.

So the writing bit just kinda happens whenever I get to sit down and write.

The longer fics the lost and found, the pern ones and Good knight are usually ten ish chapters deep and those chapters ready to share (mostly) before I start posting anything. This means I’m ahead of myself and can share and keep writing the newer chapters.

I usually… usually have the shape of the ending in my head when I start writing. Sometimes it’s the first thing I have , I knew how good knight would end months and months before I started those chapters and got almost 100k into the story before I got to include the first of the concepts that started the whole damn thing 😂

in other situations the whole thing moves with me the Ravi of it all in shifter fic didn’t happen till at least halfway through and I’ll be honest I got lucky with some things I had already written fitting what I wanted to do.

About getting time to write, I multitask, write while tv is on, in bed, at work (sometimes far too much… shame on me I know but I’m on top of my work and fulfil my commitments and they don’t pay me enough to go above and beyond, I’m also mostly in charge at work so no one is gonna tell me off either 😏 )

I write when I should be doing other things, read so much less than I used to and ignore 80% of dull household activities to prioritise the words. I write on my phone and iPad so it can come with me wherever I go and spare moments are dedicated to some editing or writing.

Ideas hit me while I’m driving and I’ll get key moments or fix a plot issue while I’m driving to work then have to hold onto it until I can find a pen! Not always easy! Sometimes I scribbles down ideas that hit me non sequentially so I can add them later - this leads to the odd incoherent email to myself if the idea hits in the middle of the night. 😳

I do tend to write in order ,usually heading towards that ending I’m already vaguely seeing. I write with chapters in mind and the length I want for them. GKSP and TLATF I was aiming for 10k. Author Buck I’m aiming for around 5 ish. The Pern ones esp the first one is much more erratic because I really didn’t have a plan there!

I write for a while then I’ll come back and read what I’ve written for that chapter from the start tweaking it and then carrying on further.

I read and read each chapt a lot!! A lot! And tweaks happen right to the last minute.

I work well under pressure, better maybe! I was writing 10k of chapter a week for shifter fic for the last 4weeks cos I’d caught up with myself! Was a bit stressful I’ll admit that but good too.

I started publishing author!buck for that reason, it had been sitting around for a year with maybe 20k/30k written and I thought the only way to drive it and me on was to start sharing. I will not let you all down once I start sharing,

Got really weird towards end of GKSP actually because I was worried I’d mysteriously die before I shared it all! Had several contingency plans in place to make sure the basic plot got shared! Strange little spot that I am!

Depression/burn out helped me too during the second year of writing. Writing was literally all I wanted to do so i dedicated all my spare time to it. When I went on meds some of the ideas slowed down which i didn’t like much at all! I was worried for a while but things settled down again, I don’t have as many wips anymore which might have something to do with that. Tend to write one fic at a time now. Kinda … unless inspiration hits!

Anyway that’s my story, not sure it helps in anyway and it got long so if you’re still reading this, well done and thanks.

Oh and a lot of cups tea have been sacrificed along the way… just looked up and another one’s gone cold 😉

[june-julie]

i request you write the wookiee bunks or zombie Benny fanfiction please

Bunks.

Zombie!Benny weir x fem!reader

— A/N; I’m so sorry I neglected this request for so long when it’s SO plotful!! My main reasoning was I tried to find the website where you can watch bunks in English but I didn’t find it however that will not stop me from writing my oneshot, it’s just who ever has understood the dialogue will know it’s not 100% accurate.

— summary: something horrible happened at your summer camp that somehow turned into something good.

From as far as you got to know about Benny weir before what had yet to happen you could tell he was a confident kind yet charming soul who volunteered on the summer camp job for an extra few bucks and hey no hate in game, you were actually quite happy seeing a friendly face around.

You didn’t have much friends other than Rory, but you did have your occasional encounters with Benny but still not enough that you two would consider each other friends. Just polite greetings.

So, from what you thought was gonna be an awkward and boring summer was ultimately brightened up a bit knowing he came, it surprised you he even got the job in the first place where you were so sure the substitute teacher was so determined to apply for help there and suddenly he for a sick day.

His loss your gain.

-

“Hey! Benny isn’t it? I didn’t think I’d see you here I thought your grandmother said you couldn’t come on the trip?”

Benny nodded having smiled back at you his rather charming smile once he was met with your familiar face. “That was before she knew there was money involved. Said I was applying for a job to help with my future college plans and bam! Benny boy is off the hook.”

“It isn’t entirely a lie tho, nice job.” You replied, “I hope to see you around more often. things are actually starting to look up now that I know your here.” You tilted your head to side as you confessed your true feelings about the matter.

“They are?” You nodded “mmhm, I was kinda bummed when you told me you couldn’t make it, glad things turned around tho.” You smiled pulling at your yet to be packed in backpack “well in that case I’m glad they did Y/N,” Benny chimed “after your finished with your stuff how about I show you around later?”

“I’d like that.” You replied happy you were making a new friend already first day of summer camp. with that his was back to finishing his job and you were back to smiling in thought,

You had always found Benny rather attractive though some may argue different, but you never really did anything about your silly little crush always saying there were more important things like your grades to keep on track than swooning over some Brunette Green eyed boy.

I guess what you didn’t know was he was gonna be a distraction for a long while from many of those things.

That was a 3 weeks ago.

-

Your favourite blonde haired best friend had offered you to sit around the campire with the rest of the gang that night but you had politely declined his offer, apparently they were all going around telling scary stories but you weren’t particularly feeling content enough to socialise some more after your social battery just about drained and you opted to just hitting the pillow instead, you heard the chatter and the music from a ukulele outside tho,

‘I bet they were having fun.. eh I’ll figure it out from Rory in the morning’ you figured.

It was around 6 o’clock in the morning when you woke again, obviously not voluntarily it was the abrutive banging on your cabin door that had did it for you, so groggily you shrugged on your shoes and whilst mentally cursing Rory for intrusively interrupting your dilfism dream you opened the door but not to be faced by Rory.

Oddly enough it was a sickly pale Benny weir. But what was he doing at your cabin door step this early?! And why was he sickly pale?

“Benny? Are you alright?” Was all you spoke out in concern through your groggy morning voice as you watched the boy struggle to form any coherent word at all never mind a sentence.

His hair was disheveled and his clothes were immensely dirty showing signs of struggle as you eyed his deathly pale complexion.

“M-mm I- I-“

you eyed Benny wearily as you saw him frustrated as he tried to fumble through his words at your door step, you had thought you were dreaming at this Rate and maybe this was all too early.

But that wasn’t the case as he desperately tried to figure out how to communicate what was wrong with him looking a little more frightened by the minute because what if his state is permanent, and you had no idea what happened at the camp fire last night

“What happened to you? Someone spike you or something ?” She said first, jokingly. This is usually where Benny would roll his eyes and blabber on before she could get a second word out. But he didn’t, Matter of fact he looked like he had no idea what she was talking about.

She got serious. “Come inside please sit down you uh… don’t look too well.”

Benny shook his head frantically as he fought back his impulsive urge to barge in and do something he would most definitely regret his mind is not in the right place. This was a mistake, it was wrong he shouldn’t have came to your door. He stumbled back and started to walk away

“Benny ? Where are you going!” You ran out from your cabins door as you eyed Benny running to the middle of the woods, is he out of his mind?! No way after that encounter were you gonna let him leave without a explanation.

Something had seriously gone wrong last night.

Unfortunately you didn’t find him immediately much to your dismay. “Y/N? what are you doing up so early? It’s not safe out here.” Said one of the workers to you confused which snapped you out of your worried trance “what are you talking about? it’s a summer camp of course it’s safe.” It was your turn to be confused as you looked her way. “last night?” She said as if it was obvious “ You weren’t here were you? One of our volunteers were murdered. there was this creepy asylum escapee who ran through here and Benny Weir had the bad luck of stumbling into him.”

“What are you saying? Do you know where he is now?” You asked “he’s uh,” she paused, almost preparing. “Y/N, we found him last night in the woods. We found him dead.” They had finally answered cautiously. But that’s not possible he was at your doorstep this morning. Did Rory do this to him?! But from as far as you knew about your best friend he wouldn’t hurt another person so it couldn’t have been. It couldn’t have been Rory’s friends Erica or Sarah either.

“Miss Y/N I’m gonna need you to go back to your cabin until further notice alright?” All you did was nod before heading back, why was no one getting sent home.

You couldn’t wrap your head around things were you hallucinating this morning? Or that whole conversation all together?

Opening the door to your cabin that was already unlocked, it was a stupid decision really even if they weren’t some kind of killer or (your own hunch) creature running about but desperate time came for desperate measure and when following a announced dead boy into the woods you don’t think of things like that.

You also wouldn’t think you’d find him inside your cabin fumbling through your stuff.

“Benny? Oh my god Benny!” You came over to him after finally closing your door, he turned to you frightened as if he didn’t know who you were as if he wasn’t banging down your door just an hour ago at 4 o’clock. So you walked gingerly slow near him as if he was a deer in head lights he stared at you with a look you couldn’t quite decipher.

Here you were trying not to scare off a dead guy in your cabin. Nice start to a Tuesday.

Then suddenly he went back to what he was doing and groaned angry with himself as he knocked over something and ultimately broke it. It’s like he didn’t know who you were or how to speak he just knew.. here. This place, Your cabin.

“I know you know somethings wrong Benny and I also know this is hard for anyone to hear but Benny… you died. I have no idea how you came back but you you’re back somehow! There was this murder who escaped and did horrible.. horrible things to you.”

As you went on to explain his current situation with tears brimming at your eyes he went into a frenzy like he definitely shouldn’t be here right now and he didn’t know how to act or why he was doing things at all but all he knew was he was aggressive, and your cabin had to show for it as he rushed to the bathroom before you could stop him.

“Benny what are you doing?” You asked Concerned and that’s when you rushed in right behind him, hearing him banging his head at the toilet seat frantically as he groaned. “BENNY! BENNY STOP!” You urged grabbing his head in your eyes and he did that confusing look again and he looked into your eyes like an innocent soul with those mesmerising Green eyes of his.

You grabbed a hand towel and was quick to dampen it at the new wound Benny had created and wiped away the blood as Benny winced at the touch and cold whilst eyeing the towel in both a confused and curious matter. You took the curtesy of wiping the wound that got him here in the first place as you lifted his bloodied up shirt revealing a nasty bite mark and slash, how vulgar.

He sat there absentmindedly as he looked daze yet kept his focus on you but not really paying attention. You wiped the bite where the chunk of skin and where the blade was slashed and lathered it with the only ointment your over cautious mother thankfully had made you bring.

You’d have to thank her later for that.

Once you were sure all blood was gone you put the stuff away. “Benny I’m just going to get you a clean shirt alright? “ you told the zombie boy in a clear tone so he’d understand, if he couldn’t speak you weren’t so sure he’d understand so you motioned to his shirt as he looked puzzled and then you walked away to get a shirt for him, Rory wasn’t in his cabin much but his stuff sure was! And by the looks of Benny he’d manage to squeeze into one of Rory’s T-Shirts.

Shortly enough you returned with a graphic tee nothing too special out of Rory’s pile so you know he won’t miss it gone but it’ll do Benny.

Thankfully Benny didn’t move from the position he was in when you returned. “Benny I’m gonna take off your bloodied shirt and change for a clean one okay?”

He grunts struggling with words, it’s like he has a hazy memory of what things are but he just needs help remembering things and you could tell, that’s where you’d come in to help of course.“

Raise your arms for me, love.” You showed with actions and a beat past he copied your motions, raising his own arms you gingerly removed his shirt and replaced it with the clean one.

Benny looked down at the new shirt he was now sporting and tugged at the fabric looking at you with a curved lip of what seemed like a ghost of a smile.

-

“Okay Benny I need to you to learn what you want to say when you need something alright?” It had been a few days since you took Benny in seeing he was at his most vunrable state, 2 other people fell the victims of whatever psycho killer turned Benny into whatever he was now but they didn’t have the same affect as Benny did.

Your roommate Rory has assumed it was because maybe he was a witch or something but you laughed at the idea, having said that he was a vampire so anything’s possible. Which was another problem you found a fix for,

Rory who was supposed your roommate in this cabin could definitely not find out about Benny yet when everyone was grieving the boy just days ago, and Rory was absolutely no good with secrets so you couldn’t tell him just yet so made up excuses.

So here you were now teaching Benny words yet again, he was getting better at showing his emotion and affection! A few times now he had hugged you randomly when you returned to the cabin in the afternoon.

You held up an image on your phone that had the word food underneath “so when you’re hungry I want you to say food? Can you say food?” You worded out ‘food’ clear and slow so he could get it, being patient with him.

“Fffff… oood.” He stuttered out but he said it nonethless, you grinned.

“Great Job! Okay now when you’re tired say this,” you scrolled to another image which underneath said bed.

“Can you say Bed?”

“B… b..” his brows furrowed in frustration and he groaned after a while of trying and went nowhere. “sss-stu-“

“No Benny you’re not stupid.” You placed a hand on his pale cheek as you gently positioned his head to meet your eyes instead of looking down in shame.

“You have all the memories of things in here I know you do, you just need someone help you remember them which is what I’m helping you with.” You smiled kindly to Benny who averting his gaze for a moment before looking back at you and holding up his hand,

This is something Benny had done to show affection lately you noticed. You laced your fingers with his as he watched your two interlaced hands “Y-yyy-y/n.. nnno more.”

“It’s okay you did such a good job.” You assured “you wanna know what I do when I’m frustrated?” Benny tilted his head.

You got up from your position on the bed as Benny watched you in Curiousity wondering what you were doing, you rummaged through your draw to pull out headphones and giddily went back into the same position.

“This is called music okay? You used to show me a bunch a songs before, but this one was your favourite.” You played said song on your iPod and watched Bennys face intently as the song played through the headphones.

Immediately Benny began looking around for the sound being played in his ears as he hummed, you stood up to clean to place as a smile tugged on your lips.

you bent down to retrieve your dirty clothes and place on your nightstand once folded so at least it wasn’t in the way Benny came behind you humming the rhythm of the song playing through the device. When suddenly he hugged you from behind,

Your smiled grew as your turned so you were facing his, brushing some stray brown hairs away from his face as you eyed his beautiful features Benny smiled. You pecked his nose and his smile grew along with his blush as he nuzzled his face into your shoulder in a shy manner which you found so cute.

You pulled his face away from your shoulder after a moment and shared a sweet kiss with him and pulled away to hug him further.

“Cc… c-cuddles, y/n.”

“Yeah okay Benny.”

OH MY GOD YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW HAPPY I AM WITH THIS I MIGHT MAKE WAY MORE !! Again sorry it took so long but im so thankful you encouraged me to make this your love is very much appreciated @iloverosesforever but man did this take long. I hope you like it as much as I do after all this wait time my lovely ! <33

Taglist; @iloverosesforever @redc4ts

[narwhalandchill]

(soo ignition teaser thoughts ig)

hmmmm im ngl the trailer itself as a like prelude to what is coming in 5.0 intrigue and plot wise is like. compared to the region teasers that came before w lazzo and overture. its just. its kinda bad im sorry KWKJKWDJKWDJK like okay cool seeing the new cast and production value is high as always (+ music) but its such a middling teaser for the story itself?? it feels like a powerpoint presentation of the cast more than anything narratively coherent with an inherent draw and mystery

like theres mavuika speaking to the flame thingy (xbalanque that u? "one entombed in the primal fire" perhaps????) with some intrigue i suppose as well as her brief thing w capitano. ororon also appearing to be working together or aligned with capitano given theyre standing together there which could make for an interesting plot thread but beyond that its very.... eh. its not giving us a lot to grip onto ya know???? and thats rly a shame especially since i also felt that way abt the teaser in the 4.8 livestream. i wish we got more

and sure theres a tournament wahoo but like. its really Not helping to hype up that thing when half the introduced cast isnt being like "OMG the tournament!!!!1!1 this is HUGE!!!1" (or even. "oh no this is BAD!!!1" to set up basic conflict. like why would they dread it?) but instead just. "oh right... the tournament 🙄🙄" like who thought that was a good idea 😭😭 if the PEOPLE of natlan dgaf abt the big plot event happening then how am i as the viewer supposed to feel majorly invested in it . wow theyre tossing a ball around . wow nobody wants it guess ur tournament is having a bit of a PR issue in the making mavuika lmao

anyway i wouldnt even call myself a true capitano glazer despite being a fatuiHQ enjoyer on the side but like. that hmph still carried welcome capHIMpeaktano truly o7 JWDJWDJKDWJK also did yall see the. anemo-ish turquoise flare when mavuika is confronting (?) him? wonder if thats a thing with her flames or is it implying cap as anemo or sth.... i think itd fit him decent enough but ya. looking forward to HIM for sure

(+ congrats to him for losing the goofy timbs from arles animated short lmao like his design looks so fucking sick now)

character design wise uhhhh. well theres the obvious huge fucking issue here and while id say that hoyo p much already showed their true colors on the matter with sumeru that doesnt rly. make it any less disappointing and egregious wrt all the cultures and peoples theyre So willing to gather inspiration from in all possible aspects Other than the diversity of the people themselves. like its just... bad and such a shame but also not very surprising unfortunately.

(and really it just. looks especially bad given they clearly Can put melanin on people its just... enemy mobs only.)

beyond that i kind of dont have anyone that super catches my eye rn??? mainly because . well leaks moment eek but its basically official info now so basically. xilonens existence as a geo and a 5* (which like . u dont need leaks to guess she will be im sorry jdwjdw) was leaked a bit ago as well as the patch she should appear meaning. im actually in chiori rerun savings mode since its very high chance that she will be back w xilonen if anyone. so thats my plan for now kjdwjkdwjkdwjk

in terms of the actual cast i do like kinich and ororons designs v much, the design motifs of the latter especially are interesting bc those eye-like patterns are almost giving quantum symbol (= black hole imagery) to me???? and thats V interesting especially if hes actually working w capitano and the fatui. now him being a cat boy or whatever animals ears those turn out to be isnt like sth thats huge for Me personally but i do think hes valid and also W for anyone whos into that, congrats guys im happy for u ! but like fr itd be such an insane twist if hoyos Finally introducing the void quantum abyss whatever element w him (and maybe cap too.) bc that symbol Rly is looking Curious. or then hes just electro lol. for kinich its like. yeah fair he might be xiao-tighnari-gaming from minecraft ill admit that but. i do like the color scheme and his outfit a lot JKWJKDJKDWJKD so like i forgive it

w the girlies i overall find them all like. quite nice but so far without any personality + lore known its hard to settle my complete thoughts on them just yet. tho citlali being pink is super refreshing for genshin since we do have a shocking absence of it so like shes definitely one im drawn to, chasca looks interesting and like she could play a bigger part plot wise (maybe?) so that might be neat. both her and citlali being cryo is kinda surprising?? but cool. maybe ill get to unbench my shenhe and play some cryo teams again lmao freeze has been dead in abyss for so long now....

xilonen again w the kemomimi isnt sth im particularly into or not into but she looks cool, depending on personality and how her kit synergies turn out (+ assuming the chiori rerun, the fate of those pulls too), i might try for her as well? theres an Energy to her i like it. if she has proper Attitude and flair thats gonna be a massive bonus for me

mualani i think is rather bland to me, sth about her outfit and design just doesnt click for me even if the shark thing from the teaser before is neat and everything. the chibis are never sth im actively drawn to but like both do look okay, im kinda hoping kachina could be a lynette moment for 5.x and end up a free 4* since her exploration roomba looks p fun

anyway then theres. mavuika and i. well at least the design wasnt. That concept art one (ThoseWhoKnow...) . so instant massive W improvement solely on that basis holy fucking shit but ehhhhh im sorry i still dont know how to feel abt the very modern like. biker bodysuit thingy. im not a huge fan of the bodysuit type designs anyway so its not that surprising but still. her eyes + hair is absolutely stunning tho like not a question at all.

tbh in a way i kinda feel like having too many Thoughts on her design is kinda just unnecessary bc like. shes the archon. of Course the kit is going to be insane so i will get her anyway (UNLESS a pyro onfielder JKWJKJKWJKWJKWFKJ like god please no). and in terms of like is her design and energy from what this vid is giving us good enough that i wont like. Actively resent having to get her for meta and strong teams??? Absolutely. so in that sense ig its all cool lmao

but yeah. idk i just think as a teaser for the upcoming story its rly a shame how weak this felt for me???? like sure overture ended up being a bit of a misleading teaser since it gave the impression of arle as this mastermind of the fontaine AQ which didnt rly happen but it still served as a source of hype and intrigue. and yes lazzo is sth that can Never rly be beat in terms of how out of nowhere it was and how fucking insane the whole harbinger reveal went (+ elogia cinerosa existing) for lore and long term hype but its just. unfortunately those 2 are the regional teasers this natlan one is supposedly meant to parallel and it just didnt deliver anything comparable to those for me

like still looking forward to natlan and seeing the rest of its cast (like im fairly convinced the flame thingy might be xbalanque and hes gonna be a big deal ultimately or sth) and where it goes and all its environments but this trailer didnt rly. grip me the way i wouldve expected it to. which is unfortunate kdjkdwjkwjkdwj but yea thats all

[ask-zerotrio]

Epilogue/Author’s final note

Idk if anyone’s been paying attention to how the blog has been transforming over the course of the story, both in answers + meta blog layer, but I hope it’s been a fun ride! I wanted to thank you those who wrote really nice words again ;u; it means a lot, especially when I poured a lot into this blog (Probably more than I should lol.)

Anyway, I really wanted to do a full write up of the blog’s plot/timeline... A summary of the vision, if you will.

Arc 1: An idyllic universe

I’d be lying if I had this plot from the beginning, but the whole of it certainly came in a rush. Anyway, the beginning of this story was very much an AU where Sada and Turo did leave the crater, reuniting with Clavell and Arven before dying. It’s a universe where everything is perfect, and certainly one that Clavell of every universe dreams of, regardless of whether he’s romantically involved with anyone.

Arven gets to have his parents, Clavell gets to have his childhood friends by his side, Sada and Turo see that Paradise was never something found in the past and future.

Arc 2: A crumbling dream

Then, a desire to explore zerotrio “canon” overcame me, and I thought it might be fun to pursue a change in direction via story, as opposed to usual ask blog announcements/retcons. So... upon the mention of harm coming to the trio, Clavell assures himself that Sada and Turo are fine.

Thus begins the crumbling of this ideal world, with Clavell becoming sickly and grieving for something he doesn’t know... But Sada and Turo do. Throughout these few asks, whoever’s responsible for this dream is implied... and I think I’ll leave that for you to guess :)

Reality is rushing back at Clavell, and eventually time runs out for him. Sada and Turo know this, and I hoped I made it clear how apologetic they are (Love these complex, problematic, but fiercely loving professors lol. Their personalities are so intense, Clavell always in the crossfire)...

Arc 3: Zero Lab era

Suddenly, Clavell was no longer available to respond... as per his injury. Instead we have the Zero Lab Search queries: An opportunity for people to investigate what truly happened between the trio historically. No better certainty in happenings than real video footage, no?

An added plus was to show the trio’s early relationship together during the Tera Orb research eras... Fluffy filler between the grimness of what becomes of them.

Although the “footage” isn’t posted in chronological order, they are all still roughly dated to show a coherent-ish timeline of Sada +Turo and Clavell beginning to have different priorities for Arven’s sake. Arguments had and never truly resolved... logs of Sada and Turo’s absence in Arven’s young life... so forth.

Peppered amidst all these were little clues, as well as puzzles. I attempted to throw a red herring, wanting to keep Sada and Turo’s deaths a not so secret for longer.

Eventually however, we reach present day, with lots of footage locked or damaged. Clavell, Sada and Turo are never shown, but their impacts of their action are. (These poor poor wild Scream Tails haha.)

Arc 4: Present day

We finally arrive at the true present day... with Clavell facing off Protocol Sada and Turo on his own.

The reveal isn’t a crazy twist, nor did I really want it to. But the build up had been for a tragedy we already knew/are familiar with: that Sada and Turo died for their dreams....

But in these final moments where Clavell woke from a vision that felt too real, Protocol Sada and Turo weren’t immune to it either.

Zero Lab queries no longer function as they used to, and asking about the past hurts. Sada and Turo’s conscious speaks through the logs. (Its true workings I leave to your imagination, but I liked the thought of the AI and Protocol representing the two parts of a whole Professor.) We see the final moments of Sada and Turo in what is a death-defying retrospective.

What next... complicated/messy resolutions. Clavell saved, Sada and Turo “alive” but different. It’s more open ended than I intended, but I think it’s also alright to leave things to the imagination... 

The trio have always been in search of their respective treasures, and though it takes a long and rough journey...

... lost treasure can always be found.

[geehollow]

Agatha All Along and Loki(s), my thoughts

[Cointains spoilers for: Agatha All Along (2023), Loki (2021), Young Avengers (Marvel Now! 2013) and Journey Into Mystery (from #622)]

[I watched this show not on D+ or any other platform that had the original English dialogue. Whatever I recall from the show has thus been translated by me from the Italian dialogues]

Giving in to @lucianalight 's nudging about watching Agatha All Along yielded some interesting results and I'm going to share. Thank you Luci.

Overall thoughts on Agatha itself are:

very good, 9.5/10. That remaining 0.5 is a score I give to concluded stories that have wrapped up nicely without disappointing me–Agatha doesn't get it because it doesn't feel concluded, although it did not disappoint me.

In fact, it gets high praise for not feeling like an MCU series at all, which means its story was engaging and well performed (everyone seemingly did their loving best and the sets and cgi were good), the characterization didn't feel disrespectful, I didn't feel the need to throw anything at any point, it kept me guessing back and forth for a long time during the episodes, and it truly felt like an independent series I could have randomly found on Netflix and binged in two days as I did. I only needed to ask Luci a few clarifications (I haven't watched Wandavision) and they could be delivered with a few sentences at most, so the series itself stands on solid lore and storytelling.

Major props to the soundtrack and song choices too.

Being a Loki comics reader and thus already knowing who Billy was meant I was able to make accurate guesses on what would happen and why throughout the story, and I think it lessened my enjoyment, but I don't think it should diminish my judgement of it all. I was pleasantly surprised at least once as I sidetracked myself thinking I was cleverer than the story, and although for some reason I couldn't manage to learn the other witches' names besides Alice's, I very much enjoyed their characters, the acting, their storylines and how they were told. The concept and execution of divination in the show is quite engaging.

10/10 on the humor. Coherent with the story, well-sprinkled, not one cringe one-liner for the sake of one-liners, didn't treat me like a dim idiot. Seeing the Agatha-Billy interrogation and chase scene from his POV was sooo funny I giggled the entire time, and I appreciate that the humor was created through the juxtaposition of two sequences that made sense in their own time, not through childish jokes. That's real work. It reminded me of the effortless humor in Loki S2.

More of this please. Stories and characters loved by their storytellers, a healthy consideration of the audience's intelligence, diverse cast, settings that were real–true respect for people and craft.

Similarities with the YA story

Across the central and penultimate episodes, I was reminded of Ikol from the 2013 Young Avengers run, and it was interesting.

Episode 5: I was first reminded of how Ikol wanted to take Billy's power by Agatha taking Alice's, as both stories involve Billy, and him being mad about someone taking someone else's power, and the act itself is an important part of the plot;

Episode 8: Agatha and Ikol both consider an option leading Billy to his death for their own gain, then both have a change of heart that lets Billy live;

(a bit of a stretch but I was laser-focused on similarities, so–Rio Death carving a path out in the background like AoA Loki drew a door in the background lol)

the way show-Billy's power acts through the Road reminded me of YA-Ikol's guilt-led missing power***

To Luci I jokingly said "'Based on Marvel comics' yeah I know which one."

I find it peculiar because, in a way, knowing that story + general expectations of how a story like Agatha could work allowed me to predict what was going to happen in the second half of it. It combined with my previous knowledge of Billy and it amused me to no end. I can't help but see Agatha in the role of Ikol within Billy's experiences–in Agatha, she helped him realize he was the creator of the Road and the implications of it. In the YA run, Ikol helped Billy along in realizing his powers to save Teddy and get rid of the Mother parasite.

Future MCU projects with Billy and Loki

In another post of mine, I'd shared the idea of having Kid Loki from the series be the one joining a team of Young Avengers, with the magpie being Tree Loki.

In JiM, Ikol the Magpie is a hallucination of the Kid from the phantom of the old Loki planted in his mind, with malignant intentions. But the magpie in a future series/movie could be benevolent–the MCU seldom follows comics faithfully and this could be a very nice instance of that habit. I would very much enjoy Tree Loki extending some protection and guidance to the displaced Kid. I think he would be kind to all the young heroes, and be particularly interested in Billy given Billy's ability to warp things, thus his potential to create timelines or even, through destructive actions, erase some.

At the end of Agatha, her ghost and Billy start looking for Tommy. The YA run, besides running from Mother, also includes looking for Tommy. I can see this being the basis for a future MCU project with the younger cast that has been introduced slowly after Endgame.

"Your path winds out of time" and "I need more time!"

I have the headcanon that the Road created by Billy was outside Time, simply because of that sentence. Yes, it most likely references Rio-Death, the original Green Witch described as the cycle of all living things, growth and decline in a constant stream, the common path everyone walks on, and is likely a warning directed at divination witch lady–***which by the way was the element that made me realize Billy's power shaped the Road around each participant, like Ikol's guilt-led missing power shaped itself around each Young Avenger's past for the final confrontation.

The Road-out-of-time is an interesting headcanon and I'm keeping it. It would make Tree Loki's curiosity more peculiar too. I'm sure there's more to be said about this whole thing.

It caught my attention that "I need more time!" was a repeated line/invocation in Agatha. I remember three instances (it's late as I add this so I might misremember): while the ceiling with swords was lowering, while Agatha was trying to make the dandelion growth, and Agatha pleading for more time with her child. Another little crumb I found intriguing.

Death the Green Witch, green the color of Time

I'd like it so much if Rio Death was a Loki. Or, better, more abstractly, a consequence of Loki creating Yggdrasil.

Agatha describes death as the green witch, tied to the cycle of all living things, growth and decline in a constant stream–like the branches of the Tree.

Green being the color of Time and all that exists within it means so much to me after everything the MCU did.

"Loki's magic keeps the multiverse alive. If he dies everything dies with him" pointed out Luci to me. True–so Loki is both life and death in the MCU. Time means growing, like the branching timelines, like living beings from birth through youth through maturity to death. From the beginning to the end. A manifestation of Death is a manifestation of Time, and in the MCU, Loki is Time–in Norse Mythology Loki is the parent of Hel. Well, I'd say Loki's the parent of death in the MCU in a way.

(Which brings me to MCU Hela, in an–undeserving of my brainpower and efforts–explanation for why she looks similar to Loki despite them not being closely related: if you become the god of something, you take on certain characteristics. Like a green and black palette)

Light thoughts: SWORD

Luci told me SWORD was in the Wandavision series after I asked if it might have been the SHARP society from the Mackenzi Lee's Where Mischief Lies book–a young Loki going to Midgard and running into a ragtag society whose acronym he finds silly, suggesting two more: first SWORD and then SHIELD.

I'm not expecting anything to come from this light connection, but like the "Your path winds out of time" quote, I find it really interesting.

__________

Obligatory link to the Loki comics reading order + plea to help find appearances

[negentropies]

hate being a hardcore plotter with terminal writer brain because i can't even fucking like something without picking it apart like a rotisserie chicken carcass and trying to fix all the weird holes in the plot that won't let me sleep at night

so anyway, heres a bullet point essay on my thoughts on the bhaal plot bc it doesnt make any fucking sense and its been driving me insane and patch 5 was just the final nail in the coffin

so bhaal's motivations are . muddy. in the case of most durges, it seems he crafted durge as his most perfect champion, let them get a little bit of life experience, and then led them to the bhaal temple where they became its leader with the intent of ???? murdering lots of people and getting more followers ?? i guess ???? omnicide only really became a possibility after they hatched the elder brain plot with gortash, but they were very much already a cult leader by then. regardless, we establish that as of ~15 years before the start of bg3, bhaal wants to use the brain to murder everyone in the world. HOWEVER. if you just so happen to be an oathbreaker paladin durge and face sarevok and become an unholy assassin, you get this dialogue:

this suggests that bhaal's goal is to walk the planes again? which doesnt seem like it would have anything to do with omniciding the world, since gods get their power from the number and fervor of their worshipers. as i see it (ty moth) his goals seem to be as follows: expand his divine portfolio and worshiper base to obtain greater divine status -> reclaim his divinity and re-ascend to full godhood -> rebuild his church into something more coherent and structured -> walk the planes again -> fuck with bane and myrkul

if the absolute plot succeeds and durge takes control of the absolute in bhaal's name, i see no reason why he'd rid himself of a massive new worshiper base, since followers of an exarch (durge in this case) also count as followers of an exarch's god (bhaal). if anything, it would make more sense for bhaal to EXPECT the absolute plot to fail. this way he fucks with myrkul and bane and gets rid of their chosen as well as substantial chunks of their followers.

like yeah, sure, having the entire absolute cult under his control would be cool. it'd probably make him a powerful enough deity to get him out from under bane's yoke once and for all. but it's also worth noting that bhaal hates bane SO fucking much. bane poached his servant loviatar to take her as his consort and then there was the Gortash Situation, so that hatred could mean he'd lose sight of that power and make it so he'd be happy if the elder brain plot collapsed, as long as it meant he could make bane look stupid or undermine him in the process.

this brings me to the new patch 5 epilogue, which inspired me to write down my ramblings in the first place. if you either lose to orin in the duel or you embrace bhaal, then destroy the elder brain, you become this urge-crazed, twitching murderer good for nothing except crashing parties and siring more bhaalspawn. which like . doesn't make sense to me? it's outright stated that durge becomes nothing but a vessel for bhaal. bhaal has been established as extremely patient and more than capable of cooking up plots that could span centuries (see: baldur's gate 1 and 2), so i don't know why he wouldn't just use his newfound puppet bhaalspawn as a mortal avatar to restore his church and facilitate his return to power in a faerûn where myrkul (bane also, but less so) had to take a step back to recoup.

the characterization of bhaal and pre-lobotomy durge makes me a little confused in general. gortash frequently talks about how intelligent durge was and how their strength came in their intense self-control, and in the fact that bhaal let them pick their battles. going off of this, i expected durge to be kind of a stick in the mud compared to the other bhaalists, and we get SOME of that? there's a journal entry you can find from durge to orin where durge insults her for "posing [her] corpse-dollies" instead of just killing and being done with it. however, from the flashbacks and other conversations with the bhaalists we get, our vivisection-loving cannibalistic necrophiliac doesn't really have a leg to stand on here. it really seems like the larian writers had two separate, incongruous visions for durge and tried to mesh them together to limited success

now can we talk about sarevok. can we talk about sarevok? can we talk about how utterly batshit insane it is that fucking SAREVOK, who literally attempted to usurp bhaal to become the new lord of murder, would have gotten so much power and favor from his father? it's clear from durge's internal narration that they hate sarevok's guts. they straight up get inspiration for killing him. so... why did durge ever answer to him? why did bhaal let his perfect clone and champion into the hands of a son he hates and who tried to usurp him?

which all leads me to my conclusion that the baldur's gate temple of bhaal is, in fact, a heretical sect. and more importantly, that durge was led to it with the intent that after they'd exhausted the temple's use, they would off sarevok once and for all, gut the temple completely, and rebuild something new and worthy of their father from the ashes.

everyone at the bhaal temple is interested pretty much exclusively in the ritualistic aspects of murder, while in contrast, durge is (stated to be) more interested in efficiency and (apparently?) restoring their father to power and helping him walk the physical planes once more. again, this is all incongruous with other aspects of their characterization, but i'm going to chalk that up to messy writing. this would also track with durge being raised outside of the bhaal temple, ensuring that no matter what, bhaal would get to them before the temple did. sceleritas fel in particular is shown to be loyal to durge and bhaal exclusively, while not caring for orin or sarevok. the pieces are all here for a religious schism that just . never happens

so, if we pick up some of what larian is putting down and ignoring the rest, a possible version of events would be:

-> sarevok the attempted usurper establishes the temple of bhaal in baldur's gate as a niche, heretical sect focused exclusively on ritualistic murder, with no intention of expanding bhaal's portfolio beyond that

-> bhaal crafts durge, lets them form an identity outside the temple, then brings them in to lead, use, and subsequently destroy the baldur's gate bhaalists

-> durge and gortash hatch the elder brain plot. no matter if it succeeds or fails, bhaal will still win one way or another, whether it be getting a new legion of followers through his exarch or by crippling myrkul and sticking it to bane

-> orin (and probably sarevok) misunderstands bhaal's edicts, interpreting them as him wanting to use the brain to murder everyone in the world. orin fucks everything up when she lobotomizes durge but tbh, that still doesn't really matter. either she dies and bhaal gets rid of a heretical and unstable spawn or she becomes his puppet, just like durge should have in their bad ending

going off bhaal's characterization for the previous games, he is fundamentally a patient plotter with lots of foresight and also immense rizz. omnicide via elder brain is like . the stupidest scenario for him when there is so many other different ways to take this. where is bhaal sending in his perfect murder catholic spawn into a den of murder pagans !! where is the bhaalist religious schism !!!!!

thank u for coming to my ted talk

[vryfmi]

What did they do to skull???

using this inbox as an excuse to infodump about character that i know more about than Stroud himself

before i start to explain the downgrade that skull's character experienced in the adaptation, i'll say that the show is good, but not excellent. there are a lot for things that were done surprisingly good and i was having a mostly positive experience watching it. it's the main cast and overall atmosphere of the series that truly make it special. however, there were things that did not translate well from book to screen. one of those vital things was skull in the jar.

[TL;DR] skull doesn't get any screen time and in those combined five minutes is horribly mischaracterized. not to mention that it doesn't progress the plot whatsoever.

i was a bit sad that i was late to the show-finally-was-released party because i thought people would already discuss everything that was in the show so far. but to my surprise there're hardly any coherent takes on skull. especially when you compare how well rounded all other characters were portrayed. so what is my problem?

well first of all how the fuck did Stroud allow that to happen? in every single interview it is stated that directors and scriptwriters were consulting with Stroud yet somehow complete annihilation of skull happened.

i want to say that the problem is in screen time that it is really hard to keep books' pacing (action scenes as well as domestic ones, Lucy's thought process, dialogs, worldbuilding etc.), but it's really not, the problem is much deeper than that. the show decided to change various small pieces of original stories, and with more details changed, the further it differentiated from initial plot. that's my problem with the show in general.

the second part of the season is revolved around the bone mirror, yes, this is correct, just like the books. but the book itself isn't called the bone glass. it's called the whispering skull and for a good reason. the role of skull in the story was so downplayed i feel physical pain just from thinking about it. overall, yes, the story is the same: Lockwood&Co get a case regarding an unauthorized grave, it turns out Dr Edmund Bickerstaff was buried there under unclear circumstances with some device. that device being a bone mirror, that doctor had created around late 1800s with his followers and, most importantly, young servant. the servant boy was skull, now a type three ghost, previously stolen from Fittes. bone glass was stolen, L&co compete with Kipps' team in finding it, Bickerstaff's mansion, George is affected by the mirror (but not as bad as Joplin), Fittes ball, the auction, the fight in Kensal Green as well as in catacombs. the end. the main plot is the same, but it's the details that are the keys to why that story worked, and why it's my favourite book of the series.

show differentiates from book when it completely gets rid of Wilberforce's character, makes events of tss immediately followed by tws (without an eight month time skip) and changes the reasons behind drama between main characters.

can you guess what character suffers the most from these changes?

the skull.

[i'll try my best not to spoil any major points of the story, but there will be slight spoilers regarding skull's backstory - both in life and in death (but seeing how ghost lore was changed, maybe these won't be spoilers at all)]

here's the list of my main problems with skull's character in the show

1. skull doesn't move the plot forward

2. mischaracterization

3. not enough screen time

4. his arc is unfinished

5. no silent boy (i am the only person affected by it but i will be insufferable nonetheless for its exclusion)

the first problem picks up where we left it - small details were made and now plot doesn't make sense, especially skull's role. fine, you've decided to exclude the mystery of who was buried in an iron coffin, now we know from the get-go it was Bickerstaff. but book had lingered on it for a while - the grave was marked, and it belong to Bickerstaff, but the remains didn't match with historical records - Bickerstaff was claimed to die in his house and eaten by rats, where the body in the coffin was pretty solid apart from the bullet hole in its head. here's your mystery. then bone glass is stolen as well as something else, that nobody quite noticed at first, but Lockwood pointed out it out on photo of the crime scene - a tripod. not one, but two relics were gone after the coffin was dug up. the later one is less important to the story but it made a pretty great characterization of Joplin early on, how this character has kleptomaniac tendencies. but mystery of the body was something no one could solve - nor L&co, nor Kipps' team, - unless they were there and then. that's where skull comes into play.

Lockwood&Co have not only a literal witness of events that happened in the late 1870s, but someone who took part in creating the bone mirror. how cool is that? it would, if skull was talking about Bickerstaff's deeds, and wasn't making witty comments and insults. but not just any insults - it keeps bringing up how stupid and blind main characters are. and here's the thing - if these were just constant calling names, Lucy and others would just shut the lid tight and never open it again. instead it has an effect on them. they feel as if there's something they're missing, that by talking to the ghost it will eventually crack and tell them. skull makes itself useful in the long run.

when late night interrogation begins, skull actually talks about it's master and a bit of its own identity. skull, of course, teases Lucy and others with scraps of information when it feels as if it is in control. until one of the questions touches the raw nerve of its:

‘No!’ The voice was urgent, intimate, as if whispering directly into my ear. ‘Bickerstaff was no grave-robber! He was a great man. A visionary! He came to a sad end.’ ‘What end? The rats?’ ‘Hold it, Lucy...’ Lockwood touched my arm. ‘We didn’t hear what it said.’ ‘Oh, sorry. He was a great man who came to a sad end.’ ‘I said he was a visionary too. You forgot that bit.’ ‘Oh yeah. And a visionary. Sorry.’ I blinked in annoyance, then glared at the skull. ‘Why am I apologizing to you? You’re making some pretty big claims about a man who kept sacks of human bones in his basement.’ ‘Not in his basement. In a workroom behind a secret wall.’ ‘It wasn’t his basement. It was a workroom behind a secret wall...’ I looked at the others. ‘Did we know that?’ ‘Yes,’ Lockwood said. ‘We did. It overheard George telling us that earlier this evening. It’s giving us nothing new or original, in other words. It’s making all this up.’ <…> ‘Well, believe me or not as you please, but yes, I saw the bone glass, though I never saw it used. The master wouldn’t show me. It wasn’t for my eyes, he said. I wept, for it was a wonderful thing.’ <…> ‘All very well,’ Lockwood said, ‘but what does the bone glass do?’ ‘It gives knowledge,’ the voice said. ‘It gives enlightenment. Ah, but I could have spied on him. I knew where he kept his precious notes, hidden under the floorboards of his study. See how I held the key to his secrets in my hand? I could have learned them all. But he was a great man. He trusted me. I was tempted but I never looked.’ The eyes glinted at me from the depths of the jar. ‘You know all about that too – don’t you, Lucy?’ <…> ‘He was a great man,’ the ghost said softly. ‘And his legacy is with you today, though you’re too blind to see it. All of you, too blind...’

there is a reason for l&co going to Hampstead Heath and its abandoned mansion - not only can they confirm skull's words about the papers (and confirm to others that Lucy indeed can talk to ghosts), but, eventually, they find out who died in that house and was eaten by rats (Wilberforce). and thanks to Lucy using her Touch in the secret study they find out that bone mirror doesn't give enlightenment, it kills the one who looks into it (on top of that, skull was the one who put the idea of testing the device on Wilberforce into Bickerstaff's head). the steaks go higher.

compare it to the shows version of the same events.

skull talks about Bickerstaff for like a minute, says it was acolyte and that there's something in its masters mansion. and asks for Lucy to take it there. (in books it was an after though of Lockwood to take it with them because the prospect of Lucy communicating with ghosts was way too big for him to pass. skull doesn't really help them inside, only insults them when they barely escape Wilberforce's ghost). what did the trio got out of going there and risking their lives? nothing. they got absolutely nothing that would've move the plot. yes, they got the papers, but did they give anything new? no, they've only confirmed that bone mirror is made of sources of people that were killed by Bickerstaff. which is also a big problem for me. because bone glass is now made of supposedly vengeful spirits, not the ones who are upset by their remains being stolen from graves, grieving over their disrupted burials.

what was skull for in that case? was he simply sitting in that basement and telling his master whether the bone was source or not? and that's it? book's skull was helping in gravedigging and warding of ghosts from Bickerstaff and other adults, who weren't able to see them. not to mention that he a) had to be young, but old enough to see ghosts and keep others save from them b) have a great talent to be able to find potential source in massive churchyards. skull's role of servant got also massively downplayed, im pissed.

One paper says he’d sometimes have a servant lad with him, poor kid dragging heaven knows what behind him in a heavy sack.’

[Dulac's confessions] With the help of his servant, a most cunning and malignant Boy, whose eyes saw phantoms clearly, we went on expeditions to the churchyards, gathering materials for the Device. The Boy protected us from the vengeful Spirits until we had trapped them in the glass.

[i like the idea that skull in his life was something of a parallel to agents. where agents fight disrupted visitors and get rid of their sources, skull had to do the opposite. ghosts haven't been roaming churchyards back then, so you'd either had to dig up every single grave to find any source, or provoke the ghost into manifestation. skull was probably doing just that and told Bickerstaff and his followers where'd the ghost's remains were.]

as a result, all important information about bone glass was only given in Dulac's confessions in the show, all other steps were meaningless. and to get to those you don't need to consult with the skull. in fact, could the whole mansion trip be skipped? since it doesn't move the story forward and takes away from Lucy's conversation with skull - those are iconic, and Complete Fiction just cut them off. i understand that it most likely comes to ghost CGI but like... yall wouldn't have to rent a massive mansion? and all information about what kind of a man Bickerstaff was Lucy could've got from that conversation. if i understand things correctly, Lucy can't talk to skull all that long now, since it overwhelms her (she passed out after their first conversation and seemed to be in pain when it happened). ok, let's keep it, i actually like it. with this new limitation, the first conversation in the kitchen would have played out a bit different. but it would've played out at least.

so it leaves two more scenes with skull: Lucy and Lockwood finding out where George is and the culmination in the catacombs.

first one goes as well as any other conversation with skull. which is rushed and without any character development for skull and its relationships with Lucy. and because of already revealed motivation for skull - being freed from the jar - there's no revelation to have.

‘You’re a head in a jar. You’re not going anywhere and we’re all you’ve got. So – we’re not going to put you in the furnaces,’ I said. ‘We’re not going to torture you. All we do, if you don’t start co-operating, is shut your lever up, put you in a bag, and bury you in the ground somewhere. Nice and deep so no one ever finds you. Just you, on your own, for ever. How does that sound?’ ‘You wouldn’t do that,’ the ghost said, but for the first time I heard uncertainty in its voice. ‘You need me, don’t forget. I’m a Type Three. I’ll make you rich. I’ll make you famous.’ ‘Stuff that. Our friend is more important. Last chance, skull. Spill the beans.’ ‘And there was I thinking Cubbins was the cruel one.’ The face drew back into the shadows of the plasm, where it glared at me with an expression of blood-curdling malice. ‘All right,’ it said slowly. ‘Sure, I’ll tell you. Don’t think I’m giving in to your blackmail, mind. I just want to enjoy what’s coming to you all.’

now this, this is beautiful. not only good ol conflict, but also a nice development for both sides of conversation. especially how Lucy has grown to care so much about George which was a pretty long process for both of them in books. and to top it all off, Lucy takes skull only to keep threatening it into co-operating and to get an insight on how to avoid an immediate death from the bone glass.

in show, however, it is the skull who begs to take it to its master, and Lucy, as well as Lockwood, for some reason go with it. it doesn't help Lucy to get into catacombs nor saves Lucy from looking into the bone mirror by hinting at how to destroy it. which was also rather unsatisfyingly done in the show. mostly because this ending doesn't complete skull's arc (not like there was any thanks to the lack of screen time).

skull's arc is rather simple in its debut book. it used to be a servant to a mad doctor, was very loyal, to the point that it seemed like it lost all its identity in the pursue of its master and his work. the ghost had denied its own death, so it became a type three. but once the name of its master was mentioned, it desired to reunite, to serve Bickerstaff once more, only to be faced with harsh reality (that Lucy was also trying to make it understood) - Bickerstaff had never cared for anyone nor anything apart from the device. his servant boy was simply useful and obedient. now Bickerstaff's ghost had Joplin who'd also became just a tool.

It gave a sudden shout. ‘Master! It’s me! Welcome back!’ Over in the corner, the cowled figure [of Bickerstaff's ghost] stood silent. It did not respond. ‘Master...’ The plaintive whisper was filled with fear and yearning. ‘Over here! It’s me!’ The figure didn’t stir. All its intentness was on the bone glass, and on George. ‘Yes,’ the skull said irritably. ‘Well, he’s not what he was.’ Of course he wasn’t.

im going on a rumble here but im way to passionate about the books and skull's character - where else you'll find such a bastard to love? speaking of character and its full scale assassination.

there were barely any scenes to truly grasp skull's character but still it is not the skull we know from books. from saying "thank you" to not wishing death upon l&co trio every five seconds. it's just not the same character. and im still trying to understand why this change was made. for some reason show actively tries to make its viewer (and Lucy) feel empathetic towards skull: first with its conversation with Lucy in ep.4, and later in the same episode with Marissa Fittes' interview and her description of type threes. which immediately bring Lucy to refer to skull as "he", not "it". all ghosts are being referred in the show as well as books as "it", to strip of any empathy towards them, apart from Annabel Ward but Lucy got a strong connection with her as well as she reminded her of Norrie. because technically, ghosts are not people, they're only echoes of one's identity or emotion. but not type threes. and yet it takes Lucy five books to learn to trust and see skull as a person, and show rushes it a lot (that's another subject on which i might write something one day because Lucy-skull parallels let's fucking goooooo).

skull played a role of an inner obstacle to overcome for the main trio. it put a seed of doubt into Lucy's head, voiced her concerns and deepest fears regarding her new friends. so the gap formed between the teammates, which only made l&co come closer together once they started opening up and trusting each other more. and whole show drama came from the inside the group with them overreacting and saying very out of character harmful things.

one of the things that im sorry for show-only people is that they miss how tws not only is extremely dark, has really good horror elements, tons of ghost lore, but also, it's extremely funny. and yes, mostly thanks to skull. the balance of mystery, quiet moments and well-written jokes is just superb. so now im waiting for season two announcement for Complete Fiction to redeem themselves.

[kirwell]

"LOVE" as seen in A Starless Clan

I wrote most of this while reading Shadow, but my feelings on the matter still haven’t changed, now having finished the book. 

I don’t like how Warriors handles most of their romantic relationships, and maybe it’s just my demiromantic brain taking the reigns here, but even still, Warriors has a problem. 

Read on! A semi-coherent ranting below. Spoilers for book 3 Shadow of A Starless Clan!

---

FROSTPAW is not in love with Splashtail 

She has a crush built on her own infatuation and inaccurate expectations of love, and that’s understandable as she’s young and literally has no parents left to teach and guide her. The last thing anyone should expect from their own trusted clanmates is manipulation. Before it was revealed that Splashtail had ulterior motives for getting involved with Frostpaw, I was really nervous that they would actually become mates. There is nothing of real substance between them. But now we know that Splashtail is in fact using her affections to manipulate her in his favor. With the amount of gaslighting that he uses on Frostpaw and how she’s so annoyed by him second-guessing her decisions, I’m surprised she still has a crush on him. It’s really sad to see someone inexperienced in life be manipulated by an older, trusted individual, especially when “love” is involved.  From our perspective as well as Frostpaw's, Splashtail is never supportive with what she wants, and he’s never once shown signs of what actual love looks like. Like...putting the other person first...considering their feelings...supporting their dreams...taking an interest in them as a person...and the list goes on. Very concerning and predatory, and I hope Mothwing gets to beat the living shit out of Splashtail when everything is revealed in the end. Or better yet, have Frostpaw do it now that she has warrior training. Imagine Frostpaw pummeling him, eyes flooded with tears, grey fur stained red, and her body quaking with pain and fury. “I THOUGHT YOU LOVED ME! YOU USED ME! MY…MY MOTHER DIED BECAUSE OF YOU!” 

If Frostpaw doesn't get her moment, ima be upset.

NIGHTHEART is not in love with Sunbeam 

He may find Sunbeam attractive and enjoys her company and attention, but that is the extent of his feelings, and he’s lying to himself when he says otherwise. 

Nightheart busting into ShadowClan and proclaiming to everyone that he and Sunbeam are IN LOVE was absolutely embarrassing. I’m surprised no one really questioned him up front, or asked Sunbeam directly if she wanted Nightheart in ShadowClan or not. He “loves” Sunbeam because she’s giving him the validation he’s never gotten from loved ones, and Sunbeam just so happens to be a she-cat he can be mates with. Let’s be honest: if Sunbeam was a tom, Nightheart would have been less inclined to leave ThunderClan for ShadowClan… (actually…that would’ve been cool to see! Can’t cats switch clans for friendships, too, as they do for mates?) 

Nightheart’s situation kind of feels like a patient falling for their therapist because they feel listened to and accepted and then blur the lines between "love" and "in love". I believe that he believes he loves Sunbeam, but they still have no foundation past, “Oh, you agree with me? Wow, I feel special. Let’s get together.” I also wanna mention that Nightheart JUST became a warrior. HE’S YOUNG. He’s barely been a warrior, and now he already wants to take a mate? Maybe it’s just cat hormones at work, but calm down man.

If we had gotten to see Nightheart realize that he actually didn’t romantically love Sunbeam and was just projecting, THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN AMAZING! Tragic but awesome for the plot and his character progression.  I thought that's what the plot was being set up for, because we see Nightheart ignore Sunbeam whenever it suits him, worry her, question her, and never ask what SHE FEELS about him. It’s all about Nightheart.

Nightheart should have faced consequences for the hurt he’s dealt. Show Sunbeam resenting him instead of going after him. And show Squirrelflight rejecting his request to rejoin ThunderClan instead of just accepting him back like he didn’t abandon and embarrass them. I actually think a rogue Nightheart arc would have been interesting! Make him learn about being an adult, that not everything revolves around him, and that other people have emotions too. Show that his initial problems weren’t as big as he thought they were and have things put into perspective. Imagine he befriends like this old rugged stray who's seen some shit, and they just put Nightheart in his place at some point and tell him to grow up and make amends with his family cause life’s too short, and cats die before we’re ready for them too. 

Have Nightheart return to the clans after experiencing some real-life shit somewhere, more mature and changed on a much deeper level.

SUNBEAM is not in love with Nightheart.

And it’s painful to read her inner dialogue about him, trying to manifest romantic feelings when they’re nonexistent. She wants to be in love with him, but she wasn't for most of the book. If anything, I’m given the impression that Sunbeam felt as though Nightheart was indebted to her love because he’s already made sacrifices for her in their relationship. And he did, which only puts Sunbeam in a worse situation.

Imagine you just met someone that you’re kinda into, but it’s new. Now imagine that person selling their house, all their possessions, basically disowning their own family, and then suddenly showing up at YOUR HOUSE, in front of YOUR FAMILY, and just being like, “I’m here now because I love you. And you love me too, right?”

That’s messed up.  Is that love in the air? No, it’s emotional manipulation.

Sunbeam likes his personality, his demeanor, finds him handsome, and the two can relate to each other on some level. But there’s no real love behavior between them, previous or current. Nightheart is self-serving and thoughtless. I’m pleased Sunbeam made the point to say that Nightheart needs to want to be in ShadowClan for himself and not just for Sunbeam because he’s not loyal to ShadowClan. He just wants Sunbeam. And if I were Tigerstar, I’d be very hesitant to let him come into my clan on his current pretenses. What happens if Sunbeam doesn’t love him back, or they break up? If Nightheart loses that support and validation from Sunbeam, will he whine and cry, and run away from ShadowClan because he’s “not understood?”

Sunbeam deserves better.

My thoughts after reading Shadow

I hate…I HATE how everything went down between Sunbeam and Nightheart. I was so excited when Nightheart realized he wanted to be in ThunderClan, and wanted to make amends with his kin and leave ShadowClan. 

And I love that Sunbeam felt deeply hurt and betrayed by him because she had every right to be. He used her to escape from his own problems, put so much pressure on her, and then when she finally grew romantic feelings for him, he dumped her. 

We could’ve seen Sunbeam have an arc of being bitter and angry, and aligning with her mother’s ambitions because of her resentment.  BUT INSTEAD. SHE FOLLOWS HIM TO THUNDERCLAN.

“There’s no other tom for me in ShadowClan.”

GIRL. There are toms who will treat you right. Maybe not in ShadowClan, but they exist. Don’t chase the boy that broke your heart! 

Idk man... This feels like a missed opportunity for some actual good drama between two main characters that could have gone somewhere tragic. I imagine some ObsessedSunbeam!AU could easily be made here, especially after her having that dream that another she-cat put the moves on her man and she was PISSED. I doubt we’ll see a love-crazed Sunbeam in canon, but it’s a fun concept. 

sigh. 

I guess Nightheart will just get off scot-free, messing with Sunbeam’s emotions and putting ThunderClan through so much unnecessary shit. 

I’m still curious to see where everything will go in the upcoming books. Maybe there’s still room for something real to happen between Sunbeam and Nightheart… 

But really, im much more invested in what's goin on with the frost baby,, ;-;

[maxtothemax]

hey do you guys wanna hear about how i'm making river's backstory Worse™? of course you do

okay technically it isn't backstory so much as the actual plot of On The Wing (which isn't coherent yet but i'm getting there). for context, river is 15 years old when this happens, and so is zipper.

but basically the climax of OTW is that amity (evil science lady masquerading as a benevolent do-gooder who saves hybrid kids from unethical labs) finally manufactures a decent excuse to vivisect zipper (by mildly poisoning them and then claiming it's appendicitis) (btw she wants to experiment on them bc apparently they can't die and she wants to know more about that bc she, too, cannot die). BUT ideally she'd like to have a control specimen, and guess what! river is the same type of hybrid that zipper is!

and river has known amity for half his life already and trusts her and is so super grateful to her for rescuing him from an unethical lab. so she really doesn't need to do much legwork with manufacturing a reason to do surgery on him. instead she sits him down and says "zipper is really really sick and needs a new kidney, and you're a genetic match for them. i know you don't get along with them, and of course you don't have to agree to anything you're uncomfortable with, but it would save their life." and when she puts it like that … like, clearly there's a correct decision for him to make in this situation. but she gives him a day to think about it, because of course she knows what his answer will be anyway.

and this part is a little shakier (still working out logistics) but river thinks about it for a little bit and decides that he wants to go through with it, because it's the right thing to do, so he goes to find amity so he can tell her he'll do it. he arrives outside her office and hears her talking to agent green, one of her most trusted agents, and they're talking about river. and river doesn't want to eavesdrop, but he kind of overhears something that … well, kind of implies that amity wasn't telling the whole truth to river, but she's confident that he'll agree because he's so trusting, almost to a fault. and when river hears this, he doesn't want to think that amity's taking advantage and outright lying to him, but … that's what it SOUNDS like is happening.

now river's freaked out, kinda panicking, so he does what he always does in these situations: he goes and talks to gavin. because gavin will know what to do, he'll figure it out.

buuuut the thing is. gavin, by this point in the story, has been replaced by his clone, who is completely loyal to amity. so the REAL gavin is MIA (i haven't figured out what's going on with that yet, but i'm sure it'll fit together eventually). so river isn't talking to HIS gavin, he's talking to evil!gavin. and evil!gavin says that river must have misunderstood what he heard, or not heard the full conversation, because amity is a good lady who would never want to hurt him, and evil!gavin says they should go talk to amity together and sort things out.

so river calms down, because gavin is probably right; if amity was evil, river would know it by now; he's known her for seven years, so she would've had plenty of opportunities to take advantage of his trust if she wanted to, right?

so river and evil!gavin go talk to amity, and she laughs and reassures river that she wasn't saying what he thought she was saying, but she can understand his confusion. she was just hopeful that river would agree to be a donor for zipper, and saying that he's such a good, selfless kid that he probably would, but it wasn't up to her.

river is relieved, comforted by her reassurances, and he says of course he'll do it; he wants to help. internally, he feels kind of silly for doubting her. of course there's nothing sinister going on. why would she lie to him?

when he goes under for the surgery, he's a little nervous, but he feels confident that he made the right decision.

when he wakes up, he's in a room in a part of the foundation that he doesn't recognize, and instead of the small incision he expected, there's a big, Y-shaped incision down the full length of his torso, and suddenly he's not sure what's going on at all. because why would amity lie to him?

(undecided yet whether, at this point, amity will keep up the ruse or finally admit the truth. i think both options have interesting possibilities.)

[hamstermastersamster]

The evening I finished The Last Of Us Part 2 at around 10pm, after playing the whole thing with my dad, I told him after that final Joel and Ellie scene how much the first game (and scenes that even vaguely resembled it) gave me strong Dad feels. He smiled and said "that's what we're here for".

I love him a lot.

That same night, a sickness bug he'd caught from one of my nieces manifested and, due to some underlying health conditions, he had a severe medical emergency and I had to call an ambulance for him. Took a day off work, managed to get him out of the hospital same day and he's okay now, and through the mercy of living in Europe all it cost me was £4.40 to park at the hospital (free him).

My mom and then I contracted the same sickness bug in swift succession so my thoughts on TLOU2 have had to wait until I recovered.

That might be a good thing because I've still been sitting on them for a bit. I wrote a lot of notes while I was still mid-game, but I have been reflecting on them afterwards and some of those notes feel a bit harsh in retrospect. Below the cut are my final thoughts, criticisms and feelings on it. Warning: There are lots of Words, and also spoilers I guess, though I try not to be too explicit.

Ultimately, if I had played this game when I was in a vastly different headspace, and in a time when I wasn't constantly aware of real world news of people being absolutely monstrously horrendous to each other, I might have experienced it more positively? Just, the things it was trying to do did not land right with me in this time and this space, and I have a lot of feelings about it.

Overall, I felt it had a few core problems:

Overreliance on flashbacks to tell a story

Multiple main characters and thus multiple 'main stories' and trying to tell them all in the same game is a goddamn mess

The egregious transparency of the narrative's attempt to emotionally manipulate the player

It's just fucking miserable to play from start to finish

So let's start with . . .

The Flashbacks

I said in a prior post that the story I wanted to experience (Joel facing social consequences for what he did at the end of TLOU1) was now impossible because of Certain Events that happen right at the start of the game. Well, it turns out I was wrong! The story I wanted to happen sort of did happen. It just didn't happen while I was playing. It happened Before present events, so I only get to see glimpses of it through flashbacks of events that have already happened. Knowing I have no influence over them. Knowing I'm just moving a character through shit that already happened, so there's no tension and I'm not invested in it.

That sucks.

But it speaks to TLOU2's bigger problem with flashback storytelling.

At one point we were 2 or 3 layers deep in flashbacks, flashbacks-within-flashbacks, like it was Inception. We gotta go deeper! The game can take you away from the 'present' for hours and hours at a time, by which point you've forgotten or stopped caring about what's going on back then (or when!).

At the halfway point, we cut away from Ellie to a prolonged flashback from the perspective of different character in the middle of a tense scene just seconds after a named character DIED, but oh noooo, you don't get to process that for like 10 consecutive hours! During which you're gonna get introduced to lots more people and faction politics to keep track of that will overwrite your working memory!

Good luck remembering that person who died before or what even the hell was going on!

My Dad struggled a fair bit with following the timeline once we switched to Abby, and he may be in his late 60s but he's not an idiot. The constant jumping back and forth just did a disservice to the plot and made it unnecessarily hard to follow. It makes me wonder how the hell they will make the TV season coherent for your average viewer.

People are not recursive algorithms. Flashbacks can serve a narrative purpose, but if you need to use them so much, it's generally a very good indication that you should have started your story earlier in its timeline. If all this stuff in the past was so important, why didn't we start there? The non-linear storytelling isn't clever here like, say, Mouthwashing, which is fucking with you in a very deliberate way; it's papering over the cracks caused by ND trying to tell at least 2 main stories at once over at least 2 sets of protagonists.

Compare and contrast with P1. Where does the story open? Outbreak day. The story starts where things start happening. It starts at the beginning of the (singular, focused) main story it wants to tell. Imagine instead how much less powerful the game opening would have been if we'd started super slowly in the QZ, and only got Joel's backstory as a dream when he went to sleep at some point during the day. No, we got to PLAY it happening, we got to experience it emotionally when it was the player's present, without the inherent 'interactive flashback' burden of "this has already happened, nothing I can do about it even if I can superficially move a character around in the scene" dulling everything about it.

I'm not saying you can't have subplots. P1 had subplots, with Bill and Tommy and Tess and the Fireflies and the cannibals, but at all times the main plot never lost its momentum because we experienced them through the tight, focused lens of Joel and Ellie in the present. Every subplot was another chance for us to watch Joel and Ellie grow through what they had to survive. The most significant"flashback" we had was DLC, and we didn't know exactly how that was going to turn out because it covered unanswered questions in Ellie's backstory. It meant that, even when TLOU was indulging in its atmospheric quiet, explorative moments, it never felt slow.

By contrast, TLOU2 really drags at times. And the reason we are so bogged down in flashbacks is because . . .

Too Many Main Characters

Of course, we have Ellie, and later we have Surprise Protagonist Abby. You have all the entourage of side characters separately revolving around these two, and you also have Yara and Lev, who have an interesting story of their own although I will allow that they are actually side characters in service to Abby's character arc.

I am super aware that having Abby and Ellie be parallel protagonists was entirely intentional on ND's part. It's exactly what they were trying to do. But that awareness doesn't mean it always worked.

Abby is actually a really interesting character in her own right. I loved her! She's a lady military grunt, built like a brick shithouse, visually nothing like a stereotypical female video game protagonist, has an awkwardly dorky sense of humour, collects coins like a fucking nerd, has romantic interests and rich social network in the WLF, is as equally capable of great acts of self-sacrificial kindness as she is of literal brutal violent torture - and despite being tough as nails she has a terrible fear of heights that is executed amazingly in-game, actually, with visual effects that made me, a fellow heights-hater, feel uncomfortable. The ingredients are all there! She's fascinating and layered! She's even a goddamn trans ally!

The trouble is she doesn't ever truly get to exist in her own right. In a hypothetical game where she was the sole protagonist, she shines! In P2, she exists only as an emotional hammer with which to bludgeon the player for an extended and laborious playtime. Everything she has, she was only given to make her a parallel to Ellie, and the only reason she is a parallel to Ellie is to Make The Player Feel Bad. She gets friends and a community that she cares about because Ellie has friends and a community that she cares about. She gets a dad because Ellie has Joel. She gets a revenge plot because Ellie gets a revenge plot. She gets a 'conflict over the necessity of violence' arc because Ellie gets one. It's just so . . . painfully artificial. Even her flashback story feels like a sequence of laborious sidequests so obvious they could have put an exclamation mark over each NPC suggesting them. My dad and I groaned every time a new one popped up. Oh, we don't have the supplies we need? Nooooo, really? Oh, they're in another location we need to get to? Nooo, never! Groaaaaaan.

But ultimately, narratively, Abby and Ellie are the same. It's all a matter of perspective. We get it, ND. We get it.

Not helped by the fact that Abby experiences a clear growth of character and starts making better, more selfless decisions as the game progresses. It is entirely conceivable that, by the end of the game, you will like her more than you like Ellie.

The section where you are playing as Abby, versus Ellie as a boss fight, is an absolutely stellar mindfuck that I will applaud as a bizarre and effective narrative choice.

Dad, by contrast, absolutely hated that part, and he's valid. It's weird. They wanted the player to feel conflicted. Again, I get it. ND knew most players would have automatic loyalty to Ellie because we played all of P1 with her, and thus would not enjoy fighting against her in the skin of the person originally set up to be the game's main villain. Clever.

Nonetheless, it is SO frustrating to sit there and play out Ellie making one terrible decision after another, with no ability to influence it, while Abby gets to grow and become a better and more likeable person because the Plot Says So. I got more upset at the inevitable culmination of her arc in the aquarium than I got when they Did That Shitty Thing They Did At The Start Of The Game, to characters that I already pre-loved from TLOU1.

Which leads me onto . . .

Holy Emotional Manipulation, Batman!

The attempts at emotional manipulation in this game are so overt and transparent that they are frequently insulting. You think the enemies crying out the dogs' names is bad? Wait until you're on Abby's flashback section where, after you have already killed half of their dogs as Ellie in the 'present', they are portrayed only as Extremely Good Puppers that you can play fetch with (twice!), and they all have names and favourite people and their boarding cages have their names lovingly written on them.

At all times, relentlessly, this game is forcibly putting you in Situations and making you Do Violence. And then it tries to make you feel bad about it.

I'm not just talking about putting us in situations where we have to kill to survive - that's standard video game fare. I'm talking about making the act of violently beating information out of someone an interactive button press, and not giving us the choice to refuse to push the button.

It's not fun. And because it's so grossly obvious what the authorial intent is, it's not emotionally impacting either. It's just annoying :\ I resent it.

Oh but Hamsterrrr, you loved the ending of P1 and that was a emotionally manipulative, too!

YEAH OKAY so now I'm gonna explain why it worked in P1, and didn't in P2.

P1, as we've already established, is a much more tightly-focused narrative with a very small named cast, told primarily in chronological order. As such, you experience the story as the characters experience it. You get invested in them because you grow and learn along with them. The primary mission of the game starts out as a slightly more complicated smuggling mission for Joel, and it becomes both personally important to him and for the Greater Good. What you're doing could cure infection! It could save the world! There's hope in it! We're not just being violent for the sake of it! We're surviving and progressing towards a Good End!

(Don't look at those hints that Joel may have great darkness in him. It's for survival/the greater good, it's ok, we're ok. You can still love him as a character. It's fine).

Oh shit. Joel no. JOEL NO. MY HEART. I'M CONFLICTED. THIS IS THE WORST ENDING. IT'S THE BEST ENDING. I'M SCREAMING CRYING THROWING UP. MY DAD SITTING NEXT TO ME SAYS "I'd do the same thing". I'M HAVING AT LEAST SEVEN EMOTIONS.

You see, P1's emotional manipulation through the mechanism of making you play a character doing things you may not agree with comes at the very end of the game. It's an unexpected emotional rugpull. It fucks you up. And because it was so intense and surprising, I didn't reflect on why it hurt so much and the dev's intentions until afterwards.

Meanwhile, in P2, they are fucking with you almost from the moment you launch the game and they are not even trying to hide it, and it's exhausting and boring and insulting. The Man Behind The Curtain was a constant, intrusive presence in TLOU2, and yes, it "ruined my immersion".

I don't know about you guys, but I don't play games primarily to be made to feel bad for playing the game the way the developers intended (or mandated).

When I reflect on the game after finishing it, it had some powerful moments. And the game still, STILL, despite all my bitching, managed to deliver an ending that yet again had me writhing and teary and moaning "noooo, no, no I don't wanna do this!". I will give ND that. They can have all the credit for that. I do not know a game series that has pulled this off before, twice.

But crucially, whilst I was playing it, I was routinely frustrated, pissed off, bored, annoyed, gritting my teeth to push through to the next section. I can't fully ignore that.

There's also the fact that . . .

It's Miserable

The simple fact is this game is fucking depressing in every way, made me feel bad for playing and experiencing it, and just . . .

Look.

Every. Single. Character, every single faction in this fucking game ends up worse off than they started by the end of it, often because of stuff the main characters (controlled by you!) have done, and I just find that a really difficult thing to sell as a great game. I can't recommend it. It's horrible to play. There is no hope in it, no catharsis, nothing redeeming in it, everybody who even survives is traumatised and nobody heals, it's just loss loss grief grief PTSD, there is no glimpse of a better world or a greater meaning. It is just an absolute fest of misery. If you cared about any of the surviving characters from TLOU1, I'll spoil it for you now and say they all get irredeemably fucked over, and so do most of the new characters you're going to meet, too.

It made me realise that, although I generally love stories set in a post-apocalypse, if that post-apocalypse doesn't have at least a glimmer of hope and humanity in it to contrast with the chaos of a collapsed civilisation, it's simply not for me.

I'll finish on some positives:

I really respect that ND tried to do something different than just a repeat of TLOU1. Narratively they tried something very original that I haven't really seen before in gaming, and that deserves some credit

I really respect that ND loves women and loves queer and trans people and brought both strongly to the fore in their narrative, and fuck everyone who thought it was too 'woke'. This is clearly not a one-off, as evidenced by their game awards trailer for Intergalactic, and I'm happy they're continuing to casually stick a middle finger up at narrow-minded gamers

Obviously it's a triumph in terms of visuals, production quality, cinematic quality and every other basic mastery that we've come to expect from ND. Stunning from start to finish.

Rejected Joel in the flashbacks took a knife to my heart every time. Every. Time. You bastards >:'[

Alas, I just can't recommend it. Not unless you like pure angst, trauma and misery and being made to constantly feel like shit.

Which, you know, kinktomato.

Also possibly worth a go if you are interested in storytelling generally, because it does try some really interesting and original stuff, even if it doesn't always pull it off.