#escape hatch fan comic

[wanderinglimeblood]

Wondering if I should put Escape Hatch on MSPFA... would y’all be able to read it there? Or does Tumblr just work better for this? I don’t know if there’s any cons to it aside from having to host the images elsewhere (one thing I’m thankful about Tumblr’s posting system is in-house drag and drop for the pictures)... so I’m feeling a bit cautious. Could be neat to try and could boost visibility, but it’s the potential unseen cons that have me nervous lol

Also, speaking of, if I’m still posting it on Tumblr, should I be tagging each entry as a Homestuck fan comic? I’d like to give it some visibility but I also don’t want to spoil things for new readers later down the road or just jump right into it when it hasn’t been tagged so far... so this is an area where MSPFA may come in handy? So many decisions lol

So yeah, that’s just where my thoughts are rn

[escapehatchcomic]

======>

Oh hell.

[longitudinalwaveme]

How to Distinguish the Mirror Masters

So on Reddit, I saw a post that asked how the two Mirror Masters should be distinguished from one another if they were to be used in the same story. Here's what I came up with:

Sam Scudder, the first Mirror Master, is flamboyant, dramatic, and vain. He loves fame and is always angling for it, and his crimes are frequently centered on getting as much attention as possible.  He almost views himself as the lead actor in a movie series about him; he's always trying to come up with interesting stories about himself and trying on variations of his basic Mirror Master role---pretending to be a superhero, taking a self-help course as a regular guy, turning his enemy into a genie in a bottle, live-action role-playing as a cowboy, and even once casting himself as a romantic lead. While he likes money and really likes stealing fancy mirrors for his extensive collection, ultimately fame is most important to him.

In some ways, Sam kind of parallels Barry insofar as they both seem to kind of living out childhood fantasies (Barry is a huge comic book nerd and idolized the Jay Garrick Flash, while Sam was explicitly stated to be a huge fan of cowboy movies in the issue where he disguised himself as an Old West outlaw for a bit.) I think if I was writing the character, I would make this connection a bit more explicit, and have Sam also be a fan of the Golden Age heroes, with the Mirror Master persona being a twisted mirror image of his childhood heroes. 

One side effect of this is the fact that Sam doesn't have any real personal hatred of Barry. He'll do the standard supervillainous death traps and the like, but on some level he enjoys having the Flash around. After all, the Mirror Master looks much cooler fighting the Flash than he would effortlessly avoiding the police.

On the same tack, Scudder almost never endangers civilians, since doing that would interfere with his fantasy life as an over-the-top comic book supervillain. 

Sam is also the genius of the two Mirror Masters. He's the one who invented all the technology and discovered the Mirror Realm, and he's always coming up with new inventions. He's probably the most scientifically inclined of all the Rogues, but he specializes in reflections and advanced physics. I don't generally think of him as having had a lot of education, but he is extremely intelligent.

Scudder is something of a pretty boy; he's extraordinarily vain and spends an inordinate amount of time fixing his perfect hair and looking at himself in the mirror.

Sam is also superstitious (he seems to fervently believe that breaking mirrors is bad luck, which is unfortunate given his gimmick) and can't swim. He's also a chain smoker; he goes through four cigarettes every hour. 

Evan McCulloch chases anonymity as much as Scudder chases fame. After his traumatic childhood and his role in the death of his parents, he wants to be anyone BUT Evan McCulloch, and the Mirror Master is a convenient role for him to disappear into. He doesn't really want to establish himself as separate from Scudder (though his accent and somewhat burlier physique make it somewhat inevitable that most people don't mistake the two of them). In a sense, being the Mirror Master is an escape hatch for him...just as his cocaine addiction is.  

 Evan is a deeply weird individual on many levels. He has a strange sense of humor and a strange moral compass, and he seems to take some enjoyment out of how much he unsettles other people. When interacting with heroes, he's generally quite chipper and genial, something that stands in stark contrast to the lengths he's willing to go to in order to get what he wants. He bears no malice towards the heroes he fights, but he also has very little restraint in fighting them.

Evan is far more dangerous, brutal, and unhinged than Scudder; he was, after all, a hit man prior to becoming the Mirror Master. He also uses the Mirror Realm far more effectively than Scudder does, partially because he's less worried about the potential risks involved in spending time in such a bizarre reality, and partially due to a natural aptitude for navigating it. He is not an inventor, and indeed struggles to understand and repair the technology he uses, but he is more than competent in wielding it.   

Evan does have something of a sentimental streak. He always sends a portion of his ill-gotten gains to the orphanage where he was raised, and he refuses to kill children (Grant Morrison, who created the character, established early on that Evan had a policy against killing women and children, and it's always been a little frustrating that most subsequent writers have abandoned it). But making the mistake of assuming that his sentimentality makes him any less dangerous might very well be the death of you, since Evan has no compunctions about killing generally.   

Evan is exceptionally powerful; indeed, he's something of a Lovecraftian horror. He can go anywhere, attack anyone from anywhere at almost any time, and can launch those attacks without even having to leave the Mirror Realm himself. He's almost untouchable when he wants to be.  

Oh, and Evan is Scottish. He's very, very Scottish (more specifically, Glaswegian), and he takes great amusement from the fact that the Americans around him often have no idea what he's saying.

In terms of physically distinguishing the two, I would have Evan be a bit more built than Sam. He also has much messier hair when the cowl is off, and has freckles and a gap between his two front teeth, which Sam does not possess. Both have brown hair and brown eyes, but Evan's hair has a reddish tinge to it and his eyes are more hazel, whereas Sam's hair and eyes are more pure brown. Finally, I would have them be mirror images of each other in terms of handedness, with Scudder being left-handed and McCulloch being right-handed. 

I would also have Scudder be quite a bit older than McCulloch, with Scudder being 41 to 45 years old and McCulloch being 26 to 33. 

Also, importantly, the primary distinguishing trait between the two is not that Sam is boring. For some reason, there's this common idea in the wider Flash fandom that McCulloch is the only Mirror Master to really have a personality, but that's actually pretty far from the case. Prior to Crisis on Infinite Earths, Sam was probably the most dynamic and interesting of all the Flash's villains, and he was also very popular, as illustrated by the fact that he appeared more often than any other costumed villain, as well as the fan response he got in the letter columns of the day.

For example, in Flash vol. 1 #130 (published in 1962), someone wrote in with the results of a poll they took in their neighborhood:

And in this very long letter from Flash vol. 1 #174 (published in 1967), the writer identifies Mirror Master as his favorite Flash villain:

Granted, Sam doesn't have the depth or complexity of the characters who either survived into or were created in the modern era (since he was dead for almost all of it), but he definitely had a character, and he was a lot of fun.

And then they brought him back in the New 52 and he really WAS boring. But that wasn't because classic Sam had no personality to work with, it's because the writers made him a less interesting version of the Top, and then made him Evan-in-all-but-name-and-accent.

And while we're on the subject of badly-written Mirror Masters, it's very frustrating that DC brought Evan out of his decade-long limbo only to apparently shunt him back into limbo about a year later---especially since it's really, really clear that Evan is the Mirror Master most writers actually want to write about.

It honestly feels like DC thinks that the ideal Mirror Master is the hybrid version. They want the Mirror Master to have Evan's eldritch horror powers and general human disaster personality, but since Evan's Glasgow accent is hard to write and the details of how he got the Mirror Technology require them to acknowledge that there are two Mirror Masters, they use Sam's civilian identity because he isn't Scottish and invented the gear himself. As someone who's a fan of both Mirror Masters, this is very frustrating.

Thanks to @gorogues for the scans.

[daresplaining]

Mattea Murdock, the Daredevil Drummer of Philly

In celebration of the forthcoming new Spider-Punk: Arms Race series (not to mention Hobie stealing scenes in "Across the Spider-Verse" last year), I wanted to finally write up my long-overdue overview post on Mattea Murdock! If you haven't read her introductory run yet, check it out here.

Mattea truly stands on her own in the wide canon of alternate universe DDs. She is a female Daredevil, she is Latina, and she somehow managed to escape Marvel's NYC gravity and base herself in Philadelphia, where she defends its citizens from violence and exploitation. Hobie and his self-styled Spider-Band encounter her in Spider-Punk (2022) #3, when they make a detour to fix the busted Spider-Van. They are all immediately-- and correctly-- impressed.

Mattea: "Yo, Kam!" Hobie: "Wait, you know each other?!" Kamala: "Duh! You think I wouldn't know the Daredevil Drummer of Philly?" Hobie: "You're a drummer too?" Mattea: "Best in town." Hobie: "Oh man, my friend Gwen is a pretty dope drummer too. I think y'all would definitely get along." Mattea: "Hope they're ready to get outplayed by a pretty, blind girl." Spider-Punk vol. 1 #3 by Cody Ziglar, Justin Mason, Jim Charalampidis, and Travis Lanham

I talked a little about her killer character/costume design when she was first introduced (I was a fool; of course she's blind), and my love for her look has only grown. It's badass, distinctive, and it slots her beautifully into Hobie's punk rock world while still evoking that trademark Daredevil image (red, sticks, pointy bits...). Her irises are red, which is a visual choice I enjoy in more heightened, fantastical DD stories/art styles, and I think it works for Mattea. Heck, I could even imagine them being colored contact lenses she's chosen to wear for the aesthetic. Also, one detail that wasn't in the previews is the fun little laughing devil face on the back of her jacket (I'm not punk rock enough to get the reference if it is one, but it reminds me of Darkdevil):

Of course, always a big priority for me is Daredevil's power-set, and Mattea provides a quick primer on her unique perspective, mostly focused on hearing and the radar sense:

Mattea: "What? You think just 'cause I'm a blind girl, I can't see? Echolocation, my abuelas used to call it. But it's more intimate. Instinctual. Can hear a kick drum from ten blocks away. Can see it too. If I think hard enough, I can even see what the garage it's being played in looks like." Hobie: "Yo, are you doing it right now?" Riri: "She's definitely doing it right now."

This is not my favorite description of Daredevil's powers, nor-- to be honest-- a particularly informative one. She can gather spatial information through walls...from ten blocks away? I also never love an overuse of visual language in any explanation of these powers, especially as it's implied that Mattea, like Matt, is completely blind. Surprisingly, no direct mention is made here of the hypersenses as a whole, beyond the reference to hearing a kick drum from ten blocks away. Even her hearing doesn't receive that much attention in the story overall, which feels like a missed opportunity for such a musical character. Her blindness, too, is pretty much irrelevant to the story, and never comes up again. But I do LOVE that she uses the term "echolocation", though is still very clearly the radar sense, in all its vague, undefined, semi-magic glory.

And visually? This is great. I'm always a fan of the cross-hatching visual, especially against a black background, and artist Justin Mason doesn't go too overboard on the detail, which is another preference of mine. And thematically, I love the ways in which Mattea's drummer identity is tied into her superheroics-- not just for laying a beatdown on bad guys, but also for channelling and enhancing her echolocation/radar sense. One of my favorite scenes in the comic is when she plays a drum solo on a roof edge to scope out the Kingpin's lair. I'm willing, in that moment, to ignore any gripes about radar sense irregularities out of respect for the coolness and thematic heft of the concept. I mean, this rocks:

Mattea: "Come on, show me the good stuff."

At the end of the day, though, this is not a Daredevil comic and Mattea is not the main character. Plus, it's only five issues long, and introduces a bunch of other new characters as well. There was only ever going to be room for the creative team to offer a cursory introduction, hopefully generating enough interest to prompt these characters to appear again in other comics. In that, I think they fully succeeded with Mattea; we get a cursory sense of her powers (or at least, enough to show that they're the normal DD set), her personality (delightfully cocky, playful, tough, fearless), a few hints of her backstory, and some truly kickass fight scenes. There's a bit of suspension of disbelief required to believe she can use drumsticks as a stand-in for billy clubs (unless her drumsticks are made of something really hefty-- and hey, maybe they are), but this is Spider-Punk. Hobie killed Norman Osborn with a guitar--twice. It's not about realism, it's about style.

Mattea: "Been waiting for this for a long time, Fisk. Real long time." Fisk: "I'm going to break you, li'l girl--AWGGH!" Mattea: "Big, strong man who sends out his band of wackos to push over people too weak to fight back." Fisk: "Wouldn't get too cocky, girlie...you're not the only one who's fast! I'm gonna hurt ya. A lot. Then I'm gonna kill ya. And I'm gonna love every second of it. You know, this is the same look you had when I had your old band clapped a few years back. I like it. Brings out your eyes--GAAAH!" Mattea: "There's something you need to understand about me, papi. I'm not the kinda girl who goes down without a fight."

I can't wait to see more of Mattea and learn more about her, her world, her friends, and her enemies. In particular, she seems to have a history (possibly romantic?) with this world's Kamala Khan, and I would love to see more of that relationship. While Mattea Murdock clearly has a lot in common with Matt Murdock, she also seems happy to be a team player, unlike Matt, and I really enjoy that. Though I guess it's not that surprising a distinction. After all, every drummer needs a band.

[astoundingbeyondbelief]

Kaiju Week in Review (March 19-25, 2023)

This week gave us a much better picture of Gamera Rebirth, thanks to its panel at Anime Japan: we got a synopsis, character descriptions, another opponent unveiled (Jiger!), some toys, and a trailer. I'm loving the redesigns for the kaiju, and am pretty intrigued by the extent to which the U.S. is battling them, but the animation for the humans doesn't look any better than the Polygon Godzilla trilogy. I guess I can bear it for Gamera's sake.

Actor Jiro Dan (middle) died on Wednesday at the age of 74. His claim to fame was playing Ultraman Jack's host, Hideki Go, in Return of Ultraman and many Ultraman series and films since; he was also G-Guard Commander Besuke Jinguji in Godzilla Island. May he rest in peace.

Just when I was starting to worry that IDW's second run of Godzilla comics was going to abruptly end in May, here's another five-issue miniseries. Godzilla: Here There Be Dragons chronicles a secret voyage of Sir Francis Drake in which he and his crew encountered the King of the Monsters and (naturally) other Toho creatures. Believe it or not, this is Drake's second meeting with Godzilla: the first was in Dark Horse's Godzilla, King of the Monsters #10. Can't say I'm a huge fan of Godzilla in pre-Atomic Age settings though. Frank Tieri is writing and Inaki Miranda is illustrating; first issue's in June.

Godzilla: Tokyo SOS was the first Godzilla movie I saw in theaters (at the Pickwick, no less), so catching the Fathom Events showing on Wednesday was a nostalgic treat. Less nostalgic, but quite welcome: new subtitles! Well, new to us. @kyodaikino theorized that they're actually older than the dubtitles we've been forcibly acquainted with. None of the frame rate issues I heard Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla suffered from either. No idea why this was playing on a random weekday in March, but they should keep it up.

Every so often, The Asylum makes a giant monster movie that's a decent way to waste 90 minutes. Ape vs. Monster, their Godzilla vs. Kong mockbuster, was one such production, but I'm sorry to report that Ape vs. Mecha Ape (their... King Kong Escapes mockbuster?) is not. Indeed, it seems bent on entertaining the viewer as little as possible. Avoid at all costs.

Here's the trailer for Shinpei Hayashiya's next kaiju flick, War of the Ninja Monsters: Jaron vs. Goura. The bar is in hell after his last one, so qualities like "there are suits for both of the monsters" and "the frame isn't wallpapered with cheap CG effects" are notable.

Godzilla Battle Line introduced a new mode, and it's a pretty enjoyable one. Like free battles, challenge battles equalize the levels of all Battle Pieces in the match; you also have to follow certain restrictions when building your team, forcing strategies to shift significantly. The more you win, the faster your egg cracks open and yields rewards. I've only dropped one match so far, which is no surprise; as a trans Pokémon player, I have a lot of experience with egg-hatching.

[sixty-silver-wishes]

Reading Junji Ito's "Billions Alone" from a post-lockdown, culturally individualist perspective

Today, I met up with some local writers at a cafe/comic shop for some group discussion and writing. One of them is a fiction writer like myself; the other is a video essayist. Since becoming more involved in the local artistic scene, both as an artist and a writer, I feel like my mental health has been improving, at least when it comes to my personal life- I'm building a circle of like-minded creatives, surrounding myself with others who have similar beliefs and interests as me. As I'm finding community in the creative scene, however, I'm also realizing that many people I'm meeting feel much of the same way.

At the writers' meeting, while we discussed our stories, our goals, and our writing challenges, the idea of "third spaces" also frequently came up as well. My video essayist friend was talking about a new project studying how public infrastructure is designed to favor drivers over pedestrians, and we all agreed on something that I've been hearing many times in online circles- the internet itself is changing. Despite social media platforms supposedly promising to bring people together, they've only become more isolating as they've become more corporate, AI, and algorithm-driven. We talked how lots of online users are returning to the "old internet," forming their own blogs and seeking an escape from the increasingly stifling major platforms. We discussed how while everything is filled with SEO and short-form content, nobody actually likes TikTok or Instagram, but they've become so ingrained in online society that we tolerate them, using them to promote our small businesses or connect with others.

After the meeting, I decided to look around the comic store, and was drawn to a copy of Junji Ito's manga collection, Venus in the Blind Spot. I'd become a Junji Ito fan way back in college, and his art style has had a big influence on my own work. While I also take heavy inspiration from styles like Expressionism and New Objectivity, and artists such as Edward Gorey and Stephen Gammell, Junji Ito's painstaking pen-and-ink hatching, bulging eyeballs, and grotesque faces have played a distinct role in my artistic growth. However, I didn't own any of his mangas (having read some online), but I'd been wanting to get one so I could study his art style up close. I ended up buying Venus, and after my conversation with my writer friends, it was strangely coincidental that the first story in the collection was Billions Alone.

Junji Ito's Billions Alone tells the story of Michio, a reclusive young man who has a crush on his former classmate, Natsuko. Natsuko is planning a school reunion, and invites Michio to reconnect and meet her new friend group. Meanwhile, a mysterious series of mass murders have been taking place, as a group called "Billions Alone" appears to be killing people en masse and sewing their bodies together. As Michio and Natusko's friends are killed and the heaps of bodies grow bigger and bigger, the public is warned not to form gatherings, and to isolate from one another. Eventually, Michio sees military planes that he thinks are attacking Billions Alone aircrafts, but are actually dropping pamphlets about "coming together" onto the town. As he thinks the government is finally taking action against the murders, he goes to tell Natusko, only to see her sewing the bodies of her family together, implying that the murders have not been carried out by an organized crime group as suspected, but rather civilians being compelled or brainwashed into killing each other. I've seen analyses before that Billions Alone is a commentary on Japan's collectivist culture, and that many of Junji Ito's works critique different aspects of Japanese culture- for instance, Gyo has been interpreted as a metaphor for the Japanese government's denial of atrocities committed by Japan during WW2, such as in Nanking, China, while My Dear Ancestors has been read as a criticism of the concept of filial piety. While these interpretations are certainly fascinating, I admittedly don't know enough about Japanese culture to properly analyze Ito's works from that lens, and will leave that up to people more knowledgeable than I am. However, coming from the United States, which has a heavily individualist culture as opposed to collectivism, Billions Alone resonated with me in a different way, especially after the Covid lockdowns and the increasing isolation of people, ironically in part due to the internet, which has simultaneously allowed people to "come together" and drive them apart.

Before I get into my thoughts on Billions Alone from my own cultural perspective, I want to add a disclaimer- just because Covid lockdowns are over doesn't mean that Covid itself is over. People still get the disease, it's still contagious, and it's still deadly. If you're sick and going out in public, it's common decency to wear a mask; public health is still important. This analysis is not anti-mask or anti-lockdown, but does discuss the social and psychological effects of lockdowns. I'd also like to say that when I call myself "culturally individualist," I mean that I come from an individualist culture, not that I consider individualism to be a superior ideology; both individualism and collectivism have their pros and cons. That being said, back to Junji Ito.

One thing that stood out to me the most in Billions Alone is the way the concepts of togetherness vs. isolation are framed in both positive and negative ways. Natsuko is a very social character; she has a friend group, a fiancee, and is planning the school reunion. She's also the only character shown sewing people together at the end. Meanwhile, Michio is very isolated; he's spent the last seven years at home. He misses Natsuko at the beginning of the story, and while he wants to confess his feelings towards her, while he's been shut up in his house, she's found someone else she loves. Togetherness prevents social death, but it also means physical death. Isolation means mental anguish and loneliness, but it also means survival.

The characters in Billions Alone both crave and are terrified of togetherness. As they're ordered to stay separated by the authorities, many young people, including the main characters, ignore the orders to gather in groups. This definitely brought the Covid lockdowns to mind for me; like the characters in the manga, to protect ourselves and the people we loved, we had to avoid gathering with them. Michio thinks that by the end, the Japanese government "finally" decides to take action combatting Billions Alone, but only after the death toll has become impossible to ignore and increasingly large masses of bodies begin to appear in public spaces. Worse yet, the planes he sees are in the control of Billions Alone, dropping propaganda to even more people (this page points out they're possibly an allusion to Allied planes during WW2; the allusion to John Lennon's music on the radio also makes a possible case for an analysis of the Billions Alone group symbolizing western globalization, but that's a study for another time). Notably, the bodies don't appear in workplaces or the home, but rather in "third spaces"- public parks, hiking trails, and areas being used for parties, like the school reunion. To survive, people must avoid these places, leading them to become more and more isolated. Natsuko's desire for social connection leads her to continue with the reunion despite Michio's insistence, justifying it as a "memorial" for the members of her friend group. However, the auditorium is empty, and she and Michio are confronted with a large web of bodies.

Looking at Ito's (frankly amazing) drawings of the corpses (I found myself analyzing his use of hatching and texture in every single one), I was reminded of the discussion my friends and I had about the modern Internet. In the story, technology is shown as a way to keep people connected while isolating from each other; Michio watches the news on the television for updates, calls Natsuko on the phone, and reads online forums to see what people are saying about the murders. But, as in real life, technology is not a substitute for social interaction, and while people can communicate and receive information over long distances while being isolated, they still continue to gather, despite knowing about the murders. They increasingly rely on technology, but still crave connection, enough to risk their lives for it; even Michio, who is used to being alone, says he wouldn't mind being sewn to his crush Natsuko as he ventures to see her again despite the risks. It's a line that was probably intended to be humorous, but speaks to the fact that even for him, there's only so much isolation he can take. When he sees the military planes, she's the first person he goes to talk to- if not the only person he knows who's still alive.

Overall, I think there's a lot to analyze with Billions Alone, and while I saw some people on the internet also drawing parallels with the Covid lockdowns like I did, I think what we can interpret from it in terms of the long-term increasing isolation of society- while we paradoxically "come together" with the internet- and the disappearance of third spaces is just as interesting. Like my friends and I in the comic store today, the characters are desperate for connection, and lament not being able to have it. Even if isolation may help them survive, they ultimately fall victim to their desire to live.

[totaleclipse573]

Hello, I followed you rather recently and know basically nothing about your Eclipse headcanons. So I am curious, does he have archie sonic backstory or something else, an AU perhaps? Sorry I am too lazy to scroll your blog, can you give me an overview please? 🥺

Ah yes, recruiting a possible new Eclipse fan to the small fanbase he has, I do love my work

*LONG POST WARNING!*

If you really want to understand his full character, he appears in the Archie Sonic Universe reboot, in Shadow Fall (issues 59-62) and Total Eclipse (issues 67-70.) Shadow Fall gives more info on his character and how he is, while Total Eclipse gives more of an understanding of his true nature. Here's a link to where I typically read them in case you want to check those out :

But if you want a quick overview on his character coming from me? I can summarize his story the best I can, but be warned, spoilers + I love him a lot.

Eclipse is, essentially, Shadow's "half-brother" from his Black Arms side, being created specifically to put an end to Shadow once and for all. But Eclipse, being the only Black Arms soldier with free will and the ability to think for himself, doesn't exactly want to hurt Shadow? They're brothers, after all, and Eclipse thinks it would be more beneficial to drag him into the hivemind instead of just killing him. Black Death, his creator, (he's pretty much like Black Doom but...less cool in my opinion) does let him try this idea when Team Dark and G.U.N. arrive on the "New Black Comet," but it doesn't seem to work. There's a whole scene in issue 60 that showcases Eclipse's mental power over Shadow through their hivemind connection, and its cool as hell btw. When he can't manage to drag him into the hivemind, Black Death has to come and assist. Long story short, it ends up working, and Shadow is ordered to basically kill Rouge and Omega (but of course they manage to snap him out of it and they work together to blow up the comet, but this is about Eclipse)

(Also I should mention that, at the time, Eclipse had been experimenting on Wisp DNA with Black Arms DNA in an attempt to create a new species of Black Arms to strengthen the numbers of their race. Keep this in mind, it's important.)

Theres a battle between Shadow and Black Death, and all the while, Eclipse is sent off the comet and into a shuttle with the wisp experiment eggs by Death's Eye (same thing as Doom's Eye just with different colors) so he can survive as the last remaining member of the Black Arms species to carry out his mission, and raise the next generation of Black Arms so they can survive. Eclipse though, is heartbroken, screaming as he gets dragged away that he can help, let him help, he'll destroy Shadow this time. But while Team Dark and G.U.N. escape, he's on the shuttle, watching his home explode. Its then he gets REALLY angry, vowing vengeance on Shadow.

THEN THERES TOTAL ECLIPSE

Total Eclipse takes place more in Eclipse's POV, giving his character more of a chance to shine (and that's why I love this arc so much, it also shows a softer side to his character.) His shuttle coincidentally ended up crashing on the Red Mountains of Angel Island, where he passed out on impact when the shuttle crashed. It's never stated how long he was passed out for, but when he wakes up, the shuttle is in absolute shambles. And the eggs? All destroyed, and Eclipse is panicking over it.

Luckily though, four managed to survive and hatch, much to Eclipse's relief and joy. No seriously, his reaction to them being alive is precious (until the whole vengeance thing anyway lmao)

He calls them the Dark Arms, their names being Blurk, Cregal, Cyzer and Rhygenta. Look at them, they're adorable.

As shown later on, each of the Dark Arms can "bond" with Eclipse (its like a fusion basically) and give him different abilities. Blurk basically turns him into living armor, Cregal allows him to fly, Cyzer gives him this cool laser canon arm, and Rhygenta gives him a "sonic canon," which when fired, blows back enemies. Though that isn't revealed until the end of the arc in the final battle, until then Eclipse is just happy she's the well behaved one of the four.

There's a whole subplot of Team Dark having to find Knuckles so he can help and stuff but Eclipse is the real main character here so who cares

While they go find Knuckles, Eclipse is taking care of the Dark Arms, even becoming a sort of father to them (he's a child and he was forced into so many responsibilities.) He has an extremely strong bond with them and loves them very much, and will do anything to make sure they're well fed and cared for. (It's also funny how the Dark Arms even seem to have their own personalities. Like Blurk is relatively chill, Cyzer and Cregal are more wild and always fighting each other for food, and Rhygenta is the sweet and well mannered one. Its so cute how they interact with Eclipse and with each other.)

Eventually though, Eclipse does realize he'll never be able to enact his vengeance on Shadow if he's always staying in the shuttle, so he decides to go out and find him, telling the Dark Arms to stay behind and to stay safe. So he ends up where Shadow is, the Master Emerald shrine (Knuckles reluctantly went with Rouge and Omega to some place) and after giving him a few strange hallucinations through their mental link just for fun (he can be a jerk sometimes and I love that,) they battle.

After a bit of fighting though, Eclipse tells Shadow something and the page honestly speaks for itself on the levels of HEARTBREAKING it has

He started crying. And he did because he genuinely loved his big brother. Otherwise, why would he even bother to try and get Shadow to join him again? Sure maybe the "leave this broken planet to rot" thing wasn't the best choice of words, but to Eclipse he was trying his hardest. He just wants a brother, who doesn't want him back. He loves his brother, who will never love him back, because he's a Black Arms. And that's part of what makes his character so tragic.

After more fighting, Shadow eventually uses the Master Emerald's power to beat Eclipse, and throw him to a completely different part of the island. The way he beats himself up about failing is pretty sad too, because you KNOW he's trying his hardest.

Then Shadow and Knuckles fight over how to keep the Master Emerald safe from Eclipse and blah blah blah

Eclipse goes back to the Dark Arms while Shadow and Knuckles fight, AND. JUST. LOOK.

ITS LITERALLY SO CUTE HOW MUCH HE CARES ABOUT THEM. BEST SINGLE FATHER OF FOUR.

*cough* anyways

The Dark Arms, after hearing this, want to help Eclipse fight Shadow. Eclipse is reluctant at first, but then he remembers that they were created SPECIFICALLY to fight. And they're already growing up too, so why not? So he leads them out of the shuttle and they go to fight Shadow all together. Only now that Shadow and Knuckles are out fighting, he battles Rouge, Omega and Relic (also an archie character) instead, and this battle shows off the Dark Arms' abilities when they "bond" with Eclipse. The kid absolutely DESTROYES THEM. Relic is crying, Omega is torn apart, and Rouge's shoulder is dislocated. Eclipse can be pretty brutal sometimes. AND HE TAKES THE MASTER EMERALD.

But of course when Shadow and Knuckles stop fighting like idiots, they go after Eclipse and the Dark Arms, who are taking the Master Emerald back to the shuttle. But just before they can make it, Shadow and Knuckles arrive to stop them. There's another battle with the Dark Arms' powers included, and this is where we first see just how powerful Rhygenta can be. (But not before Knuckles shatters the Master Emerald to keep it safe from Shadow and Eclipse.)

And then, exhausted, Eclipse and the Dark Arms leave on the shuttle to at least be able to escape.

AND, I AM NOT JOKING, THIS IS HIS FINAL APPEARANCE

AND THATS IT. WE NEVER SEE HIM AGAIN (due to the archie cancellation.) So sadly, that's his canonical ending. And it broke me. Because he deserved so much more than what he was forced to be cut short to. (He was even supposed to get a redemption arc and I SCREAMED when I found out because that was what I had wanted.)

So yeah, Eclipse overall is an amazing character, if not one of the best, and I really wish he would come back in any piece of media someday. Hope this helped!

[deacblues]

been thinking about a comic idea for a OMD retcon. i don’t really know anything about mephisto, so i’m just going to assume he’s the devil and work from there. i also don’t really know anything about the devil either, now that i think about it. oh well.

for years, mephisto has entertained himself by watching peter parker suffer. despite what you may think, hell is a pretty boring place. recently, though parker’s life has been on an uncharacteristic upswing, and this frustrates mephisto to no end.

peter isn’t a frail, bitter teenager anymore. he’s grown into a fine young man, one who’s happy with his life! peter has shared his greatest secret with the two most important women in his life, and he has a great job. what’s not to love?

well, mephisto hates love! so he hatches a scheme to get revenge on parker. mephisto orchestrates a global conflict on parker’s homeworld: a superhero civil war that hospitalizes parker’s aunt and puts him and his wife on the lam with no place to run.

then, mephisto approaches parker with a deal. parker can trade his own life for his aunt’s, and set the whole world back to the way it was. and, for peter, that’s not really much of a choice at all.

so parker is chained in hell, where mephisto can really pour on the grease, and everyone back on earth forgets peter is spider-man. but, because mephisto is the devil, this isn’t enough.

back on earth, mephisto places an empty shell in parker’s place. it can mimic peter’s basic actions, but it has no free will of its own. mephisto has also implanted in it a subconscious directive: to ruin parker’s reputation.

mephisto purposefully fails to erase mj’s memory of parker’s identity, and leaves his imitation with her. of course, this faux-peter drives them apart almost immediately, leaving us where brand new day starts.

i dunno if i’d ever actually finish this but i figure it’d start with peter escaping hell to beat on his fake. i feel like i’m not really giving mj enough credit, either, for how her personality has been sapped from her in recent years. you can blame me for being a peter fan first, and an mj fan second.

[kudosmyhero]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (vol. 1) #23:Totally Hacked!

Read Date: June 30, 2023 Cover Date: July 1989 ● Writer: Mark Martin ● Pencils: Mark Martin ● Inks: Mark Martin ● Letterer: Steve Lavigne ●

**HERE BE SPOILERS: Skip ahead to the fan art/podcast to avoid spoilers

Reactions As I Read: ● let’s see what dumb-fuckery happens in this issue ● “Abandon continuity all who enter here” — ok, the self-awareness is a little funny

● ok, I still give zero fucks about this storyline, but the humor in this one is legit funny in moments ● this writer knows nothing of Splinter, it seems ● 👏

Synopsis: As this issue opens, we find a disgruntled Dale Evans McGillicutty sulking on a Utopian Earth. "How many stupid times to-stupid-day do I have to save the stupid planet?" she growls as she kicks a mushroom.

As the girl heads into The Forest (marked with a sign labeled, "Abandon Continuity All Who Enter Here"), she's confronted by an angry, costumed rat calling himself The Fannywhacker. The rat demands to know why Dale isn't in school and she points out that it's Sunday, whereby the rat demands to know why she isn't in Sunday School. The girl explains that it's almost dark and Sunday School let out hours ago. An enraged Fannywhacker scribbles demerits on his clipboard before admitting that he's not very good at his job… or anything else. The rat laments that all he wants to do is squash punks and read comic books, but the world is so perfect that there's no crime to punish. As Fannywhacker exclaims that some grave cosmic error must have taken place, Dale decides that he's the one person on Earth desperate (and crazy) enough to get into the quickly deteriorating time machine and try to undo what she had done in the previous issue. Armed with confidence in her companion's instability, the girl hatches a plan…

Meanwhile, back at April's apartment, the Turtles (still in their normal, pet shop turtle form) are stuck in an aquarium and are going stir crazy. The guys try to escape, but their efforts are futile.

Two million years in the past, the ape man is busy in his garden when the dilapidated time machine appears. The happy ape man is overjoyed, thinking that Dale has come back to visit him… but he's rudely alerted to the arrival of The Fannywhacker when the rat greets him with a punch in the jaw. The costumed rodent then destroys the garden and the comfy recliner before launching the puppy into the air with a mighty toss. "Now that oughta incite the little goon!" Fannywhacker decrees.

Monkeyboy runs off to save his dog but returns quickly, infuriated and wearing his Jocko mask. Fannywhacker rips the mask into tiny pieces and then runs off, ape man in hot pursuit. The Fannywhacker makes it back inside the time machine, leaving Homo Habilis outside, kicking the cube in frustration. The rat pops his head out of the vehicle and honks monkeyboy's nose, and then launches the craft forward in time… leaving a very, very angry and very, very frustrated caveman in the past.

As Fannywhacker travels back to the future, he reverts to his true form, that of crime fighter The Gnatrat. Thus, the plans of the Skwal are foiled, and humankind returns to its violent past (and present). Unfortunately for Gnatrat, as he tries to journey home, the time machine begins to come apart…

Back at April's apartment, the Turtles have reverted to their mutated forms… but are knocked senseless, as they were still inside the aquarium when the change took place.

In the sewers, Master Splinter is relaxing by playing a Speed Racer video game when he hears a knock at the door. The Sensei assumes that it must be the Shredder, so he loads a cannon and blasts a hole through the door. Unfortunately for Gnatrat, he was the one behind the door, and the giant projectile embeds itself into the rodent detective's chest.

As Splinter fetches Gnatty a shoe horn to pry the missile out of his torso, the crime fighter explains his predicament: thanks to Dale's malfunctioning time machine, he's now trapped seven years in his past. Splinter hatches a nutty plan to utilize Supperman and Gnatrat's Vulcan mind-meld ability to get Gnatty back to his own time.

Meanwhile, the Turtles have decided to go out for pizza. The boys don their disguises and head out into the night.

Gnatrat (whose secret identity is bazillionaire playboy Boo Swain), buys a restaurant for one million dollars. Gnatty and Splinter put out an "All U Can Eat" sign and wait for Supperman to arrive. As soon as the gluttonous hero sits down, the pair of rats begin to stuff him with tons of food. Supperman eats until he looks ready to explode, wherein Splinter and Gnatrat unveil the "koop da grass!" - a gigantic pizza! The Turtles show up just as the mega pie is pulled from the oven and exclaim that they'll take it. Gnatrat rudely tells the Turtles to beat it. Splinter tells Boo to cool it, as he knows the Turtles and they've had a bad day. Gnatrat continues to be rude and an argument breaks out between the two rodents. Gnatty screams that they're wasting time and their plan will be ruined by the Turtles if they don't hurry. Splinter sighs and then gives the pizza to the TMNT. This action enrages Gnatrat and he attacks the Sensei. Splinter flips the charging Gnatty into the restaurant near the overstuffed Supperman. As the crime fighter stands up and prepares for battle, Supperman lets out an enormous belch, which rockets Gnatrat into the stratosphere, where he orbits the Earth with such incredible speed that he travels forward in time… thus landing back in his own time zone.

Now, Dale in her room, is at home arguing with George. The alien is angry, but he leaves in his ship - and the Earth is saved from alien invasion. From downstairs, Dale's mother yells at the girl for talking to strangers and reminds her that she has a test tomorrow.

"You've really got your work cut out for you, young lady!" Dale's mom screams.

"…I know." Dale states, as she dejectedly reads the newspaper, which is filled with violent headlines.

(https://turtlepedia.fandom.com/wiki/Totally_Hacked!)

Fan Art: ( A ) April O'neil by yachter

[multifandomfanficss]

The Road to the Afterlife

Platonic!Dead Boy Detectives (and Doom Patrol) X Reader

Prompt: After dying, your friends at the Dead Boy Detective Agency will do anything to get you back. This includes diving into one of the most dangerous planes of existence with their friends at the Doom Patrol by their side.

Warnings: blood, anxiety

A/N: I’m a big fan of both the Dead Boy Detectives comics and Doom Patrol so after their appearance in season 3 I knew I had to throw something together. This was inspired by both the comics and the tv show, but you don’t have to read the comics to read the fic. I do suggest watching the episode of Doom Patrol first. This mostly surrounds around everybody’s 2 favorite dead boys, but Crystal, Dorothy, and the Doom Patrol do make appearances. Let me know if you want more Dead Boy Detectives or some Doom Patrol centered fics!

It was just a normal case with your best friends Charles, Edwin, Crystal, and Dorothy until it wasn’t, but then again when is anything truly normal in your business? One minute you were bleeding out on the concrete gripping Crystal’s hand and the next minute you were hanging from a hook like meat in a horror movie. You had just woken up from what felt like hours of darkness. You had heard the stories of people seeing loved ones in the afterlife to persuade them to crossover, but you had no one. You never knew your family because you grew up bouncing from orphanage to orphanage. You were told your parents were alive, but they just couldn’t have you in their lives. The only people who were ever there for you were two dead boys running from the afterlife, a teenage medium, and a 107 year old child with real imaginary friends. There was nobody to greet you. No one to keep you company and give you any form of hope. Nobody to calm you down. You tried to take deep breaths. Your friends would surely come for you.

THIRD PERSON POV

Charles was anxiously pacing around the tree house while the rest of the group was sitting down trying to figure out their next move. They all knew what they needed to do wether they wanted to go or not.

“I’m going to get them” Charles blurted out. He stopped pacing and stood seriously in front of his friends. He tried to fake confidence.

“Don’t be rash. We need a plan” Edwin said thinking about what to do next. Dorothy and Crystal sat at a table with a couple of (Y/N)’s things trying to reach them. One of the items on the table began to glow.

“We’re running out of time, Edwin!” Charles began to get frustrated. Edwin stood up and put a hand on Charles’ shoulder.

“I know you’re worried about them believe me I am too, but we can’t just go running into the afterlife with no backup” Edwin begged his best friend. 

“Well somebody needs to figure out something and fast” Crystal added. Dorothy knew what she needed to do. She excused herself from the table to call her old friends at Doom Manor.

(Y/N)’s POV

“I’m dead…I’m literally dead…I bled out and now I’m actually really dead. What the actual fuck” You whisper aloud to yourself. You can feel the tears begin to roll down your cheeks. You try to keep your sobs quiet as to not alert the monsters above that you were awake. You had heard about Watchers and you weren’t very excited to meet one. You heard the hatch lift over your head as you were lifted off the hook and onto the platform above you. You wiggled and kicked trying to get the person to release you.

“I’m not going to hurt you” The voice promised. You looked up to find a man with kind eyes, eyes that seemed to have seen a lot. You recognized him from descriptions of the last time your friends had been to the afterlife. Underneath cuts and bruises this seemed to be the man who had helped your friends escape. He must have been tortured for helping them escape. You felt terrible. You found yourself to be staring at him until he pushed you down a corridor.

“Run!” He said with urgency. You couldn’t even say thank you before your found your feet taking you away as quickly as possible. You turned down another corridor and stood at the end of a long hallway trying to catch your breath. You felt like you couldn’t breathe. Why did you need to breathe anyway? You were dead. You thought death would stop the feeling of a racing heart and breathlessness, but it only made your anxiety worse. You felt footsteps coming towards you. You tried to hold back your sobs as you came to terms with what was happening to you. You didn’t know what would happen next. What would happen if the Watchers found you? You turned the corner to find a dead end. You had nowhere to go. Your legs gave out in fear as your slid down the wall, collapsing to the ground. The footsteps were only getting closer and closer until they stopped.

“(Y/N)?” You heard a familiar voice say softly. You looked up to see Charles, Edwin, Cliff, Vic, and Jane.

“Are they okay? They’re kinda freaking out…” Cliff asked.

“Leave this to us Tin Man” Charles said as he slowly kneeled in front of me and put a hand on my shoulder. Edwin follow closely behind him and crouched down. The others kept their distance.

“Very funny jack ass” Cliff said before Jane pushed him.

“Not the time” She whispered.

“I’m gonna go stand guard” Vic said running down the corridor.

You avoided eye contact with the boys. You were scared and embarrassed. Most of all you were still panicking. You felt like you would throw up on them if they got any closer. You were still holding back a lot of tears.

“It’s okay (Y/N) we’re going to get you out of here” Edwin began.

“But I’m de-dead” You let out a sob you didn’t realize you were still holding in and Charles brought you into his arms. He rubbed circles into your back and spoke softly. He reminded you that everything was okay and that they were there to take you home. Charles felt different in this plane of existence. He felt more solid and less cold. He felt more alive…or maybe you just felt more dead.

You apologized profusely for putting them in this danger. Edwin assured you that you had nothing to be sorry for.

“I hate to break up the reunion, but the Watchers are coming” Vic said running back to the group.

“Then let’s take those sons of bitches down! We fucked them up once we’ll do it again” Jane said before receiving a high five from Cliff.

“That is really not a good idea” Edwin chimed in as the three of you stood up. Charles stood up first giving you his hand to help yourself up. After standing you didn’t let go. You don’t think he minded as you ran for the river. As scared as you were you knew he was probably feeling worse at this moment. He would probably never get over his fear of water and who could blame him? The boat rocked back and fourth before you sat settled between the boys, your boys, your heroes. You had no idea what horrors they had been through to get to you. You were thankful. You laid your head on Edwin’s shoulder. Being the less affectionate of the two you were only a little surprised when he barley stiffened at the touch. You sighed of relief. You were going home.

When you got back to your body you were surprised to see there was little to no evidence of your mortal wound. You bolted up taking a deep breath. Dorothy, Crystal, Larry, and Rita immediately ran to your side as Cliff, Jane, and Vic returned to their bodies from astral projection and Charles and Edwin came through the mirror. You were in new clothes. This was no doubt Rita’s doing. She confessed she didn’t want you waking up in blood soaked clothes. You gave a small laugh as that had been the least of your worries.

Hours later after everyone had left, you sat alone in the tree house with Charles. Dorothy had gone back to Doom Manor to visit for a couple days and Crystal was trying to show Edwin how to play her favorite video game, Yonda, for the fifth time this week.

“Thank you for coming. I know how much you guys risked to come save me” You thanked Charles.

“It was nothing” He tried to down play it.

“Do you ever think about getting back into your bodies?” You asked.

“We’ve been dead for too long. Edwin’s remains are lost and my body has been decomposing in a plot at St. Hilarion’s for decades” He explained. You felt bad for asking. You got quiet.

“It’s okay though. Being a ghost has its perks” He smiled.

“Like what?” You asked.

“Like this!” He laughed as he lifted you up and floated out the door and to the roof of the tree house. You laughed along with him.

“Don’t drop me!” You begged.

“I won’t drop you!” He promised. The two of you sat on the roof and were later joined by Edwin and Crystal for some star gazing. You saw a shooting star.

“What are you going to wish for?” Crystal asks you.

“I already have everything I’ve ever wanted and more” You respond as you lay with your best friends, your family.

[carriagelamp]

Art of Aardman

I found myself a cheap copy of the Shaun the Sheep movie, so I was rewatching a bunch of Aardman films earlier this month and decided to hunt down some books too. For anyone that doesn’t know, Aardman is a British stop-motion studio that does fantastic work like Wallace and Gromit, Shaun the Sheep, Chicken Run, Early Man… tons of cool stuff. They’re always quirky and funny and warm-hearted. This was just a very nice art book for anyone that’s a fan of Aardman stop motion and wants to see a bit extra; it shows some cool concept art and blows up the neat details in Aardman work, especially in their intricate stuff like The Pirates! In an Adventure with Scientists!

Asterix and the Picts (Asterix and the Chariot Race, and How Obelix Fell Into The Magic Potion)

I decided to try a couple of the new Asterix comics that were done by the new team, just to see if they stand up to the old ones (that and How Obelix Fell Into The Magic Potion cause I’d never read that one before). They were pretty decent! Asterix and the Picts was my favourite of the two though I wouldn’t say either are going to contest for my favourite Asterix comic... but still! The art looks good and the stories felt like what I would expect, they made for a pleasant couple evenings of reading especially since it’s been so long since I’ve read a new Asterix comic. If you’ve never read Asterix it’s one of the biggest name French comic series in North America, as far as I know and very worth the read. It’s about a single Gaulish village that’s holding out against the invading Romans through sheer force of will, slapstick hijinks, and a magical super-strength potion brewed by their druid. Lots of fantastic visuals and cute wordplay, even in the English translations.

Bear

I found out about this bastion of Canadian literature via tumblr post that was losing its collective mind over the fact that some bizarre bear-based erotica novella somehow won the most prestigious literary prize available in Canada. Since I too found this hilarious and unspeakably bizarre I had to give it a read, obviously. And yes, the flat surface level summary is... a librarian moves out into rural Ontario and falls in love with a literal for-real not-supernatural-not-a-joke bear. And I have to say… it is actually worthy of an award, which I was not expecting given that I was there for a laugh. It has beautiful writing, and the subtextual story is pretty interesting… it kind of makes me think of The Haunting of Hill House actually in terms of themes. (Womanhood, personhood, independence, autonomy partially achieved through escaping the male gaze by claiming non-human lovers... listen if I were still in university I would right a paper comparing the two novels).

I dunno man, it’s fucking weird. Actually a well-written book, but sure is about a woman falling in love with a literal bear. Give it a read if you want something bonkers but like… high-brow bonkers.

Hunger Pangs: True Love Bites

Best book I have read in like… a while. A long while. I am not a fast reader, and I consumed 90% of this book over a weekend. It’s not at all like Terry Pratchett, but at the same time it scratched an itch for me that I haven’t had satisfied since Pratchett’s death. A very clever, hilariously funny poly romance between a disabled werewolf, an anxious vampire lord, and an incredibly powerful woman, with heaps of social satire, political commentary, and sinister undertones. The whole thing reads a bit like fanfiction and I say that in the most flattering way possible -- it is so easy to jump right in and be immediately taken over by the characters and the world and the plot, you never feel like you’re fighting to engage even though the world-building is fascinating and expansive. It welcomes you in right away, it was the book equivalent of a quilt and a hug which is something I sorely needed with all this pandemic bullshit. If you read any of the books on this list, go read that one while I sit here in pain waiting for the sequel.

Kid Paddle

I watched the cartoon of Kid Paddle as a kid and was thinking about it recently, so I decided to hunt down some of the original comics online. They’re fun and weird, with a cute art style and fantastic monsters designs. (My favourites are always about Kid either daydreaming or playing games that involve Midam’s weird warty troll creatures. It’s like a cross between Calvin and Hobbes and Foxtrot with the fun sort of quirks that I love in Belgian comics. Unfortunately, unlike Asterix, I’ve only come across these ones in French, but if you can read French it’s totally worth popping over to The Internet Archive and reading the ones they have available.

The Last Firehawk: The Golden Temple

The lastest Firehawk book. Despite being written for quite young readers, I did enjoy the early books in this series quite a bit. They’re about a young owl and squirrel who found an egg for a magical species that was believed to be extinct. With the newly hatched firehawk, the three of them head off on a mission to find an ancient firehawk magic that could save the entire forest. Very basic adventure story but a good intro to the tropes for children. Unfortunately the quality really feels like it drops with each subsequent book; this will probably be the last one I bother reading.

Lumberjanes: The Moon Is Up

I honestly think I enjoy these Lumberjanes novels even more than the comics just because it really gives time to delve into each story and examine how the camper are really thinking and feeling about everything. (Also I’m always weak for novelizations of anything.) The Moon Is Up is a book that focuses more on Jo, and takes place during the camp’s much anticipated Galaxy Wars, a competition between cabins that goes over several days. While the campers prepare for these challenges though, they also run into a strange little creature with a penchant for cheese and theft. Roanoke cabin needs to keep ahead in Galaxy Wars and somehow deal with the fearsome Moon Pirates that a closing in...

Lumberjanes v4 (Out Of Time)

One of the Lumberjanes comics, a cool, girl-focused, queer comic series. Honestly, this is just a fun series that I never got as into as I should have. My advice is honestly to skip book one because it gets better as it continues, and I’ve really been enjoying the later books now that I’ve given it another go. It follows five campers at Miss Qiunzella Thiskwin Penniquiqul Thistle Crumpet’s Camp for Hardcore Lady Types (Jo, April, Molly, Mal, and Ripley) as they handle all sorts of challenges, from friendship to crushes, camp activities to supernatural horrors, getting badges to not being brutally killed. Great if you liked the vibe of Gravity Falls but want it to be queer-er.

Mooncakes

Another queer graphic novel, but unfortunately not a very good one. It really looked appealing and I had high hopes, but the book itself really didn’t hold up… I actually couldn’t even finish it, the plot was just too… non-existent. The art is fairly mediocre once you actually look at it, especially backgrounds, and it feels very… placid. Not much conflict or excitement or even a very compelling reason to keep reading. If you just want a soft queer supernatural you may get more mileage out of it than me, but it didn’t really do it for me. There’s better queer graphic novels out there.

New Boy In Town

One of the worst books I have ever read. My girlfriend had ordered a very different book online but through a frankly stupendous error was sent this 1980s pulp romance instead. Absolutely nauseating on levels I couldn’t even begin to enumerate here. Naturally we read the whole thing out loud. Probably took us 10 times longer to finish than it warranted because I had to stop every two sentences to lose my mind. If you like bad decisions, baffling hetero courting rituals, built-in cultural Christianity without actually calling it that, and gold panning then boy howdy is this the book for you.

(seriously, you better have patience for gold-panning if you attempt this one, because I sure learn that I don’t)

Piggies

This was a picture book I enjoyed as a kid and had a reason to reread recently. Honestly it’s just very cute and simple, and the art is completely mesmerizing. Wonderful if you know a young child that would enjoy a simple goofy boardbook.

Shaun the Sheep: Tales From Mossy Bottom

Related to my Aardman fascination earlier this month. I tried reading a varieties of Shaun the Sheep books — most of which are mediocre at best — but the Tales From Mossy Bottom Farm series is genuinely good. Just chapter books, of course, but the illustrations match the series’ concept art and each story feels like it could have jumped directly out of an episode. They’re just cute and feel-good! Kinda like Footrot Flats but more for kids, and from the sheep’s perspective moreso than the dog’s.

[wanderinglimeblood]

In case anyone’s wondering, that’s supposed to be a door opening, not Xephyr just “woosh”ing in, lol (amusing though that is). Art program size restrictions are trying to paint a different narrative here lol

[escapehatchcomic]

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Oh.

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[createandconstruct]

can i ask about amarant coral? the monk in red himself~

Can you ask about Amarant Coral? *cracks fingers* Oh I insist that you do. Welcome to my Amarant Appreciation Post:

favorite thing about them: First off best thing about Amarant? His theme. The percussion and the guitar. It’s great and it captures him so well. People out here like “take Amarant out of the game he adds nothing.” EXCUSE ME? You remove the Amarant you remove the Amarant Theme my friend and that is something I do NOT vibe with. 

least favorite thing about them: I wanna know more about him. Now Amarant doesn’t need a backstory or history in the game. In a sense, he already has one that connects him to Zidane and explains his motives and actions and eventual arc. But my issue is, Square never gave him anything else. If you look at Ultimania there’s additional lore about other characters, like Steiner for instance. You learn Steiner was a war orphan who was saved by the Pluto Knights - explaining his devotion to them. Amarant though? Square was like “uh... yeah he was born....? And then he uh got famous...? Idk then he met Zidane. You figure it out.” Square. I hate you. 18 years from his birth until he became “well known”. WHAT WAS HE DOING. WHY’D HE BECOME A SECURITY GUARD. WHAT WAS ON HIS RESUME. TELL MEEEE. Like, okay, what the actual in-game canon gives us on Amarant is sort of enough. He’s a purposely written mysterious “cool-guy” character so we’re given scraps to make him unknown but come on. In the published after-game canon, like Ultimania, we could have been given a bit more. He says he doesn’t remember anything about his origins or parents, but why. Was he another victim of Gaia’s wars? Probably. Was he born on a battlefield? Fighting for his life, living without comrades, taking scraps whenever he could? Was he betrayed when he was young? Is he a supposed to be a version of Zidane had he not been adopted into Tantalus by Baku??? These are questions I deserve answers to, Square.

favorite line: “’I can't just walk away. It goes against my nature...’ You're a real simpleton. Forget it, guys. There's no stopping this fool." I love this. Amarant figures Zidane out pretty quickly after Ipsen’s Castle. Zidane is hardheaded and also an actor. He acts cool and pretends his reasons for doing things are loose but when he’s decided something it’s always for a reason. You don’t need a reason to help people, but Zidane has his reasons for helping Kuja and while Amarant doesn’t give two shits what they are he knows Zidane won’t be stopped because, despite everything, Zidane saved a loser like him. Also this line “Tell me! Why didn't you kill me!?" Because I quote it all the time and it makes myself laugh. Amarant is such a drama queen and Zidane knows it. Zidane’s like “dude... what is your damage, it’s 5 pm on Tuesday in Madain Sari. I ain’t getting blood on my gloves cause you’re having a temper tantrum.” And then Amarant runs away to have an existential crisis. He’s 26 but compared to Zidane, he’s the real teenager with angst.  

brOTP: I could talk about Zidane or Freya with Amarant but instead I’m gonna say the underrated dynamic of Amarant and Eiko (and also Vivi).  Amarant with the kids is truly the greatest gift given by his presence in the game. Amarant has never known true suffering until he became a designated legal guardian of a group of minors. It also kills me how he’s the one to volunteer to carry Eiko and Vivi up the Iifa tree. He looks at Zidane and is like “you have seriously been the ‘adult’ of this group???”

OTP: Gotta say the Freya and Amarant dynamic. I really enjoyed their unlikely friendship in the game but then the content. The fan content. The Freya x Amarant fans out there, you win. Ya got me. You captured me and I am now imprisoned by their banter and begruntled allies to lovers story. Even if they’re not romantic I love them together and really wish the game gave us more of them. But even Lani and Amarant together are valid, though I prefer them as butting head bros. Not much content for my girl Lani out there either, she deserves more.

nOTP: Nothing I can think of. I tend to like platonic pairings for Amarant. The dude needs friends because he can barely define the word friendship.

random headcanon: Before Zidane returns at the end of the game Amarant wanders around a bit, unsure of what to do. He doesn’t feel any place with the others in Alexandria, Burmecia, or Lindblum. I imagine he goes off on his own for a bit like before but this time he’s not after Zidane or a fight. Instead he’s got no particular destination. Yet he somehow always finds himself running into people just like him - or the old him - friendless lonely people who are looking for a fight. He doesn’t go out his way to find these folks he simply runs into them and decides he might as well knock some sense into them. He does however make it his business to go after any murmur of people hatching any ideas of going after the far off little village on the Lost Continent. The home of the genomes and black mages. They were so helpless, so weak that anyone who’d want to mess with them is pathetic in Amarant’s book. Until Zidane returns, no one has the chance to even look at the Black Mage Village the wrong way because in the shadows Amarant lurks, making damn well sure of that.

unpopular opinion: I kinda love that he’s just there for most of the game? While I agree he gets the short end of the stick in the same way as Freya, not receiving additional individual character spotlight (which could have very well been supplied through discoverable lore in the world/npcs or through sidequests) I never considered his “standing off to the side” as a detriment to his character. 

Many would probably agree that Amarant always felt like a bit of a parody of the loner character, or at least the stereotype of the loner character. Amarant is so easily paralleled with Squall and Cloud’s surface-level attitudes because his dialogue always felt like something to poke fun at. As the player we’re supposed to align with Zidane’s way of thinking and how he views Amarant. When Amarant loses to Zidane and pretty much grits his teeth and goes “KILL ME,” along with Zidane we’re supposed to kinda raise our brow at him and go “...really, dude?”

 Amarant’s a character introduced as an antagonist who has more in common with the power hungry villains of the game. Like many of the characters in FFIX, Amarant is in search of purpose in life, which he has never found, because he was always looking in the wrong places - in places of violence and power. Very toxic-masculinity of him. Amarant is “cool” on an aesthetic level but in reality he’s the polar opposite of cool in terms of what FFIX states about the need for others to be intertwined in your experiences so that you can live a full life. 

I sort of love that he’s like a grumpy pitball following a 16 year old and his friends around. Then he sits in the corner when they all meet up and discuss current events acting like he doesn’t care (not to mention he casually walks as everyone is running as fast as they can to escape Terra - made me laugh cry on my first playthrough) He is “just there” but that’s because he has no where else to be, no where else to go, he’s a man without a home. And until Zidane offers his hand, at the point where Amarant is most willing to take it at Ipsen’s Castle, he’s not truly a party member. He IS an outsider for almost the entire game but at Ipsen Castle he joins the party, becomes a comrade, and decides he’ll allow himself to change paths and start a life where he has friends and lives, as well as fights for them. Which is why after that moment, Amarant finally has a victory pose.

song i associate with them: I was scratching my head for so long trying to think of a song or track that had Amarant vibes until it hit me. Outskirt Stand by Tsukasa Tawada (from Pokemon Colosseum). Amarant is so chill, he’s not a bombastic guy, so he needs a theme that drops me in the rocky open desert of the Lost Continent like I’m just lumbering around looking for a monkey-tailed menace. Some other Amarant tunes:  Pyrite Town, The Under, Snagem Hideout tracks from Pokemon Colosseum. This post is just an elaborate call to action for everyone to listen to the Pokemon Colosseum soundtrack. Tsukasa Tawada is so great and he has a YouTube. Check him out.

favorite picture of them:

Yoshitaka Amano’s Salamander Coral. I love him. He had too much power. 

Also everything drawn by @crispy-ghee. Everything. I will think of this Comic forever until I die. Tattoo it on my flesh. The banter, the dynamics, the post-game content, the Zidane prince-consort outfit, the new Amarant outfit, the stuck-in-the-same-place relationship him and Freya have. Perfect. Go read it and consume Crisipy’s stuff. And also check them and their current art out, they just consistently get better and better. Here’s a first panel preview of my fav comic. Read it.

 @hannahlady​‘s Amarant art and their Freya/Amarant art is just ugh. *Chef’s Kiss* Here is another preview because you should go look at it.

Here’s a piece that deserves so much more love by @snackage. I LOVE how they drew Amarant. Here’s a little preview. It’s SO GOOD

Anyway TL;DR: Amarant is love and life and you’ll have to pull him from my little gremlin hands.

[scaredyships]

Renegades (Din Djarin x gn!Reader) | pt. III

summary: Mando picks out the planet Sorgan for the three of you to lie low on. Things get complicated, Reader gets a glimpse of how hectic Mando's life can be as a bounty for hire, and everybody is confused about feelings.

word count:  14.5k (...help)

author’s notes: Good LORD I was stuck on this for way too long. Between my creative focus being elsewhere and just being completely stuck as to how I wanted some scenes to play out, it took a lot for me to do more than a sentence or two at a time and then forget about it for days or weeks at a time.

This was also hard to write bc I am very uhhh put off by Omera and her original role as the possible love interest and I was trying very hard to remain believable/respectful about her. Cara Dune was also hard to write because of certain actions by her actor, so she's got a little bit of a lesser role.

I'm saying this now, with future chapters I am not going to be going episode-by-episode like I originally intended. I might jump around and have some "filler" things, I may completely skip over some episode happenings, I may diverge from canon here and there, but generally the outcomes will be the same as the show. I cut out the actual battle of Sorgan too bc this is already too long and I am terrible at writing action scenes. :v

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 (you are here) // ao3 link

---

It had been a couple days since you’d set yourself up a space in the hold. At least, it felt like a couple days. You weren’t accustomed to space travel and dealing with the lack of solar cycles to indicate the passage of time, so it was difficult to tell exactly. It didn’t really matter, in the end, but it was still a little annoying.

In that time, you spent most of your time getting to know your way around the Razor Crest’s small layout, what panels and buttons did what, and making sure the child on board was cared for and didn’t get into anything he shouldn’t. Easier said than done, as that kid was surprisingly sneaky and far too curious. He seemed well-behaved, right up until you weren’t looking, and the next thing you knew he was doing something like rooting around in a pile of netting and getting hopelessly tangled, or trying to put things in his mouth to teethe on.

Right now, the kid was up in the cockpit with Mando. Even though you were on board to help out, Mando still seemed to feel better when he was in the same room as the kid versus you being the one supervising, and to be honest it was nice to have a break from babysitting. You had never wanted kids of your own to begin with, and though this kid wasn’t exactly your standard child, it reinforced that at the end of the day, the factor of being able to give the child back to their actual caregiver played a large role in just how tolerant you were of them.

The entire ship suddenly jerked to the side and sent you crashing into the hull wall, your shins narrowly avoiding smashing against the edge of one of the crates lying around. To say you were shaken was a bit of an understatement, despite not a moment later, the normal smooth flight pattern returning and the ship righting itself. Did Mando hit something? Was some part of the ship on the verge of breaking down completely? You did a quick sweep to make sure none of the weapons lockers were damaged and that nothing was in danger of going ogg. You swore, this man had far too much firepower on board and one day it was going to come back and bite him.

Fortunately, everything was where it should be and the only things really out of place was your now-askew space, and your frazzled self. Huffing, you sped over to the ladder and clambered up to the cockpit to see if you could find out what was going on. On your way up, you could hear the low, modulated voice of Mando speaking, very likely to the child with the tone you could pick up.

“Ready to lay low and stretch your legs for a couple months, you little womp rat? Nobody’s gonna find us there.”

“Nobody’s gonna find us where?” Your head and shoulders were poking out of the ladder hatch, arms folding over the edge as you gave the pair a pointed look. You weren’t about to let Mando decide where you were going to camp out for months without you giving some input.

The Mandalorian turning to face you with the child in his lap was almost comical, like they’d been caught doing something they weren’t expecting to be called out on. You didn’t see any sign of concern over whatever had shaken you down below, so you figured you could bring that up later.

You could see a holomap beyond Mando, though it was too far for you to make out any of the text on it. You dragged yourself the rest of the way into the cockpit, righting yourself and coming to a halt just far enough that you could read the screen.

“An outer rim planet.” He leaned aside and let you read the screen’s details. Sorgan, huh. You vaguely remember that name from when you were compiling planets for Mando back when this whole mess started. The details past that escaped you, though. You squinted as you read on. No populations outside of small settlements to speak of, no starports or anything industrial… and it was one of those planets made up of a single biome - swamp.

To be honest, you weren’t thrilled at the idea of actually camping out for so long in such a place. You were so accustomed to being in places that had somewhat larger settlements, and absolutely more tech than this planet likely had, not just for business but simple things like staying entertained. But you were even less thrilled at the fact that this was a  swamp  planet. You knew not all swamp planets were the same, but the simple holomap readout didn’t indicate any further details about what kind of swamps it was made up of.

You hope above all things it’s not a bog planet like Nal Hutta. Gaseous atmosphere, skies choked by sickly green clouds, brown water, hardly any land to speak of.

You turned and gave Mando a look. “No information about the biome past ‘swamp’?”

He shook his head in that slow, deliberate way of his. You exhaled through your nose.

“Not a fan of swamps?”

“You could say that.” You turned back to the screen, like staring at it might make it give up more information.  Maker , you missed your database.

“How far away are we?”

“Not very, maybe an hour or two.”

You stepped back and fell unceremoniously into one of the passenger seats further back in the cockpit. The child, who had been watching you through this whole exchange, seemed to lose his interest once you sat down and went back to looking curiously around at the controls laid out in front of Mando. You could almost see the cogs turning in his head, and you started to suspect he had something to do with the ship going sideways earlier. Probably got a hold of the controls somehow.

“I guess I’ll have a better idea of where we’re going once we get a look at the planet.”

The Mandalorian nodded, and turned back to the controls to pilot you all there.

You had been closer than you anticipated, though it was still not a very short journey. Instead of going back down to the hull, you opted to stay in the passenger seat and simply wait. Jumping to hyperspace was something you had yet to get used to, but after so long of the smooth traveling with the smears of light streaking past the windscreens, you found you could relax a little and rest your eyes.

A jolt in the ship as you exited hyperspace shook you awake. Blinking and sitting up in your chair, you peered out the window at the planet taking up the view.

Deep green. Streaks of blue. White cloud cover. You breathed a sigh of relief and slumped back against the chair back.

“Acceptable?” There was a hint of amusement in Mando’s voice. You smirked at him.

“Yeah, I’m fine with it.” You actually were looking forward a little to seeing just what kind of plant life was on this planet. You could see a fair amount of tree coverage, which meant forests. It had been far too long since you’d seen proper forests, let alone been out in one. You had tried to replicate it with your plant corner back home, but it was never the same. Some time amongst real trees would do you good.

The descent had you watching out the window the whole time, surveying the landscape as its features came into view. It had its marshes and rivers, but equal amounts of coniferous forests and solid land. This place could almost pass for an arboreal biome planet in places. You spotted very few settlements on the way in, too, and what you did see looked to be the most basic of small villages.

Mando landed the Razor Crest some ways away from a small market, hidden amongst ample tree coverage. He locked down the controls and lifted the kid with one arm, removing a small silver ball from his clutches to attach to one of the levers in the array.

“I’m going to go out and find us some lodging. Wait here with the kid. Don’t let him touch anything. I’ll be back.”

He passed the child off to you, with such surety that you’d take him that he nearly dropped the little one on you before you could respond. You grabbed him with both hands in a slight panic, thinking he was about to fall, and in doing so your fingers gripped into the gloved ones already supporting his weight. Even with the barrier between skin-to-skin contact, it was awkward and had your face heating with embarrassment that you’d accidentally touched the bounty hunter. He, however, made no indication of any such reaction, damn that helmet making him unreadable. His hands withdrew once it was certain the child was in your grasp safely.

You and the child stared at each other as you held him out before you, like you weren’t sure what to do with him now. He looked back at you with a similar expression, and you swore there was a hint of some sort of mischief underneath it. Oh, he had definitely  been the one to make the ship go off-kilter, no doubt now. And knowing your luck, he was going to do more of the same once Mando left. You’d already experienced him trying to eat trash despite you actively watching him, you knew he was capable of more.

Mando descended the ladder into the hold, and the sound of the ramp opening up reached the cockpit. You looked out the windscreen, watching as the Mandalorian appeared in your field of view just as the sound of the ramp closing itself back up sounded.

And that was all it took.

The child turned into a complete nightmare the instant it was clear Mando was gone. It didn’t matter what you did - first he fussed and squirmed to be let down, so you did, and the second you turned your head he had somehow managed to get into the pilot’s seat and was attempting to mess with the controls. Every time you picked him up, he fussed again, wriggling and whining loudly, and whenever you set him back down he went straight for whatever he knew he could get in trouble for. You tried to keep this up as long as you could, which proved to be a pathetic five minutes or so. It was like having an extra-smart, extra-naughty loth cat with thumbs on board.

“Okay, kid. We’re going down to the hold. You can’t accidentally start the ship up down there.” You snatched the kid up under his armpits, and though he continued fussing, it was much less, like perhaps he wanted to be in the hold. You knew that the hold had just as much, if not more, for him to get into trouble with, what with the armory down there, but it was better than possibly starting up the engines and taking off.

You awkwardly climbed down the ladder with one arm latched around the child, and once you reached the floor you set him down, hoping he’d behave a little more. How wrong you were. It was like the kid instinctively knew where the controls for the ramp were, because he made a beeline for that panel - knocking whatever he could out of the way just to accentuate his point - and reached his-far-too-short arms into the air like he could possibly reach it if he just tried hard enough. No amount of you trying to redirect his attention or picking him up to set him down elsewhere worked, he would cry and go straight back to the panel and give you repeated looks with big, desperate eyes, like you were a monster for not understanding he wanted to open the door.

“Mando told us to stay here. So we’re going to stay here until he gets back.”

It was when the loud crying started that you knew you had lost the battle.

That alone was one of your top reasons for not desiring children - you couldn’t handle the noise that came with an upset child. Not for any good parental reason like not wanting to see them sad. You genuinely couldn’t stand the screaming, it set you on edge and made  you want to scream in turn. And here one was, cries bouncing off the hull walls and drilling into your eardrums with far more force than you could have imagined possible for something so small.

You rushed as fast as you could towards the control panel and slammed the button to open the ramp.

“OKAY!  Okay, okay, you win, we’ll go find him.” You glared down at the kid, whose clear face and perked ears indicated the crying had all been an act. You sighed heavily. He’d only known you for maybe a few days and he already knew how to get you to do what he wanted.

“He’s not going to be happy, you know that, right.” The child just tilted his head at you, smug little face seeming to say “no, he can’t get mad at me”.

You wandered back to your area not too far off to get some of your outerwear on - your belt, your ear piece, your blaster, whatever you might need in the immediate future. The neck gaiter you loosely wore got pulled up to securely cover the lower half of your face - it made you feel more secure, somehow, when you were venturing out into strange places. You picked the kid up and awkwardly shifted him to one arm, making your way down the ramp, and hoping you wouldn’t get into  too  much trouble with the bounty hunter. The kid, meanwhile, happily burbled in your grasp.

With a deep sigh and a roll of your eyes, you marched out onto the planet’s surface in the direction you had seen Mando go.

-

You were right. Mando wasn’t happy at all.

He had been trudging along, lost in his thoughts about what kind of lodging he should be looking for now that there wasn’t just him, but you and a child to account for, but still attentive enough to his surroundings that when he heard what sounded like distant footsteps crunching through the undergrowth he paused.

It was when he heard the sounds of the child babbling and you calling out to him to wait that his wariness turned to mild panic, and he rushed towards where he could hear your voices, hand staying within reaching range of his blaster. What had happened? He told you to stay back at the Crest and yet here you were, with the child. Had you been discovered, and just barely escaped? Was the Razor Crest captured?

He came to a halt just a few feet from you, surveying you and the child for any signs of distress or damage, stance wary and ready for a fight.

“What happened?” His tone was terse, apprehensive.

You looked wryly down at the bright-eyed child in your grasp, and back up at the bounty hunter. Or rather, somewhere in the general vicinity of him, as you found you couldn’t look directly at him.

“He, uh. Was very upset at you leaving without him.”

Mando’s defensive posture deflated and he tilted his head in a way that you  knew  he was giving you a disbelieving look.

“I told you to stay put, and the kid throwing a fit is all it took for you to leave?” He didn’t miss the way your mouth tightened into a thin line and your brow furrowed.

“He wouldn’t stop trying to be destructive, and when I tried to move him he’d just scream and go for the ramp! Look, I  told  you I wasn’t the best out there with kids.” You snapped, glaring into the blank visor.

Honestly, he could tell you were disappointed in yourself for caving so easily, and he probably wouldn’t have fared much better with his own lack of experience with children. But you could have been followed, and now the ship was unattended. The child, however, looked content as ever, his plan having worked. He sighed. It was what it was at this point. At least he was still in range that could lock the ship up remotely with his vambrace controls, which he set to doing immediately.

“Come on, then.” He motioned with a hand as he turned back to the direction he had come from, cape swirling around his form dramatically. You exchanged a tired glance with the smug kid, having half a mind to set him down and make him walk the rest of the way to wherever you were going.

“You’re lucky you’re at least a little cute.”

By the time you get to civilization, you’d let the kid down to walk - just beside Mando, and you just behind the child. Two unlikely bodyguards for an equally unlikely “dignitary”. The towering trees thinned out on the edge of the small market center, man-made structures beginning to appear. The buildings were small, mostly made of wicker and wood, with very little in the way of tech. The people were equally simple, their dress and presentation reflecting their rural occupations.

With the interest of the child in mind, Mando led the three of you into a common house, the busy sounds of kitchen work and the smell of grilling food easily reaching you before you even got to the entrance. It would have been more welcoming, if it wasn’t also accompanied by nearly everyone turning their eyes to your odd trio and whispering amongst themselves. On one hand, you couldn’t completely blame them, as the three of you were like the lead-up to a bad joke come to life. But it still made you very uncomfortable, knowing without a doubt that you were being watched and discussed. You hated the feeling. You self-consciously adjusted the fabric masking your face and furrowed your brow to try and give off the most “do not approach” energy you could, glancing around at the tenants. Not many of them returned your gaze, save a few, including one woman who didn’t at all look like she was from there. Strong, wearing armor and weapons - not to the extent of the Mandalorian, of course. But you could still feel that she wasn’t to be messed with. You averted your gaze quickly.

The child, meanwhile, was bright as ever with this new place he was in. He looked around the establishment, taking in the new scenery and the light filtering in through the gaps of the woodwork with his big eyes. You in turn watched him, as Mando located a table for the three of you. You followed suit and sat at the table, and as you turned to see what the kid was up to, you noticed the little one had locked eyes with a tooka cat beneath the chair of a nearby tenant. The child was curious, but you knew enough about tooka cats to know that the way it was looking back meant it was interpreting the child’s staring as threatening to its peace. Very few animals took maintaining eye contact as anything but a challenge, and this was no different.

“Leave it alone, kid.” You murmured just loud enough that you hoped he’d hear. Your words were too late, as the cat’s lips pulled back and revealed its enormous maw of teeth in a menacing hiss. The child flinched back with a frightened noise, and next thing you knew you were snatching him up by the ruff of his oversized coat and plopping him in the seat beside you.

There was barely any time for any of you to exchange glances when a proprietor approached the table, face weathered but welcoming.

“Welcome, travelers. Can I interest you in anything?”

“Bone broth, for the little one.” Mando motioned with his hand towards the child. You suppressed giving the armored man a skeptical look for ordering the most basic of things for the kid, when it was obvious they had more substantial food in this establishment. It was fine, you told yourself, he had the final say and this wasn’t the place to call him out on his decisions.

“Oh, well, you’re in luck. I just took down a grinjer, so there’s plenty. Can I interest you in a porringer of broth as well?” Mando shook his head. The proprietor turned her gaze to you expectantly.

“No, thank you.” You put your palm out in a placating gesture. Even though the aroma of food filtered through your face covering and had a tempting quality to it, somewhere as public as this was absolutely not somewhere you’d be comfortable trying to eat at. If you could take it to go, maybe. But you had no idea where you’d even be staying at this point, or how much longer you’d be looking for such a place. No, you could wait.

The proprietor nearly began to speak again when Mando cut her off. “That one over there, when did she arrive?”

So, you hadn’t been the only one to notice the intimidating woman across the room. Well, it wasn’t that difficult, with how much she stuck out amongst the residents of the planet. You three were equally as noticeable, and you didn’t miss how the woman was still watching you, though she was trying to be discreet about it. There was wariness coming off of her, you could feel that much.

The proprietor glanced towards where Mando had indicated the strange woman to be, seemingly confused. “Uh, I’ve seen her here for the last week or so.”

Mando continued pressing her for answers she didn’t have. “What’s her business here?”

“Business?” The proprietor looked as confused as ever. “Well, there’s not much business on Sorgan, so I can’t say…” The sound of credits clinking onto the countertop reached in your ears as Mando casually tossed some onto the tabletop. You were too busy watching the woman out of your peripheral vision to pay too much attention to what he was up to. The proprietor mentioned the woman not being a log runner, and offered complimentary spotchka before she left to retrieve the order.

The moment the woman stood and moved to leave the common house, you discreetly rapped your knuckle against Mando’s vambrace. The black T of his visor turned towards you, and you vaguely twitched your fingers in the direction the woman had been moments before. “She’s leaving.” You murmured as lowly as you could so Mando could hear but others couldn’t. You didn’t get any impression of real danger or malice from her, but knowing that the three of you had prices on your heads, you had a feeling the bounty hunter would try to follow her and make sure she wasn’t about to report on your whereabouts to anyone.

Mando stood from his seat, gaze trained on the doorway to the establishment. “Stay here with the kid. I’ll be back.”

And there it was. You exhaled through your nose and looked down at the kid, comically small in his chair and watching as the beskar-clad man made his way to the exit and out of sight.

You wondered how often he went out of his way to pick possible fights like this.

The proprietor returned to the table and placed a small bowl in front of the child, breaking you from your thoughts. The complimentary bottle of spotchka made an appearance, too, but you didn’t pay much mind to it. Alcohol was never something you liked, between it being an acquired taste and dulling your thoughts. You still nodded appreciatively at her before she left to tend to the next table.

Before the kid could finish picking up his bowl, the faintest of sounds reached your ears. While you normally wouldn’t pay much mind to such things in a public place, there was some notion in your mind that it was the buckethead getting into a fight with the woman from earlier. You looked over at your tiny companion, who looked up at you over the brim of his bowl and towards the doorway Mando had left through moments earlier.

“He doesn’t need our help, we’ll just get in the way.”

The kid seemed to take that as a challenge, and hopped down from his seat and began to toddle off.

“Hey, no, we are  not going out there-” You jumped up and tried to herd him back towards the table, and you almost succeeded, but the little green thing was surprisingly determined and avoided your awkward movements, both of you caught up in a ridiculous dance. The tenants were watching you and your face heated with embarrassment. You finally scooped up the rapscallion with one arm, narrowly avoiding some of the broth sloshing from his bowl and onto the floor.

“Fine, we’ll go see what’s going on. Just stop trying to run off on me.” You pointed meaningfully at the kid with your index finger, peering into those big dark eyes and hoping he actually listened. He looked back at you with those big bright eyes and perked ears in a way that somehow told you he understood.

You carefully set him back on the ground. “Stay close.”

Exiting the establishment and turning the corner was as far as you needed to go to see just what you suspected - Mando and the woman scrabbling to get the upper hand against the other. It was almost comical, in a way, even though blasters were involved and the situation could very well turn dangerous.

And it nearly did just that when the two fell on the ground with blasters pointed at each other’s heads -  causing you to pull your own blaster from its holster - except everything was interrupted by a very loud slurp from the child as he watched from beside you, bowl of broth clutched tightly. The slow turns of their heads and prolonged look from both of them was enough of an announcement of a stalemate as any. You snorted and shook your head slightly at the scene.

“I take it you don’t actually want to kill each other, then.” You slightly lowered your blaster from where it was aimed at the woman. You didn’t miss the way Mando paused in a way that you imagined he was rolling his eyes under his helmet. He turned his attention back to the woman he was still vaguely pointing his blaster at.

“Would you like some soup?”

-

You all returned to the table you’d had back in the common house. The woman - named Cara Dune, you learned - told you her story. She was a former shock trooper for the former Rebel Alliance working on Endor, with no additional support, and as soon as the ex-Imperials were gone the politics got out of hand and she found herself working to “keep the peace”. Beating rioters and favoring delegates wasn’t what she’d signed up for, so she left, and now had a price of her own for desertion. She recognized Mando as being part of the Guild and suspected he’d come looking for her. She kept glancing curiously at you throughout her explanation, like she wasn’t sure what to make of you tagging around with a Mandalorian bounty hunter and why he was even letting it happen. Sure, the child was an equally puzzling factor, but she seemed to sense he was a touchy subject.

She eventually turned to you after her explanation was finished. “So what’s your story?”

You shrugged, idly adjusting one of your wrist pieces. “He got my house blown up and put me on a wanted list, so this is his way of dealing with the guilt.”

Cara visibly bites back a laugh and tries to hide behind her own cup of broth. You glance over at your companion, whose stiff posture tells you he’s not sure how to react, but he’s definitely embarrassed to some degree.

The ex-trooper downs the last of her broth, and stands from the table. “Well, this has been a real treat. But unless you wanna go another round, one of us is gonna have to move on, and I was here first.” She gives you all a curt nod, and walks away.

Mando leans back in his own chair and looks between you and the kid, who’s working on his second helping of broth. “Well, looks like this planet’s taken.”

-

The walk back to the Razor Crest was a somber one for you. Now that you had spent some time on the surface, you’d actually taken a bit of a liking to the place. But Mando was right - as remote as this planet was, it could likely only handle one fugitive at a time. Looked like it was back to the ship directory to root through whatever systems it could access. You tried not to let your mind wander off to mourn your lost database again. This was exactly why you compiled lists of multiple options, in case something like this happened and one of those choices fell through.

A tug on your pant leg dragged you from your mulling. You looked down and were met with the concerned face of the child looking back up at you.

“I’m okay, don’t worry about me.” The kid burbled quietly at you in response. That seemed to catch Mando’s attention, as he was now looking questioningly back at you.

“Something wrong?”

You exhaled through your nose, trying to come up with a brief answer that wasn’t too revealing. You weren’t big on talking about your feelings, and you got the impression that neither was Mando, so between the two of you it would be better if it was kept to a minimum.

“Feeling a little useless on the front of hunting for a planet, that’s all.” It was the first time you’d felt this useless in a  very  long time, to be honest, but you weren’t about to let that part out.

Mando turned back to continue the trek back to the Razor Crest. “We’ll figure something out.” His tone was superficially dull, but you could tell he was trying in his own way to sound reassuring. That counted for something.

Once you made it back to the Crest, which was safe and sound amongst the trees, the two of you got to work - the Mandalorian using the dying daylight to look over the ship for maintenance, while you took up the task of sifting through the planetary database for your next options. Originally Mando wanted you to take the child up with you so he’d be better contained, but after a pitiful look from those big, dark eyes, it was over and decided that he’d watch him. The “watching” very quickly turned into “put the kid to bed”, thank the maker.

It felt like you’d had barely any time to really start your search when you saw what looked like lights on the ground from your view in the cockpit. You slowly stood, watching the lights as they drew nearer. That couldn’t be anything good.

You clambered your way down the ladder and into the hold just as whoever it was pulled up. It was a small cargo sled, one that barely seemed to be holding itself together, with two men of seemingly modest origins on it. Mando wasn’t the least bit concerned about it, as he continued his repairs and ignore them as they tried to get his attention.

“Excuse me, sir?”

Mando didn’t stop working. “There something I can help you with?”

You slowly made your way towards the ramp, taking care to accentuate the sound of your boots hitting the floor and make your presence known, Mando could take care of himself, but if they knew you were here they were less likely to try anything than if he were alone. You shot them a warning glare when they glanced at you, but watching their already-anxious expressions deepen almost made you regret doing so.

“Uh… yeah… raiders.” “We have money.”

You raised an eyebrow at them.

“You think I’m some kind of mercenary?” Mando still made no indication he was going to stop his work for them.

That was enough to get them stammering. First about how they’d read about Mandalorians, and how they thought he was one based on his armor, and if half of what they read was true then they could recruit him for help. One emphasized again, that they had money.

“How much?” Mando had paused his working, turning more attention to these strangers.

“Everything we have, sir. Our whole harvest was stolen.”

“Krill… We’re… krill farmers.” “We brew spotchka. Our whole village chipped in.”

You don’t know what else you were expecting from locals of the planet, but the coin purse one of the men held up as proof of payment was sad to say the least. Krill farming and spotchka brewing didn’t strike you as a very lucrative business anyways, but if that was all they could muster…?

“It’s not enough.” And there was Mando, confirming your suspicions about what his rates were. You didn’t recall him being picky about his bounty, but thinking back, he did go for higher bounties more often than not. It looked like he still held onto that standard despite no longer being part of the Guild. Hell, if you were going by your own rates, what they appeared to have on hand wouldn’t even cover half of your cheapest services.

Mando finished what he’d been doing and made his way up the ramp towards you. The men following him up the ramp was unexpected, but not frightening. They were desperate, and you were getting a better sense of just how much.

“Are you sure? You don’t even know what the job is.” One of them tried to look to you for support. You stared back apprehensively.

“I know it’s not enough. Good luck.” Mando brushed past you, using your form as a barrier between him and the strangers as he retreated further into the hold.

“This is everything we have! We’ll give you more after the next harvest!” You stayed where you were, crossing your arms and staring the men down. You knew you should feel bad for them and try to convince Mando to do something, but with the last time you extended help ending with your entire life up to that point being destroyed, you were too wary to do so.

The two men looked between each other and your standoffish presence. Defeated, they slowly turned to return to their sled, talking to each other as they did.

“Took us the whole day to get here. Now we have to ride back with no protection to the middle of nowhere.”

Mando had only made it a few feet past you by then, so he was definitely within earshot of their conversation. He stopped and turned on his heel, coming up behind you and stopping just behind your shoulder. It took everything in your power to appear unbothered by just how close he stood.

“Where do you live?”

The men paused, turning back to look at the man that had just dismissed them.

“A farm, weren’t you listening? We’re farmers.” The hurt was apparent in the man’s voice.

“In the middle of nowhere.”

“…yes?” The confusion was palpable. You knew where this was going and you weren’t sure you liked it.

“You have lodging?”

The men started to realize where this was going, too, and jumped to provide answers he wanted to hear.

“Yes, absolutely.” Mando briefly glanced at you, as if he was about to ask what you thought. Unfortunately for you, that never happened and he made the decision on his own.

“Good.” Mando motioned to them. “Come up and help.” He motioned to you as well, and began pulling out cargo crates to have them start loading.

You approached the man, once the other men had carried one of the crates far enough that they’re out of hearing range.

“Mando, I don’t know about this. Middle of nowhere or not, Dune’s right, this planet can’t handle more than one fugitive at a time.”

Mando continued moving crates to the ramp. “If it took them all day to get here, they’ll be isolated enough.”

“That kind of distance from civilization, however small, hasn’t stopped bounty hunters before. You of all people know that.” You glared into the T-shape of his visor. You also knew that all it took was enough time for word to get out about sighting a certain beskar-clad Mandalorian traveling with a green child to reach interested ears. For all you knew, it could be happening right now.

Mando stopped his actions to turn and face you fully.

“We can always move on after the job if it doesn’t seem right.”

You sighed heavily through your nose. That seemed to be him trying to tell you he wasn’t about to change his mind. He  had  been doing this longer than you, you supposed. You glanced towards the closed door of his bunk, where the child was sleeping.

“…fine. But I’ll hold you to that.”

You briskly moved to where your makeshift corner was and started gathering up your own things for whatever sort of stay you were in for. Behind you, you heard Mando exchange a few more words with the men as they loaded the last of the cargo he’d pushed on them onto the sled.

His heavy footsteps approached you. “I’m going back into town for a while.” You turned, and noticed the pouch of credits that one of the men had shown you earlier clutched in his hand. “Stay here to keep an eye on them and the kid. I’ll be back.”

You stared at him for a moment, then nodded slightly. “At least he’s not awake to make me come chasing after you this time.”

You swore you heard a slight snort from beneath that helmet.

-

He’d returned some time later with Cara Dune in tow, and after rousing the kid the four of you joined the two men on their journey back to their village. The cargo sled, thank the maker, was the only part of the ride, no connections made with another transport like a boat like you were fearing. You didn’t like boats much, the swaying made you anxious. Five people made it a little crowded and awkward, and try as you might to sit as far as you could on some strapped-down cargo, to try and preserve some sense of personal space, you found yourself nearly falling off one too many times.

“That’s a good way to fall off and get left behind.”

You narrowed your eyes as you stared at the beskar-clad man that had basically just talked to you like a parent.

“It’s fine. I don’t want to get in anyone’s way.”

The way he tilted his head was enough for you to practically see the skeptical look he was no doubt wearing on his hidden face. The kid, sitting beside him, watched you intently.

“Nobody’s doing anything but waiting out the ride.” He pointed to a spot on the cargo just in front of him, where there was definitely enough room for you to fit, though it meant if you tried to stretch your legs out they’d be right alongside his. Clearly, he didn’t care about that if he was doing this.

You stared at the spot like it was a trap. Almost as if to prove a point, the sled went over a particularly pronounced piece of terrain and jostled you. You very nearly fell just like Mando had said you would. The only thing that kept you from going completely overboard was your grip on the cargo’s ties, but you still flopped embarrassingly around. You saw the man’s head tilt to the side as if to say “see?”

Defeated and embarrassed, you clambered down into the open area. Thank the maker Cara Dune had decided to try and get some sleep earlier, and the two farmers transporting you were busy navigating. You didn’t think you could handle having them involved in this, admittedly silly, exchange. You kept your gaze down, not daring to even look up at the Mandalorian. The kid, however, earned himself something between a glare and a smirk when you heard a small giggle come from his direction.

You drew your legs up into your new space, both to keep from invading even more of Mando’s space, and to keep out of the child’s space as well. Mando could handle an accidental kick if you absent-mindedly shuffled; the little green one probably wouldn’t fare so well.

Once you’d settled, you leaned back onto the cargo packed behind you and tried to get as comfortable as you could manage. Which wasn’t much. Mando, however, seemed capable of doing it, as he slowly fell backwards and folded his arms behind his head. You didn’t realize how  broad he was until now, seeing up close how much space he took up just by doing that. And all over again, you felt like you were in his space, and needed to get out of it out of respect. But there was nowhere to go.

You had to snort to yourself when the child mimicked the bounty hunter and tipped backwards onto his much-softer surroundings, peering up at the dark sky with equally dark eyes. At least he was content to do that.

The sled ride stretched on for the duration of the night and into the morning, the farmers switching shifts partway through. You’d never really fallen asleep all the way, just dozed in the same position you took when you initially settled in. Your eyes had closed, and you became somewhat less aware of your surroundings, but the slightest of unusual sounds or movements still drew enough attention that you’d crack an eye open to see what was happening. All through the hours of darkness and through the light breaking over the land. So when the sled began to approach the village, you could hear it. The sounds of people working, distant voices. Opening your eyes and pushing yourself upright, you turned to look up ahead. In the distance you could see the beginnings of some sort of settlement.

You shifted your attention to the others on the sled. Cara Dune was still sleeping, though you didn’t know how. Mando and the child seemed to be out, as well. It was harder to tell with the bounty hunter because of his helmet, but the way he laid there was convincing.

Reaching over, you lightly grabbed one of the child’s clawed feet and shook it to get his attention.

“Get up, kiddo.”

He blinked awake, eyes squinting in the morning light and mouth working to remedy having gone dry while he slept with it open the night before. His big eyes shifted around to look for his Mandalorian guardian, body relaxing once he located him.

You weren’t going to try and use touch to see if  he was awake, though. That could get you stabbed or shot, what with the combination of his reflexes and waking up in a strange place.

“Mando.” You raised your voice, hoping volume alone would do the trick. Fortunately for you, it did. The man shifted and groaned like he had just come alive, his helmet shifted ever so slightly and you could tell he was looking at you.

“We’re there.”

The armored man slowly drew himself upright into a sitting position. As much as he’d tried to get comfortable, he knew he’d be fighting with a back ache for a while after sleeping like he had. It wasn’t anything he hadn’t already dealt with before, with his longer bounty hunts taking him far from his ship and civilization and requiring him to put comfort to the wayside. You, however, had probably not had to relegate yourself to such circumstances. You looked like you hadn’t actually slept, bags present beneath your eyes and a subtle, narrow-eyed scowl he hadn’t seen before on your face. You probably didn’t even know it was there.

The approach to the village was quickly noticed by the villagers, and before you knew it there was a crowd forming to welcome you.

And a lot of them were children.

You could see and hear them immediately. You squeezed your eyes shut and exhaled through your nose for a moment to steel yourself, both for the crowd and the large percentage of it being so young. You hadn’t even had a chance to really get used to the green child you were tasked with helping out with. And these kids could  talk .

The sled came to a stop, the slight jarring motion shaking Cara Dune awake. She looked around, mind working to remember the circumstances that landed her in a strange vehicle with equally strange company.

The first thing the children of the crowd did, was fixate on the child companion of yours in the sled. They were all murmuring and giggling amongst themselves, and the kid looked back at them with equally curious intent. None of you had any idea when he was last around anyone of his mentation.

“Looks like they’re happy to see us.” You heard Mando’s voice crackle through his voice modulator. Cara Dune smiled, but all you could do was blink tiredly. You weren’t ready for this.

One of the children, a girl,  broke away from the crowd and got closer to the smaller, green child, greeting him personally. You watched the interaction carefully. She seemed to notice, as she quickly made eye contact and ducked away back into the safety of the other village children.

With that, everyone disembarked the sled and began unloading cargo. You slowly rose from your spot, knees protesting from staying folded for so long and making you grit your teeth. You grabbed the pack you’d brought with you, slinging it over your shoulder and hobbling off of the sled to join the others, who were carrying their respective luggage. The child had been surrounded by the village kids, the curiosity on both sides still strong and outweighing the apprehension of the strangers with him.

It was time to be shown where you’d be staying, though. Without any words exchanged, Mando shuffled over to gather up the child, kids scattering, and you, Cara Dune, and he were led to your accommodations.

The village was modest, but cozy. The huts all had a distinct charm to them, with the same woven look as the common house, and reminding you of fishing baskets. Smoke rose from some, and in the distance you could make out man-made ponds where they likely farmed their krill.

You were all led to what appeared to be a building other than a hut. There’s a woman there, apparently putting the last touches on preparing it for guests. When she sees you approaching, she stops fussing with the blinds and turns to face you. You don’t miss how she’s focused in on the Mandalorian, with some sense of hesitation, like she wasn’t anticipating how meeting a Mandalorian in person would be. You couldn’t blame her, honestly.

“Please, come in.” You let Mando lead, watching him walk in and put his cargo down onto the floor. The woman turned and seemed mildly surprised when you entered as well, like she hadn’t really seen you before when you made your approach. Again, you couldn’t blame her - if you’d never met a Mandalorian before, it would be hard to notice anything else. That, and it made sense that should word get out in the village about a Mandalorian arriving, the last thing anyone would talk about would be his companions.

“I apologize… I didn’t realize how many guests there would be.” She glances briefly at you and the child individually. You began to feel guilty about being there at all. Of the adults that were there, you were by far the least useful for the job involving the raiders, and of the resources available for guests you felt like it would be better to distribute them amongst the others before you. The child, too, you felt deserved things before you did. You didn’t miss him looking up at you with his big dark eyes, as if he could sense your discomfort.

“Is, uh, there anywhere else available—“

“This will be fine.”

You give the beskar-clad man a perplexed look when he cuts you off. You were attempting to give the man his space back, surely he would like that better than having you hole up in the same small building?

“It’s not any different from the ship. We’ll make do.” He was looking back at you through that dark visor as if he had heard your thoughts. You blinked.

“Are you sure?”

The curt nod he gave you told you the conversation was over. Well… as long as he was okay with it.

The woman took that as her cue that she could speak again. “I’ve stacked some blankets over there, I can get more should you need them.” She indicated the area she meant. You nodded appreciatively at her.

There’s a very slight sound from the doorway, and both you and Mando turn to see the girl from before that had been talking to the child. She attempted to hide behind the doorframe, bashful about being noticed, but the woman goes to gently pull her back into sight and gently hold her to her side.

“This is my daughter Winta. We don’t get a lot of visitors around here, she’s not used to strangers.” That explains the extra feeling of being watched you’d felt on top of the village at large watching you, this girl must’ve followed along. The woman turned to face her daughter. “This nice man and his friends are going to help protect us from the bad ones.”

Winta looked shyly at you and Mando, and politely whispered a thank you. The woman took her daughter by the hand, leading her outside. “Come on, Winta, let’s give our guests some space.”

Just like that, you were left alone with your usual companions.

You glanced around, seeing that it was essentially just one open room. That wouldn’t do. Whatever Mando told you, you knew he would appreciate having a space to himself. You, also, would appreciate some semblance of privacy.

Speaking of Mando, he hadn’t moved to unpack at all, he continued to stand in place as he tried to process what he’d gotten himself into. He’d done plenty of jobs, with plenty of clients, but he wasn’t at all used to being treated like a “nice man”, as the woman had put it. He didn’t know how he was supposed to fee about it.

His buffering was briefly interrupted when you pushed past him into the barn, and began to root through the blankets that had been left and other supplies that had been pushed off to the side to make space.

“I’m going to build some sort of divide for the room. To at least make it feel like there are two rooms instead of one.” You began draping things over your shoulders and arms as you found them, and looking up at the ceiling and the walls to see what you had to work with. Part of him wanted to tell you to just sit down for now, since he could tell you weren't rested at all from the night before. But he also felt like he wouldn’t be able to stop you from your current activity until you’d finished it. He resigned himself to getting his cargo unpacked.

What he doesn’t know, is you were also trying to distract yourself from your own thoughts. You had noticed how the woman had briefly paused in the doorway as she left to look back - at Mando, and only Mando. You didn’t know why, but something about it bothered you. Was it a look of apprehension and were you offended on his behalf? No, that wasn’t it. It was some other expression that was subtle and layered and happened too fast for you to read. But it still bothered you. You tried to brush it aside and get to working on your new project instead.

-

Before long you had constructed a simple set of walls from various things you’d found around - you’d taken some sheets from the pile of blankets, and used them in conjunction with some netting and poles to fix them to the walls and ceilings similar to what you had done with your space back on the Razor Crest. A crib had been provided for the child, and you moved that onto the “half” that you’d designated Mando’s space - the larger section, and the one with the window. Your “half” was more like your “third” of the bar’s interior. Really, you didn’t mind. Mando had been busy unpacking and reconvening with Cara Dune to offer any input until it was done, anyways.

Later in the day, you’d more or less finished unpacking what little you’d brought, and Mando was tending to his rifle. You sat on a crate, idly fussing with the settings on your blaster, musing to yourself if you could possibly bother the bounty hunter in the future for something more substantial.

“Knock, knock.”

The woman from earlier stood at the door with a tray of a few plates of food in hand, her daughter in tow. You could see them, but their attention was turned to Mando and the child, who was standing in his crib. “Come in.” Mando’s voice sounded from beyond the divide in the room.

The woman entered, setting the tray down on a nearby surface and picking up a plate from it. Winta stepped forwards shyly, asking if she could feed the child. Mando wasn’t quite sure what to make of that, but he didn’t see a problem with it. “Sure.”

You watched from just around the edge of the divide, as the girl first knelt to feed the child, and then asked if she could play with him. Mando seemed just as fond of dealing with kids as you, hearing his sigh and flat “sure” in response. You smirked at that.

Once Mando had set the child on the ground, Winta immediately darted out the doorway with the child in tow. Mando started to protest, but the woman held him back. You didn’t know why, it was such a simple thing and she was coming from a place of experience where he had none, but for some reason… it made you bristle slightly. You felt like she was overstepping her bounds somehow. You shook your head briefly. She didn’t know any better, it was fine.

The woman then reached for one of the plates of food, to set on a surface closer to where Mando had been maintaining his rifle. “I brought you some food, I noticed you didn’t eat out there. I’ll leave it here for when I go.” Mando awkwardly thanked her, and moved to turn away.

You were hoping she would leave, then, but she didn’t. Instead, she asked if she could ask Mando a question. With his approval, she continued.

“How long has it been since you’ve taken that off?”

Oh, the helmet question. That was bound to happen sooner or later, honestly. You hoped she didn’t say anything too intrusive or insensitive.

“Yesterday.”

“I mean in front of someone else.”

The air felt heavy. You couldn’t quite see from your position where he was looking, but you saw him motion through the window towards what might have been the child and Winta, and other children based on the sounds of play you could hear.

“I wasn’t much older than they are.”

The woman sounded almost horrified that he hadn’t shown his face to anyone since then. The bounty hunter protested, saying that after his parents had been killed, the Mandalorians had taken him in and cared for him as their own.

It’s not like you knew what his past was, or what you expected it to be, but hearing it like this was like a punch to the gut. It was a horrible thing for him to have gone through at all, let alone as a child. You arguably had only just been getting to know him, but the fact that this woman he had never met before was able to get this fact out of him at all, let alone such a personal fact, stung. He had told you earlier that he’d trusted you. That should’ve been enough, and should’ve stopped you from having your thoughts run loose like they were.

“...I’m sorry.” The woman sounded genuinely sad.

“This is the way.”

“Let us know if there’s anything you need.”

Finally, she left. It did not escape you, though, that she hadn’t stopped to see if you had been there to let you know that she had brought you some food, as well, as you also had not left to go get food since arriving. That hurt a little bit, but with the way the prior exchange had gone it probably just slipped her mind. It wasn’t her fault. She was being a good host, she still brought it, didn’t she? You could swear, though, that she seemed to feel some sort of draw towards the bounty hunter and was acting on it in small ways. And you could not figure out why it bothered you.

Once she had left completely, you quietly crept out from behind the divide to retrieve your own plate. Mando was still standing before the window, watching the kids playing with the child. The woman now approached the crowd, no doubt to supervise and make sure they weren’t being too rough. You felt his eyes turn to you slightly.

“I uh… I’m sorry. About what happened in your past. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but I couldn’t not hear that part.”

Mando inclined his head for a moment, and then looked back up at you. “It wasn’t anything I wouldn’t have told you if it had come up.”

That lifted your mood a bit. Plate in hand, you wandered over to stand before the window, not too close but beside where Mando stood, to watch the kids.

“Looks like he’s having fun.” Mando hummed in agreement, arms folded.

You don’t notice, but the Mandalorian had turned his head ever so slightly to look at you without giving away that that’s what he was doing. He’s usually not the best at reading people, but he could tell that something about the interaction he had just had with the woman had upset you somehow - he also had not missed how she had left after speaking with him and hadn’t tried to see if you were around to speak to you, as well. This was a different kind of upset than what he had seen when you were first on his ship, after your home had been destroyed. He didn’t like it then, and he didn’t like this now. He realized didn’t like seeing you upset, or to be linked to the reason you were upset.

The two of you stood there for a few more moments, watching the villagers and the child play. You cleared your throat.

“Well, I still don’t like eating around others. I’m going to my ‘room’.” Mando felt a small smile flicker on his face at that, as you left and went back to your area.

Once you were there, you had been about to pick up a piece of the food when you heard the tell-tale sound of Mando’s helmet being removed. You didn’t know if it was the closer proximity or the conversation that had just happened, but you retreated even further into your area until you were as far away as possible, like somehow even being too close while his helmet was off was just as bad as seeing his face.

-

The job turned out to be much more complicated than any of you had thought. Surveying the woods showed that the raiders were in possession of an Imperial AT-ST, a formidable weapon to have even against trained troops, let alone a defenseless krill farm. Cara Dune was especially off-put by it, having seen the mech in action and barely escaping to tell the tale. Mando, blunt as ever, tried to tell the village’s occupants to just leave and find another place on the planet to farm, but that went over horribly - everyone was angry, saying that he’d agreed to the job and that he should keep to it, that they had lived there for generations and it took so long to even get the farm established, and so on. They insisted they could be taught to fight and help take on the raiders, stubborn in not wanting to leave their homes. Somehow, their desperation won over the bounty hunter and ex-shock trooper, and it was decided that the entire village of twenty-odd people would follow Cara Dune’s instructions to modify the village grounds into a battleground to take down the machine, and the raiders in turn.

The biggest hurdle was teaching the villagers how to fight to begin with. Nobody knew how to deal with hand-to-hand combat. None of them - except the woman, whose name was Omera - knew how to fire a blaster.

That also meant that Mando’s entire arsenal he’d brought along with him would be put to use arming everyone.

While Cara Dune was working with melee training her half of the adults, Mando was overseeing the target practice. You were more familiar with firing a blaster than you were with physical fighting, so you were attempting to help in that department, as well. You had certainly fired off your fair share of one-in-a-million hits in the times you’d even had to use your blaster, but you had no idea how you were able to do it. It was just… an instinct, somehow, that kicked in right at the moment it was needed, and would vanish just as quickly before you could even try to comprehend it. Still, though, you could try.

They were terrible.  

Shots were flying and only a small fraction were landing anywhere, and of those, even less were hitting their intended targets. Except for Omera. Every shot she fired landed square in the middle of her target, one after the other. You could see Mando watching her closely, nodding when she turned to look expectantly at him with a slight smile.

It makes you grit your teeth and you don’t know why. He’s allowed to be impressed by someone from a backwater planet being good with a blaster. He was allowed to be impressed by her tenacity to defend her village. He was allowed… and whatever this strange feeling was that you had, wasn’t allowed to get in the way. That was up to him.

You had been walking between the villagers, giving them pointers on how to better aim, but once you’d noticed what you had with the widow and Mando, something shifted in you. And unbeknownst to you, Mando was watching you, probably more than he had been watching Omera. Your eerie accuracy with your own blaster when you fired off and hit the targets, the way you went from person to person to curtly correct their poise, the way your eyes flashed as you stood back and looked from trainee to trainee with a calculating, concentrated look to determine who needed fixing where. This was a new side of you he hadn’t seen. It was intimidating… but in a good way. He caught himself being confused by his own thoughts, and reminded himself sternly that he needed to concentrate on training everyone and getting things ready.

That night, the plan would be executed. Luring the raiders out, having the villagers go hand-to-hand with the raiders while Mando and Cara Dune took care of downing the AT-ST. You hoped it would work.

-

In the weeks following the successful defeat of the raiders and destruction of their AT-ST, you stayed put in the village. You and Mando and the kid didn't have anywhere better to be, and Mando still stood by it being a good place for waiting out the hunt going on for the kid. Unlike Mando, though, you didn't feel completely safe. You still felt like it was only a matter of time before someone came looking. The raiders didn't all get killed, and though they probably hadn't laid eyes on the child, let alone the village's children in general, it would have been difficult for them to miss the beskar-clad man that they went up against. Word was going to get out.

Mando wasn't convinced. There was nothing besides your sense of unease to indicate that sort of thing would happen, and he needed more substance than that to act. And so, you were stuck there for the time being.

So you tried to make do with living during that time.

Mando spent his time being the quiet watchman of the village, keeping his weapons he'd brought along in top condition just in case. It couldn't hurt to stay vigilant. And it helped you be more at ease to know he hadn't completely shrugged off the possibility of danger.

And when he wasn't cleaning his weapons for the millionth time, or making sure the child wasn't getting into too much trouble with the village children, he was watching you.

He noticed the way you'd go sit out at the far edge of the village clearing, by the edge of the water beneath the shade of the trees, scribbling things in the odd flimsiplast book you'd brought along with you. He got curious one day and wandered over to where you were, making the excuse that he was patrolling the perimeter and just happened to be passing by you on his way. He got to see what it was you were doing - you were sketching the huts and ponds, as well as the trees and animals, making notes beside them. You didn't limit your note-taking to sitting out on the edge of the village, either, sometimes you stayed amongst the buildings and watched the locals and made notes about them.

There were more than a few times that the child would break away from the village kids and watch you, too, and there were times you'd tear a page out and let him scribble on it alongside you. It was endearing to watch, though he'd never admit it, how intensely focused the little one would be on mimicking you during those times. He saw you do your best to be social when the rest of the kids would inevitably crowd around the two of you and watch what you were doing, and begin asking questions. They did that to him, too, with his weapons, and he would try to tell them stories he remembered hearing as a child himself. You didn't seem to tell them stories, so much as just facts about how this or that worked, or how things are different on other planets in this or that way. They still seemed to take it in just as well.

When you weren't note-taking, or trying to avoid being swarmed by curious children, you'd be in the village kitchens, taking advantage of having proper cooking facilities outside of the makeshift space on the Razor Crest and trying out local ingredients and recipes. The child was frequently your taste-tester, and he loved every bit of it. There were times that he'd take a bite of something you'd made, and instead of downing the rest of it, he'd look around for Mando, and upon spotting him he'd hurry over with the food in hand, waving it up at him as if to say "try it". He would, of course, wait until he was in the privacy of his own space, but he'd always try it. He had to admit, though he knew the locals had been working with the ingredients for generations and were by no means bad cooks, there was something about your cooking that he liked better. He knew you'd brought along some of your own spices and that you put your own spin on things, but it was deeper than that and he didn't know why.

 He notices that though you try to converse with the locals when appropriate, you frequently retreat to be in his presence and just sit quietly. It starts as you just going back to the barn and him happening to also be there, but over time it evolved into you actively seeking him out in moments where he was apart from the others, wherever that may have been. It was… nice.

 It was also nice that, on some nights where neither of you could sleep, you would wind up quietly talking about this or that through the makeshift wall in the barn that divided your sleeping areas. The conversations were about mundane things, never lasted long, and were always quiet because of the sleeping child nearby. But it was a new thing for him that he found he liked. For so long he had traveled alone and in complete silence, and while there was still a degree of silence and separation between the two of you, it was different.

 The villagers seemed to act like you would just stay there forever. Names were learned, bits and pieces of life stories were swapped, some degree of familiarity was established.

 There was absolutely no way anyone could miss how attentive Omera had become to ensuring you all were still tended to, but especially in regards to Mando. He was civil in return, and you swear he had started to open up to her and go beyond just being polite. You, also, did your best to be civil towards her, but it was difficult for some reason. It was not your place to decide who was allowed to be friends with who, or how they responded to such actions. Not your place to feel put off by another person getting close to arguably the only person you knew beyond vague acquaintance-ship.

  And this didn’t just feel like someone building a friendship, either. You did not know why it bothered you as much as it did. But here you were.

 One day, you, Mando, and Cara Dune were all on the porch of the barn, lounging for lack of a better word. Cara Dune sat reclined in a chair, you on the edge of the porch, and Mando casually leaned back against the wall of the barn. He looked very relaxed and it took you a little more effort than normal not to just stare at the rare sight.

 And then Omera appeared.

 She had been in the barn doing some tidying up, as hosts do. As she exited, she handed a cup of spotchka to Cara Dune, who thanked her, and then she turned to Mando.

 “Can I set you something in the house?” She briefly turned her vision towards you, to indicate the offer was extended to you as well, but it went right back to the bounty hunter before you could answer.

 “Uh… thank you. Maybe later.” He mumbled his answer, awkward as ever. The woman looked back at you, and you shook your head to her offer, not daring to try and open your mouth. She seemed satisfied with that, and turned to watch the village children playing with the child. He’d captured a frog, and wasted no time in stuffing it into his mouth and trying to swallow it like a vine snake. The children laughed and groaned in amused disgust. The frog turned out to be too big for the little one and he spat it out, and everyone cackled as the frog hopped away, no doubt startled by nearly being eaten.

 “He’s very happy here.” Omera’s voice broke the silence on the porch.

 “He is.” The bounty hunter’s voice responded.

 “Fits right in.” And with that, the widow walked away. You watched her leave with narrowly-disguised distaste on your face. The kid was still a target for all you knew, and that little comment implying he should continue to stay just made you realize how little they understood about the consequences that could come their way should the hunters find him. Being able to actually be a child was good, yes, but not at the expense of having another event similar to the raiders, one they wouldn’t have time to plan for.

 Apparently, Cara Dune had some thoughts of her own.

 “So what happens if you take that thing off?” She nodded at Mando, indicating his helmet. “They come after you and kill you?”

 Your distaste turned to her next.

 “No, you just can’t ever put it back on again.” Cara scoffed at his answer. She looked at you to see if you thought it was as ridiculous as she did, a smirk on her face. You narrowed your eyes at her, and her smirk faded a bit. You’d known, and you respected his cultural beliefs not to badger him like she was trying to do.

 “I was gonna say, if that’s it, it wouldn’t be any trouble at all for you to just slip it off and take up living here, raising the kid and sipping spotchka.” She motioned in the direction Omera had left with her glass.

 “The beautiful young widow would be more than happy to help with that.” She looked back at you. “Am I right?”

 Your skin felt like it would scramble right off your body.

 Somehow, hearing Cara Dune confirm that she, too, had seen Omera’s interest in Mando made it all too real in your mind. And she wouldn’t be making such comments if she didn’t think Mando had similar feelings, either.

 Why did it bother you so much?

 You heard your name, realizing she was actually waiting for an answer from you.

 “Yeah, sure.” Your voice was quiet and clipped, a poor attempt to keep your feelings veiled. Cara Dune finally noticed your tense posture, the discomfort very apparent in the line of conversation she’d started up.

 She immediately regretted her teasing about the widow. Unlike you and Mando, she was actually able to read people. Mando may have been oblivious to it, but she could see now that you were more fond of the bounty hunter than she initially thought. She’d sensed some sort of dislike towards Omera from you, with how brief you kept your interactions with her, but this made it make sense. Kriff, you were probably oblivious to it, too.

 Mando’s modulated voice brought her back to the present. “You know, we raised some hell here a few weeks ago. It’s too much action for a backwater town like this. Word travels fast. You might wanna cycle the charts and move on.”

 You leaned your head back, rolling your eyes. “Finally.” You’d only been trying to convince him to do that the moment you’d chased the raiders off. “I thought it was going to take bounty hunters actually showing up to get you to make that decision.”

 You swiveled where you sat to look at the man pointedly. He shook his head lightly. You could almost hear the good-natured smirk under his helmet. You couldn’t help but quirk the corner of your mouth yourself.

 As forward as Omera was with hinting her interest towards Mando, Cara Dune thought, you weren’t too bad of a companion choice for him, either. You might not be the worse of the two, either, as far as the dynamic between you. As long as the buckethead wasn’t alone.

 She looked back to where the kids were all playing. “I wouldn’t want to be the one who’s gotta tell him that it’s time to leave.”

 “I’m leaving him here.”

 You and Cara Dune stared at him.

 “Traveling with me… that’s no life for a kid. I did my job, he’s safe. Better chance at a life here.”

 No. You weren’t going to let him decide that easily.

 “Mando. Do I need to remind you that the kid is being hunted as much as you are?” He started to protest, but you continued, standing up from your seat to face him fully, crossing your arms. “And, like you said, the fight with the raiders will have drawn attention. We sure didn’t kill them all, some got away. ‘Word travels fast’.”

 Mando stared back, at a loss for words, and looked to Cara Dune for backup. She only shrugged, indicating you had a point.

 “...if anyone was going to come, they would have done so by now.”

 You dropped your arms to your sides, an incredulous expression on your face. Really? Really?  

 “Mando-”

 He held up his hand to stop you. Such a simple motion shocked you enough to derail your thoughts. He really wasn’t changing his mind, was he…? Was he that ready to leave the kid behind?

 Was he that ready to be rid of you …?

 Leaving the child here meant your current “job” would no longer exist. It meant having to figure out where to go next, how to start next.

 You weren’t ready for that.

 You looked down at the wood flooring of the porch. You couldn’t figure out how to argue back in a way that didn’t sound selfish. Defeated, you turned away from the beskar-clad man and faced away, looking at the children playing again.

 Mando truly felt like this was the best option for the child at this point. He wasn’t anywhere near an acceptable parental figure, and per your own admission you didn’t do well with kids, either. The kid needed other kids to be around, adults that were willing and happy to raise him. You needed to be able to actually settle down somewhere you could rebuild. This tiny village, with its lack of technology, wasn’t it, and it wasn’t on his cramped ship with his stubborn self, either. You deserved better. He didn’t want to say goodbye to the kid, or to you, but it wasn’t about what he wanted.

 The three of you solemnly watched the child play with the other village children.

 “It’s gonna break his little heart.” Cara Dune muttered.

 “He’ll get over it. We all do.”

 You didn’t want to agree with him, on that last line. But he was right.

-

 Everyone had finished packing, all that was needed was for it to be loaded onto the cargo sled. The air felt weighted, and it wasn’t from the humidity of the surrounding swamp.

 For you, the air got even more oppressive when you saw Mando approach Omera and lead her slightly away from the others to speak to her. You knew he was just asking her to watch after the child. But you could see the way she was looking at him. You could see Mando fidgeting, almost shyly. You could feel your face get tingly. Why was this so hard for you? It wasn’t about you.

 You couldn’t hear the exchange, but you could tell Omera was saying something back at him, and the way her expression changed, you almost felt like she was asking him to stay, too.

 But then, pulling you from your wallowing in self-pity, you felt the same thing you’d felt back at your old home, just before the bounty hunters broke through and your life as you knew it ended. The intense, physical feeling of wrong, of something in your head thrashing about telling you to run. Telling you to grab the kid and run.

 They were here.

 You sprinted towards where the village kids were, focusing in on the child, drawing your blaster.

  "Mando!”  

 Whatever had been happening between Mando and Omera was forgotten, the widow spinning around to see what the shouting was, and Mando falling into a defensive stance, hand going to his blaster handle.

 Your timing couldn't have been better. As you skidded to your knees to grab the frightened child, the village children scattering in confusion and fear, blaster fire rang out and a scorched blast marked the earth right where he had been sitting. You ran in a crouch to hide behind the nearest barrier you could get to, in this case some of the cargo that had yet to be loaded. The child whimpered and clutched at your clothing, and you clutched him closer, blaster raised in your other hand in case you needed to peek around and return fire.

 You heard chatter from the other adults, and peering around the corner of the cargo, you see Cara Dune and Mando rush off int the trees. Omera is quickly herding the children to safety. You stay where you are, slumping against the back of the cargo, knowing Mando won't let whoever's out there get away. You look down at the kid in your grasp, who is looking back up at you with those dark eyes you'd gotten used to.

 "I told him it wasn't safe here."

-

 Just as you had warned him, the shots had come from someone carrying a tracking fob for the child. Cara Dune had seen to the demise of the hunter, and the tracking fob was destroyed. If it had been a different situation, you would have been more smug about being right.

 But as it currently stood, you needed to get out of there as soon as you could.

 The cargo sled was fully loaded, with additional supplies beyond what you’d brought with you, and the child was seated up where he could see out. You sat close by, not wanting to chance having to make a dive for him again. You hadn’t anticipated being so protective, but here you were. The village gathered around to see you off. Cara Dune offered to escort you back, but the decision was made to completely bypass going through town and just go straight to the Razor Crest. For once, you agreed with this decision.

 “Well then, until our paths cross.” the two exchanged a firm handshake. She looked back and nodded at you, and you returned it with a raised hand. It was good to know you had an ally out there now.

 You’d anticipated leaving by then, but when Winta rushed forward you had to suppress a groan. You were so ready to leave behind the other kids and yet here they were again, prolonging the goodbye process. With little regard for any sense of personal space, she wrapped her arms around the child in a hug. You leaned away a little to give them room. You didn’t expect her to release the child and give you a hug, too.

 “I’ll miss you so much.”

 You were frozen, your mind having drawn a blank and your body unsure of what to do. It took you a few moments to regain your senses, and you awkwardly put your hands on her shoulders.

 “Uh… us too.” She pulled back and gave you both a shy smile, and scampered away back to stand by her mother.

 Omera smiled and nodded at you in farewell. You tried to do the same, but you couldn’t guarantee your smile looked anything other than awkward and forced. You were terrible at this.

 “Thank you.”

 Mando nodded at her as well, and finally, he boarded the sled, and you left the small village.

 It was strange, you’d only been on the Razor Crest for a few days before the stay on Sorgan happened and took up the following few weeks of your life, but somehow the ship felt more like home than the village had.

 The three of you all sat in the cockpit area of the ship, Mando at the controls, you sitting in one of the chairs with the child in your lap, you idly letting him mess with your hands.

 Now that it was just you three, your curiosity was getting the better of you.

 “So, Mando… what was Omera saying to you before the bounty hunter attacked?”

 Mando flipped a few more switches and dials on the controls and sat back in his chair. “She was suggesting we stay, too.”      You mean she was suggesting    you      stay,     you thought to yourself.

 “...if the hunter didn’t show, would you have?”

 He turned to look at you. “Would you?”

 You huffed. “I liked being in the trees, but… too remote for my taste. Too closely packed. Too many kids trying to see what I was doing.” Too much of Omera trying to be friendly with the Mandalorian. You didn’t say that part, though.

 He turned back to face the windscreen. “If I had wanted to settle down somewhere, I would have done it years ago.” He folded his hands over his stomach. “I’m not interested in living the sedentary family life.”

 Somehow hearing him say that took a huge weight off your mind. But that still didn’t answer the selfish, nagging question you still had.

 “Did you like her?” You still didn’t know why you cared so much. But while your courage was up and you were on this train, you had to get it out. Mando’s head tilted in your direction slightly.

 “She was… nice. But I don’t think I liked her at all the way she liked me.” He turned back to look at the expanse of space before the ship. He didn’t want to say it out loud, but he was glad that you all got out of there before he had to tell her that. He wasn’t as oblivious as some thought, he could definitely tell that the widow was harboring some kind of affection towards him. He just didn’t feel the same way back, though. He never did. Besides, even if he did, his idea of how to live was so different from hers that it just wouldn’t work. Living on a farm, having and raising kids, staying in one place? Absolutely not.

 You looked down at the child in your lap, tugging on his claws that clutched your fingers, trying to hide the little smile of relief on your face. He perked his ears at you and babbled, seeming to sense you weren’t as weighed down as before.

 “You could’ve been free to go start your infochanting back up somewhere, though.” You looked up, a little surprised at the slightly quieter tone to Mando’s voice.

 He had come to appreciate your company, but he wasn’t about to directly admit it.

 You shook your head and huffed. “Honestly? I don’t mind.”

 You looked back down at the kid, gently grabbing the ends of his long ears and fussing with them, making him squeal.

 “I’m kind of glad to be back on this bucket of bolts with you.”

 You hadn’t made any indication of it, but Mando liked to think you were talking to him just then, and not just the child. Hearing those words stirred something in his chest, and though he couldn’t pin down what it was, he wouldn’t mind feeling it again.

[popculturebuffet]

Final Space: And Into The Fire Review or Now with 110% More Homoerotic Telepathy

Welcome  new and old to my first Final Space review! If you’ve never seen the blog before, and given this is the first “new” series i’ve covered as it come out in some time that’s probably quite a few of you, welcome. I’m Jake, I do recaps and reviews of various animated shows and comics, mostly just stuff I want to do, often on comission (5 dollars an episode if theres any episode of the first two seasons of this show or any episode of any other show you’d like tos ee me cover), or for my patreon patreon.com/popculturebuffet. And it is my utmost honor to add this show to my rotating roster of shows I cover as they come out. 

I friggin love Final Space. I was intrigued by it back when TBS released the animatics alongside Close Enough (Wth the two shows ironically finally together on HBO max as of earlier this month), for their doomed block. I heard a lot of good things about season 1.. and let it get away from me, not watching it till Season 2. But both seasons had more than enough to pull me in with intriguging characters, even greater jokes and a truly unique idea for a premise involving giant monsters, an edltrich god and lots of cookies. 

So while it took an extra year given Covid, I’m super friggin pumped to get into season 3 at long last after the hell of a cliffhanger, especially since ironically last night I saw Steven Yeun’s oscar nominated performance in “Minari”. Now i get to watch him play a cat teenager again too.. and in a few days Mark friggin Grayson. It’s a good week to be a fan of his is what i’m saying and a good week in general. 

Previously on Final Space Yo!: Since it’s been a year and while the series provides  a recap , I’m going to be doing these anyway so:

Our heroes finally got all 5 dimensional keys and freed Bolo, and in the process also freed Avacato from Invictus, the horrifying entity controlling final space. Meanwhile Tribore got Sheryl to stop being a selfish prick and she joined the team trying to be a better mother from now on. But freeing Bolo came at a high cost as Nightfall sacrified herself as the sixth key (KVN was natrually both Gary and Bolo’s first choice, but was inllegible. ) So we ended the season with our heroes entering Final Space and Gary reuniting with Quinn.... while Invictus loomed. So over a year later we finally get some answers so join me under the cut for spoilers, recaps, and homoerotic text ahoy. 

Something i’m doing since both the roster keeps changing.. and as I correctly guessed from the trailer, and the general tone of the promos for this season, that everyone won’t be all together all season.. or even in one piece.. i’ll be doing a silver age style roll call to let us know who all we have on the Team Squad for the episode Roll Call: Gary, Quinn, Avacato, Little Cato, Ash, Fox, KVN, HUE, AVA, Sheryl, Bolo, and Tribore

So we pick up right where we left off, Gary tearfully reuniting with Quinn, with Quinn wishing he hadn’t come for her, and Gary being Gary naturally having ignored that, and actually been more determined since that made it forbidden which made it extra tempting and him want to extra do it. God I missed this glorious idiot let me tell you. 

So things are quickly interrupted by invictus, who turns out to be a giant flaming head.. thing... and chases them and the crimson light, which has to start speeding with our heroes tethered to the outside, Quinn holding onto Gary. 

So we get one hell of a thrilling chase as the Crimson Light outspeeds the demon head and runs into two titans, but Bolo shows up to take out one, with Mooncake trying his dimension shattering blast thingy on Invictus.. and naturlaly g ven this is the big bad we need to show off how horrying they are, and it does NOTHING. But Gary catches his little buddy so we’re alright. 

Sheryl also shows off her badass bonafieds by LIGHTFOLDING THROUGH A TITAN... granted she still has some parenting skills to learn as “lightfolding while your son is hanging out the back through an edltrich god” really isn’t a motherly thing to do.. but neither is trying to murder your child several times or blaming him for how shitty your life turned out so ANYTHING is a step up for her. 

But.. it’s not enough. While she does manage to kill ONE the Crimson Light is too badly damaged to go on and we get two tragic deaths in one go... The Team Squad is forced to abandon the Crimson Light.. and AVA is too damaged to Upload into HUE. “I’m Sad” “For who?” “For you.. and for us. “ God damn Tom Kenny is amazing. You don’t need me telling you that, but sometimes you need a reminder. 

So our heroes end up on a desolate mystery world, stranded in final space with no ship, no suplies and no hope. The only thing to do now is survivie and hope they can continue the mission at some point. 

ONE MONTH LATER

Things have not gotten any better, as naturally , our heroes have only found weird cartoon eyed worms that regrow their heads when you bite them off. So while this means unlimited food, it’s also disgusting and Garry hates it. “This may be a head but it tastes like a butt”. Quinn and Tribore are with him and Quinn hasn’t been ready to talk about her experiences trapped in this hellscape and still isn’t but being a good dude, Gary dosen’t push her on it. Though the weird red veiny thing on her arm tells me maybe one of you should speed that up before she explodes or gets cronnenburgy. Just saying. I’ll also say i’m not huge on the one month time skip, as while I feel they probably have a reason for being that specific i’ts a bit TOO long and I question why have that long a period of a jump, not the longest but still long enough for things to happen with nothing changingin that time? Still it’s a minor nitpick in an otherwise fantastic episode so I can let it go, I just don’t get it. 

What we do get is some Gary Corpses dropping and Invictius puppeting them... i’m with gary that is bowel openingly scary. I also do like how despite the FAR more dire circumstances, they still get in the requisite shenanigans this series requires. I’ts not to the network mandated subplot levels where it distracts, but it’s enough to help ease the terror of the situation and isn’t around for situations like the opening where it really SHOULDN’T be. As the series always has when something big happens, the bollocks goes away. Once we’re in between we can get back to literal pissing contests, KVN leading a crowd to their deaths and HUE in a pimp hat like god intended. 

So yeah our heroes have to outrun the horrible horde of Gary’s, though Little Cato catches on something’s wrong as Tribore makes gary cary him as foreshadowing for later and Sends mooncake down to asssit. Our heroes escape.. but a cave in happens.

After the break, Gary wakes up confused with the party now split in two: Gary, Quinn, KVN, Tribore and HUE on one side and Avacato, Ash, Fox, Little Cato and Sheryl on the other. So Gary does the logical thing... and take his shirt off telling Avacato to feel him. 

I mean I didn’t even ship them before this scene but... Gary claims because of their bond he can telepahtically connect with Avacato. That’s normal Gary shenanigans.. except not only does he shrug off his girlfriend asking why they can’t do that.. but it WORKS. We have a scene of the two telepahtically talking in a wheatfield that is so homerotic I guarantee there only wasn’t the Careless Whisper sax because they couldn’t afford it.. or their saving it for later this season. Look sometimes you don’t ship a ship because you just.. dont’ care that strongly one way or another and sometimes you just need an incredibly gay scene to see the light. Same thing happened with Weblena same thing here. 

Fox also says “that was glorious to watch” same man. That was freaking art. So our heroes split up into three plots. As usual for me

Team Gary: So yeah... Triobore’s pregnant. No way to really softball into that. He’s been pregnant this whole time. So we get a stupid and mildly horrifying gross out sequence with Gary having to look Triobore in teh eyes and Quinn having to “uncork him”. Which is code for ... you know what i’m not going to say it. If you’ve seen the episode you know and if not your better off not visualizing it trust me. Point is this whole sequence is dumb and the worst part of the episode by far. And the series CAN do good gross out. While Olan Rodgers regrets it, the pissing contest was one of the funniest scenes of season 2, and managed to make a gross idea on paper actually pretty damn funny. This.. this is just “Haha males giving birth and tribore’s an asshole”. There’s no joke here just a .. plug. .. gah.. the vomit is rising let me tell you. 

We do get something good out of this nightmare, Tribore’s son who hatches as the army of gary’s dig their way in, Quanstranstro, who rapidly ages into a stylsih spanish speaking adult badass. He is fucking awesome and a great addition to the team and the sheer.. oddity of his birth is wonderful even if the actual birthing was not. Then the climax happens so before that. 

Team Avacato:

Avacato and Co come across a sleeping giant robot cyborg .. thingy. Naturally Fox wakes him up. Little Cato remains not suprised. It occelates between panicking over it’s legs being gone and amenisa and is pretty damn funny. It’s voiced by John Dimagio. But it gets serious as we find out nothing has ever made it out of final space, and things.. change the longer there there. And Quinn’s been there several months if not a year. Whuh oh. This part is much better both due to better jokes and plot advancment.. though again Quanstrano is still fucking amazing. 

Team Bolo: Bolo meanwhile returns and fights a titan, and has mooncake help him rather htan join the others, but looses, hitting the planet with his body.. I mean he might not get back up.. but the impact shatters the caverns and causes an explosion. Everyone but Gary, Quinn, KVN and HUE are MIA, as our remaining party find earth floating overhead. 

TO BE CONTINUED> 

Final Thoughts: A decent start to the season. Like I said the whole birthing sequence can die in a fire and reminds me of the terrible comedy subplots adult swim wanted grafted onto two episodes.. but otherwise it’s a tense stark opener that sets up the bleak tone while still keeping the series rediciulous shenanigans in tact. It’s the perfect welcome back after so long. I mean the gay telepathy alone would make it a winner. 

Next Time on This Blog: We dive into a little history with HIsteria. See you at the next rainbow.