#don't like... take my word as gospel OF COURSE

[deoidesign]

Hi, how did you learn to draw Steve's physique?

Ohh what a complicated thing to answer...

When it comes to how I learned to draw anything, it's hard to say anything too specific since it's always a culmination of many years of assorted study and practice... but I can try to do my best to explain some of the biggest things that helped me learn, some tips I keep in mind, and maybe at least some places to start/delve further.

(just a little disclaimer it's not like my drawings here are going to be 100% medically accurate.. they're just to illustrate concepts!)

The main thing about learning various physiques is understanding anatomy. Which feels obvious, but I don't mean proportions; these are important, but perhaps more important is understanding the skeleton and how it moves and learning where muscles connect to bones and where fat grows on the body. When you understand how these function on a more mechanical level, depicting form and movement in a way that feels natural comes in tow.

For instance, understanding things like the pronation and supination of the radius and ulna, as well as the fact that muscles can ONLY contract or relax, will help you understand a bit better which muscles will be flexed and which will not while someone moves. It's inherent to the positioning based on the structural makeup of the body... It's not like you NEED to memorize all the muscles and bones, of course, but understanding and gaining at least a passive familiarity with the concepts really helps.

In tandem with this concept is the way parts of the body flow into eachother. Muscles ALWAYS come in groups because they can only contract. Whatever muscle is there to lift something, there is a muscle on the other side to pull that bone back down. What this results in is a series of straight edges next to curves, which gives us a lot of really lovely "s curves" and dents and folds and so on and so forth just naturally occurring.

I would suggest at least learning the "bony landmarks", which are bones (usually) visible on the surface of the body. things like the iliac crest, the great trochanter, the 7th vertabrae, the acromion process... These can be used to help you understand the parts of the body as angles and relationships, rather than trying to remember lengths and sizes, which vary immensely... (since you asked about steve, he can be our model... also study these on your own don't just take my word for it haha, these are the ones I personally keep in mind)

I've done the same thing with body hair... learning where it grows and in which directions... It helps me make up variations without needing reference, because I have a set of rules I can follow.

The biggest thing that helped me understand all this on a much deeper level was my ecorche course. I sculpted this guy. We started by sculpting the entire skeleton to understand the bones, and then we added muscles on top. Not every single muscle, of course, but the "artistic muscles" AKA the ones which directly affect the surface of the body. Doing this let us see where muscles connect, because we would make a shape, put it on the bone where it actually goes, and then you get to see how other muscles overlap that.

This helped me, perhaps, more than anything else. But I also didn't just start with this course, I had been drawing for years before I even took it. I had been in school for years before I took it. Not that I think it wouldn't be helpful to someone just starting out, but I do think that the more you know going in, the better an in-depth course like this will help you and stick with you. Classes are also expensive, though so I'm not really like... recommending you pay potentially thousands of dollars to take one... But it did help me a lot, personally.

I also, of course, have done many figure, gesture, and master studies...

These just help you quickly gain a stronger understanding of generalized anatomy, and gives you real life examples of and practice with of how people move and balance.

What all this does when combined, is gives me a very solid ability to depict movement and form in a way that feels relatively natural from my subconscious without the need for reference.

The rest of how I've learned to draw his physique is honestly mostly just stylization. I understand the body, and this is how I am depicting it for his level of musculature.

And as I move into depicting him in other ways, either moving in comics or in animation, realistically rendered, or extra stylized, these concepts inform every step of that process for me! When he keeps the same/similar relationships between parts, he gets to still look like himself.

It ALSO really helps when putting clothes on, because the way cloth falls and bunches and lifts is all directly related to the form it is on... So the more you understand that form, the more you can depict clothing and movement in a way that feels natural.

This is all, of course, true when I draw anyone, you asked about Steve so I'm trying to mostly show with him! But because I'm just drawing from raw information of general anatomy rather than trying to study one body type at a time, it allows a lot more "give," I think!

Like, here's most of the cast from TTA so far... actually, they're not as varied as I thought they were nevermind LMAO ignore this part

But, it also makes monster and alien design much easier! It's a lot easier to come up with non-human anatomy when I understand human anatomy, because I can manipulate the knowledge I have...

There is infinite more to study in the world of anatomy... The complexity of the human body goes extremely deep. For our purposes as artists, we need only depict a fraction of it, but more information rarely hurts the process.

I'm sure there's something in here that's wrong on a technical level, I'm mostly going off of memory. But that's kind of my point - I understand enough generally and conceptually that when I am missing something and need to find reference for it, I understand what I'm looking at. It's much easier than trying to learn AND draw at the same time.

I hope even one thing in here helped you! Sorry it's so long.

[yeyinde]

Brain went brrrrrrrr

Price and the new 141 member getting into an argument. Price is all like if you don't behave ill take you over my knee girl.

She's all like I fucking dare you or you'll have to catch me first or even you don't have the balls.

🫠🫠

i’ve always wanted someone who was super by the book to clash with John “i routinely tell my superiors i’m going to maim/murder/hang them” Price. this gave me the perfect opportunity to do so. 

noncon spanking. abuse of authority. power imbalance. size kink. mean, dom!Price. forced submission.

You have this way of getting under his skin. 

An impossible itch. No matter how many times he picks and prods at his flesh, you worm beneath the dermis, burrowing deep. Sitting pretty against his goddamn bones. Festering. 

Incurable. 

He turns to vice to stem the irritation. Cigars. Whiskey. His hand shoved down his trousers like he's a fuckin' boy and not a man on the wrong side of forty. 

Thinking of you—of breaking that smart mouth of yours on his cock. 

It's the way you saunter around with your head held high, balancing golden eggs on your crown, that irks him something awful. The patronising drawl when you huffily remind him that what he's doing is breaking seven, no, ten, different laws, Price. You can't just do whatever you want, there are rules—

And that's the crux of it. 

A difference of ideas. Experience. You still see the world in shades of black and white. Good and bad. Unwilling to acknowledge that the line between is saturated and blurred. A putrid muck that traps all. Bogish. 

He knew it was a mistake when they sent him your file, asked if he needed the additional help. Hostage negotiator. He's heard of you. By the fucking book. You recite passages like it's gospel, turning printed words into a knife. A terrible fit for a team that works in the pivotal no man's land you claim doesn't exist. 

Yet—

He takes you on. Brings you in. Buries his anger at your fucking gall deep in his chest where it rots. Grows. Swallows down the rage, apoplectic fury, when you undermine him at every opportunity, citing laws and regulations like it's a fucking prayer. 

A calamitous decision, he knows. Terrible. But—

Despite it all, you're good at what you do. Brilliant. A budding rose germinating in fecund soil. You'll grow into something wild, won't you? Something untamed. 

Under his hands, you'll bloom the prettiest. He knows this deep in his bones. But—

“You're breaking the rules, Captain—”

—pedantic little thing, aren't you? 

Obediently following the wrong master. 

It irks him. He's been known to step on the toes of his superior officers for less, caustic words hissing foul from between his teeth. 

But unlike them, you're worth something. Even as the moral antithesis to his utilitarian dogma, he sees your potential. How you can shape this world dangling on a brittle thread if you lay down your senseless principles and follow him. Listen to him. 

But of course, you don't. 

And he supposes he ought to have known better. It's dripping gasoline over an open flame. The sequence of events is easily premeditated, seen, when you refuse to listen to what he says (“it's against the law, Price!”), walking away from him, his team, the mission, and take matters into your own, morally righteous hands. Bringing his underhanded methods to the desk of your superior officer, demanding he be investigated for crimes. The result is a loose warning from someone in a suit several sizes too big for them, and your fury when he pulls you back, has you assigned to another mission with the 141, with himself. Preens at your glower when you march back into his office, into his hands. 

In the fallout, he has no one to blame but himself, really. Anyone could have seen this coming. But the thing about shirking his morality in favour of a better outcome—above all else—is that he doesn't have to. 

And so, he doesn't. 

No. He blames you. 

(How perfect for him, then, that there's no one on base except you and him.)

“If you think I'm not going to report you again if you do something illegal, Price, you're wrong.”

He scoffs, shaking his head at your fucking audacity. 

"Better watch that mouth of yours, Sergeant, or you won't like what happens next." 

His palm itches when you look up, offering him a slow, feline blink. Leonine eyes creasing at the corners. 

"And what is that, sir? I'm just doing my job—" it's whispered breathlessly, all faux professionalism even as jest leaks down your brow. They pinch, then. Drawing together in a mockery of confusion. "Isn't that what you wanted me to do?" 

"What is that, mm?" He mocks, arms folding over his chest. He has to breathe through his nose for a moment. Gather himself together before he does something reckless, something like— 

It's the defiant little jut of your chin that does him in. That unravels this fraying knot of control until threads slip through his fingers. Falling too fast for him to clench down on them. 

He's threatened his superiors for far less. His kin, teammates. You have no one to blame but yourself for this, really. No one at all when he pulls his hand from where it's tucked under his armpit, curling rough, worn fingers around your wrist. Pulls you close, wrenching you into his chest until your nose bumps the buckle of his vest. 

"'m'gonna take you over my fuckin' knee, is what's going to happen." 

Your swallow is a gunshot. “You—you wouldn't dare—”

He leans in close, closer still. Breath scorching over your cheek. Preening when you bare your little teeth at him. “Wanna bet on that, Sergeant?” 

It's easier than he would have expected to wrangle you over his knee, pinning you down with an arm across your lower back. The height of his chair keeps your front bent, belly pressed against his thigh. Ass seated perfectly in his lap. Precious gem. 

He hums low in his throat, teeth sinking into the butt of his cigar as he locks you tight against him. Grabbing your wrist, twisting it up behind your back. Holding steady. A warning. 

The dangerous twinge in your bone stills you. 

One wrong move and he'd snap it in half. 

This has you taking a different approach, legs falling limp over the armrest. Head dropping over the other side. Malleable in his grasp—however artificial it is.

“Price—” you breathe, winded. Panic on a spindle. “What are you—what do you think you're doing—?”

He hums, mouth tense around the cigar. Words muffled, slurred. “What I should have done a long time ago.” 

“What—hey!”

Your words pepper off into a choked scream when his other hand falls to the hem of your pants, grabbing the fabric in his fist. The shock fades into indignation. Anger. He tastes it in the air as your hips squirm, legs kicking at nothing. Furious little growls spilling from your lips as you thrash, unconcerned by the ache in your bone. 

“Better keep still, love,” he taunts, mouth curling over his teeth as he twists his hand high, higher, up the small of your back until your fingers brush the skin between your shoulder blades. Any more and he'll break it—

“I'm going to fucking—!” It ends on a whine. A whimper. The pain makes you shiver. “Fuck, fuck—stop, stop, ow, stop—!”

“Not a fan of a little pain then, mm?” 

Your breath is ragged. Paints the air in a fine mist of defeat. He has you. The only option out of this is breaking your bone, a threshold no one is willing to cross. 

Price purses his lips back around the cigar, inhaling once, thrice, before he slips his fingers out of the hem of your trousers, reaching up to take hold of the cigar. It's all so matter-of-fact. So nonchalant when he places it in the ashtray. When he brings his heavy, warm hand back to your ass, curling his fingers beneath the fabric. Pulling. Tugging. 

They come off easier than he'd expected. A harsh tug, and the cleft of your ass is revealed. Plush skin curving enticingly as he rips them down to mid-thigh—panties and all. 

The shock fades back into indignation. You hiss something foul under your breath that makes him huff out a chuckle. 

“Not really in the position for that, are you, love?” 

“Shut up—”

He likes the way you sound like this. Feral. Furious. There's ash in your throat. It blots soot around each word, giving them weight. Gone is the woman who barged into his office, sniffing like you smelled something foul. Backing him into a corner. Sputtering in his face about rules. Regulation. 

Now you're bare-assed, panting, in his lap. Small little fawn in the maw of a bear. But oh, do you fight back—

Teeth bared, indignation bleeding into embarrassment, blotting pink in the whites of your eyes.

The sight is hewn into his hindbrain. 

“Look at you,” he purrs, petting your cheeks. “Been beggin’ to be bent over my knee since you got here, haven't you?” 

“Begging? Don't be—ahh!”

He brings his hand down with a small huff, eyes glued to your flesh. Watching it shake under his hand. The width of one swallowing up an entire cheek. So big is he that you're nearly made infinitesimal in his clutch. The thought makes him groan.

You squirm more in shock than discomfort. Head craning over your shoulder, eyes misting over with tears. Glaring at him. 

“What the fuck, Price!”

He strokes your skin, feeling the heat of your flesh bleed through his palm. Resilient little thing, aren't you? He huffs again, blood buzzing. Electric. There's a kindling fire in his guts. Embers sparking, catching. 

He can't deny how badly he's been wanting to have you like this. Craving your tears, your agony, your submission.

“Count,” he barks out, rough. Abrasive. “You're getting ten. Count ‘em for me, and if you miss one, I'm adding two more.”

“You're crazy, you're—!”

His hand comes down again. The impact shakes the fat of your ass. The strike makes you yowl, thrashing to get away. You don't get very far, still trapped in his hold. The threat of a broken bone keeps you from lashing out too wildly, and all you can really do is sit in his lap, and take it—

The notion has him groaning low in his throat. Something wicked spooling in his veins. Wanting. The sight of you heaving, bare-assed, and begging for mercy unleashes something inside of him. Something primal. Starving. 

Price takes a breath to steady himself, head buzzing. Heart pounding. It feels like the euphoria of nicotine—all bliss, sedation. Ease. 

Cathartic. 

“I said count,” he rasps, words cinder in his chest. Smoke. Dragged up from that burning pyre in his belly. Nocuous, hungry. “That's an order, Sergeant.” 

His hand is scorching against your skin. Thoughts turning over themselves as you hiccup in his lap. So pretty, he thinks, eyes flitting over to you. Taking in the sight of your shock, your denial. It tastes like fine wine on his tongue. Heady. 

“Here comes one—”

“One?”

“I told you, didn't I?” His nail rakes across your skin, cruel. Mean. Something preens when you gasp. Your pain perfuming the air. “M’addin’ two more if you don't count. Thought your speciality was listenin’?”

You scowl, twisting back to level him with an awful sneer. “Oh, fuck you—!”

His hand comes down again, harder this time. Vicious. The scream is tangled in your throat, gagged. He feels pleasure—dark and ugly—bloom in his chest, dripping, liquid, down the length of his spine. The twist of agony on your face is beatific. 

“Not gonna count?” He taunts, pinching your inflamed flesh between his thumb and forefinger. “We're gonna be here all day at this rate, love.”

He leans down, broad chest curling over the small of your back, hand cupped possessively over your cheeks. “But maybe you want that, mm? Maybe all this, mhm, insubordination has just been for show. You wanted this. Wanted to be taken over my knee—”

“You're wrong. I haven't—” it tapers off into a squeak when he pinches your flesh again. 

Price pulls back, breathes shallowly through his nose. 

“You and that smart fuckin' mouth. Told you it was gonna get you in trouble—”

He doesn't wait. His hand rears, and comes down with a loud smack that echoes in the sparse office he has you trapped inside. Your howl races alongside it, curling up the walls. Beautiful in all its agony. 

“Christ—” it's a dagger to his resolve. You sound so fucking good howling like this. Oscillating between feral anger and pain, hissing vitriol between clenched teeth. Choking on sobs. 

The first few are experimental. Testing the waters. Feeling. You're combative during it all. Fighting. Screaming. Each strike is uncounted, echoed only with a plea for help. One he knows won't come—

The only person on base is his Lieutenant. Ghost knows better than to barge in on his affairs. 

“No one's comin’, love,” he grunts, sweat beading along his hairline, dripping down his temple. The room heats along with the blood in his veins, stifling and oppressive. He reinforces each hit with more strength, increasing the tempo until you're screaming on his lap, begging for mercy, mercy, please, please, Price stop, stop—

Your skin raises with each new strike. Swelling. Becoming inflamed. The perfect imprint of his handprint sits on each cheek, edges intumescent. The globes shake, shuddering deliciously under each hit. 

He gets to eleven before you break. Tears streaming down your face, voice a threadbare whisper. Hoarse from screaming. 

His hand rains down, slaps your left cheek so hard it stings his hand. Burns. You whimper. Mewling. Squirming on his lap, and then—

“O–one—”

He grunts, feels himself thicken in his trousers. “Good girl.” 

You shudder, body breaking out in goosebumps. “Price—”

“Ah, ah, love. You're not allowed to speak unless you're counting.”

He hits you again, cock throbbing when you tense up, sniffling. Grinding out a soft two between trembling lips. 

You don't break the way he wants you to. There's a glare on your face despite the tears, the sniffles. A defiance that burns over the bridge of your nose. 

But that's fine. He has eight more strikes to ruin you, doesn't he? 

He sets to it with a low moan, your pelvis pressing taut to his tumid cock, the friction raging in his guts. 

But that, he finds, isn't really the point. No. The pleasure, the arousal, is secondary to the way you fall to pieces at his hand. Flesh stinging his palm with each loud smack that rings out sharply in the room. Uneven breaths. Shuddering little ah-ah-ahs that tumble out through clenched teeth. 

It's addictive, this. Therapeutic. 

There's static in his head. White noise. It renders everything else mute. Moot. Molasses drips down, thick and entrenching, congealing over every churning thought in the back of his head. There's a sense of peace, ease, he hasn't felt in years. In decades. 

He feels his belly knot each time your ass jiggles, skin bulging up from the trauma of being hit so harshly. Chafed under his palm. Welts forming in the shape of his hand. A tattoo you'll have for weeks when he's through with you. Aching each time you try to sit. And fuck—

You'll think of him. Of this. Being taken over his goddamn knee like the bad fucking girl you are. Broken in over his lap. Helpless. Submissive. 

The whimpers fade, replaced with shallow hiccups. Your throat is torn. Raw, ruined, by your screams, yowls. Each rasping whine sends jolts of pleasure down his spine. Liquid want molten in his marrow. 

“S–seven, nngh—”

The moan slips out—scorched, bleached—and drills deep into his loins. 

He peels his gaze away from your blistered skin, glancing at your face, but you duck from his view. Hide. Dropping your head over the armrest. Evading him. 

It's new, this. This meekness. 

You were so combative, so feral before. His gaze rakes down the expanse of your spine, over the curve of your cheeks, before settling, hot and heavy, at the crease where your thigh meets your pelvis. You squirm in his lap, thighs sliding together. Rubbing. It's no different from before when he'd spank you, but—

He catches it. 

It glints in the soft light when you move, and he feels something dark, ruinous, curl in the tar-stained fibrils of his chest. Congealing in the crevasses. Hardening. 

Price flicks his tongue out, swiping over his lower lip. The bristles of his beard graze the soft flesh, prickling across it. His throat is suddenly dry. Parched. 

His hand comes down again, notably softer than the other hits he subjected you to. Almost—

Tender. 

This isn't meant to hurt. Not this one. 

He strokes his finger over your skin, cock throbbing with the rasping gasp that spills—a twisted amalgamation of pain, skin still smarting, burning to the touch, and—

His lashes flutter. Nostrils flaring. 

Your slick, wet, between your inner thighs. 

He slides his hand down, down, until your ass cheek is cupped in the bracket of his thumb and forefinger. Nestled tight. A perfect fit. The sight of your skin—soft, so soft—against his bearish, hirsute paw is sickeningly addictive. He grunts, pressing his thumb into the crease between your cheek and thigh. 

“P–Price—”

And then he pulls, moaning deep in his chest as he peels the fat of your ass away, unveiling your cunt to his rapacious gaze. Fuck—

“What’s this?” He taunts, breathless. Pinched. You squirm, trying to press your thighs together. Hiding your pussy from his scorching stare. He doesn't let you. “Gettin’ off on me spankin’ your arse?” 

“N–no, I'm—”

He pushes his thumb up, sliding it over your skin. Gathers your slick on the tip. “Don't lie to me, mm. You're fuckin' soaked.”

The air is punched from his lungs. Spills out in a wretched grunt. In the vacuum, something grows. Knots. Festering inside his chest. Animalistic. Primal. There's an itch in the back of his head. 

He lets go of your arm, knows you won't run. Won't try to escape. No. 

You're a good girl, aren't you? One who does what they're told. Follows orders. It tangles in the soporific slurry of his head, pitching a bivouac of need when you bring your arm down, curling it through the gap of the armrest, holding tight. 

Bracing yourself. 

His hum breaks in his throat. He drags his hand away from your cunt, reaching for the snuffed cigar idling in the ashtray. There's a fever in his veins. It makes his hand tremble. Shake. He needs the blunted drag of nicotine to quench this heady anticipation blooming in his guts. A brumous storm gyring inside him, an incipient maelstrom of want thickening. Intensifying. Threatening to spill over. 

He needs something to steady himself before he tears into you like a beast—

You cock your head over your shoulder, staring at him with eyes drenched in midnight ink. There's a flicker across your tear-stained expression. Something coy. Feline. Leonine. 

There's nothing said. Nothing needs to be. He finds what he's looking for in the fracture of your mien, and scoffs under his breath at your sheer gall. Little fuckin' minx. 

Tobacco proves to be a paltry facsimile when he draws in a bursting mouthful. The restive glow of it dulled under the adrenaline coursing through his veins, heady. Syrupy. A roaring deluge of anticipation broiling in the balmy air, crackling around him like a storm cresting over the horizon. Ozone saturates in the thickening atmosphere. 

Something will break. Shatter. 

He tenses, waiting for the first stormcloud to breach, and drops his hand back to your tender ass. Stroking over the raised welts just to make you gasp. Your hips flex under the shocks of pain riveting down your spine, undulating in his lap. Pitched perfectly over his cock. 

His breath shudders through a needlepoint. The friction is electric. 

In petty retaliation—and just to see you squirm—he trails his knuckles over your heated skin, luxuriating in the way you shiver. Head falling back down over the armrest, beautifully alluring in your vulpine submission. His fingers dip between the cleft of your cheeks, feeling the slickness sticking to your soft, sensitive skin. Soaked between your thighs. Wretched girl. 

His index and middle finger slide over your slit, parting your folds. He feels the small pulses of your drenched hole against his flesh when he slides over it with the press of his fingers. Eager little thing.  

He hums under his breath at the sight of his hand seated across your hand, fingers shoved between the globes of your smarting ass. Soft and tender to worn and gnarled. The cropping of dark hair over his knuckles, his hand, against your bare skin is obscene. The picture of sin with your stricken flesh and his thick veins. The contrast curdled in the back of his head, morphing into something ugly and wanting. 

Idly, he thinks of making you bounce your sore ass on his lap later, your pussy swallowing up his fat cock. Taking it all the way to the root. Over and over again. Breaking you on it until you're begging for mercy, until this little attitude of yours is crushed between his teeth. 

Slick gathers against the rough pads of his fingers, drenching them. The hair on his knuckles is matted down, wet with your arousal. Naughty girl. He'll make you pay for that. 

And for the puddle seeping into his trousers. 

You mewl when he slips, sliding over your clit. The noise spilling molten over your lips, bludgeoning into his loins. 

He drags in another mouthful of smoke. Lets it rot between his teeth as he drops the cigar into the ashtray once more, attention riveting to the slip-slide of your slick thighs rubbing together for friction against your aching clit. Cunt pulsing needily against his hand. 

You haven't learned a damn thing at all, have you? 

Smoke funnels out of his nostrils when he growls. “Spoiled, aren't you? Need to be taught a lesson in respect.” 

“I, ah, am respectful, Captain—” 

He sucks in a breath between clenched teeth. This lippiness of yours grates on his nerves. He wants you begging for mercy, limp in his hold. Pretty doll. Waiting obediently for him to put you back together again. Soft and submissive at his heel. 

“Got three more to go, love.” You shiver when he strokes over your ass. Petting gently with wet, tacky fingers. “If you're a good girl and take it for me, I'll play with your pretty cunt, mm. You'd like that, wouldn't you?” 

Price brings his hand down, grunting when you moan out his name. Sharp and needy. Your plaintive posturing is a spark inside a tinderbox. 

“E–eight.” 

The next one is harder, sharper. The force twinges his joints. Rattles through his bone. 

It's unexpected, and the pain makes you yowl, body drawing tight like a bow. There's no pleasure when it's like that. No friction against your cunt. It's just—

“Price—!” You yelp, shrill and distressed. The lead up to this has been child's play. A soft hand to tender a nervous mare. 

His old man taught him to never strike with the whip first but to wean them slowly. 

He waits, humming mockingly to your pettering whimpers as you heave, tremulous, into the air. Shuddering in his grasp at the aftershocks of agony rippling through your body. 

Waits. Waits. And—

“Ah, ah,” he tuts, cooing low and condescending when you gasp, craning your neck to level him with an imploring, pleading stare as you stammer out a frenetic nine in a breathless rush. Tears soak your lashline, clumping them together when you blink through another deluge pooling against the rim. Your lip wobbles. The stream breaks, spilling over. Fresh tears run down your wet, sticky cheeks. 

There's real panic in the whites of your eyes now. That haughty, pedant gleam buried under pyretic desperation. Gone is the coy twist to your lips. The wily little bloom of amusement in your gaze. 

Aw, poor thing. But—

Too late. “You didn't count. You know what that means, love.” 

That knot in his chest unfurls, and leaks acid into his lungs. This want is corrosive. A poison. The sob breaks through your chest. The first thunderclap. He relishes in it. Leans back in his chair to bask in the potency of your unmaking. 

“Good girl,” he husks out, burning lungs spewing black smoke into the air. “Just ten more now, love. Know you can take it for me, can't you?”

Pretty thing. He'll have that haughty attitude snuffed out before the end of the night. Have you begging for his touch, his cock, him, before the sun draws across the horizon. 

Your ruination at his hand. The thought strokes along the kindling smouldering inside of his chest. Burning away at the pyre he's been building since the day he met you. When you looked up at him, pretty in your scorn, and disobeyed his command. Undermined him. So righteous in your fury. A burgeoning flame he wanted nothing more than to snuff out under his heel, and now—

Wide, wet eyes plead with him. “Please, Price. Please, please. I'll be good—I promise I'll be good, sir—”

—ash in the palm of his hand. 

He strokes over your searing flesh, humming softly under his breath. “I know you will, pretty girl—” basks in the hiccup of relief you let out, lets it glue in his ears, echoing over and over again. So sweet. 

He lets your relief live for a moment. Take its first breath of air through aching lungs—

“But I told you, didn't I? That I'd take you over my knee.” Price pats his hand over your cheek, shushing you when you startle, squirming on his lap. 

“Now. Be a good girl and count for me, mm?”

[akanemnon]

Hello!!!! I am a aspiring artist that wants to make comic book/stories like you do! Do you have any personal advice or stuff that helped you when you make comics?

Hi there!

I'm by no means a professional. Heck, I'm self-taught when it comes to art and making comics. So please don't take my word as gospel.

What helped me the most was having a solid and easily understandable script. When writing stories and comics, it's very easy to drift off course from the main point of your story. This is where things can get messy. A good script is the main foundation you build upon. A comic is not only pretty pictures and cool action scenes. The writing is as equally as important, if not even more so.

Hope that helps!

[ellestrade]

What do you think makes a good Damian Wayne fanfic ? Like what are your standards and red flags when you're reading one

Usually, I would first look at the 'Damian Wayne-centric' tags on ao3 and go from there. I don't think I hold any fics up to a certain standard, though being able to read any is important to me— that means proper paragraphing, grammar, etc.

I know that most, if not all writers on ao3 are amateur writers, novice at best and, if I'm lucky, have been writing since the dawn of Wattpad, so it's not fair for me to expect top-tier writing/characterisation. Everyone always has some kind of trope to fall back into, myself included. It's just a matter if said trope is annoying or not to consume.

"Good Damian Wayne fanfics" are, itself, subjective— because good fanfics, for me, means that there are no attempts at butchering his character, along with his loved ones, and that includes Talia, Ra's, Maya and Mara, etc. If I open a fic and it's all just a grandiose of people putting down Talia (making her a bad/abusive mother) just to have Bruce hugs his son, then I'm closing the tab.

That being said, here are my red flags/pet peeves when it comes to reading a fanfic:

Any, and I mean any variant consisting of bashing the al-Ghuls.

"Talia al-Ghul is a bad mother"

"Talia al-Ghul is a rapist"

"Ra's al-Ghul is a creep"

"Damian is a bad sibling"

Usually, any fics that consist of these types of fics often came out as xenophobic or straight up racist— taking Grant Morrison's run (primarily Talia's character assassination) as gospel, or never reading canon material as a whole.

Of course, credits where it's due, there are some, and I mean a very small some, fics that don't transpire that image— using the tag that to simply convey Damian's time in the League, or phrasing it in a way that Talia/Ra's were an abuser once victim. However, making them bad in comparison is just a no-go for me.

Also, making Talia a rapist is a one way ticket for me to block you— because not only that it is wrong, but it also shows that you don't care enough to do thorough research and just take it as it is; Talia, pre-Morrison, was depicted as this kind and loving woman. She was studying medicine when she met Bruce. They genuinely have Chemistry together. She was also a victim of abuse herself, and she would rather die than inflict harm upon others on purpose. She loves her son, she loves her husband, she loves her family and she also loves herself.

Also, the al-Ghuls are also some of the most affectionate family there are— at least, of course, prior to the whole character assassination for the sake of making Bruce seem like the better parent in comparison. They aren't afraid to show genuine affection to one another, becoming physical and shows their devotion beyond what words could measure— which, is , unfortunate, since they're presented in Western media, and God knows how bad someone would interpret a relationship if 'I love you's aren't being exchanged regularly like therapy talks.

Dare I say, they might actually be better than the BatFam 🤷🤷 but then I might get hunted down for sports so I'll keep that opinion to myself, for now.

I'm also going to redirect you to this one lovely account, @rasalghul777 and read their take(s) on Brutalia. Here's a starting post and this one if you'd like to start. This person makes wonderful posts regarding Brutalia and the al-Ghuls as a whole than what I could ever conspire and I applaud them for it.

White savior complex

"Damian got his love for animals from [insert any BatFamily members here]"

"Damian learned to love through being with BatFam"

Again, this could also be read along with my first point, but can also be seen separately— I genuinely cannot stand when Damian was written in a way that he was a 'feral, stabby boi' prior his transgression into the BatFamily since it conveys distasteful perception of the Arabic people as a whole; them being uncultured or even uncivilized.

It's gross, I hate it, get it away from me.

Also, Damian inheriting his love for animals from anyone else other than the al-Ghuls is just pure fanon bullshit— because that means you have no perception of what the League of Assassins really are and just takes everything the fandom writes at face value; the League (including Talia and Ra's) aren't some 2-dimensional villains who kills. Reducing a villain to a mere trope just to prop up your white boy isn't going to make me like them. It just takes away the fun of it.

People just love to forget the 'eco' in 'eco-terrorist', which Ra's is.

If anything, Damian would inherit his genuine and deep love for animals and nature from him.

It's worth mentioning that the League of Assassins doesn't kill people just for the sake of violence— there's a reason why they're being categorized as eco-terrorists, and not the other category people love to associate Arabs with; they kill with reason. Similar to Poison Ivy, they specifically target any organisation that brings ruins to Earth and nature as a whole.

On another note, writing Damian as 'uncivilized' or 'feral' is just plain wrong. While it certainly can be cute, in a sort of gremlin-esque, little brother way (Lord knows how much I love my little brother, but simultaneously wanted to (subliminally) throw a chair at him) but depicting him as this one child that goes around stabbing everyone unprompted rubs me the wrong way.

This goes along with my first note, but Damian was raised as a prince when he was in the League; there were some instances where soldiers who came to pick him up refer to him as "Young prince". He has manners. He knows what to say and what to do when being confronted by the media. If anything, Damian would adapt 'Gotham's Darling Boy' facade faster than BatFam girlies mischaracterise the next POC character.

Damian does love his mother and grandfather and his family back in the League very, very much. Just because he doesn't convey it in a conventional, traditional way, doesn't mean he doesn't know how. He has his own ways of saying 'I love you's of his own.

People that clearly consume more fanon media in comparison to canon.

Tim Drake stans. Like, as a whole.

Let me begin by saying I actually do not care on how you plan to enjoy your nice little character trope, but believe me when I say that there are some weights to what's famously transpired in the fandom spaces.

It's the "fandom affects canon space" phenomenon all over again.

It should go without saying that what goes in the fandom stays in the fandom, and vice versa. Like I said before, people tend to fall back to their favourite trope— writing characters in a certain way, conveying certain messages, etc. However, in the midst of your 'creative freedom', it's easy to forget that these characters are not yours.

Fandom is derived from the canon substance, that's why it's so flexible and allows creative freedom in the first place. The consumer can decide what's canon in the fandom space (rejecting what's real), though it's important to remember that canon is still the blueprint and shouldn't be thoroughly ignored in favour of your dumb little incorrect quotes. Rejecting everything just means that you're creating an Oc, which, atp is what you should be doing instead of DTI a canon character.

It's why we got gems like these:

(I have reached tumblr maximum capacity for images, but know that there's more)

Again, do what you want, I don't care! But remember that when you're depicting certain character dynamics like these, it also affects other potential fans' views and first impressions of said character.

I don't want to go off tangent longer than necessary— but I actively avoid any variants of, "Hurt Tim Drake" tags on ao3. Mostly because mischaracterisation awaits me. The rest are because his fans are genuinely obnoxious and (more often than not) have little to no comprehension to actual canon substance.

I think that's all that I could muster up. Sorry this post is long, lol, but I got carried away.

[bwat5-blog]

Just Slapping Down Some More Attempts To Use Jinx Against Vi

**Spoilers For Arcane**

I don't want to make a whole big thing on this, because I've discussed it before as have many others. But I just saw like six or seven posts in a row parroting this weird idea that Jinx is somehow this golden standard that Vi has to live up to. I know these posts of mine sometimes draw some pretty harsh Jinx rhetoric. Let me be clear. I love this character. I think she has quite possibly the most tragic start of any of them and her battle to reclaim her soul and her mind over the course of the story is beautiful and heart wrenching. But man. Some of this stuff I read is just beyond baffling. This is NOT an anti-Jinx post. I am perhaps just too stupid to know how to address these points any other way when they are linking her specifically to other characters.

"You guys think Vi lost any sleep over the fact that Jinx honored Vander's legacy more than she ever did by becoming Zaun's hero, while Vi became as bad as Silco using gas to subdue her enemies?"

Jinx:

Integral part of Silco's operation pushing shimmer into Zaun

Attacked the council murdering three councilors bringing wrath of Piltover down

Unleashes the grey on all of Piltover indiscriminately

Lived in hiding with Isha during the occupation

Was made "The Symbol" because she was who Caitlyn was hunting and the Zaunites were desperate for something to believe in. It isn't because Jinx was a freedom fighter. The show confirmed multiple times over she did not participate before Act 2 picks back up.

Only goes to Stillwater for Isha.

Vi:

Part of team that destroys Chem-Barons (agents loyal to silco) and Shimmer (drug silco unleashed) which Ekko confirms are massive risks to Undercity

Part of team that uses the grey in strikes that are confirmed to be strategic to a pin-point per Amanda Overton.

More Like Silco?........ really?.......

2. "How do you guys think Vi felt leaving her two youngest surviving siblings behind on that bridge to fight while she ran away with her new Enforcer girlfriend?"-

Vi says goodbye as Caitlyn and Ekko crossing bridge

Marcus shoots Ekko and moves to attack Caitlyn

Jinx blows the ever loving shit out of the bridge

Vi runs back to help

Jinx wigs out and tries to kill Vi and Caitlyn

EKKO TELLS THEM TO RUN

3. Some mellow-dramatic wording with some images of little Vi protecting Powder and then angry Jinx looking at Enforcer Vi saying something like: "You used to promise to protect me from monsters. Then you became one" (wish i'd saved it).

A- Not sure she's in a position to judge:

B- Why are they going down there anyway? Of right lol I remember:

4. "Never thought my sister would turn blue belly".

This is frequently used as a "oooohhh get her Jinx" moment. Shortly followed by Jinx justifying her orphaning of children because she's orphaned herself plenty, all taking place in the venue she's chosen to die in. Perhaps We shouldn't be taking her word as gospel here? Maybe?

Honorable mention: "I busted half of zaun out of stillwater while you were passed out in the bottom of a mug!" (paraphrased)- Like I said above. Ignored the occupation until Isha needed her. And Vi was in a just sort of suicidal spiral because of everything that happened to her including Jinx' behavior among other things.

[lukolabrainrot]

Calm theory anon here.. I've been busy with life but I checked in and I want to share some thoughts I have been having. Pictures are just a moment in time. I can look at a picture and think wow this couple really looks happy and you can look at a picture and say 0h wow there is sadness in their eyes I wonder what happened. People interpret differently and that's the beauty of everybody having their own mind. So you've seen a lot of photos, right with Nicola and Luke this summer. And we've seen twice now where people have misinterpreted situations. One pate gate people assumed that Luke didn't mind the photos, and that was due to the pictures we got. Later on someone put the photos together and a different story was told. Another circumstance the Nicola and JD picture we didn't get the photos in order and what happened assumed that she was just hugging him. As More pictures dropped we seen that they were actually taking a photo together. That's two times now that we've misinterpreted a photo. And that's fine because we all say this is theory. No one knows what actively going on. Not any of these big creators on Tumblr not any of these big creators on TikTok not any of these big creators on Instagram not any of these creators on Twitter. Not one of these people actively know Luke or Nic. All they're doing is taking a set of photos and likes and assuming situations. But as we've already established, there is something called misinterpretation. so anything you see or read can be a product of misinterpretation. Guys feelings and love aren't easy things to understand. Think about the last time you were in love. I was so confused and the feelings were scary. It was the best and hardest thing I ever dealt with. But imagine someone from the outside that doesn't know you trying to understand your feelings for each other. That's just impossible. Luke and Nic are people. They are dealing with feelings most of us have never dealt with seeing as I believe they are soul mates. I truly feel they will find their way.

💯

Ok I am going to say a few things, and I know my comments are going to blow up probably, but I need to get this off my chest:

Me, and NONE of the other creators on SM, actually know L and N, or any of the people in their lives. We are all coming to our own interpretation based on PUBLICLY AVAILABLE INFORMATION. None of us have some special inside scoop into L or N's life, and no one should take our word as gospel! I share my opinions on what I am seeing, but I can't definitively say what is going on BTS, or predict the future. I think because we have a lot more questions than answers, we just want to know what is going on BTS. But we are never going to know that full story, and we have to be okay with that. We need to just let them cook, and see what happens.

I have mentioned this multiple times, but my background is in psychology and studying human behavior. I have also mentioned how ~70%-90% of human communication is non verbal. And L/N's non verbal cues speak VOLUMES and is the reason a lot of us are still here. I've talked about this a LOT on here, so feel free to scroll through my page and see my thoughts.

But it was all PR, right?? It wasn't. IMPOSSIBLE. The end.

I try to look at the FULL picture of ALL the publicly available information I have before coming to my interpretation. Yes, I have had a few little freak out moments, but I try not to fixate on a single moment in time, or a single post or interaction on SM. I try to look at everything in context of the bigger picture. And if you look at the larger picture, a lot of the information is pointing to L/N being a lot closer to getting together and going public at some point in the near future. This is my opinion though of course, and it is alright if some of you don't share my opinion.

I think a major reason I decided to start this blog is because I was having a lot of thoughts that I wanted to share around L/N and try and put a psychological lens on what might be going on BTS and what we saw during the PR tour. Another reason I started the blog though is because I have NEVER seen a connection like L/N, or seen people respond so positively to two people just interacting with each other. I am a VERY jaded person, and do not think super highly of the human species. I also have never believed in soulmates, but L/N are the closest example I have ever seen in my life. Yes I don't know them. And yes, I KNOW it sounds sappy. Trust me. I NEVER thought I would end up here today shipping two celebrities I have never met. But watching the way these two publicly interact almost felt like I had run into a unicorn or fairy in the wild. And by THAT I mean this. It is SO rare to see two people publicly show their affection and love for each other the way L/N do. Humans aren't great at it. Period. So I think we fell in love with the way they love each other (at least I know I did) because it is so rare to see, and makes us a little more hopeful. And that, and ALL the other publicly available information I have seen, is why I am firmly sat. I want to see how this movie ends, because I feel like when the PR tour ended, the movie stopped partway.

Lastly, if you do not ship Lukola, MY BLOG IS NOT FOR YOU. Also, if you find yourself spiraling over every new piece of information, this shipping space is probably not the healthiest thing for you. I feel like ultimately, shipping should be fun and not taken too seriously since we're just fans and we don't actually know these people. If you find that you are getting really stressed and not having a lot of fun anymore, it is definitely valid to take a step back. And it is fine if you have a different opinion than me or someone in the comments, BUT PLEASE BE RESPECTFUL. I am going to start blocking more people who are trolling in the comments. Ya ain't slick, people can see you 👀

[whorediaries-09]

don't blame me;

pairing- priest!remus lupin x reader warning(s)- illusions to sex, dark themes. (let me know if i should add more). [this is a dark fic. your media consumption is your choice and i'm not responsible for it. please do not continue under cut if you're uncomfortable.] a/n- i found this in my drafts. i have no idea why this wasn't published yet but okay.

ps- not using my regular taglist since this is a topic many people can be uncomfortable with.

little train inspiration (for god's sake please use headphones) 700 followers celebration post.

' and baby, for you, i would fall from grace, just to touch your face. '

remus slowly read the verse, the thick spine of the bible tucking into the flesh of his thighs.

'amen,' he said, speaking his final lines of the verse. the sound from his lips was blinded over the noise of the hinges of the church door opening. he snapped his head, eyes darting towards the entrance. the soft sunlight peaked through the glass, creating a beautiful kaleidoscopic effect.

'hello?' his voice echoed through the empty church. when his eyes met yours, he couldn't stop but dawn his eyes upon yours. you were clad in the white clothes you regularly wore when you went to the church. but there was something different around it. perhaps an extra sinch at the waist which highlighted the curve of your breasts. or was it the sunlight behind you making a halo like effect which made you look like an descending from heaven.

'oh, it's you,' he gathered, his fingers raking over the bible, closing the hardcover. 'come on in, then,'

'am i interrupting anything?' you asked. your voice was soft, like cool breeze blowing after the first rainfall. he chuckled.

'no, no you're not interrupting anything,' his statement ended, clashed with the sound of the door closing. you walked towards him, twiddling with your thumbs, your eyes transfixed on the statue of jesus.

'do you need something? i can leave you in peace if you prefer.' he said, standing up and dusting his clothes. he wasn't wearing his usual robes. he had opted for gray slacks paired with a soft blue shirt.

'no it's fine,' you walked towards him. 'i actually like some company, when i pray,' he smiled, his gaze smoothening down on your form.

'no no, i understand,' he said walking towards you, his thumb raking over the rosemary beads in his palm. 'lots of people prefer company in the church. physical company anyway. he,' his index pointed towards the stature of jesus, 'is always here.'

'a constant companion,' you said, recalling his words from a few months ago. 'i remember that. you enlightened me with that information during our gospel interpretation session.' he chuckled softly,

'i'm surprised you remember i said that. that was quite a few months ago,' you nodded, twisting your fingers together.

'speaking of which,' he whispered, so as to not let his voice echo. 'erm, you have been missing for a few weeks.' you stare at him, your eyes glossy.

'are you mad? that i've been missing?' he moves forward, waving his hands quickly reassuring,

'no no, not mad at all. i just,' he pauses, as if choosing his words carefully, 'missed your presence. and our discussions afterwards.' you let his words register into your senses. it's quiet as the sun settles, the blue hue of the sky meddling into a beautiful orange.

'there are other people who come to the church, mr. lupin.' he takes a deep breathe. it's serene, the way his name spills off your tongue.

'yes, but it gets quite boring with the same old people and the same old interpretations. you're intelligent...you're curious. i enjoy your fresh air of understanding.'

'you don't mean that.' you laugh. he sighs, letting his tongue dart over his teeth.

'oh no, i mean that,' he twiddles with his thumb, running his fingers through his locks with his other hand. he rubs his neck, drawing your attention to a small patch of ink on his neck.

'may i ask you the reason of your absence? it's none of my business of course,' his stale amber eyes pierce into you, as if trying to scan for answers.

'i got a few days off work. so i wanted to go on a little vacation.' you say.

'oh, i see, i'm glad you're out there having some fun. i'd do the same in your position. especially with the weather we've been having recently,' he emphasizes. his eyes wander about, as if searching for words, looking for phrases to let the conversation continue. 'i understand your need for freedom.'

you let the words hang in the air, tasting the freshness of the newly spoken sentences. you watch his nicely polished shoes, before you bite your tongue, meeting his eyes, allowing yourself to drown in the burnt amber color of them.

'do you mind it? the freedom? the fun?' he stands silent, as if speechless. it was extremely difficult to keep a man like remus lupin dumbfoundedly silent.

'no,' he says, 'i don't particularly mind it. i've...dedicated my life to this... this is my calling.' he laughs a little, a bark like laughter echoing through the walls. 'besides, i live my life through hearing your escapades.'

'i think you should live life a little. i'm saying this because i consider you my friend.'

'you do?' he says, softly biting his beautiful pink lips. 'well i consider you a friend too.' you nod.

'not many, erm, consider me other than someone who's a priest or think of any... friendly interactions, so... i appreciate that very much.'

you twiddle with your thumb, tucking a stray strand of hair behind your ear. your mind floods with screams as you think of the next question you want to ask him. your heart thumps loudly in your chest, the heat of the blood curving through every inch of your body.

'can i ask you a question?'

'of course, you can ask me anything.'

'have you kissed anyone before?' it's vague, short yet straight forward. a slight pink tint overcomes his pale skin, his tongue tying up in knots before he processes his answer.

'oh, i- yes. i have kissed people before.' he licks his lips. 'though, in secret. we're not...uh meant to have relationships but... everybody needs company...sometimes.' you hum softly at his answer, minutely surprised at the lack of a reaction. then, you frame your next question, almost like a child so free of sin. you are, if partly so.

'do you consider it a bad thing mr. lupin?'

'no,' he laughs. 'i don't consider it a bad thing. i enjoy your curiosity.' he moves forward, a few painful inches away from you. it's as if he can feel the heat from your body. he enjoys it. 'and, neither do i think you're going to tell on me or anything, but yes, i have had companies of a different nature, too.'

the gasp ends in your throat. it's as if he reads your mind.

'i'm not such an extremist that i condemn that kind of thing. carnal desires are...human. the lord created us with them. so why should we deny ourselves?'

'isn't it wrong? a sin? perhaps you... don't mean it.' you say.

'no, i do mean it. to want intimacy is such an intricately human thing it isn't...wrong to want it or engage in it.'

'i've wanted intimacy, desired for it. for so long, mr. lupin, but i find myself stranded. because nobody expresses it back. perhaps you can tell me how it feels, with your experience of the humane carnal desire for intimacy,'

'oh.. well we've established that we're friends but... is that really something you should be asking a priest? you're a curious little thing aren't you?' you smile paired with a little nod of your head. you truly are curious.

'well,' he pauses, looking into your eyes, trying to search for something. 'if you must know, i haven't had any complaints. i've been told i give a rather...satisfactory performance.' he laughs. 'but, it has been quite some time.'

'oh. how long?'

'almost eight months so uh..nearly about a year, roughly,' he whispers, as you move closer. you're close enough for his warm breath fan over you, letting goosebumps kiss your skin.

'i think... i'll also be a satisfactory performer in bed,' you say. he laughs his eyebrow tilting.

'oh you think you are? your confidence is very cute.' he says, moving closer. you watch his pupils dilate, as the distance decreases between your bodies. something takes over him, as his breathing turns erratic, his heart palpitating. 'although,' he continues, 'the matter of one's performance in bed is highly subjective.'

'i can show you, the performance. i want to feel the intimacy, how it feels to be wanted, mr. lupin.' you say, almost begging. his hands twitch and your body aches for the touch of someone you've never felt before.

'i guess i'm sure you would like to find out, but...we shouldn't... we really shouldn't,' he feels his nerves turning shoddy as tries to not drown into the depth of your eyes. he says it, trying to convince himself more than you. but how can he when you look so pretty, like dew strewn across fresh grass. you jut out your lower lip.

'don't you find me pretty mr. lupin?' his eyes widen, his palm cradling your cheek. his thumb runs over your cheek and he enjoys the warm flush of your skin upon his touch, the goosebumps on your kissing every inch of your body.

'no, you are very beautiful. i mean it. apart from your intelligence, your beautiful mind is what...drew me to you.' he watches you melt into his touch and words and knits his eyebrows. 'but, we can't, we really can't, someone could just walk in.'

perhaps that's what excites you. the idea of someone walking in, the idea of somebody catching you. perhaps it's the sin that excites you.

'please,' you beg, your eyes glossy with an unsatiated lust, the carnal desire for intimacy, for his touch. 'please, remus, i need to know.' he takes a deep breathe, as the warm blood rushes between his legs.

he grabs your face, touching his temple with yours. 'fuck it,' he whispers, capturing his lips with yours. he's the priest, he needs to enlighten you with the knowledge you beg for, the experience you beg for.

perhaps it's sinful, but when his tongue meets yours, swallowing the sounds from your mouth, there's no sweeter innocence than his gentle sin. he'll be a poison ivy just for you, just to worship you at the shrine of his sins.

[jadeddangel]

Could you do some head cannons for Sundrop, Moondrop and eclipse x handler and general technician reader (preferably trans masc reader but GN is fine too)

OF COURSE NEW FRIEND!!

The drops with a Trans-Masc handler

Art is not mine

Sundrop:

As soon as you meet him he's immediately asking your Pronouns and what you wanna be addressed as

He made you a little pin with your Pronouns and preferred name

He gives you little pictures of him and the other drops that you can cut away from the paper and put in the back of a clear phone case

He gets jealous, like super easy

Oh? Your giving a kid a talk about not bullying? He's behind you waiting for you to be free

He purposefully gets dirty just so you wash him

He tries to convince you to stay in the daycare over night

Literally just a whiny baby

He crouched down when he talks to you since he's almost 10 ft tall (a little over 3 meters)

If you don't give him attention when he wants it and your in the daycare alone, he will bite you

Not even sexually just bite you to get your attention

"Oh Mr. Attendent?! Mr.attendent?" Sun called out trying to get your attention.

Your music was in your headphones and was so loud you couldn't hear him.

Next thing you know you feel teeth pinch into your arm, not hard enough to draw blood but it still hurt

"OW SUN WHAT THE FU -" "No cussing in the daycare!" Sun cut you off happily before shoving a drawing in your face "anyway! Look what I drew!!"

Yeaaaa, there was a reason your pay was so high

Moondrop:

Tried to get you to join nap time the first time he met yoy but quickly adapted to leaving you out of it

If your wearing a binder he insists you take a break with it off during naptime

He mostly just sits quietly while you do what your doing

If your drawing his eyes make the perfect light that won't wake the kids up

He doesn't really care if you cuss while the children are asleep as long as you keep your voice down

Tends to look over your shoulder when your on your phone

He doesn't struggle to get your attention since all he has to do is close his eyes and it's noticeable

Moon sighed shaking his head before closing his glowing red eyes.

You pouted "Moon I was coloring. What do you need?" You asked quietly

Moon opened his eyes. " Nap time is ending soon if you want to put your binder on," Moon reminded

Overall as long as you behave he behaves

Eclipse:

Knew all about you from what sun and moon had told him

He likes to wander around the pizza plex with you after hours

He's over 16ft don't ask me how, just take my word as gospel

He only lets you cuss if you hurt yourself if you just cuss freely he may let it go once or twice but if it gets repetitive he gives you a warning

It's not a nice warning either

"Oh dear friend, it seems like you can't keep the cussing under wraps, and although it is after hours and we are not in the daycare, remember, your words matter, and they will get you hurt if you don't stop ..... anyway!"

Be scared shitless if this man threatens you

He'll act like the warning never happened as long as you behave

But if you don't, well, I hope you have life insurance

[funishment-time]

🔵 Kodaka BlueSky Q&As: Misc DR & Multiple Characters

⚠️ DISCLAIMER: Please be advised! Translations of all Japanese answers derive from a combination of Google Translate and my manager's three-quarters-remembered Japanese. We've tried our best to work out what he's saying, but there will be mistakes here and there. Do not take this as gospel!

To avoid spreading too much misinfo, where we're completely boggled about an answer, we've decided not to even make an attempt. We'll still list the post, but mark it accordingly.

➡️ AN IMPORTANT NOTE FROM KODAKA BEFORE READING:

First of all, the questions answered here are not official. Everything that is official is what is said within the work. In contrast, this is simply what Kodaka, the creator, thinks, and it is not the correct answer. Use this as a starting point to enjoy the depth of each character, or to say, "That's not right!" and enjoy it with your own interpretation. I think of this as a way of communicating with the characters who live in fiction. This is important, so please spread the word.

💕 FEBRUARY 2024:

Q: Out of all the characters that have appeared so far, who is your favorite visually?

A: As a fan, Haruko from FLCL. Among my own creations...hmmm, Monokubs lol and Enoshima.

/////

Q: Sorry if this has already been said! I saw a tweet saying that Fukawa Toko's novel "Before the Scent of the Sea Disappears" was made into a short film by Kodaka Kazutaka! Is there anywhere I can see it?

A: I don't have it..! I have the data on my PC, but…lol

/////

Q: Are you interested in making games in the world of Ultimate Talent Development Plan? I would like to see all the characters together. (Sorry my Japanese is not very good. I am using a translator.)

A: It's too early to tell. I'll continue to make more and more characters.

/////

Q: I love Ultra Despair Girls, but it's sad that so few people are playing it 😢 Are there plans for a port or remake for the Switch?

A: It's an absolute masterpiece! I'm proud to say that it has the heaviest storyline I've ever written, and the friendship at the end will have you in tears. And it's also pretty fun to take down all the Monokumas in one fell swoop. The controls are a bit rough in some areas, so I'd like to tweak them and re-release it. But maybe that last possibility is impossible in today's world...

/////

Q: What is your favorite chapter in the Danganronpa series?

A: Hmm, Chapters 1 and 6 of 1, and Chapters 5 and 6 of 2. Maybe Chapters 1, 5 and 6 of 3.

/////

Q: I love Danganronpa Zero, and I'd like to ask if there were any particular things that you were thinking about when you were writing it.

A: At the time, it was my first novel in about five years, and although I said "I'll do it" lightly, I wasn't good at writing the narrative, and after pushing myself into scrapping it many times, I finally managed to get it done by writing the narrative from the protagonist's point of view.

/////

Q: I got hooked on the Danganronpa series when I was in elementary school and am now a working adult!! Danganronpa is my favorite work of all time! Of course I played Rain Code too!! I love how Shinigami-chan grows and becomes more human as the story progresses! I wonder if a sequel to Danganronpa is really possible...? I'm also waiting for a sequel to Rain Code I'll keep waiting until I die! I love you!

A: From elementary school to working adult…! Thanks to Danganronpa, you've become a fine adult! Neither sequel is impossible. I'd like to expand more, get results from other new works, and make myself more valuable, and do it when it's best for me.

/////

Q: Are there any characters that have a secret backstory in any of the Danganronpa works?

A: For the most part, there are still stories that we haven't talked about.

/////

Q: This may be a question that can't be answered (it may have been asked already), but in the bad ending of Danganronpa, Togami holds a portrait of Fukawa, and there is a child of Togami? Will the truth about that ever come to light?!

A: With the loss of Kirigiri, and the decision to live together within the school, everyone had a change of heart and decided to join hands. Fukawa stopped belittling herself, and Togami stopped being arrogant, and the two started dating, but the next day Fukawa died in an accident. She died after choking on a dumpling, and Togami was confused, believing it was a curse from Celes. As Asahina comforted the depressed boy, things just sort of happened and Togami's child was born. Asahina loves children, and decided that this was her mission and she would give birth to everyone's children. And since that was all there was to do in the boring school life, everyone did it a lot. After that, she gave birth to more than 10 children, and the school flourished.

NOTE: This is the worst thing I have ever read.

/////

Q: I can't help but wonder about the night that Asahina, Hagakure, Togami, and Fukawa spent in the gym in Chapter 5 of Danganronpa. What were they doing that night?

A: I think they were standing in the dark gymnasium, each at one of the four corners, going around tapping the shoulder of the next person in the corner...

/////

Q: The "motivation video" that appeared in V3 featured someone important to each character, but it wasn't revealed who was in the motivation video for the characters in the main story. Did you have a set idea in mind of "this character is this person", Mr. Kodaka? Some characters talk about family or special people in Free Time scenarios, but there are also some characters who don't talk about such things, so I'm curious.

A: I had it set at the time, but I've forgotten about it...

NOTE: ugh

/////

Q: What's your favorite romantic pairing in danganronpa?

A: Monomi and Monokuma.

/////

Q: I love the scene in Chapter 6 of the original Danganronpa where the mastermind and the scissors girl (I will not reveal her name for now) meet and politely greet each other. Mr. Kodaka, are there any funny or gag scenes from the Danganronpa series or Rain Code that you like?

A: There are heaps of gag scenes and funny scenes, but when I first saw Monokuma and Monomi's comedy routine in 2 with their lines incorporated, I felt something otherworldly that I'd never heard before. We record out of order, so after incorporating it with the game, I was surprised at how otherworldly it was.

/////

Q: I would like you to publish profiles of Danganronpa Zero characters! Please do so!

A: Let's ask Spikechun! Spikechun reserves all rights! Let's all protest and demand that these profiles be made public!

/////

Q: In the summary of the materials for Danganronpa 1, there was a detailed description of the non-killers' punishments, but I wonder if those will ever be made into a movie...? I've been dying to see it 🥲

A: It's not exactly a good idea to capture people dying on film…

/////

Q: Who is the most popular character in Danganronpa? I would be happy if you could tell me one male and one female!

A: My personal opinion is... For guys, it's Shinguji. There are girls who are attracted to weird guys like that. For girls, it's Iruma. There are boys who are attracted to weird girls like that.

NOTE: I believe this is IRL, not in-universe, as Kodaka later answers who has the most friends in-universe, and it's not Miu or Kork.

🍀 MARCH 2024:

Q: Excuse me for asking a question! Who is the strongest drinker among Munakata, Yukizome, and Sakakura? 🥹

A: It's probably Yukizome.

/////

Q: Among the BGM used in the original, 2, and V3, is there any that you particularly like, Mr. Kodaka? I absolutely love New World Order from the original, DANGANRONPA SUPER MIX from 2, and V3 Discussion - SCRUM - from V3!

A: The punishment music was created first, and it created a Danganronpa atmosphere, or rather a playful yet serious atmosphere, so it has a deeply cryptic vibe.

/////

Q: I bought Danganronpa again on Steam and had my ex-girlfriend play the whole series, and she got hooked. This may be mentioned in other media, but are there any characters who weren't meant to die but ended up dying?

A: While I was writing, some roles were switched, but I don't think there were many changes to the plot. I think it was Nidai and Kuzuryu who switched roles...

NOTE: His memory is correct. Beta designs show a Fuyuhiko-like character who was meant to the the team manager, and a mafia guy who was a big Nekomaru-ish dude.

/////

Q: In the Danganronpa series, you get underwear when your bond with a character reaches its maximum, but whose underwear do you like the most, Kodaka?

A: Personally, I'm not interested in underwear. They're dirty.

/////

Q: I know you didn't write or supervise Danganronpa S at all, Kodaka, but have you played it since its release? And if you did, were there any event conversations that you particularly liked?

A: [From @/genoskissors: "エアプ is slang meaning he knows about the games content, but has not played it himself." Thank you for the correction!]

/////

Q: [A longer question, found here, that comes down to: "i'm curious how your writing with your world evolved in ways you may not have had planed..."]

A: The scenario changes a lot when I write it. It is live. Try writing it, move the characters around, and it keeps changing. Because the characters are alive.

/////

Q: Yamada and Celes seem to have been quite close during their school days, but how did they end up like that?

A: "I've gotten better at making royal milk tea."

NOTE: This is probably Hifumi talking.

🥬 APRIL 2024:

Q: Will you ever make a V3 animation? That could be so cool I’d love to see it so much.

A: That is a matter for Spike Chunsoft to decide.

/////

Q: Who is the character with the most friends in each of the Danganronpa games: the original, 2, and V3?

A: I guess Yamada, Koizumi, and Angie. I'm not sure if I can call Angie a friend, though.

/////

Q: Chabashira Tenko and I have the same birthday and blood type, so I'd like to know how a character's birthday and blood type are decided. I'm currently studying Japanese.

A: It's decided by fate.

/////

Q: Tired of answering questions about Danganronpa?

A: I'm not bored. I love Danganronpa. However, I may forget some things, so I don't want to answer carelessly.

🌺 MAY 2024:

Q: I think Harukawa-chan had romantic feelings for Momota-kun, but did Momota-kun see Harukawa-chan as a romantic interest? Or did he just see her as one of his "students," like Saihara-kun?

A: "I didn't realize it at the time, so I wasn't even conscious of it. If I had realized it sooner, things might have been different..."

NOTE: This is probably Kaito talking.

☀️ JUNE 2024:

Q: I feel like there weren't any characters in the original Danganronpa who were definitely able to cook, so who was cooking at breakfast and the like? I'd also like to know if there were any characters who could cook in the original!

A: I think they basically just used pre-cooked food, but I think Fujisaki and Yamada seem like they can cook.

/////

Q: How did you decide the seating order for the class trial?

A: Intentionally in random order so as not to create any patterns.

/////

Q: Are there any characters in 1, 2, and V3 who are not virgins? Sorry for the really vulgar question.

A: A rough estimate is a quarter.

/////

Q: Is it decided how old the characters in works such as Danganronpa and Raincode are? If so, how old are they?

A: Of course, Danganronpa is mostly in their teens. Raincode has a wide range, but even Yakou is in his 30s.

NOTE: This is kind-of hilarious, because I'm pretty sure it's canonically stated Yakou is actually in his late 20s...in something that Kodaka himself wrote. I'll have to go find evidence.

/////

Q: I'd like to know the recommended menu items at Hanamura Diner!

A: Fresh tonkatsu.

NOTE: Tonkatsu is a fried pork cutlet.

/////

Q: Were the Love Hotel scenes also supervised by Kodaka-san? When Ouma says that he doesn't care what Saihara does to him, is that what he says to make it possible for him to have anyone in that space under his control?

A: I did supervise it. But I left that to people who are good at that sort of thing and refrained from interfering too much, and I still refrain from doing so now.

/////

Q: Is there any trick to Tanaka Gundham's chuunibyou dialogue? I'm curious to know how you think of the unique expressions used by Saionji Hiyoko and Iruma Miu.

A: The insults come out super easily, but Tanaka's lines were thought out thoroughly, based on the light novels I've read, so it's exhausting.

NOTE: A "chuunibyou" is a kid, generally 12-13, who believes they have secret powers or a grand backstory. Gundham's a bit old to be a chuuni by Kodaka's own admission in the DR2 artbook, but that was apparently part of the charm (and why it was so difficult to write him). It's spiritual Naruto running.

🎇 JULY 2024:

Q: I'd like to know what underwear your favorite Danganronpa character wears, Kodaka-san.

A: Monomi's panties. Diapers.

NOTE: This is how rumors get started, Kaz...

/////

Q: Do Rain Code and Danganronpa take place in the same world? Do any of your games and works have a shared universe with another? Or are they all separate? 🤔 💭 I'm asking because I just had a dream about Rain Code today!

A: I won't make a clear statement. I am not sure what will happen in the future. Anyway, please spread the Rain Code around the world.

/////

Q: If Hope's Peak Academy had regular exams, who would have the best overall grades?

A: It would have to be Togami. Kirigiri has clear strengths and weaknesses and doesn't seem like she'd be good at things like art. However, when it comes to multiple choice questions, Komaeda who relies on luck is the strongest, Ouma steals the answers in advance, and Ki-Bo tries hard and is average, but is bad at calculations.

🌭 AUG 2024:

Q: when i played danganronpa there were times where i wondered about how some characters got along with their family, have you written/thought anything about a character's family background that isn't mentioned in the video games?even if it's something small i feel like it would be interesting to read

A: I think, but the fact that I did not put it in writing means that I left it to the player's imagination.

/////

Q: If Sonia and Fubuki met, who would take the initiative in the conversation?

A: Even though they don't match up at all, they seem like they'd get along really well.

NOTE: Fubuki from Rain Code.

/////

Q: When all the Danganronpa characters are gathered together, who do you think has the most aura?

A: It must be Ogami. I think everyone would look at her first.

/////

Q: Thank you so much for making "Danganronpa"!! 😊💓💓 Many fans have a special feeling for the relationship between Komaeda Nagito and Hinata Hajime. Is there a possibility that the two will become lovers in the future?

A: I have no plans to create anything that takes place after Danganronpa 3.

🍁 SEPT 2024:

Q: Are there many undiscovered super-high school level talents outside of Japan?

A: You could make a Danganronpa World War. 150 students are locked in a school, about 10 incidents occur at the same time, class trials are held here and there, and punishments are handed out one after another.

/////

Q: Are you afraid of bugs, Soda? I'd like to know who among two people can stand bugs and who doesn't like them!

A: Soda is not good with insects that suddenly appear, fly, or move suddenly. Sonia is fine with insects.

/////

Q: I would like to know Ouma's first words and reaction upon seeing an armed Keebo-kun!

A: “This isn’t like you!”

🎃 OCT 2024:

Q: Hello, Kodaka-san. You're probably tired of questions about the sexual orientation of characters. Komaeda in particular is one of the most talked about characters when it comes to this topic. It's actually a little sad that the fandom cares more about what gender a character is attracted to than who they actually are. This may be weird to ask after writing this much, but I want to ask out of pure curiosity: what do you think about couples in Danganronpa? I don't think any couples have ever actually been confirmed, is that intentional? There's been a lot of discussion about that topic, so I just wanted to know.

A: Like the Asahina ending in Danganronpa, there's the possibility that different people could become couples with different people. That's what makes it interesting.

/////

Q: Will the V3 characters be made into anime someday?

A: I'm not getting any offers...! I'm sure there are a fair number of people who would watch it...!

🦃 NOV 2024:

Q: I really want to see a world where Danganronpa Kirigiri is made into an anime or manga...

A: I want to see it too...!

/////

Q: Will Danganronpa 2 be made into an anime? This is something I've always wanted to see

A: I want to see it too...! I want it to be made without my involvement...!

/////

Q: A question about V3. I've heard a lot of speculation that in V3, the conclusions reached as a result of trials other than Chapter 1 are different (there is fraud on the part of the mastermind), but are there any chapters other than Chapter 1 where something different from the truth is said to be the truth?

A: It might all be a lie

NOTE: The question here might be a bit hard to understand, but it's basically asking if all of V3's culprits were actually culprits. A very peculiar answer.

/////

Q: I'd like to see a remake of the original Danganronpa with added theories and scrum debates, or a despair arc (school days)! I'd like to see it while the voice actors are still in good health.

A: That's true. But it's boring if it's just a remake. I would do it more like this...

NOTE: Don't quote me, but I believe "this" is what the question asks, i.e. he'd remake the game with added stuff.

/////

Q: Hello! What are Kuzuryu-kun and Peko-chan's best and worst subjects? I can't help but wonder!

A: Peko is good at everything. Kuzuryu is bad at a lot of things.

/////

Q: Why was the island in SDR2 named "Jabberwock Island"? I can't think of any other elements from Alice in Wonderland...

A: Yes, that's what inspired me to use the name metaphorically.

🎄 DEC 2024:

Q: What do you eat to come up with a character like Komaeda?

A: Meat buns in Kanai Ward

/////

Q: I think V3's punishments are similar to the original punishments, including the unused punishments, in many ways, but were you aware of that?

A: I think the second game wasn't that cruel, or rather it was mostly on the lighter side, so I wanted to make this one cruel.

/////

Q: Although they are both super high school level detectives, what is the difference between Kirigiri-san and Saihara-kun? 

A: Kirigiri is a better detective in terms of career, talent, and family history. 

/////

Q: Are there any good rappers among the characters? If so, who would it be? 

A: Hagakure or Kuwata or Soda or Ouma 

/////

Q: Mr Kodaka, In response to your question on Twitter, I would like to ask. Who have you considered as candidates to be your successor for Danganronpa? Back in 2020, you mentioned Uchikoshi might be a good candidate for being the creative director for Danganronpa. Taro? Hino? Takumi? Hashino? Kamitani?

A: It's a story about young people, so young people are good.

/////

Q: Do you remember that pot of aphrodisiac soup from Despair Arc? How would other characters react if they drank it? 

A: I want to make that doujin game and earn money.

NOTE: A "doujin game" being a kind of fan game. Basically, he's joking that the aphrodisiac soup with other classes is kind of a fan smut idea...but he'd still do it for the money. One way to get TooKyo out of debt, I suppose...

/////

Q: How did the trick in Chapter 5 of SDR2 come about that left many players in despair?

A: Famously, after months of having the planner in charge of the project come up with many ideas, and then losing them all over the place, he suddenly came up with the idea. It was built on his despair.

NOTE: This is another weird one that's hard to translate, but I think he's referring to himself as "the planner in charge of the project," so he's saying that he went through hell trying to figure out how to kill Komaeda.

/////

Q: Are there any characters in Danganronpa who believe in Santa? 

A: Souda, Gonta

[spiderrmax]

SHIT IM SO sorry LMFAO 🌼 20 kyle broflovski pleasee💀💀💀🙏

🌼 20: clumsy attempts at flirting

word count: 640 author's note: LMAO you are so good nonny!! just wanted to get what you wanted :) i also wrote a small drabble based on your original ask (rivals to lovers) & tried to incorporate the trope here but it was not working also kyle is the only one clumsily flirting. he's the best representation of hopeless romantic but no game there is.

Kyle hates the feeling of having a crush. Knows from his adolescence that his romantic endeavors seemed doomed from the start. He is also aware of Cartman’s never ending enjoyment in ruining his life, and knows that these things are more likely to crash and burn.

Even so, you are always on his mind. With how you wait for him to tie his shoes, ask about his family, seem to care about his religion. Your interactions have a softness he isn’t familiar with, everyone around him seemingly made out of harsh edges. He doesn’t want to lose you, can already feel the way you are starting to erode his jagged walls.

Kyle only went to Kenny with his dilemma, aware of his promising history with romance, even if Kenny is driven more by lust. He was his best shot.

(“Just be yourself, but more confident. Like, lean up against a wall. You’re tall, they’ll like that. You don’t give yourself enough credit.”)

Kenny’s advice is all that rings in Kyle’s mind as he finds you in the hall. The last bell just rang, and you will be at your locker. Luckily, it seems to just be you who needs to be grabbing books, which gives Kyle ample space to follow Kenny’s gospel.

Leaning against the locker is horrendously awkward, one of the hinges digging into his shoulder. He feels stupid, but doesn’t have a chance to straighten out because you are shutting your locker door and closing the one thing separating the two of you.

You jump, startled by his presence, but that fear alleviates when you notice who it is. “Oh! Hi Kyle. Do you need something?” 

(“You could try a pick up line. But I don’t think you’re smooth enough. Maybe ask them for coffee. A study date is horrendously boring but could work for you.”)

“Are you free this afternoon?” It takes him a moment to reply, trying to stop the words from getting stuck in his throat. He doesn’t understand how you can look so beautiful even after getting up at 6 in the morning and being inside of this school for 8 hours. It makes it hard to think, when you look like that.

You pause to think, holding your few books close to you. “Yeah! I was just going to do some assignments due later this week. Why? Do you need something?”

Kyle wonders if you can see the blush on his face; he can feel it. “Uh. No. I mean, yeah. I just…” His voice trails off, and he fumbles a bit around as he stands straight up, feeling more like himself without the attempt to replicate Kenny’s cool persona. 

“Do you want to get coffee with me?” He finally asks, and he can’t breathe until you respond.

“Aw, Kyle, I’d love too,” You start, and he tries to get ready for the familiar taste of rejection, “But I don't have my wallet with me.”

His shoulders sag, and he can’t believe he was that tensed up. He lets out a deep breath, not rejected. Of course you’d feel bad for not having money, and would want to pay even though he asked you.

“I don’t mind paying,” Kyle smiles, and he should thank Kenny later for the coffee date suggestion. 

You grin even brighter and nod, “If you’re sure. I’ll just pay for the next date.” After that you begin walking to the parking lot, laughing as you hear him stutter a response and jog to catch up with you. Ever the gentleman, he offers to take your books. You let him, knowing how much the small gesture probably means to him. 

If his hands weren’t full, you’d probably be holding his hand, warm and presumably sweaty from anxious he was. It wouldn’t matter, and there will always be a next time.

[idylls-of-the-divine-romance]

The Garden of Gethsemane. (The place where Jesus wept?) Any thoughts? I like the way you explain things.

Hi Anonie <333. I am glad to hear that and glad to discuss this part of the narrative. This... will not be like the other ones I've done. First, because there are 4 accounts instead of 1. Second, because I am in the Agony in the Garden as I write this.

Jesus has just gotten done with an incredibly intimate moment. He has eaten with and attempted to comfort his disciples. John lays on him, listens to his heartbeat. Judas consumed him, despite what's going to happen. They sing the Passover hymns (which are absolutely amazing as a literary whole by the way). He tries to explain to his friends that he's about to die, that a New Exodus is coming and the Firstborn Death will be his own. But they love him (too much and not enough) to understand. They distract themselves by arguing about who will be the greatest. Not knowing that to live a king is to die a slave.

He takes his closest friends, John, Jacob, and Peter, and brings them to a garden. Asks them to stay awake. He's at his most vulnerable so he quotes a psalm. 42-43. A psalm of lament and exile. But they still don't get it. He's the Suffering Servant. The "one from whom men turn their faces."

Right now for me, I'm reveling in the hypostatic union of it. I rebel fiercely against the impassibility of God (the idea that God does not have emotions like ours). My God is omnipassionate. Crying in the garden. Asking. Begging. That the wrath of Babylon- "the cup" in Jeremiah, the Gospel Accounts, and the Revelation are the same - is not forced down his throat. Three times he prays this in Matthew's account. Quoting from his own Sermon on the Mount ("not my desire, but yours be done"). Each time realizing more and more that this is really happening.

"My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me; yet not as I will, but as You will."

"My Father, if this cup cannot pass away unless I drink from it, Your will be done."

And He left them again, and went away and prayed a third time, saying the same thing once more.

But nonetheless, God suffers alone. His disciples, despite their denials, know what is coming and so they sleep off their depression. With no one but himself to comfort him. Sure messengers come from the skies to strengthen him. But to strengthen him to do what? To die. And so he sweats blood, knowing that he must drink Rome and that he will fall.

I have a great disdain for exegesis that tries to eliminate the passion of the Passion, the agony of the Agony. The attempt to eliminate the pain of Our Lord because it is hard to look at. It is shameful. Humiliating. Look at our God. Lamenting. Crying. Begging. But this is him, and we cannot look away. To look away is to shrink back from death. It is apostasy.

But after that agony, he is composed. He knows there is work to do. That "the one who is betraying me" - why is that phrase in present tense? Has he not already done it? - "is near." That this hour "belongs to yall and the powers of darkness". Judas - his brother and his friend - kisses him. Almost brings him to tears. "Are you betraying the Son of Adam with a kiss?"

With that single moment - a moment that would change the course of history - the fires of gehenna begin to break loose against Our Lord. Swords are out on both sides. Peter cuts of the ear of a slave. Jesus rebukes him (and all the other soldiers with swords and all in the future who will ever bear an arm) and heals the slaves ear: "those who find life by the sword, will find death by the sword."

He questions them: "Why are you so scared? Have I ever taken up arms against you? Am I a rebel, that you come at me with swords and clubs? I was with you every day in the House of God, and yet you did not try to arrest me then?" There is a sense of betrayal in these words. Shock. Sadness. Anger. Despite their hatred of Rome, they have given themselves over to the exact same spiritual evil that the empire has.

It on gets worse as all the disciples flee.

And then at his arrest, it is only the women and John his Beloved who are with him.

Because at the end of the day, as it was in the Garden of Eden, so it is the Garden of Gethsemane: our God must suffer. Alone.

And yet.... I suffer with him. Crying with him. Asking our Father not to abandon us. Asking him to save us from Babylon. Asking that his desire be done. Asking our beloved's to care for our mother. God suffers alone, and yet he refuses to do so. And the gospel accounts include his agony and passion so that we might suffer and die alongside him. Pledging our lenience to the God of Loyal Love and Covenant Faithfulness, who has power over Life and Death.

May the favor of our God and Lord Jesus the Anointed One be with us, so that we might have the strength to not shrink back from death.

[roxannepolice]

Interpreting the drums/the Master's a cat - Schrodinger's cat in fact/I still have administrative stuff to do and hate it/also still fear my supervisors won't greenlight the thesis/also a pill just came up my nose wtf????

The Master's drumbeat seems to be one of those things the fandom either loves or hates, with main criticisms being of the "it messes up the canon" kind and/or viewing them as either a "woobification" of the Master or generally "taking away" from their villainy. Now, I clearly fall more into the first group, but I also think that even when the idea is embraced, the interpretation is sometimes wanting. That is not to say there is only one correct interpretation - in what follows it'll be clear they're above all a metaphor and those are ambiguous - but, as the title suggests, between still being a nervous wreck and POSSIBLE NEAR DRY DROWNING WTF I LITERALLY THOUGHT I WAS DYING FOR A MOMENT, here cometh another rant.

When it comes to the canon/lore issues, well, I keep saying I accept the writers playing fast and loose when it comes to a text as huge as DW. It's just straight up impossible to either demand of the audience to know the whole lore or of the writers to stiffly hold onto it. All I ask is the writer establishing just which parts of the universe are to be kept in mind, and which aren't in the current context. Buuut, if we really want to go the purist way, I'd say the loophole lies in subjective vs. objective timeflow, ie. the Master did have the drums all along during classic who, they were just never brought up, but no it's not the case the Doctor was just too insensitive in not hearing them, because the Master was a node between the timeline where the drums were already physically implanted in their head and the timeline where that hasn't happened yet. Basically, the Master's the cat in the box and the drums both are and aren't there until observed during the time war, while the Doctor is an animal rights activist that can only watch and complain but doesn't know the determined state of the cat either.

This cat turned out Alive, Dead and Bloody Furious, as Pratchett would put it, all the same time

And if you still really need to reconcile the subject never being brought up in classic who, there's my nuwho Masters = the Master + the War Chief hybrid theory, which I'm frankly appalled isn't getting due recognition it's pure crack tbc.

Also to clarify, I am not saying RTD is just this absolute genius who even brought the world's favourite thought experiment into his slash, I am always operating in the work's intent paradigm, ie not trying to figure out what the author had in mind, only what the text ended up saying, intentionally or not. Again, personally, I just don't care about canonicity and enjoy a bit of overconcluted reconciling like a riddle. But I'm bringing this up here because it neatly ties into a more major issue I have with RTD's writing of the Master: equating psychopathy with insanity and psychosis, which I think is most of the idea that the drums were somehow intended as an excuse for their villainy comes from. And yes, they're certainly framed as the reason behind it, but I don't agree they're framed as an excuse. And the problem lies in the general conflation of the word "psychopath" with "insane", which the text does nothing to correct.

This conflation resulted in an interpretation of the Master's villainy stemming from psychotic irrationality, and that appears to be what the Doctor wants to believe, I suppose this kinda sorta fits into this sort of Socratic idea of evil having root in some cognitive error which the character often follows but fortunately only rarely is it treated as gospel that only started in s10 thank you very much. But of course, and this becomes more apparent once it is revealed the drums are not in fact a hallucination, the problem with the Master isn't that they are irrational - it's that they're too rational. Which would not work as a case of limited culpability in court. It's not a cognitive problem with understanding the consequences of one's actions (which is what the instanity plea boils down to), it's just not caring for them. But it is something that's still colloquially referred to as insanity.

Basically, I don't think the drums are the cause of the Master's villainy, nor do I think they're a metaphor of psychotic problems. I think they are above all a metaphor, a symptom and a side effect of "seeing all of time and space", which not so much fried the neurons on a kid as implanted a perspective that's just fucking unliveable with. It's a more cosmic scale of how Lucy became desensitised to other people's suffering after seeing the end of everything. It's an unquenchable drive that got its shape from outside (hence Rassilon implanting it), and you hate how it never ever fucking lets you just be satisfied because the goals do not come from within, but at the same time, you know you would never be what you are without it. It's a sort of You killed me - you taught me how to read! aspect of general formation of an individual through outside influence, except in the worst sense of uncaring and malevolent grooming.

Basically, you can hate your trauma, but you can't deny it shaped you as you are, and you hate that it's been done to you, but also enjoy the final product.

From this perspective, I think the "to have the priviledge of seeing all of time and space - that's ownership enough" is not only an admission of the power relations point the Master's been making since Frontier in space, but also a sort of appreciation of perceiving things one by one, as opposed to taking it all in at once. A genuine offer of help with the drums in a stop chasing the goal because it's either already there or non existent which is. obv another case of pot calling the kettle. And I'll never stop being obsessed with the choice of words when the Doctor tells the Master You could be beautiful. Because that adjective is just so perfect. It's not of the realm of ethics, beauty isn't good or evil. It's not an invitation to "cure" or cahnge the Master into the idealised child - it's an expression of belief in what he can be with what's already there. Not hidden under piles of lore, just waiting for the right context.

[dreamingpichu]

I would like to present to everyone...

The Clayspiracy.

Aka the biggest family tree conspiracy theory in the Pokémon fandom, all curated by moi.

The centerpiece of this theory is of course as the name implies gym leader Clay of the Unova region.

The goal? To decipher the family tree and further beyond.

As we know this begins with Lian, a warden of the Pearl Clan in Hisui and obvious ancestor to Clay.

However... Have we ever considered that maybe Lian has another descendant? My proposal, is Gym Leader Byron of the Sinnoh region.

Of course then if Byron is related to Clay (which I'd say they're brothers) then that would mean his son Roark is also part of this family tree.

With Roark canonically being Byron's son, then that would mean that if Byron is in fact Clay's brother, then Roark would have a cousin. That being Clay's canonical daughter, Lacey.

Now this has been under contention for a while...who is Lacey's mother? If you've been on my blog for a while you might be familiar with who I think it is. I believe that Lacey's mother is Gym Leader Tulip of the Paldea region.

Now of course, what would Tulip be doing all the way in the Paldea region away from her family? What if...there was another child? What if she and Clay were divorced? Divorce is a common reason for children to be bullied in school...

We know Ortega has an unnamed mother, and that his family owns an apparel company. Tulip is a model, and seems rather busy, like she's making a lot of money...

Now by now I'm sure that you're assuming I'm finished. However there's one last piece in this puzzle. One more character...a character with an unnamed father, mother, sister, and brother...

Yancy/Nancy!

So now, let's go over everything in a more fanfic-y description. Clay is the descendant of Lian, and is the brother of Byron, and uncle to Roark. At one point he moved away from Sinnoh to Unova, where he married Tulip and had three kids, Yancy, Ortega, and Lacey. Yancy would become the TV personality Nancy. Eventually, Clay and Tulip got a divorce, and Tulip left for Paldea taking Ortega with her, where he would be bullied for having divorced parents and thus join Team Star. Meanwhile, Lacey would start attending Blueberry Academy.

And that's finally the end of it. Dropping the MatPat act, honestly do I really believe this? I mean, I don't think it's canon, but it's a cute headcanon. And obviously there's some small details that while not disproving anything do make things muddy. Like, Yancy's brother is said to own a Leavanny, and when she's on her show as Nancy, her interview with Clay doesn't read like someone talking with their father (though that could also just be viewed as just being professional for the sake of television).

Overall, don't take my words as gospel, and just have fun.

[blessedarethebinarybreakers]

Hey, just today I've decided to stop seeing my parents and siblings for an indeterminate amount of time, and to possibly even break off all contact if it has to come to that. They refuse to acknowledge me as the person i really am and I can't keep sacrificing my mental health and me up for that. Will you please pray for me? And if it's not too much to ask, do you perhaps have a bible passage to strengthen me during this time? I still want to stay close to God, because I know the way God created me was correct and good. Thank you

~Micha (they/them)

Hi Micha,

What a difficult, courageous thing you've done. I will absolutely hold you in my prayers; I pray you will find relief in having finally made the hard decision, and continue to live into flourishing.

The Bible story that comes to my mind is a strange one, only told by Mark (3:20-35):

Very early in Jesus's ministry, as he gathers followers and gains attention, his family is apparently very concerned.

Perhaps they know this path puts him in danger; or maybe they just worry about his "lifestyle" reflecting badly on them. Either way, they know they have to "take control of him;" after all, he's clearly "out of his mind" (v. 21).

So his mother and siblings hurry to a house where Jesus is teaching, but it's packed so full they can't get inside. So they send a messenger in and also call for him from outside (vv. 31-32). I can just imagine their calls: "Please honey, this isn't like you! Who influenced you to go this way?" "You're the man of the house, you can't just abandon us to hang out with queer friends and say edgy things!" "What will the neighbors say?"

But when Jesus is told his family is out there calling to him, he answers, “Who is my mother? Who are my siblings?” Looking around at those seated around him in a circle, he said, “Look, here are my mother and my brothers. Whoever does God’s will is my brother, sister, and mother.”

We know Jesus's love for his mother. I am sure he loved his whole family with the infinite depth of God. Yet he risks losing them, says hard words he know will probably hurt, because if they make him choose between them and living out God's will, he has to choose God's will.

We don't know whether he ever reconciled with his siblings; they don't appear anywhere else in the Gospels. Maybe this was their last encounter, not even face-to-face. Maybe his brothers could not abide his abnormal lifestyle and chose to cut him out of their lives.

But we do know Jesus reconciles with Mary, the mother who proclaimed divine revolution as a newly pregnant teen (Luke 1:46-55) — yet who seems to waver now, either out of fear for her son or failing to understand that what he's doing now is the revolution.

But I like to imagine when Mary hears what Jesus says about family, the implication that she is only mother to him if she continues to help him in living God's will, she immediately corrects course. She will keep supporting him, even when she doesn't fully understand.

Sure enough, Mary supports him all the way to the cross, all the way to the grave. They are present for each other, comforting each other through the worst moment of both their lives.

[Jesus even fuses his biological family and his found family together from the cross. Now that he will no longer be the "man" in Mary's life who offers her legal and social protection; and now that he won't be there to love on his Beloved, he offers John to Mary, Mary to John. "Woman, here is your son. John, here is your mother!" (John 19:25-27)

Is that queer or what?? As his final act on this side of the tomb, Jesus essentially makes his mother and lover mother-in-law and son-in-law! ...I can't not think of the AIDS crisis, where dying partners would pass their beloved's care over to surviving loved ones.]

___

Jesus always prioritized chosen family over biological family. A biological relative can be part of your chosen family, but belonging to that family is no more automatic for them than for anyone else.

Jesus shows us that when family fails to support us in doing God's will — in this case, taking up the invitation to co-create yourself with God, to commit your own small rebellion against the status quo, to prophecy resurrection as embracing your queerness brings you to new life — they cease to be family in the way that matters most.

That rupture can be mended at any point, if and when those who did harm seek to make amends — and receive consent to do so. Whether or not reconciliation ever takes place, we seek out others who will celebrate us and support us in our efforts to glorify God with our lives.

___

God of love, Hold Micha close in this time of loss and and changed relationships. Comfort them in the knowledge that this rupture is no fault of theirs, but caused by parents and siblings refusing to embrace all they are, and failing imagine a fuller Kin(g)dom, a vaster love, a more colorful Image of God.

Spirit of courage and wisdom, guide Micah towards those who will delight in all that they are. Help them build a family founded on love, equity, and mutual support. Wherever their journey takes them, make your unconditional love, your unwavering presence known to them.

Amen.

[hms-no-fun]

in your view of things right now, with the political climate so hot coming into the election, and companies doing worse than ever in terms of amassing greed and power and fucking us all over... what do you think has to change to find a way out?

oh boy, what a question. i've got a BA in film studies. i pay my bills by making youtube videos and writing homestuck fanfiction. i am not an authority, i only kind of vaguely know what i'm talking about in any given conversation. but i do think about this question a lot, and i've been wanting an excuse to arrange some of my thoughts on the matter. so, you know, don't take my words here as gospel, or as a coherent platform, or whatever. i'm just a goat with some opinions who hasn't read enough theory but means well.

alright. as a communist my answer is always gonna be "proletarian revolution," but that's an endgoal we're currently nowhere near achieving. the path to getting there is impossible to truly know, because of course revolutions are historically contingent on an organized vanguard being prepared to take control in a moment of national crisis. we don't have a leftist vanguard in this country, haven't done since the FBI and state governments went to war with the Black Panthers. my ideal vision of an effective communist party is one unlike any that currently exists on a large scale in the USA, built by organizing communities to coordinate neighborhood needs, as part of city/county organizations coordinating local needs, as part of state organizations that etc. right now political parties are exclusively focused on electoralism. i want a party that can organize eviction blockades, free community daycare, reading groups, high-capacity cafeterias, and all manner of mutual aid. i want a party that can operate with solidarity, as the Panthers did by supporting the 28 day 504 sit-in that resulted in the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. an effective vanguard party interfaces directly with the working class and builds its policy platforms based on their needs with no apology, rather than the acceptable liberal half-measures we've grown so accustomed to.

but it's a loooooooong road to get even that far. and you might say such an organization would be offputting, but like. the Panthers won over a lot of moderates over time because they weren't just out on the streets posturing. they took care of people. we only have free school lunch programs at all because of them. this is the thing that drives me nuts about so many leftists today-- you don't win over a moderate or conservative by debating the merit of their ideas. you help improve the material conditions of their day to day life, thanklessly, as you'd do with everyone in that community, because you cannot adopt means testing by another name without selling off an essential part of yourself. slowly, over time, some of those people will be won over. it'll never be everyone, but it doesn't have to be everyone. it doesn't even have to be a majority. you can get a hell of a lot done with even just 30% of people, especially if those people are even mildly-disciplined members of a well-organized party apparatus.

so, okay, that's my sense of the broad strokes. i want a proletarian revolution by way of a militant vanguard party. not saying this is the ONLY way forward, just the one i think would be most likely to succeed under the right circumstances. but again, we're a million miles away from having a communist vanguard in this country. quite frankly, such a thing feels an impossible pipe dream at this exact historic moment. so the question for me then becomes, how do we create the conditions that would allow for such an organization to emerge, claim power, hold it long enough to build a substantial base, then act on it towards a revolutionary goal?

first you've gotta ask why it's so hard to imagine this fanciful 20th century ass operation today. obvious answers: it's fucking impossible for a third party to gain a foothold in the system as it stands, so let's fix that. ranked choice voting would be a good place to start. i'm no electoralist, but if we're presuming that the revolution isn't happening tomorrow then some element of its foundation must be in making our democracy an actual democracy that can reflect people's needs. repeal citizens united. put HUGE limits on campaign donations and make it harder to conceal donations through super PACs. redistricting is another essential piece of the puzzle-- there is precisely one map of every major usamerican city and it's the map of redlined districts where people of color were not allowed to buy property. look at wealth distribution in communities and it'll map 1 to 1 to historic redlining, guaranteed. we gotta fix gerrymandering, loosen restrictions on poll access (such as the ad hoc poll tax that is government ID requirements), and if we're really feeling frisky push for a mandatory federal voting holiday so that no one has to work on election day (which elections count for "election day" is a whole other quagmire of course). less obvious answers: the cops and the FBI are still imprisoning and murdering black, poc, native, and queer activists in broad daylight. the national prison population is an IMMENSE locus of potential revolutionary energy. some goals on that front: abolish prisons, massively defund the cops, and curtail the surveillance state. restore the convicted felon's right to vote, and otherwise remove the many bureaucratic roadblocks that artificially create the cycle of recidivism. put money into nationwide job training programs (NO PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS) not just for ex convicts but for everyone, for reasons we'll get to momentarily.

i focus on electoral reform at the start here because i think it's an illustrative example of just how sprawling the task before us is. my goal isn't to overwhelm you or make you feel doomed because "holy shit that's already a lot of stuff that feels totally impossible and you haven't even mentioned healthcare yet," but to hammer home that the class war is being fought on a million fronts. you will go completely numb if you expect any one person or organization to address all of these issues simultaneously and as soon as possible. in an ideal world, there are many many affinity groups working towards these ends all over the place, either as part of or in solidarity with our imagined vanguard. i'm trying to look at ways to materially improve the lives of people in our political economy as it currently exists, rather than just saying "we need revolution" and leaving it there.

alright then, so what about capitalism? another major factor in the systematic disenfranchisement of the working class is the role corporate employers play in maintaining the class war. nobody has time to participate in local political actions because everyone has to work crushing hours, and when they do have days to themselves they still have to personally drive to wherever things are happening and find parking, instead of grocery shopping, taking care of kids, just fucking relaxing, whatever. obvious answers: medicare for all. right now, healthcare access is tied to employment status unless you are COMICALLY poor (i just got kicked off of medicaid a couple months ago because i now make marginally more than the cutoff, which now means i'm paying $200+ more a month on healthcare and am now way more worried about money than when i was on welfare. what a great and functional system!). if you're afraid of losing your health insurance for any reason, then you are disincentivized from expressing any opinions you might have about the conduct of your employer by, say, quitting. just passing universal healthcare alone would cause some major turmoil in the US economy. invest in mass public transit with rigorous local neighborhood access, and now a hell of a lot more people are empowered to participate in civic duty. less obvious answers: get rid of at-will employment! make it much much harder for employers to fire people, and regulate the ability of corporations to do mass layoffs. this would go a long way towards throwing some wrenches into the methods corps use to invent economic prosperity through the creative application of spreadsheets. on top of that, let's nuke the absolute fuck out of means-testing for programs like food stamps, medicaid, social housing, or literally any other form of "charity" that made Reagan shit his pants.

speaking of means testing, let's talk about bullshit jobs. there are a TON of pointless, degrading, wasteful jobs in this country. corps playing middlemen to middlemen. endless state and business bureaucracy using hundreds of systems that rarely if ever communicate with one another, putting a huge administrative burden on working people while the rich beneficiaries of this exploitation get to launder their guilt through the public-facing punching bags of customer service representatives. too many people work at the office factory. there are a lot of industries that need to be massively curtailed if not outright destroyed, a fact that intersects with the threat of climate change when you include coal and oil jobs. it's not enough to get rid of these positions, you also have to have a plan for those displaced workers-- hence the job training program i mentioned before. if we actually want to see a transition into a more egalitarian society that doesn't run exclusively on fossil fuels, then there needs to be a pipeline that gives purpose to the people whose lives will inevitably be radically altered by the kinds of changes we're talking about. there's an important thing, actually-- we all need to be prepared for this line of questioning and have a good answer in the back pocket. there is no shift from pure capitalism to even lite democratic socialism that won't hurt some cohort of people that doesn't deserve it. unless you want them to fall in with the fascists, you're gonna want to have a plan for how to integrate them into the world you're trying to build.

here's a wildcard for you. a lot of folks are on that "break up the monopolies" grind these days, and i appreciate the sentiment. i also think we would be vastly better served in the long run by simply nationalizing the monopolies. obviously there are plenty of worthwhile concerns to be had about any usamerican government gaining that kind of control over anything at this precise moment, but we cannot let that impede the horizons of our imaginary. i don't want market reform, i want the abolition of markets. the internet should be a public utility and ISPs should be government institutions. tech needs UNENDING regulation as we are all aware. social media should be public and interoperable. there needs to be a rolling back of internet surveillance. i've been toying with the idea of a Federal Department of Digital Moderation as an intervention on the current fascist radicalization pipeline that is social media, but that raises so many other concerns that i don't have an answer for. mostly i just think that the profit motive needs to be excised from as many sectors of public life as possible, and nationalization is a pretty good way to get there.

affordable housing! lower rents means fewer hours at work to make ends meet means more time to spend with family & community means more chances for more people to participate in civic action. abolish student debt and make college free! and make it illegal for colleges to invest in shit like fucking israel! a more accessible system of higher education means a more educated proletariat. this wouldn't by any stretch automatically lead to a more leftist proletariat, but conservatives have worked very hard to curtail access to higher education and that alone is more than enough reason to push for it. i've really buried the lede here, honestly. to my mind, medicare for all, mass public transit, free education, and national rent control are THE milestones we ought to be aiming for in terms of domestic policy. it is simply impossible to estimate how seismically and immediately these four policies (if applied equitably and without means-testing) could transform civic life in the USA. any systemic social ill you can name has some connection to one of these four ideas. i personally hold prison abolition & police defunding as equally essential, but these are unfortunately a MUCH harder sell for a lot of folks and will require some solidaristic frog-boiling from the likeable progressives/socialists of the world to naturalize the idea. but then, on that front i'm speaking very much outside my lane, and would defer to the wisdom of actual abolition activists in a scenario where we were talking concrete policy.

then there's foreign policy. this post has gone on a long time and i'm not the person to talk about this at length, but: the united states military needs to be defunded, and its outposts across the world removed. to curtail global climate change, the american imperial project must end. our meddling in foreign affairs is directly responsible for the domination of capital, and so long as this and other western states exist as they do, no communist outpost is safe. then there comes the question of reparations. all those billionaires didn't invent their money, they stole it. in quite a lot of cases they stole it from US citizens, but they've stolen far more from the rest of the world. tax the rich at 99% and distribute billions no-strings-attached to african and pacific island nations? other countries deserve a right to self determination without the threat of foreign interference. our nation's wealth doesn't just need to be taxed and redistributed to working class usamericans (particularly black communities), it ought to be redistributed internationally to all the countries we've fucked with over the last century and a half. but that's a pretty late stage pipe dream.

i guess the last thing that i've been thinking a lot about is more esoteric, and certainly difficult to implement. i believe we need to seriously interrogate "progress" as a concept. right now our society is defined by technological advancements as encouraged by a capitalist economy. if you fuck around with old analog tech at all, you've probably said to yourself more than once "they really don't make em like this anymore." i think about that fucking Hot Ones interview with matt damon about how streaming has stabbed the established profit model in the heart, where he says something like "we had a pretty good thing going before they showed up." i think about small museums closing down in the pandemic because they couldn't turn a profit, small local shops closing down for the same reason. constant newness paired with engineered obsolescence. disruption of the equilibrium in order to steal profit. it's easy to argue that socialized healthcare is good because it's actually more cost efficient than private healthcare. but those are the terms set by capitalists. i believe that healthcare and profit-seeking should be mutually exclusive. i believe that some things are a public good, however small --museums, quirky shops, parks, art spaces, open lots, movies, music, theater, whatever-- and that these things should be protected from the market at all costs. the alternative is corporate consolidation of everything, as every piece of local color cannot compete with economies of scale and asphyxiates to death. i refuse to accept the idea that "progress" means throwing away anyone who specialized in the thing being progressed beyond. i refuse to accept the idea that "progress" is linear and exists beyond the purview of morals, values, and ideology, nor indeed that it is inevitable and in any event an unalloyed good.

i believe that it doesn't matter if making higher-quality clothes at greater cost in unionized factories is "less efficient" than fast fashion. all "efficiency" means is spread everything as thin as possible, just enough just on time regardless of context. it's a mask for robber baron bullshit. it's an attempt by the bourgeoisie to naturalize the laws of economics as if they were on the same level as the laws of gravity, and we just can't accept that anymore. there's that meme, "i want shorter games with worse graphics made by people who are paid more to work less and i’m not kidding." i think we ought to apply that sentiment far more broadly. if we truly believe in the dignity of a self-determined life, then we must agree that some things are above profit, above efficiency, and are worth doing right. i haven't quite nailed down yet how exactly to verbalize this idea in a way that can be easily & quickly understood. but i feel it intensely, and only moreso as time goes on. as we push for these seemingly-impossible policy changes, it's of equal importance that we not lose ourselves to the limitations of the system as it exists under capitalism. to transform the world we must transform ourselves. to save the world we must save ourselves. if we hold a value to be true, then it must be constant and uncompromising. we must agree that our lives are better off when certain things exist even if they aren't efficient or fail to turn a profit, and thus decimate whatever part of us has been raised to believe that efficiency and profit ought ever to enter the equation. of course, in any revolution costs quickly become a huge going concern. there will always be painful compromises in policy along the path, always disappointments and mistakes. no revolution can be perfect. but through all these material challenges, the world that must be needs a place at the table with us. impractical, impossible, unfeasible... necessary.

you will probably not live to see that world, anon, and neither will i. we are all in the long game now, and it can never stop with one good policy, one good politician, one needed win. it's everything or it's nothing. socialism or barbarism. it is this belief which guides me, that no one ought to suffer the indignities i've suffered in my years working for shit wages, struggling to find housing, watching family die from economic abandonment. that there is simply no reason for society to be the way that it is, and that "the world isn't fair" is no excuse when we are the engineers of that "world" in every way that matters.

anyway, those are some of my thoughts on the subject. i hope i haven't made a complete fool of myself here.

[thelaurenshippen]

good night laurinia, do you have any canon sexualities for your characters? Other than the more blatant one's like Mark's bisexuality and chloe being ace,, I'm especially curious about joan wadsworth and owen, xoxo ♡

good morning anon!

so, the answer to this is a little complicated simply because of my current feelings around the idea of "canon" and my position as a creator on the internet who has a direct line of communication with my audience. so, sorry for answering such a simply question with a long and winding ramble about the current state of storytelling, but I will get to your actual question.

for a long time, I answered questions over on @thebrightsessions tumblr about anything and everything people wanted to know about when it came to my characters. but as the show grew bigger, people started to take those answers as gospel truth, even when the only evidence of that "canon" was a tumblr post and not the show itself. I want people to do whatever they want with my world and characters and it started to feel as though sharing my thoughts about things was discouraging that or disappointing people in some way.

so now, I mostly keep answering those questions to the atypipals discord. the community there is pretty tight, so they get a lot of my secrets lol, as well as my uncensored thoughts on things because we've all agreed that what I say means absolutely nothing if it's not in the text! (nap of the author, we call it, because thankfully no one wants me dead).

ALL TO SAY, there are some strong assumptions to be made about the characters based on the show, even when their sexualities aren't explicitly stated. when you expand to include the canon novels, there's even more.

but, as far as I can recall, I think the only sexualities that are explicitly stated are (just including voiced characters in the podcast - the novels have a bunch more):

Mark is bisexual

Chloe is asexual (she's also panromantic, but I don't believe I ever use that word, simply mention that she has two exes names Alex, one boy and one girl)

Adam is gay

Sadie is straight

Rose is gay

...I think that's it? no one else claims a label, I don't think, but obviously there are several other characters who have same-sex relationships:

Caleb canonically pretty much is only into Adam

Sam dates both Mark and Mags

It is heavily implied that Oliver has a thing for Mark

It is explicitly stated in the books that Damien is in love with Mark

Frankie is a trans man who dates Caitlin, which I consider a queer relationship given Frankie is a member of the queer community

and then, of course, there are the characters that are never in a romantic relationship in the podcast or are only seen in heterosexual relationships - those sexualities are up to interpretation! that does mean I don't have a straight answer (pun intended) to the characters you asked about, because amongst those three, all we know is that Joan dated Owen and had a thing for Jackson.

I hope that's not too frustrating of an answer!