#but it had that Weird Vibe and i looked up the 'Live Action' title and yeah it's anti choice

[not-my-circuss]

Followed this person for a while and kept getting the "so-and-so liked this post!" Suggestions and they were usually Christian themed posts which is not inherently bad, it's just not my bag. But it didn't hinder my blogging experience so whatever.

Finally pulled the plug because one of the posts was from an anti-abortion organization and that shit makes me seethe.

I don't give a fuck if a fetus has a heartbeat, if it has toes, or whatever the hell else is happening at whatever stage of the pregnancy. If it is unsafe for WHATEVER REASON (medical, financial, emotional, etc.) for someone to be having a baby, they deserve to Choose whether or not to terminate.

When Roe v Wade was overturned I was so heartbroken and terrified for myself and other sexually active people with a uterus because I knew that shit would affect the poor and minority populations the most. The wealthy folks will always have that option, its the people that are desperate (or even just average!!!) that suffer the most. There are so many predatory "clinics" in my state it's revolting.

Anyway, you can be pro-life for yourself and still respect other people's decisions, but if you circulate pro-life propaganda or try to convince people why abortion is "wrong", you can eat my shit and hair <3

[allthatmay]

thoughts on shanks/mihawk?

I love Shanks/Mihawk. They're great from what little we see of them together, especially in the live action. The 'divorced dad' vibes are very strong.

In my head—and in my Shanks/Ace universe—Shanks was romantically involved with Mihawk (and with Buggy to a lesser extent; they were only young, after all). I believe his experience and his failures (self-perceived or otherwise) with Buggy informed his relationship with Mihawk. I imagine that Shanks and Mihawk started out as rivals, fighting all across the Grand Line, then they became true equals, and then lovers.

Mihawk is somewhat of an isolated person by choice (putting it lightly), so his relationship with Shanks was bound to be distant in some ways—but I think that wasn't helped by the fact that Shanks learned to put his goal above everything (he's such a martyr). Shanks may have also looked at what went wrong with Buggy and decided that he shouldn't get too close to Mihawk, for both of their sakes.

(Unrelated to Mihawk, but Shanks' friendly demeanour is connected to this; it lends the appearance of friendship where there may be none. That way, he doesn't actually have to get close to people. Also means people underestimate him. The older he gets, the more he realises the importance of relationships—the sheer trust he has in Benn is something that helps teach him that—but I think, after Roger's death and Buggy's departure, Shanks felt like he couldn't afford to have too many people close to him. He has a small, fairly weak crew that he protects. I feel like he's always known the importance of bonds to other people, but has often neglected them for "the greater good" or something like that.)

Of course, Mishanks love each other, they do. But things take a wobble when Shanks disappears for a fucking year, having robbed the Gum Gum Fruit from the Marines, and returns without his arm—his dominant sword arm. Where Mihawk and Shanks used to be perfect equals, they are no longer—or, at least that's how Mihawk sees it. Things are weird then, because they still love each other, but it's not the same. Mihawk's a pretty simple guy, cares mostly about swordsmanship, whereas Shanks has always had bigger plans. They decide they make better allies than lovers.

Years later, Ace comes into play with Shanks. At this point, Shanks is preparing for Luffy's (Joy Boy's) arrival, so a lot of his part is over for the time being. Ace is someone he can see feasibly having close to him (for a lot of reasons) without compromising himself, his crew, or his goals.

Meanwhile, I could see Mihawk getting with... Well, Zoro, honestly. (Wouldn't that be funny? Mishanks both get much younger boyfriends and meet randomly at sea one day. Hah!) He could get with anyone (looking at Crocodile and Buggy), but Zoro and Mihawk share a very passionate interest in swordsmanship; it's the most important thing in the world to both of them. They could totally get together. (And their relationship could totally end with Zoro killing him for his title.)

Having said all of that, I'm also a sucker for stories where Shanks and Mihawk end up together. But, geez, sorry for the rambling! Hope this was the kind of thing you were looking for?

[theinsanecrayonbox]

FOP: A New Wish ep1-4

alright, lets do this

long time watchers will know that i live for FOP lore, i die for FOP lore, and even in it's worst examples i try to find something of value...and then run away screaming like a lunatic to make it my own and a million times better lol

so New Wish. this is the...3rd sequel attempt (after the Live Action movies, and Fairly Odder) and could be considered the 5th continuation (if you count Sparky season and Chloe season as separate continuation attempts)

as a quick reminder, like s3-5 were my jam, Superverse is my baby forever, i hated 99% of the Sparky season, love Chloe but the season was heavily flawed, the LA movies suck (Christmas is the best only because it's a holiday special), and Fairly Odder was a huge hot mess that was very questionable

so again, lets do this

Episode 1: Fly Part 1 and 2

uhg ok first just going by the title, we are doing the stupid and counting half episodes (15 min segments) as separate full episodes again huh? i hate this, it makes keeping track of the chronology harder, and makes it so the TV Guide won't always register new episodes because they'll split a previously aired with an unaired but he guide says 'has already aired" so you miss the other new half. OR you get duplicate recordings of the same episode half because they keep pairing it with a new one and your DVR fills up and just urgh. it's terrible, 30 min blocks should be the norm again. please fix all animation peoples.

anywhos, onto the episode proper

i had seen the opening theme before this, and yes i approve of the completely revamped/brand new opening song. it's got the right vibe, but is it's own thing. they tried it with Chloe...but that just felt like a copy/paste clip show element. this is it's own thing, it evokes the original but is still itself unique.

and i guess i could do it now; the art style. i'm...eh? it's hard to explain. there's times when i'm getting an eerie uncanny valley effect where my brain says that they're like flat puppets (you know the kind you made in grade school out of construction paper and brass tabs so the joints would work) and that's not right. this isn't stop motion, but sometimes it looks it and i can't process that. it's...eh? maybe i'll be more used to it by the end of the 4th episode, and if not i'm sure over time i'll be used to it. it's not bad by any means, LEAGUES above the CGI in Fairly Odder. but it's...uncanny.

the title card being 2d while the episode isn't though is slightly jarring. HOWEVER i do appreciate having a 2d model for Hazel that is easy to see and not a blink and you'll miss is thing like in Fairly Odder (she also looks far better duh lol). it's just slightly odd to do it this way, idk maybe that's just me. it's fine.

not immediately recognizing any of the staff credits aside from the obvious...that could be good or bad...

the style is looking more stop motion clay now...weird...

but i cannot get over how many Chloe elements Hazel has to her. you've got the tooth gap, the voice is similar, the enthusiasm over learning things, collecting things. as i said above, i actually LOVE Chloe, it's just the writers didn't really use her to her full potential. it feels like Hazel is a doo-over to do it right. idk if that's a good or bad thing, because i want Hazel to stand on her own, but i also want Chloe to not just get swept up and hidden away in shame like Sparky; he deserves it, she doesn't. but back to the episode...

it is also a nice changeup that Hazel is in a more urban setting; it's still more west than east sure, but Dimmsdale was suburbia, so this is a new setting with different problems to tackle. and her being a younger child is also a new and exciting development. there is so much potential here, it is exciting!

are they going to explain why Cosmo and Wanda are pretending to be humans again? i know descriptions mentioned retirement...but why would the retain their magic...or unlimited magic at least.

is Hazel's dad the new Crocker?

Dev Dimmadome is the bully id ok...wait your dad is Dale Dimmadome?? HOLY COW! we have a spot on the timeline here folks!!! Dale was 16-18 when freed from Vicky's basement, and Dev here is a 10 year old, so this is at minimum 10 years in the future from the main series, if not more (because teen marriage/pregnancy bad, probably safe to assume Dale didn't have a kid that early). but how cool! and it makes sense that dale would move out of Dimmsdale given his history, and that his dad would give him control of stuff. ok Dev, i like you, you can be the new Remy with some Trixie and Tad and Chad blended in there.

ok that was a nice and easy and fast introduction of our supporting cast with a brief character trope to each. i like it.

heh ghost, gotta have a DP joke don't we

zomr the screencaps of Cosmo's times in space, pfftt. great continuity nod and visual gag. Totally/Spaced Out caps are obvious, the white asteroid one i don't recognize off the top of my head, but...that's an Oh Yeah! Darth Cosmo...idt they were in space for that one? how weird that they pulled s0 for this and Odder

i love it. Hazel's problems are realistic and plausible, and she's trying to deal with them in a way that makes sense. things suck, so yeah she'd need fairies. again, the element that a lot of later FOP lacked was the fact that these were mundane problems that just needed a little help to get through....and using magic usually made them worse and at the end of the day it was the lack of magic that made it better actually. i think that might be a reason why App Trap wasn't *as terrible* as the rest of the Sparky episodes, because it kinda did that...then again it had Missy and i think i focused on that way more. but conversely, that's why a lot of Chloe's episodes didn't work as well as they could've, because the situations weren't believable to start with. yes we got magic, we gonna be crazy and zany and fun and magical, but...this is also a storyline about kids learning to grow up and deal with things at their own pace. Timmy wasn't allowed to grow up after a certain point, the writers regressed him and kept him in a permanent absurd level, and that's why the series started to fail.

and i need to get back to the episode in progress, because i've already spent 40 min to get 12 min into the FIRST episode of 4 ^^; (maybe doing everything at once was a bad idea after all ^^;;;;;; )

ADULT TIMMY! ok, ok, slow it down! gah i can't spend hours untangling the timelines right now to figure this one out. because that's adult Timmy from The Big Problem (why do we keep referencing this episode suddenly?? i swear Odder did it too), as in he was aged up from 10 to this form instantly. compared that to the OTHER adult versions we've had (Channel Chaser 1, Channel Chasers 2, Channel Chasers college aged, LA, and Odder (we're not counting the grandpa 10 year old from the stupid "i paused time for 20 years" trial episode) ) who appeared to age naturally. this Timmy was guesstimated to be middle-aged, which is 45-65. SO if we go for 45, that's 35 years from the original series, making Dale Dimmadome like 50s...he did not look in his 50s. now i KNOW nothing says that that IS Timmy (though his vest did have T on it...but he is an actor...)

also "Chin-finity War". yes, that's mine now. idk how or when i'll use it, but i'm taking it, no takebacks. thank you FOP team, you know how to feed me well, i appreciate it.

they aren't assigned to her yet, why would saying "I wish" revert their disguises? i mean, i guess since they *wanted* to come out of retirement, their own desires could've triggered it, but still...they could hang around people who said "I wish" before and not be compelled to grant them. are they compelled because they're unattached? is that why genies work the way they do? does attaching oneself to a human limit their capabilities? or protect them more like it?? what lore ramifications does this have on the fae social and power structures?? also she's turned into a fly...that sounds like a genie's monkey paw wish granted and not a fairy's. again, is this because they are unattached to her? are they granting wishes "rule-less" so they are unfocused and more chaotic? are genie wishes twisted because they do it on purpose, or because they are unbound and unfocused?

O.o!!! i did not have Cosmo and Wanda body horror on my FOP bingo card...i applaud you writers, that surprised me

ok a carousel of timeline events...not referencing anything in the past canon...but is dating it for this time frame...eh i'll let it slide (because i missed it the first time because of the shock at the body horror)

wait their welcome gift was a Seemingly Harmless Plant? how did i miss that earlier? lol

dawww Hazel learns the lesson of the day from an ant that's going to be dead in 5 minutes. so sweet. see, using magic to fix mundane problems.

oh that's cool, their front door is an interdimensional portal. so they aren't living as humans in the human world. but oh boy, 2d flashback time again...oh no, but wait canonical confirmation that they were with Timmy for 7 years???? (pft 20, yeah that's real time i know, stilly funny). that...makes sense in both the you age out of fairies thing, but also that it was s8 where things started to loose proper focus what with only 5 episodes that you could fold into s7...and that's where the stupid Timmy's Secret Wish thing was. but also...s9 was Sparky, and s10 was Chloe; if we go back to the alternate timelines thing, ten that means it was after s7 (s8 folded in or not) that each continuation branched off from. best example being that Poof didn't speak until s9, but in the LA movies he only started to speak, so obviously those 2 are separate branches. now, this doesn't explain the lack of Poof in Odder or here (so far) i know, OR how there's a few connective episodes between s9 and s10 (very few) but DOES explain the absence of Sparky from Chloe's season since they could be considered different timelines, and why they both were not in the LA or Odder. this is fascinating, and i eagerly await more of New Wish to see if anything from s9 or s10 show up to disprove this theory

ALSO if they were with Timmy for 7 years, and we assume that 1 season = 1 year (not exactly right but roll with it), then since Dale Dimmadome first appeared in s2 (and last appeared s4) and Dev is 10...wait i lost my math train of thought and my tv went to screensaver i'm taking so long on this gah! well it's not the 35 years that adult Timmy woudl suggest. c'mon i gotta finish this episode before i hit the 90 min mark

oh i had a minute left lol. ahhhhh but the production? drawings on the credits with the instrumental of the opening theme, my heart! i love these latest sequel-reboots that know what they're doing.

so to sum it up; this is a yes. this series is looking good so far. i know, still got 3 more episodes to go. but hopefully it won't take me 3 times the length of the episode to get through them too ^^;;;;

Episode 2: The Department of Magical Violations

ok so this description says something about the fairies reupping their magical permits. makes sense, seeing as they've been retired for who knows how long (and we'll just ignore the magical build up implications of that since they do reside in Fairy World still so do regularly use magic) AND the old lore does have them having to redo their certifications like...twice i think in the canon? i know Temporary Fairy was one, but i think there was at least one other instance. so yeah, i'm on board for the premise, let's go

Jorgen what happened? you're in a sweater vest and you haven't shaved. did you retire too?

ok cool Hazel was already on the list to be assigned a fairy. Cookie though....already not vibing with them (which is the point i know, we want our OG pair tp be best after all)

Jorgen you're in cargo shorts and tall socks. did...did you become a dad?

Wish Fart...eh...i can forgive it

because this trial thing sounds very much like something they've done before too! Wishing Well, Wish Fixers, there's another one idr...oh but this is something different, cool. also nice that Hazel has performance anxiety; i guess that's our lesson for the week.

does this dance off date this...i'm not sure...the dabbing though does pretty sure

ahhhh Cookie's so proficient because she does whatever whether that makes her kids happy or not. she must annoy them so much that they willingly give up their fairy rights too early. thus leading to her productivity levels being "many jobs completed" but not because they were done properly.

oh look Da Rules!

Hazel hates chocolate chip cookies? hmmm...i guess i can still like you

huh just now noticed that the fairies are scaled smaller than Hazel.

mk, so yeah lesson of the week was communication and standing up for yourself. nice, sweet, simple. onto the next half!

Episode 3: Teacher's Pal

this description says she's lonely and wants to make friends. mk, that's a good lesson of the week, and very relatable. the title card even reminds me of A Wish Too Far...well in vibes, not in matching title card art obviously

"Dimmadelphia Enrichment Center" is the name of the school

oh wow that's interesting; Cosmo and Wanda took up her pop-it keychains but weren't them, they were overlaid on them.

"Dimmy Shimmy"...yeah...i don't get tiktok dances either

hm maybe the principal is the new Crocker...

wait does ASMR boy have a d20 on his shirt???

yup that's your lesson Hazel. see, a mundane problem made worse by magic and fixed in the end by the MC growing up and taking responsibility. good story telling

and was really a breeze to watch *shrugs* not every story is action packed or dripping in lore. as i said, some of the best stories are t he mundane and in the end are about growing up on your own terms at your own pace.

Episode 4: A Dinosaur in Dimmadelphia

it's the last aired thing my Xfinity On Demand is giving me, since this isn't on Paramount+ yet. weird that they list the previous 2 as a full ep2, yet the wiki has the half episodes (save for the pilot) being individual numbers. so for the sake of me not complaining, and simplicity, i'll just use the wiki as an episode guide from now on

(also Robby Daymond is part of the cast??? hurray! ok you just scored points with me. thanks wiki for telling me) (oh wait this is supposed to be on Netflix...but not yet...ok, so Xfinity we remain on)

so this description says dinosaurs. should be fun!

"Dimmsonian Museum" lol

"Obtuse Rubber Goose from 2001 BC" pffffft cute

classic wish train going on. get a dino, talk to him, get people to not care, don't send him back, make him fit into modern society.

convolute dover the top parade thing? lol sure

black vans huh? oh it's the mayor, not MERF, hm

but hey day is saved. and i guess a dinosaur just...is around now...mk

so this was a little less mundane, but you know that's ok too. it is a cartoon, we are silly and out there, not everything is a lesson of the week. (though one would argue that having a dinosaur around would lead to the magic reveal...but eh...)

so after 4 episodes...yeah the style was grown on me, it's less off putting. and yes, the writing here is doing very well. the team seems to know what they're doing, and they're paying attention to the past canon lore BUT they have the advantage of having a new main cast so they can be a bit looser with it. the easter eggs are fun, the energy is high, it's all good. i am looking forward to more of this series (and trying to detangle the timelines XD)

[marmorafarms]

So I want to talk about how careful you have to be not to become a bully, and how easy it is to become one. How even if you've experienced it before, you can slip into it. This is going to be long, so I'll put it under a cut.

At my work, I have a coworker who is, quite bluntly, a little off putting. She is very anxious, is always apologizing, and always has an energy of being "freaked out" at all times. Her vibe is not calming. However, she's very sweet and kind, and she really wants to do a good job at work. I've never had an issue with her, but I have felt a little offput by her. I try and be nice, and I think we're friends.

Well recently, she made a mistake at work, one that she was reprimanded for. Basically she stopped to fix a sliding door that was shut, and her client walked away. We had had an issue with a different person who lost a client, but this coworker sprung into action. It took her a hot minute, but she found the client playing with toys a few feet away, just barely out of sight. However, she had made her nervousness very public, saying her worries and fears out loud, and people heard.

And then suddenly, it happened. All of my coworkers started shit talking her behind her back, talking about how incompetent she is, spreading unrelated rumors that might be false about her vaping inside the building, (we had a different coworker smoke weed in the building, and this coworker vapes too) and taking what happened and blowing it out of proportion. How do I know that it was blown out of proportion? Because I went to my boss.

I was being pulled into the drama, shocked by what I was hearing, and saying that her behavior, based on what I was told, was awful. I even said she was hard to be around, and people took that and started ranting about how much they hated being around her. One person said they hated how she typed, and that the way she typed stressed them out. And I said NOTHING. I didn't tell anyone to stop, I just fueled the fire.

One of my coworkers told me a behavior she claimed she saw (but didn't report) regarding the coworker vaping weed around clients, and I went to my boss. That was super concerning to me, since said client was a child. Call me a narc if you want, but I couldn't be having someone take a kid for their bathroom break and then start vaping with the door closed. I had to report abuse once before, and this is something that would count. So I did it. And that's when my boss sat me down and we had a talk.

Nobody had ever said anything about my coworker to my boss UNTIL THE MISTAKE HAPPENED. Suddenly, everyone had some complaint about her. About her attitude, about how she was with her clients, about her vaping. Everyone went to my boss, sometimes with the pettiest shit, and just laid it all out. My boss started to not even be able to take it seriously because it was getting to the point where my coworker was reporting she felt like she was in a hostile environment. People were giving her the cold shoulder, refusing to look at or talk to her, stopping talking when she entered the room, all of that shit. And now she was taking a break from work to calm down.

My blood ran cold when I heard that. I realized I was apart of the problem. I was engaging with people when they said shit, and didn't question their claims. I didn't stick up for her, I just allowed them to say stuff and even said myself that she annoyed me sometimes. But here's the thing--I was bullied very very badly in school. And I was suddenly seeing that I was becoming that which I hated.

I had a long think about everything, and I went to my boss and told her that what was happening wasn't okay. We work with people with mental illnesses, many of whom are ostracized in their lives for being weird or off putting. How can we say we want to make that stop and then do it ourselves to people around us? So my boss and her second in command (I'm forgetting the official title oop) decided to sit with me and come up with an anti-bullying thing for our upcoming meeting, but we're working on how to make it sound like a typical meeting thing, and not something specifically about my coworker.

Anyone can slip into bullying and being an asshole. So when you hear rumors, or want to start talking shit, think deeply about why you're doing it. Don't take everything at face value. Stop and think about it, and form your own opinion instead of just nodding along. Stand up for people. If someone says something like "oh xyz" happened say "you should report that" and then stop engaging in the conversation.

I hate that I became a bully, but I'm gonna cut that shit out right now. I messaged my coworker asking how she's doing and saying everything will be okay. She said my message made her smile for the first time in days. Be someone's light. Be someone's hope. If you didn't see what went down with your own eyes, then you're just making assumptions and maybe think you're connecting dots when you really didn't connect shit.

Be nice, and don't feed into gossip and rumors.

[peofun1]

alright I watched Way Too Much anime this season, and now that it's coming to a close, I wanna get down some of my thoughts on everything.

there's no real method to how we picked what anime to watch beyond just what looked interesting to us. i have some friends that do "gauntlets" or who watch EVERYTHING in a season, but I'm not doing all that. we just watch the trailers before the season starts and pick out whatever looks up our alley.

anyway here's a very long post, in alphabetical order, of everything I watched in the Spring 2024 anime season. longer thoughts under the cut, but here's all of them up front:

Reincarnated Aristocrat, Bartender, Dungeon Meshi, Loser Ranger, Gods' Game We Play, Grandpa and Grandma Turn Young Again, Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night, Kaiju No. 8, Many Sides of Voice Actor Radio, Oblivion Battery, Re:Monster, Spice and Wolf, Train to the End of the World, Whisper Me a Love Song, Wind Breaker

As a Reincarnated Aristocrat, I'll Use My Appraisal Skill to Rise in the World

Stupid light novel title aside, actually pretty good. I think it's funny that MC's main power is recruiting OP friends like he's a Fire Emblem protagonist. a bit of a slow-burn at the start when the MC is really young, but I don't mind that. It's also one of these ones that kind of forgets it's technically an isekai after a bit and just becomes a fantasy story, which is fine with me. There's some interesting political drama set up that I'm invested in. We're a little behind on the anime but I plan to get back to it

Bartender

great vibes. I never watched the original anime or read the manga so I can't really say how it compares, but going in blind this one is a good time. enjoyable even if you don't know anything about alcohol, as long as you're willing to learn. the little vignettes and snippets into other people's lives are compelling, and give you a sense of what a bartender's life is like. I also appreciate that there isn't a forced romance between the two leads. also-also there's pretty masc-leaning character who I thought was a man from the OP and then cheered when she's introduced and is a woman. I see a masc woman and I start hootin and hollerin

Dungeon Meshi/Delicious in Dungeon

what is even left to say. it's an incredible adaptation of one of the best manga I've ever read. the english dub is also fantastic. Izutsumi is there. read Dungeon Meshi I'm not playing around

Go! Go! Loser Ranger!

really fun concept suffering from some severe pacing issues. the anime absolutely blazes through set-up in the early episodes, and I'm told cuts out a lot of character building stuff from the manga, which is a real shame. I really wish I had more time to learn about all these characters before they spend six episodes fighting in a parking garage. the action animation isn't even anything all that special. most fight scenes in this get bodied by Kaiju No 8 or Wind Breaker. it's a very good looking anime though, even the CG usually works. just really wish it took some more time to breathe. also easily the best OP and ED of the season and it's really not close

Gods' Game We Play

watched one episode and it put me to sleep. No Game No Life but boring. and I fucking hate NGNL, so take that as you will

Grandpa and Grandma Turn Young Again

watched one episode. cute concept but I got weird vibes pretty quickly. I don't care how hot the young grandpa is, I don't want to see his granddaughter crushing on him >:/

Jellyfish Can't Swim in the Night

fun, cute, good drama, pretty to look at. the characters are a fun group of kids, and it's easy to root for them and get invested in their friendships. I understand the comparisons to A Place Further Than the Universe; it's in the same genre, even though the characters and story are pretty different. I wanna call this genre, like, "cute girls actively working towards a concrete goal". the group also reminds me of Nightcord at 25:00 from Project Sekai, which is neat.

people are throwing around "yuri-bait" for this one which I think is pretty asinine. like I don't understand how you can get legitimately baited by a show that doesn't have a yuri OR romance genre tag. it's a good show even without romance, idk why people have to complain about it not being something it was never trying to be. and anyway true yuri fans can squeeze yuri from a stone.

Kaiju No. 8

perfectly serviceable action battle shonen. if you don't go in with any higher expectations than that, it's a good time. the action is flashy and well-animated. characters are kind of generic so far, but they're fine for the show they're in. BUT if Captain Hoshina ever dies I'll instantly drop this. also the ED is catchy but I think the OP is pretty dogshit. like the song is fine but the NVIDIA tech-demo animation is so nothing it kinda makes me mad

(side bar -- there's a review on the MAL page for Heavenly Delusion bitching that Production I.G. "wasted" money on that instead of spending all that budget on Kaiju No. 8. and I just wanna know what fucking planet they're from, because Kaiju No. 8 clearly has an insane budget. there are huge billboards in LA advertising it. they've got yungblud and fuckin One Republic in here. what are you smoking my dude. also Heavenly Delusion kicks so much ass and is honestly way better in terms of having an interesting story to tell)

The Many Sides of Voice Actor Radio

cute vibes. takes itself surprisingly seriously, and the dynamic between the two leads is fun. this is the real yuri-bait though, since this one actually has the yuri genre tag but with no yuri lmao. (not that I'm really complaining, it's a pretty good time regardless) touches a little bit on the darker/dangerous parts of "idol" voice acting, but imo doesn't get very deep into it. like it's kinda tough for me to root for the girls' VA careers after they get literally doxxed and their moms want them to quit... like yeah you girls probably should get out of this toxic industry before it chews you up lol. but if you kinda don't think about that stuff the show is cute

Oblivion Battery

watched two episodes and just couldn't bring myself to care. it's an interesting set-up for a sports anime, but it's too silly for me. i feel like the creator would rather be writing a gag manga. all the characters I saw were annoying or boring, and I was REALLY TRYING to like them. I WANTED to like this anime! I need something to fill the Haikyuu void!! (besides just re-watching Haikyuu for the 12th time!) but man I just can't get into baseball anime, no matter how dramatic and exciting they try to make it. watch Ace of the Diamond instead (which I also got bored of, but lasted way longer)

Re:Monster

watched one episode and thought it was Slime Isekai but worse. and I don't really care for Slime, so this was never gonna impress me. my wife kept watching for a few more episodes, and when I walked in on it later the MC was having a huge orgy with like 20 hot elves or something. so, I guess there's that. if you wanted to watch that.

(note: reincarnated as a slime is FINE! it's a FINE anime, I have nothing against it, it's just not for me. please don't get my ass)

Spice and Wolf remake

I see the naked wolf-girl waifu and I Get It. watched two episodes and really liked it, but put it on hold for now because my wife wasn't really into it. I've never watched the original anime, but I'm excited to get back to this one eventually.

Train to the End of the World

very weird but in a way that's kind of nostalgic? sometimes it feels like I just turned on Toonami in 2004 and caught episode 86 of some anime I've never heard of. it's fun and silly in a way that I feel a lot of modern anime don't try to be. just throwing some new flavor of batshit at you every episode, including some Totally Spies-esque "the director's poorly disguised fetish" (looking at you, giantess episodes). only real complaint is that the dialogue is VERY fast paced with like no pause between characters speaking, which is hard to keep up with sometimes.

anyway my wife and I can't stop saying wibble-wobble surgery. you just hate to get wibble-wobbled yknow

Whisper Me a Love Song

haven't actually watched this one, but it's here because I've read some of the manga and was planning to watch the anime. the manga is cute, easy recommendation if you like fluffy yuri romance. I've heard the anime adaptation is pretty lacking, which is a shame.

Wind Breaker

punched me in the face and gave me brain damage and now I'm obsessed with it. any comparisons to Tokyo Revengers don't know what they're FUCKING talking about; the only thing it has in common is "delinquents". I hesitate to even call this a delinquent genre manga, since the boys are really more like vigilantes. it's very sweet and earnest and feel good, in a way that reminds me of Haikyuu more than Tokyo Revengers. there's even ~queer rep~, if that's the sort of thing you care about lol. the anime is a pretty faithful adaptation with some killer fight choreography and a great soundtrack. second place for OP this season (though I like the song on its own a little better than Loser Ranger's)

[dat-town]

not gonna miss this chance

Characters: Han Seojun & soloist!female reader

Genre: fluff

Setting: true beauty au, set a year after the tv show’s ending timeline

Summary: Your career is on the verge of ending, hence your management puts you up to do a duet with the infamous Han Seojun. You have heard too many rumours about him to keep track of and yet, none of them could have prepared you for the feelings that came with meeting him.

Words: 4.1k

Self indulgent little snippet because he deserves happiness too.

You had heard of Han Seojun before meeting him, of course you had. Everybody who was in the industry had heard of the hot trend of a Newstagram star-turned idol and his band's shining debut from a year ago. They were told to have snatched teenage girls hearts all over Korea with their good looks and soulful music. You had heard their title track and you had to admit it was nice but nice wasn't enough in a cut-throat industry like entertainment.

Look at you, starting training at twelve, debuting at fifteen and now barely twenty-one you were on the verge of becoming a thrown away doll. Once you had been called cute and the it girl of your generation and now? People were saying you got boring just because your music had matured. Gosh, you couldn't keep singing about first love like your hit song had been for the rest of your life for god's sake. Your last album had been a flop, your company had been losing money and you were still afraid that even with a year left of your contract, they would cut you. But your manager had begged them for a chance and here it was: a collaboration with the newest love of Korea.

But the thing was, Han Seojun had quite a reputation and you didn't know who to believe. Some said he was well-mannered and hard-working. Others gossiped that he was always flirting with his makeup artists and Chen claimed he had been rude to her even when he had just been a ‘nobody’. Not that you were particularly fond of Chen either but as a fellow solo female singer you were a tad bit worried how the infamous singer would treat you.

Well, standing in front of Move Entertainment, you were just about to find out. Taking a shallow breath you followed your manager's lead, bowing to the receptionist and getting into the elevator after taking your visitor's badge. You had heard the company has gone through many changes after the executives were replaced due to the revealed Seyeon scandal but everything looked expensive, shiny and new, unlike in your small agency.

“Hey, I’m Lim Heekyung, nice to meet you. Seojun will be in a minute, too,” a woman in a pantsuit walked up to you on the right floor with a confident smile as she introduced herself. She led you to a meeting room which was apparently customized for a few people only and started preparing papers. She looked excited which was a relief and nice to see, at least someone from Move Entertainment was happy for this project apparently. You were a bit afraid they would see you like a leech, trying to cling onto their new star’s popularity.

“Shall we start? Seojun is a fan of dramatic entrances anyways,” Miss Lim laughed joyfully as if it wasn’t new to her that the idol didn’t make it on time. Ah yeah, you had heard rumours saying that he had something on the company and that was why they were so lenient with him.

You sat in silence, let your manager do the talk about the collaboration project. Seojun could play the guitar, you could play the piano, apparently it was perfect for a ballad duet, though if you used instruments yourself it added to the preparations time. But luckily, there was a songwriter named Leo at the company who had already sent in a few samples specifically for Seojun, so you didn’t have to start from zero.

“Ah, I see you started without me. What did I miss?” A tall boy opened the door wide and flipped down onto the chair across you casually. He had grown into his lanky limbs and with those wide shoulders hugged by the leather jacket, helix earrings in one ear and soft brown hair brushed to one side, it wasn’t a surprise how many female fans swooned over him. But there were a lot of handsome boys in the business, just his looks – no matter how confident he was in them based on the way he carried himself – wouldn’t make a difference.

Miss Lim patiently let Seojun know about the advances and only when she mentioned your name, did the boy glance at you. His dark brown eyes had a sharp form, just as piercing as his gaze, but the cunning smile spreading over his lips softened it a bit. He looked at you as if he wanted to see through you, to figure out how he should have approached you. You expected a snarky or arrogant comment, but in the end, he just flashed a blinding smile at you, one you could see on his posters, before turning back to Miss Lim.

“What’s the schedule?” he asked simply and you both were notified about the deadline of deciding and finalizing the song, the dates of planned recording sessions and the photoshoot. Since there would be no promotion period, it all would be done within a month and half from start to finish. You were a bit relieved hearing that and leave Move Entertainment without any confrontation.

You thought you were good at masking your wary feelings since the further meetings went well and the first recording session went okay-ish. Although both of you had been a bit scolded by the producer for not putting enough feelings into your singing. He claimed that the demo sent by Leo was much more emotional which made Seojun scoff and mumble under his nose. The PD called it for a day, making you promise to practice for next time and one by one they all left. Your manager told you that he would bring the car while you refresh yourself in the bathroom, so you really didn’t expect anyone to wait for you when you stepped out of the restroom, much less Han Seojun.

"Spit it out," he bit out barely glancing your way as he leaned against the corridor’s wall.

"What?" you spluttered as you were really taken aback by his out of blue appearance and question. The guy let out a tired sigh at your obliviousness and pushed himself away from the wall just to walk up to you, towering over your height with his.

"You look at me as if I killed your hamster or something. Which rumour about me bothers you? I fucking can't keep walking on eggshells around you, especially when it's just the two of us," he tsked and you gulped at the sudden called out. You didn’t think it bothered him, or that he was considerate enough to ‘walk on eggshells around you’, you merely thought he was so distant from everybody. It was still better than what Chen had told you.

"Oh, I… nothing. It's stupid. Sorry," you mumbled, feeling embarrassed for your your actions but Seojun apparently wasn’t satisfied without a real answer as he carried on:

"I didn't bully kids in high school but I threatened ones that deserved it, I didn't only get a pity chance from the entertainment, one of our makeup artists is actually one of my best friends, I'm not…"

"Chen told me you are rude and arrogant and have no respect for girls," you blurted out to stop him from speaking because you felt like you didn’t deserve to hear all that. He didn’t owe you any explanation for the way he was. You were just co-workers for a project after all, you had no place in his life, nor he had in yours, so he shouldn’t have been that bothered by your opinion but you understood that he felt uncomfortable due to your silent accusations.

Hearing your hasty interruption, the singer scoffed, a laugh-like sound leaving his mouth.

"Well, I have no respect for girls like Chen who harass my friends and turn their lives into hell just to go on a date with me," he said and it made you blink slowly.

"Oh."

"Yeah, oh. Check your facts before you go around believing such crap," Seojun stepped back with a roll of his eyes.

The whole situation made you feel made about how you acted, so you wished to apologise but it fell from your lips all too carelessly: "Sorry, I was just worried. This is my last chance, so–"

"Last chance?" the guy quirked a brow at you, curious but you quickly waved his question away.

"Nevermind, I just need this song to do well."

"Of course, it will. I'm Han Seojun, it will turn to gold under my hands," he grinned and made eccentric gestures as if he was about to do magic. You couldn't help a smile. “Or well, vocal chords.”

And turn it to gold, he did.

The rest of your recording sessions went smoother, even the previously grumpy PD complimented your for the development in your chemistry. Funny, you wouldn’t have thought that the wall pulled up between the two of you mattered that much, but at least you didn’t have a knot in your stomach, nor did you worry about every small thing you did around Han Seojun. He also acted more casual, more playful, joking around when both of you had a bit of time to take a breather. He snapped silly pictures, showed off with his height, smirked when he got too close but despite all his bravado and lowkey flirting, you believed even he wouldn’t have jeopardised his career over something like this.

Maybe that's why wrapping up the recording felt a tad bit weird: you got used to his presence, his jokes, his beautiful, deep voice that you could have fallen asleep to. Sure, sometimes he was cocky, a bit rough around the edges but he was a great singer and a fun guy. The project seemed to work out well and you loved it a lot, so you hoped the listeners would appreciate it as well.

But before all that you had one photo shoot together for the promotional pictures and the single's cover. You were grateful for the simple pastel colour background and elegant setting. The warm light latte colour and the clock in the background really fit the song's vibe. Luckily, your dress was decent and pretty as well, you didn't have to feel uncomfortable in it at least.  However, you didn’t expect that happy yelp coming from one of the makeup artists stepping into the dressing room. You turned to face the girl, wondering whether she was your fan judged by her excitement.

"Oh my! I'm so happy to finally meet you! Seojun told us about you so much!" she beamed at you which obviously took you back. Well, that you didn’t expect at all. He spoke of you to others? Ah. Apparently to the makeup artist who was most probably that certain one of his best friends he had told you about?

"Don't exaggerate, Imju, I mentioned her like what… once?" Seojun walked in on cue. He rolled his eyes and cleared his throat, trying to avert the topic. "How's Suho?"

You had know idea who that said guy was but after a moment or two you could breathe properly once again while listening to their chatting.

“Just the usual. He’s excited about your duet.”

“Of course, he is,” Seojun grinned, a bit snarky but you could hear the proud undertones of it. When he looked at you, you were surprised by him leaning close though as he quieted down until only you could hear it. “Don’t worry, Jugyeong is really good and just stop her if she gets too gossip-y.”

“Are you talking about me behind my back, hah, Han Seojun?” The pretty girl called Jugyeong raised her fist as if she was about to hit the idol but he just laughed it off and left you two alone when he was hurried onto the set to start with his individual shoots.

“Have you known each other for a long time?” you couldn’t help but wonder as you were seated to get your makeup from her.

“Ah, almost 4 years, I think. We went to high school together. Plus, he’s best friends with my boyfriend. Though, they are always bickering like a married couple,” Jugyeong chuckled joyfully as she started with the cushion. You closed your eyes, listening as she kept going on about the time when Seojun had been obsessed with his motorbike, getting into trouble with his mother. It was strange hearing about a whole other side of him, mama's boy but the image tugged on your mouth, making you smile even though you weren't sure you had the right to know all that. You also learned that Seojun's sister was dating Jugyeong's brother and you felt so involved with the girl's trust albeit it was your last meeting, you were sure Seojun must have only told good things about you.

Hence, you felt shy under his knowing gaze when you walked out of the dressing room. He must have known that Jugyeong couldn't shut up for the life of her, so he looked a bit uncertain, too, stretching the back of his neck, forcing a cunning smile onto his smile when you took your place next to him.

To fit the ballad's theme, the setting was a piano decorated with flowers and you were instructed to sit beside him as if you were about to play a four hands piece. As you did what you had been told, you were very much aware of the way your arms brushed, his long fingers over the keys close to yours, his smile small but genuine.

"Great, great, guys! Someone help her onto the piano and Seojun, stand in front of her," the photographer directed the next scene but before any staff members would have rushed up to you, the singer next to you shushed them.

"I can do it," he insisted as he stood up and looked you in the eyes, silently asking for permission. You nodded while holding your breath back before Seojun put his hands on your waist above the fluffy tulle skirt part and counting on three, he lifted you onto the lid of the beautiful instrument.

You crossed your legs, watching in awe as your pink skirt fell down on waves  but your breath hitched for an entirely different reason when you looked up, gaze meeting Seojun's feline eyes trained on you. You had never seen him look at you like that, lacking playfulness or suspicion or curiosity. He looked open, vulnerable, outright starstruck. Your lips parted meaning to ask something but your brain shut off when you heard the shutter of the camera go down and the director yelling compliments at you. It made you snap out of it and later, you blamed the evident blush on your cheeks on the makeup. Seojun blinked too, his guarded expression back in no time, finishing the photo shoot professionally, always lingering close to you, but never touching you. Even though you wouldn’t have minded.

"Hey," Seojun peeked into your dressing room just as you were about to leave, packing up, with a smile on his mouth and sparkles in his deep brown eyes. But unlike half an hour ago when he wore a fancy suit and looked at you like a prince would have looked at his princess, he acted just as casual as he looked in his denim jacket over dark tee. "Wanna grab something with me if you finished for today?"

His question took you back but first thing first you glanced towards your manager, eyes begging for permission which you had gotten with a sigh.

"Just be discreet and call me if you need me to pick you up," your manager shrugged, leaving you two alone with a knowing look that told you to be careful. You didn't need to be told though, you knew how much depended on the current public response to your image.

"Seems like a green light. Have you thought of anything specific?" you turned back to the boy with a subtle smile.

"Not really but I know a few less frequent, secluded places to avoid much talk about us," he said and you nodded, following his lead. Masks, caps and hoodies on, you barely talk on your way to the tent with the lovely ahjumma who welcomed Seojun (two heads taller than her) with a pinch of his cheeks and told you to get seated.

"Are you a regular here?" you inquire, carefully pulling down your mask since not many people are around.

"You could say that," the boy hummed letting you adjust to the place at your own pace, not pressuring you with extra reassessments about how safe it is there. Yet, he is so casual as if he wasn't afraid of a getting mobbed by Dispatch out of the blue. Not that it happened to you a lot of times but you heard stories and at such a crucial time in your career, you feared something like that more than anything.

"Do you want to come up to mine instead?" Seojun blurted out suddenly which made you wide eyed in a span of a moment as you splattered out a surprised yelp. "Come on, I don't mean anything by it. You just look really nervous being in the public," the singer said, his deep voice softening, soothing by the end and you needed to take a breather before answering. You didn't think it was so obvious but apparently you had never been a good liar with him.

In the end, you decided on going over to Seojun's place, so he asked the ahjumma to pack your food to go and you headed towards his flat a few blocks from the company. It was a small but cozy place, much softer and brighter than you expected, lots of pastels and photos of friends and family. While the boy busied himself in the kitchen, getting you plates, chopsticks and beer, you were encouraged to look around and you couldn't help but smile at his photos with not only his band members but high school friends, too. You had seen photos of his graduation with Jugyeong, then another one of his debut with her and another guy.  He was a recurring person on a lot of pictures, so you assumed that he was the so-called Suho.

"He's Jugyeong's boyfriend," Seojun affirmed as he walked up to you which you acknowledged with a hum and smiled at his photos with his sister and mother. The makeup artist was right when she said he was only tough on the outside.

"You knew Seyeon?" you whispered as your gaze shifted of a picture of three boys smiling widely into the camera. The middle one was the talented boy you had known  from the news of his committed suicide. Such a tragedy.

"Uhum. We were best friends. Him, Suho and me," Seojun nodded and without having to ask, he told you how they had gotten to know each other, what were their favourite past time activities and how they fell apart when he died. You could see he was hurting even now as he was talking about it, so you grazed your fingers against his knuckles as though to say you were there for him to listen, or whatever he needed.

Talking about his best friends and how a group of guys including someone named Chorong stuck by his side over the years warmed your heart. It was nice to know that not everyone had it as lonely as you who basically missed out on high school and memories from that time to be able to turn your dreams into reality. Your only friends were also in the industry but it made things both easier and harder.

"What about you? What did you mean by this being your last chance?" Seojun asked like a loaded gun but after everything he had just told you, you knew you could trust him with this and being in the industry for a while now, he must have understood, too.

You told him about the rising expectations, about your image and your company's ultimatum. It actually felt nice to talk about with someone other than your manager. Especially since Seojun seemed to understand exactly why you felt conflicted over the matter. You have given your youth to this dream of yours, so giving up on it would have felt like betraying yourself and everyone who believed in you but you weren't sure you could give it another 10 years of your life no matter how much you liked music. You had decent CSATs result, maybe you could have applied for a university program. Seojun even offered to arrange a meeting between you and Suho who was studying to become a proper songwriter.

You talked for hours and ate the tteokbokki even though it had gotten cold long ago and you couldn't remember when was the last time you had felt so light. You felt giddy even with just the tiny bit of alcohol in your system by the time you knew it was time for you to go.

Once you had felt relieved knowing that promoting your duet would be only one performance but recently, you started dreading the moment because that meant that you wouldn't have any more excuse to see Seojun. In the backstage, this time around you greeted Jugyeong like an old friend and teased to give Seojun a funny makeup before walking up to your  own assigned staff members. Your look was full of sparkles and glow fitting the silver colour of your dress, completing the ethereal vibe off the stage you were going to do and the beautiful song you had grown to love so much you held it close to your heart. The last rehearsals went smoothly and if you noticed Seojun's gaze lingering a bit too long, you didn't comment on it.

"Are you nervous?" he asked before the final recording and you knew it would have been unreasonable to deny it, so you replied with a small smile.

"A bit."

"Don't be. You're pretty and you'll do amazing," he reassured you and the way he said those words oh so easy. As if they were natural. As if he believed in you and maybe this was all the reassurance you needed because when you walked up onto the stage, not taking your eyes off his, it felt like it was just the two of you there. All the stress about not being good enough, about being judged for who you were and what you wanted to do with your life was subsided as you focused on the moment, just to sing this one song with one while trying to fight your heart's crazy beating.

You didn't really have the luxury to have crushes. You had always been concentrated on your work, you couldn't let yourself have distractions, especially since love scandals always affected girl worse than guy. At least that was what you told yourself for always putting up a wall around you and guarding your heart all too well. But during the past few weeks, between playful or flirty remarks, between smiles and ruffling hair, Seojun took apart your wall brick by brick even if he wasn't aware.

So it might have been only a few days since you had last seen him but in that rare moment of boredom, alone in your room, you realized that you missed him. Hell, you liked him and the feeling made me want to scream into your pillow as if you were a silly teenager. As if on cue, your phone buzzed with a new message and seeing the KakaoTalk ID made you shy.

duet partner, han seo jun

so...

i've been thinking

you

sounds dangerous but ok

duet partner, han seo jun

don't get sassy with me, miss

you

what have you been thinking about?

duet partner, han seo jun

that i don't want to miss my chance

there's this girl i like

i thought of asking her out

do you think she would say yes?

you

oh. well... why wouldn't she?

i mean, you are talented, handsome, funny and reliable

duet partner, han seo jun

and what about my job? it's busy and a bit crazy

don't you think it would be unfair of me to ask?

you

I think you should let her decide that

duet partner, han seo jun

okay

are you free on friday?

you

um, sure?

duet partner, han seo jun

cool, then go on a date with me?

[trashcanfills]

Hero Killer Stain | Akaguro Chizome Relationship Headcanons

Yes I’m here to deliver.

The kind of person to only have very few friends. This guy ain’t the socialising type. I mean look at him he practically oozes lone wolf vibes. Not a people person for sure. He’s definitely socially awkward as fuck though thanks to his poker face that part of him isn’t obvious.

If you do manage to be friends with him though, oh boi where do I even begin?

He is an independent guy so expect like long ass periods of non-contact. He would occasionally check in on you to make sure that you are alive and doing well, sometimes with a text saying hes coming over. If you are lucky he might hang around for a while but apart from that he’s not gon do much (totally not because he’s socially awkward cough cough).

Really thoughtful as hecc. He’s not such an asshole to make any demands for you and your time. With how disillusioned he is with the current state of society, he’s going to cherish all the shit you have done for him, especially when you are one of the only ones who stayed with him despite the bloody path he has chosen.

Mention offhandedly about needing or wanting something? So long as he can afford it, it’s definitely going to appear on your table the next day without a trace of him left in your house. The kind to help around the house when he possibly can. Even if you try to deny his aid he’s not gonna budge at all cus he is one stubborn ass motherfucker. After some time you just give up and let him do what he wants. Though it is kinda funny to see the Hero Killer doing domestic stuff around your house.

However he can be a bit of an insensitive jerk at times. He judges a bit too hastily and makes wrongful assumptions. He also tends to believe that the fault lies within the person themselves whenever theres a problem, and will point it out if you asked for it.

This can result in arguments when you make mistakes or anything cus he will unintentionally make a comment that directly attacks you and your character. I can see that eventually you would reach a breaking point where you cry and/or scream at him about these hurtful comments. Yelling would of course devolve into an argument until you explain your feelings and situation to him such that he understands. Crying would just really hit in the realisation on how shitty his actions were and he would rectify that immediately by comforting you.

Hangouts typically consist of you guys sitting there in silence doing your own thing or watching a movie, or both of you engaging in philosophical discussion about today’s society. Yes because this is Stain we are talking about, expect the topic of False Heroes to come about. Once that happens, you would end up listening through his entire rant on False Heroes and their Unworthiness for the Hero title.

You definitely have engaged in debates with him on dealing with false heroes. He would be respectful of your views so long as they are well supported AND well-rounded arguments. Being one-sided esp towards the heroes would make him dismiss your views since it’s the same opinions adopted by the masses. Acknowledging and accepting that his views and ideals are valid would be a big deal for him, even if you disagree.

Sadly I’m not really sure if it would change much on his hero killing ways. To him, it’s the only solution he feels he could implement to best deal with false heroes, and it’s a necessary evil. Plus, he’s more of the take action guy. He can’t really just sit around, wait and think on what to do when there’s so much at stake. I find that it would be good for him to have a partner to hold him back and properly think through some stuff because of this, if he were to get into a romantic relationship. And speaking of that…

If you are in a romantic relationship with him, it’s just the above friendship qualities multiplied by 10 plus the couple things.

He WILL be a mother hen for his s/o. Regarding his friends, he tends to trust their ability to take care of themselves, only stepping in when needed to. Regarding his partner? He takes responsibility for their wellbeing. If their condition is less than perfect, he’s going to do something about it.

Accidentally cut yourself? He’s already grabbing the first aid kit. Sees you aren’t getting enough sleep? Prepared to be whooshed away and dumped on your bed. Stressed and anxious? He asks you to confide in him about your worries, and if you can’t, at least tell him how he can make you feel better.

God forbid someone lay a hand on you intending harm cus if Stain knows about it, he will straight up gut them. He will interrogate you if he sees an injury on you that’s unlikely to be an accident. He’s not going to budge until you tell him who did it to you, and even if you don’t, he WILL find out on his own. He might end up hurting someone innocent so it’s best if you tell him who did it to save him the trouble. And if they mysteriously disappear from your life, that’s only for the two of you to know :^)

He’s definitely not used to physical affection being the loner he is, so if you initiate and like give him a hug or a kiss he will get flustered and blue screen for a short while. He would also be tense when cuddling for the first few times, then relaxing a little bit afterwards. Uh don’t surprise tackle him out of nowhere unless you want to get slashed or chucked at a wall. As much as he loves to indulge in your affections, he still needs to keep his instincts honed for fighting. You never know when someone might decide to attack the both of you. (You tried to surprise hug him once. It ended up with you getting injured and him attending to your injuries while lecturing you a little about doing that AROUND A SERIAL KILLER WHO KILL HEROES for a LIVING)

But otherwise he doesn’t mind physical affection. He would grow to love it, and would gradually take initiative to touch you at any opportunity if you tell him you are open to it. This does become funny with his brilliant poker face, when you guys are doing your own thing and all of sudden he gets close to you to hug, smooch or cuddle. He gives absolutely no warning whatsoever. It never gets old. Your reactions to him doing this amuses him a lot.

Expect occasional heartfelt speeches on how much he loves you or how much you mean to him. Might not realise this himself but gOd he can be a sMOOTH motherfucker. He is good with words, and gENUINE about what he says about. He will pull off the how I saw the world as a dark ugly place until you came along speech shtick and there will be this Moment of you guys beholding each others presence. THATS how good he is. (I mean you heard him monologing while fighting Izuku, Tenya and Shouto like daamn)

He’s a very practical person and isn’t one to be sentimental. He can’t afford to be sentimental if it can jeopardise him and his loved ones in any way. He’s adamant on not keeping anything of his around in your house cus he doesn’t want you implicated or associated with his murders at all.

Somehow, if you both are really really deep into the relationship, I can see him letting both of you carrying rings from each other. Not worn around the ring finger of course cus that can attract unwanted attention, but rather it being attached to a chain necklace that both of you would have at all times.

It’s kind of a promise and dedication to you, in the sense that, if he could or if he had the chance to, he would have formally proposed to you. He hopes that he can if somehow he fulfils his personal mission, and if both of you can find somewhere peaceful and safe together.

Edit: Realised I forgot to add some stuff in lol, so dont mind that I add more points to this already long ass post. Im on mobile so apologies if formatting is weird.

[mourningbirds1]

Beloved amazing Clare!! <3

You already know how obsessed I am with your writing, and how unique and individual your voice is in a way that stays with me like few others do.

I saw your earliest post about authors who has influenced your writing the most and am already putting a bunch of items in my amazon basket. It made me curious, what would you say are your top 5 (or more if you have the energy <3) books that you feel have influenced your writing or you would recommend others to read for a beautiful and unique writing prose?

Dear CiCi, thank you for sending me this ask on Friday night. It was much much appreciated. I am always excited to see you in my notifs because I know I am in for something that is going to make me grin with how hilarious and charming and entertaining you are, or make me soft cause of how very kind and thoughtful you are to me and to others. I hope you’re having a happy weekend, eating good things and having some quality Ripley time ❤

Thank you for asking me about book recs - my fav subject. However, I feel a bit embarrassed to recommend some stuff on here because I have kind of weird, old-timey taste in books. I have put asterisks next to the titles that I think might not have such a broad appeal and I hope people proceed with caution before spending their money on them. But I still want to include them because they mean a lot to me.

*Twenty Thousand Streets Under The Sky – Patrick Hamilton, 1935

Absolutely one of the most underrated novelists out there. This is a collection of three novellas about the characters in a London pub. His prose is chef’s fucking kiss oh my god. The way he describes characters makes you feel like you can see them standing right in front of you. A couple of his earlier novels are a bit clumsy – I think he was still honing his style - but he really hit it with this book.

For Esmé - with Love and Squalor: And Other Stories – JD Salinger, 1950

My favourite things about Salinger are his dialogue, which is very entertaining - he commits 100% to the speaking style of each character so everyone feel authentic and like a real person. And also how good he is at the whole “show, don’t tell” thing. I love the way he opens stories in the middle of scenes, without giving you any exposition – all the backstory is there within the context of the action. It is so clever. I attempted to imitate this in Gresham House. Also he describes action (even just someone picking up a pack of cigarettes) in such a lively and elegant way. I would like to learn how to do this!

*The Good Companions – JB Priestley, 1963

This is about a travelling theatrical group touring England in the 1920s. It is a lovely, entertaining romp and has major found family vibes. I guess JB Priestley is best known for his play An Inspector Calls, but he was a brilliant novelist as well. I’d give anything to be able to write prose, characters and dialogue like he does. His writing is very cosy and comforting to me. The characters in this book felt like friends and I was so sad when I had finished it and had to leave them behind. The way he opens this book – setting a scene and then having the characters walk onto it, as though it is a stage – was what inspired me to open Don’t Look the way I did.

Perfume – Patrick Süskind, 1985

Set in 18 century Paris, about a man who is born with a super-human sense of smell, and the dastardly way his uses this talent. Süskind is a genius at describing locations and atmosphere, and of course smell, in an incredibly visceral way. This book is so immersive and gripping.

Fingersmith – Sarah Waters, 2002

A wlw Victorian gothic mystery. This book made me gasp and my jaw drop many many times. I recommend not reading too much about it because you will enjoy it more if you go into it without knowing anything. I love everything Sarah Waters has written and I think this is her best and cleverest story. I really like the way she adapts her prose style depending on the era she is writing in. This one is all Dickensian style which I am nuts for…

David Copperfield – Charles Dickens, 1850

Sorry this is not exactly a ground breaking recommendation but I have to mention it. I have so much love in my heart for this found family story. It’s so warm and gentle and funny and is full of love. It made me cry so much.

Okay that was 6 books, not 5, and I could definitely go on. I didn’t even mention PG Wodehouse… Maybe I will do a part 2 if anyone wants it.

[meimae]

31/07/21

Another month, another monthly immersion overview! ʕ•̀ω•́ʔ✧

Managed to finish a couple of reads this month totaling around 600k+ characters which is more than half of my monthly reading goal. Need to push myself harder still, but I'm quite pleased with the amount I was able to read. I also found some gems in the good old JDrama pile that I'm happy to share with you all.

ANIME

Honestly didn't think I'd be watching any anime this month as I just wasn't in the mood after being disappointed with my picks from June. Towards the end though, I started digging through my pile of anime that I put on hold and now here we are.

るろうに剣心

No particular rhyme or reason for this pick. I just vaguely remember watching this when I was younger, but I really don't have any context for what's going on. Also, Netflix dropped most if not all of the live action films, and I refuse to watch those before watching the original anime series, movies, and sequels.

This show got dubbed and televised where I live, so I had no idea what they sound like in Japanese, and 剣心's voice threw me in for a loop. I was expecting it to be deeper or something honestly, but it sounds funny sometimes in a good way.

NANA

I took I break from this, but I'm back and ready to finish. This series is actually really good, and is literally one of the best 女性's out there. The themes are pretty realistic and the art and fashion is really quite outstanding, alongside of course, Paradise Kiss, which is from the same 漫画家 and was my intro to the world of 女性漫画.

Honestly, I could not vibe with 小松 奈々's childish personality and her desperately jumping at the next boy who appears, but I'm slowly warming up to her.

BOOKS

Seriously why do they title LNs this way? The entirety of the plot is in the title. I mean, I guess it's convenient for a first time reader, authors guiding expectations by literally writing it on the front cover, but still.

Everything here is an 異世界ラノベ.

本好きの下剋上 司書になるためには手段を選んでいられません 第ニ部 兵士の娘II

An absolute mouthful.

Anyway, read a few chapters here and there. Still, pretty impressed with マイン. I read a lot, but there's no way I'd know how to make literal paper top of mind. Her patience is through the roof! I'd rather just embrace cross stitch and embroidery (lmao literally the hobbies I put aside in favor of language learning).

無職転生 異世界行ったら本気だす

Again. A mouthful.

Few chapters. Everyone was reading this series a few months ago and I'm only boarding the hype train now mostly because I saw a clip of the anime and I was swooning at how smooth the water animation was. Good motivating factor.

くまクマ熊ベアー 1 ʕ•̀ω•́ʔ✧

Okay, less obnoxiously long, more cute, and an absolute flex on just how many ways you could write the same word in Japanese.

I finished this! I'll be posting a review and stats in a bit.

JDRAMA

Also known as me having withdrawals from 嵐 (mostly 櫻井翔 saving me from this drought) and plugging the hole in my JPop heart with 星野源.

ネメシス

Look man, I love anything coming from 広瀬すず, but add 櫻井翔 or any other 嵐 member in the mix and I am sold. This however was not up to par with my expectations - the writing was kind of bland and the climax/ending was really weird. This would have been so up my alley otherwise, because I love mysteries, the soundtrack was pretty fun to listen to, and the comedic aspect of this would have been so perfect for this cast, and yet it was kind of meh.

逃げるは恥だが役に立つ と 逃げるは恥だが役に立つ ガンバレ人類!新春スペシャル!!

Someone from TheMoeWay Discord recommended this to me with the warning that it was kind of sexist. What a way to sell a show.

(；´∀｀)

This actually turned out to be pretty wholesome drama though, with these two really pathetically cute and romantically awkward characters. Really interesting too how they managed to insert the pandemic in the special and how it affects families with children.

Honestly, I don't know if I really love this drama or I'm just fallen into an obsession with ガッキー. She was so cute in this aaaa! This couple seriously 恋ダンス'd their way to my heart, man. They got married in real life! I can't deal with that cuteness.

Brb, jamming to 星野源's albums on repeat.

恋はDeepに と 恋はもっとDeepに

I swear, 石原さとみ is a good actress, but I still haven't seen her in anything that I ended up really liking.

This was a miss. It's hilarious though how they didn't even bother doing the whole ~she transforms into a mermaid~ thing that these shows usually do, so for all we know, she could have been a 河童 and we've all been baited. They did go the mermaid route, I'm just memeing. Would have been funny though.

家族ゲーム

櫻井翔's acting was through the roof in this one and I was pretty creeped out by him by the end of it. I won't even discuss this anymore. Just watch this show and discover why its a 8.6 on MDL. Should be higher tbh.

VISUAL NOVELS

ファタモルガーナの館

Completed! Here's my review and stats.

Angel Beats! 1st Beat

This was the VN challenge at TMW that I didn't finish on time, because I came to the realization that I liked watching SoL not reading it. Still finished a route though, and because I like reading all routes for that sweet reading immersion, I'm going to continue reading this no matter how long it takes. I'm not about to let a SoL VN beat my completion streak.

I have never watched any Key anime and started but never finished any Key VNs yet, so with all the hype it gets, I hope I get over the boredom soon.

白昼夢の青写真

Heard that they will be making a definitive edition of this, but I think I'll just read the bonus cases when the time comes 'cause I already started reading. I don't even know when the release date is, so there doesn't seem any point of holding back now especially because this turned into TMW's August intermediate VN challenge.

-☆-

And that's a wrap! As usual, any recommendations are appreciated. Really enjoyed the recs I received the past month.

Hopefully I can keep up with my reading and actually hit my reading goals this August. Really should utilize timeboxing better than just perpetually scrolling through social media without a time limit.

Updates in the future as always. Thanks for stopping by!

[terramythos]

TerraMythos 2021 Reading Challenge - Book 15 of 26

Title: Tehanu (Earthsea Cycle #4) (1990)

Author: Ursula K. Le Guin

Genre/Tags: Fantasy, Fiction, Third-Person, Female Protagonist 

Rating: 8/10

Date Began: 6/24/2021

Date Finished: 6/30/2021

Decades after The Tombs of Atuan, Tenar decided to settle down and live an ordinary life on the shepherding Isle of Gont. Now a farmer’s widow, she adopts a disfigured and horrifically abused child, who she names Therru. When a giant dragon deposits a grief-stricken Ged at her doorstep, Tenar finds herself in a strange situation as she cares for her old friend and her adopted daughter. But threats from Therru’s past and a malevolent force on the island soon threaten Tenar’s small family. 

Despair speaks evenly, in a quiet voice.

Content warnings and spoilers below the cut.

Content warnings for the book: Violence and death. Mentioned murder. Severe child abuse. Descriptions of traumatic injury and disfigurement. Mentions of r*pe, including of children. Trauma, sexism, and ableism are explored in depth. 

Tehanu is a much different book than the trilogy that precedes it. Perhaps this is unsurprising, considering the 17-year gap between this book and The Farthest Shore. I’d describe the Earthsea series as “grounded fantasy”. While all of them take place in a magical world, the thesis of each book is universal; the fantasy always comes second. Tehanu takes this idea to an extreme. The story is about everyday life as a common woman in the Earthsea world, with fantasy barely factoring in. The pacing is intentionally slow and introspective, which is something I normally don’t like, but Le Guin is a consistent exception. 

Key characters from the previous books make an appearance. Obviously Tenar is the biggest return, absent since The Tombs of Atuan. The Tenar in this book is older and much more mature, having decided to live a simple life in spite of her adventures and accomplishments. Ged returns, but he’s a shell of his former self, as he mourns the loss of his magic and the man he used to be. Even King Lebannen (formerly Arren, the main character of The Farthest Shore) makes a brief appearance, and is quite a palate cleanser after the horrible men throughout the rest of the book.  

Probably my favorite aspect of the novel is the fact that these characters stand well on their own without magic to prop them up. Tenar explored the terrifying freedom she won in The Tombs of Atuan; got married, settled down, had kids — but still finds herself at a loss on what to do with her life after her husband dies. Ged is in a similar boat; he’s gone from an almost mythic character to an ordinary man, and like Tenar finds himself at a crossroads in life. Other characters embody this idea of transformation and uncertainty; Therru’s escaped her abusers and now has a loving mother, but what does the future hold for someone with her appearance? Stuff like that. 

The idea of metamorphosis and new beginnings is well-trodden. But what makes Tehanu interesting is Le Guin primarily examines this with the middle-aged characters. Tenar and Ged are legendary figures in the world of Earthsea, but life has taken them to an uncertain future. The thrust of the novel lies in finding a purpose and becoming someone new. I also like that Tenar/Ged is endgame; I got Vibes from The Tombs of Atuan, but neither character was in a position where it would work. Seeing them form a romantic relationship much later in life is touching and cute. But it’s not the reason that either of them grow as people; finding one’s purpose is something one has to do on their own. Their relationship only develops once both parties have done so.   

My main complaint about A Wizard of Earthsea, the first book, is the sexism inherent in the setting, which is never examined below the surface level. Perhaps Le Guin’s outlook changed, or perhaps the publishing environment did, because often Tehanu reads like a response to this criticism. The central theme of the book is misogyny, the patriarchy, and its debilitating effects on women. Le Guin examines everything from micro-aggressions (“common wisdom” that happens to paint women as inferior) to domestic issues (“women’s work” and how much that actually is) to outright sexual assault (both in threats and actual acts; it is heavily implied this is part of the abuse Therru endured). She even goes into how powerful women are only considered as such because a man gave them that power. 

While I appreciate the fact she addresses these issues in such a frank, blatant way, at times reading Tehanu felt like reading a basic feminism primer. These subjects are all things I’m familiar with, and I feel like anyone who’s studied key feminist ideas would be aware of them also. Maybe 1990 was different? Le Guin doesn’t add any insights to the bleak reality of patriarchy and sexism, which is a little disappointing compared to previous books. That being said, this book is aimed at young adults despite its dark subject matter. Tehanu could be the first exposure to these ideas that many children receive; looking at it that way, it makes sense that the analysis comes off as basic. 

I also found the book’s examination of gender to be very cishet-normative. That’s definitely not surprising, considering the book was published in 1990, but to a 2021 reader this hasn’t aged super well. There’s a lot of discussion about the relationships and differences between men and women--whether there are any or not, how magic differs between them, the ability to bear children, and so on. There’s a weird sexual component to this, like how wizards (who are exclusively men) have to remain celibate in order to… keep being wizards? But women who are witches don’t have to do that, and that’s an advantage women have? (There’s mentions of male witches too, iirc, but it’s not expanded upon— do they have to remain celibate? Who knows.). I found this whole bit pretty odd and unnecessary, although I realize a lot of my perspective on the matter comes from a modern view of sex and gender (and, y’know, being trans). Not all the gender takes in the book are bad, but they are limited. 

I found Le Guin’s exploration of trauma and ableism through Therru to be more interesting. There’s a lot of examination about how society treats Therru, a survivor of unspeakable abuse. Her trauma is visible due to severe burns along part of her body, leaving her with a missing eye and disfigured hand. Tenar spends much of the novel wondering what future Therru has; no matter how capable she is and how much she acts like any other little girl, strangers gawk at her, or assume she “deserved” what happened to her. Therru becomes happier and more independent over the course of the novel, but relapses into a traumatized state when she encounters one of her abusers. As a survivor, it’s heartbreaking and distressingly realistic. As much as I like Tenar, I almost wish the novel was from Therru’s perspective (other than the brief jump at the end), but I realize it would spoil the ending.  

I’m torn on the ending because, while I thought it was cool and had some interesting revelations, it’s a jarring tonal shift. As I mentioned, Tehanu is a slow novel with a heavy focus on everyday life, and the trials and tribulations both Tenar and Therru experience. There’s even a climactic event a few chapters before the end; the only thing left is a persistent loose thread from earlier in the novel. That subplot explodes to the forefront a bare chapter and a half before the end of the book, and a lot of action-y fantasy stuff happens. It doesn’t come out of nowhere; it’s set up throughout the novel, but it is sudden. 

That being said, I do like that the subplot with dragons vs humans is hinted at as early as The Tombs of Atuan. When Tenar tells the legend about the origin of dragons early in the story, my mind immediately went to that one room from the Labyrinth with the sad winged humanoids painted on its walls. I’m curious if there are hints elsewhere in the series. I also figured out Therru’s true name and how she relates to that subplot based on context clues. While it’s not a shocking twist, it is a satisfying one. Though parts of it gave me a “magical destiny” vibe which is counter to much of the series so far; I do wonder how the last two books will address this. (Also… did Le Guin imply Kalessin is Segoy? AKA God? What did she mean by this. So Ged literally like… hitched a ride from God, who promptly yeeted out of the story until the end? That’s kind of funny. Maybe I misinterpreted something.) 

I probably sound critical of this book, but I did genuinely enjoy it. It just didn’t speak to me the way the previous two did. The next book is a short story collection before the conclusion to the series, so we’ll see where it goes! Tehanu set some stuff up that I expect will be expanded upon in these volumes.

[yozzers-abandoned]

Why You Should Read The 5ds Manga :)

this is actually meant to just be an art archive blog but I feel like talking about this here anyways lets get to it. more spoilery stuff and my opinions under cut. 

It’s only 65 chapters and has been thankfully archived on this reddit post

it’s VERY different from the anime and despite how different the story and characters are it’s really fun to follow along with what we’re given, distinct lack in cyberpunk but there's a lot more emphasis on the aztecs stuff! 

Most of the signer dragons were gained through some sort of inheritance style duel which meant proving yourself to the dragon itself, and also emotionally bonding with it. Which is really neat....

The Godwin brothers have a MUCH more fleshed out reasoning for their actions and what they do just made so much more sense. Genuinely really fun villains, well Roman’s actions are a bit questionable at the start but by the end you kind of forget and just enjoy (er there is a weird bit with roman and his sister...personally i just ignored it... changed the context in my head) 

Yusei is a bit more standoffish in the manga and is a huge adrenaline junkie. He still loves his friends!!! It’s just a bit more downplayed since we meet everyone in like a couple days he doesn’t get a solid bond with anybody but his pseudo brother, Sect. 

Jack just has this sick little evil smile he does all the time he literally never stops looking evil I love manga Jack so much because of this. Also we actually get more backstory on Jack! He shares his backstory with Kiryu and they have a crazy past together. It’s a nice trade off... anime gives us a  more fleshed out backstory on Yusei and Crow’s lives before team 5ds is formed while Jack and Kiryu get more in the manga! 

Crow is really different from his anime counterpart. He hates kids (says so outwardly...but doesn’t really hate them he just sucks at interacting with kids), and is the painfully straight friend in the group. He’s one of the only characters that really interact with Yusei so if you wanted more Crow-Yusei stuff, the manga is for you. 

Aki also changes a lot, she goes to an all girl school, is beloved by the student body and has a posse that follows her around. She has like rivalry tension with this manga-only character and Sherry it is so funny how different she is but her vibes are SO good. She has a Queen title  to parallel Jack’s King title. 

The Twins are evil for reasons for over half the manga but their characterizations are really fun. They have like a fairytale deck and turbo duel together as a cohesive unit. It’s so fucked up because its really unbalanced but their fights are pretty fun! Also Ruka is the callous mature twin and Rua is a crybaby that tries really hard to protect both of them. 

Kiryu completely skips out on his team satisfaction characterization, he has the crash town characterization from when he’s a kid to an adult. I can’t say much because his involvement with Jack really should just be something read for yourself its so good. (or read under cut)

The classism is really downplayed in the manga, people get insulted like twice and that's where it ends. there's still a physical separation, but social boundaries don’t seem to exist between satellite and the city because letting a bunch of people with criminal markers wasn't seen as a big deal in the Fortune Cup (vs people’s reactions to just Yusei being there in the anime Fortune Cup)  

Yusei’s lil brother goes through a whole thing that’s kind of similar to Judai’s Haou possession business. The armor even looks similar lol 

KIRYU HAS SPENT ALMOST A DECADE TRYING TO REACH JACK AND SAVE HIM FROM HIMSELF. Their backstory involves them being lab rat kids who would duel each other constantly to see who would be fitting to inherit Red Dragon Archfiend. Jack leaves via winning and is meant to inherit the card but Kiryu kind of blows up the facility before Jack ever gets it... because he was trying to keep the other lab rat kids safe but they have crazy history or whatever.... their duel was my favorite. 

Crow and Yusei’s dynamic in the manga is genuinely so funny Crow just randomly drops in like “hey hey hey you’re cool, I’m cool, lets be buddies” *punts yusei’s little brother out of the way” and Yusei’s response is, “huh, okay!” 

Sniffling, the Godwin brothers got it so good in the manga like it’s such an interesting take on their story. They’re from like 5000 years ago, and were adopted by this duel priestess who got taken over by an ancient dark god or something. The entire plot is caused by their family feud that was a total misunderstanding and accident where Roman had to kill their sister and Rex thought his brother murdered his sister for no reason and tries to kill HIM but ends up killing his sister as well its a WHOLE thing okay but trust me it’s better than what the anime gave us

THERES REALLY CUTE OMAKES BETWEEN THE CHARACTERS!! LIKE THE SIGNERS GOING TO THE BEACH, PLAYING CARD GAMES JUST FOR FUN!!! Theres also little valentines day stuff and I really love the one where Kiryu holds out the little marshmallow monster at you and the mangaka is like: “I FUCKED UP I DIDN’T REALIZE WHAT GIVING A MASHMALLOW MEANT IM SO SORRY KIRYU FANS!!!” 

[whetstonefires]

Hi Whetstonefire. I have a question about the comic where Nightwing cheats on Starfire with Barbara: What happens directly after that? Does Starfire find out that Nightwing cheated on her? And, if so, how does she react? I've read online that (according to Marv Wolfman) Starfire is the opposite of everything Batman taught Nightwing to be and that Batman taught Nightwing to be repressed and cold. What did Nightwing contribute (emotionally) to the relationship between him and Starfire? (Cont.)

(Cont.) From what I can tell, from online, Nightwing was adamant about standards of mercy and monogamy - how do you think, if Starfire were to be written as her own character and not written around Nightwing and his emotional needs, she would handle and react to that? (This bit is an FYI for other readers: this is just speculation, not hate. Sorry about that.) Sorry about the questions! Have a nice day! 

Okay there are so many separate questions packed in here! I may miss some of them lol and I do not want to put in the hours it would take to produce an orderly response to all this, so this post is going to be a mess.

Initial query and important point: the cheating story was out of continuity. Like, literally, not just by ‘being rejected by the fanbase,’ it was just this weird retcon oneshot that seems to have been some sort of fuck-you to Nightwing or his fans or something. So no, it had no in-setting fallout lol. It, in more ways than most comics, didn't exactly happen.

It was just this weird thing where Dick hooks up with Babs before giving her a wedding invitation, which is both out of character for him in general and out of step with where he was leading up to the wedding--he was desperate to get married so they could have some Normal Stable Adulthood Happiness; the choice to recharacterize him as a fuckboy who regards it as a loss of freedom isn’t congruent, on much more than the level of principle.

As far as how Kori would feel about it, if she had learned...that is very hard to say. Apart from how it would require her to reinterpret everything about where their relationship stood at that point, the data is very unclear, and I don’t even have all of it. Gonna back up to cover some of the rest of the ask, get some context here.

So this actually brings up two of my biggest gripes with Wolfman’s NTT--weird Kori characterization and the weirdly negative interpretation of Batman as parent that backwashed heavily into other titles and influenced the character for the worse, in ways we're very much still dealing with today. 😩

The latter is pretty self-explanatory, though Wolfman’s take that the main thing Bruce taught Dick was repression does shed light on some writing choices and make others funnier. But Kori. Oh my lands.

So, item one, I wouldn't say that Kori is overall opposite Bruce, or even of his philosophy? There are just some very major points of opposition. She isn’t emotionally buttoned-down like at all, especially about positive feelings, although considered realistically with all the bullshit they’ve piled into her backstory she absolutely leans on repression to cope and stay positive, which makes her a lot like Dick actually.

To an extent, she was clearly written around foiling Dick’s Batman-derived traits in the same way that Robin was written to foil Batman, bright and glad and aerial. A Flamebird to his Nightwing in theme if not in name.

You could do some interesting stuff with that, and the bildungsroman aspects of this period of Dick’s life, like he has two roads forward in terms of how he’s going to define ‘adulthood’--does it necessarily require becoming more like his mentor-father, for good and ill, or can he make Kori in part a destination, as it were, and create an adult self that is derived from who he has always been as well as the man he’s modeled himself after?

To an extent I think this even was one of the things going on in ntt but like. Only a little bit.

(Given how much like Bruce Babs is in most of the ways Kori isn’t, especially once she’s Oracle, you could make a case for her as love interest being like. Symbolic of his not being in a rebellious phase? That gets weird and oedipal really fast tho lol.)

Okay stepping down one meta level lol, the thing about answering the 'what would kori' question here is that her character is deeply bound up in her culture, about which we are told and shown a great many contradictory things. Any attempt to read her as an independent character has to tackle not only the gender stuff you allude to and these inconsistencies, but how much of the sheer mess of her is rooted in racism.

'Fantastic' racism, technically, because Tamaraneans aren't real, but the 'taming the savage' narrative that kept surfacing between them and the language used in reference to it is just. The existing racism of presumably the writers, placed in Dick's mouth, and it's super gross. I hate it so much.

(I had a faint hope when they cast her for live action it was with a deliberate intent to directly tackle and better that history, but lollllllll nah. At least they didn’t double down in it tho! Can you imagine, with a black actress, in this day and age....)

So to predict and comprehend Kori, you have to make a lot of calls about Tamaran as a civilization. I like to slightly privilege stuff established earlier if there's no good reason not to, so while much is made over time of her inappropriate rage and the violence she was raised to normalize, I think what she says in her first appearance is good to keep in mind: in her culture, kindness is for friends and cruelty is for enemies. She doesn't understand why the Titans seem to have this backwards.

Kori is not a merciless person. She’s very empathetic, as a rule. With people she loves, she is self-destructively forgiving. That's not a trait only Dick benefits from--her family keeps betraying her in new exciting ways, and she keeps letting them.

Her arc of growing away from that habit is however greatly crippled by centering Dick in the narrative and by the awful 'civilizing' overtones that keep coming into it. When she comes back after the 1986 breakup, still married to Karras, she brings with her a commitment to doing things the Earth way--to eschew lethal force as more than a compromise with her friends’ values, but as a deliberate choice.

This deserved a lot more space and time than it got, and the fact that it didn’t get it is only somewhat due to her being subordinated to Dick and to general writing fail; a lot of it’s just the team book problems of everything happening to everybody all at once.

I mean, Dick’s journey later on to deciding he loves her enough to date her even though she’s married and it’s technically against his principles was packed into this absolutely heinous issue where he was inspired by a woman refusing to separate from her husband who’d just threatened to kill her and their kid with a knife, until being stopped by Nightwing. Because he’s apologizing for what he did.

This is his inspiration for accepting Kori’s marital status! It’s supposed to be heartwarming, as far as I can tell! Not heavyhanded messaging that this is a self-destructive terrible choice in which Kori will inevitably harm him somehow! This issue is pro ‘consensual open relationships under certain circumstances’ and also ‘giving abusers another chance’ as expressions of love. Welcome to the 80s ig.

(Notable is that the wife in this issue was black and the husband and son both looked very white, so it’s probably her stepkid and she probably wouldn’t get to keep him if they separated; this is not even vaguely treated as a factor.)

Point is, everyone was getting too little space to actually go through the amount of development they were getting, and it was clumsily handled; it’s not just her.

In an overlapping period Gar processed his issues with his adoptive father with whom he constantly fought and their shared trauma over the rest of their family (the Doom Patrol) having died violently not long ago via a batshit several-issue storyline where Mento went crazy, created supermutants, and abusively mind-controlled them to attack the Titans. It is literally all like this.

Back to the infidelity thing, now. So much to unpack. So like I mentioned above, their first big breakup, while partially driven by Dick’s existing conflicted feelings about their different ideas about things like ‘killing in battle’ and ‘her identity and loyalties being tied up with her home planet,’ is explicitly over different takes on monogamy.

When Dick is breaking up with her, Kori makes it clear she thinks it’s totally reasonable to have both a husband and a love, since Karras also has someone he loves and they’re both fine with it, but the story doesn't really explain how nonmonogamy works on Tamaran, or even if it's practiced outside the context of political marriage. They do do a sort of...soulbond fusion dance...thing, as part of the ceremony, so marriage is definitely serious business. There are so many levels of cultural difference that get poor to no development.

But to return to the weird ooc retcon cheating story: because of this context, no matter what her personal norms are, Dick specifically casually sleeping with someone else would be something for Kori to be mad about, because of the hypocrisy.

Then there’s the Mirage Incident, which I haven’t read through properly and which was very poorly handled by the writers. Kori is upset about Dick having slept with someone impersonating her and there’s a general vibe of this being treated by Dick’s social circle as unfaithfulness even though he was in fact sexually violated by deceit; it famously sucks.

We still don’t learn a lot here about Kori’s ideas about monogamy, from what I have seen, because her focus is mostly on feeling like Dick doesn’t care about her enough or in the right way since he couldn’t tell the difference. Which is an understandable feeling, even if it’s not an appropriate reaction to have at him at this time.

What Nightwing contributed emotionally........hm. This is a mess, honestly; he was all over the map, and not just because of having Brother Blood in his head. I cannot speak definitively on this, it’s too inconsistent.

For most of their relationship, Kori was the more intensely invested one, the one to initiate and the one who was shown at length to be excited to come home at the end of the day to their shared apartment because her boyfriend was there to see and talk to. If we set aside his more egregious white male bullshit, Dick was pretty emotionally available most of the time, though? They were cute.

Since they split up a lot of ink has been spilled making him less into her in retrospect, but he was pretty invested--leaving her coincided with mental breakdowns both times, and it wasn’t even mostly because she was doing his emotional processing for him, because she wasn’t, although it’s fair to say he often fell into using the relationship as an emotional crutch. Kori was definitely doing the same thing though so...it wasn’t the most balanced relationship in fiction history, but apart from slight codependency and the racism, it was decent enough.

She gets more evenhanded development than most superhero love interests, honestly, because she was costarring in a team book. She had her own storylines. She had other friends.

Mostly both of them just needed some space to finish growing up and stop being retraumatized long enough to process some of the existing trauma better, and I think they could have gone on being good for each other for a long time.

[spirit-shroud]

what are some roles that have been largely changed for cityrune? since you said queen was an influencer now :]

hi ty for asking me im vibrating. havent gotten to talk about this au now for three years and now that chapter 2 is like real and this time i can like........draw occasionally and i have more understanding of nuance...... [grips table] [screams]

this isnt quite what you asked but heres what's everyone from chapter 1 has been Up To with a little bit of context (and under a read more bc it got LENGTHY):

kris - professional stay at home teen (they live w/ asgore n help run the flower shop sometimes. this decision was entirely bc i dont like toriel). was wrongly diagnosed w Sudden Soul Rejection when they were incredibly young and given an experimental transplanted soul as a replacement. it works for them fine, give or take having to see gaster once a month for checkups. but sometimes the soul makes them skittish n decides they're going to sit in front of the pc and play 30 consecutive hours of a certain simulation game and not even let them drown people in the pool. if it were entirely up to them, they'd be like. passing out on the sofa to documentaries about bigfoot. or practicing cool knife tricks to impress their friends at their next tabletop meetup

- EDITED IN: the soul is kind of their friend. they are wearing a hypothetical get along shirt. most of the time, they agree on actions and things to do. tends to refer to themself + their soul as we/us which originally was just something they did in their head but they kept slipping in speech/text n just became a Thing of how they talk. switches to 'I/Me' whenever smth is wrong.

- also edited in: they believe the soul they have is their original soul bc nobody has told them otherwise. whenever theyre like 'oh yeah we think about our soul n view it as a separate entity to us like. all the time. it likes to hurt if we make too many choices it doesn't seem to like and kind of forces us to be a toned down version of what we want to be but thats just how souls are haha' and everyone is like.... 'Hey Kris That's Really Not How It Is.' theyre like. 'huh. gonna ignore that for now' - this was going to be a plot point

toriel - head of H0MEWOR1D (H01)'s department of education; kind of lost her roots as a simple math teacher as she was pushed into a lot of power she didn't even really seek out. divorced asgore over some miscommunications in their relationship; also loosely as a result of grief from asriel's death

asgore - the same. runs a lil flower/gift shop. people come in more to talk with him than to buy flowers most of the time, though

asriel Flowey - he's back in flower form, thanks to the government an accident. causes a lot of technology glitches wherever he goes, and wants revenge. isn't sure how to go about it. asriel "died" around 8 years before the story takes place and kris still misses him and refuses to even THINK about even the IDEA of calling someone their sibling after what happened, just in case it somehow happens a second time

susie - more of the same really. she spends most of her time either at grillby's (she's sort of become his assistant n helps with opening/closing. it just happened) or getting into low-stakes trouble w/ kris

noelle - she's in the city's equivalent of college and shes so tired. shes So Abysmally Tired n got kinda pushed 2 follow in her mom's footsteps. she's rarely around anymore except through text or on monsters & mages (dnd) night. (however.........she will come back w/ a long break n hang out w everyone again)

berdly - tbh i didnt even consider berdly when i made the au initially. idk what he's doing. probably in a similar situation to noelle??? canonically got kicked out of the M&M group due to clashes w/ other players but lurks in their group chat to posts memes sometimes

didnt rly think of any other of kris' classmates (+ their families) after ch1 and probably will continue to not, until chs 3-5 come out and i gotta whip up roles and histories for like. a lotta guys all of a sudden. i also forgot about noelle's parents

sans - runs a convenience store that everyone kind of thinks is a front, but also it has really cheap snacks and the local teens make a point of stopping there after school. so essentially, more of the same papyrus - similar to ut. is a very polite and sweet boy but you'll know when he's coming

grillby - he's back. he runs a bar like back in ut but the cozy vibes and weird-for-a-bar hours keep attracting kids who need parents, so half of his menu is comprised of overly sweet mocktails. usually only frequented by monsters

QC - same as usual. has a "rivalry" with grillbz but, theyre besties and have a book club

mettaton - he's real and he's back. he's similar to how he is back in ut w/ his EX body. likes to hang out at grillby's and talk to unsuspecting fans. has a show for everything

napstablook - similar to how they are in ut. helps mtt with making music sometimes. doesn't leave the house too often, but spends a lot of time posting on undernet

undyne - unfortunately. more of the same. she is a cop in the monster district. i am also upset by this but couldn't think of anything better for her

alphys - a doctor studying under dr. gaster in the hopes she'll one day take over his research. she spends most of her time as a nurse with a bigger title, though, and blocks out the weirdness of her job with anime.

gaster - weird guy. H01's top soul researcher and resident House wannabe. trying to manufacture the ultimate soul that can be controlled with simple internal switches, but so far he's only had 1 (very limited) success with a certain human. monsters just melt, and darkners just sorta......get weird... he's onto Something, though.

ralsei - lonely boy with some very strange hobbies. popular on UnderNet for poetry, baking videos, and general cryptid vibe. is the DM for the monsters & mages group (also seems to think everything is actually very fine in H01 when it is very much not)

lancer - about the same. professional Round Boy. lives w/ rouxls full time. follows susie around like a lost puppy and calls himself her "underling."

rouxls - runs a hotel/casino kind of deal where the objective Bad Guys hang out, and usually ends up doing any of the spade king's paperwork.

spade king - mafia godfather. kind of a dick. don't play cards with him

seam - works with the spade king as his right hand cat more or less because they have for a lot of years and are in that 'sunk cost fallacy' zone. thinks of retiring to a quiet life in the monster section of town like, daily

jevil - used to work with the spade king, but got imprisoned for Crimes. got weird after The Accident (separate from asriel's accident)

temmies (all) - dont really get mentioned except offhandedly but they run the monster space station. so far, are the only monsters who have ever been to space.

as far as chapter 2 goes:

yeah i dont have much so far for characters. in the original version of the au i accidentally made darkners as a whole just kinda..... not great? like all sorts of weird organized crime ties n sort of going out of their way to be A Problem to the city (not even in like. a revolution way. in a working against them but with the same goals kinda way). with the whole context it worked At The Time, bc i just had the spade king to look to as a villain, and also in this au the darkners are just trying to survive a world that ultimately was not built for them (that humans think they own, and monsters sort of... seeing this and wondering what it'll mean for them whichever one wins), but w/ new info abt how the dark world works n more guys to work with i want to kind of. edit the vibe a bit. like yea darkners will ultimately do whatever it takes to take over H01, but maybe in a better way than like. idk. all this. it doesnt have to be peaceful or anything it just has to be more adaptable as we meet more kinds of darkners

however yeah i thought up 'queen as some sort of childless mommy blogger/influencer' and that completely revived all memory i had of this au. she should be on mtt's talkshow. also she sells collectible wine glasses w/ her likeness

spamton is another one of gaster's failed soul experiments, but he hasn't melted yet, and seems............fine? sort of. so he hasn't gotten decommissioned yet. he does want to give you malware tho. hot monster singles in your area n all that

im blanking on the rest of the guys but i hope any of this was comprehensible

[soldouthaz]

Hey love! Can you give us a quick summary of all the fics you’re currently working on and also of those you kind of have ideas to write about in the future but haven’t started yet? I’m so interested in your writing 💕

ahh of course!!! I'll put it all below the cut in case anyone wants to be surprised :) thank you so much for your interest! I hope you’re doing well! 

okay, so aside from a couple that I'm keeping secret for now, these are all the ones that I'm currently working on! (I'll put my other ideas that I haven’t started yet near the bottom of the post! 

1. single dad fic 

this one and the next one will most likely be out sometime in the beginning of 2021 since I’ve already got a bit of them written! this one is abo too, which is also still kind of new to me! L moves in next door to H who has a daughter, and quickly becomes caught up in their lives, getting attached to both H and the little girl. there are a few twists and turns along the way though because I can’t help but write in some angst, and I’m excited to write these characters! I don’t think I've ever written a kid fic before, so this one is full of new concepts for me! 

2. look after you iii 

this one has been a long time coming, but I'm hoping to get it out sometime before march 2021 if all goes well! it’s the final addition to my look after you series, and I feel like it wraps everything up really nicely. it also shows a more serious and domestic side to those characters than any other part of that ‘verse, and touches on some important aspects of my own life like adoption and a few other things yet to be revealed. I always say that this series began as an excuse to practice writing smut, but it’s turned into so much more to me :) 

3. science & faith

I've mentioned this one a few times before as well! it’s STEM major L who has dedicated his career to proving that love doesn’t actually exist. H is a philosophy major that challenges him from the beginning, and through several interviews they become unexpected friends. cue major character development and wayyyyyy too much psych/philosphy conjecture because it’s my guilty pleasure. some of my favorite fics are the ones where they’re both insanely intelligent and debate a lot, so I've tried to mirror some of that in this! 

4. sitcom au 

okay, this is the first of several long fics that I want to write this coming year! this one is an idea that I've been obsessed with for nearly two years now, and I'm finally getting around to writing some of it! it’s loosely based around Friends, but very different I'd say. the entire gang are on a new-age sitcom and the fic explores their lives both on and off screen. it’s enemies to lovers (sort of) and has a bit of side ziam because it’s my guilty pleasure, and I feel like it’s one of the most real, raw, emotional pieces I've ever written. I am so so so so excited about this one, and I feel like people will really be able to relate to many aspects of it!!! 

5. love & monsters 

this au is loosely based around the movie that came out earlier this year (Love & Monsters) in which the world ends, but not entirely. I'm changing quite a few details about it though! the vibe here is very dystopian, everyone lives in bunkers, and there are giant, radioactive insects as a result of the world ‘ending’ (lots of world building which will be explained in detail in the fic!). this one features bunker leader H and traveler L, and it’s another one that is unlike anything I've ever written before! I have so many ideas for this one, and I've always wanted to try my hand at a dystopian type world! 

6. speakeasy au 

this one was inspired by the lovely, talented @loubellies !!!!!!! her fic was phenomenal, and it immediately inspired me to want to write a fic that took place in a similar ‘verse! mine will take some slightly different turns and hopefully won’t be too similar! as the rough title suggests, it’s based around a speakeasy and it’s also a historical au (I am going to try my best to make everything historically accurate, but I made a B- in history in school so - we’ll see!) so far it’s got lots of prohibition-era type themes, suspender-wearing H, and one of the most interesting L’s I've ever written, I think. oh, and LOTS of alcohol! I'm excited to try to write some crime/action more in depth! 

7. married in vegas au 

for this one I wanted to go back to my roots for another road trip fic! it’s strangers to lovers to enemies and then back to lovers (sorry for the slight spoiler, but you know I'm incapable of writing anything other than a happy ending) and features H&L both flawed and at some difficult parts of their lives, and they both find themselves in vegas hoping for a distraction. on the trip back to their old lives they both are forced to confront some things and improve themselves, and maybe also learn to love again while they’re at it. I adore road trip au’s and character development, so this is another one I'm really excited about! 

8. abo royalty au 

the last I'll share of my current wips for now is one that I've had in my idea list for a while, but randomly wrote a few thousands on over the past few weeks! it’s a historical royalty au that’s abo, featuring royal H. I don’t want to give away too much of L’s storyline just yet, but his character is one of my favorites in this one for sure! also, may or may not be written with my lovely friend @falsegoodnight .... let me know? ;) 

that’s about it for now! I have nearly 30 wips but I only counted the ones that have significant word counts here, and I'll put some below with the ideas! 

and then here are some in my list that have 10k or less that I want to write in the future (feel free to send me ideas or things you’d like to see in them, or to ask me for more info if you’re curious!): 

- ziam au 

- sterek au 

- fashion designer!L 

- rival CEO’s (this one has over 10k but it’s been abandoned for a bit! I need to get back into it!) 

-superpowers au 

- ghost writer!L / popstar!H au 

- *possibly* a triplet fic (nothing weird! strictly X/L | X/L | X/L) 

- witch!L 

- more vampy drabbles 

- a pride and prejudice au where L is mary

- phone sex operator!H but the hotline is for aftercare

- H is engaged to someone else (although ris @falsegoodnight knocked this trope OUT OF THE PARK and I don’t think I could ever do it justice after reading hers!) 

- some modern day fairytales 

- I'd like to do some more uni au’s as well! 

- a loosely inspired reversed Grease au where L is preppy and pretends he doesn’t know H when they get back to school, and H is from the ‘wrong side of the tracks’ and falls head over heels for L 

alrighty, I think that’s about it! these are most of my plans for the next two years or so, with the exception of some drabbles/pwp’s/some other works that I'm keeping private for now! if you see anything you’d like more info on or make any suggestions for, please don’t hesitate to reach out or send me an ask! 

and thank you again for asking me this, I've really been uninspired recently and I feel like I'm kind of dragging, but getting to talk a little bit about them has made me very happy tonight! thank you so much again for your interest, and I hope you have a lovely rest of your day/night! <3 

[moonlightreal]

Thoughts on the Fate trailer

Some quiet, mild opinions.

“enemies known as the Burned Ones”

That’s interesting.  If the Dragonfire is back as the source of all magic after the funny dipsydoodle of a retcon in season 8, then the Burned Ones are probably connected to it in some way.  They could be something mystical like “the ashes that remain after the flame of goodness is extinguished” or maybe they’re people who tried to capture the flame’s power but weren’t the chosen one.  There are possibilities here.

Tecna, Flora and Terra

The trailer makes me think that the show’s writers didn’t actually go to the Winx cartoon for their inspiration, they went to traditional fairy lore.  The thing is filmed in Ireland and the ep titles are all from Yeats…. This is cool.  Fairy lore has some great dark stuff in it.

But that’s probably why Tecna got the chop; not much place for a fairy of Technology in a world of ye olde ancient lore and with only six episodes to work with fewer characters means more time for the ones we’ve got..  So I assume they decided to merge Flora and Tecna—and even merge their NAMES—to get Terra.  I wouldn’t be surprised if at some stage of planning Terra was going to be fairy of both, maybe something like “she’s fairy of plants and stone and computers run on silicone and crystal circuits so she can magic technology.” Then I suspect the technology aspect just got pushed aside at a later stage of planning.  That’s a plausible leadup to Terra, I wonder if it really happened that way...  I kind of wish they’d just straight up cut Tecna and had Flora be Flora instead of introducing a new character.  

I think we’re all gonna just mentally replace Terra with Flora anyway making the whole thing unnecessary.

Musa, Fairy of Mind

Confuses me.  Have the writers not watched Escape to Witch Mountain?  They could’ve just given her a suitable instrument—maybe not a harmonica, but pan pipes or a flute-type thing.  A magical woodwind of some description she could play to move things or do magic.  Music is tied up with traditional fairy magic so it would’ve fit! I’m worried that “Fairy of Mind” will just mean “all the psychic cliches” and won’t be as cool as it could have been.  But maybe there was a solid plot reason for Fairy of Mind!

Costume comments

I was surprised by how dowdy the clothes are in that standing-at-the-gate scene, but then I realized if they’d been in the scanty skirts and low-cut tops I’d been expecting I’d be making fun of that.  So I guess I’ll be pleased about the clothes!  I really, really want this show to be about magic not about teenage sexual tension. Please, show, please actually be about magic… T_T

I do like that the girls are color coded, just a personal taste I like color coded characters, but wish they’d tried to use their Winx colors instead.  Everybody had perfectly good colors already!

Sets

The Irish castle they got to be Alfea looks gorgeous.  The stone circle looks… appropriate!  Finally, a stone circle!  Can’t have magic without having a stone circle turn up sooner or later!  The cool green forest looks amazing.  I am a little worried about how dark some scenes look.  Not gritty dark, but literal I-can’t-see dark.  Very annoying when you can’t see what’s actually happening in the show you’re trying to watch.

And that globe filled me with delight.  Not sure why, I mean every show has props but just the notion that someone made this otherworld globe for this show is just wonderful.

Wingless Fairies

The problem with wingless fairies with elemental powers is what makes them not witches or benders or psychics?  But the problem with wings is how do you DO them in live action?  Wings need to look magical, move like they’re real body parts, work realistically with clothes, and not have a cosplay vibe. I mean, it can be done but it would cost a mint and then the girls would have to fly and that means swinging the actresses around in front of a green screen and paying the CG people enough to not have it look bad… how big is the budget for this show?

Carnival Row did live action wings all right, having them hang limp when not in use but the hanging wings looked really weird flopping behind the fairies!  And Carnival Row had amazon money to get that far.

I was hoping for brief wings, something like: Bloom casts a big spell and as she poses CG wings blossom out behind her just for the few seconds it takes to cast the spell.  Once she moves the wings vanish so they don’t have to move with her.  That still might happen!  And I’m happy the CG magic we’ve seen looks good.

[teababe27]

Notes From the 2020 Myanimelist.net Challenges - Part 2: Manga

Time for Part 2 of the Thoughts on the Challenge posts; this one talking about the manga side.

A lot of the executive dysfunction and side effects of the chemo kinda took away my desire to read sometimes. As such, I didn’t get as far into the challenge as I had hoped, only getting about halfway through the required amount I had chosen for myself. There were even a few manga I was reading for the challenge that I have unfortunately not yet finished (Billy Bat, Battle Angel Alita, Meteor Methuselah), so I reluctantly won’t be including them on here. However, I did still read and finish some decent manga and some pretty good ones, too.

Like the anime post, I will mention some honorable mentions/one I had thoughts on, followed by my favorites that I read for the challenge this year.

Let’s do this.

Honorable Mentions/Other Notables:

Scumbag Loser (aka Saiteihen no Otoko) - completed for the task “Read a manga series you can finish in one day”

Masahiko is a fat, perverted loser who has a smell fetish and thinks everyone is beneath him. He takes solace in the fact that he’s not the Class Loser. However, when the Class Loser gets a girlfriend, Masahiko becomes the new Class Loser. Desperate to get out of this position, he lies and says he has a girlfriend: his childhood friend Haruka, who transfers to his class the next day. But there’s a problem that only Masahiko knows: Haruka died several years before. 

This wins Worst of the Challenge, but I didn’t hate it entirely. Masahiko is not a good person, which is usually a negative in my book. This manga basically goes from 0 to 100 real fast. It takes a couple unexpected turns and I couldn’t help but wonder how the problem would be stopped. Ends on a bit of a downer.

Dragon Head - completed for the task “Read a manga that started serialization in the 90s”

While on a school field trip, the train carrying the students crashes after a natural disaster. Teru is the only survivor in his class. While trying to find a way out, he finds two other survivors, Ako and Nobuo. The three survivors try to escape while dealing with lack of food and light, earthquakes, cults, and the freaking apocalypse happening outside.

This manga was quite the ride. Creepy and scary at times. The artwork was really good, definitely adding to the atmosphere. I liked the characters. The story did kinda drag a bit in the middle and I felt the ending was kinda rushed and stopped inconclusively, but I liked this one.

Omukae Desu - completed for the task “Read a manga that started publishing the same month and year as one of your listed favorites” (Azumanga Daioh, in this case)

Madoka is a college student who has the power to see lost souls, kinda like the Ghost Whisperer. He is recruited by Nabeshima (the guy in the bunny suit on the manga cover) to work for the GSG, an organization that helps transport wandering souls to the afterlife. In order to help, Madoka often lets the souls briefly take over his body to do various things that they always wanted to do before passing on.

This manga was actually pretty adorable at times. Lighthearted and fun. Characters are kinda hit-and-miss, though their interactions are very amusing. I liked it.

Deathtopia - completed for the task “Read a manga that got cancelled/axed”

Kou Fujimura is an average guy. One day, he gets into an accident and is severely injured, leaving him blind and on the brink of death. He gets surgery and survives, but he now has psychic abilities and can see weird monsters. A mysterious woman appears, and she recruits him to help her and her fellow hot assassins who work for the police department. He helps the ladies take out the aforementioned weird monsters called Cheaters, people who come back from the dead with special abilities and blend in with normal people.

I liked the story/concept a lot. Kinda gave me Parasyte vibes at times. A little bit too fanservice-y at times. Very good in the beginning, but took a lot of lapses in logic (pointed out in the scanlations I read) near the end, and the ending felt rushed, though I can blame that on the manga being prematurely cancelled. I still recommend this one, as the story is interesting and the action is good.

The!! Beach Stars - completed for the task “Read a manga with a symbol in the title”

The sequel to the manga Beach Stars that I read for last year’s challenge. 

Iruka and the rest of the team are back, getting ready for and competing in the Madonna Cup. Iruka’s goal is still the same: to beat the local volleyball champ Sanae Kayakawa.

Everything I liked about the prequel is here. The action/sports scenes are great, and the camaraderie between the ladies is cool, too. Though it is disappointing that this sequel is only 12 or 13 chapters, as some things could have used more buildup and fleshing out, especially the final match. Still a fun read, though.

Favorites from the Challenge:

Watashitachi no Shiawase na Jikan (aka Our Happy Time) - completed for the task “Read a featured manga” (Article: https://myanimelist.net/featured/1561/11_Epic_Manga_That_Deserve_to_Be_Adapted_into_Anime)

Juri is a former pianist who has gone down a dark path after a traumatic event in her life. She has grown to hate her mother, who was once a famous pianist herself. Juri has since attempted suicide multiple times. Yuu is a convict on death row charged with murder, and he has tried to kill himself as well. When Juri’s aunt Monica, a nun, invites her to visit Yuu, their lives both change forever.

This manga makes me think of how a friend told me they recently saw the movie Collateral Beauty for the first time. They said it was melodramatic, but they cried and enjoyed the movie all the same. This pretty much sums up how I felt about this manga.

This one honestly made me tear up a bit, as melodramatic as it was. A little dark, but I was still invested in the characters and the situations. The art is really good, too. It’s one volume, so it doesn’t take that long to read. 

Kingyosou - completed for the task “Read a manga that includes a character with a disability”

One day, a girl, Asuka, falls in love with a boy, Manami, after hearing him play the taiko drums at a school festival. Manami is deaf, however, and has closed his heart to love. Asuka and Manami get to know each other and face various obstacles in their relationship, both relating and not relating to Manami’s deafness.

I thought this manga was really sweet. I also liked that there was deaf representation here, though I can’t really speak on how accurate it is because I’m not deaf myself. You don’t see many manga where the characters have disabilities. The relationship felt a little more realistic in this one because it took some time (as proportional as time can take in a 2-volume manga) for Manami and Asuka to get into the relationship. Another manga that was short, sweet, and to the point, at only 2 volumes.

Babel - completed for the task “Read a manga that appears when putting in your username in the Myanimelist search bar”

Kouta is a hotel waiter dissatisfied with his job serving rich clientele on New Year’s Eve at the Babel Hotel. On New Year’s Day, a worldwide terrorist attack occurs, with bombs going off everywhere. Kouta then meets someone who gives him the ability to go back in time. Kouta has to use this ability to stop the terrorist attack from happening and pretty much causing WW3.

I liked this manga a lot. A lot of unexpected plot twists. A fascinating mystery, keeps you hooked. I’ve always found time travel plots to be interesting as well.

Bloom Into You (aka Yagate Kimi ni Naru) - completed for the task “Read a Shounen Ai or Shoujo Ai manga” (tagged Shoujo Ai)

Yuu is a new high school freshman who loves romance manga and wants to experience a love story of her own. But when a classmate confesses his feelings to her, Yuu finds she feels nothing. Yuu sees the student council president, Nanami, turning down a love confession herself. Yuu joins the student council and she and Nanami become friends. Nanami soon confesses her feelings for Yuu, and Yuu is confused.

This one is tied with the next entry in this post for Best of the Challenge.

I loved this manga. So sweet and adorable. Made me tear up at times. Great, well-written character development. Doesn’t rely on bad/problematic tropes like certain other yuri I’ve read and watched recently. I loved watching this complex and realistic relationship between Yuu and Nanami develop. Some of Yuu’s feelings are pretty relatable. Read this one if you’re looking for a great yuri manga.

Inside Mari (aka Boku wa Mari no Naka) - completed for the task “Read a Psychological or Thriller manga” (tagged Psychological)

Isao Komori is a shut-in who spends his time after dropping out of college fapping, playing video games, and visiting a local convenience store every night to see a high school girl named Mari, who he admires from afar. One day, Isao finds that he is in Mari’s body! Isao-as-Mari continues to live her life and tries to find out how to switch back.

I know I mentioned this earlier, but I’ll be giving Best of the Challenge to both Bloom Into You and Inside Mari. I honestly couldn’t decide between the two, as they are from two different subgenres and two different styles. Kinda like how I couldn’t decide between Hereditary and Into the Spiderverse as my favorite movie of 2018 because they were so different form each other that I couldn’t really compare them.

This manga threw me for a loop multiple times. A subversion and deconstruction of the usual body-swap plots. A darker take on one, if you will. A couple of interesting plot twists, and the manga often takes a different direction than you expect, especially about halfway through the manga, where it switches to different characters’ points of view.

Highly recommended, though not for everyone.