#but we're back now sorta. with lore
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Why did you choose NOW to butt in? Why not follow the death cultists that can ABSOLUTELY destroy the world 99% of the time?
Quincy: "Besides, how was I supposed to know he was working with these 'death cultists'? It's not like he told us anything useful. All we've known for a long time is that he wants power--there's loads of powerful deities and artifacts in the Main Realm, and even beyond. It's like finding a needle in an astronomically large haystack, and constantly finding Nothing upon Nothing is just...I'm kind of at my wit's end here. Cut me and the others some slack, ok? ...Oh, and I saw what you said about some 'long hallway'. I was hoping you could be more precise. You seem to know what's been happening, so surely you'd have more information, right?"
They paused, sighing.
Quincy: "...Sorry. I'm not trying to be rude. This is just...a lot more than you realize, and now that I know Void Termina's involved...I really don't work well under this much pressure, huh..."
#Event: Chapter 2.5 - Intermission#story#ask#revolver115#wow it's been a minute uh. yeah i saw the other ask but didn't know how to respond and my brain went into another fandom & kinshift#but we're back now sorta. with lore#this has been an ongoing search party for a While. out here working their ass off with their tech knowledge#not me using this as a metaphor for how it's difficult to get motivation sometimes#and that i put so much effort into shit only to not feel like it matters much lmao pls ignore me#also also quincy's not tryna be rude and i'm also not tryna be rude either just uuuhhh#little bit of Feelings there oops#it's fine i'm fine you're fine everything's fine like i said ignore me#kirby#kirby star allies#kirby au#kirby fanart#kirby series#kirby oc#quincy#ask blog#ask-the-retired-cultist#retiredcultistredux#retired cultist redux
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wallace x willard art when? 🤔🤔🤔
kicking the rat bastard from Arcane into the sun for a while because GET IN CLAYMATION GANG, WE'RE GOING BACK TO OLD MAN YAOI TOWN (these 2 goobers just keep adopting more children. First 4 woke dogs and now a whole army of robots)
heads up for Vengeance Most Fowl spoilers!!
no but hear me out HEAR ME OUT I have been brainstorming of so many possible ways of how to add Vengeance Most Fowl into my Apple pie with Cheese lore, and AHEM:
Wallace has no visible love interests in this one because he's dating Mr. Tweedy :^) the movie is set during the phase in their relationship when they're sorta not-quite-in-the-beginning-anymore, but not full on married yet either, and are constantly discovering new things about each other. Willard is not present because his apple farm is having a REALLY busy season so he hasn't had time to go visit the West Wallaby Street gang. Which is why Fluffles decided to go to the countryside for a while, to help him and the terrier twins! (and to be Willard's therapy dog <3)
None of them could have anticipated all the crazy shit that would happen in Wigan in the meantime LMFAO but hey, it's what makes being part of Wallace's and Gromit's weird little family so exciting! Though Willard, who has...ahem... PARTICULAR memories about gnomes stealing his stuff in the past, takes a long while to get used to the Norbots and is highly uncomfy at first...honestly, he'd be even scared, as their massive overwhelming amount reminds him of a certain flock of birds. Slowly, he will ease up though, once he learns that the gnomes are only as dangerous as their commands - and surprisingly... it helps him in a therapeutic way to cope more with his chicken farm trauma <3 (he WILL ask Wallace though why he added an evil setting to them LMAO and Wallace answers that he thinks that in case the gnomes gain sentience, they're allowed to choose what sorta people they will become)
ALSO THE FACT THAT BOTH HIM AND GROMIT LOVE GARDENING ANG GROWING VEGGIES/FRUITS???? HELLO???? STEPDAD AND SON BONDING ACTIVITIES RIGHT THERE!!!!!!!!
PLUS!! Now that Wallace has learned his lesson about technology, he knows how to program the gnomes to help with Willard's apple farm in ways that won't damage it or take away from the fun creative part of it :)
#yesyes vengeance most fowl has computers and all while Chicken Run is set in the 50s#but hey. Dawn of the Nugget has working mind control. I don't think technological consistency is a thing in this universe LMFAO#wallace and gromit#wallace and gromit spoilers#vengeance most fowl spoilers#vengeance most fowl#chicken run#willace#wallace#gromit#mr tweedy#willard tweedy#norbot#fluffles#apple pie with cheese#*blows off dust from that tag* NOW THATS A NAME I HAVENT HEARD IN A LONG LONG TIME#myart#aardman#old man yaoi
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If you're still taking mortasheen questions - Can you tell us any lore stuff about the ultimate bioconstructs like hestermoan?
Mortasheen's original three "legendaries," Hestermoan, Tormanshee and Mothneaser, all have names that are anagrams of "Mortasheen," which itself is the name of a disease spread by the Nuckelavee in folklore. They were imagined to be three "kaiju" that would be completely frightening and disturbing with none of the whimsy or silliness of other Mortasheen monsters, and also broadly represent their three common categories: a physical attacker, a mental attacker, and a bioweaponry wielder. Hestermoan is the biggest and strongest and basically Mortasheen's "Godzilla," Tormanshee was meant to have a nasty Silent Hill kind of vibe and spreads "madness" while Mothneaser collects your blood and turns it into other monsters. They're so old by now, they conflict with a lot of the "style guide" i have in my head. I know I just said that was kind of their point, but there's other internal guidelines I impose on the setting that I'd like them to follow by the time I introduce them into the RPG, and they might change a bit drastically, but hopefully they'll keep the same vibe.
Tormanshee in particular was based on one of the very oldest Mortasheen monsters, a simple embryo in a floating bubble, which I then brought back as the "tormite" here and tied them together, also giving Tormite one huge open eye so it can also read as a floating eyeball.
Now for the RPG I'm using Tormite again as the lowest-level and most common psychokinetic creature, though I turned it back into a sleeping embryo thing with its eyes closed:
If you liked the "simultaneous eyeball" gimmick, don't worry! I'm doing a thing with that! I don't know what yet, but one idea is that they kind of "wake up" and then they start to evolve various forms from there.
I think Tormanshee will still connect with them somehow, too, like their "termite queen," but my design ideas for it are a whole lot more elaborate. They still have the "silent hill pregnancy demon" vibe but with a whole lot more body, kind of from a "what if this was also an ultraman kaiju or an evangelion angel" angle.
The more current concepts I had for Hestermoan are odd enough I don't want to spoil it, and it was originally going to be included in the first book - sorta - but we're holding off on it for now and may release them as free supplemental monsters. I also kind of like the idea of doing so because it has a similar feeling to Mew and other "secret" legendary Pokemon. Maybe their first release would even be through a really silly and gimmicky exclusive medium, before they get released as free public downloads.
My newer concepts for Mothneaser are all over the place, but it still has nothing whatsoever to do with moths. I just really like the sound of the name. All three still have the lore that they wake up only when the city's existence is threatened. This is monumentally rare because the city is the size of a continent and it's alive enough to regenerate from almost anything.
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⋆ ˚。⋆୨୧˚ Boy Next Door ˚୨୧⋆。˚ ⋆
warnings: sub!soobin, afab!reader, dom!reader, making out, friends to strangers to lovers, nerd!soobin, nicknames (noona, soobie), kinda leg riding?, first time, pervert!soobin, not proofread
a/n: short, kinda a random idea but fits him. We all know he'd he such a boob guy. Theres lore guys theres lore okay trust me
!!MDNI!!
Everyone labels him the "nerd" of the neighborhood because he's kind of the guy everyone uses for homework answers. Your friends, they can be a bit harsh. They sorta.. kinda.. bully him? That sounds realllyyy bad but really all they do is tease him from time to time. For small things like his glasses, the way he dresses, yk the usually things. And yeah, you've laughed along a few times. It felt wrong, but it was worth it to be friends with them.
Though he's always kinda been your friend, secretly. He helped you out with math when you were practically failing, listened to your endless rants about whatever drama was going down at school, and never asked for anything back. Thats just all he was though, always there, kind of like part of the scenery of your life you never really paid much attention to.
Then randomly at school, Soobin comes up to you. He's looks of nervous, which honestly wasn't that weird for him. He purposefully tried to meet you when your friends were getting snacks during your break.
"Y/n," he mutters, "there's something I really need to tell you." You just stare at him. You were kind of annoyed because if your friends saw you they would never shut up about you talking to him. "I like you, more than a friend like. I've felt this way for a while but didn't say anything because I know how it is with your friends..I know you laugh with them, and it's cool but we're graduating soon so I didn't want to miss the opportunity." You didn't really give him an answer. You just stared at him, mouth open slightly and with a confused expression before he walked away.
It pissed you off that he just HAD to tell you. It was awkward as HELLL and now you couldn't even ask him for help with work. And not to mention finals were like in a week. And now you stood in your kitchen, pissed of because your mom told you 5 minutes ahead of time that the Choi's would be coming to your house to have dinner. Was this a joke? Well you wanted to make the best of it. At least you could play around with him for the time you had. You tried slightly with your outfit and makeup, but no too hard. When the door opened and his family entered, you were sitting on the couch. You got up to greet them all, glancing at Soobin. He had his usual black framed glasses on, and a plain outfit.
"Hey you came." You waved slightly to him. He VERY awkwardly waved back, looking at his feet avoiding eye contact. "Mom we'll be in my room." Now this would sound suspicious if it wasn't for the fact that you've known each other since you've worn diapers. You both made your way up your stairs, and into your room. "You can sit on my bed if you want." He nodded silently. "Soo.. anything new with you?" You wanted to talk about something, ANYTHING to break this awkward suffocating feeling. It wasn't just awkward, but you were also still pissed. You weren't pissed at the fact that he abruptly confessed, but more by the fact that he didn't let you give a proper response. He constantly avoided you at school and pretended not to be home when you brought stuff over to his house for his family. Did he think he was alone with his feelings?
"Some people started a rumor at school.." He said breaking the silence again. "They said we're a couple. You raised an eyebrow. "Oh yeah? You sure you didn't start the rumor yourself?" You teased. He looked genuinely bothered. You scoweled. "What? Does it make you that unfomfortable that people think we're dating?" He quickly retorted, "N-no..! I just thought it might make you.. annoyed"
"Ill decide for myself how I feel, thanks, I dont need you deciding that."
"thats not what I meant.. I'm sorry noona.." He said repentually.
"I never even got to respond to you that day. Maybe the rumors would have been true if you let me speak." You said moving slightly closer to him on your bed. He looked confused.
"My answer is I like you too, and I do want to date you. So does that answer suit you? Or were you expecting rejection?" he paused. He felt a bit embarrassed when you so bluntly expressed your feelings to him. He wasn't expecting a positive reaction, so he felt hesitant on if he should speak or stay quite.
"H-huh?" He couldn't tell if you were teasing him or not. "If you're actually serious then why didn't you just tell me then?"
"Because you didn't give me the opportunity to. Well its good we got that out of the way. I'm actually really excited now. We can do tons of fun couple things." She said facing him.
"We-w-what?" The whole mood shifted. A moment ago you guy's were all serious, which was totally out of character for you. Soobin was taken by surprise as you leaned closer. "What 'couple things' are you talking about..?" His voice broke as he spoke.
"we could play around and.." she leaned closer to whisper to him, "I would even.. let you touch them." She leaned back away from him and laughed hysterically while cupping her chest in her hands.
Soobin felt his entire face immideitatly turn red and his heart rate shoot up. He felt like he could die from embarassment as he felt his body heat up because of the teasing. He could only slightly nod. "W-well I guess.. we can do that.."
"Oh so you're admitting to being a pervert?"
"I-it's.. not like that" He said answering quickly. "I'm not.." it was a joke you often said to him before.
"You've thought about it before haven't u? How they felt?"
"W-well.. um.. yeah.. I have thought about it.. but that doesn't make me a perv.." His face flushed even more than before.
"It totally does. But your wish is my command." She took his big hand and placed it on her chest. Soobin immediately felt a sudden warmth on his hand. It was like every nerve was being stimulated, and his breath began to become more heavy as his heart rate increased. You never knew boobs turned guys on this much. Or maybe it was just Soobin..
"You like it right?" You teased.
"W-well, I mean.. they're- they look really soft and I.." He trailed off and he was stuttering profusely. It was already too much for him to handle.
"you're already this flustered from feeling my clothed chest?' He nodded in a mix of shame and embarrassment. His face was completely red now. You wanted to test his limits. You leaned onto him, pressing a soft gentle kiss onto his lips. You just wanted to test the waters. His eyes widened in surprise as he felt the unexpected sensation. He hesitated for a moment before slowly parting his plush lips. The kiss became more rough, and you pulled his waist, so once he attempted to pull away, naturally he fell onto his back on your bed. He gasped for air, his body trembling under yours. His hands moved up to your shoulders, trying to push you away but finding it almost impossible to resist. The warm touch of your hand started to spread all around his torso as your fingers began to run over his skin. He let a groan before speaking, "M-Mmph...p-please don't.. dont't stop.." You moved your mouth down to his kneck, slowly trailing kisses down his sensitive skin.
A shiver ran down his spine, and he let out more groans as he tried to hold onto u, not wanting you to stop. You lifted up his plain tee revealing his chest. You brought one of his even more sensitive nipples into your mouth, gently sucking. Soobin let out a soft moan, and he couldn't help but arch his back slightly. You could feel his heartbeat now, and he could feel himself getting harder under your touch. You felt it. It was huge. Wasn't he the nerd everyone asked for homework answers? Why did god give him everything. Looks, brains, and a huge cock. She let out a teasing laugh.
"Somone's excited." She lifted her knee in between his legs.
"M-mhhh..mm n-noona.." His moans became even more intense as you pushed into his hard erection through his sweatpants. He couldn't hold it in anymore. "M-more..please," he managed to whisper between ragged breaths. She gave attention to his swollen nipple while still pushing her knee into him. The sensations were overwhelming. His body trembled. He pressed his hips forward in an attempt to get closer to the sensation you were creating. "Fuck.. I can't take m-more.." His voice strained. "Mm.." He tried to hold back, but as soon as he felt your hand slip down under his sweatpants onto his hardness he couldn't help but make noises of pleasure.
"Shhh.. these walls aren't sound proof soobie." You told him, knowing there was no way anyone downstairs could hear if they couldn't hear your blasting music that you usually played on your speaker. His body tensed up and he felt himself about to climax, his hips bucking forward. "noona I'm- I-" With a suppressed and strained moan he released his seed into his sweatpants, panting heavily as the wave of pleasure washed over him. He took a second to fully come down to realize the situation. His legs still twitching, he felt both incredibly embarrassed and incredibly speechless.
"Oh- by the way I'm sorry for laughing with my friends.. before.." She had a complete 360 in the way she treated him but he didn't even seem to notice-- or care. "I-i don't even care anymore." He said calmly. "Can you grab me a tissue?"
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Y'know, one thing that bothers me about the backstory information we get for the end of the war and Megatron in Earthspark; is /how/ he actually def acts from the cons.
Like, all we really see is how he was fighting them for the allspark in the battle scene, sneaking into Shockwaves lab to steal it, and how the cons behave towards him. Some cons outright call him a traitor, while others still were like "I'd never fight /you/ Megatron!" And it just makes comprehending what exactly went down between them so tricky.
It stands to reason that Megatron had gone behind their backs with his decision to side with Optimus. But why? Why didnt he just stand in front of his army, and /tell them/, "we're doing this now"? He was the leader, why couldn't he do that? Why /wouldn't/ he?
So then the thought trails to perhaps he'd decided that he wanted to quietly remove the allspark, lie and say the bots stole it when it vanished, and let it fade into the shadows in a safe place only Optimus was to know about. That seems like a decently plausible plan. So then in the scene with Shockwave on that theory, Megatron wasn't actually outwardly against them yet, but Shockwave knew. Shockwave already has a bit of his own history in lore of wanting to expand his power over the Cons in his own right, so I don't think it unreasonable for him to have kept a keen eye on Megatron's behavior. Hell, Shockwave had been planning a protoform army that Megs didn't seem to approve of. So maybe that timeline could have been how things went, with Megatron running off with the Allspark after locking the scientist away.
But then it still doesn't make sense. Cuz if we're going off the idea of the first plan, why wouldn't he have simply covered up Shockwaves absence and done it the quiet way instead of it leading to some huge battle? Clearly no one knew where shockwave was since he hadn't been freed beforehand by another con-- or maybe they did since in a deleted scene ravage was supposed to have gathered a remote to release him. Maybe that's why they deleted that scene tho. Who fucking knows. It's jank as hell.
So then Megatron must have already been openly with the bots in that scene, and snuck in due to insider knowledge to the location of Shockwaves secret lab. Okay sure. So then, who took charge after Megs disconnected? Starscream? But Shockwave had literal underground plans of his own. And Star's line of "witness the fall of Megatron!" Is just so funny to me thinking about the timeline shit. Cuz I process that line as "witness the mighty warlord falling from his throne to become a pitiful traitor to everything he created!", but it could just feel like some typical slag of the "Megatron has fallen, now I'm the new leader!" But then if Starscream had already appointed himself as leader by that point, then that'd seem odd in context, especially as it's worded differently. Were the cons all just flailing around disorganized? Some listening to Starscream, some to Shockwave, some to Soundwave?
There are not enough details touched on for my liking. Vague context that leads to more questions than what answers it gives.
I think at least for my fic imma have it as a sorta mix where Megatron decided he was gonna dewit on his own and went behind their backs, he was caught fraternizing with the enemy, and when he tried to explain then his three main lads thought it was bullshit and were actually on the same page at least on the idea that they didn't wanna throw away their advantage and thought what Megatron was saying was dumb. And I bet Optimus and other bots were there during that confrontation so it just escalated into a full on battle where Megatron just left to stay with the bots. It could have also just been Star who initially found out that way and just relayed what happened to the others.
It still just seems so weird tho...so tbh i'd love to hear anyone else's thoughts on the matter.
Bro's fumbling-
#transformers earthspark#tfe#Megatron#earthspark megatron#tfe starscream#tfe shockwave#tfe soundwave#tfe optimus#theorycrafting#timeline brainstormin#tryna wrap my head around wtf actually happened#idk if its just me getting more confused the more i think about it
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The Mishandling of LO's S3 Midseason Hiatus - Part 1
So Lore Olympus' return is right around the corner, and I realize I've never actually talked about the S3 midseason finale. I think I said I was going to, but then I just sorta didn't, probably because I was still reeling in the absolute absurdity of it for weeks afterwards. In hindsight, I should have written about it back when it was still fresh, but I feel like I can do it just as much - if not more - justice writing about them in hindsight, now that they've had time to sit and I've seen what Rachel and WT are clearly planning to do after the comic ends (whether or not they succeed... that's a different story).
CAUTION: THIS IS PART 1 OF A 3 PART SERIES IN WHICH I WILL BE SPOILING MUCH OF EPISODES 251-253. THIS EPISODE CONTAINS DEPICTIONS OF VIOLENCE INVOLVING STRANGULATION. THIS WILL BE A LONG POST. BRACE YOURSELF.
So one of the things that really motivated me to finally talk about this was a conversation that happened recently in the ULO Discord - the realization that there are many readers who still don't know what happened after the free to read finale cliffhanger.
Y'know, the one where Hades gets possessed by Kronos and attempts to choke Persephone-
Now, awful dark jokes aside about how Persephone frankly deserves to have her balloon head popped, this was a wild cliffhanger to leave on for free readers, but the strange thing this time around - unlike with the previous midseason hiatus - is that this is where the cliffhanger has stood for free readers for the past 3 months, and it will be 4 months by the time the series returns.
And frankly... this just highlights a huge problem with LO's writing, because this cliffhanger? Like all the others, it's literally resolved within the next episode. The one that's currently under the FP lock.
Man, isn't it a little fucked up that we only ever get trigger warnings when it's concerning Persephone? Where was the warning for when Minthe got turned into a plant? Where was the warning for the entire episode that depicted Hera's trauma from Kronos and how it's still affecting her in the present? It's always either the Persephone, Hades, or Apollo focused episodes that get the trigger warnings, they couldn't care less about the violence being done onto other people in the story.
Anyways. Episode 251 opens up by reminding us, oh yeah, Kassandra exists!
Remember back in Episode 227 when Psyche stole Apollo's USB drive (and by "stole", I mean she picked it up off the ground where Apollo had conveniently dropped it?) And they found a folder with a picture of Kassandra? Well, Episode 251 opens by reminding us of her... 24 episodes later. SEVEN MONTHS OF REAL LIFE TIME, LITERALLY THE LENGTH OF BOTH THE SEASON 2 AND SEASON 3 MIDSEASON HIATUSES COMBINED-
Anyways, I guess Rachel finally figured out what she was gonna do with Kassandra after all that time, and it's... really stupid.
But wait, don't worry about that yet, because only the comic's opening reminds us of Kassandra, we gotta establish the title first and get back to that cliffhanger from before, the one that free to read users have been waiting 4 months to see.
(pay attention to the episode titles here btw, it's probably one of Rachel's lamest 3 parter title sequences yet)
Turns out Kronos is still intent on getting his hands on Hera, even though we've literally already seen Kronos haunting Hera. Is he just a ghost? A hallucination of her traumatized mind? We don't know, it never really explains itself. So Kronos is still looking for Hera.
(kinda weird that we're getting all these redrawn fullbody angles of Hades-possessed-by-Kronos choking his noodle-bodied wife who is doing literally NOTHING to actually fight back besides yelling at him, but okay.)
Turns out Hades isn't really hyped about this choking game going on between his dad and his niece wife, so he goes full on "release the beast" Naruto mode on his ass.
And that's it. That's literally the conflict resolved. The cliffhanger that free to read users were left with over the 4 month hiatus is resolved literally within a handful of panels and Hades just "believing enough" to save his wife.
And then that's just it, it cuts away, and we get this sorta awkward conversation between Persephone and Hades (now himself again) over the fact that he just choked out his wife.
The scene transitions to Hades waking up in his bed (literally that last shot of him and Persephone was it, it transitions immediately). I'm trying not to use up Tumblr's 30 image posting limit so I'm not posting the 3 fucking copy pasted panels of this that just involves Hades waking up, use your imagination lmao
There's literally no actual conversation here, no amount of Hades asking "what happened", somehow despite his possessed state he remembers everything so succinctly that he jumps right to demanding Persephone to see her neck.
(literally removed the panel of Persephone saying "Hades..." because these types of "let me do the thing" "Hades :(((" "let me do the thing" exchanges are literally just Rachel trying to hit her panel limit, once you start seeing these '3 panel' exchanges that copy paste the same shit over and over again, you can't unsee them and you realize this is why so little happens in the comic as a whole, because it's just constant repetition of dialogue and reaction panels to pad out the episodes).
And then we get what I like to call "guy in a position of power manipulating his more vulnerable partner into pitying him without actually apologizing":
No for real, I didn't cut out a single thing from this exchange aside from a couple copy pasted reaction panels, this is the entire conversation. Hades doesn't apologize, he doesn't ask Persephone if she's okay, he just pulls the "you can leave if you want toooo :(((" baiting Persephone into further trapping herself with this jackass. SHE'S the one who's stuck with HIM.
Like, obviously Hades wasn't the one who choked her, that goes to Kronos, but he doesn't even ask her if she's okay. He just looks at her moldy ass bruises and immediately goes "YOU CAN LEAVE IF YOU WANT TO I'M A MONSTER OH GOD-" and then of course she's having to comfort him which is fine but where's the balance? It's always Persephone having to comfort him and listen to his trauma and we never get Hades doing the same for her - the times we do get Persephone talking about her trauma and struggles with him, he always finds a way to make it about him.
Hades proceeds to talk more about his childhood and more of the shit he's already talked about multiple times before, I don't even need to go over it at this point.
That said, Rachel does remember to bring his stutter back. When's the last time he stuttered? 200 episodes ago ?? (literally I don't remember, it's like when he used to twist his napkins, he doesn't have these character traits consistently anymore).
THERE we go, finally some semblance of an apology. It came after more trauma dumping, but at least it's something-
Oh for fuck's sakes.
This is literally such generic "you've come so far!" motivational jargon. And it's made even worse in LO because what has Hades overcome exactly? Just a reminder, here are the things we've seen in Hades' backstory since he was rescued by his brothers:
He started a business in the Underworld that he's been operating with slave labor and profiting off ever since as a tyrannical oligarch
He entered a multi-century-long affair with his brother's wife, his own sister in law
He cost Demeter - Persephone's own mother - the role of Queen of the Mortal Realm and Persephone still does not know this.
He abused and neglected his adopted son - who was literally abandoned on his doorstep - for hundreds of years and used his role as his adopted father to guilt trip his son for getting "special treatment".
He never took responsibility for the financially dependent relationship he created between himself and a lower class nymph and tried to bribe her out of his life as soon as he fell for a 19 year old intern
HE LITERALLY FELL FOR THE 19 YEAR OLD DAUGHTER OF A WOMAN WHO HE HAD SCREWED OVER AND PRETENDED LIKE THAT WOMAN WAS IN THE WRONG FOR NOT APPROACHING HIM DURING THE EVENTS OF THE ACT OF WRATH, AND THEN HE HAD THE GALL TO PROPOSE TO HER DAUGHTER RIGHT IN FRONT OF HER WHEN SHE BASICALLY HAD NO OTHER CHOICE BUT TO SAY YES.
Everything he's legitimately had to overcome involving his trauma has gone completely ignored until pop in comes the pink cinnamon roll girl to solve all his problems and do for him what apparently even a therapist couldn't do (because haha he thinks his therapist is a hack.)
Persephone saying "look at all you've done" should be a reminder of all the crimes Hades has committed against people weaker than him, but instead it's used as a term of endearment, because Persephone literally got with him when she was 19 years old. And apparently the whole "eternally 19" thing applies to more than just her body, because even now, 10 years later, she's still lacking all the smarts and self-awareness and maturity to realize marrying this man was a mistake.
At this point Persephone isn't too naive or stupid to realize what she's gotten herself into, she's just a terrible person who's entirely complacent in Hades' bullshit and frankly, they deserve each other.
They literally keep talking about him for several more panels. Hades literally whines on and on about how much of a failure he is, how he feels like he failed the child who's trapped in Tartarus, and then of course Persephone tells him "no honey, you're the most important being in this process!" and she's LITERALLY STILL JUST TALKING ABOUT HIM, THIS WHOLE EPISODE IS PERSEPHONE TALKING ABOUT HOW WONDERFUL HADES IS, NOTHING ELSE HAPPENS. HAVE YOU NOTICED WE HAVEN'T EVEN SEEN KASSANDRA YET ?? HAVE YOU NOTICED THE COLD OPEN FOR THE EPISODE HASN'T BECOME RELEVANT YET ?? I'VE ALREADY HIT THE 30 IMAGE LIMIT AND I HAVE TO START CUTTING STUFF OUT-
Persephone and Hades talk about how they should name the interloper, but they don't come up with anything before transitioning to Leuce and Thetis.
And y'all, this has gotta be one of Rachel's worst cases of backpedaling in the entire series. You thought how she turned Leuce - Hades' first wife - into a homewrecker was bad? You thought it was absurd the plot tried to turn Leuce into Minthe 2.0?
Remember those text messages that Leuce and Hades sent between each other? The ones we never saw but kept getting alluded to? Well of course we couldn't have Hades actually text Leuce during Persephone's banishment, because then that would mean he isn't 100% loyal to his little pink cinnamon roll "qween", so what was the next best thing? Kronos possessing Hades and texting Leuce like so many people - even fans - assumed? No. It's worse.
The text messages... weren't real.
This literally makes no sense. First of all, it's once again Rachel creating drama out of "haha woman delusional!" much like she did with Minthe. But second, it literally doesn't make sense after what we've seen leading up to this.
Leuce didn't just talk about Hades texting her. She went to his office, intent on seducing him, with the knowledge of these text messages being real. She even TALKS ABOUT THESE MESSAGES WITH HADES.
But of course, they were interrupted before Hades got a chance to respond, so this was convenient enough for Rachel to try and pull off some 'twist' where she could easily absolve Hades of "cheating" on Persephone (again, the girl he only knew for like 1-2 months) but also not have to deal with the weird logic of Kronos possessing Hades just to text some random nymph.
This is absolutely one of the most absurd retcons Rachel has ever tried to pull to get herself out of the corners she writes herself into.
Now the episode is still going and FINALLY, it gets to Kassandra, after teasing her at the beginning of the episode and proceeding to do a whole lot of nothing throughout the entire thing.
This has to be one of the funniest panels in the entire comic, bar none. Rachel's gotten worse at drawing men despite making this comic for 5 years and having plenty of opportunity to improve, and he literally just looks like the fucking Amazing Bulk, haunting this poor mortal woman with his very presence.
So yeah, it turns out that the "curse" Kassandra suffers from in this "retelling" is, rather than having prophecies no one believes (or at least, if she does, we don't see that), she sees Apollo and no one believes her. Again, Rachel takes these weird liberties with the original myths that don't make a whole lot of sense all for the sake of seeming original, but whatever, Rachel hit her panel limit for the week, because that's essentially where the episode ends, with Apollo greeting Kassandra. As quickly as it was shown at the beginning of the episode, the one part of the episode actually featuring Kassandra is wrapped up in literally 7 panels.
THOUGHT VOMIT TIME
So with Episode 251 now summarized and out of the way, I really wanna talk about how this episode operates as the first FP episode after the midseason finale for free readers.
Despite the fact that it was a 4 month break and despite the fact that WT has always still released these episodes for free on schedule - with the idea that every reader will be up to date with the current content and can start fresh with a new set of FP episodes when it returns - this time around Episodes 251-253 have remained locked.
And I say Webtoons specifically because as far as I know, the creators typically don't have control over this type of decision. From what I've heard from other Originals creators, it's often WT who decides shit like coin costs, FP release dates, etc. This is why during hiatuses the numbers on the episode unlocks never actually align with their real return dates, sometimes they completely undershoot and reset, sometimes they overshoot and tell people LO is coming back in January despite the fact it's been confirmed it's coming back in November. This isn't Rachel's doing. It's clearly Webtoons trying to squeeze as much money out of this series as they can so they think the 4 month hiatus will motivate people to pay... but even the newest episode is still only sitting at 17.9k likes, which is just slightly above the average amount the FP episodes normally wind up sitting at by the time they're unlocked after 3 weeks, but this has been after four months. The hiatus of the comic and its communities absolutely put LO out of sight, out of mind.
That said, I don't know what this means for the series' return, if it'll have 6 FP episode unlocks going forward or if it'll just return with one new FP episode and Episode 251 unlocking for free readers, but holy shit, if that's the case, this is gonna be a shitty way to return from 4 months of nothing. The cliffhanger from 250 implies so much more than what it ends up being and it's, again, highlighting a fundamental issue within LO - it operates purely on a week to week basis, producing episodes on the fly, and concerning itself more with filling up its panel quota so that it can get readers from beginning to end when they can drop some new cliffhanger that likely won't lead to anything or will be completely resolved within three swipes of the next episode. Season 3 has been especially egregious with this and it's clear Rachel has run out of track to run on.
There is speculation that perhaps the reason the timing of this cliffhanger is so off is because Rachel didn't know the hiatus was going to happen and WT forced her on it. That said, it's not something anyone can really confirm besides Rachel. I wouldn't blame her for taking the time she did considering she was attending both NYCC and SDCC this past summer, and it's hard enough for her to keep up with any sort of buffer to begin with, so those conventions would have definitely resulted in episodes getting postponed anyways.
What I'm really interested in seeing is the reception when the comic returns. Hiatuses like this are brutal for traffic, it's incredibly difficult to get every single person who you started the hiatus with to return after it's done. It's not uncommon for comics to come back to only a fraction of their readerbase - and that's where the marketing comes in.
S3's return has been incredibly undermarketed. I've talked about it already but I'll mention it again here - they have done nothing to hype up LO's remaining audience for the ending of LO. Not only has the fact that the comic is even entering its final part been mentioned on either Rachel's or WT's social media pages, but the fan groups have been shut down for almost the entirety of this hiatus, shutting fans away from discussing the comic, making predictions, and just participating in their most active and direct part of the fandom. This was an absolutely absurd decision on Rachel's part, I don't know if this was her trying to shield herself from criticism or if she genuinely just doesn't give a shit about her fanbase anymore, but it's not a good thing if the only active groups to be found online during a comic's hiatus - it's final hiatus before the series ends - are the critical ones. Fans of the comic should not have to find out about its ending from me. I know I've got a way with words, but it's not fair to the long-term fans of this comic that they're being shut out by the comic's own creator, simply because she either doesn't care or is just so afraid of the critics that she'd rather hurt her relationship with her fanbase by shutting them out just to maybe shut out any critics who are nearby.
I don't know what the reasoning is and I don't know how it could have been beneficial. But that leads us to the other theory, one that I can see as plausible-
I don't think Lore Olympus was supposed to end here.
We've talked about this theory before, but to reiterate - it's been speculated for a while (prior to the news at NYCC that the comic would be ending) that S3 of LO wasn't going to be the final season as so many people had been assuming based on past info. There was no indication or marketing implying this was the final season - meanwhile webtoons like City of Blank were marketing their final seasons from day 1 of the premiere - and there were loads of new plot threads being established in S3 that we knew couldn't possibly be wrapped up by the end of the season. Case in point, it took Rachel seven months to get back to Kassandra, and while during that time she's rushed plotlines that shouldn't have been rushed (the wedding) other plotlines have proceeded to drag at a snail's pace or been dropped altogether. The speculation that S3 wasn't going to be the final season was plausible.
But now, suddenly, LO is coming to an end, likely within the next 20-30 episodes, and neither Rachel or Webtoons have said a word about it. No announcement post, no hype, no promotional art, no statement from the Webtoons VP of what to be excited for (which he's done before). It seems like they're either intentionally trying to bury it to keep people from panicking while Rachel retreats into the shadows to hide from the crimes she's committed, or they're intentionally keeping the ending of the comic unannounced so they can backpedal on it later to generate hype over it "deciding to stick around". Chances are, it'll be based on how the return of the series goes, and whether or not it's able to get the performance numbers back in the green.
I do not think it will. As I said already, hiatuses are already notorious for destroying built up traffic, especially on Webtoons where people (many of whom are teenagers and children) are conditioned to expect regular content on a schedule. But there's one other thing that's been bugging me - there hasn't been a shred of promotional art. We're currently less than a month away from the return of LO and not only are Rachel and WT being incredibly hush hush about it, but all the art Rachel has put out has been largely on her Blue Sky, where she has the smallest following, and none of it is exactly indicative of being "promotional art", rather just random sketches and doodles that she's doing on her downtime. Everything else has been promos for her books, SDCC/NYCC, of course, Rachel Smythe Presents, her next venture which she has been hyping up more than the actual return or ending of the comic that made her famous in the first place.
At this point, I'm not even fully convinced she's even started working on the next episode yet, let alone any sort of buffer. If anything, she knows that she's coming back to the series with 3 episodes still locked under FastPass, so all she'll need to technically have ready for launch is one new episode. Rachel has never been good at building buffers, not even in the beginning when she apparently started off with 2-3 episodes of buffer. Even when her comic is nearing its end, she's not learning any lessons, she's not setting herself up for success. And I'm not setting myself up for the hope that the series could possibly come back any better than it was when it left - if anything, I think we're about to see Rachel and the comic outdo itself once again on how bad it can possibly be.
And we still have two more episodes to talk about, which includes the cliffhanger for FP readers that we've been waiting four months on. Part 2 and 3 of these FP episode analyses will be going up as soon as I can get them done, ideally I'll have all three parts done before it returns so we can start off fresh with the newest episode.
Buckle up folks. Pour yourself a drink. We're gonna need it.
#lore olympus critical#lo critical#anti lore olympus#antiloreolympus#long post#essay post#tw violence#tw assault
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Alrighty my dudes buckle up
GHOST RIDER D&D AU
also WOE. ART STYLE CHANGE BE UPON YE.
First things first thank you to my beloved mutual @moosemonstrous, who was basically the brains behind the operation I basically just wanted an excuse to draw tiefling Robbie and then got smacked in the face with an awesome story way beyond what I had ever thought of with KILLER fucking lore to match <3.
While I usually like to start with Robbie when introducing an AU, we're going to unfortunately have to start with Eli. A man who fucked up so monumentally that the kinda sorta god he's supposed to be serving went 'Bitch??? How about NO.' and humbled him faster than my DM can say 'roll perception'.
Ok I'm getting ahead of myself. Eli is pretty much the same personality wise as he is in canon. Insecure and desperate for power/control. He grew up surviving with Beto by doing jobs for the Myriad crime syndicate. Somewhere along the way he started serving his patron, Desirat, the twilight phoenix, in exchange for her power.
Im just going to directly quote what moose said about Desirat cause its phrased WONDERFULLY:
"Desirat, The Twilight Phoenix - companion and mount of Asmodeus during an ancient war, was torn from her master and captured by uppity mages. They were eventually killed, but she remained chained under a mountain, creating weird thermal phenomena in the area. Her sanity fractured in isolation so she thinks herself divine, and she lends through dreams and visions to those who 'carry a seed of fiery vengeance'. She now speaks to the minds of those who lie spurned and angry at night, calling them to unlock their inner flame and let Desirat aid them in their vengeance."
Desirat chose Eli as her champion to free her. She believed his faults would make him easy to manipulate for her purposes.
But eventually Beto wanted to settle down, and Eli refused to (to quote moose) 'Stop that warlock bullshit that EVERYONE SAID will get him in trouble'. And the brothers separate. During that time, Eli gets it in his head that he can steal more power from her by becoming a Litch. Great! In order to become a Litch he needs to have the most important person to him engage in a willing life sacrifice. Not great.
So he finds Beto and tries to get him to oblige to his sacrifice, and while there might have been a time where Beto might have laid down his life for his brother, he wont anymore. He has a family now. People who rely on him who AREN'T Eli. Unfortunatly, Eli is PISSED by this and kills Beto even though he isn't a willing sacrifice. Eli figures 'Whose really gonna care? A life is a life right?'
DESIRAT cares. She basically obliterates Eli on the spot and stores his lifeforce for later purposes.
(all stat sheets curtosy of the great Moose. Also I feel obligated to mention there was a scary moment during the art process where Eli looked like a beautiful butch lesbian. Horrifying.)
After Eli's spiritual, physical, and magical bitch slap, Desirat starts looking down his bloodline for a NEW champion. Lucky her, Robbie is RIGHT THERE. Protective of his brother, a strong sense of justice even from a young age, a hatred of when things aren't fair; he's PERFECT. She has plans for this one. Eli was a good test run. But she has IMPROVEMENTS planned for Robbie.
So Desirat waits until Robbie is old enough and strong enough to serve her purposes. In that time, Julianna goes out adventuring to get more coin so she can pay for Gabe's treatments of Greater Restoration and just. General food and water and general supplies. But she doesn't come back. She was responsible though and hired someone who was willing to take what she could offer to take care of the boys. Gabe still believes that she's still out there and trying to come back to them. Robbie thinks she's either bailed on them for a life of adventure or dead.
Around when Robbie turns 18, Desirat puts her plans into effect. Seeing as tieflings carry innate magical abilities (most commonly thaumaturgy, hellish rebuke, and darkness) it would be far more advantageous for her champion to be a tiefling than human. In the span of about 4 months, Robbie goes through a rather drastic transformation.
His fingernails harden, then blacken, then sharpen. Awful pressure builds in his skull that is only relived when the beginnings of horns break through his skin. A similar process begins with a lump forming at his tail bone and eventually bursting out into a long pointed tail. His canine teeth fall out and grow back in sharper and longer. His eyes cloud over to black and yellow, all the while his skin reddens and forms hard ridges on his arms, ribs and spine.
To say this is disorienting and painful is an understatement. Not to mention how it changes how the other people around the village look at him (not to mention how it changes how he looks at himself). Even though the stigma around tieflings isn't as strong as it once was, it eventually causes Robbie to be out of a job. So he decides to sell the house, pack up his things, prepare schooling money for his brother and move to the city where more opportunities will hopefully await.
GABE!!! THE LITTLE ADHGH. Idk why but I got extreme cute aggression when drawing this version of him fdjkslaf.
Gabe still has CP like he does in canon, but with the magical advantages of ✨Greater Restoration✨ he can generally function pretty well. He still gets tired sometimes though, so he carries around a walking staff as an aid just in case he needs one (also he can go whack whack. at least thats what Robbie tells him when he gets a little self conscious carrying it around).
Robbie has saved up enough money for Gabe to get a months worth of schooling at the Dawn Father Chantry in the city so he can learn to cast Greater Restoration on himself. Gabe's recent growth spurt has been causing him to need more and more frequent healings, and the Chantry in their home village of Hill Rock has been less and less obliging as of late (partially due to Robbies recent uh... condition. not that anyone would dare say it to his face of course).
Some extra fun doodles with expressions and thinking about how Desirat might look and interact with Robbie. I love when gods have a kind of twisted love for their special chosen people (plus some fun transformation horror cause its ✨me✨ were talking about what did you expect).
Also I really REALLY liked that top left sketch and got the rendering itch so I had some fun and painted it in.
Theres a whole fuckin. Second post to this au all lined up cause Moose when HAM on this. But its gonna take some more character designs so I'll need just a little time. but this will not be the last you see of this lol I promise <3
#I wanna make just a little resident evil au update rq but the sequel to this will be happening SOON.#i could not stop putting these guys into situations if my life fucking depended on it bby#not proofreading this bby cause I gotta go to bed but i ALSO need to get this out#I need to inflict yall with the b r a i n r o t#ghost rider D&D au#robbie reyes#gabe reyes#eli morrow#my art#sketch
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I love E!False because when you take a step back and look at everyone's series, everybody else has gotten used to that type of roleplay from season 1. They're leaning full into it now with lots of creative liberties, and all of them are using magic as much as they please. Joel is a god, Lizzie's town is full of animals, Shelby is getting kicked out of witch school, Katherine's got her curse, Sausage is restoring magic, etc. And False, well, she's not huge on role-playing stuff—mostly she does hermitcraft. She doesn't have tons of experience, her emotional support Ren isn't here, she's just sorta floating through. Her early lore is about a pumpkin guy just sorta moving about her empire and these dreams she has about builds. She has no memory and she stole a dead guy's clothes, but mostly her videos are kinda like "hey guys today we're building a bridge because I sorta feel like there should be a bridge here :)" She has no scope of how insane she can actually be until the rift happens and she's like "oh shit I've been sorta tame actually" and then she makes a whole plot line about trying to kill her twin sister and getting tortured and imprisoned because of it. Iconic
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A review(?) of Dandadan
Starting these reviews off is always the hardest part, but it often comes to me after some time filling out the rest of the article. Dandadan has been stubborn in that regard, so much so I've been trying to figure out where to start with this series since it first came out.
I began reading DDD before tankōbon's were being printed, hell before it even made it to NA digitally (There were translations in Europe which got them early iirc.) Then batches starting coming out, and I still have those original single chapters from Sept. 5 '21
I became captivated, but, like its namesake, describing why I enjoy DDD is daunting in how esoteric it all is.
The general plot is straightforward on its own: Momo Ayase, the granddaughter of a spirit medium, though circumstance meets with an occult obsessed otaku, Ken Takakura, and, yes, he's named after exactly who you think, which drives the Takakura obsessed Momo nuts. She calls him Okarun, which I will also be doing for the rest of this.
Okarun's big obsession is UFOs and aliens, which he believes in, but not ghosts. You see where this is going. Hi-jinks ensue, both go to hot spots for each others interest and what do you know, Momo gets abducted by Aliens and Okarun is possessed by a geriatric genital biting speed demon.
Feel free to re-read that last part a few times.
Suffice to say, Dandadan gets fucking nuts almost as soon as the first chapter, but we're not even close to how off the rails this series gets.
I'll save you the details of how they deal with the Turbo Granny, but I will say the mythos and rules surrounding the various spirits, urban legends, cryptids and aliens is handled with a shocking amount of intricate care. If you're like me, you grew up surrounded by a plethora of Unsolved Mysteries, caught UFO Files as it was airing, maybe you even had some of those Forbidden World books laying around from the 80s before getting into stuff like Yokai. Even though I don't really engage with that sorta thing outside Weird NJ nowadays (It stops being fun when people in public office are into conspiracies-- particularly of the nazi variety like lizard men and flat earth)
The narrative and aesthetic appeal of them has stuck with me.
Anyone that's read my Kamen Rider reviews would know how much of a sucker I am for that quintessential cryptid look, which Dandadan has plenty of along with just being absurdly unhinged and hilarious.
The first two volumes do a fantastic job setting up the limitations and powers of spirits in particular, eventually resulting in part of Turbo Granny's soul being trapped in a Meneki Neko and leaving her speed abilities with Okarun. Unfortunately, Okarun only got 1/3 of his bits back.
So now have two super powered protagonists touched by the supernatural and the unearthly on the search for…missing nuts. Or I guess testicles that look like magic golden orbs of power. That's seriously how we're kicking this off.
And yes, there is a basis for that in mythology called Kintama. If you're familiar with Gintama you probably knew that.
But beyond that basic set up… where the fuck do I even go from there? The series is far more than OTT action and good monster lore, but it's also hard to delve into the how and why of its overall qualities. Sure The supernatural and sci-fi bits are fantastic, and the comedy is wonderful, but it's a by product of the real core of Dandadan: the interpersonal relationships of the characters. Surprise.
Which yeah, if it wasn't clear from the get go, DDD has a romantic angle between Okarun and Momo.
Under the monsters, dick jokes, and the completely unhinged nature of everyone and everything is an oddly captivating and flat out adorable love story between our two leads, one that slowly unfolds but is challenged by the various shake ups from monsters, invaders and cast additions that occur to hinder that development; or in some cases push it further by bringing the two closer.
Okarun in particular very well might be one of my favorite interpretations of the Otaku with a heart of gold. He's a legitimately sweet person, cares for people, he trains his ass off to earn mastery over his powers to make things easier on Momo and to keep up with the ever increasing threats they face. In a sea of otaku power fantasy characters, it's nice to be reminded that characters with limitations and weaknesses to be overcome or dealt with are still showing up.
He's also just a total sweetheart to Momo.
And it's pretty clear even early on that the feeling is mutual. Momo is easily flustered whenever a cute girl gets a little too chummy with Okarun, or strings him along. She even retaliates in some cases.
Momo is also about as dorky as Okarun (As seen above) just in different ways, which makes the two complement one another while also contrasting in how much of a hot head Momo can be.
For a series that gets as bonkers as DDD, Momo's grade A shit talking "too stubborn to admit her feelings" gruff Gyaru personality helps ground the series with a rather realistic portrayal of a girl her age-- albeit one with psychic abilities and goes through some extreme struggles much later in the series.
In fact one of the more overlooked aspects whenever I read about Dandadan is how surprisingly dark the chapters start to get in the 80s onward. Because despite the major kick off involving Okarun having his balls stolen, the series is capable of being very sardonic.
For all the absurd fun like giant enemy crabs or the Flatwoods monster as a Sumowrestler, and even a daikaiju way later, you also have things like human sacrifices and tragic ghost stories which are treated with a heavy tone that is never undermined by that off-kilter comedy. You even see tones of that with Turbo Granny of all things, involving the trapped spirits of butchered girls.
Don't misunderstand, however, the series is first and foremost a romcom with horror elements, but sometimes the horror shines through in surprising ways. That nuance is also seen in the rest of the cast, which I've yet to talk about much because one of the biggest challenges of this whole thing is figuring out how.
Talking about Dandadan beyond the very bare basics of the opening chapters is difficult without spoiling something, it's part why I was hesitant to review it back when I first started reading, despite how enamored I was. For one thing, focusing on any one aspect would be a gross oversimplification, doing a disservice to how each angle of the series is handled. Conversely, delving into Dandadan as whole would mean recapping the story arcs and events because Dandadan has some of the most tightly woven threads I have seen in some time. I can barely graze the surface of why character dynamics work or are unique before inevitably getting into a full blown synopsis and spoiling character arcs and entire narrative structures, which is… frustrating, to say the least.
For example, I can't really give you a good look at Aira Shiratori without getting deep into how she's a schoolmate of Momo and Okarun, gets into a rivalry with Momo because Aira thinks she's a demon while viewing herself as "The special one"; a delusion made stronger when she gains her own demonic powers which is basically Sedusa. But over time she forms a bizarre friendship with the two over their trial and tribulations, while also dealing with the massive weight of guilt over cruel rumors she spread about Momo. But that really doesn't even begin to tell you how much of an absolute fucking perfect little bitch she is, and yet what an enjoyable dork she becomes. To do so would be to just tell you everything that happens in her story, which, while not complicated, is tied heavily into the narrative.
It's a similar scenario with Jin "JiJi" Enjoji, Momo's first crush, which you can imagine the upset that causes; one that's pretty goddamn funny because the dude, while handsome, athletically fit and arguably the strongest of the entire cast, has the personality of a goddamn muppet. So Okarun's getting all strung up on a guy even more goofy than him.
In a nice subversion, his relationship with Okarun develops into something surprisingly positive pretty quickly, if not without complications due to a fairly dark story with his character, which pushes Okarun even further in his training after Jin gets his own possession. And it also makes it all the more hilarious that the chipper muppet baby has a secondary Shadow the Hedgehog cracked to 11 persona that's a legit threat.
Then there's Kinta "Kinny" Sakata who is basically if Okarun was even more socially inept and a dipshit Gunpla addict who tried really hard to be a Jojo. His strengths is a vast knowledge of sci-fi tech and a chuuni like ability to imagine entire fantastical constructs; quite handy when mind reading alien nano machines enter the picture. It also helps break up the monotony of everyone else having or developing some sorta supernatural power.
And then we have Vamola, a character I literally cannot say a single thing about without giving away massive plot points. I can't even show a photo because her design itself contains spoilers. Just know that her story is when shit really hits the fan and will be a gut wrenching read while also having the most Battle Manga goodness.
What I can at least tell you is that for as much as Momo and Okarun are the main protagonists, Jin and Aira get damn good focus and are fully formed characters in their own right, they're not just a monkey-wrench thrown into the fray. I mean, they are also that, but they add to those elements while being more than a foil to our main heroes developing relationship, making the story much more varied and expansive than a supernatural will/won't they. Vamola especially in that area.
If there's one takeaway from this it's that Yukinobu Tatsu is capable of creating a great, varied cast full of humor and impeccable chemistry. (not to mention a lot of cheescake that shouldn't work as often as it does.) I'm constantly surprised with how masterful all the different pieces come together to create a compelling dynamic in this deranged Sci-Fi, Supernatural comedy mishmash. Hopefully I can convey a little bit of that Dada-esque appeal despite my spoiler aversion.
What's a lot easier for me to get across without spoilers, however, is the drop-dead gorgeous artwork. Good god is this series beautiful to look at.
Tatsu has a backround in, uh, backgrounds, and it shows on just about every page. Any one side panel has more detail than most double-page fight spreads in other books, and when they do a splash page it is breathtaking.
The fact this is a Weekly series is goddamn insane and… honestly kinda makes me a lowkey worried about their work ethic. But a lot of panels feature just the character on simple stark backgrounds (And some pages feel a little heavy on the reference material, if you get my meaning.) But even so, it's hardly a sacrifice for the impressive amount of work that goes into each chapter and how just about every other page has at least one impressive environment to gawk at.
Not only is the detail impeccable, but the layout, timing and expressions are goddamn phenomenal and a big part of making the series legitimately funny. That same talent translates seamlessly to high energy fights and impactful creepy moments.
This truly is one of the most compelling reasons to read the manga. At the time of this writing we're 5 episodes in the Science Saru anime and I want to make clear I'm enjoying it and do highly suggest watching it. I think their high octane stylistic approach is, in many ways, perfect for the series. There's clearly a lot of love put into translating page to screen best they can. Realistically, I know there's no way you could completely capture Tatsu's style 1:1, especially with what the industry is nowadays. The budget and man power it would take for that wouldn't be worth it.
But that sense of scope, scale, the depth, shading and a ton of small eccentricities is something unique to the manga and a big part of why it works. If you only know the anime then I think you're missing out. Plus you've got 8 volumes to read up on.
But also still watch the anime, I'd love a season 2. Hopefully with a bigger budget. Frankly, they're gonna need it.
That said, while I have praised and gassed up Dandadan, I should mention it has a number of trappings that by all means should not fly with me. As previously stated, there's a lot of cheesecake, and I like cheesecake, but it can bog down stories like this and they're a dime a dozen in the manga and anime world. At first glance DDD can look like that from the outside. There are so many instances of things that are annoying in other works, schlocky things (derogatory) that are sell themselves only on the limp-dicked exploitive elements like Fan service. Make no mistake, Dandadan is schlocky (complimentary) but it's also incredibly endearing not only outside those aspects, but in them. At least for the most part. I have to imagine it's aware of the more stupid indulgent elements but wisely plays them straight while at the same time employing a cleverness many other series fail to have.
For example, the characters are comically stripped very frequently, even (and usually) during otherwise semi-serious moments like battles (although not if the stakes are dire.)
But the cheescake is always balanced out by the other qualities. Hell, the cheesecake is often imbued a certain charm that is funny in itself or oddly sweet, which certainly becomes more true in the later chapters. Think more Cutie Honey and less Highschool of the Dead in terms of how it's handled.
A big hand in that is they're not afraid to get silly with all the characters, especially the girls, so it typically feels more tee-hee fun. They're almost if not equally goofy in their own ways and that does a lot in keeping it from being obnoxious. And ya know, they also have real developed personalities and relationships outside just having their clothes blasted off, which also happens to Okarun if that wasn't clear. Actually it's worse because he usually loses everything, and the same is also true for Jin.
It's so audacious in every aspect that I simply can't fault it. I mean, I also wouldn't fault anyone not gelling with it, but I just sorta expect it and roll with it for a series this absurd. I'm a critic, not a goddamn puritan. I know exactly what it is, and it's doing it far better than most. It is, at worst, background noise.
That's not to say the series handles all of its exploitative elements well. Rather infamously the first chapter has an almost not quite sexual assault for Momo. It's… not as bad as it sounds-- in part because it doesn't happen and also the situation is so absurd. Honestly I think there's been a bit much blown out of proportion with it. Still, the over the top nature of an Alien with a metal syringe dick getting his comeuppance by having it bitten off by a granny speed-demon can only mitigate the general grossness of the implication so much and I still wince at it. It's the only part of Dandadan that dips into a level a cheapness it otherwise sidesteps in most other endeavors. Thankfully, it happens early on, but it also isn't a great first impression, especially if you didn't have more chapters or episodes to view at the time, leaving you to wonder just what the hell kinda story this is.
It's worth noting some of the other early chapters have bumps here and there, but nothing quite on the level of chapter 1, and those parts are ironed out overtime to be a lot more palatable. Compare how chapter 3 handles T&A to chapter 26 and you'll know what I mean.
Aside from that, however, there is at least one semi major stigma I have against Dadadan's otherwise enjoyable self indulgent nature, which is that a lot of the monster designs are painfully derivative. And I mean DERIVATIVE. Just about every alien creature in this series is an Ultra Kaiju.
Oh Shin Godzilla in the case of Nessie.
And, look, I get homaging stuff you like. Dr. Slump has loads of references, Patlabor has references to Ultraseven, depending on which version of Urusei Yatsura you're looking at it's loaded with them, Project A-KO has them, Eva is a love letter to Jissouji Ultra (along with flat out copying a few fights from various 70s mecha anime) and even something like Bocchi The Rock is at least a quarter references. References are not the problem. Well, maybe a little, but I'm not gonna get Orson Wells on you here.
Regardless, its hard not to think that maybe they could've dialed it back a little bit.
The Z'gok in Gundam is based on Alien Zarabe but it's doesn't look like a knock-off version of it. But the Dover Demon in Dandadan looks like "original the character" Kanegon that turns into Baltan. Because it is.
Like come on, man. Even the Space Pirates in Metroid aren't this blatant.
Why this sticks out to much is because the art is so damn impressive but the design aspect is lacking in certain areas. I'm willing to give leeway for some designs if they're based on folklore elements like Ghosts, Yokai, and crypids. You want to make them recognizable, but can still work in cute references or original ideas without being as glaring as "we have Ultra Seijin at home." For what it's worth, I guess Dada knockoffs with Pegassa eyes are better than generic greys. But while it's cute at first, I felt it got irksome by the time I saw Shin Godzilla… and then Hipporit as a subterranean shows up. Then a tail-less xenomorph. And Alien Guts, and a Metal Gear, and Elecking, even an Alien Zarabe.
A lot of those do end up as cannon fodder so I can understand not wanting to put a lot of work into stuff that ends up being one offs. I can't deny the art looks incredible and hype as fuck. But man, it gets distracting sometimes, especially when Gomora shows up at one point with the body of Red King and later on they end up making that a major deity in an alien culture. It's not played as a joke at all. It is one of the most dead serious chapters… But it's still just an Ultra Kaiju. Sometimes I'm reading Dandadan and I'm having a great time and I'm getting all the referential designs, and I don't *hate* this, but in the back of my head all I can think of is that line in Akibaranger.
And on some level I do get how that borderline level of infringement adds to the absurdity, how the near mono focus of a singular love for Tsuburaya is charming. Hell, it's even refreshing in some ways considering how that hasn't really been a thing in Japan since the 80s. But it does still get a bit much from the sheer volume.
I think on some level Tatsu knows this because in the more recent chapters the Serpo Aliens are primarily depicted in their disguised forms and the fake Gomora gets a slight redesign in later appearances that's a lot more generic. I sort of get the impression things that were maybe meant to be one off gags ended up becoming reoccurring elements, but given the tone and humor of the series that's really hard to tell, for better or worse.
Although kudos to Science Saru saying fuck it and making the opening to the anime one big Ultraman reference. They know what they're doing.
All that said... I don't really know where to lead off from here. Dandadan is still ongoing, currently at about 170 chapters in Japan, while the anime is still currently airing the first season. So I can't really give a full review of either. Likewise, for all I know the series could go completely off the rails at some point-- in a bad way, I mean.
As it stands I'm still finding enjoyment out of this series and now seems good a time as any to suggest everyone check it out. There's multiple manga out, it's easily available digitally, there's the anime across multiple platforms in NA, we've got figuarts coming out. It's good to see.
I was long over due for look since first reading those Glitter screen-grabs some years back.
Funny enough, this late August I visited my Girlfriend in Illinois and got to see 8 volumes of Dandadan on the shelf in a comic shop, that was a nice surreal experience for something that wasn't even available digitally in NA when I first started reading it.
What I didn't realize at the time was when I took a photo of them on the shelf, it was September 5, three years to the day I got the first few chapters. So yeah, it was time for this to happen.
Given the on going status of DDD, I'll certainly be revisiting the series for a future look at and proper review. Until then, I encourage you to read the manga and see if you see what I see. It might not be some super deep narrative, but it is most certainly unique and well worth your time.
As always, thanks for reading.
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November 21 2024 2009
Oh.
My.
GOD.
Yall. YALL! I have no words. None! Rose: Ascend was so good, just so so good!
Finally powered up, Rose checks in with John and notices some pretty intense rumbling is happening. Our new little loading logo gives us an idea of what we are gonna get into.
This flash, like Daves, starts interactive, putting us in Roses shoes as she navigates up to the platforms where John is just demolishing these Ogres. Hes found his footing and things are getting serious.
He starts focusing on the right ogre, spin-hammering (like a spindash, but with added hammer) with such speed theres a green after-image with each consecutive hit. The left ogre tries to pull that tire swing move we witnessed previously but Nannaquin shows off her own power with an even larger lazer than the one used on the cookie-snatching imp.
Rose, ever so helpful assists in the only way shes done so far: dropping household furniture.
I honestly love that we start out so zoomed out and then zero in on the fridge. Like a cameraman trying to capture all the action and not believing his eyes at this turn of events. Unfortunately, the ogre has some sorta sixth sense, catches it without blinking (figuratively, i dont know if theseo ogres Can blink), and parries John back with probably the same force Bro did to Dave.
Nanna makes her own sweet catch with a conjured (?) oven that John busts out of like Donkey Kong from a barrel.
I actually have some questions here like, how?? Is this a standard sprite power, that they can like, create objects from their lazer eyes? What exactly is that lazer now that Im thinking about it? Sprites have to made of something semi-physical right? Cause the object Nanna made caught John. You know what, thats not important right now lets go back to the fight.
... ... ...
...Whatever power this is Nanna can apparently use it to create other objects which she rains down upon the ogre. John, having bounced back in the air gets stopped by Rose wielding the alchemiter to create another platform.
John strikes the killing blow. One down, one to go. Surrounded by spoils, John faces the other ogre. And just a neat detail, the way John is animated makes him look like hes breathing a little heavy. Unlike Dave, I dont think John is very used to this level of excertion.
Now the oven has a cookie lazer? Ok, whatever. John lands some more spin-hammer hits and Rose finally gets a win and drops the alchemiter of the ogre, ending the battle.
Rose and John have a small chat before we get to see how far John has risen in the echeladder, a whopping 9 levels to Boy-Skylark.
Gains:
Boondollars- 11,575
Cache Limit- 2400, up from 80
Build Grist- 2260
Shale- 1040
Tar (new)- 490
Mercury- 350
Upgrades people, upgrades!
Because of the sheer size of the ogres, there is more grist scattered about that John will have to get, one of which is in the hole above Dads room. Will we finally get to see the forbidden space? Before he goes gallavanting off, Nanna reminds John to take Sassacres book. Apparently its very important he "give it a read when you have a moment. Particularly the first several pages!" Well that sure isnt suspicious at all. But honestly if it gives us more lore I am all for John plunking himself down right here, right now. But he wont. Its John we're talking about, ya know?
The last bit of their conversation feels like some sort of in joke, especially since John specifically requested "a series of really coy riddles about [his purpose] and then sort of giggle". Like:
NANNASPRITE: When you pass through the first gate, everything will change. You will find the place where the constellations dance beneath the clouds. And then your true work may begin.
NANNASPRITE: Hoo hoo hoo!
JOHN: i suddenly understand everything!
Thats great, John! Because I sure dont!
This boy is gonna be the death of me I just know it.
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Once in a Lifetime: ENA selfship!!
My relationship with ENA as a series is a bit interesting. I knew of her through tumblr for a while, I'd say, but never looked into it. My friend showed me the trilogy of shorts that had her (it was "Auction Day", "Extinction Party", and "Temptation Stairway" at the time), and I thought the style was cool! I didn't think much of ENA as is, but to be fair, I was still a blossoming bud when it came to figure out what I liked. After all I was only, like...eighteen. Lol.
Ena is def one of my more recent selfships, and I was kinda unsure of her when she re-entered my mind. I was unsure if it was really smth special, or just kind of a spur of the moment situation. I was still kinda feeling that as I got this quite frankly amazing commission, but seeing the WIPs and ESPECIALLY the final product made me go "Oh yeh...that's my gf!!!"
The Lore!!
My sona here is known as Lüc, which is a somewhat corruption of my own name? I wanted something that matched the sorta off-kilter, fake-video-game vibes of ENA as is. Tho, given the sparse nature of world building as of now, I'm kinda just making the setting...Earth-like with special features, lol. Maybe DreamBBQ will change things, idk yet.
But!! Lüc!! He's a starry eyed (quite literally) mid-twenty-something who owns a local theater, but it's a lil crummy. Has an old, 80s style appearance due to lack of budget, which also effects the showings. Since I can't afford big releases, I mainly show older public domain films and cartoons, with "new" content being indie films. It attracts...people, at least. I also sell cashews instead of popcorn cause I don't like how kernels get stuck in my teeth (and in lore an unpopped kernel cracked a tooth of his as a kid)
Ena sorta just stumbled in, as she does, and hung out in the lobby. Didn't even see a film, but she did buy some cashews. We did chat for a while. It was a brief encounter, but...I kinda fell for her at first sight XD
The feeling of liking was mutual, course, but she didn't really think it romantic at first. Which is why she visited so often! To see her friend! Yippie...but eventually I had the guts to tell her how I feel (we were close enough friends by then), and she was a little surprised at first! I was worried I upset her at first, but turns out she was just thinking it over. The look of realization on her face and the way she blurted out "THAT'S WHAT THE CARNATIONS MEANT!!!" still stick in my head, heh!
We didn't start right there, exactly. Ena said she needed time to think it over, so of course I let her. I was bracing myself for waiting a whole week of not seeing her, but she ended up popping back in three days later, roughly. She seemed a lil lost for words, which shocked me seeing as she usually had such colorful vocabulary. I tried to give her some support in realizing her feelings and such, before she blurted out, again, "I LIKE YOU A LOT TOO?? CAN WE DATE MAYBE???"
And we just kinda started dating! I took her out to a very nice restaurant, and that's also where we had our first kiss!!! And we've just been kinda going regular since! She still lives at her place, but she visits a lot to mine (second floor of the theater, saves space and money!!).
We're still very much enjoying being each other's bf and gf, so marriage is hardly on the table. No kids either, probably. Neither of us think we'd be able to handle it, lol. Moony visits sometimes too! We...get along best we can. I realize she's Ena's best friend, she realizes I mean a lot to Ena. We tolerate one another for her sake.
But yeah! That's my self ship with Ena! The series timeline is kinda...nebulous? Especially with DreamBBQ and the whole "second" Ena. I mainly just ship with the OG blue-yellow pre-TempStair version of her; gonna have to wait and see with this new gal!
The amazing art of me and Ena coming together was done by the always spectacular @cupiidzbow! I said before but you did just AMAZING here!! Like my sona is great but also your Ena is so cute???? I def gotta get more with her from ya! And you, the reader, should support Freddie and his monkey business!
#official gf post#lüc#ena#ena joel g#ena fanart#self ship#yumeship#fictional other#f/o posting#gosh kinda went all out here compared to Kate lol#Love you just as much bbgurl#just felt more inspired?#I made a lotta this up on the spot tee hee#I wanna develop my other ships more anyways#so this is a good step for that!
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... just make an iteration* for fun, I said
a universe where they've made it into their late 30s-early 40s and they chill and can be serene in the company of friends and family for once. maybe a flashback or two for the action moments
"fix" your childhood turtles so they can have a reprieve and some shenanigans, i reasoned with myself--
WELP.
my tmnt au iteration (where everyone made it past their 20s, splinter’s alive just old, venus is here, and they deserve some goddamn respite and shenanigans)
tmnt au iteration part 1 | part 2 | part 3 | part 4 | part 5 | part 6 | part 7 | part 8 | part 9
tmnt au iteration omake 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11
lny visit 1 | 2
is this actually new ramblings for the iteration or like one new lore bit and just a rerererererehashing of lore i sprinkled across the other posts.
first though, with my sorta-outsider-not-active-participant-in-fandom history I realized "au" isn't the proper term for what I've been doing, the more suitable term is "iteration".
and we're gonna sit with the fact that even someone at my old-ass age recognized my previous understanding of a term was, for all intents and purposes, not entirely correct and that I acknowledged it, rectified when I could, and that's it, it can be that easy.
...
okay back to the bullshit.
so my Mondo was introduced in the Archie run, a funky guy with a metal band called Merciless Slaughter, dressed like a punk Hulk, all around good peoples, hung out with the Mutanimals.
His design cobbling isn't too deep, I don't think. Just thought it'd be more rad if he looked more like a guy who fronts a band called Merciless Slaughter while remaining the same ol' Mondo inside, post mutation.
Kept some of his original color palette around in his hat, his pants, his NYHC logo (links) knockoff, and his little dyed leather cord bracelets.
the letters for the logo are for, Skate or Die (across), and Merciless Slaughter (down)
hmm still waffling on if I'm more tickled by him being taller than Mikey or the same height (5'4")
_________
and now for the rererererehash rambling because none of this design progression is coming out linear for me. so super quick, am an original 90s turtlemania survivor, Rise brought me back, gorged Rise then Bay then 2007 movie then rererererewatching of Next Mutation and the 90s trilogy for fun then hacking my way back through the Archie and Mirage runs then caught up with IDW and then just... slogging through 2003 and 2012 which honestly I feel like I got the gists of through gif sets alone.
one hand I can see why old fans (90s turtlemania) didn't seem to like the Rise designs, ours really were just the same li'l green dude but in different colors and hit sticks looks-wise. But here comes Rise with all the character design classics: different shapes! different sizes! exaggeration! and that's on top of all the nudges and twists made to the usual lore; Raphael is now the oldest, Leo and Donnie are now twins, they're different species of turtles, they're tools for war, brand new antagonists etc.
idk, to me when I was watching that shit, it was fun and refreshing so... ionno, built different cope maybe to the other oldheads pissing their pantaloons still ig whatevs
what tickles me most, personally, is the utter fuckton of Rise AUs, and a few Rise-driven iterations, and also some of the other non canon media iterations. so tickled that I got hit by the makeaniterationigitis itllbefunoccocal virus too. UnU (i'm kidding, i'm having so much fucking fun) just I'm addressing the flowers I wanna give to the kids who took Rise's take on tmnt and just RAN with the "different turtle species" from full out coloring their turtles the same as the species they picked to mimicking Rise's design language with different markings.
God, the markings thing just really nestled into my heart, it's such a simple thing and yet it took Rise to just try it, not even a lot, just a little for flavorrrrr. It's just enjoyable as fuck to me tbh and I'm sharpening my teeth when I revisit my coloring choices for the 8th time... fuck where was I?
right, mine are mistakes. wrongright place at the wrongright time, mutagen was there and now they can swing swords around and eat pizza.
someone(s) was high tailing it outta a TGRI lab with some mutagen barrels, driving recklessly while a bunch of eco-vigilantes had broken out of a pet shop that was the face of a black market pet trade/medicine/exotic food racket of endangered species. hence where their bit of human pre-mutagenic contact comes from (the strike team of people who freed them from their cages because all of them were endangered species & destined for a tank, a cutting board or a pill box); including a sea turtle Venus, Leatherhead, Tokka, Rahzar, Man-Ray some others etc etc. Jennika keeping her origin because it was dope as fuck. splinter was just there watching this symphony of human fuckery happen and decided to adopt some kids with no one asking (it was tang shen's onryo that is rooted in Splinter's mind that was asking, shh)
and ever since it clicked when I was gathering ref shots, ✨sea turtle Venus just makes sense✨ to me, it's taken my brain stem and rung it like a bell for new year's nonstop and i am not mad
... fuck, I am but also am not looking forward to when I start delving into ninjutsu, ninpo, Venus' whole schtick and how the supernatural fits into this world that I definitely don't need to be fleshing out this much just to draw them chilling on April's couch.
i've got like over 70 refs, holy shit
#visdev is my enrichment activity#don't leave me alone with an idea a piece of paper and something to draw with and my thoughts in the same room#Venus lover since 98#she's getting the most dev from visdev because I love her so#[ gestures to fanart portfolio which is like 45% Venus ]#55% turtle bullying#closing out the weekend#rambling about turtles again#ehehehehheehhh
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Guys I've accidentally made a Legally Blonde (musical) x Life Series + friends AU ft. Martyn's vtuber lore and I need to rant about it
Spoilers for Legally Blonde under the cut
Martyn is shoved into Legally Blonde as Elle Woods through the datastream. Now, I know Martyn is a chronic "commit to the bit" person but for the sake of this AU he is not, and is very annoyed that he has to be Elle, especially when he finds out Joel is Warner?! (He vaguely remembers the plot of Legally Blonde from that one time Scott made him watch it and does not want to spend half his time here pining after Joel of all people.
In the scene just before What You Want, he finally asks the Delta Nus what the fuck is going on and they sorta bend rules and show him the cast. When he finds out Ren is Emmett, he decides that he's gonna follow the plot long enough to get to Harvard, then he'll do whatever it takes to befriend Ren, and hope that he replaces whoever Elle's love interest is supposed to be (forgetting that Emmett is Elle's canon love interest)
The Delta Nus are slightly worried that Elle's going rogue but at least she's not completely ruining the plot? What you want in this AU would be less about following Warner and more "I need to get to Harvard so I can meet ren" (working on lyrics rewrite. using the London version because I like that one better btw)
Martyn spends his time as Elle not trying to get Joel (Warner) back but trying to get Ren (Emmett) to notice him (her?), so Chip on My Shoulder being between him and Ren wouldn't make sense. It'd probably be between him and Joel, if we're doing that, but it doesn't really make sense either. Lizzie (Vivienne) could very easily do it but then Legally Blonde (Remix) being the reveal that Vivienne doesn't actually hate Elle is slightly ruined. So. I'd have to work that out.
Martyn skips the bit with Callahan (Etho) by simply leaving before he has a chance to ask him to stay behind. He does not know what he avoided. Legally Blonde is more "they all think I'm a dumb blonde" than canon because there is no kiss or any of that. (This is purely Martyn not remembering the plot properly and his "magically knowing all the words and choreo" stuff is only for songs.)
Legally Blonde (Remix) is still "Warner might've seen a dumb blonde who's sleeping her way to the top, but all I see is a woman who doesn't have to" but instead of the two of them seeing different scenes, it's that Joel knows Martyn's after Ren desperately and he doesn't know it's genuine love rather than "Ren's important if I'm with him I'm important"
Etho still gets fired (but that's probably for less of "he's a creep" reasons and more of Cleo is Brooke reasons and also i need to think of that)
Scar is Chutney because he's absolutely capable of murder and lying about it, but he also would make a stupid mistake like she did. Also limited life where he was Cleo's son.
BigB will probably be Paulette. I need a Kyle for him tho. Would say maybe Scott or Grian but they're already taken (Nikos/Carlos idk + Margot)
Oh yeah, Scott and Jimmy are Nikos and Carlos. Can't decide which way round though.
#i want garlic bread#*spontaneously combusts*#trafficblr#traffic au#trafficshipping#martyn inthelittlewood#martyn itlw#how do i tag Martyn's vtuber lore?#legally blonde#legally blonde the musical#crossover au#isekai au#rendog#treebark
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Inspired by that Edna Mode post you reblogged, I'm curious in the early days of Eva's creation of her Voidhound persona did the standard Voidhound costume have to go through any adjustments because some part of the costume was impractical or unsafe? And were there any suggestions on things to add to the costume "because that's what the pirates in holofilms wore" that were shot down without even trying them out it was clear it was a bad idea?
Oh, golly! You've tapped the lore vein. I'm so sorry in advance. I also apologize for being SLOW on this because I had to remember/write down some of the headcanon explanations (because I sometimes forget that the Voidy costume isn't canon.....).
~~
I wrote about the appearance and the influences here in our universe, basically making the Voidhound costume an ode to the Shadow and other pulp mystery-solving heroes. There isn't a perfect Voidhound armor in game right now, but Columni Restored Smuggler/Targeter (pub side) is the current one in use for cut scenes. As for how Eva remembers it:
~~
The process of creating the costume was actually pretty fun. It came hand-in-hand with winning Nok Drayen's treasure.
Eva was a just-turned-20 moron, but she was streetwise enough to understand that everyone was going to want to be with her...or bump her off. She was already smart enough not to sign anything as 'Eva Corolastor.' EC sufficed at the gaming tables. But how did she keep her head now that she'd inherited the rep of best smuggler in the galaxy? Risha, as ever, was three steps ahead of her. "You can't walk around looking like that and demand a higher paycheck." She tossed Eva a fashion magazine. "You need an upgrade in general, but look at the expensive stuff first."
The costume came about as a collaboration between Eva and Risha. There was a spandex version, with a mask. "Not enough armor, not enough deflection capacity." "No matter how shiny it is." There was a Mando version, because it had a helmet, but that was veto'ed by Corso. "Letting people know you're a girl will make men like me think twice."
"Assume the lowest common denominator of the galaxy is Corso."
"Hey now!"
"You said it. Sorta."
Bowdaar stuck his head into the hallway from the galley.. "If I see a bounty hunter approaching me, I rip off arms first, ask questions later."
Eva pointed in his direction. "That's a better argument."
The form of the costume finally arrived while Eva and Risha were watching an old holofilm. The plot twist was surprise/secret twins, a comedy of errors for one hundred minutes.
"Wanna be my twin sister?" Eva asked Risha. "The costume. That bossy bad bitch thing we're making."
"...that would lend us some flexibility as to who actually does the negotiating. If one gets caught, the other shows up in the costume, reasonable doubt -- gotta let us go." Risha sucked the melty ice cream off her spoon as she rolled the idea around in her head. "She's going to have to make a hell of an impression if the same audience sees her twice, played by two people."
"Acting lessons for each other might help." Eva gestured at the holo screen. "Not like plotline acting, but compromising with each other and how we normally act to create that character that gets the big paycheck."
"The costume is also going to have to cover a lot of recognizable features, least of all what a pale freak you are," Risha quipped, holding out her arm next to Eva's.
"You might plan on peeling yourself back to 20 when you're 90, but I assume I'll live and die in the same skin. Plus I'm still on iodine for the cosmic radiation." Eva got to her feet. "Stand up."
Immediately: "Lifts," they said in unison; Eva was short.
"Padding."
"Binding or compressing."
"Can we leave that to the costume to make the illusion? We need to move in this thing."
"And let's not forget looking good."
~~
The button-down shirt. The vests. The neck scarf, to add a pop of color. The black blastweave greatcoat and trousers. The boots.
They had a fight over the rebreather mask (Eva no, Risha yes), but that was settled when Bowdaar pointedly hooked a claw into the mask and ripped it off -- and took half of Risha's foundation with it; the humidity in there had steamed the makeup off. No masks. Thick cake of makeup instead, in a foundation shade halfway between them, with complimenting colors for both.
There was another fight about the hat. "I hate hats," Eva said, eyeballing the atrocity Risha had on her head. "One more thing to get ripped up or ripped off. Helmet, if anything."
"I couldn't think of a more inelegant piece of gear," Risha sneered. "The hat can cast a shadow, obscuring the face in holos and in person without any risk to the makeup. It can be made of blastweave. Also." Risha drew out a long, thin hatpin. "You'll have at least five to ten of these in your hair at any time. Think of them as additional weapons."
To make her point. she stabbed Corso's sandwich on the table.
"Now, now, ain't nothing a that a toothpick couldn't handle," he drawled as he plucked it back out of his food. Corso had gotten used to the constant argument over Miss Dark and Broody and Paid Better.
~~
Then Akaavi Spar, Mandalorian of Clan Spar, came on staff and things really got fun.
She was surprisingly impressed by the costume. "Thought you'd hate it for the duplicitous nature," Eva barbed as she spun around in the greatcoat, as Risha finished removing her hat.
"I think it is a tool of cowards, but your people have a preference for live dogs as opposed to dead lions. For its function, it serves purpose," Akaavi stated, leaning back against the bulkhead in the lounge. "It also presents some interesting tactics, if you don't manage to kill yourself first."
"I like the sound of that," said Eva, as Risha said, at the same time, "That's her job. I'm just supposed to look the part."
First: after a mishap with a jetpack and, on a separate occasion, rocket boots, Akaavi applied a vigorous coating of flame retardant to all of the costumes.
Then came the delicate, almost gossamer-thin comm line that Akaavi threaded through each and every hat with such skill. No earpieces needed; Eva could be fed lines by Risha and vice versa. "Don't act surprised. Mandalorians are self-sufficient," Akaavi calmly said when Eva caught her one morning, early, sitting in the lounge and doing the dainty work.
That made the knitting thing much less of a shock later.
Customized smoke pellets and flash-bang grenades. Selectively activated hidden pockets. The final version of Eva's holdout knife set-up. The hand-held zipline launcher. Those were all Akaavi's contributions as well.
~~
Then came Corellia.
"The press is calling you the Voidhound," Akaavi reported as she flipped through pages on the Holonet.
"What a stupid, unoriginal name," huffed Risha. She eventually found the hat annoying, while Eva found that it grew on her.
"Hound caught the wolf. And the press gave it to me, so that's one thing I don't have to give to them. Anything we called this thing would be a tell on ourselves," Eva rationalized as she lined up a bunch of shots on the bar. "We were going to have to name this suit sooner or later."
"It's taken on a life of its own," agreed Akaavi. "It is not you. Yet it is."
"I'd like to keep it as a business partner only."
~~~
As a sort of postscript, the deployable hanglider got one test flight on Ziost before Eva disappeared.
#swtor#swtor fan fiction#oc: eva corolastor#risha drayen#akaavi spar#corso riggs#bowdaar#Guss didn't have any input on the costume#mostly due to fear
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slight lore dump: my ex husband and his boyfriend (also my ex, my first love to be specific) are moving back in with me and my boyfriend on Tuesday because I haven't been able to find a job since I was let go last month. my boyfriend has worse luck with jobs than I do, so we're just surviving off of my unemployment benefits right now. this is hell. we're all friends, it's fine, we've sorta all lived together before, but this time we plan to live together for a few years so none of us ever have to do this shit and fall backwards again. it just feels so hopeless. I want the privacy that I worked so hard for. to do whatever I want in my apartment. not clean up for a few days, hurt myself in the bathroom at night for hours, fuck my boyfriend on my couch at 2 am, cook dinner at 1am. but it's hard in my very tiny apartment with roommates. I'm glad I'm getting the help so I don't lose everything. however.. it fucking sucks to not have this freedom anymore. I have till Tuesday. god this fucking sucks. I really don't want to do this, I hate living in an economy where this is necessary. I just hate it so much.
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Ok so. Chip star wars au backstory. Basically, what I'm thinking is that the story is pretty much the same, with some obvious adjustments.
Chip grows up on board the Midnight Rose (a space ship this time, not an ocean one lol). It's the early years of the Empire, and the Black Rose pirates are both pirates and kind of an early rebel cell? sorta? They're still pretty powerful, like in the riptide canon, as the Empire is still kind of getting its shit together. And when I say they're *sort of* rebels what i mean is that, while they do actively dislike the Empire, they're not fighting them directly so much as they're being a general nuisance for them and stealing their shit and disrupting their plans.
As for the hole in the sea...well, I have two ideas for that would be.
Number one is that it's, like, a weird Force thing, which there are A Lot of in Star Wars. It's sort of like that weird fucking cube-planet-thing they get stranded on in The Clone Wars for that one arc with the Father the Daughter the Son--it's that sort of batshit fucking star wars thing, and it basically, like...sucks them in and the events of the Hole in the Sea oneshot play out pretty much the same way. This one I like because it has the wackass magical element to it and could thus account for the wackass Chip Lore that we're currently being insane about in the hiatus.
(The aforementioned Wackass Chip Lore does throw a bit of a wrench into the AU, since we don't know anything for certain about it, so when Riptide starts back again and we find out more this part of the au could be pretty much derailed, but adjustments can always be made and the sw lore is crazy enough that I'll probably be able to figure something out).
Second option is that the "Hole in the Sea" is a weapon of sorts--something the Empire is maybe working on in secret, something that they maybe found that was like, the ruins of an ancient space-civilization with super weird, cool technology yknow? And the black rose pirates end up there somehow (one idea is that it's like a gravity well, like they had in Rebels I think??? It might have been tcw i can't remember. Something that can pluck ships out of hyperspace like it's nothing). It could also be a combination of these two options--maybe it's some weird space magic thing the Empire was studying but then some Weird Magical Bullshit happened and drove them all out, but the Magic was like, awake, or something, idk I'm tired and that's all I have for now. This ask was not originally this long LMAO
Oh my fucking god I understand I get it. What if the hole in the sea was the Empire experimenting with the dark side of the force to build the superweapon that can just. Yoink a fuckin ship out of hyperspace and send them to some form of a rebel prison, but it ended up malfunctioning because the original designs were ones they stole from that ancient space-civilization you mentioned were made with the light side of the force/jedi use in mind. it ends up creating a sort of whackass void/black hole of the force in this pit deeeep deep into outer space and just like the Allport blockade, the Empire ends up telling any ships that try to leave the docks not to go there. the only people that can go anywhere near it are the ones that live on the nearby planets (like the underground towns and crew the albatrio found while in the black sea when chip got his heart ripped out), the Empire visiting bases (like the navy base from 114), or any rebel trader that's either stupid enough or skilled enough to disobey the Empire and make it all the way there and back alive. Since Captain Rose was one of the pirate lords, maybe it was an intentional and direct attack that just ended up backfiring and left them with no other option than to quarantine that set of planets and hope nothing else happened and no-one survived (they literally all did LMAOO)
#i make yet anothet post just for me 👍#we have mail :]#jrwi#ohhhh those bg3 brainworms have infested my head and its just this au. losing it rn#only question because im soso insane about them: how would the leviathans and the navy studying them work?#what would the star wars equivalent of that be. WAIT. WHAT IF THE DEATH STAR WAS THE ARTIFICIAL LEVIATHANS#put that in ur pipe and smoke it
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