#damien the bright sessions

[bonebuckets]

nevermind. just finished listening to some faraway place. back to crying and biting the walls about damien gorham

[yellow-bookshelf]

just finished the bright sessions, about to start on the archives and ????

damien is the first character to make me understand the whole "this character is my babygirl and he's also an evil criminal"

his voice actress >>>

[laughable-umbrella]

i am on the brink of collapse

[poorbloodymess]

Day 3 of Kinktober: Human Furniture with Damien and Adam. Please enjoy!

[rosesarewilting]

There is no way Damien ever sat on the therapy sofa™ like a normal person.

[elios-sylvelios]

Old The Bright Sessions Fanart! Summer car ride with Mark and Damien! Still working on their designs

[moylis3]

happy birthday the bright sessions. here`s damien

[mycroftirl]

[spacizia]

tfw the man you felt the most comfortable being yourself with is the worst person you could have met

[ispyspookymansion]

this is what i do for fun, basically. bright sessions character chart!! more notes under the cut:

SO each character column is the collective opinion of other characters on that character, character rows are what they think of every other character. i tried to keep it to canon, textual dynamics only. if the squares alternate, the feeling is mixed. some of the other color groups are relationship developments chronologically, or they dont feel strongly enough to have a full four color set. had to simplify some complex stuff for the sake of color coding but it was funnnnn! hoping i didnt miss anything huge and embarrassing but well the character dynamics ARE messy so its possible something slipped by me!

[bonebuckets]

bestowing upon Damien Gorham the greatest honor I can give to any character. asexuality.

[jadlz]

I just want you to damage me beyond all repair

How else could I know that you actually care?

(Victimless Crime by Blood Girl)

damiark for @mycroftirl !

[thelaurenshippen]

i genuinely cannot count on one hand the number of times i've listened to mark (episode 48)!! your writing. is absolute genius. i have never felt so much for any two characters in my life, and damien and mark are just written SOOO WELL OH MY GOSH LIKE RUN ME OVER WITH A CAR?? the "i'm trying to tell you that you hurt me" and the "But at a certain point you won’t be pissed anymore and then we can go back to where we were last summer. / Mark: We can what?" I WISH YOU HAD JUST PUNCHED ME INSTEAD BECAUSE WHAT IN THE WORLD MS SHIPPEN IM GOING TO LOSE MY MIND (also the voice acting is just incredible like paired with your writing it should be called the Shippen Effect because what in the WORLD) I have never ever been more relieved to have found any piece of media more in my entire life. just oh my gosh damien saying one manipulative thing after the other with no end but being able to completely understand where he's coming from??? i've rambled about his character to my friend so so often and just oh mark mark HOOLY MOLY every single character in tbs is so well-developed and just oh my gosh like I went through a similar experience to mark and finding tbs was WATER IN A DESERT I SWEAR OH MY GOSH just the . the part about humanizing manipulation and how manipulation makes you still empathize for them just EUEUUEUEGH I AM BITING A TABLE . you are. an incredible writer. like genuinely I look up to you so so much (you've been featured in my argumentative essays for my lang classes haha ACJHHBA) because you epitomize the beauty of putting your heart out and having it work through hard work and effort. your books are also at my school library which is CRAZY considering how tiny my school library is!! every single one of your works has so much heart and empathy and care in it, from the bright sessions to breaker whiskey to new year's day i've looked forward to and loved every single episode. thank you so much for what you do!! you as a person are also just so so admirable. you're incredibly humble while being INSANELY CRACKED AT WRITING ANALYZING ACTING ETC and are just?? so fun to listen to and have a very awesome voice??? I hope you're taking good care of yourself and looking out for your needs!! I appreciate you so so much and hope you have an awesome rest of your day :D <3

oh my god!?!?!? this is the NICEST thing in the world!?!?! thank you so much!?!?!?

but for REAL thank you. this genuinely means the whole goddamn world to me. I'm so glad you found my stories and that they were what you were looking for in one way or another and thank you so much for listening and for telling your friend about my characters!!! the "I need to talk to my friend about this character" is a feeling I personally know so well and one that I consider the highest compliment if I'm able to prompt it in someone else!

and ahhhhh I'm SO happy your school library has my books!!! that's always AWESOME to hear. I'm so grateful to your librarians (and all librarians)

I love the idea of the Shippen Effect being "voice actors take a script and spin it into gold" because that is one of my absolutely favorite things about working in audio. and I do like to think I have impeccable taste in actors :)

and the fact that you picked out one of my favorite episodes I've ever written is amazing. not only was writing it so fun, but a huge reason I wrote it is because Andrew and Charlie had such INCREDIBLE chemistry as Mark and Damien. like. off the CHARTS from moment one. which is so funny because they'd done scenes together in the acting class we were all in and had been, of course, amazing together, but there was something about them taking on those characters that just made a spark

I had never anticipated writing that episode when I started, but the performances that Andrew and Charlie gave were so inspiring that I just followed their lead with that relationship. and it was such an incredible blast. I miss them both - and especially them together - a ton.

also, omg being featured in essays is literally the greatest honor.

thank you SO much for your message, you have MADE my day!!!!

[cometsandstardust]

no one on campus knows i’m listening to doug eiffel try to explain the concept of dying to the ‘dear listeners’

no one on campus knows i’m listening to jonathan sims start the apocalypse

no one on campus knows i’m listening to “one way or another, together”

no one on campus knows i’m listening to mr. bonzo

no one on campus knows i’m listening to sally grissom take away her own choice

no one on campus knows i’m listening to celia betray sam and abandon him to a catastrophic dimension

no one on campus knows i’m listening to daniel powell realize he’s not quite human any more

no one on campus knows i’m listening to alexander hilbert betray his whole crew

no one on campus knows i’m listening to caleb michaels get lost in his own and others rage and beat damien to the point that he ends up in a coma

[thebrightsessions]

misery wants a family // a Damien mix

hello via audio; back to black beyonce + andre 3000; it’s a man’s, man’s, man’s world james brown; daddy emeli sandé; feed the hunger peter cincotti; leigh nathan angelo; blue jay way the beatles; one way or another until the ribbon breaks

[rosesarewilting]

Is that what you want? Do you want me to apologize?

Hah! You've fallen for my trap... That's right. I've tricked you into a character analysis post with angst art. How devious.

OKAY so …I listened to A Neon Darkness. I have thoughts. Damien is such an interesting, insanely well written and endlessly frustrating character, and I honestly went into the show expecting him to improve over time.

I think part of that is that I (a pretty neurodivergent person) relate to his inability to read other people’s wants, and to me it was… really obvious how he could solve his own problems? Despite what he may believe, he’s not the only person in the world who struggles to connect. And somewhat ironically, that very disconnect is what made me empathize with him.

But unlike everyone else in the show, he also doesn’t try.

He wants to have actual connections to people, but refuses to express his feelings or even make the slightest attempt to control his power. He wants to understand others, but refuses to ask what they want until it’s the last possible option. He wants others to forgive him when he can’t even forgive himself. It’s like he wants to want to change, but can’t bring himself to actually do anything differently.

If, at any point in his story, he had taken accountability for his actions, his life could have been totally different. If he’d just tried to control his powers when the Unusuals asked him to, if he’d given any of his therapists an actual chance, if he’d brought Mark to Dr. Bright like he agreed to, if he’d listened when Mark said he wanted to go back, then he could have gotten what he wanted. Hell, he could have solved most of his problems with some guided meditation and online chats. But instead he acts as though he has no agency or responsibility in his own life. He puts all the responsibility of changing his situation on the people around him.

It’s also fascinating to me how close he gets to understanding. At the end of Neon Darkness, Marley directly tells him that using his ability hurts people and that he would have been accepted if he’d put in effort. He has all of the answers laid out in front of him, yet he doesn’t connect the dots because he’s still convinced he’s the victim. This is especially present in the second half of the Roadtrip From Hell. He talks constantly about how violating his own power is… without ever realizing “Oh, this is how everyone around me feels all the time. That’s why no one feels safe around me.”

Damien could have everything he wants, and he’s the only person who doesn’t see it.