#but w&p is a genuinely fun read the characters are so human

[voidify333]

thinking about war & peace again… pierre bezukhov really is the original poor little meow meow

[dirtyoldmanhole]

continuing the 'gunter is a obfuscating snake of a sleezeball in the married conquest route and i'm kinda into it' thought: one line that bothered me for a while was in his JP S-support; it's basically his confession line:

Gunther: A promise is a promise. Please answer the question. Kamui: Y-yeah, all right… I don’t have anyone like that… Gunther: I see. Then, what about someone like me? Kamui: W-what? Gunther: You are the only woman that I have loved.

[record scratch] here's the fun thing:

that is a straight up lie.

what about your dead wife gunter? the one you spent twenty-thirty years plotting revenge for and was the literal reason you got possessed by? (kronk voice) that wife? :P

there's a few plausible reasonings for this discrepancy: one, it's not the character, somebody at nintendo straight up didn't play revelation. fates was rushed, it's entirely possible that some S-supports were not double-checked for facts when iirc the routes were being done by separate teams. (1b: technically you could argue 'maybe he didn't actually love her lol' which is darkly hysterical, but that feels so wildly out of character to the whole 'plotting revenge for 20 years' shtick that i'm tossing that out). and then two: nintendo itself fully intended gunter to be lying to corrin.

and i think it's that second reasoning.

which is interesting b/c nintendo almost always falls on the line of warping characters to be lovestruck waifus/husbandos that worship you/corrin even if it starts to bend/break their characterization. why keep his sharp, murky edges of all characters? I genuinely don't think i've ever seen nintendo go as far as have a character baldly lie to you the player so boldly especially when it comes to the main love confession---nintendo doesn't really mix the 'cold blooded emotional manipulation' with the waifuism.

now ... I do think he genuinely loves corrin [gestures @ my whole revelation loveblog]. different topic, that, but both can co-exist, since i think gunter doubling down on the 'you're the only one :)' shtick is him being so petrified at how many questions will be asked about his past, especially in conquest.

don't forget in conquest, corrin (thinks) and is truly considered to be garon's daughter.

you know. the dude that killed his wife he swore revenge on.

awkward, my dude, to fall in love with garon's daughter, lul.

and yet - gunter's trying to balance 'we genuinely love each other, let's start with a clean slate' with 'she's gonna start asking shit i don't want to get into if i do try to be honest ... nope nope nope not gonna go there'. he's a bit of a coward there, but in some ways i can't blame him. there's a lot of hints that point to him being painfully lonely as a closet widow, and the idea of ruining this tender new love with a lot of painful shit in his past is a risk he just kinda... sidesteps.... and keeps sidestepping........... until it's just too awful to even bring up to begin with.

it's a very human flaw.

but even still on the other hand, i think it says a lot of darkly nuanced things that he has no qualms not even just not telling corrin shit, his spouse in conquest, but actively lying to her about his past and doubling down on that secret.

honestly in another metatextual level, it's kind of fridge brilliance for setting up how, mmmm long-term emotionally manipulative he can be, that's only really shown in revelation ('i've been using you all along'). you also see glimmers of it with corrin's A-support with silas with the literal gaslighting corrin to forget about silas; so this isn't a one-off moment.

gunter is a fucking fantastic snake of an actor.

and lastly on another level, ultimately i think that line is actually one of those that explains some people's terrible reading comprehension of gunter. don't forget that Fate's EN fan-translation scene that first year was huge, far bigger than any other FE game, and so a lot of fandoms/people's opinions were shaped by osmosis from the JP script versus the EN script. I could totally see people taking that implication he's never been married at face value and genuinely being confused as to his actual backstory if they've never played revelation. basically everything about his character is all misdirections right down to playing players like a fiddle with his assumed archetype (jeigan, wholesome dad), and the abyss between what he says and what he is.

tl;dr more sleazeball midlife crisis jeigans plz 🙏

[mlobsters]

supernatural s12e17 the british invasion (w. eugenie ross-leming, brad buckner)

trying to reserve judgement but 30 seconds in a flipped back to football when i tried this yesterday. let me count the ways i do not care about bmol backstory. glad to see eileen again

are you fucking kidding me. children have to battle to the death at the fancy magic school. quite possibly the least believable premise for traumatic backstory starter they could have thrown out there

sam really leaning into dean's space there lol

so american mol were just this chill little group of dorky researchers but british mol are this child crushing machine to churn out good little soldiers? mommy's blunt little instruments?

DR HESS Then let me make it blisteringly simple. We don't have time to court a handful of mangy Colonials. Not anymore. So either Sam and Dean and the rest of their ill-bred lot learn to obey, or you turn them over to Mr. Ketch... and start fresh. MICK Look, I don't think... DR HESS This is not a discussion. It's an order. Are you hearing me, Michael? Assimilate or eliminate.

this is so.... ridiculous. cliche, out of left field. really not gonna beat the "we're out of ideas" rap. speaking of, was trying to explain this season's plotlines to my friend and had the sudden brainwave of OF COURSE i know who the product of the lucifer kelly KLINE union is. typing out the name had me 🤦lol

SAM Hey, you talk to Mom lately? MICK Oh, shouldn't worry about your mum. Her and Ketch make quite the team. DEAN Would you want your mom working with him? MICK Well, I can't say. I never really knew my mum. Or my dad. I was on the streets till the Men of Letters found me.

oh a street urchin too! *adds to the pile*

WHY ARE YOU LICKING THE FLOOR'S PUSSY LIKE THAT I AM SO DISTRESSED. the licking was enough to make me cover the screen but the moaning i wasn't expecting 😭 dear lord. ace thing/me thing but my faves doing sex scenes weirds me out and this might have been worse lol way too much like actual sex

LUCIFER I figured out the rules of the house, and…well, all things considered, think I'd rather be here than rotting in the Cage with my drooling, insane – and not in a fun way – little bro Michael.

how did he manage to break michael? i'll be generous and assume it's a lie along with the whole "you win" business

so is mary humanizing mr ketchup or gonna fuck him or what

CROWLEY My loyal…ish subjects, these troubled times, I'm aware there might be some confusion as to where you're supposed to place your loyalty. Even with Lucifer back in the Cage, there are those of you who would try to help him… because he scares you or engorges you.

ew :p

i don't think even mark pellegrino can save this tired little game we're playing again

padalecki, please, no with the bad accent

very pretty lighting and backdrop

eileen accidentally killing sniveling bootheel of the machine so mick can overcome some childhood murderous brainwashing? and set up conflict with the mothership?

(yes to the fucking mr ketchup and she's gonna Have It All *beanie toss*)

ok.

(script)

wasn't sure if that was swoony over the flirting or freaked out, so i guess it was supposed to be swoony

his plotline is frustrating me but goddamn pellegrino is so good at making lucifer genuinely, distressingly creepy

ah so the plot conflict with bmol and an emotional beat for eileen. twofer

does the flirtation business ever go anywhere with eileen? i will admit that ellen eileen jody donna all kind of blur in my head from what i've read in fic (side characters that generally aren't involved in what i'm reading except very briefly that may have a familial-ish relationship with the boys, as i might them in the show i have small oh moments)

(oh the actress who plays dagon, ali ahn, was in 27 out of 36 episodes of the path, which i briefly tried to watch because hugh dancy is in it but it was a little too topical for my tolerance at the moment)

DR HESS These Hunters are out of control. The brothers Winchester, in particular, which Lady Bevell has exhaustively documented.

so fancy, brothers winchester. the whole moral high ground lady this is trying to sell is so fucking dumb because yeah forcing children to murder each other, they're totally better than the monsters! pick something else, writers, because this is just asinine

redemption arc for mick complete, time to shuffle him off this mortal coil ofc

DR HESS The grand experiment recruiting American Hunters has failed. Utterly. KETCH Mm. What would you like me to do? DR HESS Exterminate them. Every...last...one.

comically bad. where's your pet cat and eye patch

look they keep trying to reach cas and nothing, because cas decided to pop off to heaven and not tell them. le sigh!

[sarahtheconjurer]

@ghosttmachine tagged me in a get to know you meme thing (tyyy!!)! So. Here i am posting for oncce lez goooo

Last song:

Technical answer is post traumatic blues by corey taylor, bc ive been using the spotify dj thing and it keeps giving me metal that i o ly kinda like. The funner answer was rhe barbie movie ost since me and my friends literally just got back from it n my friend mariana had me play it in the car. Not rlly my thing was catchy (barbie movie was good btw! Posts abt it being like. Not the deepest critique of social issues and the like are correct but it was a fun time w a lot of heart + rlly great production value + honestly. Very funny. And i watched it w two of my best friends so :})

Currently reading:

For books:

When the Angels Left the Old Country

I haven't touched it in a hot sec, but its a queer, historical fantasy ya book based in jewish folklorex about an angel and a demon that leave europe, after a girl goes missing from the village they've set up shop in. It's very light and whimsical which is not my usual fare, but I'm enjoying it! Its very heartfelt and the two main leads have very good chemistry. And its always cool to see angel/demon lore outside the usual christian sphere.

For manga: steel ball run (part 7 of jojos bizarre adventure) its. A story about a cross continental horse race to find the body parts of jesus. Which is the most coherent way i can put it. Im rereading it w two of my friends rn and im enjoying it! It isnt my favorite part, but its up there, and features some of the best stuff in the series. This is. Also a story featuring a pair of ride or die protagonists with a very strong dynamic and chemistry (honestly, best 'set' of protags in the series) and so much comes from their bond. Its at the point in the series where it started getting a monthly release and it shows, w some rlly gorgeous art. Gyro and Diego are highlights artwise because the former doesnt have a stand he just. Has these steel balls he spins and throws around, so you get very dynamic shots of him just. Chucking them that the author uses in super creative ways to lead the eye and compose panels and the latter. Can turn himself and other things into dinosaurs. Have you ever seen a dinosaur ride a horse? Its fucking sick. It also has some interesting themes of american imperialism and christianity, of all things, which i think are done, well in some respects, esp given the authors track record. IT ALSO HAS SOME OF THE WORST STUFF IN THE SERIES THAT MAKES ME WANT TO KILL HIM W HAMMERS.

Currently watching:

Nothing in particular, but ive got a p big to watch list (Trigun, mob psycho, etc) and i just watched the barbie movie, like i said.

Current obsession:

Guess. Take a guess.

Jfc jojos bizarre adventure is holding me at gunpoint. Its not good its not bad (besides when it is) it its own tier of media. I forgot how much 15 year old me was obsessed w it and so i foolishly rewatched it thinking id be. Normal. I was wrong. God. I've never seen anything like it! It's so clearly a passion project from someone who's very eccentric and so it goes from absurd and stupid and comedic to circling right back to being very human and poignant. Like, it's about love! And familial trauma! And prevailing in the face of great tragedy! And also killing the president because jesus told you so! It's got a myriad of flaws from technical writing issues to genuinely tasteless/bigoted content, so its not some untouchable media, but ive been enjoying it a lot.

Part 5 and 8 are my favorites for very different reasons.

Part 5, Golden Wind, is abt a bunch of weird mobsters on a roadtrip through italy to kill their boss. It has a very charming supporting cast who are a sort of found family of societal rejects, brought together by this guy named Bruno who acts as a leader + mentor + sort of dad? To them. They're all surprisingly fleshed out characters, esp for this early on in the series, and their group dynamic, combined w some of the best fights in the entire show, really sell this part. The main character and main villain are. Not good. Sans a few aspects. Tho. Like i forget giorno is there half the time. (Giorno is my beloved stale cracker of a character but hes MY stale cracke, tho)

Part 8, Jojolion, is uh. Hm. It follows this amnesiac dude who wakes up in the dirt, as he tries to piece together the person he was. It's set in an au version of the town from part 4, w some characters being spins on old ones. Its the most recent part, and it shows. Its a lot better structured, paced, and developed compared to earlier parts. The mystery running through it has a lot of fun twists and turns, the themes are coherent, and the pace is slow, but not meandering. The supporting cast is fun (the lead's romantic interest is an actually decent jojo woman and they have a very cute relationship, and the family the main character is sort of adopted into are all fucking insane) but the real draw for me was the main character. Josuke (the second. Theres another josuke from an alternate universe in part 4, anyway) is probably my favorite jojo. I could go on about him, but compared to the others, he feels the most real? Theres this very grounded sense of frustration abt him as he tries and fails to piece together who he is, while everyone around him seems to have somethimg they need from him, or an idea of who he SHOULD be. He isnt a hero, he isnt even all that noble, hes just trying to find himself and if anyone out there loves him. He's blunt, one track minded, and is doing the jojo equivalent of spamming x to skip through all the dialogue bc hes not here for anyones shit beside his own. Jojolion somehow captures the feeling of being a weird, displaced pseudo adult trying to piece yourself together, while everything Keeps Fucking Happening. I love it so much. But by god does the ending suck hoooooly shit oh my god dude jesus christ. Fucking. I hate tohru i hate tohru i hate tohru fjcjendnxzlzm. Anyway jobin sweep

OTHER OBSESSIONS INCLUDE OCS AND DND.

Im currently running a csm tabletop n curse of strahd game, and am in a ravenloft game. They're all very different but i love them all.

Ravenloft game is a sort of sequel to the curse of strahd game i was in a while bsck

I play pageturn (kenku paladin) and coda (changeling flavored as fallen angel, bard). Ones a 13 year old w a kill drive going through a double crisis of faith while somehow being the heart of the group and the others a shapeshifting corrupted celestial, whos trying to find themself. we are currently exploring the fomain the latter was imprisoned in and have found the eye of vecna and. I am. Excited and concerned for what our wonderful dm has cooked up.

Chainsaw Man game is a high stakes office drama following the worst group of devil hunters youve ever seen. Its more episodic and light than my other games which is a nice change of pace, and i rlly like the energy our group brings to the table. I am always horrified and surprised by whatever new government supplied human rights violation they commit next! Every character is uniquely sad, while still maintaining the token csm dark comedy abt them. We are currently revisiting a mystery allll the way back from our first session and im stoked for some stuff i have planned.

Sippy Crew (curse of strahd game) is drawing to a close and ahh i could make a whole post abt how much these guys mean to me. Its been a joy dming for this group of freaks and watching as they come together not into a found family, but a group of distinctly doomed, but fiercely loyal individuals. They've had two pc deaths, even more close calls, and have lost so much, but they're pushing through like dandelions in concrete. Its genuinely the most emotionally invested ive been in a ttrpg, and am so excited, to see their journey come to a close, and will miss them dearly.

Both jojo and ttrrpgs have been a way to reconnect with friends i dont usually talk to as much, and strengthen the bonds of the friends that i do, which is why theyve hit so hard, haha.

anwyaY this turned out way longer than it needed to be bUt.

@turtleslothart @500sunstone you. Do this.

[brainimpediment]

[door to the ask box slams wide open] Characters PLEASE tell me your character thoughts if you have any. Favorites? Top 10? Somebody had a wacky hairstyle you liked? Infodump to me if you'd like to I would LOVE to hear your thoughts on it (especially Chapter 2. Top 3/5 favorites, you know how it is)

OH!!! Im glad you asked !!!!

I was reading it like pretty late at night + just got out of school so I’m trying to recall everythign that even happened,, but I know 4 sure I rlly enjoyed it!!!!!:33:3:3:33!!! AUGHH ranking all the characters in a top 10 is gonna b so hard,,,,, I can rank all the Gordons tho I think!! (I’m not ranking them from “best” to “worst” rlly, more like,, how attached I am to th character, how much I know abt them,, stuff liekthat) huge apologies if I misremember sruff or use the wrong names or pronouns or anything like rhat, everything is kinda foggy for me rn 😭💔

loverboy/Gordon b./leading light/whateva u wanna call him:3,,, idk if u could tell by the recent sketches I’ve been doing but I’m def a fan,,, all of his designs r incredible and the character overall has been super interesting 2 see develop, esp in Ep2.,,, like. Out of all the Gordons, I rlly did NOT expect LB to be the most genuinely villainous,,,,,!! + the thing that was said abt how he took advantage of Benrey similarly to how he tried to and like,.. completely flipped everything from Y2KVR around tonally was super neat,,, he is #1 lovecore in myheart 💔

Probably Doc!! I feel p similar abt LB to Doc,,, I ended up being rlly invested in his backstory and how his character was developing, and his dynamic w/ sleepless n the others was so fun,,,, :33 also love all his designs sm ,,, including the other characters in his AU, they were great :]] will b drawinf him next !!i prommy!!

Hjonesslty,,, prob Malcom & Player,,,,being from something I had never read I was worried I’d like,, not “get” the character,,, but I found them both super interesting!! The overall concept of the AU was so silly but also rlly compelling,,,and the ultimate outcome of their arcs iguess was cool2 me :] Kittle’s redemption and Player’s complete shift in Ep2 were both great :]

Freeman,,,! I initially figured his character wouldn’t change very much and would mostly just serve as liek,,, a foil to all the absurd characters rhat surrounded him, but I was pleasantly surprised and Very excited to see that he had a lot more to him!!!! :D and was rlly prominent in the story !!!!! Esp him in Ep2!!!!!!!!!!! iwanna write more sobad but I keep getting distracted sndliie I may need to skim thru everything again as a refresher,, ihave So many thoughts ,,,,cant form them 💔

Swap is all that’s left!!! It wss so hard for me to put them at 5 becos I rlly like them but I had nochoic e ,,, swap AUs r always so iconic burlike,,, unlike most others from other fandoms, this roleswap AU introduced lots of unique elements to the stories and characters that it became way more than just “what if this character had the opposite outfit and personality!” Which I REALLY appreciate and enjoyed a lot in the story,, esp when it came to Swap themself!!!! Like!!! Aaagh!!! Them being an alien from Xen!!!! Is so cool{!!! I’ll def have to read the original fic eventually becos it seems rlly good,,, anyways!! I loved their relationship w/ Neo (and Neo in general!! All the “normal human/player” characters were so silly ilovethrm) aaaaaa

uaaoaoaaithtiejfmghtn ‼️‼️‼️ istill have So Much 2 say abt everythugn but iam struggling to get it all out ,,wuaaa… I’ll talk more abt it later 4 sure :33 overall I very much had fun reading it all and iam SOSO excited 4the finale,,,,, AAAA!!!£!!3!! I’m pretty sure I did see some more stuff to read tho, so I’ll be doifn that later as well!!!!!!!!!!! And potentially live-blogging it too since peopl seemed 2 enjoy rhat :3 sorry if this is completely incomprehensible, I can see that I was typing sort of repetitively but I am too eepy to fix it💔

Extra note: I loved Mothra a lot :3 them just dipping at the end was super silly and is also very much hinting at a return so I am excited for that !!!!!!!!

[asuka--langley--soryu]

I know you headcanon Asuka as a lesbian, but do you have any other sexuality headcanons? Your Asuka post was nice so I was wondering if you had any other similar headcanons

aw ty ty im glad you liked my post <33 tbh even though it was kind of a rambling mess I'm like a lil proud of it lol and am happy it resonated w a lot of other people.

in terms of other hcs I don't have any that are nearly as detailed or interesting, mostly just kind of vague sketches and ideas. except for asuka I mostly think of character's sexualities in regard to relationships between them and other characters rather than how they may exist as 'an identity' within the character as an individual entity, if that makes sense.

Like, for example, I think of Misato as bi but most of my interest in that is vested in reading her and ritsuko as ex-girlfriends--bc i think its a fun idea and a genuinely interesting way of reading their dynamic and also objectively correct :). And I really only think of Rei's sexuality (as in identity and actionable interest. i think about rei's '''sexuality'' as in her presence as the womb/mother and how she's objectified etc quite often lol) pretty exclusively in terms of Asurei because it's kind of the only situation in which I can imagine Rei in romantically. I do think that probably Rei would have a difficult time genuinely forming a relationship with a man considering her experiences. I have some loose thoughts on her connection to gender because I imagine it's pretty nebulous--in terms of 'hcs' id say I see her as p solidly nb--but also fraught in that 'im supposed to be a womb' afab way crossed with 'literally a clone of a woman and a genderless alien'. could maybe expand on this more but I'd have to think on it a little--i'm still not really sure where i'm going with it lol.

off the top of my head for just like cut and dry hcs: ritsuko is a lesbian. duh. if you are even thinking of considering saying anything about gendo to refute this then your head is full of sawdust. kaji's bi but what else is new. Toji and Kensuke COULD be Boy Best Friends but probably theres too much robot trauma going on and also kensuke might be a little too dense idk. tbh I just want someone to hold toji's hand who isn't like also trying to be his mom :/

kaworu is firmly gay and uh....gendery. idk he's an alien and obviously distanced from the concept of humanity but, also, has consciously identified himself as a boy or at least like.....boyish. I also have some vaaagueeee thoughts about that and him self-assigning as a 'protector' but as of rn I mostly think that it is worth noting that he chooses to be 'a boy' in whatever kind of approximation of that and of 'gender' he has. but also at the end of the day kaworu doesnt give a shit about gender he's from space.

uhhhh off the top of my dome thats all I can think of rn. if you want me to talk about anyone specifically feel free to ask!

[tfw-no-tennis]

animorphssss.....2!

ok one L abt reading the series on my ereader is that the flipbook illustrations arent there ;_; those were my favvvvv

anyways I love animorphs still

I feel like I'll end up repeating myself a lot during these little liveblogs lmao but mannnn it’s so good. its so hardcore. like I know that that’s the whole Thing but I still get shocked by some of the stuff that happens 

like a big theme in the series centers around the morality of killing your enemies - and it’s so all over the place bc in book 6 you have jake boiling a bunch of yeerks alive, which is kinda gnarly if you think abt it, but the alternative would be to leave them there and let them infest people soo...? and that’s basically the point, that there are never any easy choices in war 

also I went on the animorphs wiki to look at trivia bc I love doing that and I cant BELIEVE (some of) the books were reissued in 2011 and they changed/removed some of the references to be more ‘modern’ omfg....talk about erasing 90s culture smh 

likeeee I was born in 97 so I didn't exactly grow up in the 90s and therefore some of the references go over my head but its so charming and fun to have them there! and it makes sense given that the books are SET in the 90s

I don't remember ever being confused by any of the references as a kid (tho for sure a lot of them went over my head), but then again I read the books in like 2008 sooo

also some of the stuff that they change - like changing ‘recorded w/a vcr’ to ‘recorded w/the TV’ or ‘floppy disc’ to ‘flash drive’ may make more sense to modern audiences, but doesn't make sense in the context of the story still being set in the 90s

tho it is funny that the books use the phrase ‘hook up’ to mean ‘meet up’ a lot bc that is a phrase that definitely has a different meaning nowadays

alsooooo as it turns out I'm p sure I only read a couple of the spinoffs - the hork-bajir chronicles and the ellimist chronicles (which was confusing lmao), bc my library didn’t have the others :( 2007/2008 woes....

but now I get to read the spinoffs woooooooo so I read the first megamorphs and the andalite chronicles 

I'm reading them in the chronological order (I think?) which is good bc part of the problem was that I read the ellimist book at a completely weird time and it confused me more lmao

megamorphs 1 basically felt like a regular animorphs book except longer, but the plot didn't feel like it needed all that extra page space tbh? even so it was an entertaining adventure

and rachel having amnesia was great, amnesia is one of my fav tropes lmao. and it was a lot of fun here, though a bit underutilized 

another favorite trope of mine is time travel, so I'm gonna have a really fun time here w/that

as for the andalite chronicles, I really enjoyed that one. I thought it was a well done story about the horrors of war (which is a theme animorphs does excellently), kind of similar to the overarching story of the whole series, but fit into one book without feeling rushed

the way the story starts out with elfangor wanting to be a hero, not understanding what that entails, to the end where he IS going to be a hero, and he knows now that this is a burden rather than a reward 

the horror elements are also really strong, with the taxxon morph being horrifying of course

and mannnn I loved that we got to see more of the taxxons as a species, and see that not all taxxons submitted to the yeerks - which breaks the previous theme of ‘all the taxxons are evil just because’ 

this book also establishes that the taxxons gave themselves over to the yeerks due to their constant hunger being unbearable, so it isn’t just that they’re evil for fun 

animorphs does such an excellent job showing that each ‘side’ of a war will have good and bad (or at least sympathetic and unsympathetic) people 

also loren was awesome, what a cool character. though I didn't realize she was literally like 13 until the very end of the book, holy shit. that's crazy. i thought she was 16 at the youngest....geez. her throwing a rock at visser 3 is even more iconic knowing she's a middle schooler at the time

and chapman was here! I'm assuming this must be the same chapman as the assistant principal controller... I thought it was a little strange to put chapman in that role, bc in this book he was a huge asshole basically the entire time, but in the previous (’future’) book it was revealed that he became a controller willingly only to spare his daughter, which is pretty far from this book where he’s actively trying to sell humanity out to the yeerks...people change I guess? (also he got his memory erased so I guess there's that)

alloran was a really interesting character. horrors of war again - we hear from his old buddy that he used to be a fun, witty guy, but war changed him into somebody who would do horrible things 

and him becoming a controller was horrifying, obviously, but I like that alloran wasn't portrayed as some perfect, holy guy in order to make it all the more tragic when he got infested. its already fucked up enough as it is, and making him flawed was a lot more meaningful 

and him wanting to flush all the yeerks out into space....oooooof the (later) parallels hurt 

plus the fact that elfangor refusing to commit genocide against the helpless yeerks (even though they’re the enemy) directly contributing to alloran becoming a controller.....oof. I love that it shows that even making the morally correct decisions during war can lead to awful things happening, but not in a way that endorses evil actions - the story isn’t saying that elfangor should have killed the yeerks, it’s saying that there are no good choices in war 

arbron being trapped as a taxxon was fucked up. but also really intriguing, especially how he found purpose and led a free taxxon uprising. I don't remember if we hear from him/the free taxxons again but I hope so

also the plot twist of tobias being elfangors SON...bruh. I do remember that despite not having read this book so it must come up in the main story later but my memory of that is vauge so I’m excited to see how that plays out. it’s always gonna be hilarious to me that ax is technically tobias’s uncle 

and then the ellimist drops in and wacks up the time stream even more. classic. I love the crazy time travel stuff in animorphs

omfg and the bits where elfangor is a human tech guy and talked about his friends bill and steve LMAOOOOO

also the scene where elfangor drives the yellow mustang while blasting '(I cant get no) satisfaction’ by the rolling stones was one of the most iconic things I've ever read

basically I loved all the angles of war fucking people up. from loren’s dad, to alloran, to elfangor himself learning about the true horrors of war...v well done imo

ok back to the main series - so my pick for the most fucked up scene SO FAR (in my own personal opinion) - the scene where they're in the jungle and rachel passes out in bear morph and a bunch of rainforest ants start EATING HER ALIVE and like crawling into her ears and mouth and HGGGGGG that was genuinely so fucking disturbing

its a good thing that the time travel made it so rachel couldn't remember that bc that was fuuuuucked

another contender is a scene we don't actually see - erek having his capacity for violence instated and then slaughtering a ton of human and hork-bajir controllers 

like damn, you know its fucked up when its too fucked up for ANIMORPHS to even ‘show.’ this is a series that doesn't pull punches but evidentially that would've been Too Much to actually portray (understandably). also i feel like seeing the aftermath/everyone’s reactions had more of an impact than describing erek killing a bunch of people would have

also I forgot that marco Literally Fucking Dies during that scene and that's why he doesn't get to see the slaughter. wow

and then in the very next book JAKE dies too. jesus

oh it was also so sad and fucked up when marco’s dad told him that he and his wife used to fight sometimes, but then all of a sudden they stopped fighting, and their relationship was basically entirely peaceful and perfect - and this is how marco knows exactly when his mom was made into a controller, bc of course a yeerk wouldn't care enough to get into petty arguments like that....ooooof

Okay and book 15 really got me...that was fucking heavy man. Geeeez. Everything w/Marco and his mom is so fucked uppppp

Like he literally has to deal with so much awful traumatizing shit. The scene where he pretends to be a controller and is face to face w/visser one and THAT HIS MOM but he can’t even do anything, and he just sees the evil in her eyes and thinks about how there’s no way she had been controlled by a yeerk that long before bc he’s never seen her look like that...that was so fucking sad.

Plus Marcos mom now thinking that Marco is a controller...aughh...and then later Marco knows he can’t even think-speak to her bc he’ll just talk about everything he’s wanted to talk about to his mom this whole time... ;_;

And the parts where Marcos humor slips and the utter rage he feels towards the situation comes through...man

Plus everything about him being understandably afraid of sharks after being nearly torn in half by one back during their first dolphin adventure

Augh oh and jake telling Marco that everyone can tell something is up bc Marco isn’t joking around and talking about how insane their plan is like usual, so Marco fakes it sand does all that even tho he’s terrified and conflicted...aughhhh

Ok and the last scene where Marco is thinking about a future where he and his parents can talk plainly about how awful and traumatizing everything is, and then eventually they’ll feel okay enough to joke about it, bc Marcos mom is the one who taught him to look at the funny side of life...Oh The Pain

There were a lot of great fucked up individual lines in this book too. I’m just so sad about these poor middle schoolers jfc

Also I do distinctly remember the scene where they collapse the shark tank at Ocean World or w/e, it was weird af reading it bc I remembered none of the rest of the book but got weird deja vu reading that scene and remembering having read it like 13+ years ago

if it’s not clear by now I have a pretty terrible memory for media which is honestly good bc then I can reread things and it’s like new

Also jake...man...I said it previously but I was kinda eh about jake when I first read these bc he’s kinda the ‘basic’ character, but now I find his story much more interesting

His conflict over being leader is really good. KAA does a fantastic job capturing the pressure he’s under bc he was chosen by his friends to be the leader, so he REALLY can’t back out, and he doesn’t necessarily feel up to it, but feels he has no choice in the matter...

And constantly having to make really difficult decisions that could get his friends killed...geez. It’s so much pressure. And he talks about wanting to go back to being a normal kid when this is all over, and it kinda strikes me as him being in denial - like, there’s no way things can ever be ‘normal’ again, but that’s his way of coping.

Especially with Tom and all that. That conflict is so compelling...jake having to play all these different roles - as leader, as a son/student, as a regular brother to Tom - he’s constantly having to act a certain way and rarely gets to be Himself

It’s actually kinda relatable in a way - that feeling of being In Charge, but in a somewhat abstract and informal way, so you feel like regular old you, but you have to carefully regulate how you act bc the people around you expect a certain standard of behavior from you...

And all the morally grey situations they’re put in are fucked up, but especially for jake who has the final say on what they do, even when knowing it could lead to his friends being killed or made into controllers

Like in the book with the cannibal yeerk guy - there’s basically no good choices there. Jake lets the cannibal live, and (at first) implies that it’s for the best that he’s cannibalizing other yeerks and therefore helping get rid of some yeerks - except that he kills their hosts too

but the alternative would be to directly kill another human being who isn't actively fighting/resisting you, which is a fucked up thing for a middle schooler to have to do 

And the conflict between jake and Cassie is really excellent bc jake has to make these awful decisions, and Cassie is the type of person who can’t stand that sort of thing, so it gets left up to jake a lot, but then she’s upset with jake for doing something awful, even while knowing that there were no better options

like, her asking jake to kill the cannibal guy for her was really fucked up, but also entirely understandable for cassie as a character to ask. it was an emotionally charged situation, and cassie is an emotional person. she’s also somebody who like to Act, to do concrete good, and getting rid of an Evil Bad Guy in front of her would be a definite action

But Cassie is a great source of morality to the group - most of them are pretty jaded, but Cassie is able to hope in a way none of the rest are. It creates a really compelling dynamic between jake and Cassie that I kinda dismissed when I was like 10 or w/e

Also the scene where jake as a fly gets crushed and starts dying? Seriously fucked. And then after when he’s nearly breaking down in the airport and Cassie comforts him...that was a really good scene. Cassie is so good  

And the continuity is so excellent - I love how in book 17, Cassie (and jake to an extent) doesn’t really weigh in on the moral debate abt the oatmeal bc she’s still shaken up by asking jake to murder a guy for her, and then (presumably) going ahead and lighting his house on fire when jake doesn’t kill him

And augh jake and Marco have such a good and interesting dynamic - the entire group kinda pushes each other into their respective ‘roles’ in the group, but for a few books that’s really true for jake and marco

I don't remember what book it was but at some point marco (I think) mentions that jake understands what marco is dealing with w/his mom being a controller bc of tom, but that they don’t talk about it bc they ‘don't talk about stuff like that’ or something and I'm just like noooo talk to each other :( 

but at this point jake feels like he can’t really express doubt and fear and stuff like that bc he’s the Leader and they look to him to be strong (which is ironically very similar to how rachel feels), and marco feels like he can’t be serious bc he’s the funny guy. 

Basically I love all the different dynamics in the group. How Cassie and Rachel are such opposites but are best friends and get along well, while Marco and Cassie are more directly opposed - as jake says, Marco is ruthless, and Cassie definitely isn’t. Rachel and Marco are also pretty different which is interesting, bc they have a lot in common, and actually agree on a lot (even if they disagree out loud) but their commonalities combined with their circumstances make them react very differently to the same situations

I also love seeing the differences between characters from each other’s POV - like, p much all the characters think that Rachel is completely fearless, but when the book is from her POV, we get to see that that isn’t true at all - she feels plenty of fear, but she recognizes that her role in the group is to be the fearless one, so she pushes aside her fear to fit into that role (which inadvertently pushes her more and more into that ‘fearless warrior’ box - something that happens to all the characters more and more as the story goes on, like jake as ‘the leader’ and Marco as ‘the jokester’).

Also I loooove the grey morality of literally everything. Like the book where ax discovers an andalite traitor - not a controller, just an andalite who betrayed them to the yeerks. This leads to the deaths of like a hundred other andalites, and that whole scene you really just feel for ax, bc he feels so awful about everyone else dying while he escapes, yet he’s also so grateful to be alive, which he in turn feels bad about...

And ax’s conflict about being torn between his home w/his fellow andalites and his new home on earth w/his friends is great

And oh man I fucking love book 19. Any of the books where it goes more into the yeerks and their side of things are so good, just like the book where jake was made into a controller.

And book 19, where we meet a sympathetic yeerk, comes right after 18, where we meet an andalite traitor - again, I love how we clearly see that no one side is completely good or completely bad

So yeah book 19 fucking slapped. That shit was so compelling. I love how Cassie made a bunch of foolish decisions based on naïve hope, but it worked out!! Things aren’t always bleak and awful!

Except there were plenty bleak and awful parts of this book. It had a great balance of moods tbh, even though a lot of the situations were extremely contrived lmao. I love the stuff that aftran says, which is basically what I was thinking when I started my reread - being a yeerk fucking sucks, you’re literally a blind slug but also completely and fully sentient, on the same level as humans and andalites - and as afran pointed out this book, the yeerks are born as parasites, just as humans are born as predators - why is it okay for the humans to kill countless animals to eat, but not for the yeerks to enslave races to act as hosts? Well, the situation isn’t totally comparable, which Cassie and Marco both point out when aftran makes that comparison - the yeerks are enslaving sentient species, and cows and chickens are not the same as the humans and hork-bajir (though the story understandably doesn’t fall too deeply into the ‘who deserves what right/animal sentience’ rabbit hole).

And I like that aftran points out that the yeerks basically have 2 options currently - stay helpless and blind in a yeerk pool, or enslave a host. It’s interesting to hear that a lot of yeerks don’t like doing this but see it as the only options, as opposed to complete sensory deprivation. It makes me wonder if there are yeerks who are so staunchly against it that they elect to stay as pool-bound slugs forever

Also maybe it’s the shounen anime fan in me but I don’t even care that much that Cassie’s entire plan was completely off the rails and hinged on only the slightest chance of success - with failure being much more likely and completely catastrophic, with the animorphs and their loved ones all being wiped out, vs success being unlikely and also achieving...a moral victory? Peace between two enemy combatants in a huge war? nothing all that concrete...anyways it was a bunch of good-faith horrible decisions on Cassie’s part, but I don’t even care? I love stories where hope and love save the day against all odds, especially when they’re wielded like weapons by a character and make everything end nicely

This is especially true here bc animorphs is generally a series that leans very far away from that type of thing, so when it does happen, it feels like a victory. Plus the David trilogy is next so we kinda need a happy ending while we can

also bc I compared animorphs to hxh last time, I now have to compare it to the other series I've (partially) liveblogged, transformers mtmte.

this is gonna be more abstract and brief but basically. mtmte is all about after the war, and everyone has so much trauma and everything just sucks, so they all go on a space cruise and work on themselves. basically.

but the series does a lot of exploration of how war fucks people up - same as animorphs, tho animorphs spans the beginning of the war (for the main characters at least) until the end, whereas mtmte starts when the war ends.

but the point is. both series do an excellent job showcasing the wide range of reactions people have to being put in unthinkable situations during wartime. all the major characters in mtmte go through arcs where they heal/change from the war, some more subtle than others

basically the animorphs needs to go on a wacky space cruise adventure with a bunch of other fucked up people and figure their shit out, mtmte style

ok this is wicked long already so I’m gonna end it here. also I feel like I should start the next liveblog w/the david triology bc I’m for sure gonna have a lot to say abt that

[masteroftheblade]

What are your favorite and least favorite animes? Why do you like/dislike them?

oh god here we go lmao 🤠👍 prepare for an entire novel as always lol

my favorite animes atm are Naruto, Dragon Ball, Attack on Titan, and Claymore. Overall, my favorite genre of anime is shonen (and in case you dont know what that is, its basically shows that are marketed to young boys. it'll have shit like superpowers and poorly written female characters). My least favorite genre is Shoujo (marketed at young girls). I honestly don't hate the entire genre, I just hate how much romance is in there since im pretty romance-repulsed. If there were more Shoujo series like Claymore, I'd probably be in love w/ it. I'll start talking about these shows individually, starting w/ Naruto.

1. Naruto.

Honestly, the only reason I started watching Naruto was because my friends peer pressured me into doing it, and it actually differed from what I expected it to be story-wise. The beginning of the show started off amazing; it had excellent world building, magic systems, interesting characters, and it attempted to address how messed up the whole shinobi system is. But then Naruto got on the front page of Shonen Jump, and everything went down from there. It started to focus more on cool fight scenes than the actual plot. I wont get too much into that, because you can literally find entire blogs dedicated to dissecting that, but Naruto killed itself w/ its own popularity. That said, I love the characters and world building and I can look past most of its flaws anyway.

Would I recommend reading/watching it? Yes, but only to say you did it for bragging rights. Don't go into watching Naruto if you want deep looks into imperialism and militarized governments, because you will get the complete opposite of that :P Also the best way to watch it is to watch it with friends.

2. Dragon Ball.

I only started watching DB about a month ago, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but I think its a garbage series. The fight scenes have little to no weight to them, because no matter what, the protagonist of that episode will always succeed in some way. For example, when Goku (a 12 y/o boy) was fighting Giran (a 10ft tall godzilla man) and was getting his ass beat until Goku just... randomly grows back his tail that was cut off earlier and wins. We are never told why he grew back his tail, and i think he only gets it back so he can have a cool fight scene in a later episode. Goku can literally be battling genocidal gods and he will still always win. The show also goes out of its way to sexualize/show a female character being harrassed. Every. Fucking. Episode.

That said, it is a fun show, and I really enjoy watching it. Like Naruto, I really love the characters and the world they are in, I just hate the way it was handled, and its painfully obvious that DB was made by a bunch of old men in the 80s. Unlike Naruto, however, I really appreciate how simple it is. It doesn't force a narrative about space genocide or whatever being bad, and I'm very thankful because that kind of narrative would be absolutely botched in this kind of series. It's also nice to have a show that doesn't take itself too seriously. Shows like AOT are amazing and important, but those shows can be overwhelming with their heavy subject matter. I would only recommend watching DB if you want to see some really good art/character design. Don't take the show seriously, and you'll have a good time.

3.Attack On Titan.

This anime was actually the first I've ever seen! I saw the very first episode when it aired in 2014, so I'm definetely biased in that regard, but I still try to look at this show in the most objective way I can. This show does almost everything right. The pacing, the characters, the art, the plot, you name it. It takes a concept that looks silly on paper and turns it into this grueling story about war, politics, and the trauma of being a soldier. It never treats it's characters like they're only one-dimensional, or like they are there just for one purpose only. These characters feel human in a way Naruto and Dragon Ball could never be. But there is one thing that has me concerned about this show, and its about the weirdly anti-Semitic undertones it has.

You probably heard the controversy already, but it really effected the way people on the outside of the fandom view the series. The show is heavily inspired by European culture, specifically that of Germany, and there are an ethnic group of people called The Eldians in the show that are pretty anti-Semitic in this kind of setting. The Eldian people have the capability of turning into Titans, and the Titans are what divided the world and killed millions. As a result, another group of people started doing the shit the Nazis did to Jewish people, basically making the Eldians into this weird allegory for the holocaust??? Which was kind of a shock to me when I first realized that was the angle they were going for. I genuinely did not expect that considering what the series started off as. The foreshadowing is there and all, I just didn't think they'd use real-world events as inspiration.

Now, this actually has the complete opposite problem Naruto and DB had. Naruto and DB had amazing ideas and concepts that went to shit, AOT's whole holocaust narrative was trash from the beginning.

The show could have easily had a different kind of social/political commentary without even going near the holocaust narrative. It comes off as kind of a half assed idea that people put way too much effort in, so it's kind of in this weird grey-area between "modern anime masterpiece" and "what the fuck were they trying to get across with this show?". If you asked me what the moral of the show was, I wouldn't be able to tell you.

Now, because of the fact that the Eldians can literally turn into man-eating beasts, this makes the comparison of Jewish people and Eldians very racist, and it doesn't help that Japan is still full of legitimate Nazis, making the whole situation look even worse. Since I am not Jewish, I wont speak for other Jewish people. There is a very heated debate on whether the show is racist, and frankly I don't think it's within my right to say if it is or isn't. What I will say, is that I really loved the show and appreciated the social commentary it provided, and I think a lot of people would benefit from watching it, but I think it's also important to listen to Jewish people's views on the show. For this reason, I specifically avoid reblogging AOT stuff, but I do love that show and I wont hate on people who do reblog stuff from it. It's definitely not a light watch, but it does provide a lot of thinking material.

4. Claymore.

This. Show. Was. Amazing. But. Underrated.

First off, this is a shonen show that is led by a majority female cast and a female protagonist, and all of those women are badass swordwielding lesbians and I love it. Second, the art style is beautiful. Third, the story is really interesting from so many angles, so much so I am not even going to mention what its about because you dont need to know, you just need to watch it and see what happens. The first season was an absoloute ride of a show, and if you love shows like AOT or Berserk, you'll love Claymore. Honestly, this show was what AOT should have tried to be. It also has its fair share of militarized imperialist commentary, but this is the only show on this list that actually fucking critiques imperialist ideals and has a main character that actively refuses to participate in that kind of oppressive system, choosing to fight it all together.

But the show got fucking cancelled right before the first arc even finished. You can thank shows like Naruto for that 🙃🙃🙃

10/10 Would reccomend, but just be prepared to be left on a major cliffhanger. You can try reading the manga, but it's kind of hard to follow since all of the warrior girls look the same.

[scrambled-eggsed]

1 + 2 for one of your WIPs?

1 - give short descriptions of all your current WIPs

Ahhhhhhh this might get slightly long so sorry in advance [I apologize for NOTHING]. They dont really have names so this is gonna be fun to keep track of

There's one that's basically almost autobiographical lmfao, where a genderqueer lesbian teenager is figuring himself out. It's really self indulgent bc the two main characters are the nb girl and her teacher, and they get p close, and the teen in basically in love with their best friend (romantically? Platonically? Who can say [=maybe I'll decide when i figure out my own feelings about my friend]), and her story mirrors the story of the teacher, who is in a qpr with another woman. Basically it's self indulgence about how i need a dependable adult figure in my life. I'm gonna move on to the rest cuz they're not nearly as depressing as this

Space pirates - i still haven't worked out everything but I'm thinking of maybe doing two parallel stories, where basically one group of overworked workers on a spaceship are considering a mutiny so as they're planning the thing they're telling the story of the first space pirate crew from earth to overthrow the captain of the spaceship and take command for themselves, and how they oparated and how those supposedly legendary people were actually just people. Like they have the auras of greek heros but all the stories people tell about them are actually about tenderness and care and the simple goodness of humanity

WITCHES - I'm still tryna figure out a plot that isn't entirely a The Owl House rip-off, but basically the world is where magic is fundamentally about a connection w nature. And not everyone has that connection and that's okay bc nature can't provide everything so there are essentially two coexisting societies with ties that benefit everyone (it's a utopia - witches basically have "shifts" in the fields to grow an infinite amount of food, and the non-witches give them essential products). When it comes to characters, the main character is a girl who comes from a non-witch family and basically Has The Connection With Nature (which is not uncommon) but her family is relatively conservative so she gets a lot of Looks and mild disapproval from them (yah this is basically a queer metaphor). And basically she goes to live with an old lesbian witch couple at the parallel witch town. And I'm thinking maybe the witchs' son will be a non-witch and will go live with the girl's family (thats also a queer metaphor although i haven't figued exactly how. Anyway he's gay. The witch girl is also gay)? Basically Found Family Shenanigans. But it's not exactly a plot yet

Magic World™ - i have a few ideas for stories in this world (maybe I'll just write a bunch of short stories? I dunno) but i really like this world!! Basically magic is entirely about curiosity and kindness. The world will literally sense your intentions and will not let you do anything Evil with magic. And there's this whole thing where if you become evil out of good intentions the world will not let you pass it on to anyone. So if you don't redeem yourself, the world will not let you have kids (as in, adoption basically - there's no biological reproduction [i started thinking about this when i was twelve okay]. If you want a kid, the world will sense that. And when the infallible world will sense that you're ready, you will just wake up one morning and there'll be a fucken baby outside). So every idea for a story i have in that world is basically about villians redemption arcs but fun ig? Listing all of them would genuinely take forever so im Not Gonna Do That Here. Also the way i explained the world is a bit rudimentary and there's more depth to it but it's hard to explain without a plot lmao

Seedbombing gone wrong - this is my most recent one i think. Basically a bunch of kids try to do seedbombing at school bc the school cut down a beloved tree and then there are So Many Flowers Just Everywhere bc the ground was Magical. Also one of the teacher is a witch/fairy and will explain shit to the kids. Idk i haven't thought a lot about this one but it's a fun idea for the future

My fucking god that was so long. Goddamn

2 - give short descriptions of the main character from one of your WIP

Well fortunately for those of you who decided to read this far i dont exactly have many fleshed out ideas for main characters. The only one from a story where the main character isn't literally me that i know what they're gonna be like is the captain of the legendary original space pirate spaceship from the space pirates story. Basically I'm imagining her like Lovelace from wolf 359 (a combination of her pre and after trauma. Also I'm only about halfway through the podcast so no spoilers) - so generally a fun person and cares deeply for her crew, but feels like everyone's fate rests on her shoulders and is dealing with So Much. Oh if the question was about physical description then idk really? I just know that she's gonna be a woc (it makes so much sense for the worldbuilding but i could talk about that for hours. In the same vein, she was also in prison at some point. Bc the system discriminates heavily and deliberately against people who were in prison. Again i could talk about that for so long lmao). Also she's gonna have a romantic arc with the ship's appointed doctor bc Tenderness and h/c. Cuz basically she needs to learn to let herself rest and what better way to do that than the cliché of a loved one pulling the doctor card on her

That got WAYYYYYYYY longer than i expected so sorry lmfao (fr tho i apologize for nothing)

[yaboyspodcastpalace]

For the character asks: Jon, Peter Lukas, Annabelle Cane? (giving multiple suggestions so you can pick one in case you get the same character twice in different asks)

very kind of you to assume i get many asks :') THANKS ill do all of them u_u

[Send me a character and i'll tell you...]

(under the cut bc i love talking and this got long lmao)

Jon

First impression

he's a uptight prick with obvious favoritism for sasha and tim and i love him so! much!!!!!!

Impression now

my poor little mew mew hm................I've got a complicated relationship w/ jon bc i love him a lot, but i loved s1 him the most, and literally everything else just makes me really, brutally, sad ;_; The way he tries so desperately to cling to his humanity and how other characters just call him by the title imposed to him makes me wanna cry

...also he just cares so much ;_; i cry

Favorite moment

probably his interactions with georgie at the beginning of season 3!!! From s5 id say when he killed not!sasha, it felt vindictive ù_ú

Idea for a story

Dhfhdh im p basic when it comes to him ngl, either jon/tim/sasha friends to lovers or jon and desolation!tim or *something*!sasha trying to stay as human as possible, together 😔 (or just any of them living and coping together in s4 n s5)

Unpopular opinion

Im just not a fan of monster jon, at all! He's not the type of character that i enjoy seeing having a corruption arc unfortunately!! It just hurts!!! (and this Is from someone that Loves corruption arcs!!!)

Also i really hate moth jon imagery??? For not particular reason, moths are pretty, but i still hate it u_u AND THE ASSOCIATION OF GREEN W/ JON (or the beholding in general!) I CANNOT STAND IT!! i know its bc of the tma logo but guess what! Its wrong! Purple jon rights!!!

ALSO ALSO the so called pining he had for martin just.... didnt felt like that at all! i have Many feelings abt this!

Favorite relationship

either georgie in s3, or sasha!!! i love how he always praises sasha in her research in s1 and even thought he's at his driest & sharp Trying-To-Project-Professionalism-And-Skepticism she still rolls into his office, interrupts him mid statement to banter w/ him abt pronunciation n stuff and its just Normal, like that speaks volumes of how comfortable they felt around each other! they were friends gdi! the moment he realizes she died and then everytime the not!them mocks him w/ her death makes me wanna break smth q_q

im not even gonna mention tim bc even though i love their relationship It 👏 makes me👏 very 👏 sad 👏

non shippy and also staying strictly canon, i love his relationship with melanie!

Favorite headcanon

sometimes i think abt that one hc that hes really good with arcade games bc he lived near the coast and i smile bc thats cute :) also hes a trans man 💙💗🤍💗💙

Peter

First impression

Mystery evil captain man!!! Fog?? I LOVE him :)

Impression now

I STILL LOVE HIM SO MUCH!!!!!!!!! Hes an asshole and has a lovely voice and smile and hes not, hes not Dumb but also he's far from the whooooa evil lonely influence he think he is (played like a cheap fiddle). He also makes me sad in ways i cannot and wont describe, and its a shame that he died cuz he was the best part of season 4 😔 rip you beautiful bastard man i still miss you </3

Favorite moment

"It has blood on it" "thats Leitner's too :D". Also when martin was angry abt idk, breekon? Jon going into the coffin? Cant remember, but peter was like I said id protect the institute, that guys not my problem ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Idea for a story

dfgdfg i have..... a petermart story that dealt with the different flavor of loneliness they both had, half smut half genuine meta of both of them and theorization on the branching of an Entity & how their powers manifested in other people...

basically, peter thinks hes hot shit when it comes to loneliness but gets overwhelmed when martin accidentally projects his feelings abt *fic's plot stuff* on him, its fun stuff!

Unpopular opinion

people either paint him like an absolute devil or an incompetent idiot and hes neither of them! hes an asshole who loves being an asshole but far from the worst monster in the show and he tried to do a clever scheme TWICE on his life and 1. while it was established that any of the rituals wouldnt work singularly the Silence was still a pretty clever attempt if it weren't for gertrude! and 2. well... he tried to manipulate someone petty and formerly supposed to be a web avatar, again not his fault, cant call him stupid for trying dfgdfg

i Do think hes kinda pathetic in some sense considering his backstory, but more out of personal pity than anything else

Favorite relationship

Canonically speaking him and martin! The pull and push of them was The best thing about season 4! Peter being a quite dangerous avatar and martin, beautiful and scared and kinda feisty, confronting him every chance he gets, peter doing his best to manipulate him and martin letting him believe hes succeeding (even thought, he is, partly). They're fascinating characters to have side by side

Favorite headcanon

Partly canonically speaking him and mikaele salesa :) they do bets together! They're lonely sea men! What else could you possibly want?

Also non shippy i like thinking abt peter's and simon's relationship but thats entirely non canon ♡

Diversity wins! The heir of the lonely is a gay man!

Also I think as every rich household(?) the lukases had many paintings and peter as a kid saw the ones w/ sailing ships and imagined sailing far far away from his family. That and seaman aesthetic fucks, which is why he always has the same vibe going on as an adult. He does Not know half of the things he'd need to know to have a ship though but hey he's rich and thats all he needs

Annabelle

First impression

thats a horrible psychological experiment they're making there D:

Impression now

THATS STILL A HORRIBLE EXPERIMENT AND ANNABELLE DESERVED SO MUCH BETTER............. idk! she makes me sad in the same way jon (and to a degree, peter) does! to be a living puppet for the thing that traumatized you as a kid and that later kinda killed you / is the only thing keeping you alive, to be devoted to it scrambling to believe in a higher reason for all of it to happen bc to believe otherwise is............. anyway. i love her, and i feel so so sorry for her

Favorite moment

her "maybe ive never been to the beach" at the end of ehr statement (that i fully believe its bullshit but, yknow, i love that she adds that), most of her convos with martin, her "i told you this might happen" "you did, you did" with mikaele

Idea for a story

i think a lot about her having conversations w/ either mikaele (platonically) or sasha (shippy) and their different points of views and treat with her making her doubt the web a bit

Unpopular opinion

listen, listen, i know it sounds like im woobifying her i Know it but reading the scraps of her story how can i Not feel sorry for her? when the story framed her very similar to jon? the supernatural childhood encounter that gave them arachnophobia and the subsequential joining with an Entity against her will? the fact that both the story and the fans treat her like a spider woman always sat very very bad to me, and the fact that the story itself always framed her like a villain (considering All The Other Characters that get the benefit of the doubt) was extremely disappointing

Favorite relationship

her and mikaele!!!!!!! wish we could have seen more scenes of just the two of them!!!!!! *singing* he is her daaaaaad, hes her dad! boogie boogie boogie! (ok no but like... their offscreen friendship is my favorite thing of season 5 ;_;)

Favorite headcanon

Sigh i dont know...i still think she's scared of spiders which make her current existence harder but thats a sadcanon :/ umm...... i love the idea of mikaele and her cooking together from time to time! Mikaele showing her some plates he used to eat as a kid as he talks stories about his life :) and she listens and sometimes tells a story of her own! its been so long since he had a quasy normal conversation! its weird yet nice!

[dillydedalus]

april reading

oh yeah this is a thing. anyway in april i read about uhhh.... first contact (twice), murderers on skis & victorian church politics

the yield, tara june winch a novel about indigenous australian identity and history (now and throughout the 20th century) in three narrative strands. imo the narrative strand that consists of a grandfather writing a dictionary of his language (wiradjuri) in order to prove a claim to some land is by far the strongest, but overall i liked this quite a lot. 3/5

land of big numbers, te-ping chen a solid short story collection focused on modern china and young(ish) chinese people, both in china and the diaspora. i particularly liked the stories that had some slighty surreal or speculative elements, such as one about fruit that strongly evoke emotions when eaten and a group of people stuck in a train station for months as the train is delayed, which imo use their speculative aspects in effective (if not super subtle) ways to talk about society. 3/5

the pear field, nana ekvtimishvili (tr. from georgian by elizabeth heighway) international booker prize longlist! a short, fairly depressing read about a 18-year-old girl at a post-soviet school for developmentally disabled childred (but also orphans, abandoned children & other random kids) who is trying to get a younger boy adopted by an american couple. there seem to be a lot of novels set at post-soviet orphanages etc & imo this is a well-executed example of the microgenre, with the pear field full of pears that are never picked bc they don’t taste right as a strong central image. 3/5

the warden, anthony trollope (chronicles of barsetshire #1) ah yes, a 6-part victorian series about church politics in an english town, exactly the kind of thing i’m interested in. not sure why i committed to at least the first two entries of the series but here we are. despite this lack of interest (and disagreement with most of the politics on display here) i found this quite charming; trollope has a gift for an amusing turn of phrase & making fun of his characters in benevolent ways. 3/5

the lesson, cadwell turnbull first contact scifi novel set on the virgin islands, where an alien ship arrives one day. the aliens seem benevolent & share helpful technology, but also react with extreme violence to any aggression. they claim to be on earth to study.... something, but it’s never entirely clear what. the book makes some interesting choices (like immediately skipping over the actual first contact to a few years in the future, when the aliens are already established on the islands) but i thought much of it was kinda disjointed and confusing. 2/5

the heart is a lonely hunter, carson mccullers look, i get it, it’s all about the isolation & alienation (& dare i say loneliness) of 4 miserable characters projecting their issues on the central character singer, who is kind and patient and also deaf and mute, thus making him the perfect receptacle for their issues without really having to connect with him as a person and how that isolation hinders them socially, artistically, emotionally, politically, but like... i didn’t really like it. i didn’t hate it but i just felt very meh about it all. 2.5/5

acht tage im mai: die letzte woche des dritten reiches, volker ulrich fascinating history book about the last week(ish) of the third reich, starting with the day of hitler’s suicide and ending with the total surrender (but with plenty of flashbacks and forwards), and looking at military&political leadership (german and allied) as well as prisoners of war, forced laborers, concentration camp prisoners, and everyone else. very interesting look at what kästner described as the “gap between the not-anymore and the not-yet.” 3.5/5

firekeeper’s daughter, angeline boulley) i’ve been mostly off the YA train for the last few years, but this was a really good example of contemporary YA with a focus on ~social issues. ANYWAY. this is YA crime novel about daunis, a mixed-race unenrolled ojibwe girl close to finishing high school who is struggling with family problems, university plans, and feeling caught between her white and her native familiy when her best friend is shot in front of her and she decides to become a CI for an fbi investigation into meth production in the community. i really appreciated how hard this went both with the broader social issues (racism, addiction) and daunis’ personal struggles. there are a few bits that felt a bit didactic & on the nose (and the romance... oh well), but overall the themes of community, family, and the value of living indigenous culture are really well done & i teared up several times. 4/5

the magic toyshop, angela carter i love carter’s short stories but struggle with (while still liking) her novels so far. this one, a tale of melanie, suddenly orphaned after trying on her mother’s wedding dress in the garden, coming of age and awakening to womanhood or whatever. carter’s really into that. it’s well-written, sensual as carter always is, and the family melanie and her siblings are sent to, her tyrannical puppet-maker uncle, his mute wife and the wife’s two brothers, both fascinating and offputting (& dirty) make for an interesting cast of characters, but overall i just wish i was reading the bloody chamber again. 3/5

barchester towers, anthony trollope (chronicles of barsetshire #2) (audio) lol tbh i still don’t know why i am committing to this series about, again, church politics in 19th century rural england, but it’s just so chill & warm & funny (we love gently or not so gently - but always politely - mocking our characters) that i’m enjoying it as a nice little trip where people do some #crazyschemes to gain church positions or fight over whether there should be songs in church or whatever it is people in the 19th century fought about. it’s very relaxing. there also is a lot of love quadrangleyness going on and that’s also fun. trollope has weird ideas about women but like whatever, i for one wish mrs proudie much joy of her position as defacto bishop of barchester, she really girlbossed her way to the top. 3.5/5

semiosis, sue burke (semiosis #1) i love spinning the wheel on the “first contact with X weird alien species” & i guess this time we landed on plants! plant intelligence is interesting and the idea of plant warfare is really cool. i do like the structure, with different generations of human settlers on the planet pax providing a long-term view but this allows the author to skip over a lot of the development of the relationship between the settlers and the plant and locating the plot elsewhere, which i think is ultimately a mistake. i might continue w/ the series tho, depending on library availability. 2.5/5

one by one, ruth ware a bunch of start-up people go on a corporate retreat to a ski chalet in the alps, avalanche warning goes up, one of them disappears, presumably on a black piste, the rest get snowed in & completely cut off when the avalanche hits and then they get picked off *title drop* (altho really not that many of them). nice fluff when i had a miserable cold (not covid) but fails when it tries to go for deeper themes... like an attempt to address classism and entitlement sure... was made. also like what kind of luxury skiing chalet does not have emergency communication devices in case internet/phone lines are down...  i’d have sued just for that. 2/5

fake accounts, lauren oyler the microgenre of ‘alienated intellectual(ish) probably anglophone person has some sort of crisis, goes to berlin about it’ is my ultimate literary weakness - i almost never really like them, they mostly irritate me & yet i can never resist their siren call. this one is p strong on the irritation, altho at least the narrator does not ascribe much meaning to her decision to go to berlin after she a) discovers her boyf is an online conspiracy theorist (probably not sincerely) and b) gets a call that said boyf has died, it’s really just something to do to avoid doing anything else. but other than that it’s so BerlinExpat by the numbers, like she lives in kreuzkölln! put her somewhere else at least! there is one scene that elevates the BerlinExpat-ness of it all (narrator asks expatfriend for advice on visa applications, expatfriend assures her that it’s really easy for americans to get visa, adds “especially now” while literally, as the narrator remarks, gesturing at the falafel she’s eating) other than that, the novel is.... fine. it’s smart, but not really as smart as it thinks it is, which is a problem bc it thinks it’s just sooo incisive. whatever. 2/5

the tenant of wildfell hall, anne bronte this is reductive but: jane eyre: i could fix him // wuthering heights: i could make him worse // wildfell hall: lmao i’m gonna leave his ass anyway i enjoyed the part that is actually narrated by the titular tenant of wildfell hall, helen (which thankfully, i think, is most of it) because the perspective of a woman who runs away from her abusive alcoholic of a husband is genuinely interesting and engaging, while gilbert, the frame story narrator who falls in love with helen, is.... the worst. i mean he’s not the worst bc the abusive husband arthur is there and hard to beat in terms of worseness, but he’s pretty fucking bad. imagine if helen had found out that gilbert attacked her secret brother over a misunderstanding, severely injured him & LEFT HIM TO DIE & then (when dude survived & the misunderstanding got cleared up) apologised like well i guess i didn’t treat you quite right! she’d have to run away from her second husband as well! poor girl. 3/5

[sweet-royalty]

Never Been in Love

Summary: Patton is alone at home and is enjoying this time dancing and filling himself with pride (Extremely self-indulgent but at this point all my fanfics are like this and I have no shame at all so yeah xP)

Genre: Songfic (Will Jay, Marina and the Diamonds and Moses Sumney)

Word Count: 3371 words (9 pages)

Pairings (All of them are heavily mentioned but they are not the focus of the story): Queerplatonic LAMP, Romantic Analogince and Romantic Dukeceit 

Content: Slight Angst w/ Comfort; Human!AU; Aro!Patton; Closeted Aromantic; Virgil, Roman and Logan are romantically dating and each one of them are Patton’s QPPs; Fluff; Just pure fluff despite many things; Sympathetic Deceit; Sympathetic Remus; Hoh!Deceit; Sign Names mentioned for 2 characters; Hoh experience written by someone who is not hoh (read as “please tell me if I’m doing something wrong”); Non White Sides;

Trigger Warning: Nudity (without sexual content or genitalia description), Snake mention, Amatonormativity (the characther is not actually arophobic, he just doesn’t know Patton is aromantic) (Tell me if I forgot to tag something)

Disclaimer: I couldn’t find a hand sign for “vitiligo” other than actually spelling it to make as Deceit’s sign name so his sign name in this story might not be so good. If you have any other suggestion for his sign name and explain how to sign it I’ll really appreciate it!

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“Don't you want somebody to never let you go? Knowing someone's body better than your own Don't you want a family with a white picket fence? Tell me when's the wedding, the names of all your kids” Will Jay – Never Been in Love

Being alone at home was always one of the best things that could happen for Patton.

Not because he doesn’t like his family but because he enjoys the freedom of being alone. And this time, the house would be all his for the whole day. His parents were taking his brother to see if they could fix his hearing-aid or buy him another one. And after that they would take him for a sleepover at the twins house and go out to celebrate their marriage birthday. It was simply P E R F E C T.

Patton noticed his brother walking in the room and sitting on the sofa in front of him while their parents were going back and forth taking everything they need. He knew what that meant. That’s usually what they do when they want to talk privately. Patton paused his music player and left the cellphone behind.

- Sorry about your hearing aid, D - he signed with a sad face.

The last sign made him sulk

- I adore when you call me like this - he said rolling his eyes when pointing his index and middle finger to the side and touching his heart so Patt would know he was being sarcastic. He giggled.

- Ok, can you teach me the s-n-a-k-e sign again, please?

D made a two with his fingers, pointing to Patton, brought his hand to his chin then lowered it with a zig-zag movement like a snake moving. He repeated the movement but instead of a two he rised his index finger and touched the other ones together forming a “d” with his hand.

He gave him the thumbs up. D’s love for snakes made him really happy for being given this sign.

- Don’t worry about my hearing aid - he showed his broken aid, hand painted as a snake – I’ll paint a new one if we can’t fix it

- What are you doing with this one then?

He shrugged then placed his index and thumb together under his nose and slid it on his upper lip before crossing his fingers. “Mustache” followed by “R”.

The sign he gave to one of the twins.

- Remus asked if I can give it to him if we can’t fix. Maybe he wants to open it? I don’t know

Patton smiled and gave him a malicious face.

- You will be cuddling with your boyfriend!

- Remus is not my boyfriend! - he sulked while grunting.

Patton tried not giggling too loud, since D could still hear something from his right ear.

- Ok, he’s your crush. I hope you’ll have fun

He rolled his eyes but didn’t say anything else to defend himself.

- You’re lucky you don’t have a crush. I’ll make your life a living hell when you do!

Patt snorted.

- Good luck

 “… with that” he meant.

 “I'm not missing someone that I've never met Maybe a little scared, still I don't care” Will Jay – Never Been in Love

Patton took some of his clothes off having just a baby blue long T-shirt covering his brown-skinned body, feeling the wind from the open window run through him. He spinned around the room and laid down to the sofa, grabbing his phone and scrolling to see if there were any new messages for him.

Roman (7:01 AM): Good morning~ Who is ready for today?

Virgil (7:02 AM): Ro, it’s 7 in the fucking morning

Virgil (7:02 AM): Lemme sleep

Roman (7:02 AM): I’m sorry, lil sunshine

Roman (7:03 AM): But if you actually were sleeping you wouldn’t be answering it!

Virgil (7:05 AM): Ooooor maybe I WAS sleeping but then a stupid bird sound woke me up!

Roman (7:05 AM): Not my fault if you sleep with your phone glued to your face!

Logan (7:05 AM): Can you stop bickering this early in the morning?

Logan (7:05 AM): We’ll be ready when the time comes, Roman. No need to rush.

Roman (7:07 AM): Oh my lovely nerd

Roman (7:07 AM): I meant to ask if you were excited

Roman (7:07 AM): Not if you were literally ready.

Roman (7:08 AM): The movie is only at 7 PM

Virgil (7:08 AM): I’m extremely excited, your highness

Virgil (7:09 AM): Now would you please stop texting here and let me sleep?

Roman (7:09 AM): As you wish, my love <3

Virgil (7:10 AM): -_- <3

Virgil (10:23 AM): Ok, now I’m up

Patton (10:30 AM): Good morning, my dears ^_^ <3

Patton (10:30 AM): Are you going to the movies today?

Virgil (10:33 AM): Sup, Patt

Virgil (10:35 AM): Yeah… I kinda won 3 movie tickets…

Virgil (10:35 AM): We’d call you but the movie isn’t really your type

Virgil (10:36 AM): I’m so sorry, Patt :( I didn’t mean to exclude you or anything…

Patton (10:36 AM): No no! I didn’t feel like this at all, love!

Patton (10:37 AM): Don’t worry! I’m happy that you’re goin out!

Patton (10:37 AM): Send me pictures of you once you meet, I wanna see your pretty faces <3 <3

Virgil (10:38 AM): Are you sure? :/

Roman (10:39 AM): Patt, you’re just as important as any of us. We don’t want to make you feel like a third wheel.

Logan (10:39 AM): Just because you’re not involved with us romantically that doesn’t make our platonic feelings for you less important.

Virgil (10:40 AM): Just tell us if something is bothering you, ok?

Roman (10:40 AM): Yes, if you want we can try to see each other earlier so even if you don’t go to the movie we can at least see each other

Logan (10:40 AM): Yes, we’d gladly do this for you

Patton’s smile got wider. He was being sincere when he said he wasn’t feeling excluded and he knew how genuine that invitation was because they all genuinely loved him as much as he did and in the same way he did.

As strong as everything he could feel.

They were the friends he never wanted to miss, they were the people he could always count for and know they’d do anything to help him just like he’d do anything for them and they didn’t need to be in love with each other for it.

Patton (10:43 AM): You’re amazing, loves <3 But really I’m not feeling like going anywhere today. D went out with our parents and I’ll be alone the whole day, I think I’ll spend this time with myself here at home ^_^ But I appreciate it, really. I love you so much ;u; <3

Roman (10:43 AM): Anything for you, my dear! Enjoy your day!

Virgil (10:43 AM): We love you, ok? We’ll make sure to include you next time.

Virgil (10:43 AM): Promise

Logan (10:44 AM): Tell us if you need something or change your mind

Patton (10:44 AM): I love you too <3 Don’t worry

Patton swiped the chat group off and searched for something to listen while baking some cookies

“I know exactly what I want and who I wanna be. I know exactly why I walk and talk like a machine I’m now becoming my own self-fulfilled prophecy” Marina and the Diamonds - Oh No!

Patton was mouthing the lyrics while scooping the cookie dough. His shoulders wiggling with the song’s catchy rhythm as he felt every beat controlling his body.

Patton didn’t really listen to Marina and the Diamonds so often but Roman successfully made him addicted to this song. Last time he came to sleepover they danced together the whole night and without noticing they were practically lip-synching this song, which was so amazing and powerful that Patton never left this rush go.

He turned the stove on, started the chronometer and just left the music flowing through his body

Patton twirled off the kitchen, the wind following his movements filling his legs with a chilling sensation that would only make his movements more and more powerful.

He was throwing his head back with his eyes closed, shaking it so hard that Patton could feel the curls of his hair touching his cheeks making him smile as bright as the sun.

That’s what he likes the most about being alone. As long as nobody could see he could be as cheerful, loud and expressive as he wants without any judgement. He could manage to make his entire body feel happiness and express it in it’s own way.

He could shake his as weird and as careless he wanted.

His thoughts were cut off by a loud ringing.

- Oops! Almost forgot my cookies!

 “Oh yeah I'm tired of falling Oh yeah For someone else's story 'Cause he gets the girl and I get ticket stubs I guess it's time to write my own personal version of love” Will Jay – Version of Love

Patton (6:34 PM): Hey, Dee! Are you already at Remus and Roman’s house?

DD (6:40 PM): Hey there. Yeah, we’re watching the Saw movie for the 4th time this year -_-

Patton (6:40 PM): Wow…

Patton (6:41 PM): Why you never tell him you don’t like this movie?

DD (6:42 PM): No one likes to hear him beaming about the deaths and all the gore stuff.

DD (6:42 PM): And it’s funny to hear him laughing when that woman tries to reach the keys and ends up trapped

Patton (6:44 PM): Awwwww

Patton (6:45 PM): It’s cute that you do that just to see him happy

DD (6:50 PM): -___-

DD (6:51 PM): If you wanna see it this way

DD (6:55 PM): At least the movie don’t make me feel uncomfortable so it’s more bearable

Patton (6:56 PM): Yup

DD (7:00 PM): Hey, Patton

Patton (7:01 PM): Yes?

DD (7:02 PM): I think I’ll try to tell him tonight

Patton (7:05 PM): Tell what?

DD (7:02 PM): Don’t worry, I’m hidden in the bathroom. He’s not seeing our messages.

Patton (7:03 PM): Oh, ok!

Patton (7:04 PM): Well, good luck! ^^ I’m pretty sure things will turn out fine

DD (7:05 PM): I’m not worried about it

Patton (7:05 PM): Pfff

Patton (7:05 PM): Sure ;)

DD (7:06 PM): urgh

DD (7:07 PM): You should tell Roman too

Patton sighed. There we go again.

Patton (7:07 PM): D, I told you before. I’m not in love with Roman…

Patton (7:08 PM): He is my best friend, just like Logan and Virgil.

DD (7:08 PM): Well, I never said you were not in love with them TOO

DD (7:09 PM): Look

DD (7:10 PM): I know talking to mom and dad will be hard

DD (7:11 PM): It is hard for me too

DD (7:11 PM): But you don’t have to talk to them if you don’t want to

DD (7:12 PM): None of us have

DD (7:13 PM): I’ve always hid my relationships very well, and you know that

DD (7:13 PM): I can help you so they won't find anything out too

DD (7:14 PM): Or… Idk, protect you if they react badly about it

DD (7:14 PM): Just know that I’m on your side, ok?

DD (7:14 PM): I’ll never judge you for being who you really are

DD (7:14 PM): And polyamorous relationships usually go great

Patton didn’t know how to answer. It wasn’t the first time they talked about it.

No matter how many times Patton would say he’s not interested in anyone, D would try to say that he’s in love with Roman or one of his boyfriends.

Or act like he will be in love with someone someday.

But Patton highly doubted that and was pretty fine with it

Patton (7:15 PM): I know, D

Patton (7:15 PM): I love you

DD (7:16 PM): I need to go back now, I’ll talk to you tomorrow

Patton (7:16 PM): Good luck!

He never told his brother about being aromantic and all this talk actually makes him less inclined to do so. He knew he means well despite everything, so Patton never felt like yelling or fighting with him for insisting on it.

But at the same time…

He was so DONE.

It was already difficult for him to find out who he really is.

It was already a huge pain to see that the fact that he doesn’t feel OK with the idea of being romantically attached to someone. That this whole thing actually makes him feel sadder, empty and chained just by the simple thought of it because “that’s what everyone needs to feel”.

It was already difficult for him to see how he can explain his relationship with Logan, Virgil and Roman.

Yes, they were made for each other.

No, he never wants them to go away.

Yes, he loves them A LOT.

But his love was not romantic.

His 3 partners were dating each other romantically but they all see Patton as someone just as important in their lives, even if they don’t see him as a boyfriend.

When they found out about Queerplatonic Relationships it was like big realization and a good way to include Patton in their lives that was not just a simply “he’s my best friend”.

And that makes him so happy, special and wanted he didn’t need or wished anything else.

But it was almost like the whole world was revolved in romance and that was the only way for anyone to find happiness. Like not having a romantic partner meant you’d be “alone forever” as if that was the worst thing ever.

Patton was not alone.

Patton was not unhappy.

Patton was not repressing feelings anymore.

Patton was free. Patton was Patton.

And that was everything he needed.

Why wouldn’t anyone get this? Why was everyone so fixated on it? Why-

- No! – Patton murmured before eating one last cookie and getting up from the sofa and turning his TV off – I’m not letting this ruin my day. I’m gonna take a shower.

“Am I vital If my heart is idle? Am I doomed? … If lovelessness is godlessness Will you cast me to the wayside?” Moses Sumney - Doomed

Ok, maybe choosing this album to listen while taking a shower wasn’t a very uplifting choice. Not that his songs are bad. But they were not the type of songs for you to feel good, it’s more like a song to give you a relatable feeling. Something might make you say “yes, that’s what happens to me".

But the shower did gave him some good, since the cold water mixed with Moses’s voice echoing through the walls were relaxing and almost swooning, like meditating. Logan taught him how to fixate his thoughts in one single thing until he could slowly focus on the sensations of his surroundings and Patton particularly enjoyed doing this in the shower.

Patton threw his naked body in the bed and turned to see his own reflection in the mirror close to it.

He stared at his freckles, covering his entire brown body, and smiled as he remembered how Virgil made a small comment about how much he likes it because as a child he used to look at people with freckles and try to form constellations with them and it was like they have a little piece of the sky with them. That was the best “non-intentionally” cute comment he ever made.

He sat on the side of his bed and stared the mirror, giving more attention to his own details. He looked through his whole “galaxy body” passing some of his fingers through them, mentally picturing the whole sky moving around it. He never knew why but sometimes imagining things like this made him feel so good and at least for a second forget about everything else.

- Let’s see this galaxy dance.

He picked up his phone, chose the first song that came with shuffle mode and got up.

“You're vulnerable, you're vulnerable You are not a robot You're lovable, so lovable But you're just troubled” Marina and the Diamonds – I Am Not a Robot

This time he danced slowly and with his eyes closed.

His arms embracing his body and his movements had no shape or choreography.

It was just free and random.

Patton’s hands were running through his arms gently, like a self-cuddle, having this short moment to love himself.

He was moving his shoulders inclined his head behind and instead of just mouthing the lyrics, Patton allowed himself to actually sing.

He definitely was not.

He was a human being.

A lovely human being.

“It's okay to say you've got a weak spot You don't always have to be on top Better to be hated Than loved loved loved for what your not”

Later that night, now completely undercovers and almost ready to sleep, he received a photo from the chat group of Roman, Virgil and Logan in the cafeteria after watching their movie.

The image of the latino man and the black goth kissing each side of the ginger haired nerd made Patton smile fondly.

Patton (11:12 PM): Omg, you all look so adorable <3

Patton (11:12 PM): I’m happy you enjoyed your movie :3

Virgil (11:14 PM): Yeah, it was really cool

Virgil (11:15 PM): Logan and Roman wouldn’t stop geeking around it after the movie, they almost didn’t finished their meal

Roman (11:16 PM): Oh, come on! There were many things to think about after that

Virgil (11:17 PM): I’m not complaining, charming prince. It was cute seeing you theorizing things.

Roman (11:17 PM): UwU

Roman (11:20 PM): But hey! I guess we were not the only one who had a good movie night ¬u¬~

Roman sent a picture of his twin, laying on the living room’s couch, sleeping with his mouth open and his eyes slightly allowing to see his sclera as a short man with a small vitiligo around his left eye was sleeping on him with this arms embracing the rat man. Patton cooed upon the vision of his brother in such a lovely state.

Roman (11:22 PM): @Patton Morales blackmail? >:)

Patton (11:23 PM): Pffff come on, Roman. We both know none of us would do this xD

Roman (11:23 PM): Urgh, yeah you right…

Roman (11:23 PM): Ah to be a poor honest man, who loves his brother too much

Roman (11:23 PM): ú-ù

Virgil (11:25 PM): Say this for yourselves, I have no sympathy for those dirty little sinners

Roman (11:25 PM): omg VIRGIL!

Virgil (11:26 PM): Urrrrrrgh alright alright, I’m the one who’s not allowed to be a jerk. Sorry.

Roman (11:27 PM): I’m afraid some sins shall not be forgiven, sweet pudding… ú-ù

Virgil (11:27 PM): Tsc, fuck you then. I want my Nightmare Before Christmas DVDs back

Patton (11:27 PM): Omg, dears. Not this late at night xD

Virgil (11:28 PM): lol ok, Patt. Don’t worry, I was just kidding

Virgil (11:28 PM): I highly support your brothers

Virgil (11:29 PM): I love you all

Roman (11:29 PM): I love you too, storm cloud <3

Patton finished to curl up on his bed, hugging one of his pillows like a teddy bear and smiled to the phone screen with his lovely partners texts

Patton (11:30 PM): Hey, loves?

Virgil (11:30 PM): Yeah?

Roman (11:31 PM): Yes, Patton?

Patton (11:32 PM): I know this will sound random but… Thank you

Patton (11:32 PM): Thank you for being with me for so long

Patton (11:32 PM): Thank you for accepting and understanding me

Patton (11:33 PM): Thank you for being so kind and so nice and for having me in your lifes

Patton (11:33 PM): Having you as my partners was the best thing that ever happened to me and I don’t know how I’d be able to live without any of you

Patton (11:34 PM): I just have a lot of feelings hehe

Patton (11:34 PM): Anyway… That’s it. I’m going to sleep now but I had to say it.

Patton (11:35 PM): I love you, dears!

[endysgirl]

Sailor Mars Birthday Tribute

I am so late on posting this but I just did not have time to edit. For Mars I wanted to talk about her 90s anime version and her much better manga version.

Let me start by laying my bias wide open. I never liked Sailor Mars. As a kid I thought she was unnecessarily mean. She was and still is my least favorite, besides ChibiMoon. She’s beautiful, and her powers and attacks are awesome. As for how she fits into the overall scheme of things, I have major issues with how the anime portrayed her compared to how Naoko intentioned her. Frankly, I can’t help but view 90s anime Rei as an imposter and I’ll explain why...

Ok, first let’s talk about 90’s anime-Rei. We know she’s very hard working, goes to an elite girls’s Catholic school and wants to be an independent career woman when she grows up. Yet, for some reason (*cough*patriarchy) she sees Mamoru in season one and thinks he’s perfect so she’s gotta have him. She embarrasses herself going all boy crazy over him (he literally steps on her head and just walks away) and he seems like a typical clueless dude who doesn’t realize she *likes* him. I relate hardcore to Mamoru here. She’s so thirsty and he is so not. Then fast forward to after Endymion gets taken and Rei slaps Usagi calling her a coward. It’s meant to be some great emotional scene that some fans latch on to. Yet, it’s not Rei’s slap that motivates Usagi. It just hurts her. Go watch it again (epi35); it’s the voice of Mask from her memory, gently and patiently encouraging her, as always, that she is strong and can fight that spurs Moon into action. We’ve seen over and over that Usagi responds to patient encouragement over violence, just like when she does when she faces the baddest villains. Yet, the 90s anime always has Rei cutting her down. As far as I’m concerned, it’s just the patriarchy at work, trying to convince young girls that the boy or girl who’s mean to you really does care about you. It’s toxic and just plain stupid.

Now, am I saying 90s anime Rei doesn’t really care about Usagi? No. Not at all. She’s her Senshi and they share the same heart and the same dream to protect those they love together. Of course she loves Usagi. My issue is how the 90s anime portrays that dynamic. It’s spreading toxicity within female friendships and trying to sell it as genuine. I also understand that Mars’s fiery personality is what a lot of her fans love about her. I’m not saying that’s bad either, even if it’s an inaccurate representation of the character Naoko created. Apparently, it was Ikuhara that wanted the anime to change her cold and aloof personality to “fiery”. To perpetuate the patriarchal tropes I’ve mentioned, the anime tried to paint her as Usagi’s bff of the group, usurping Minako’s place. In the manga, Minako is the Leader of the Senshi and the one closest to Usagi in personality and in her role as the Leader of Serenity’s guards. Yet the anime is constantly trying to make Mars the one that is extra special to Usagi. Case in point, at the end of Stars the first voice we hear address Eternal Moon after she defeats Galaxia is Rei but in the manga, Usagi is drawn hugging Minako first. These little moments bother me, probably a little too much.

Then there’s the love triangle they tried to created with her and Mamoru. Fucking kill me. The love triangle garbage is just typical, patriarchal tropism within the storyline that has no place in the SM story in regards to Mars. Let’s make two friends like the same dude bc that’s drama that people have been conditioned to enjoy. It’s lame as far as I’m concerned. Let’s take a moment to remember the random, stupid and pointless scene in the curry episode where ChibiUsa and Mamoru run into Rei and after a moment of awkwardness they decide to go find Usagi together. Tell me that’s not the patriarchy trying to validate one woman’s place by using another woman as comparison instead of letting her stand on her own. 😒 And they’re trying to backtrack on the whole Rei liking Mamoru episode. This isn’t Rei’s fault obviously, I’m just using this scene to explicate why I don’t like the dynamic the anime created, and why that makes Mars a difficult one for me to get excited about.

There’s no way you can convince me that Mars’s bitchiness wasn’t a direct result of a “male perspective” (as Naoko called it). The idea that female bffs bully each other and cat fight all the time is ludicrous. As a 32yo woman (and lifelong Moonie) with a tight circle of girlfriends, there isn’t a single one of us who would tolerate such toxicity from the other, even at 14yo. It just isn’t realistic, unless it’s a bad relationship. I’ll give the anime credit for getting one thing right - her bravery. In both the manga and the anime, Mars is fearless. She charges into battle and gives it her all. She doesn’t let any doubt get in her way. She does not hesitate or dwell on self-doubt. And that alone is reason enough to love her.

Now, let’s discuss Manga-Rei. Because Adult-Moonie-Me LOVES manga-Mars. She actually appears in Codename Sailor V outside the arcade. She says the atmosphere is “disquieting” and leaves. In the manga, she’s very quiet and reserved. There is no bickering or cat fighting between her and Usagi. She’s also probably the most objectively beautiful of the Inners. She’s suppose to be “slender”, with long black hair and brown eyes which are sometimes seen as purple. When Usagi first sees her on the bus, she thinks she’s soooo beautiful. And another time, when they’re at the beach/pool, guys keep buying Rei drinks but she’s not flirting or giving them any attention, bc she is not boy crazy. Sis is enjoying those drinks tho.

Her awakening in the manga is very similar to the anime with the exception that’s she sees a premonition of Usagi and Jadeite that makes her go find the bus. Like the other Senshi, she is drawn to Usagi.

In her manga profile, her dislikes are television, modern society (the anime has her immersed in pop culture, going so far as to make her write her own songs and dance at the school festival), canned asparagus and men. It’s implied that she doesn’t like men or care for them bc of her father. He never had time for her and she doesn’t have a good relationship with him. Plus in a short story, she has a guy she likes but he chooses to follow her father’s footsteps into politics. So she kisses him and is like, boy, bye. ✌🏽 She considers men emotionally weak, untrustworthy and is generally disinterested in them, even if they’re buying her drinks and fawning over her. Same, Sis.

She is described as beautiful and “reserved”, but “scary” when she’s angry. She so beautiful that when Mamoru’s underclassman, Asanuma, sees her, he thinks she would be the perfect girlfriend for Mamoru (who Asanuma thinks is perfect) and that she should be Mamoru’s ideal type. He’s really surprised that Usagi is so *ordinary*.

Rei has strong precognition and has an affinity to fire. Ironically, there is nothing in Shintoism about fire reading, so that must just be a shoutout to the Greek influence on the manga. I love her psychic abilities in both the anime and the manga. Random fun fact: Naoko worked at a Shinto temple for a while before or maybe during college.

Mars is one of the only Senshi, like Michiru, who can use an item as an attack in her civilian and Senshi form. Her “ofuda” (Shinto talismans) are powerful enough to disperse evil and make regular people faint (remember anime epi w/Unazuki’s mouth getting sealed and in the manga/crystal she accidentally “purifies” Usagi, causing her to faint). Mikos (shrine maidens) are known to use archery attacks, so civilian Rei was already proficient in archery before awakening as Mars. Also, just like Jupiter’s earrings stay on her when she transforms, Mars is always wearing a pendant and when she transforms, it attaches at the waist to her fuku.

Mars also, uniquely, has her own guardians: the Crows, Phobos and Deimos. In the anime, the crows never take human form as they do in the manga. In the Dead Moon arc, Jupiter and Mercury power up by speaking with their inner consciousness. But Mars powers up by speaking with the human forms of her crows. This is a great moment in the manga bc Phobos and Deimos basically tell Rei that’s it’s ok to not want or desire men and marriage. She is the asexual goddess everyone overlooks and I love this aspect to her personality. The Crows are the ones to give her the Mars Crystal which is her starseed. We also find out here that Mars pledged a vow of Chastity to Serenity in the SilMill. They don’t explain the reasons behind the vow, but considering Rei’s spirituality and serious conservatism, it’s understandable. Also, while Phobos and Deimos are named after the moons on Mars, in the Stars Arc it’s revealed that they’re from the Coronis and were acquainted with Sailor Lead Crow.

For the most part, Rei in the manga seems more boring than Rei in the 90s anime, but personally, I don’t think so. Reading the manga in middle school and seeing a female not *give*a*fuck* about marriage was awesome to me. She’s also kinder and she has far more respect for Usagi. She’s extremely popular at her school and has her own fan club. She carries herself with a certain dignity that reminds me of Michiru. She’s second in command after Venus. And let me end this by saying that Crystal gave Rei justice, and for that I am happy.

Happy Birthday, Mars! 🔥 🌙 ⭐️

P. S. Check out Allison Yarrow’s book “90’s Bitch: Media, Culture and the Failed Promise of Gender Equality” for more detailed analysis on how women in the 90s who wanted to have a home and a career got turned into the bitchy boss, bitchy girlfriend or bitchy best friend to subvert their quest for gender equality. I think Rei is the perfect example of this narrative. Especially when you consider men changed her nature in the anime from what her female creator intended for her. Also, check out the podcast on it https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/unladylike/id1333193523?i=1000432317654 (podcast name: Unladylike episode 45. how to free the 90s Bitch)

Thanks for reading all this you wonderful Moonies!!!

[teruthecreator]

if you're looking for something to rant about, do u have anything to say to someone who genuinely hated amnesty? i thought it was really uncreative compared to balance and it didn't scratch that Taz itch for me.

i mean, ur asking someone who now literally Cannot re-listen to amnesty bc of the trauma i retained from the ending, so like. cant blame you! i think out of all three of their arcs, it was the one with the most potential but the least amount of effort done to access that potential 

i, honestly, was never the biggest fan of balance. high fantasy bullshit has never been my cup of tea. i didn’t read h*rry p*tter or lotr when i was a kid bc it all seemed so Boring to me. i stuck to settings based in our reality, but with a fun twist! like the series of unfortunate events, which i read three times over

basically all of this to say i preferred the premise of amnesty over balance. balance was like high fantasy bullcrap that slowly merged into sci-fi bullcrap, while the premise of amnesty was like spooky and mysterious!! but still grounded in some sense of normalcy, which is an enticing premise to me! maybe it was a little cliched, small town in the middle of the woods has Something Off, but i would argue most of balance was cliches too. 

my biggest problem w amnesty now, looking back, is griffin genuinely did not give a shit. you can feel it in the effort he put into making the narrative, you can SEE IT in the end, and it’s just really evident throughout that griffin Did Not Fucking Care. which, if you don’t give a shit, don’t make a story that is going to make others give a shit bc it’s only going to end up unsatisfying for the both of us in the end. 

i think talks happened behind the scenes, and it was ultimately decided that travis would dm the next big arc. but, dust was a bust (as he said he couldnt maintain mystery for that long) and the other idea he had was barely in the works. so, to fill time before trav was ready with graduation, griffin decided to dm amnesty. i don’t think griffin wanted to do this; i think he was tired of dming and tired of making stories. griffin SOUNDS tired throughout most of the ending so like, it can be assumed this was a perpetual concept. they also literally admitted to having graduation ready to go Right When amnesty went to shit, so i think this is a really solid theory. but, even still, i think it’s a goddamn shame the amount of potential they wasted to jump to graduation asap 

but i think amnesty has better characters than balance, ill be deadass. i cared WAYYYY more for the amnesty trio than the balance. balance was just boring men, while the amnesty pc’s had like. legitimate flavor. flavor that was squandered, mind you, but flavor nonetheless. 

ned is the best character they’ll ever make for a pc, and i will live and die by that. ned had an intricate and complicated backstory that explained parts of his present personality while still leaving some mystery to him. every interaction he had with the other pcs or npcs felt both Genuine and Not, but given his character being a crook it’s literally the most accurate out of the three. my biggest problem with amnesty is ned got squandered to appeal to griffin’s inclinations towards big story tropes and sci-fi bullshit

aubrey’s Whole Shit relied on her understanding her greater power. duck’s Whole Conflict was coming to terms with his greater power even when he has a long-standing history of problems related to it. sound familiar? 

it’s magnus all over again! which, tho it was trav’s character, you can tell in balance that griffin was heavily aiding trav in fulfilling this greater fantasy

in my opinion, ned was what the show should have focused on. because ned’s story had NOTHING to do with high-fantasy themes or sci-bullshit that griffin used as a crutch in both balance AND amnesty. ned’s story was about genuine connection, re-discovery of self, and the lengths it takes to forgive and let live. ned’s story was the closest to the human experience any of the pc’s has gotten thus far (graduation tbd), and you know what they did? 

they fucked it. 

they fucked it for angst bait, and for that i literally can’t even hear ned’s voice for half a second without being filled with anger and sadness. 

and don’t even get me STARTED on the wack bullshit griffin and justin did in terms of the relationships in amnesty. SORRY, HUH??? THE FUCKING COP WHO SPENT THE ENTIRE ARC TRACKING DOWN THE CRYPTIDS HE LIVED WITH AND LITERALLY WAS AN ACTIVE PARTICIPANT IN TORTURING MAMA GETS WITH BARCLAY??? THE GUY WHO NEVER WANTED TO INTERACT WITH HIM IN THE FIRST PLACE???? 

and to any d*ckn*vas out there just kno ur opinion is shit. i have a whole Essay as to why that relationship is a genuinely Bad Representation of a relationship and i’ll make ur broke bitchasses go find it. duck was a TEEN and minerva was a GROWN ADULT when they met; even if they got together when they were way older it still means they met and interacted at the equivalency of when you meet your high school gym teacher. and the power imbalance that existed for the entirety of their friendship bc it was mentor/student that y’all just Glance over. yeah, right. i kno yall dumb bitches had really gross teacher crushes I See It. 

but given ALL OF THAT, do i think balance is better than amnesty? 

nah. imo balance was boring and i only really started to care by stolen century. amnesty i cared from Right Off The Bat and only lost it after they ruined their own show

so yeah lmao that’s it ghrbjhrgbhjrgbhj

[frxstguardian]

All fandom asks

Idk if this was a joke or if you want me to die but I’m gonna do it!

A - Your current OTP Jackparse from Check Please! Jack canonically never wants to talk to Parse ever again and their last conversation 2 years ago was an argument. I love pain.

B - A pairing you initially didn’t consider but someone changed your mind Zukka. Idk why their parallels weren’t obvious to me until pointed out.

C - A ship you have never liked and probably never will Makorra. How am I supposed to like the blandest most heterosexual ship?

D - A pairing you wish you liked but just can’t Solangelo. I like it just fine conceptually, but I grew up thinking about Percico, Jasico, and Valdangelo, and Will Solace is a new guy who I have zero emotional connection to. Good for all the kids growing up with him though.

E - Have you added anything cracky/hilarious to your fandom, if so, what Enlightened Jar Jar Binks is my legacy

F - What’s the longest you’ve ever been in a fandom Doctor Who was the first fandom I read fanfiction for back in 2008.

G - Do you remember your first OTP, if so who was in it I really liked Zukaang during middle school.

H - What is your favorite source text for fandom stuff Probably TV shows since I watch lots of cartoons.

I - Has tumblr caused you to stop liking any fandoms, if so, which and why Yes, I refuse to associate with the Check Please! fandom because everyone either hates my favorite character or likes my favorite character for the wrong reasons. There’s just too much discourse.

J - Name a fandom you didn’t care about until you saw it all over tumblr The answer is Check Please! again haha.

K - Say something nice about someone in any of your fandoms Soniatera makes really nice ROTG gifs!!!

L - Say something nice about a character who isn’t one of your faves Kylo Ren’s line “Let the past die. Kill it if you have to.” is really good. It’s better dialogue than he deserves smh.

M - Say something genuinely nice about a ship that you don’t ship I like Rapunzel and Eugene a lot individually, but I don’t ship them. But it’s been a long time since I’ve seen Tangled (2010), maybe I just need to rewatch.

O - Pick a song at random, which ship or character does it remind you of Every song reminds me of Jackparse. Don’t underestimate my power. I can relate any lyric back to their relationship through sheer willpower.

P - Invent a random AU for any fandom ROTG AU where the guardians are like the X-Men and Jack is a young mutant who they rescue! Except Pitch is a dangerous mutant who wants to start a war with humans...

Q - A ship you’ve abandoned and why Merthur. I still like them, but the dynamic is unhealthy. Merlin needs to stop sacrificing himself and others for Arthur. It’s a selfish form of selflessness.

R - A pairing you ship that you don’t think anyone else ships I know other people ship it, but Ventrobi doesn’t get enough love. It’s so much fun. So much potential for wacky hijinks.

U - 5 favorite characters from 5 different fandoms Jack Frost Aang Nico di Angelo Eric Bittle Kent Parson

V - 3 OTPs from 3 different fandoms Cassunzel (Tangled) Enjoltaire (Les Miserables) Jackparse (Check Please)

W - 5 favorite ships and 5 kinks you like best for said ships My kinks are requited love, communication, and catharsis. Unrealistic!

[dragimal]

Longform Audio Creepypasta Recs

hey TMA fandom! as a new TMA listener but looooongtime creepypasta fan, I find it rly cool that ppl who aren’t into horror are getting into TMA! I’m hoping this will help bring fresh blood (hah) to the horror fandom, so if you’ve realized that you rather like audio horror but don’t know what else to look into, I’m here to recommend my favorite longform creepypasta narrations! 

this is far from an exhaustive list of long creepypastas, but I just want to introduce some of the stories I consider to be the best of the genre. and while I’m just reccing longform in this post, there are plenty of short one-shots I could rec if anyone wants to ask me abt a specific theme/Entity or even a specific ep of TMA (there are several MAG eps that brought me straight back to a specific creepypasta or two, lmao)

also, I’ll just be linking to MrCreepyPasta’s narrations b/c I’m heavily biased so I mostly listen to him, but there are plenty of other great narrators out there like CreepsMcPasta, CreepypastaJr, etc. (most of their names are variations on a theme asdfgh). and if u just want the text version of any of these, every video I link has a link in its own description back to the original text posting of the story

THAT outta the way, here are my recs! I’ll try to remember all the trigger warnings I can, but keep in mind I tend to be p hardy to most horror content, so there may be some things that slip past simply b/c they don’t register to me. also it’s been a minute since I’ve listened to some of these, so some have updated or I may have just forgotten some aspects. I’ll also update this if ppl find it useful and I find more good long pastas~

Penpal (2.5 hrs, complete)

op recounts some of their odd experiences as a child, all of which stem from an elementary school project involving a pen pal. as he recalls these experiences, a horrifying picture of his past begins to emerge...

easily my favorite pasta of all time-- and that’s saying something, considering there are some damn good recs here. it’s one of the first I read so long ago, and few have come close to what this one made me feel. op does an incredible job of capturing the nostalgia and childhood wanderlust of youth, and the last few lines of each chunk of the story hit like a goddamned truck-- esp "Friends”, I cry like a baby every time, it just.... hits something tender in me...

TW: stalking of children, subsequent kidnapping and child abuse at the end (and while it’s not necessarily *confirmed*, heavy implications of child sexual abuse, for that last bit). implied cat death. some graphic description of the victim of a hit-and-run

Search and Rescue Woods (~5 hrs, ongoing?)

op recalls several of the strange and disturbing experiences (their own and quoted from coworkers) of working search-and-rescue for an unnamed national forest in the US

y’know that feeling u get when u see photos lawn chairs just sitting at the bottom of the ocean? even if there’s a perfectly good explanation for why they’re there, it’s still haunting b/c it feels wrong to see them there, in that context? that’s basically this entire assortment of stories-- the obvious example being the stairs, of course, but even a lot of the human elements feel so out of place and wrong. if you’re a fan of Spiral-type horror w/ a hard edge of Stranger, this is the story for u

TW: generally clinical but graphic descriptions of mutilated bodies. use of the r-slur against an nd individual (it’s during a story that the main character is quoting from a different one-off character, so it thankfully only happens the one time..). child death, in certain stories. some wild animal death

Borrasca (2.5 hrs, complete)

Sam moves to a small mountain town with his family after his father’s job relocates them. he hears some spooky legends about the town, but doesn’t think much of them... that is, until his sister disappears. as Sam and his friends dig deeper into the town’s history to find any clues to his sister’s disappearance, they begin to realize there’s something deeply deeply wrong with their quaint little home

I’ve always loved horror that’s ‘mundane’ enough to be done by regular humans, but vague enough that it could actually be supernatural, under the right circumstances-- and this is one of those mysteries that keeps u guessing until the VERY end. my mind felt like that Pepe Silvia corkboard meme the first time I listened to this, I was losin’ it. this is also prolly one of my favorite examples of MCP’s talent as a narrator, b/c he adds in his own subtle foreshadowing with his voicework, and it blows my mind every time I listen to it again

also worth mentioning there’s a (3.5 hr) sequel! since the horror/mystery is basically done after the first one, the sequel is mostly suspense/thriller and character closure. if ur just here for the horror/mystery and the gut-punch of that first ending, then the sequel isn’t necessary. but if you want more closure for our dear sweet cast who deserve so much better, then by all means!

TW: the ending involves heavy sexual abuse (involving underage girls, no less), part of which is graphic. like I know I joke abt having to take breaks after reading emotionally exhausting stories, but I genuinely had to take a couple days of recovery after this one-- and that’s from someone who’s p hardy to all kinds of graphic content. do NOT take this warning lightly if this is a sensitive topic for you

Tales From the Gas Station (10 hrs for free, otherwise ongoing)

Jack works at a gas station at the edge of a middle-of-nowhere town. Strange things happen at the gas station-- bipedal deer stopping by for a drink, dark gods leaving vague messages, fingers growing from the ground out back, sudden lawn gnome appearances-- All just a part of the daily grind, right?

so if I wanna be totally fair, this is more a rec for Night Vale fans than anything (tho the TMA/WTNV overlap seems to be p significant). the comedic, nonchalant tone taken towards everything supernatural and horrific is p much 1:1 WTNV. I’ve genuinely cried laughing at some of the fuckshit that happens, esp anything involving Jerry. not to say that GST doesn’t have its heavy-horror moments, but the frequency is more comparable to Night Vale’s approach-- dark comedy definitely takes center stage, here. tho this also varies by the POV-- the “Finding Vanessa” arcs are told from the perspective of a more serious character, so the heavy parts are far more frequent and hit a lot harder

as for the time estimate, here’s where it gets a littleee bit complicated. the first version was put out for free, and read for free by MCP (among a few other narrators). this came out in several different parts, and the one video I linked above has compiled *most* of volume 1, but not the Halloween story, featured here. HOWEVER, the author has taken a second go at v1 and beyond, which is currently ongoing and available to buy as books or audiobooks ALSO narrated by MCP!

as for deciding which version to listen to, I’ll just try to describe the differences here. the first version was written entirely via Jack’s online forum posts, which were subject to more direct reader interaction and Jack’s scatterbrain. thus, the first version leaves a LOT more details up to reader interpretation/theorizing, straight up doesn’t have or explain certain plot arcs yet, and is very disorganized in terms of timeline all due to Jack’s canon memory issues. this all, personally, made it v fun and silly to follow, but I’m aware that’s not for everyone. the second version is written from a more standard first person narrative from Jack’s perspective. while Jack’s memory issues still make him an unreliable narrator (often *upsettingly* so in this version), the actual narrative is far more organized, complete, and easy to follow. the fun thing is that the first version can still be considered canon material to the second version, as Jack references making those very forum posts within the second version narrative. so, personally, I consider the second version to be the core cohesive story, while the first version is supplemental, fun material that provides more context for a few of the strange bits that happen in the story (like Jack’s ‘secret admirer’ makes more sense if u’ve listened to the first version). either way, the second version is the only way the story is going to continue (as far as I’m aware), so if you’re ONLY going to listen to one version of the story, listen to the second version

TW: for the first version, there are some uncomfortable jokes/implications at certain points-- associating villains/assholes with fatness and/or personality disorders is unfortunately a running theme, and a few off-color jokes are made abt some of Jack’s conditions (general mental health and his brief use of crutches). there’s also a point at which it’s implied that a specific one-off arc is a ploy to rape Jack, tho nothing actually comes of it beyond awkward scheming (but just in case, that story is specifically “Death at the Gas Station” at the very end of that long compilation, if u wanna skip it). for the second version, I believe the author was made aware of these issues and either straight-up removed or fixed most of them in some way. there’s just one point where an intentionally-questionable character uses the g*psy slur, and a few points where a regular commenter on Jack’s forum posts has w*ndigo in their username

in terms of gore for either one, uhhh maybe some descriptions of injuries? body horror? this one’s a lot harder to call for me, b/c the comedy softens the blow on a lot of the horror

Accounts From a Lonely Broadcast Station (5 hrs, ongoing)

Evelyn is the new voice of a small mountain town’s local radio station. her job is to take calls, play music (ALWAYS play the music), and broadcast emergency warnings whenever the fog rolls in from the surrounding forest. pretty standard stuff. she tries to make the most of it-- if only that damn crow with human eyes would stop watching her...

this one’s similar to Gas Station Tales with its heavy reliance on dark humor, but it takes itself a bit more seriously, with a more even split b/t genuine horror and comedy. also MCP brings in wonderful extra voice talent w/ this one, I RLY love Evelyn's va ;w;

TW: graphic descriptions of mutilation and body horror

My Friend Has Been Living in an Alternate Reality (4 hrs, complete)

op’s eccentric friend, Clint, turns up on op’s doorstep unannounced after several years missing. Clint vanishes again just as abruptly, leaving op with a journal detailing a horrifying, dangerous journey that’s almost too bizarre to believe, yet...

so this one’s more like an action/thriller with horror garnish, tbh-- very exciting and suspenseful! I love the weird, apocalyptic world Clint describes in his journals, and the societies that have cropped up around these hostile circumstances

TW: graphic descriptions of mutilation/injury

My Name is Lily Madwhip (~8 hrs, ongoing)

Lily Madwhip sees things before they happen. they’re usually horrible things like deaths and injuries that she wishes she could prevent but often can’t. at least her best friend-- an angel possessing one of Lily’s dolls-- is around to provide advice

this one’s from the perspective of a little girl, and it leans into dark humor enough to soften at least some of the more traumatic moments. Lily’s young enough that she’s somewhat removed from the full gravity of the deaths around her, but the fact that it’s happening so frequently at all seems to be warping her perspective towards death to be more... casual? is that the right word? it’s just a rly interesting perspective to see for horror. also we’ve got another rly great guest va here for Lily~

TW: brief descriptions of injury, but they’re not graphic. frequent animal death.

The Showers (2.75 hrs, complete)

op recounts a scary story he heard from a teacher back in high school about a vague location and a terrifying encounter. he later ventures to find this location to see the truth for himself, but is it worth it?

this one’s a classic-- I think it was of the first creepypasta I listened to? not this version, but I wouldn’t be able to tell u which narrator it was at the time. I won’t say that this one’s the most unique story out there, but something abt it has always stuck with me?.... idk, I think the premise rly hooks me

TW: oh god it’s been a while, but I don’t remember anything particularly triggering? maybe body horror?