#crafted the performances for the show like. knows what they're doing.

[deermouth]

u know normally i find a lot of gimmicky "inclusion" of nonbinary genders in crowd addresses to be, well, gimmicky, and annoying, especially if an author's putting them in a historical character's mouth. but. "offal, and offalesses, and all those who flourish outside the divide" really works i think.

[heartfullofleeches]

Vendetta [Magical Boy Yan] with a magical Scientist Reader who experiments on the monsters they fight and is generally just one of the worst magical people to stumble across. It's a mystery as to why Reader does what they do - they hardly have any compassion for their fellow humans and laughs at the ridiculous idea they're performing these experiments to turn these creatures back into humans. The ones that used to be humans that is. They've crafted weapons and armor from the skin and meat of their enemies, but they grown old of their toys before long. Many have asked. The answer remains the same.

"Why do I do this?.... Because it's fun I don't know what else you want me to tell you."

Vendetta swears he hears wedding bells- A ruthless, coal hearted scientist with zero regard for how the public views them who also happens to have a sadistic streak? Where has Reader been all his life? Drags monsters and crooks alike to Reader's doorstep in exchange for a reward - Money doesn't mean shit to Vendetta when he could have front row tickets to Reader's next surgery. I see Scientist Reader being a med student outside of their magical persona which Vendetta would tease them about, but totally sees as a bonus because nerds are hot.

Weakens the locks on Reader's cages so their pets can escape and he can live vicariously through them when Reader comes to collect them.

Reader tries to kill Vendetta when they first met, but upon realizing he likes getting the shit kicked out of him they bail because he's a freak.

Reader is stronger than Vendetta in their magical form, but weaker in their normal because I like the idea of that.

-

[Scientist Reader presses the heel of their boot against Vendetta's neck as they stand over him, sneering down at the man as he gasps for air]

Reader: You disgust me. Any last words before I remove your vocal cords?

Vendetta: You should spit in my mouth. I'd reallllly hate that- Here, I'll show you how to do it.

[Vendetta sucks blood from the split in his lip - spitting upwards directly into Scientist Reader's mouth.]

Scientist Reader: Mother-FUCKER- That went into my mouth! Why does your blood taste like battery acid?!

Vendetta: I'm waiting~

-

Scientist Reader: Give it back.

Vendetta, holding Reader's id card out of reach: Aw, this what you normally look like? You're pretty cute for a dork. I could totally take you.

Scientist Reader: Oh, please- I've beaten your ass more times than I care to remember.

Vendetta: Who said anything about a fight.

-

Vendetta: Got photos of you leaving that old abandoned library. Must've nicked yourself pretty bad down there- All that blood on your clothes...

Scientist Reader: And what do you plan to do with those photos?

Vendetta: Jerk off?- Tf else do you want me to do with them?

[renthony]

On "Consuming Content"

Every now and then a post crosses my feed that follows the vein of, "you have to do things other than consume media or else you'll be a dumb person who doesn't know anything about how the real world works and does nothing but pointless fandom stuff."

I hate those posts for three major reasons, not counting the inherent ableism and classism of "you must have approved Smart People hobbies or else you're worthless" rhetoric:

You don't know what people do or talk about outside of what you see on their social media. Responding to fandom communities on a fandom-driven website as if all these people are one-note cardboard cutouts of people is asinine. In many cases this genre of post feels like repackaged 2012 tumblr "not like other girls" and hipster discourse. Yes, yes, you think you're better than everyone else on this website because your hobbies are less mainstream, more morally pure, and have greater intellectual merit, we get it.

What do you even mean by consuming content? As someone who purposely avoids using the phrase "consuming content" because I find the term too vague to be useful, please be more specific. Are you including every single form of media engagement and art enjoyment? Are you just talking about mainstream TV and film? What about novels? Plays and scripts? Nonfiction books and instruction manuals? Do you mean to imply that going to a book club is a worthless non-hobby? Are you including academic reading? Are you including going to the art museum? Going to the theatre, concerts, or other performances? Taped liveshows? Watching sports events on TV? Are you including news media? Are you including YouTube tutorials about how to do various tasks, crafts, or other hobbies? Are you including trade magazines? Are you including industry publications in various fields? What constitutes "content," and what constitutes "consuming" in this discourse? Define it. "Consuming content" is a nothing phrase that people use to mean multiple different things depending on what they, personally, judge as valid media. It's a buzzword at best, and when the same buzzword can be used to describe both "idly scrolling social media" and "reading and discussing a book," it's a meaningless phrase.

As an artist and author, if engaging with media is bad and worthless, am I supposed to conclude that making it is equally worthless? If "consuming content" is a bad, lazy, worthless, fake hobby, what makes creating art a worthwhile pursuit? If I am constantly being told as an artist that engaging with media isn't a worthwhile pursuit in its own right, and the people who want to engage with my art are just brainless fandom losers, what incentive do I have to make that art anymore? Furthermore, to everyone reading this paragraph and thinking, "that's not what content creation is," I refer you to bullet #2: If the phrase "make content" can be used to mean "low-effort posts made to advertise cheap and useless products" as well as "being a novelist" or "getting a gig as a writer on a TV show," it's a meaningless phrase.

None of that is even getting into issues such as the way influencers are preyed on by both brands and targeted harassment from trolls. Influencer culture has major issues, but boiling those issues down to "stupid vapid young people who are too lazy to make real art or get real jobs" (which is a mindset I see frequently online) is unhelpful. So many people pursue influencer deals because they're living in poverty but are skilled at various social media and advertising related tasks, and just like any worker, they're being exploited because they need to eat. Labor rights for influencers are a huge topic that entertainment industry unions have been actively discussing and working toward. (Related links for further info: [x] [x] [x] [x])

"Consuming content is not a hobby" is a worthless statement unless you define what you mean by both "consuming" and "content." Quite frankly, you also need to define "hobby," because if you're putting requirements on what is and isn't allowed to be a "real" hobby, you mostly just seem like you're moving goalposts and defining "worthwhile hobby" as "hobby I, personally, think is good." Use more specific language to articulate your actual problems with the entertainment industry, the art world, influencer culture, or whatever else you're actually upset by.

Media and fandom can involve any number of enriching, satisfying hobbies that take up a perfectly acceptable and healthy space in someone's life. If you aren't into it, go find hobbies you do like and stop policing how other people spend their precious free time in this nightmare hellscape of a world.

[cuntess-carmilla]

Men won't benefit from a more feminist society outside of being less pressured to perform hegemonic masculinity. A more feminist society will cause a net negative for men not because a feminist society will set itself to kill them or oppress them, but because it will take away the privileges they currently hold just for being men.

Mediocre men who only get ahead in their careers because more capable women are overlooked or not even allowed to put their foot through the door? In a non-patriarchal society, they'll get stuck behind.

Similarly, men who only get the chance to achieve their ambitions by dumping all the domestic and emotional burden of their existence onto the women they live with? No more. In fact, they'll have to shoulder some of that responsibility in equal parts with the women they live with so those women, too, also can try to reach their goals. Actually, if the women they live with are undoubtedly more talented or promising than them, it will only make sense for those men to do labor similar to what's expected of women (workers or stay-at-home) so that those women can focus on perfecting their craft or career unburdened by cooking, laundry, cleaning, home-managing, etc.

Men will no longer be paid more than women of the same racial/ethnic group.

Incels have already correctly pointed out that a reason why young adult men are so lonely currently is because some of feminism's achievements; women entering the work-force (beyond extremely poor and often racialized women who never had a choice), women being allowed to have bank accounts and own... Anything. The fact that being married to a man isn't a requirement to any of those things in many societies means now women can opt out of being with a man if they don't want to (categorically, or just the man in front of us) so men who in the past would've had a guaranteed wife despite being deplorable humans, are now alone.

That's the point of "privilege". It's an undue benefit obtained directly from unfairly taking away from others. And this is why male feminist allies tend to sooner or later show their true colors, too.

It's not because men are inherently evil. It's because even if a man genuinely believes that women are – gasp – full human beings and that the treatment we get in patriarchal societies is awful and inhumane, there will come a time in which effective feminist praxis, as a feminist ally, will require him to sacrifice the benefits that patriarchy extends to him. And he won't. The same way rich people can think it's so so sad that homelessness is a reality, but they won't vote for a candidate who's a threat to their class privilege and wealth.

Feminism will not benefit men for the most part, and men who actually give a shit about fairness will be okay with that. Problem is, most won't. Most already aren't. Not necessarily because they're Evil Bastards who want women to suffer, but because it's against their self-interest.

Stop campaigning on "feminism benefits men", because 1) that it benefits women, who have been treated like dogshit in all patriarchal societies for centuries, should be enough reason to support feminism, and 2) it WON'T, and men instinctively know that.

[she-posts-nerdy-stuff]

Wicked the movie thoughts - spoiler version

I went to see Wicked today! If you want to read a spoiler free edition of what I thought you can do that here but otherwise below the cut I am going to talk in a lot of detail about the show and share my thoughts - they're overwhelmingly positive!! I loved this movie, I love this musical, and I have a lot of thoughts to discuss, I'm welcoming conversations about things I say or about stuff I didn't say but that you want to talk about let's absolutely chat, and this is all the way through going to contain spoilers for the plot but also for specific details, scenes, acting, etc, of the new movie so be warned if you don't want to read that

First of all, the genuine love and care that was put into the show and that can be seen not only in the acting but in the set, the music, in every aspect the care and the adoration for the theatre production was so clear, it was so lovingly crafted from the word go. I also felt like not only Wicked the musical but also Oz, in the original Wizard of Oz novel, in the Wicked novel, in the world and in everything that Gregory Maguire brought to the world, and so on and so forth was being treated with such care and being genuinely revered whilst also balancing well enough that I didn't feel like I was only ever seeing rehashes of existing material or a carbon copy of the past

Even as I was watching and thinking this, and thinking how well they had captured the feeling of watching something on stage, I was still wondering how they were possibly going to execute the Emerald City and the One Short Day performance because it's so iconic and so distinct in the musical but genuinely I was so impressed with the success of that scene. It both captured the essence of One Short Day on stage and added something new to it without taking anything away from the original and they deserve so much praise for that. I'm going to talk a little bit about the nail salon scene later when I discuss propaganda in Wicked (this is gonna be a looooooong post y'all buckle up) but other than that for One Short Day I just need to address, because how could I not, IDINA MENZEL AND KRISTEN CHENOWORTH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I didn't know they were going to be there!!!!!!!!!! I was losing my goddamn mind you guys omg

I was genuinely astonished. Like I'd seen them doing press and stuff but I assumed that was just because their names are so synonymous with Wicked I didn't realise they were actually going to be there!!

I really enjoyed the small stage production about the Wise Ones and the Grimmerie it was brilliant in concept and execution for worldbuilding and lore but KRISTEN AND IDINA OMG wonderful oh my gosh. Now was it on the nose? Absolutely. But I don't think that it felt forced, I thought that if you didn't know who they were then even when Chenoworth was singing to Grande and Menzel was singing to Eviro then it still wouldn't have felt strange or out of place, but of course I'm looking at it through the lens of a fan receiving fan service so generally speaking even though I know it's fanservice I'm still going to enjoy it and it's possible that through another's eyes it would feel different. I thought it was brilliant though and nothing will take that away from me

I think it's fair to say that the pacing of Wicked is kind of messed up and I have heard concern that because of that the act 2 movie will struggle; pacing of act 2 does get messy, but I cannot fault them in any way for splitting it into two movies ok because this was spectacular and I would not want to cut a single thing from it so yeah that's kind of all my thoughts on that point; I think that even if act 2 is harder to bring to screen that it can still be done in a high quality and successful way and especially after watching part 1 today I absolutely trust that this production can do that

I'm gonna now hop right back to No-One Mourns the Wicked (the pacing of this post is gonna be worse than the pacing of wicked). I was slightly concerned that Ariana Grande's intense recognisable-ness was going to take something away from the show because it would be hard to see the character she was playing rather than just Ariana Grande singing, if that makes sense, but from as early as No-One Mourns the Wicked my concerns were alleviated. Glinda is not an easy character to play, in my opinion, and she's not an easy character to play because she acts incredibly melodramatic in everything she does whilst her genuine emotions are incredibly subtle. What I saw in both Grande and Erivo was how fantastic their micro-expressions are and how much they can tell the audience with one or two features, often the eyes, alone. In No-One Mourns the Wicked , Galinda genuinely believes and will presumably continue to believe for the rest of her life that Elphaba is dead. And throughout her performance of the song, I more than once found it visibly notable that Glinda was on the verge of tears. She was smiling, she was singing, she was moving gracefully with her typical accentuated and dramatic movements, but the pain in her eyes was remarkable. This was a woman who believed that the only person she had ever had a genuine emotional connection with was dead, a woman who had lost not only someone she had manufactured a relationship with (Fiyero) and convinced herself that she was happy with what she knew was a false pretence of love to receive from, but also the only person in the world who had ever shown her real love and was finally being confronted by the fullest extent of the choices she had made but having to keep everything light and cheerful because of those very choices. Did that make sense? I hope I'm not just spouting nonsense. One of the most emphasised moments of this for me was when this massive effigy of Elphaba and one of the munchkinland residents hands Glinda the torch to light it; there's this blink and you miss it moment where Glinda looks at the torch, at the effigy, then back to the man who held it out to her, who's watching her expectantly, before she turns and tosses it on with a sense of urgency. Not only is this alone powerful, but I also think it's powerful that she throws the torch instead of standing at the effigy and taking care to set it alight firstly because she may not be able to bring herself to do so but also in a way that may be reflective of their relationship and the story: Glinda does not outrightly attack or harm Elphaba but she makes the choices that she makes, she throws her torch and whatever burns will burn.

I also felt that she captured the comedic elements of Glinda fantastically, with one of my favourite moments being when she melodramatically collapses kneeling in front of the bed as though she is sobbing into the quilt but just sits there perfectly still and the camera just stares at her for a few moments before she peeks up over her shoulder to see if Elphie's looking. The difference we can see between these two sides of Glinda's character was very well executed and I think we also see something of her more vulnerable side in some of these comedic moments, because ultimately she does (I'm going to talk about this later) feel unloved because of how shallow all of her relationships are and even in melodramatic, foolish or naive moments like the throwing herself on the duvet cover she is actively seeking attention because she equates attention to love - she so desperately claws her way to attention and popularity because she feels unloved and she thinks that this is love, so when it doesn't give her the feeling she was searching for she becomes convinced that it was because she doesn't have enough of it yet and she needs more. I thought that she was incredibly well captured and presented from all angles with her very many layers being well laid out.

Again with the insane jumping around but let's just dive headfirst into a couple of little details that I noticed whilst I'm thinking about them - during the Wizard and I when Elphaba is imagining her success and her dream she runs through a cornfield!! As though she is running towards Fiyero!!! I loved it. Like it's so tiny, but I love it. Another tiny one - loved the silver shoes for Nessa as a hark to the original book wherein the magic slippers were silver, but then in Popular when Glinda is going through her wardrobe and pulling out all these different options she gives Elphaba a pair of ruby red slippers and then decides against them and throws them away again!! Loved it as a teeny little reference. I also really lovedddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd and this one is more meaningful to the story but when Elphie has her magic outburst at Shiz right at the start where she sends Nessa into the air and stuff gets thrown everywhere, there's a statue on the wall of the Wizard that gets smashed. When it smashes, it's briefly visible that beneath the statue the wall was originally painted with a mural of animal scholars!!!!!!!!!!!!! I LOVED this detail, I was BUZZING. Like you saw it long enough to see what it was, there were three animals with a bear in the middle and I think the bear was wearing maroon robes and they were all clearly scholars

My personal theories on this is that either they were highly valued intellectual alumni of Shiz or that they founded the school, however there mya be lore standing on them that I am unaware of I started reading the book a long time ago and never finished it (I really want to read it but I haven't got around to it yet. I read enough to know what happened to Dr Dillimond in the book but I don't remember a lot after that)

Speaking of Dr Dillimond, I'm not sure if I just missed a detail or something implicit but I wasn't sure that they gave any real explanation as to why the poppies didn't knock Fiyero out????

On Fiyero: Johnathon Bailey understands Fiyero so well and it was brilliant. His performance very much took in the different layers of the character and the split between what he presents to the world and the intensity of the emotions he hides. Fiyero experiences emotion so intensely and feels such an intense response to others' emotions as well, and I think that you could really tell that whilst not feeling like anything was being taken away from the charismatic charming persona that you knew he was putting on. One of my favourite moments between him and Elphaba in this was when she siad something along the lines of 'you aren't as shallow and self-loving as I thought' and he replies something along the lines of 'how dare you? I genuinely love myself and I am deeply shallow' and I love this not only because his humour is enjoyable and his defence mechanisms are interesting but also because she immediately breaks through and says no, you're unhappy.

I promised thoughts on Dancing Through Life so whilst we're on Fiyero -> I don't at all intend to say that Bailey isn't a good singer because he is, I just thought that to some degree his voice didn't stand out from the chorus' voices in the same way that Erivo's and Grande's do and so the song did necessarily have the same bite to it as some of the others did/ That isn't to say that it wasn't a fantastic scene, because it was, and I loved the choreography and I was obsessed with the spinning bookshelves and all of it, the bringing the beat of the song in through the movement of the books was brilliant, and again he is a good singer and I think that having the actor's own voice in the movie is almost always the right decision

Okay I am going to make a post on its own about this as well because this is really long and I am so deeply obsessed with this I want to give it a chance to get proper discussion but one of my favourite propaganda-related details of this movie was Elphaba's nails. Yes, you read that right. Her nails.

In all of the imagery and posters of the 'Wicked Witch of the West' she is very often leaning forwards with her hands strangely position in the foreground and then her face behind them so your focus is drawn very quickly to the hands. In these images, her nails are always presented as extravagantly long, sharp, and claw-like. So in a world where animals are discriminated against and being used as the common enemy long before Elphaba is used as that enemy it's so fascinating that the dehumanisation of Elphaba has emphasis on her hands appearing strange or 'unnatural' and it makes me think of the line in Something Bad 'It's enough to give pause to anyone with paws' because that's where the emphasis on this distinction lies with no-one but humans having limbs that resemble hands - having Elphaba presented effectively as though she has claws in a world where animals are discriminated against and actively silenced, especially since she advocated against that silencing. And something I really enjoyed after having noticed the long nails in the posters during No-One Mourns the Wicked is that throughout the movie Elphaba has unapologetically long, beautiful nails that in a truly wonderful subtle aspect of Erivo's acting we get the sense she cares about even though they are never discussed. When she and Glinda go to the Emerald City we see this montage of their day during One Short Day and one of the things they do is go to a nail salon and we see Elphaba excitedly showing off to Glinda her long pretty nails that she loves so much and that make her feel pretty. Again this is such a massive testament to Erivo's acting skills because there's no dialogue about it but we know that she is so excited and we know that this is one of very few times that Elphie has felt pretty, she loves her nails. And they get used so horrifyingly against her. The nail salon is such a brief, subtle moment but it's so very well executed. There's also an earlier scene where she's alone with Madame Morrible practicing magic and when she reaches out to make the hand movements the camera cuts to show the shadow of her hand and it creates this emphasis on the length of her nails and how because of the shape of her hand midway through the movement the image looks like a claw or like a very stereotypical evil witch hands sort of thing. I also think that this moment is particularly powerful bc she's alone with Morrible and everything that Elphie does under Morrible's instruction is perfectly natural but what is seen on Morrible's stationary on the desk below her is representative of the propaganda that Morrible will turn the actions that she forced Elphaba to do into.

Also more propaganda stuff I could talk about the use of the word 'witch' for all goddamn eternity so I'm not going to hark on about it now but I will say that a piece of media like this one cannot be created today without acknowledgemnt of the difference between the word 'wtich' and the word 'wizard' and how they are presented, and I think that this was really interestingly handled in the word 'witch' not being said in the prequel aspect of it until Morrible labels her 'this Wicked Witch'.

Okay I think this is going to be what I finish off with but if you know this account you know that I LOVE a parallel and I was obsessed with the parallel drawn between family dynamics in Elphie's relationship with Nessa and her father, and then with the family that she's looking for and briefly thinks she could find with Morrible, the wizard, and Glinda. Yeoh said in an interview that Morrible's betrayal is realising that the mother figure isn't who you thought she was. Madame Morrible becomes Elphaba's maternal figure, and to her living memory realistically her only maternal figure, from very early on and this maternal view of her that we have through Elphaba's eyes is very much existent by the time we reach Sentimental Man, wherein the idea of the Wizard being able to offer her some kind of paternal love, that she has never felt because her relationship with her father is so fraught, is brought forth. Sentimental Man was very well performed in my opinion, it was the right decision to keep it low and subtle and close because it created this very specific closeness between Elphie and the Wizard and we felt what she felt, which was the exact manipulation that the Wizard wanted her to feel. When Madame Morrible enters the scene we then have both of these parental-style figures present telling Elphaba how precious she is, how amazing she is, how much they believe in her - essentially all these different things that she has been denied her entire life. What I find particularly fascinating about this is that what gets created here is exactly Elphaba's existing family dynamic - because Glinda is there too. This is what Elphaba always wanted - a motherly figure, a fatherly figure, and a sisterly figure - but it still comes at the expense of the sister. Glinda is being actively diminished and put down whilst Elphaba is raised and complimented for the purpose of manipulation and to be used for their purposes rather than existing for herself, just as her father diminishes and hurts her whilst complimenting and idolising Nessa but also manipulating her & never allowing her to live her own life. There's a moment where they're all stood around the grimmerie to get the four of them in shot with Elphie looking over the book, Morrible encouragingly at her side, the Wizard watching on from behind, and Glinda leaning over Elphie's other side to try and squeeze herself into the picture and I think that this still alone captures the entire thing so very well.

In a way, this is why Glinda turned round - without Elphie there, she gets love. When Elphaba had parental figures over her and no Nessa present to be better than her, she felt loved; when Glinda has parental figures over her and no Elphaba present to be better than her, she feels loved. The fundamental difference between them in the moment of choice is arguably that Elphaba's love for others, primarily Nessa, will always be stronger than her need for love from others, whereas Glinda's need for love from others will always be stronger than her love for others, primarily Elphaba.

In this moment, Glinda's warped distinction between love and popularity, as I discussed it earlier, is finally put to direct test and even though she loves Elphie and is loved by her in a way that she has arguably never been loved (we saw just how shallow her relationship with her parents was upon the arrival at Shiz. It's as shallow as her friendships at Shiz and romance with Fiyero.) she chooses popularity because she has somehow convinced herself that superficial love from many is better than genuine love from few. Elphaba's love for Glinda is probably the most genuine affection she's experienced in her entire life - but it doesn't come from authority. Elphaba's love isn't coming from someone who can raise Glina up or give her advantages and ultimately she is always seeking the approval of authority, possibly because she felt like she never received it from the authority that was her parents when she was a child, and she finds that feeling in Morrible and the Wizard, and arguably in the power that Fiyero's family could give her as well.

Okay super quick additions that i just remembered:

I loved loved loved the addition of her falling from the palace and seeing young Elphaba in the reflection and once again so freaking much could be said about the strength of Erivo's acting here it was truly beautiful and I found it like genuinely nerve-wracking even though I knew she obvs had to make it and the song wasn't over yk but yeah it was fantastic

When Elphaba's running from the soldiers & the flying monkeys just after the monkeys have been told to attack her and Glinda is chasing after her. They go through a narrow corridor of the palace lined by windows, and the wall are made of green brick. The sunset beyond casts pink light through every window. Every window is pink, all the walls are green. Elphaba is running and Glinda is following, trying to tell her to come back to the Wizard. As they run the flying monkeys start smashing the windows, so for every pace that they take THE PINK SHATTERS AND ONLY THE GREEN IS LEFT BEHIND. They are running towards Defying Gravity and for every step closer to it they become the less intertwined the colours are. The pink shatters and the green is left behind. It was visual poetry.

Okay I hope that this insane rambling made sense, I was partially transcribing this from voicenotes I sent to my friends when I got back after the movie and they actually got more than this so apologies to them and thank you for indulging me, and thank you to anyone who has bothered to read this lol I hope it was interesting - overall, excellent movie and I loved it!! Already can't wait for part 2

[jinnie-ret]

could we maybe get a part two to fallen Angel? Maybe it could have her healing process, like her physical therapy process, and the fan reaction? I just love reading your work :3

fallen angel pt 2

Stray Kids x Ninth Member!reader (Platonic)

content warnings: mentions of injuries (ankle, rib)

genre: fluff, angst

word count: 2.2k

after suffering a nasty fall in a Kingdom performance, Y/N is eager to get back on her feet, only to feel downhearted when she receives some less than motivating news. it's a good thing she has the boys there to support her.

Thank you so much @mynameisnotlaura for this request!! I hope you enjoy! :)

As always, if you enjoy please like and reblog! And my asks are open so be sure to leave in some requests if there's anything you'd like to see!

MAIN MASTERLIST

Stray Kids' Fans in Uproar as Second Member is Removed from Kingdom: Legendary War

With just a few more weeks until the finale of the competition between six boy groups, a second member of the group Stray Kids has been removed from the show.

MNET have released an official statement saying:

"Due to faulty equipment that had not been properly authenticated by outside distributors, Y/N of Stray Kids sustained an injury that has prevented her from continuing in the competition. This is a very unfortunate situation and we wish her a speedy recovery."

However some fans have speculated that it was actually MNET's fault and that they should have checked the equipment themselves.

What do you think? Let us know down below:

Comments:

First Hyunjin, and now Y/N, this is so sad to see our group of 9 go down to 7...

It's clearly MNET's fault! You could tell Chan was angry about something before making sure Jeongin was ok

I wouldn't be surprised if Bang Chan went off at the staff, we all saw how annoyed he was in that one vlive...

Our poor maknaes, I hope they're both doing ok! Jeongin, Y/N, fighting!

I hope the rest of the boys are doing ok, now that they're down two members...

The way you can see the moment things go wrong in the performance and Y/N still manages to keep a calm face!

Okay but you wouldn't have been able to tell that Y/N got injured until they showed it after the performance.

Y/N put her phone down sighing. She was glad there was no nasty comments from what she read but she still didn't feel all too optimistic. MNET had blamed someone else for her injuries, and had also denied her requests of participating in the competition once more. Sure, she wasn't fully healed yet, but they could have let her be a part of it somehow without her dancing too strenuously. And no, she wasn't going to accept their request to just sit backstage and watch. In any other world she wouldn't mind doing so, but she knew that MNET would manipulate their footage and craft a vision that reflected badly on her own part.

It had been a couple of weeks since they filmed that performance, and a week since the episode was released, and Y/N was still on bed rest. Anytime a member saw her hobbling about they'd immediately do the thing she wanted for her, or escort her back to her room. Cutting a long story short, she felt like she was in a hell of some kind. Y/N longed for her independence, which added on top of the reasons why she was feeling so angry and upset and just... jumbled at the moment. It wasn't even like she could hang out with Hyunjin, because when the members left for practice, not before checking up on her of course, she would be left alone in the dorms. Hyunjin was spending his hiatus at home at the moment, but she was excited to see him soon after filming for Kingdom was finished.

Shuffling out of bed, and letting out a harsh breath at the pain that hit her mid section, Y/N slowly stood, now having to hobble across her bedroom floor with crutches, careful not to further distress her sprained ankle. Some say she was lucky it was only a sprain, but really it was a pretty severe one that was she lucky it didn't do any permanent damage.

"You should be in bed," Lee Know sternly said, back turned to her as she entered the kitchen.

"How did you know it was me?" Y/N pouted, letting out a groan as she leant against the kitchen counter.

"Here let me, careful, careful," Han gently supported her weight momentarily, helping her into a seat and offering a smile at her.

"Thanks, Hannie," Y/N smiled at her squirrel like member, turning back to Lee Know.

"Not hard to distinguish the difference between crutches and hobbling, to normal footsteps. Plus you normally run in for my breakfasts but you can't do that at the moment," Lee Know tapped Y/N on the nose as he put a plate of pancakes in front of her.

"Hey... don't remind me," Y/N said, shoulders feeling tense as her irritation was evident on her face.

"Yeah, you'd normally be the first one in here," Seungmin chuckled.

"Stop," Y/N slammed her fork down against the table, feeling bad for suddenly lashing out but she also felt so annoyed at the fact she currently couldn't do less.

"Sorry, sorry, we won't mention it no more, unless you want to, okay?" Felix calmed her down, one hand on her shoulder as the other ran through her hair.

"No, it's okay, I'm sorry, it's just... It's really annoying, I've ranted enough about it, you guys already know what I think about it all," Y/N waved her hand dismissively after her apology.

"Doesn't mean we don't want to hear it," Changbin reminded her, as he always did, being the great listener he is.

"Yeah, plus you know you've got our support and the fans' too, right?" Jeongin quietly pitched in, still not fully awake himself.

"I know, I know," Y/N nodded, taking a bite of her pancakes, humming in delight.

"Good?" Lee Know rose an eyebrow from across the table at her, a satisfied smile appearing on his face when she nodded enthusiastically.

Bang Chan emerged from his room just a everyone was finishing breakfast.

"Come on, time to go!"

"You missed breakfast," Changbin tutted at him, Chan only able to respond with a sheepish smile.

"You have to go so soon?" Y/N asked quietly. She could already predict how her day was going to go. Lay down, watch Netflix, sleep, repeat.

"Sorry sweetheart, got a lot of recordings to do today and we need to practice for collab stages on the show," Chan felt bad for his dongsaeng, he could tell she was feeling lonely, but they all tried their best to keep her in the loop.

"I can't even sing on the tracks?" Y/N asked hopefully, but even she knew that the answer would be...

"No, I'm sorry, you know it could make your ribs feel worse if you do. And you know you've got a physio session today, right? Seojun hyung will come round to pick you up and take you there," Chan reminded her, as she let out a groan.

"Ugh, I forgot about that. At least it gets me out of the dorms for an hour or so," she tried to see the positive side.

"See, not too bad!" Jeongin tried to encourage her, but it fell on deaf ears, knowing no one else would want to be in her position right now.

"Can someone help me to the sofa before you guys head out?" Y/N asked awkwardly. She always was awkward when doing so, feeling a guilt of some sorts that crept up on her in these types of situations.

"If we must," Seungmin playfully rolled his eyes, but was gentle nonetheless as he and Felix supported her onto the sofa.

"You comfy?" Felix double checked, shoving a pillow underneath her lower back to help with the healing of her ribs.

Y/N nodded as she took in some deep breaths, the short walk from the kitchen to the lounge leaving her a bit breathless.

"Are you sure you'll be okay, Y/Nnie?" Han bit the top of his thumb worriedly.

"I'm fine, I've got Netflix to keep me company for now, I'll see you guys later," Y/N didn't even look at them as they left, turning the TV on and hoping to block out her jealousy and irritation.

There was a knock on the door before it was unlocked and Y/N couldn't believe that she had already watched 6 episodes of Modern Family.

"Hi Seojun oppa," Y/N greeted him as he helped her stand and grabbed her crutches.

"Hi, Y/Nnie, how are you feeling today? Ready for your physio?" Seojun said warmly.

"I'm never ready, you know that," she laughed as he helped her out of the dorms and took her to the physio session.

On the way there they listened to some music, and Y/N fought deep within herself to not put her all into singing along. She couldn't make things worse. She wanted to recover as soon as possible.

Throughout the session Y/N herself felt like she was making good progress. Seojun and her physiotherapist, Soyeon, praised her as she did her exercises.

"So, only 2 more weeks left, yeah? Then it's been 4 weeks like you said and I can start working again," Y/N said with a big smile on her face. She was in a good mood from how the session went, which was soon to disappear.

"Yes, I did say 4 weeks, but I also said 4-6 weeks. Unfortunately it seems like your body is taking longer to heal than we initially expected, which isn't anything to worry about but I believe your healing process will be more in the 6 weeks," Soyeon informed Y/N, feeling bad for the younger girl.

"Right, okay, yeah, that's fine... thank you as always, Soyeon," Y/N said with a tight lipped smile and turned to Seojun with a look that said 'I want to go home now'.

And he complied. The manager felt bad, hearing the sniffles Y/N tried to hide during the journey back to the dorms. But knowing the girl, he didn't want to make a big deal of it, and simply passed her a tissue, knowing she would be thankful.

He helped her back into the dorms and took her to bed, letting her rest and feeling slightly reluctant to leave, he eventually did, sending a text to the other Stray Kids members to let them know how she was doing.

'Y/N isn't feeling too cheery. Not a good result to the session today, she's back home now. Could do with some comfort I think.'

And with that, the boys rushed home as soon as they could, not wanting their fellow member to be feeling upset. They knew she was angry, but they hadn't really seen her sadness or tears since the day her injury happened.

"Y/N?" there was a tentative knock on the door.

But Y/N didn't answer, she was too busy being curled up warmly under her duvet, her own sobs sounding muffled to her as she listened to some sad music through her airpods.

"Y/Nnie, hey sweetheart," Chan said softly, brushing her hair out of her face and removing her airpods.

"Adele? Damn she is going through it," Seungmin muttered to himself as he put the listening device to his ear, wincing lightly when Changbin heard and smacked him on the back of the head.

"Go away," Y/N tried to pull the duvet over her head not wanting the boys to see her upset but failed.

"Hey, hey, none of that, what happened at the physio appointment today?" Chan asked worriedly, thumbs swiping away the tears that ran down her face.

"Was it something serious?" Jeongin asked frowning, hoping that it wouldn't be.

Felix sat around the other side of Y/N cuddling her behind gently, for comfort.

"I've got 4 more weeks of this. 4 more weeks of doing nothing," Y/N sniffled, Felix rubbing her stomach in circles with his hand that was draped lightly across her midriff.

"I thought it was 2 more weeks?" Lee Know wondered out loud.

"Me too, but now I'm stuck here like this for even longer. Something about not healing as they expected," Y/N hiccuped on her sobs.

"Calm down, you're working yourself up, it'll be ok, those weeks will fly by," Changbin soothed her as he patted her head.

"I just hate doing nothing. I feel like I'm making you guys do all the work and making you babysit me when I should be pulling my own weight," Y/N confessed after calming herself down a bit.

"It's not like that at all. Plus, we love babysitting our maknae," Han let her know, patting her leg from where he was perched on the bed.

"Speak for yourself," Seungmin joked, making Y/N laugh, and then stop from the pain in her ribs.

"Here, silly, take these," Lee Know handed her some paracetamol to take, shaking his head fondly at her.

"I'm not silly," Y/N sleepily muttered after taking the tablets, leaning back into Felix's arms.

"You are for thinking you're making us do all the work," Chan sighed, still smiling at the girl.

"Yeah, don't worry, there's plenty for you to do when you're up and about," Lee Know said with a devilish smirk.

"That's fine by me," Y/N yawned, eyes fluttering shut.

"She's the only person I know that can sleep so comfortably at the idea of having lots of work to do," Jeongin shook his head with wide eyes.

"Told you, works like a charm," Lee Know laughed quietly at his shocked face.

They all stayed until she fell asleep, leaving just her and Felix in the room in peace.

tagged: @oo-li

[mlmxreader]

Kill Our Friendship | Legolas x gn!reader

『••✎••』

↳ ❝ Hi can I request “When you've known someone a long time, you just want to kiss them just to see if they're a good kisser. There's nothing wrong with that, right?” With Legolas please? ❞

: ̗̀➛ To perform one small little action will kill a friendship, but maybe that's for the best.

: ̗̀➛ n/a

•───────────────★•♛•★──────────────•

You were comfortable as you strolled through the woods with Legolas at your side, all too aware of his hand lingering beside yours, so close that you could almost feel his fingers brush against your own so deftly; it wasn't far now, the small little clearing that sat at the edge of the expansive lake.

There was a small raft waiting for you there, tied to some weeds and some bushes, anchored against the bank. It was made of old wood, but it was sturdy in its frame; it could easily hold you and Legolas without a doubt, and you were excited to show it to him.

After all, you had spent so long crafting it that there was only one person in the world you deemed important enough to see it.

You caved in, linking your fingers with his and swinging your hands back and forth a little bit; it made you smile, especially when he looked at you so softly and so warmly. In his blue eyes was a hidden summertime that never ended, and when he smiled, it seemed as if the seasons were forever stuck there.

Legolas dared to smile, practically skipping along beside you until you tugged him over to the little raft at last. Amongst the expansive lake, it was easy to tell that it went on for miles. The murky dark olive colour calming along with the thick scent of the bushes and trees.

You finally let go of his hand, kneeling down for a moment to untie the raft. Legolas wasn't far behind, helping you to get it onto the water's body; he jumped on it beside you, lying on his back and letting the sun hit his skin.

You lowered yourself down next to him, your temple pressed against his and your hand finding its way to his; fingers interlocking tightly. You could only hum as you smiled, clearing your throat and trying not to show how anxious you really were.

"What do you think?"

Legolas grinned as he closed his eyes. "How did you manage to do this without anyone knowing?"

You shrugged, letting out a quiet laugh. "You aren't the only one who can be so stealthy, you know."

He laughed along for a second before falling into a comfortable silence with you; he rarely got the time to be so close, and he appreciated every single second that he could get.

It was his favourite thing, to be close with you and to actually be there with you whenever it was possible. He loved it, he loved you.

But of course, there was a... certain expectation. Legolas was a Prince, after all, and you were not of royal blood of any kind; but you had been friends for so long, always joined at the hip, that it was impossible to get you away from him and vice versa.

He knew that if he was going to act on his feelings, it would surely bring about the death and ruin of friendship - but when he opened his eyes to see you undressing, it was all too tempting for him to finally admit how he felt.

Your body was the most brilliant thing he had ever seen; every inch of exposed flesh slowly creating a masterpiece until you were left with nothing but your skivvies on. You laid back down, all too aware of his gaze, and awkwardly shifted onto your side; resting your head against your hand and letting your elbow dig into the wood.

"Why are you staying at me like that?"

Legolas shrugged as he met your gaze, swallowing thickly and trying to ignore it all. The racing, heavy pounding of his heart in the cavern of his chest. The little droplets of sweat forming on his palms. The slight shake of his fingers.

"When you've known someone a long time, you just want to kiss them just to see if they're a good kisser. There's nothing wrong with that, right?"

You shook your head, trying not to smile as you swallowed thickly, letting your free hand rest on his chest. "Not at all... I may have wondered myself, here and there..."

His gaze flicked to your mouth for a moment, and he slowly reached out; his thumb just in front of your ear and his fingers desperately clinging behind it as he leaned in slightly. "Shall we find out?"

You nodded, softly whispering "yes" before leaning in yourself; clumsily, Legolas moved to straddle your waist, letting his other hand copy the position of the other as you clung to his shoulders. Finally, he sealed the kiss.

It started out so chaste, but you could not help it; gathering his platinum hair in your hand and tugging it softly. He grinned, kissing you harder and harsher as you eagerly and desperately tried to keep up. But it couldn't last forever, and he pulled away when the need for air started to creep into his chest.

"That was..." he breathed out, nodding. "If it would be alright with you, I'd like to do it again."

You nodded back, trying not to act so fucking eager. "I'd like that, actually."

He smiled, a little relaxed as he pressed his forearms either side of your head and allowed some of the anxious tension to drop from his body. "Can I ask you something?"

"Always."

"Can we kill this friendship?" He asked quietly. "And become something else?"

You shrugged, gently playing with his hair as you nodded slowly. "I would like that, actually. Especially if that something else means you'll keep kissing me like that."

Slowly, a grin spread across his face, and he nodded as he licked his lips, his gaze dropping to your mouth. "I'll kiss you like that as many times as you wish, beloved. All you have to do is ask."

"All I have to do is ask?"

"Yes," he breathed out. "Just ask, and I will happily oblige."

"Alright," you agreed. "Legolas, if you'd be so kind... kiss me again, please?"

[shiny-jr]

I know you probably don't want to talk about this anymore, but I'm still really curious. Genshin Natlan characters have been revealed, and I want to know your opinion

Taking a long sigh. The fact that you seem hesitant to ask this means you probably have an idea of what my response would be like. Just so I don't have to end up making multiple posts about this topic, I'm gonna try to include everything here. If I forget something and someone asks later, I might be willing to address it.

So, heads up. This is a long rant. Shiny rants. Disclaimer, I am Mexican-American, so I believe I have some say on some of the cultures involved in this fiasco. Some of them, not all. That being said, I'll try to handle the others with as much respect as possible, but forgive me if I make a mistake somewhere.

I stopped playing genshin when Sumeru was announced. Despite me not having any affiliation with the cultures represented by Sumeru, I remember being livid as some of y'all might recall. So, let's start off with:

THE AMALGAMATION OF CULTURES. This meaning how very weird it is that somehow the european/east asian cultures get their own distinct nation dedicated to one sole peoples while brown/black cultures get meshed into one unrecognizable figure. Mondstadt is based off Germany, Liyue is based off China, Inazuma is based off Japan, Fontaine is based off France. On the other hand, Sumeru is a mix of south asia, the middle east, and north africa while Natlan takes that a step further by involving Incan, Mayan, Maori, Yoruban, and Hopi cultures (of what we know so far).

Why are all these other nations so carefully crafted and picked, but it feels as if for Natlan and Sumeru, the developers put up a map and grabbed some darts, then decided to use whatever culture wherever a handful of darts landed on the board? In the way they're handling it, it feels like these cultures are nothing but an accessory to them. An excuse to make these "exotic" looking characters, but not even make them properly due to the horrible designs and lack of melanin (these are two topics I will come back to).

It feels like they got lazy, and/or they clearly don't care enough to do in depth research properly as they might've done with past nations. The best example I've seen of this is Yunjin and Ororon. Yunjin is a beautiful example of a character done right and respectfully, as she is meant to be a Chinese opera singer. They even went so far as to hire an actual Chinese opera singer for a song she performs in-game. However, Ororon takes the name of "Olorun" which is a Yoruban deity, but when you look at this character's design, there is nothing that would even hint towards the fact that he's meant to be African.

This brings me to the second part, CULTURE AS COSTUMES. As mentioned previously, nothing about this Ororon character portrays the fact that he's meant to be African. NOTHING. If you do not know what he looks like, the character named after a Yoruban god is quite literally just a pale anime boy in edgy clothing and has some type of dog/cat/animal ears. I am not joking. That is what he looks like. If you don't believe me, look it up.

Do you know what the saddest part about all this is? It's the fact that I guarantee you, sometime in the future when Ororon appears in-game, gets his own quest, then his own banner, all that jazz, the chances of images of him appearing when you look up Olorun are high. In fact, when Sumeru was announced, I vividly remember doing research on the characters there were announced, such as Al-Haitham. When you looked up the name Al-Haitham then, google showed an Islamic astronomer. However, if you look up the name now, you immediately get builds and character guides and art of genshin's Al-Haitham, which is horrible when you really think about it. Because the same thing happened to Dehya (a Berber warrior queen), and it's about to happen to Kachina (Hopi spirits), Kinich (Mayan Sun God), Mualani (a princess of Hawaii), etc.

When you look at these characters, Natlan and Sumeru included, most of their designs don't even look as if they're portraying a culture. For now, I'll focus on Natlan.

Kinich is supposed to be Mayan, however, nothing about his design is giving Latino or indigenous Mayan. As a Mexican, I should be able to look at him and say, 'hey, he looks kinda like me or my cousins! Oh, I recognize those patterns, or that type of footwear/shirt/pants/headwear.' SOMETHING to that degree, but if you had shown me him and I didn't know, I would have never guessed.

Another infuriating design is Murata, the pyro archon. Tell me why does she look like a futuristic biker girl instead of a Maori/Polynesian warrior? The level of disrespect, ESPECIALLY because according to what I've gathered, her name is based off an actual entity/deity.

Time to point out the obvious, and I'm gonna say it but WHY ARE THEY WHITE? Yes, I know the argument about how not everyone from latino/arab cultures is brown, I know. But not everyone is white either, so please, get over it. If the entirety of Fontaine can be white because they're French, by that same logic, wouldn't it makes sense to make the entirety of Natlan brown/black because they're indigenous/african?

It lies well within hoyo's abilities to include colored characters. They have millions of dollars and they say they want a global audience, they just don't do it because there is major colorism there. Saying "but they're a Chinese company!" is no excuse either, because then that would be automatically classifying them as ignorant of anything outside of China when they clearly are not if they utilize strong elements of hip-hop and jazz (both with origins in African American communities) in their other games, want to pick these cultures like accessories on a shelf, and make brown/black npc enemies with locs and other poc features. I won't immediately jump to blaming the designers either, because it's probably that they have tried presenting ideas that do actually cater to the wider audience and poc people, but they were most likely turned down by higher-ups.

Anyways, I've been typing this for a while now and my mind is blanking. I'm sure I had more to say but I currently cannot remember it. I'm glad people are FINALLY speaking out against this, it's about time and actually late because the outrage around this should've happened back in Sumeru but better late than never.

If you don't agree with me or my takes on this, don't even bother trying to look for a response because I'm not gonna argue about this. That's about it for now though.

[jadeddangel]

The Owl House x Reader

General Headcannons for The Owl House x Reader

Older!Luz Noceda:

Her love language is physical touch and gift giving

She's a cuddle bug

If your sick or not feeling well she'll refuse to leave your side

The kind of girl to write poetry that doesn't make sense

But you can still tell that she does it cause she loves you

She's a horrible cook but don't tell her that

She buys or makes charms for your staffs

She kisses any kind of small wounds that you have

Luz let out a loud gasp "ay! Mi amor! Tu estas bien? Does it hurt?" Luz asked frantically as she held your hand looking at the literal smallest paper cut on your finger before digging in her pocket and pulling out a small bandaid and putting it over the cut and kissing over the band-aid " all better mi amor!"

"Uhm Luz? Why do you just have bandaids?" You asked confused. Luz straightened her lips into a line "uhm.. a good witch is always prepared?" Luz said questioningly

She buys you themed band-aids from the human realm

she tries to teach you Spanish

She's not the best teacher but you can see her effort

Older! Amity Blight:

Her love language is acts of service and words of affirmation

She's really big on arts and crafts

She likes to make you things

She likes to let your palismans play together

She likes to do things like make your laundry and things

Cause in some part of her mind she thinks it'll make you love her more

She's rather shy with PDA at first

She's a touch starved baby

Ghost and your palisman were cuddled up in a little window hammock that amity had made for them

"Hey amity? Do you think our palismans live eachother like we love eachother?" You asked curiously

Amity blushed a bit "oh quiet take your nap you were so adamant on it earlier" amity said defensively

It doesn't matter if you've been dating for years

She still gets flustered if you say anything too sweet

She shows her love with actions rather than words

So she often makes you food

She's an amazing cook btw

Eda The Owl Lady:

Her love language is quality time and gift giving

She likes giving you shiny things

Like rings, jewels, anything that shimmers or shines really

She doesn't particularly like her curse being around you

But after she makes her piece with it she's fine cuddling you

Whether that's in her harpy form or in her full form

She's starting to realize that it won't hurt you

Eda groaned holding her head. "Eda? Dear? Are you ok? Is the owl bothering you again?" You asked sweetly sitting up in edas nest. Eda sighed and nodded "its just getting worse and I don't know what to do it just.. it's like it wants to be with you? If that makes sense?" Eda tried to explain as you nodded along.

"Yknow, eda I don't really mind the owl.. it's rather sweet after you guys had that heart to heart, so how about you just let it put? And if anything goes wrong I'll have elixir on hand" you reassured the older woman

That night was one of the first of many that eda let the owl interact with you

Raine Whispers:

Their love language is the same as Eda's, quality time and gift giving

They can't really cook anything but eggs

They're so sweet

They really like to make little songs/ lullabies for you

but they're willing to learn anything you'd be willing to teach them

They're not really touch starved

But if you so much as lock your pinkys together they're melting in your arms

They loves you with their whole heart so when they're performing or teaching your the only thing on their mind

In all truth the thought of you probably helped with their stage fright

They gets flustered so easy

Raine was playing their fiddle for their class they were playing the song they had made for you.

Raine finished the song after a few moments before bowing and putting their fiddle away gently

They had a smile on their face at the thought of you in the next classroom over listening to them play... just for you

They always sat and ate lunch with you in their classroom

The Collector:

His love language is gift giving and acts of service

Game nights literally every damn night

He likes to hide your things all over your home

He always takes your petty arguments as a joke

He may not be the healthiest but he's definitely always there for you

He's a cuddle bug

Practically clinging to your side where ever you were

He isn't shy about pda in the slightest

The collector was clinging to your sleeve "nooo don't leave!" Collector whined trying to tug yoy back into the house

You sighed "baby please I'm begging you just let go of me I'll be back soon, I've got a class to teach" you bargained

The collector let go of you gently "fine.." he pouted

He's beyond clingy

It's a problem sometimes but you manage

Older!Hunter:

His love language is acts of service, quality time, and gift giving

He makes you little cravings of animals

Especially wolves

Definitely his favorite earthly animal

He's touch starved

Please give him hugs and kisses

Really likes to hold your hand

His hands are rough and calloused after the years of being a golden guard and then his hobby of carving palisman

He likes to visit earth with you for small dates every now and then

Hunter held your hand gently as he led you through a forest on earth, hunter had been planning this small, somewhat simple date over the past month

Hunter had set up some fairy lights and a picnic deep in the woods, he had been quiet and mysterious the whole walk but soon spoke softly. "Don't worry, I'm not gonna kill you or anything" hunter joked

You laughed a bit but paused as you saw the at area "oh hunter.. this is beautiful "

Hunter smiled and helped you sit down "yea.. just like you" he said sweetly

He was sweet and romantic like this alot of the time

He's corny but it's relieving to know that he really cares for you

[theminecraftbee]

On the subject of modpack recommendations, I made a custom one for myself a little while ago and i've been playing it nonstop since.

It's very chill, and lighter on the mods so my silly little laptop can run it without crashing. I put it together cause most modpacks are so complex and overwelming to my lil brain. I've found it a good mix of still feeling like minecraft, but having the benefits of the 'more' from the mods.

The lineup is: Create, Farmer's Delight, Sophisticated Backpacks, Waystones, Comforts (the sleeping bag mod), an animals mod called Naturalist, Xaero's Minimap/Worldmap, Decorative Blocks, Macaw's Doors/Trapdoors/Lights & Lamps/Bridges/Paintings for some more decor options, and Simple Hats (I wanted to wear a fox hat on my head. sue me). There's a few basic quality of life mods too, like AppleSkin and JEI, and some compatability add on mods for Create and the waystones to the maps, but that's it.

It's worked really well so far, and i haven't crashed at all-- though i have fallen victim to the massive sinkhole in the neighboring savannah I've been using as my strip mine and tree farm. I put keep inventory on, it's fiiiinnnneeeee-- I never like having stakes for death anyway, makes it too stressful. Let me throw myself from build height to bedrock without having to do the walk of shame for my stuff--

My game chugs a touch with Create, but all I had to do was turn down my graphics and be VERY careful to not dump out thousands of entities at once But that's just Create, really

oh, this can be a really great approach to playing modded too, especially if you personally know what mods you like and don't care about stuff like recipe compatibility! the main advantage of a 'true' modpack is normally that the good ones balance the recipes of the different mods to each other, and also i really prefer modpacks personally that have quest systems. but if your goal is to "play with mods" mostly, or, say, like you, you have a computer that can't handle heavier modpacks, or you just wanat a few things you like, this is a path that is DEFINITELY an option for a chill modpack!

i will say for those new to modded, here are some mods i recommend everyone include of the QOL variety, even if they're otherwise not doing many mods:

some variety of mimimap; xaero's is the one i'm most familiar with but choose your favorite.

if that minimap doesn't come with waypoints for some reason, get yourself a mod that adds waypoints.

quark. i never play modded minecraft without quark, if only for the rotation lock feature alone (never worry about which direction you're facing while placing a block again). you can go through quark's website to decide which features you'll enable and disable, and this is possible to do through an in-game gui, so even people who don't want to touch .json files can easily configure what quark features they do and don't use! it just adds... so many little qol things.

appleskin. this just makes the food bar more useful and shows you saturation. i don't know why vanilla doesn't do this.

jei (just enough items). you will ALWAYS WANT JEI WHILE PLAYING MODDED I CANNOT EXPRESS ENOUGH HOW HANDY THIS IS. a searchable list of every item in the game, which you can click on in order to see their recipes, and even automatically transfer items from your inventory to a crafting grid for that recipe! it's in every modpack ever for a reason! the larger the modpack, the more you're gonna want this!

a performance mod. personally i'd recommend not using optifine, as optifine is a mod a lot of other mods note break them, but if your particular pack is optifine compatible, go for it! most packs i've seen go with either sodium on fabric or rubidium on forge, but there are also other options! i'd just include at least one.

any other convenience you've ever had in another modpack that you want! personally, i need something like tom's simple storage network, drawers, or both to want to play a given modpack, because i get sad without storage, but maybe you only want to play packs with a variety of crops! maybe you think sophisticated backpacks or sophisticated storage are a requirement in your mind! maybe supplementaries or other decorative mods are a requirement to you! the world is your oyster! add whatever of those!

[witchofthesouls]

Oh~ I just saw your latest post about cybertronians and human dances and I love it!

As a former ballerina, I loved the admiration from the audience but over time grew to hate the process of ballet dancing. Between the cut-throat competition, the EDs, the amount of toenails that have fallen off and lost, and the fact that I don’t really have much feeling left in my feet due to the 15 years worth of ballet that damaged them.

I still love dancing, I just don’t put it above my peace and health anymore, so I can look back at my ballet career and all the stuff that happened and laugh. Trust me, my story isn’t unique among the thousands of ballet performers out there.

I think that cybertronian would be kind of horrified about the ‘smile behind the pain’ and ‘there is beauty in pain’ aspect of ballet, especially the medics and especially about the falling off toenails 😂

Ohhh, thank you for sharing! I actually had some thoughts about this since my mom is a nurse with patients who were professional dancers and holy hell, the kind of injuries that could happen! Ballet feet, indeed.

First Aid would be absolutely horrified and feeling guilty that he enjoyed the performances when it brings on that much damage. He didn't think such beautiful, effortless movements could do long-term damage. The poor thing will start digging into things to learn about the human body and how to mitigate injuries and fall into a weird spiral of "what?! No... What?!"

(It's Skyfire that needs to drag him out that funk since xenobiology on Cybertron was a massive field with so many specialties without going into different species.)

Ratchet, on the other hand, isn't surprised. He's ancient compared to a lot of the crew. He definitely remembers when professional dancers on Cybertron had to have their latches sanded or permanently removed, so it wouldn't catch the costumes or hurt their partners when their bare frames glided together. Luckily, the tech improved, but there are still common injuries like pulls and stains and breaks, especially without proper warm ups or among those without the trained flexibility on an intense choreography or heavy costumes. They still have long term-health impacts as well.

Professional dancers from Cybertron have issues with hyperflexiblity since armature has a key role in protecting joints and ligaments and cables from overusing and overextending. Very set or old professionals have a knack in popping back their parts without a grimace. A must know trick, especially during a performance. The younger ones have masks during the shows until they can master that necessity because crowds don't want to see dancers in pain. Unless it's part of the script. It can get to the point where it severely impacts their own lines (fuel, coolant, lubricant) and need either invasive corrective surgery or retirement.

They also have issues with their sensory perception. Quite a few feel too contained or claustrophobic with proper plating to the point that they're basically in root-mode all the time, so many high-end tailors leverage that. Or use really specialized plating that tricks the outside eye that it's thick when it really isn't.

Another common injury is protoform burn, especially among the dancers that do aerial performances with rigs since the straps are set deep into their base, and they're in direct line of fire of special effects. This can lead to deformations and scarring, which messes with their sensation. Many dancers see this as a matter of pride in their craft and take to highlighting their scars as a calling card or a showing at performances.

Similar to the gladiators' war paints, dancers would utilize specialized paints upon themselves to create a variety of effects: trailing mirages, bold streaks, color shifts, gradients, fog trails, and so on. Some power couples and cohorts among them coordinate their own scarring and preferred effects to create memorizing and stunning visual masterpieces.

Those of the Artisanal Caste were/are very intimate between the fine line of passion and pain.

[ravenousnightwind]

In moments of great tragedy and anguish, I only had the gods to look to. I never expected help. I just would talk to them about how bad it was. Sometimes, I'd ask for things. Sometimes, I'd plead with them for things I needed.

It was in these moments I could feel peace. Even if nothing came of it. It was the only thing I could do with those emotions. Then, sometimes, years later, things might happen. Here and there. Little things building up to a conclusion.

When I asked Odin to help me through my trauma, he did. Sending me spiraling in my own head. Realization after realization threatening to drive me insane. Testing my resolve against myself.

When I asked Loki to help me speak better to people, I got better. Knowing instinctively, almost. The words flooding from my mouth that shoved into the ears of others like a spear. Casting like a spell.

When I asked Frigg for stability, she made me go through things to find how I could balance my desires and my finances. How to move forward in life with mental illness. She taught me patience and calming. She taught me how not to worry about silly rituals and offerings or tools. She showed me better, more mindful ways to see the world and nature, and herself. As well as the other gods. It was through Frigg that I started worshipping again, it was through her that I found my spirit, my craft again. It was she who showed me how to be who I am and to embrace my own brand of witchcraft and magic, heathenry as a whole.

Odin may have been my interest in heathenry through his stories and myths. He helped me dive into my own head. Helped me find the deeper reasons. In myself as well as within history. Searching for the truth in the lies. In the end, it was Frigg, though, who showed me I didn't need all that bullshit to be or perform. She guided me with a gentle hand because she knew how fragile I was, how untrusting I became. It was through her I rediscovered my own beliefs, and by extension, I found myself and the wholeness I feel now.

To say the gods never help, to say the gods never do for people, I think it's wrong. Maybe it could all just be in my head? But for me, they exist, and they're the reasons why I am the way I am today. All of them. Without them..I am not sure I would of had the strength or the wisdom to do what do now.

[cherrirui-official]

Friendlocke Violet Gijinkas (Part 2/7)

PART 2 BAYBEE WAHOOO!! Three more gijinka designs comin right up!

I plan on posting them in order by groups of three, so there’s gonna be seven parts in total, all of which I’ll be linking here when done vvv

(Part One) (Part Three) (Part Four) (Part Five) (Part Six) (Part Seven)

!! These will contain personal headcanons I have for the cast, little fun facts, and also spoilers for Friendlocke Violet (for both the edited vids and the streams) This also contains a small amount of blood on one of the images!!

@saltydkart-reblogs

And that’s pretty much it, designs under the cut!

JOE:

The reason Joe dislikes most bird pokemon such as fletchling is because they're always stealing and pecking at the olives he... or well more specifically his company grows.

Speaking of which, they own a large plot of land which is used specifically to grow olive trees, which of course are used to make the olive oil he sells. What? Did you think that the olives come from Joe themselves? Of course not silly, welcome to capitalism.

That being said, Joe DOES know how to garden. When they first started their olive oil company they had to grow their own olive trees. Nowadays, in their spare time, they'll sometimes be found tending to the olive trees in their company's garden.

His crown is personally tailored for Joe and Joe ONLY. Crafted with the shiniest gold and the richest olives, all fit for a king! Somehow it never falls of his head. (Fun fact: the points are made to look like olive oil bottles)

Joe needs glasses but usually wears contacts when in public. Not that they look bad with glasses, it's just a personal choice.

Joe LOVES being involved in... well, anything! As long as it's not weird or sexual or illegal (that last one counts UNLESS it involves scamming others into buying his oil products), he is more than happy to invite himself into whatever is going on around him. What are you going to do? Stop him? Oh please!

HANNAH Ü:

At the start of her career, she would spend her days doing her own one-man (or.. well... woman) shows at subway stations, telling stories and entertaining other pokemon and people alike while they waited for the next train to arrive.

Her hat and cape are made entirely of salt! She is able to transform her cape and hat into different shapes and usually used this ability of hers to make stuff such as accessories, hats, and props that fit the role she's donning at the time.

Hannah LOVES collecting stickers and often wears them proudly on her body (in her poke form ofc ofc). However, she usually has to get someone else to stick them onto her bc of her lack of actual hands.

Some of her improv roles are inspired by the people she meets while others are inspired by pieces of media she's interested in at the moment.

Will ABSOLUTELY learn a new language if she needs to for a role. Duolingo speedrun world record

MYKYIE:

As stated previously, Mykyie used to be a circus performer before he quit to pursue his dreams. His most popular act involved him spinning plates on a stick while standing on a ball.

^^^ Because of this, he also has really, REALLY good balance.

Mykyie always keeps his Miku glowsticks on him, even when not attending any of her concerts.

"Anger Point" is basically an uncontrollable form of last resort whenever Mykyie is close to death but can still fight, it usually leads to him attacking whoever or whatever caused him great harm (In the instance of Lark, it was when he crit Mykyie and the ladder's health was extremely low.)

The Miku tattoo on Mykyie's arm was designed by Mykyie himself! However, it was drawn on him by an anonymous underground artist who went by many names to hide his true identity. The name that the artist went by at the time Mykyie got his tattoo was "Cl@ir33"

The cuffs and cape that he wears are... well, WERE, red. An unknown force seems to be slowly turning them into a shade of blue.

And that's all the HCs for now! Next Gijinka batch will consist of GrAce, Braidy, and Christene's

Also here's the posterless version of Joe's Gijinka bio before I go

[lancrewizzard]

Please tell me you’re not a gaiman fan because it seems like you have issues with him and goddd me too

Okay this is a complicated question to answer and has got both more and less so in the last couple of weeks. Since there's still information coming out about the sexual assault allegations, I don't want to say too much now and then have to backtrack hugely, but even the very best case scenario makes his behaviour scummy as all hell. And I don't believe it will turn out to have been the best case scenario. So we'll just bundle the whole thing up with "yikes" and move on to things I've had a long enough time to think about and put proper thoughts around.

A month ago I'd have said that he seems like a decent bloke, but seems to have real trouble understanding experiences he can't relate to. The foreword to his short story collection Trigger Warning is a great example of this. He spent a while wittering on about his misgivings about trigger warnings as a concept, then remembered he knew someone with a severe phobia of tentacles and conceded that they had their place. He then proceeded to give a very dumb non-warning which completely failed to mention how something like one in three of the collected stories involved sexual violence. Great job Neil.

I already mentioned in the tags of that previous post my issues with his obvious lies to TV Omens fans who don't know any better. It's just annoying and stupid to lie about something that unimportant, unless it was actually an attempt to get disillusioned Book Omens fans back on side (in which case, wow that failed spectacularly).

And now I realise that everything else is about specific works of his, so I've stuck it under a cut if you don't want to see me bitch about Good Omens adaptational changes changes for the umpteenth time or go on a short heartfelt ramble about what was almost a perfectly crafted short story.

I'll be blunt, I only saw S1 of Good Omens, and while I enjoyed it, it was an incompetent adaptation. The fucking radio play managed to tell the same story with greater faithfulness and more elegance without a 3rd person narrator (and had the brilliant idea of having the opening and closing credits performed by Agnes Nutter's voice actress). Compare and contrast the show making God the 3rd person narrator and exposition dump, and how that changes the whole story from a humanist tale where people are all people and whose choices matter, where God's grand plan night not even exist, to a story where everything implicitly or explicitly is going to God's plan under God's watchful eye.

And I will never comprehend how Gaiman successfully argued to have a whole set built to film Agnes Nutter's death, but then said that for practical reasons they couldn't have Crowley revive the dove. The angel accidentally killed a dove and the demon intentionally revived it! It's so thematically important! Neil why are you like this? Do you understand your own works or was Pterry the only one of you who put actual thought into things' meanings?! HOW DO YOU FUCK THIS UP NEIL? I UNDERSTOOD ITS IMPORTANCE WHEN I WAS 15 NEIL!

Ahem. Moving on.

Neverwhere is the most recent Gaiman book I've read and it's a good showcase of all the issues I have with his writing. The protagonists are dragged along by the plot, they're Special TM by birth or fate, not by the choices they make. The world they inhabit is wonderful, detailed, and vibrant, but I found that far more interesting than the protagonists inhabiting it. We got a random rape backstory for a girl whose main role was to die so the male protagonist feels bad. The way Gaiman described every female character bar one in terms of their attractiveness made me unsure if it was him or the protagonist who was weird about women (although I guess I have the answer to that now). Funny how Gaiman didn't shy away from things and people smelling bad right up until a hot woman who had been fighting, running, and falling over in a swamp apparently smelled not of sweat and stagnant water, but "musk". Really normal, that. There were wonderful descriptions and great moments, but after that first SA moment I couldn't relax and enjoy the ride because I was always on edge waiting for the next time Neil felt the need to be Like That.

Then there's my beloved, hated The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains. It's almost the perfect neat fairy-fable where every little detail is paid off later. It's a story of grief and vengeance and greed. It's about the price of fairy magic. And it has a pointless scene stuck in of marital rape. It has no purpose. It does nothing for the pacing or themes or characters. It never comes up again. I hate it.

Stuff can be horny or harrowing or both, I don't care, but Gaiman just drops SA into things for no clear reason as a generic Bad Thing Happen, Make Tone Dark. It's distasteful and inelegant. It cheapens the rest of the writing by its presence.

The simple truth is that Neil Gaiman seems to have a near pathological urge to shove sexual violence into places it has no need or right to be. It's disgusting but sadly not shocking that this apparently includes his personal life.

[adrianasunderworld]

The Night Raven Circus AU

"Come one, come all, to the most daring show in all of Twisted Wonderland! Witness spectacles beyond your imagination. Death Defying Aerial dances. Beasts from Hell tamed. Creatures from the depths. Dolls given life and fires run wild. I, Dire Crowley, will be your host this evening. Welcome the Night Raven Circus!"

✨🎪✨

The Night Raven Circus is a famous show that travels all over Twisted Wonderland. With it's Whimsical and Gothic aesthetic, to it's large cast of performers and attractions, it has always stood out over the years and has earned its excellent reputation. And, befitting it's name, the circus is only open at night.

The Ring Leader, Dire Crowley, had hired the best performers he can find. From Lilia, the best swordsman around, known for his sword swallowing an knife throwing tricks and his son Silver who is also learning the act. The fire breather Malleus. Who due to his draconic heritage is able to command fire and control it, leading to a thrilling act that scares and excites the audience. Jamil the talented hypnotist that calls audience members to take part. Along with many more.

The newest addition to the cast being Isabelle, a Beast Tamer. But instead of working with your average circus animals, she tames monsters. Griffins, Hellhounds, and of course, Grim, a feline creature that can go from a kitten to a large fire maned beast.

Other recent additions to the performance lineup being Dires daughter, Darling. Where she controls her hand crafted and life like dolls to perform for the audience. And Dreary, who has a tent she tells fortunes out of. Though most of her predictions are fake, and all her real visions are only bad things to come.

However, with all the fame of the circus, comes those seeking to topple it. The rival Playfulland Circus is run by a man known as the Coachman. The inner workings of their business being shady at best. Whenever they happen to be in the same area as The Night Raven circus, little things tend to go wrong. A wardrobe malfunctions, a prop or two going missing. Giddel has even been caught sneaking around now and then and promptly scolded. However, lately things star to escalate. Equipment is being damaged, costumed shredded. Isabelle has found the cages of her beasts unlocked when she knows for a fact it was closed.

However things take a turn for the deadly when Clara, an aerial dancer, was performing when the rope holding up the hoop she was hanging from snapped and she fell. She walked away with only a few injuries, but now Dire was enraged and needed to find a way to get back at the Playfulland circus for this.

With Darling taking over the slot that was for Claras routine, the rival circus is now keeping a new eye on the new talent to see what else they can sabotage or even copy.

Au thought I talked with @marrondrawsalot (The owner of oc Darling Crowley) about.

@mangacupcake @writing-heiress @the-weirdos-mind

Feel free to add what your characters might be doing in the circus or as audience members. Or even which circus they're apart of.

[autumnslance]

New Game+ Tutorial

"I don't remember this part of the story." "It's been so long since I played X expansion." "What happened during that raid again?" "Who was this character?" "I story skipped the MSQ/job quests so I don't know what happened and who these people are!"

There's answers to this, friends. Not only is the game's own Unending Journey (in inn rooms, or as furnishing in your FC or private rooms/homes) able to replay many cutscenes, and there's the completed quest log, but there are places online, such as Garland Tools and the FFXIV Game Script, that keep most (not all) of the quest text handy.

But if you want to relive those quests, and/or get the side dialogues and replay (or first time play!) the experiences, as of Shadowbringers 5.1 there's a feature called New Game+ to allow that.

New Game+ (or NG+) will let you replay past questlines, at your current level (which makes it go pretty fast in a lot of cases). There is No experience or rewards to gain through this feature--no using it to level alt jobs. It purely exists to allow experiencing, or re-experiencing, completed content.

Once defeating the Ultima Weapon and Lahabrea at level 50 in ARR's finale of 2.0, you can go to Vesper Bay and find the Wistful Whitebeard.

More info and images below the Keep Reading cut...

(image taken from gamesconsolewiki and their article on this feature.)

Once you've unlocked the feature by talking to him, you get a new menu option in your Duty menu (the exclamation point icon), right between Duty Recorder and Hall of the Novice.

Once you select the feature it brings up a menu of options; it usually defaults to Main Story Quests, but I also have a paused replay under "Suspend" in progress. There are also options that match other quest interfaces, like your Journal or the Unending Journey; Chronicles of a New Era for raids and trials, Side Story for quests like Hildibrand, the Scholasticate, Role Master Quests, Void Quests, and Chronicles of Light (story important side quests, like Tales of the Dragonsong War, Tales from the Shadows, Tales of Newfound Adventure). Tank, Healer, DPS, Crafting, and Gathering quests also have their own categories.

Each Expansion MSQ is broken into parts; usually 2 parts for the x.0 main expansion, and then 2 parts for the patches. They're only available after x.0 or the patch stories are complete.

Also notice the "Help" icon in the top right of the NG+ overlay; it opens a pretty comprehensive guide, divided into menu sections, about how the feature works.

ARR is split into 6 parts, and I do think 2.0 could use a rework in how they're split but for now, I'm selecting Part 6 to look for specific side dialogues that only exist in this timeframe.

Selecting Part 6 opens the description; the Crystal Braves have just been formed, to help the Scions with the turmoil still facing the realm--from refugees, to Garlemald's continuing threat, to primals and Ascians.

Once you do, the NG+ quest info shows up, usually around where ever you keep your MSQ quest marker. I hide my MSQ tracker once it's done, so NG+ fits in that same spot in the upper left for me.

It tells me to "Relive Past Adventures!", which expac and part I'm in, and which quest is my starting point in this case, "Traitor in the Midst", the start of the Ivy spy plotline in Patch 2.4.

From here it progresses as if I am back in that patch and on those quests, but without any experience or rewards. Aeryn's in her current level 90 appearance and skills, making it easy to skip past and handle level 45-50 enemies in these zones.

So long as I am in NG+, I cannot do current quests, plots, or other content; I can't complete new current level duties (duties new in NG+ itself are fine), I can't access the MB, my retainers, or the Unending Journey. I can manually Suspend my current playthrough, or performing some of these actions (like duties) will automatically suspend my NG+ playthrough. You also cannot start NG+ while doing certain things (like some quests, such as leves).

This also will not let you play through the start of other city-states, only your original starter town. Solo duties will let you choose their difficulty immediately, without having to fail them first like in normal play.

If I want to drop my NG+ save before I've finished the replay--maybe I found the info and screenshots I wanted--I can delete the save.

This is an extremely helpful feature that can be used to replay events and quests, either for the fun of it, or because you want to find specific dialogue or lore information that only exists in a specific point in game. Maybe you want to visit old friends lost along the way, or take new screenshots of your WoL as they are post-fantasia.

Maybe it's just been a few years, and you've found you've forgotten some things and want to remember how the story actually went, especially knowing what you know now.