#even a humanized verison on a season

[tides-of-clarity]

The urge to make a whole new muse for my list is strong. Aurel was just added not long ago and I already want a new one. God I have no self control.

[80-ursa-major]

been a long time without a grub rant so here it goes

i'm still trying to go full seasonal so instead of waiting for end of the month i used all my crystals AND all the shrimps to spark my perfect son but the writing was shit because they use him to push that sinister agenda. also yes spark because nothing's changed. ssr tickets are always useless dupes and you can never roll the chara you want even if he's on rateup. still missing a bunch of grands too bleh

now let's see what has happened since last time: that one cute amnesiac is actually an evil mastermind so forget it. The detective event didn't even have chat noir and literally everyone died; they made like 7 new designs for 2 hours. Very weird vibe. The potato couple is dead but at least they are together but their pseudo son is not playable of course! and they gave the nice moments to sevil not one of the many ikemen and actually popular ones.

ok fine i shouldn't talk cause my favorite isn't popular either and i got some cute content and i'd give him more if i could so i totally get siero but there's so many waifus, even literally marriage and the husbando side is *crickets*

damn the rant was supposed to be about the anni but it had been a while so there was a lot more. anyway where to start -new boy is a waste of a design cause he's not even a character, just a chatbot talking in circles so siete can have a sideplot and idiots can make cuckmemes. And of course he dies! -other new boy suffers for 6k years and then dies lmao what! there was literally zero reason to do that in the very end when everyone's finally together and happy -btw both of this is because the big boss the ASSHOLE fire chicken who of course has a female voice manipulated them and then discarded them. but she brought back her loli verison because how else will disgusting coomers throw money at the gacha -and fucking lu who won't let me kill this dumb bird becauuuuse -the rest of the cast was whatever -i don't care about the casino and the couples especially since 10 years later one of them still isn't a couple. having said that christina rose(heh) in my eyes with how thoughtful she was about nanashi -the six 9ds just bloated the cast and once again it's 4 hot girls, a bird and one ok guy -sidenote: those new free charas are also 4 girls, not even one guy like everyone though from the silouettes -the free event chara is of course another booba angel pulled out of nowhere (no the spellbooks don't count) who's also another luci orbiter and spends years proving she has room temperature iq but somehow in the very end she was the only one who understood the complex (read:super simple) motives of the phoenix. the irony is that the conclusion is that it's beyond human understanding so don't even bother trying hahahaha -and of course no males allowed in dark so they resurected a half-naked primal to grand who's also somehow a master detective wow -and somehow the worst of all? caglioSHITro. So strong, the strongest we can't solve anything without him ooooh. I hate him. Yes him the man who put his essence/soul/whatever you wanna call it into a homunculus made in the image of his own sister(!) and gets his kicks from switching between tought ore voice and cute gril tehee~. Peak CRINGE!!

all right that felt good. will unload my other gacha grievances later XD

[meili-sheep]

Shenhe headcanons concerning the Modern verison of the Brigade:

She’s as cryptid as it gets. Lives in the countryside outskirts of whatever city.

Doesn’t have much, not in the sense that she’s poor, but that she doesn’t feel the need to have it.

She knows what the Internet is, but doesn’t really care for it and only uses it to comminicate with others like her nephew.

Absolutely LOVES untainted nature. Will disappear into the wilderness for weeks at a time and then come back completely refreshed.

Is okay with solitude and is okay being alone, but struggles with feelings of loneliness due to her unique condition and tendency to disappear in the face of interpersonal or intrapersonal conflict.

Works as a sort of person that does odd jobs (helping people move things, finding things, temporary gigs, stuff like that) and occasionally guard duty when it comes up.

She probably meets the rest of them on a grocery run for essentials and other errands before she disappears from the face of the earth for another two weeks.

Her debit card probably isn’t working right (ATMs be faulty sometimes) and then she kind of just punches through it in her anger.

She’s embarrassed as hell and it doesn’t help that there’s someone behind her waiting to deposit some checks.

Upon surveying the damage, the person behind her is like: “Damn. You a boxing champion or something?”

It’s Yelan. This is important because Shenhe is as off the grid as it gets and Yelan has never seen her in town before.

Shenhe is quickly overwhelmed with the sheer emotion induced by the situation and bolts.

Yeah, she disappears into the mountains for a long while after that.

A few weeks later, she’s in a cafe because she was going to meet with Chongyun and his friends there as an introduction of sorts.

She orders a small cup of tea and maybe a little snack as well and she tries to pay, but she kind of forgot that her debit card was permanently lodged into the machine when she punched it and she didn’t have enough cash on her person.

(As if Shenhe is stupid enough to buy into credit cards LMAO but no shade intended)

The next person behind her just slides a crispy $100 on table.

“Get her a sandwich too while you’re at it. And you can keep the change as a tip. Lord knows you need it.”

This was Ayato this time. This is important because Shenhe is immediately confused as to why he did this and he’s confused as to why she looked at him like he was the devil. People usually thank him profusely for this.

So she bolts. Again. Because this is a lot of human interaction for one thing. She doesn’t even get her food before retreating into the darkest and furthest corner of the cafe because goddamn it her nephew is coming and she’d be screwed over twicefold if she didn’t try to see him.

So Chongyun arrives, the meeting is great, and then she leaves yet again. To the deeper woods this time. Because she does not want to interact with another person for a LONG while.

Except that doesn’t happen because while she’s in there, she hears a bear.

This bear sounds huge and aggressive, unusual for that season and location.

So naturally, she checks it out, only to see someone wrestling with one.

You read that right.

She can only watch as the person seems to be playing with the bear? Laughing about it? Enjoying themselves?

Maybe she oughta hitchhike to a new location to retreat because this is getting ridiculous on her end.

And that is exactly what Shenhe does. Only, she ends up in a field of grapevines. She certainly isn’t in her usual stomping grounds anymore.

While stalking through the vines, she ends up in an apple orchard and a beekeeping place, picking up all sorts of fruits and goods on the way there.

Shenhe eventually ends up underneath a tree and is about to doze off before she looks up to find the same bearwrestler up in the branches.

“I can’t blame you for eating of what I’m about to harvest. I did the same recently. Also, did you like the honey? It’s made with sunflower nectar specifically.”

Yup. Shenhe stumbled into Diluc’s private experimental homestead.

Before she can run, an apple falls into her lap.

“Try this one. It’s crispy.”

There’s enough space between them for her not to bolt this time. So they eat some apples in silence.

She leaves this time, but not without saying goodbye.

He also invites her out to the property again the next day to try out some juices.

She simply camps out an hour away and shows up in the early morning for juice.

Shenhe waits there at a set of chairs and a table for like six hours.

“How long were you waiting there for?”

“Sunrise.”

Diluc calls for someone to bring out some breakfast and they eat that before he asks her if she’s okay if any of his friends also show up for the juice sampling.

She’s somewhat okay with this because Diluc seems nice. So his choice of friends should also be nice, right?

When Yelan and Ayato show up, she almost runs away yet again. But they seem less intimidating this time. So she watches them.

“Hey, it’s you again! I ate your sandwich because it would’ve been a waste, but I’ll gladly buy you another one next time we go out, okay?”

“Don’t worry about the ATM, I took care of it already. Also, you’re like freakishly strong and I love that for you. We should work out together sometime.”

“You know my friends already? That’s comforting. I hope they haven’t scared you too much.”

“. . . Huh?”

These people are super nice to her instantly and it’s a happy sort of shock this time. So she stays.

So that’s how they meet up for the first time.

————

But wait! There’s more where that came from.

She gets a bass guitar after hearing some bass-heavy tracks while the rest of them were walking around.

She gets really good at it and she’s secretly proud of herself for it.

She eventually gets brave enough to post some covers on Youtube and amasses a decent following on there.

Uploads like once a month because she really doesn’t care about the hype that much.

She makes like one appearance on Yelan’s Tiktok every three months.

The conspiracy amongst their followers is that Shenhe doesn’t really exist and that she’s a ghost from Diluc’s mansion.

Up until she does a QnA with the rest of them.

“Are you rich too?”

“No. I’m not really a fan of money.”

Then Shenhe looks at her account on her broken and old cryptid phone and then asks “Is [insert a large ass amount of money here] something?”

And then the chat LOSES THEIR MINDS

————

This is chronic. Feel free to expound on this. In fact please do. This is fun.

Oh Wow. I really don't know what to add. Though with the Tiktok, I sort of see a reserve happening. Like A lot of the TikTok of the bullies are about how stupid Rich Diluc and Ayato are. But when Shenhe joins them it Diluc and Ayato realize how simple she lives and how little she fucking cares about it. It would be so funny, to be honest.

[yellowhearther0]

OKAY

@thisisacallfordreamteam​ helped :)

Au where theres a shitty live action verison of the dream smp

It ends after Season 1 (it runs through all major events until wilbur presses the button in actual dsmp lore)

It basically has the l’manburg war (casual nod to the discs at points for filler) and then the election and corruption arcs

theres only like 30 episodes or smth christ the pacing is terrible they needed like 2 or 3 seasons instead of one

Characters

They dont fuck up the human actors

other than tommy and tubbo who get played by old white guys in their 50s /hj

BUT

THE NON HUMAN CHARACTERS

OH BOY

They dont humanize everyone so dream, antfrost, fundy, and technoblade stay like they are

They dont even keep the CGI the same

This is long as fuck so im putting the rest under the cut but please read it its funny

Fundy, Antfrost, and Technoblade repectively look like:

Sally also appears!

She gets CGI’d too :)

They needed the fish to be sexy okay

Plot

OH BOY

they fuck up the lmanburg war by making dream eviler than he needs to be during that time

its terrible

and dreams actor is also like

legit terrible. they did dream dirty

they toss some really shit music in there too thats like super out of place

tommy’s discs are like a subplot and its never really explored much outside of like,, 2 episodes lol

there are no drugs because they try to make it pg13 but that is the only thing they change

the drug caravan is now the candy caravan :)

dweam is so mean and evil bc he wont let this grownass man and his children who also look like grown ass men sell candy on his property >:(

theres still like sword fights and stuff so people get hurt

but the blood is so fake

like so painfully obvious that its fake

the finale of the l’manburg war is a 2 parter

eret betrays part 1

and then it ends during part 2

and dream gets forgiven! bc friendship :) and eret does not but they never address them forgiving eret ever again so sometimes they’re buddy buddy with him and other times they hate him

GEORGE

GEORGE IS THE MOST INCOSISTENT BITCH IN THE WHOLE SHOW

THEY HYPE HIM UP SO MUCH TO MAKE IT SEEM LIKE HES GONNA DO SMTH BIG DURNG THE VERY ANTICIPATED ELECTION 2 PARTER

AND HE NEVER SHOWS UP ASDFGHJKHGFDSA

During the corruption arc tommy and wilbur are stuck in the ravine but like its so clear they didnt have the budget for anything to look remotely like a ravine

so its all filmed in some long hallway

and they just add rocks and stuff

how the fuck did the remake get cleared again?

THE FINALE

IS SO BAD

DREAM SWITCHES BACK TO THE ‘GOOD GUYS’

PHIL TALKS WILBUR OUT OF PRESSING THE BUTTON BC WE CANT HAVE ANYONE DYING OH NO

SPEAKING OF NO ONE DYING

SCHLATT

HE DOESNT DIE OF A HEART ATTACK BC THATS lame <3

INSTEAD HES ARRESTED AND THE LAST SHOT WE SEE OF HIM IS HIM LOOKIN LIKE THIS

NIKI, WHO DIDNT SHOW UP FOR THE ENTIRE FUCKING THING, IS SUDDENLY THERE

GEORGE IS THERE TOO WHAT

LITERALLY ALL THESE PEOPLE ARE HERE WHO THE FUCK-

(They’re all characters who are more relevant in season 2 but they never got a season 2 so ur just left with all these random ass people like who even-)

Curtains close the end go to credits

The DSMP Show is to DSMP Fans as the PJO Movies is to the PJO Fans

Everyone hates it

Like everyone

including the DSMP Members

bc they didnt have much say in the process

so everyone just clowns the shit out of it its so funny

Everyso often there are rumors that they’re gonna make a season two of the show but its never true

ANYWAY THATS ALL TY THAT WAS HORRIBLE IM SO SORRY

[weirwoodking]

who do you think will be on the throne at the end? is there a chance it will be a woman? do you agree with the theory that bran will be king in the north bc he symbolizes winterfell? idk if i see dany on the throne bc i don't feel like she belongs in westeros, i think she would be better off with a throne on the other side of the narrow sea but i really don't know what i'm saying

It’s very hard to make predictions for ADOS, because we don’t have TWOW yet. So much can change about the story and the characters in one book, thematically and narratively. Think of how much the plot was influenced by just that final Bran chapter in ADWD. 

But, here I go anyway.

My short answer is: no one. (And no, I don’t mean Arya)

Let’s get into it.

Part 1: How the Show Tainted Everyone’s Brains

Obviously, a lot of people care about the Iron Throne plot. Sometimes too much. I do believe that this is mostly because of how much the HBO show changed everything about the story to make the Iron Throne seem like it was more important than anything else. Like promotional posters of all the actors each sitting on the throne, the name of the series itself being changed to “Game of Thrones”, actors getting asked in every interview “who do you think should get the Iron Throne?” as if it’s the last cupcake at a birthday party that everyone’s fighting over, the final episode was titled “The Iron Throne”. The marketing for everything was “it’s the fight for the Throne!” up through the eighth season. It made the object itself become a huge pop culture symbol.

It almost felt like the show was trying to make it seem like the goal of the Night King (a character not in the books) was to sit on the Iron Throne! The show portrayed it as if the Others were just a little distraction that needed to be dealt with so the characters could get back to arguing over the Porcupine Chair. However, in ASOIAF, it’s the exact opposite. The Porcupine Chair is what’s distracting the characters from the real conflict, the Others.

It’s almost comical how that has somewhat transferred over into the fandom, the “game of thrones” is what’s keeping everyone from focusing on what really matters, the “song of ice and fire”.

Part 2: GRRM’s Quote

It wasn't easy for me. I didn't want to give away my books. Every character has a different end. I told them who would be on the Iron Throne, and I told them some big twists like Hodor and "hold the door", and Stannis' decision to burn his daughter. We didn't get to everybody by any means.

-George R.R. Martin

So, he “told them who would be on the Iron Throne”. Something important about this quote is that he doesn’t say who. And, of course, the Iron Throne gets destroyed at the end of the show anyway. Show!Bran doesn’t really “end up on the Iron Throne”. Show!Dany does. George never said that who “ends up” on it in the books is who ends up on it in the show. He’s said that the Shireen thing and the Hodor thing will “happen very differently” in the books anyway. And, of course, another major part of that quote is “every character has a different end”.

I don’t think that who sits the Iron Throne last is necessarily going to be the ruler of Westeros at the end. For example, Cersei (or Aegon) may be the last person to sit the Iron Throne. Or even Euron (however, even though his goal is to rule post-apocalyptic Westeros as a god from the Iron Throne, I don’t think he’ll actually get there). If wildfire is hot enough to melt iron, I could see the throne being destroyed during whatever fiery shenanigans go down with Cersei and JonCon in TWOW. I think it would be fitting for the fight over the throne to end in the next book. ‘Cause the winds of winter are coming, baby, and it’s gonna be time to start dreaming of spring.

Part 3: The Weirwood King

The idea/theory of Bran becoming King has been around for a long time, long before the HBO show even started airing. This is because of the Celtic myth of King Brân the Blessed, whose name means “Blessed Crow” or “Blessed Raven” in Welsh. Other than the obvious connection with the name, Brân the Blessed’s story involves a magic cauldron that can bring the dead back to life. 

In the myth, Brân’s head is cut off and continues talking (think of how Bran’s most powerful aspect is the magical powers of his mind), because in Celtic mythology the head is believed to be where the soul is.

Celts had a reputation as head hunters. According to Paul Jacobsthal, "Amongst the Celts the human head was venerated above all else, since the head was to the Celt the soul, centre of the emotions as well as of life itself, a symbol of divinity and of the powers of the otherworld." (source)

Catch that? “Otherworld”. There is another myth (Irish, specifically) called the Voyage of Bran, in which the title character goes on a quest to the Otherworld. The Otherworld is a supernatural realm in Celtic mythology. It is also where the sidhe (a.k.a. aos sí) live. Remember, the sidhe are what George has said the Others are inspired by. In Irish mythology, the Otherworld is called Tír na nÓg, Mag Mell and Emain Ablach, in Welsh mythology it’s called Annwn, and in Arthurian legend it’s called Avalon. Fun fact, “Avalon” was the title of the novel George was writing when he had suddenly had the idea of a scene in which a young boy and his brothers see a beheading and then find a litter of direwolf pups in the snow. And so ASOIAF happened.

I’ll leave that there, and try not to go down the great big rabbit-hole of Celtic (and other cultures) mythology connections in ASOIAF. The takeaway is: ASOIAF has been influenced by these myths.

I do believe that Bran is going to be King. Not just because of his ties to this mythology, but also because of symbolism in his own story. The most notable one being…

Under the hill, the broken boy sat upon a weirwood throne, listening to whispers in the dark as ravens walked up and down his arms.

[...]

The singers made Bran a throne of his own, like the one Lord Brynden sat, white weirwood flecked with red, dead branches woven through living roots. 

[...]

His father and the black pool and the godswood faded and were gone and he was back in the cavern, the pale thick roots of his weirwood throne cradling his limbs as a mother does a child. 

- Bran III, A Dance with Dragons

Bran is also the only one of the Stark kids who still thinks of himself as royalty:

What was he now? Only Bran the broken boy, Brandon of House Stark, prince of a lost kingdom, lord of a burned castle, heir to ruins.

- Bran III, A Dance with Dragons

Bran is the heir to Winterfell. It doesn’t matter if Robb named Jon his heir in his will, the will was written under the pretense that Bran and Rickon were dead.

However, Bran doesn’t have any connection to the Iron Throne. It’s far more likely that he would sit on a weirwood throne, because of, y’know, everything about his story. So, if Bran was King of the Seven Kingdoms, I don’t think it would be on the Pincushion Stool.

If Bran is king of the realm, I do think there would still be a separate Lord/Lady of Winterfell, but I do think that there’s a possibility of a Pevensie siblings ending, where all the Stark kids would rule together as the Lords and Ladies and Winterfell.

Something that I’ve never really seen talked about regarding the idea of Bran becoming King of the Seven Kingdoms is the religious differences between the North and the southern regions of Westeros. Of course, the show didn’t deal with this at all. For fuck’s sake, they had Cersei blow up the Westerosi verison of the Vatican and face no backlash. It was so laughably absurd how Show!Cersei’s destructive reign was shown to have like… zero impact on the Seven Kingdoms. 

In short, I’m not too sure that the Kingdom who is majority Faith of the Seven worshippers would react too well to a weirwood-tree-Old-Gods-warg-wizard-king. I mean, when Janos Slynt finds out Jon is a warg he calls him a “thing”, a “creature”, and a “beastling that is not fit to live”, and wanted to execute him not just for being a turncloak but for being a warg as well. And Jojen warns Bran of these things, saying that his own folk may want to kill him if they know what he is.

But… all of that anti-magic attitude might not matter after night falls. 

Part 4: Winter is Coming

I believe that the Long Night is going to be very devastating for the Seven Kingdoms.

Martin is a big believer in making things have meaningful, permanent consequences in his stories. I don’t think that an apocalyptic event like the Long Night is something that’s just gonna get dealt with in a quick snap and have no lasting effect.

A lot of people are going to die. I don’t mean main characters, I mean people that would not survive a normal winter and sure as hell won’t be prepared for this one. Westeros’s food stores have been severely depleted by the War of the Five Kings, and we’ve been told multiple times in the text (particularly AFFC and ADWD) that feeding people during this winter is going to be extremely hard.

Besides that… the whole, uh, invasion of the eldritch ice beings thing might have a bit of an impact on the realm. 

I won’t go into depth about how the Seven Kingdoms will be affected by the Long Night, ‘cause we really have no idea. But, however it all goes down, I do think it will have lasting changes for the people of Westeros. The impact that it leaves may make the concept of Bran being a wizard-king more acceptable. “Oh, well we’ve just seen zombies and winter elves, so what’s too surprising about a magical greenseer warg king?” I think that Westerosi culture becoming more aware and accepting of the existence of magic is the only way that Bran could become the king of the whole realm. The Westeros at the end of the series is not going to be the place that it was at the beginning.

Part 5: Dany: A Home, Not a Throne

To sum up my thoughts on our dragon girl, I don’t think Dany will end up on the Spiky Toilet. I don’t want Dany to be on the Spiky Toilet.

Now, my personal speculation (which a lot of people disagree with, which is fine) is that Dany will never see King’s Landing before the Long Night. I personally don’t think that Dany will ever meet Aegon or Cersei. I don’t see there being enough time in the story for that. Yes, GRRM said that there will be a second Dance of the Dragons, but he also said that the second Dance does not have to involve Dany. He may have originally planned for it to be Aegon and Dany, but probably not once the Meereenese Knot happened.

The Meereenese Knot is what Dany’s ADWD plot is referred to as. GRRM did not intend for Dany to stay in Meereen as long as she has, but because of his “gardener” style of writing, that’s where the story led him. GRRM has said that one of the hardest parts of writing the Meereen plotline (which involves Dany, Barristan, Quentyn, Tyrion, and Victarion) is trying to find a way to cut the plot knot he accidentally got himself stuck in. He has said that Tyrion and Dany will meet towards the end of TWOW, which means that Dany will most likely be spending a large portion of her story with the Dothraki. That part is a completely blank page, but I believe that Dany will meet Tyrion possibly ¾ of the way into the book, and sail for Westeros at the end.

I won’t write a full meta about this here (because that’s not what this post is about), but to summarize my prediction: Aegon VS Cersei is going to be the battle in King’s Landing, a battle which will destroy the city. Dany (who has already rejected sailing for the Throne multiple times) will still be stuck in Essos, dealing with everything she’s still got going on, and will sail for Westeros at the end. Not for the Throne, but to go North for the real fight (remember that Marwyn is also on his way to Meereen to tell Dany that they need her).

Because Dany's purpose is not to fight for the Iron Throne, it’s to fight the Others. Dany (fire, light, and life) VS the Others (ice, darkness, and death) is the main thing the title refers to:

“Well of course the two outlying ones, the things that are going on north of the Wall and Daenerys Targaryen on the other continent with her dragons are of course the Ice and Fire of the title, the Song of Ice and Fire.” 

- George R.R. Martin, 2016

One of the most important excerpts that shows us where Dany’s story is headed is this:

That night she dreamt that she was Rhaegar, riding to the Trident. But she was mounted on a dragon, not a horse. When she saw the Usurper's rebel host across the river they were armored all in ice, but she bathed them in dragonfire and they melted away like dew and turned the Trident into a torrent. Some small part of her knew that she was dreaming, but another part exulted. This is how it was meant to be. The other was a nightmare, and I have only now awakened.

- Daenerys III, A Storm a Swords

Dany has a short prophetic “this is what I was meant to do” dream. Dany could possibly have more dreams about the Others in TWOW, visions that will make what Marwyn has to tell her more believable. It’s not like that dream was the only one Dany has had that alludes to the winter threat, Dany has had visions about this since book one:

The red door was so far ahead of her, and she could feel the icy breath behind, sweeping up on her. If it caught her she would die a death that was more than death, howling forever alone in the darkness. She began to run.

- Dany IX, A Game of Thrones

Anyway, there’s just a lot more foreshadowing in the plot that this is what Dany is meant to do. I think adding in another conflict into her story once she leaves Meereen would make the story feel bloated and would severely fuck up the pacing.

I don’t think Dany will ever see the Iron Throne. The themes of her story have never been about her wanting the Iron Throne for what it is, but for what it represents to her. It represents the possibility of a home and of feeling safe for the first time in her life, what Dany truly wants. I think that it’s absolutely fine if Dany never sees the Throne or sits on it, and that it makes more sense for her narrative arc if she discovers that she can find a home somewhere else, not necessarily where she thought it would be. 

Part 6: Final Thoughts

So, in conclusion, I don’t really give a shit who ends up placing their ass on the Forbidden Laz-E-Boy, I care about the War for the Dawn. I care about seeing the characters I’ve followed for the past five books coming together to fight the real conflict of A Song of Ice and Fire. Also, even if we do get a Scouring of the Shire-type post-climax for ASOIAF, it doesn’t matter. People don’t see the Scouring of the Shire as the climax of Lord of the Rings, they see the climax as Aragorn leading the forces of good against the forces of evil and Frodo and Sam throwing the One Ring into Mount Doom. Whatever ending resolution comes after the climax of ASOIAF, it doesn’t change what the climax is.

"Do you think your brother's war is more important than ours?" the old man barked.

Jon chewed his lip. The raven flapped its wings at him. "War, war, war, war," it sang.

"It's not," Mormont told him. "Gods save us, boy, you're not blind and you're not stupid. When dead men come hunting in the night, do you think it matters who sits the Iron Throne?"

"No." Jon had not thought of it that way.

- Jon IX, A Game of Thrones

TL;DR:

My prediction: Cersei will be the last person to sit the Iron Throne, which will be destroyed in the Wildfire of King’s Landing. After the Long Night devastates the Seven Kingdoms, Bran will become the King of this new Westeros that has been majorly affected by the return of magic. Also, it would be real nice if Dany found her red door.

God I hope my rambling made sense

[popculturebuffet]

Final Space Reviewcaps: The Hidden Light or Beelzbub’s Dad and Death Himself

Welcome back all you happy people! My regular coverage of final space continues as our Team Squad continues to be split up. Team Gary heads to the ruins of France and while HUE lives the dream, Gary finds the architect of his misery might also be the archtetcht of hope when he meets KVN’s creator.  Meanwhile Team Avacato find some friends of some friends... and an old enemy horrifically reborn and just as pants crappingly terrifying as before. Find out whose back, whose just been introduced, and whose resting under the cut!

So once again i’ts time for roll call, as our Team Squad has been split into three groups so Team Gary: Gary, Quinn, KVN, HUE Team Avacato: Avacato, Little Cato, Ash, Fox, Sheryl.  Team Bollo: Bollo, Mooncake

Same as last time and if your wondering why some names are missing from Avacato’s team, we will get to that. And since our three plots are entirely seperated from the start this time...

Team Gary: The Father of Beelzbub is A Moderaltey Tolerable Guy Picking up where we left off, Gary and Quinn gaze at earth though we do find out, naturally, the other half of the team is okay when Avacato buzzes in, confirming he’s alive at least. So with half the team stranded in the depths of final space, Gary’s next idea is naturally to plummet to earth and pick up a ship to pick them up. HUE has some flaws in the plan, i.e. the earth’s gravity field but KVN proves useful for once and helps carry them down to earth, our heroes ending up in Paris. 

We get a fun subplot of HUE thoroughly enjoying his dream of visiting Paris in a body.. even though Paris itself is pretty fucking horrific, littered with floating corpses and with a smokey, unnerving atmosphere. But the contrast works.. what dosen’t is the ships our heroes fine, which are junked, likely due to months of having no mainteince coupled with the destruction brought on by the titans. 

Gary does find something.. his worst nightmare.. a bunker FULL of KVN’s “I always thought i’d die like this”. They thankfully don’t want to kill him, and he finds a dwarf ventrixian whose a fan of his as are the KVN’s. As it turns out they somehow watched all his video logs to Quinn, and the little guy saying Quinn is even more beautful than he imagined lets him live when Quinn shows up. Gary is naturally puzzled why someone would create his worst nightmare, an army of kvns who know his personal details... until we find out who created the bunker: Kevin, the genius scientest who created the KVN’s. 

Naturally Gary has as mature, sensible and calm reaction as you’d expect and he goes to see Kevin’s dad without innocent....

Had you there for zero seconds. No he has a fairly fluid and incredibly well voiced freakout ending in him wanting to burn the place to the ground in cleansing fire. It’s.. actually a very good thing Quinn’s the one who went with him as everyone on the other team except MAYBE Avacato would’ve gone with operation BURN THEM, BURN ALLL OF THEM. 

So while Gary can’t burn them he does go to shoot Kevin’s creator in the head after finding out he’s alive and still in the bunker. And.. he actually is alive. It’s a nice change of pace as in most sci fi stories where we find the robot first the creator is long dead. But no Kevin.. is alive. It takes a bit for him to accept this is really happening due to a combination of Gary’s transmissions..and Nightfall having contacted him to make a ship. I’ts only when he tries throwing something at Quinn does he realize that nope these are real peoples and gladly welcome them for some rest so theyc an go find the ship he made for Nightfall. Relately the one major flaw I have with this episode.. is that it takes Gary and Quinn an embarassingly long time to put two and two together. Gary I get, he’s kind of distracted being caught in a waking nightmare and finding out he needs to rely on the man who ruined 5 years of his life. He’s also Gary. It’s okay. Quinn though, even with months of trauma stuck in a hell dimension.. is still the resonable one and still should’ve figured “Hey maybe the alternate future verison of me who was around back then did this”. The reveal is well done towards the end when it happens.. it’s just very weird it didn’t happen sooner. 

So the couple are FINALLY alone.. for about 5 seconds because Kevin gets into bed with them. And while part of his loopiness is probably the horrifying isolation for the last few months, after all Gary wasn’t exactly the most coherent after his stint in prison, I do feel that at least part of it is just him. It just makes the most sense: the infinity guard massed produced the guys and Kevin was one of their top scientests. He likely didn’t half ass a project of this size or importance.. so it’d make sense that instead the KVN’s suck at their job because the person who made them really dosen’t get humans, or personal space and the KVN’s are simply degraded copies of him. 

We do get a sweet moment with Quinn and Gary before Kevin decides they’ve rested enough time to go. They use the KVN’s to head to belgium, where the ship is, but have to fight Landfish, horrifying monsters that feast on the remains of dead worlds. So we get a fun and tense action sequence as our heroes sorta zipline through the monsters and KVN suprisingly turns out ot be useful twice in one episode. Our heroes make it to the ship, though HUE is down two arms and his self esteem, with Kevin asking why an AI would WANT to put themselves in a garbage bot. HUE admits he just wanted to experince life but it comes at a cost.. which granted the loss of arms seems rushed.. but it’s not like pre-AVA most of his life as a robot was that happy or fufilling so it dosen’t come out of nowhere and the person who MADE it better... is now dead and gone. He has no real reason to stay in the body anymore: He’s tasted life, he’s loved, and he’s lost. 

So naturally he goes back to being the AI on their new ship, which Quinn Dubs the Galaxy 2 because naturally Gary’s name tries too hard and Kevin’s is nonsensical.. though really Galaxy 2 itself just.. isn’t a great name. Seriously call it the purple rain or something. Still it’s a cool looking ship and while i’ll BADLY miss the crimson light as Olan designed a really fucking cool ship there, the Galaxy 2 is none too shabby. So our heroes have there ship, HUE has his old Job back, and we get a sobering scene as Quinn and Gary finallyg et the nightfall thing, and Kevin leaves to go get the portal up and running and he’ll call them.. they don’t have his number but he’ll be in england where the project is so it’s not like they can’t find the crazy man when the time comes. So we end with Team Gary heading off to a huge energy signture to hopefully find someone. Who it is, if it’s even one of our groups, is unknown.. but given the stinger it’s probably Bollo and Mooncake.. but we’llg et to that. First

Team Avacato: FUCK

So on their astroid Sheryl wonders if the plan is to just stand around and wait for Gary. Tribore however.. wants to leave again. Despite being in an edltrich space nightmare, he decides to take some paternety leave and cuts off part of the asteroid to go bond with his son leaving us with five heroes who all quickly get abducted by teleportation. 

Their abductors.. are Arachnitects, the last ones left in final space who intially confuse them as part of of Invictus unholy horde before Little Cato brings up Jeremy, and thus they free them and explain what’s up: as said their the last ones left in final space, the only ones who weren’t slaughtered or escape and try to offer our heroes hope and shelter.. before brutally being slaughtered by telekensisis... and it’s with that... HE has returned. While the trailers made no attempt to hide it and it was blatant from the start of last season he woudl return.. it dosent’ make his return any less chilling or impactful or David Tennant’s performance any less terrifying after being gone for a bit: Lord Commander HAS RETURNED

And make no mistake, hopefully, this is OUR Lord Commander, as he comments on the new additions.. and is GLEEFUL to have new toys to play with. Avacato is naturally horrifed he’s back and tries to just shoot him but that’s as effective as it’s always been, and he simply force lifts all of them, and naturally, being a sadsitic bastard, brings LIttle Cato forward as he wants to know where Mooncake is, though Little Cato makes a valid point: he dosen’t know where Mooncake is and even if he DID he wouldn’t tell him. And.. that’s where this part of the plot ends till next week. I”m fucking terrified. Nice to have David back though. Especially with Ducktales over. And as a side note... it’s notable Ash doesn’t try triggering her powers. Either she can’t and Lord Commander’s even stronger than her, or she just hasn’t yet. Or third horrifying option i’m going with thier powers come from the same source. 

Team Bollo:The Forge

So with Gary hopefully coming to the rescue and the rest of our heroes trapped by a sadistic bastard who will likely gleefully kill at least one of them.. we find out where Bolo went after getting his ass kicked. He surivived.. but clearly needs a leg up.. so naturally for a charcter voiced by Keith David he goes about it in the most badass way imaginable: he has mooncake do the thing on a dwarf star so he can FORGE IT INTO A FUCKING BADASS SPACE SWORD TO SLAY THE TITANS WITH. My.. my body is ready for next week. 

Final Thoughts:

This episode was excellent. The premire while not BAD had some issues with pacing and tone, where as this one found the perfect places to inject the series humor.. while keeping the stakes incredibly high and having the chilling return of it’s most terrifying antagonist. and yes tha’t swith the people posseing murder face out there. This episode returned Season 3 to the right track. It also continues to be seralized like season 1.. but I feel at least so far they’ve learned their lesson from Seasons 1 and 2 and combined the two better, having basically one big story, but having the pacing be more on par with Season 2 where things move along at a nice clip and we get more character stuff peppered in. It’s a nice combo. if it’ll hold out I do not know, especaillly with a longer runtime but we’ll see as we go won’t we. For now.. this episode was fucking awesome. 

If you liked this review join my patreon, my current stretch goal is for a darkwing duck episode a month and i’ll be putting up a patreon exclusive review soon for 5 dollar or more patreons so check that out, follow me for more and if there’s any episodes of the show from seasons 1 or 2 you’d like me to cover we can discuss that in my ask box and dm,s only 5 bucks an episode. See you at the next rainbow. 

[mrlnsfrt]

Lessons I'm Learning

As I am writing this I am currently transitioning from pastoring a church in Valdosta, Georgia to pastoring a church in Boise, Idaho. I have been studying John 14 with my church here in Valdosta and reflecting on Jesus’ words of comfort and encouragement that He shared with His disciples. Even though I am sure that God is leading in this move, it has not been easy. I am tired and have often felt overwhelmed. But I keep turning to the words of Jesus recorded in John 14. I have also been reflecting on the big lessons I have learned in ministry and life so far.

Quick Review of John 14:19-31

Jesus’ life is connected to our hope of eternal life. Because Jesus lives we can secure in the assurance that we also will live.

Having and keeping the commandments and the word of Jesus is deeply connected to loving Jesus and witnessing His revelation.

The Father will send the Helper, the Holy Spirit to teach and remind Jesus’ followers what He taught them.

Jesus gives us His peace and we should not let our hearts be troubled or afraid.

Jesus tells us what is going to happen before it does so that when it does happen we may believe in Him.

Because Jesus loves the Father He obeys the commandments of the Father.

Takeaway

What I take away from John 14:19-31 is that Jesus never abandons His followers. When Jesus left He left us His word and his commandments (I believe these two are essentially the same) and the Father sent the Holy Spirit to teach and remind Jesus’ disciples of the things Jesus said. I believe the same promise holds true to us today.

I am convinced that the Holy Spirit is available to us today to teach us all things and to bring to our remembrance all thing things that Jesus said.

But the Helper, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in My name, He will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all things that I said to you. - John 14:26 NKJV

To me, it is clear that the secret to our spiritual success lies in receiving the Holy Spirit. Only then can we better understand Jesus and remember His words and keep his commandments. All the things we must do we can only do with the power of the Holy Spirit.

Studying this brought to mind what seem to be two essential lessons I am learning.

Lesson 1: Pray, especially for the Holy Spirit.

Never stop praying. - 1 Thessalonians 5:17 New Living Translation

One lesson that I began to learn early in life is that prayer is important. This is the one lesson I keep re-learning in life, and I believe it is one of the most important things I do. If I am not careful, become discouraged because of my feelings of weakness and powerlessness. I often wish I had more money, I wish I had more knowledge, I wish I had more power, more strength, or whatever it is I need to be able to solve the problems of those around me. Then I remember that it is not my job to solve everyone’s problem. I can’t even solve my own problems.

I do not mean this as an excuse not to help those we are able to help. I say this to prevent you from burning out trying to accomplish something that’s not for you to accomplish. Jesus is the One who saves. God has all the power, not us. We are not Jr. Holy Spirit. We should pray, we should pray for people, we should pray with people, we should point them to Jesus. Jesus is the answer. We are His hand and feet (1 Corinthians 12 we are the body of Christ) and we should be a blessing in the lives of those around us, but we are also humans and have our limitations. Our limitations should not keep us from doing anything. We can all at least pray, and through prayer, we can do more than we could ever possibly hope to accomplish by our own strength.

Pray especially for the Holy Spirit

If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!” -Luke 11:13 NKJV

Jesus essentially tells us to ask for the Holy Spirit. Jesus tells us that the Father is willing to give the Holy Spirit to those who ask, so ask! Ask every day! Ask multiple times a day. I take this promise to heart and I pray this prayer often. I pray it because I feel a desperate need for more strength, for more wisdom and understanding, for more power to preach and teach and help and do all that I can to point others to Jesus and to reveal the character of Jesus in my own life.

I strongly believe that all the success I experienced with the Park Avenue Seventh-day Adventist Church in Valdosta, Georgia, is because of our prayer meetings and the prayers we have around the table with all the members of the church board every time we have a board meeting. I believe in prayer and we have a church board that believes in prayer.

I have enjoyed God’s blessings because I have a church and friends and family who continually pray for me and pray for God to fill me with the Holy Spirit. I don’t deserve it, but God does not bless us according to what we deserve, but rather according to His grace and His mercies and His power and His will.

It is not because of any restriction on the part of God that the riches of His grace do not flow earthward to men. If the fulfillment of the promise is not seen as it might be, it is because the promise is not appreciated as it should be. If all were willing, all would be filled with the Spirit. - Acts of the Apostles p50

Pray for wisdom

If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. - James 1:5 NKJV

Another promise that I claim regularly is this one. God tells us to pray for wisdom. We are told we will receive liberally, without reproach. Why not ask? I ask all the time.

Lesson 2: Persevere

The Bible has a lot to say about perseverance.

And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart. -Galatians 6:9 NKJV

Show Up!

One of the ways that I understand perseverance is simply showing up. So many seem to believe that change happens in a big flashy event. It has been my experience that the biggest changes happen gradually over time.

Spiritual growth, like many other things in life, does not take place overnight. Sure, the high events are a great blessing. Many times we experience it when we first give our hearts to Jesus or the day we are baptized. Other times it happens at the conclusion of revival meetings or a week or prayer or an evangelistic series. But life is not made up of high moments. Going to a concert of your favorite Christian musician is a great experience but it does not generate lasting change and growth by itself.

Lasting change, continual growth, comes from showing up daily. Show up for prayer. By this I mean when your eyes pop open in the morning, the first thing you should do is pray. Thank God for another day of life. Ask God to fill you with the Holy Spirit. Ask God for wisdom. Talk to God about your day, what are you excited about? What are you worried about? Tell God all about your day.

Show up for Bible study. You should be studying the Bible every day. You may call this your daily devotional. This is when you allow the word of God to challenge you, to fill your thoughts, to shape your decisions. Reading the Bible reminds you that you have bigger goals than worldly wealth and power. You have greater values than just physical pleasure. You remind yourself that you serve a mighty and powerful God, you remind yourself that eternal life is yours in Jesus. From there you go to live a life that reflects the character of the God you serve.

You show up for worship, to be spiritually fed, to be challenged, to serve, to teach, to bless. We come to church for all those reasons. In serving, in teaching, in helping, we grow. Also when we make God and worship a priority, we remind ourselves that this is important. We tell ourselves that we value God and His will for our lives when we stop everything and come together to worship and study. Christianity is meant to be experienced as a community. It is important to belong, to be involved, to contribute, to volunteer. Because that is how we grow.

Show up, be responsible, be reliable, have clear priorities, and make God your top priority. Now live like it. Determine in your heart to show up for God. Do it at church, but also at home, at school, and even in your downtime.

Show up for God regularly and you will grow spiritually.

Don not wait for a big opportunity to do something amazing, rather do your best each day with every small opportunity that presents itself to you.

The key is to yield ourselves daily to God, so that He may make us vessels fit for His use. Every day we should be improving the opportunities for service that lie within our reach. Daily we ought to be witnessing for the Master wherever we may be, whether in some humble sphere of influence in the home or in a public field of usefulness.

Don’t give up

in the hope rejoicing; in the tribulation enduring; in the prayer persevering; - Romans 12:12 Literal Standard Version

I really appreciate the Literal Standard Verison of Romans 12:12. It is a simple reminder of how we ought to live our lives. We rejoice in our hope, we endure tribulations, and we pray continually.

Seek the LORD and His strength; Seek His face continually. - 1 Chronicles 16:11 NASB

Don’t stop seeking God and His strength. We are not able to do it on our own. We are not meant to do it on our own. We are to seek God and His strength. He is the One who gives us the victories.

Finally, my favorite Bible passage that I often turn to and the one that keeps me from giving up.

31 What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how shall He not with Him also freely give us all things? 33 Who shall bring a charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies. 34 Who is he who condemns? It is Christ who died, and furthermore is also risen, who is even at the right hand of God, who also makes intercession for us. 35 Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword? 36 As it is written:

“For Your sake we are killed all day long; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.”

37 Yet in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. 38 For I am persuaded that neither death nor life, nor angels nor principalities nor powers, nor things present nor things to come, 39 nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. - Romans 8:31-38 NKJV

This passage keeps me from giving up because it reminds me that nothing can separate me from the love of God. The way I see it, the only way I lose is if I give up. I know for sure that God won’t give up on me. So I just have to live one day at a time, take one step at a time, just keep showing up, because I know I can count on God to show up.

[ask-proto-niro-kuma]

- This edit was maded by me mod makoto yuki on a danganronpa Roleplay amino

http://aminoapps.com/p/618txd

《credit to pitzmaker and I am using Nagisa sprite to create Niro nitris as a human.

-------------------------------------------------

Niro nitris- proto type Monokuma promo

Name :Niro nitris

Age: 16

Birthday

13/08/1980

Ultimate :reserved course student

Relationships

Ryoko \Junko

Alils

Monokuma (human version)

Niro nitris was a normal boy attending a new school that is pretty much normal.

《Warning this back story is sad and has gore 》

Intill 18th of August 1996 everyone was happy and excited over a new season of their favourite tv show which didn't mind it at all right since it's normal to have stuff like that but then he saw everyone dress up as their favourite characters from the show and keep mentioning death and despair and distance them self away from the world became insane. He tried to fit in but he doesn't know what to do.

One day when he was heading to school he heard a voice "ooh having trouble niro kidd ?" He questioned the mysterious voice and said "who are you and how do you know my name ?"" It doesn't matter what my name but is all you need to know " the mysterious voice giggled and continue to say "that I am on your side"

The boy feel terrified and started to shake in fear and said in his mind"I remember that voice but what shall I do ?" You could run away try to escape it ?" Or you can "find out what they want afraid that they might kill you if you ran away?" Niro is spilt decision in his own Brain and went for find out what they want .

So he said "what do you want from me ?" He said feeling petrified and the mysterious voice said "come with me and see for your self if you do you can feel a new man in you" niro said "um ok then " the mysterious voice said " that's what I like to see and btw your look cool but first."

The mysterious voice blindfolded niro and took them to a unknown area.

《Unknown room 》

Niro wakes up tied up with one of his eye balls out of his sockets and blue prints of a human bear thing and he heard the same mysterious voice and this time they reaveal them self "oh your awake my sweet heart. Niro "now I remember that voice that's Ryoko what happened to her ? He said in his mind.

Ryoko appeared and said "Hello niro did you miss me ?" She said with a smile on her face and niro said "yes I did but what happened to me ?" He said when he remembered that one of his eyes are gone.

Ryoko smiled more sinisterly and said "I knew you would figure it out my love your too clever and special to not guess it " Ryoko started to take off her desuise that they had and showed her look .

Niro looked at the look and said "J Junko enoshima your her ..... he got even more terrified.... "I should went for my other gut and run away ".

Junko said "you bet I am darling now what I am I gonna do with you oh right this " Junko went on over to the tools and said "I will make you my toy " she giggles more .

Niro screamed alot when the other eye went way and his mouth and nose came off his face and then junko stitch it all up and then got rid of his vocal cords from his neck and pop it into her jar and then stitch that up and give him a mask to his face and stich that to his face.

After all that niro nitrus became like a human verison of Monokuma.

In the killing game

He appears in his human form for a bit before when they getting together very well then he reveals him self as the Monokuma that everyone loves and told them about the killing game.

That's all that happed to him.

Niro nitris:"If you be so kind to give me a promo "

Songs to go with this oc

Tags

@ask-monokuma @ask-monodam

@ask-monaca @ask-junko-enoshima @ask-junkomikan @ask-mastermind-chiaki @ask-mastermind-shadow-persona

@pregameshuichi @ask-pregame-oma @ask-pregame-oumota @ask-pregame-kaede @ask-pregame-kork

@not-junko-enoshima

@despairfully-chaos @human-monokuma

Anyone else who wants to interact with this blog.

@danganronpa--despairfultruth

@danganronpa

@motherkuma-and-monokubs  @the-real-junko-enoshima @ask-miu-iruma @a-trying-detective

[sneakerdoodle]

On Second Citadel and unity

It was interesting to me that, after making Junoverse a very poignant gender utopia (and general lgbt-utopia, too), Kabert went ahead and made their second storyline so heavily centered around bigotry and discrimination (dealing with topics of ableism, mysogyny, homophobia). now, obviosuly, Junoverse is not even remotely free of inequality, and as far as the mentioned topics are handled this utopia is not disability-friendly, with prosthetics not being readily available with no charge, which, like many other things, strips people of their autonomy, turns them into a rich man’s plaything. But here inequality is arguably explored from the point of exploitation of one human being by another, of abuse of power (interpersonal and social-scale). Whereas Second Citadel opens with an episode about two knights - a disabled one and a woman one - both of whom struggled for similar reasons, so there is supposedly little power imbalance here. And yet they do not see eye to eye, even more so, one of them furthers the other’s discrimination. We can speculate that that’s Sir Caroline’s effort to fit in - strengthen the sense of her hard-earned belonging by othering someone who never got that right to belong. Which doesn’t make it any less infuriating and damaging, but sets the tone of the story very well. There is no strong thriving off the weak. There are just people infinitely rejecting one another on the basis of their differences, often under the weight of their own rejection.

The topic of ostracization and discrimination is tackled in almost every arc of SC, but the idea of othering extends beyond it. The central conflict, the ongoing war is between monsters and humans - and while we’re more familiar with the human side of it, while we may learn more about the history of their conflict and who wronged whom first and worst, for now we’ve seen both humans and monsters express deep disgust for each other and one another’s way of living. And then the same happens on a smaller scale, within one species: we see the mutual disdain between Northerners and Southerners. Sir Caroline is different not only as a woman but as a foreigner; the Cinderclasp episode made it far too clear that the attitude to foreigners in the South is no better. 

And all of that unravels against the backdrop of pretty phrases about unity that get repeated over and over. “Strength in Unity”. “Two in unity, simple, strong”. I believe those are not instruments of irony, however, but keys to the central message, echoes of this societies’ past and - hopefully - foreshadowing of their future.

Sir Caroline twists the meaning of that unity in order to keep her authority:

ANGELO: Sir Caroline, I really don't think-- CAROLINE: What is the primary edict of our Citadel, Sir Angelo? ANGELO: Strength in unity. Of course. CAROLINE: And the sooner you all remember that, the safer humanity will be in these Northern Wilds. Hypocrites. The lot of you. Unified only when it’s convenient. No better than monsters in that way: greed governs all, and everyone just does what they want to get what they want. If you just listened to authority, real authority, you might actually be safe.

And that happens to highlight what unity is not: giving up one’s autonomy and approach and unique competence to fit into someone else’s model of desired reality. 

Here Damien’s words about perspectives come into play. However labored and uncomfortable they were, showing his inability to not fixate on what separates others from him, they are important as a piece of the meta puzzle: they make us think of inherent value of different experiences.

DAMIEN: My kind, kind friend. I agree that it is a shame that we cannot trust these men. They would be valuable allies, as Sir Caroline was – for moving through the world as she has, in a life quite different from ours, has clearly gifted her with ways of thinking that you and I would never come to. ANGELO: Very true, very true. DAMIEN: And so I am certain that given Marc’s...situation, he too must have a perspective of great value in our mission. But the simple fact is that he cannot be trusted.

The importance of these lines is backed up in Lady of the Lake, when Caroline is instructed to use specific characteristics of her subordinates and turn them into strength that would aid the mission. We are told over and over that true unity is in embracing our differences, valuing them and working together to make these differences work in everyone’s favour. 

There is something to be said about quite careless exploitation of Damien’s neurodivergency of course, but that is once again the warped verison of true unity, showing what unity is not, but also simultaneously giving us some idea of its potential. At the core, behind Sir Caroline’s personal errors, the message is kinder, broader. We are told again and again that the importance of the unqiue approach, unique way of thought, unique operation of our minds can enrich our shared experience and cooperation beyond measure.

So when later on Sir Caroline instead tries to suffocate any challenge to her authority, any alternative point of view, it comes as the biggest whiplash.

And of course, when discussing the monster-human antagonism in this vein, the Moonlit Hermit arc gives some truly invaluable material. Rilla and Arum’s interactions are strongly based on the differences of their approach to the world, with Rilla’s being a rational one and Arum operating on what can be called intuition, spiritual sense and probably instinct. He despises attempts to rationalize the free broad flow of the universal energy.

And what we see is two of them coming together, sharing their views of the world and finding something useful, fascinating, beautiful in the point of view that seemed so unthinkable before. That culminates in the truly breathtaking scene of their discussion of the nature of music, whether it’s magic or math:

RILLA: I mean..why can’t it be both? ARUM: Nonsense. RILLA: No, I mean...maybe that’s what makes music special. It uses these predictable scales and measures and combines them with some unpredictable, something-- ARUM: Magic. And what comes out isn’t really either. It’s...more.

“It’s more”. Can’t overstate how hard this hits. And the parallel between this theory and Rilla and Arum’s relationship is more than on the nose, proving to us once again that the idea of unifying our different experiences and perspectives as something incredibly valuable, something that creates something new, rich, priceless, that is more than just a sum of the two, is central to the narrative.

What is interesting to me in the Moonlit Hermit arc is the distinction that is made between the monsters and the humans. Humans are supposedly rational while monsters speak of magic and the Universe - what a fun narrative is that! Monstrous spirituality... And then later on we have Damien raging at his saint, yelling “It is only monsters who listen to their heart above all!” - but apparently it is not. 

The new season offered some helpful context to that, specifically - the Thought Stream. Obviously referencing the Tarot, it has four suites resembling the Minor Arcana while what can be called the Major Arcana is not a part of the deck usually but something that appears unpredictably (specifically: Olala’s card that does not belong to the Wilds, Wastes, Frosts or Mirrors suit). 

The four Tarot suits (Swords, Cups, Wands and Pentacles) represent different areas of our life, separated: Intellect, Emotion, Spirituality/Creativity and the Material. Mind, Heart, Spirit and Body.

The four suits also correspond with the four elements. And Water is the one corresponding with Heart, with our emotions. I do not think it to be a coincidence that Saint Damien - the one encouraging his follower to listen to his heart, teaching him tranquility i.e. not losing oneself in the stream of emotion, the one teaching how to let one’s heart guide not stir - has water and the waves as his symbol.

So if Damien is Heart, Rilla is definitely Mind: she is analytical, a determined problem solver. I believe Arum represents the Wands: the Spirit and the fire - and that it is a symbol connected to monsters’ society in general. 

Wands suit deals with passionate creation, with realizing one’s vision, bringing something into the world. That seems in line with the monstrous philosophy in general. They talk of one’s place decided by the Universe, they say one is justified in their actions as long as they truly do what they want, follow where their passion guides them. There is quite a bit of hypocrisy there as we can see in the Spiral Sage arc, the monster society may just be keeping the platitudes while giving in to the power of the strongest no matter the Universe’s place for the weak - but the ideal is still there, and it is one Arum seems to follow wholeheartedly. (Hence his interpretation of Damien seemingly abandoning his path as a lack of character.)

The same idea - one’s place in the Universe - is brought up again in the first part of “The Fool in the Garden of Death”, showing this belief spreads beyond monsters’ society, into the Western Wastes. None of the elements, be it Heart or Spirit, are strictly one species’; however, we’re dealing with different cultures and ways of life people are most accustomed to, prioritizing different aspects of life. And we’re being shown that maybe engaging with each other is what those cultures are supposed to do.

The Thought Stream’s deck is made up of four suits corresponding with four ends of the world, four parts of it. Where in Tarot we have aspects in Thought Stream we have places. This reinforces the concept of different aspects of life, different ways of approaching it, corresponding with specific societies. 

Each of the suits is given an identity, but all of them make up one deck.

After all, what’s one aspect of a being without all the rest? Reign of just one’s Mind, Heart, Spirit or Body - how long can it last before turning destructive?

True strength is in balance of different elements - in unity that recognizes the value of each of them.

I have a theory that the ideals of the Second Citadel are the forgotten and revamped mottos of the beings of Fort Terminus: “two in unity” being not two partners but two worlds, monster and human, coming together to create something that is more, something new and powerful and full of potential. Capable of building something as impressive as the Bridge. I also have a theory that the Bridge is a parallel to the Tower of Babel. Which brings us to the idea of a divided world unable to see past the differences between societies, and through that losing the power that unity used to give it.

Showing the world where difference is shunned and leads to ostracism, where people that come from different places fail to acknowledge each other’s humanity and refuse to embrace their differences, where two species fail to accept the other’s way of living and deny the enemy their humanity/monstrosity, the Second Citadel storyline is offering a greater value as an endgoal: embracing difference and diversity, seeing strength in what sets us apart from each other, and recognizing that we all complete one another, like the four aspects of our own being, like four pillars upon which the sky rests. Deny one single pillar’s importance and wait for it to come crashing down on you. It says: to know true strength, we should welcome any and all experience, all of the unique perspectives, celebrate the differences that make our shared existence so much richer and make us so much more capable to deal with challenges of life. Strength in unity - not in uniformity.

[reddieandwaiting87]

Lucifer (any version) or Micheal (any version)? 😁

Angel's!!!! My favourite group of characters on the show.

Bless you Nancy XD

I don't care about Micheal at all even Jensen's verison of him was a snooze feast.

But on the other hand Lucifer keeps coming back like a cockroach and they even did the awful Lucifer knocks up a human bullshit. That was ONE thing I always liked about Lucifer's story back in the day that they DIDN'T do this over done storyline.

So of course seasons later they did.

If Lucifer never got out of the cage in S11 (thanx Asstiel) and it was just a chance for Sam to be a badass and tell Lucifer no. Then it would have been so much better.

So Micheal leaves no impression on me. While what they have done to Lucifer just pisses me off so much. XD

So back to the question.

Will say its Micheal!Dean vs Lucifer!Sam

And big shock here but it's going to be Lucifer!Sam for me.

Even the shitty CGI red eyes couldn't ruin seeing Lucifer!Sam again in S15.

Jared plays the best Lucifer and while I fucking hate they other verisons of him.

Mark.P should be ashamed cause he used to play Lucifer as a character and Misha? He is a fucking idiot who can't act.

Jared's version of him saves the character.

While Micheal!Dean......

That freeze frame ending in S14 should have been our first clue.

Even Jensen can't make him interesting.

Thank you Nancy!!!

[callie-the-snarky-geek-blog]

RvB16 Episode 2 Review: Incendiary Incidents

(Old Blog Repost)

Last time, not a lot happened other than going out for food, Donut unlocking his true potential as a contortionist, and alien Norse Gods are a thing that exist. Nothing that unusual for this show. We got the setup, so what’ll they do with it now as the pizza quest continues? Lets find out!

Overview

To the shock of no one, Grif crashed the ship. He rushes everyone through the insults and sidenote to Kai’s… so does she actually have regular contact with their mom? Makes me really wonder about where Grif stands with his family. Anyways, good news is the pizza place isn’t far off! They just have to go through some ominous woods! Grif however opts to go through the less than ominous woods which would take longer, but isn’t… well, ominous. This gets Simmons attention. Enough that, as they make their way through, he pulls Grif aside to find out what his deal is. My shipping heart is happy to see Simmons noticing that something’s not right with his not-boyfriend and getting to the bottom of it… please tell me I didn’t accidentally write an innuendo,

So you knwo that ‘new science’ Grif mentioned last episode? Well here’s that new science: laziness… sort of! So when stuck on the moon (I THINK he called it Iris? So… after Michael and Lindsay’s daughter/Geoff’s goddaughter? AWW!), Grif found a book that Jax left behind about story structure. He found out about ‘incendiary incidents’, which are incidents that jumpstart a plot essentially I tried to look it up to see if that’s an actual term… and all I got was a bunch of fire safety websites. But I’ll take Joe’s word for it and say it’s an actual term. So Grif cutting off Jensen before, crashing the ship deliberately as it turns out due to a message from Locus, and avoiding the ominous woods is to avoid getting into an incident that would jumpstart a plot, and therefore lead them into another adventure. IDK if this is clever fourth wall breaking but… wow. WOW. Even Simmons gets chocked up about how much effort Grif put into doing nothing. It’s counterproductive when you think about it, but still!

Unfortunately for Grif, he IS in a webshow with plot structure and the powers to be aren’t going to let them get out of it that easy. Caboose discovered a glowing lake. And a figure emerges form it. Now the episode summary describes a thought to be deceased team member returning. Oh my Gd, that… that’s crazy! It could anyone! But why?! Tex? Flowers? Shelia? Church? Alpha Church? Yellow Church?! The guy who got killed during one of those 360 videos?! The possibilities are endless! It could be anyone! Who knows what kind of shocking twist it cou.. it’s Donut. Who we all knew was alive. Yeah… well I’ll give them this, it had me hyped for the episode.

So Donut… Jesus Christ. No, seriously, Donut is now Jesus. He walked ont he water for crying out loud! Donut says that he had been taken through time and that they have to go into the past to stop a great danger… and absolutely no one buys it. Now to be fair, Simmons makes a good point later. They already went through a time travel story and it turns out it was just a simulation. So them being skeptical about this happening again, especially since only Caboose saw the body horror last episode and I imagine that he forgot by now, is pretty understandable. But yeah no one buys it and Grif feels relieved about avoiding the story bomb… until Simmons points out that refusing the call is an actual story trope. See Grif? There’s no escaping!

So the Reds and Blues make it to ton and… yeah, it’s been totaled. After talking to Jeremy Dooley… I-I mean a cop… no, I’m 90% sure that was Jeremy. Anyways! After that, Donut tries to convince them of time travel again, and this time has actual proof. He has this new gun which he uses to open a portal to a few days earlier. How did he get this? Well to put it simply, after he got hit by Loco’s machine he got sent back in time and his body got wrecked, but God found him and fixed him. IDK if he means the Christian God or one of these alien Gods, but they’ve picked the Reds and Blues to be his time traveling warriors and has sent back four more guns for them to use to go back in time with. The portals can also only fit two grown humans at once.

Unfortunately, things go downhill quickly. So you guys remember the four armed guy from the trailer? Well the sky goes dark and he appears… oh sorry, typed that wrong. I mean that SHE appears. Yes everyone, we have a legit female villain at last!! I couldn’t get her name, but part of it sounded like Callie… which is my name… UGH… anyways! Yeah, she starts causing chaos and destruction. Donut uses a bubble shield, telling the others to use the portal guns and get away. They comply with everyone pairing off: Cabbose and Lopez, Tucker and Sister, Grif and Doc, and Sarge and Simmons. Donut remains behind, though I assume that he’ll follow them later. Huggins, who has been following the group, chases after Grif and Doc by going through their portal. We follow Sarge and Simmons as they land in… what looks like ancient Egypt. Could be wrong, but we’ll have to wait and find out cause that’s the end of the episode!

Review

Well all of that escalated quickly!

So… gonna talk about Grif first! Cause yes, he’s getting a character arc! I mean I guess it could have ended here since his plan failed, but since Huggins went after him and Doc we could get something on that front. Anyways, so I was right and Grif is actively trying to keep them out of getting into adventures. To the point that he’s putting effort into maintaining laziness… that’s the kind of logic I expect form this show. It wasn’t how I expected it, but I expected it. It’s also good to see that he does still have some hangups from the moon. He seems a lot more… what’s the word? High-strung than normal? He’s also still talking in pretty large bursts compared to normal. I don’t know if that’s just me reading into it too much, but it seems like Joe is trying to show that Grif still has hangups from his self-exile. Which hey, if it means more Grif focus, I am not complaining!

The episode is more about plot than the last one. Last week was the setup, and now the payoff is here. So first, Donut. He was written SO WELL. One of the issues last season was that Donut was pretty much a background prop and they even forgot to put him in scenes. Joe must have realized that this was a problem cause he’s already fixing it BIG TIME. Donut’s had shit happen man! He comes off as slightly mroe serious and competent in a sense that he actually knows the gravity of the situation. But he still feels and acts like Donut, which is good! It shows that he CAN be useful and competent, but without sacrificing his personality. Heck he only spouted out one innuendo and it was just to prove that it was really him. I am digging this new direction!

So turns out that the four armed guy si a terrifying alien goddess of death… I dig it! So someone pointed out that this character is similar to Hela from Thor: Ragnarok. SO it REALLY seems like Joe is basing the villain off Norse mythology… or just the Marvel Cinematic Universe verisons of them. Either way is fine. So I’m not sure if… Kali-Ra I think is her name? Anyways it doesn’t seem like she’s with the same group as Huggins cause I imagine that she would have reacted. I also don’t think that this chick is the main villain since DOnut referred to a ‘devil man’, but still she is terrifying and badass and I LOVE it. We finally got a female main villain guys! Joe is the hero we’ve waited for! Yay! Also Sarge asking he rot marry him, Of course he’d want to marry a violent death goddess… I’ll totes ship this!

Alright, time travel! SO ever since Joe mentioned it in that post a while ago, I’ve… been skeptical. Time travel in pretty much every show tends to be confusing and create tons of plot holes. It even happened in RvB before with Season 3 before Burnie retconned it as a simulation. Didn’t save my head from imploding, but still that’s a fair excuse. Hopefully Joe has a VERY good idea on what he’s doing with this, but I’ve been warming up to the idea since then. It’ll be fun to see the guys in different time periods at least! Form how it looks, Sarge and Simmons may go tomb raiding it it really is Ancient Egypt. I mean Sarge vs mummies, there is no way that cannot be epic!

So the gang is being split up, and the pairs are interesting! Sarge and Simmons sin’t that much of a surprise and tbf it’s been a long time since they had some one-on-one time. Simmons has also grown out of being a kissass quite a bit, so it’ll be interesting to see how that goes. Caboose and Lopez are together… so I’ just going to assume that in every animated RT production, Burnie is just meant to be stuck with/get annoyed with Joel in one way or another. Cause that is the impression I’m getting. Tucker and Sister are together, so I imagine flirting… okay I’m good with that! Hopefully Sister gets some focus to herself that isn’t just Tucker trying to hit on her, but still I’m good with this!

And finally Grif and Doc… that one is gonna be interesting. Grif in particular seems very grudgey against Doc for the betrayal and we just saw Doc save Grif form getting crushed by tackling him into the portal. Which props to Doc for that BTW. Still with that and since they’re 100 on an adventure now, Grif’s not gonna be a happy camper. Also if O’Malley gets active and starts going into Grif’s past issues like in S13, I… imagine that’ll be rough for our favorite orange boy. Also Huggins chased after them, so I assume that they’ll be discovering her soon. Which if she pals up with them…t hat could be really cute tbh! I am all for Grif and Doc shenanigans with a a ball of light! But yeah, this could lead to a LOT of things and I’m very interested in seeing how this plays out.

Final Thoughts

It was great! Admittedly this is a lot mroe bizarre than RvB has been in a while but it’s also RvB where Grif still being alive after getting hit by a tank and having Simmons organs thrown into him improperly isn’t ever questioned. Alien Norse Gods? Ia m all for it! Donut being Jesus? Awesome! More setup for Grf having a character arc? HELL YEAH MAN. It was a well done episode, progressing the plot without wasting any time, gives us a glimpse at how dangerous our villains our, gives us a badass female villain, and sets up everything for the episodes ot come. There’s definitely a feeling of epicness compared to last time, so it looks lie Joe is taking the armature gloves off and giving us one Hell of a story. I am very excited to see where it leads!

[thenightling]

Cain’s psychosis (An in-depth look at the character)

Today Cain of DC comics turns fifty-years-old so I have decided to focus a few posts on him, especially since the season finale of Lucifer is this Monday and there has been some confusion about the comic book version of the character as opposed to the TV show and to his true nature.  

The Lucifer solo comics version of Cain is very, very different from the verison in the Lucifer TV series.   But no, unlike the versions in New 52 (the 2011-2015 failed DC “Soft” reboot) neither Cain nor Lucifer are truly evil in the comics.   

(Cain from Lucifer Volume 2, issue 4 from 2016-2017)

(Cain AKA Marcus Pierce from the Lucifer TV series Season 3, 2017 to 2018)

Somehow someone here on Tumblr mistakenly thought the New 52 “I... Vampire” comics version of Cain was the one from the Lucifer comics.   I suspect this has to do with the poorly written entry in the Wikipedia page about DC’s Lucifer that neglected to mention that the Cain and Lucifer in that story are not from the continuity where Lucifer quits ruling Hell and were the result of a misguided attempt to reinvent the characters in 2012.

The version of Lucifer that quit ruling Hell and the version of Cain that has interacted with him have since been restored to canon.

This post is going to be discussing and even defending the comic book incarnation of Cain.  For those new to the character, first you need to ignore the New 52 version of Cain. 

 First, iI am sorry to tell some of you that if the version of Cain you have been reading about is this guy... 

“Cain, Sire of all Vampires” 

then you are reading about the wrong character.  

I repeat, the image above, is the wrong version of Cain!

The version of Cain that appears in Lucifer’s solo comics is from The House of Mystery, The Sandman, Lucifer, and all comics labeled “Sandman Universe.” 

The version of Cain in New 52 titles such as “I... Vampire” is NOT the right version of Cain.  

The Cain from the lore where Lucifer quit ruling Hell, is NOT a vampire, nor was he ever “destroyed” by Constantine and dragged to Hell.  In fact, the version of Cain who appears in the Lucifer comics, has only been to Hell once, and that was to relay a message.  

The cain that appears in Lucifer’s solo comics is this one.

Cain is skinny with auburn (or brown) hair parted to resemble horns, a funky and slightly excessive soul patch beard (without a mustache), wire rim or pince-nez spectacles and he has slightly pointed ears.    

 Fifty-years-ago Cain made his first comic book appearance in The House of Mystery issue 175, published for DC in the summer of 1968.

For those who don’t know about the DC / Vertigo version of Cain and Abel they are loosely inspired by the biblical characters.   They may or may not actually be them. They could be Nightmare incarnations of the characters created by Morpheus (the ruler of The Dream Realm).  It’s a bit ambiguous to if they are the original Cain and Abel or if they are dream versions of The Characters. 

One thing is certain though.  Lucifer respect’s Cain’s mark as if he is THE Cain.  

Though acknowledged, Cain’s mark is rarely shown in the comics, but is apparently hidden under his hair over his forehead.  Like in the Lucifer TV series it is an “O” shape but it is not on his forearm.

Even if Cain is only a Nightmare incarnation of the Biblical character the mark is respected and for this reason it was Cain that Morpheus (The Dream Lord) sent to Hell to relay the message that he would be paying Lucifer a visit to rescue a soul he wrongfully left in Hell centuries before. This was in The Sandman comics during the storyline called Season of Mists.

When Cain returned to The Dreaming (The realm of Dreams) to tell Morpheus that Lucifer was awaiting his arrival, poor Cain was scared out of his wits (Lucifer had taken delight in deliberately terrifying him).  Lucifer is the only thing Cain is afraid of.

It was when Morpheus arrived in Hell that he soon found out that Lucifer had quit.  This is the basis for the Lucifer TV series. 

Cain and Abel’s original purpose in DC were as hosts for the horror anthology series House of Mystery and House of Secrets.  Cain was the caretaker of the House of Mystery and Abel was the caretaker of The House of Secrets.  The two often intersected, reading scary stories to an audience (comic book reader) much like The Crypt Keeper, Old Witch, and Vault Keeper of the old EC comics. 

In the late 1980s Neil Gaiman scooped them up and made the duo Nightmare residents of The Dreaming (The realm of Dreams) in the Sandman comics of the late 1980s into the late 1990s.  It was a play on the punny idea that after the murder of Abel, Cain went to The land of Nod (which is another term for Dreamland).

Cain habitually kills Abel fairly regularly with ghoulish Crypt Keeper style puns.  Abel revives and heals within a day and the cycle begins a new as they are both more or less immortal beings.  Sometimes Cain seems remorseful about the murders of his brother and the murdering might be an unavoidable compulsion while other times he seems to take vicious glee in the act.  This could be because they are actually personifications of what people anticipate of the famous Biblical characters. 

The best way to describe Cain is he’s like a cross between The Crypt Keeper, Vincent Price, and Alfred Hitchcock with Abel as his recurring and only victim.  Cain is usually a gracious host to most other people.

Abel is more sweet and timid by nature.   A perpetual victim.    

In the Sandman comics they are loyal to Morpheus, AKA Dream of the Endless, AKA the Sandman.   Morpheus is the very entity that Lucifer left the key to Hell to and the one who helped Lucifer by cutting off his wings for him with Mazikeen’s blade when Lucifer quit Hell.

In the older House of Mystery comics Cain has a pet black cat named Oskar and a pet large green Gargoyle that behaves rather dog-like.  The gargoyle is named Gregory and is still with him in The Sandman comics.  If you’re familiar with Disney’s Gargoyles, Gregory is a bit like Bronx.

Abel has a little baby golden gargoyle named Goldie (Originally he wanted to name him Irving but Cain insisted Gargoyles have G names).  Cain gave Abel the egg that Goldie hatched from as a present.

The name Goldie was ultimately chosen after Abel’s old “imaginary friend” who may or may not have been an actual ghost haunting The house of Secrets, also by the name of Goldie.

The house of secrets (Abel’s House) contains all the secrets one might learn in Dreams.   The house of Mystery (Cain’s House) contains every mystery one might dream up.  Cain is excessively melodramatic and loves a good story.

Abel has a permanent stutter, probably from being murdered so often.  

When they first appear in Sandman, Morpheus (Dream / The Sandman) has returned to his realm but he collapses on his way to the castle.  This is shortly after Morpheus has escaped from nearly a century of captivity at the hands of mortals.  It’s Cain and Abel who nurse him back to health after Cain’s dog-like gargoyle, Gregory is who had found Morpheus barely conscious.

 Despite their dysfunction Cain actually does love Abel and even pleaded with Daniel (Dream’s newest incarnation) to bring him back when “The Kindly Ones” killed him (Abel only comes back from the dead when Cain kills him).  And yes, he does bring Abel back for Cain.

During the Sandman comic storyline Season of Mists, Morpheus sends Cain to Hell to announce he is coming to retrieve a soul.  Morpheus intends to rescue a woman he wrongfully left in Hell centuries before.  He figures Lucifer won’t hurt Cain but Lucifer terrifies the old Nightmare anyway without actually hurting him, and Cain returns trembling and mortified.  Morpheus calms him and rewards him with a pleasant sleep.  

To Morpheus’ surprise, when he arrives in Hell, that is when Lucifer is shutting everything down because he has quit.  (basis for the Fox TV series).

There was a brief attempt to allow “Cain, Sire of all vampires” to co-exist with Cain, The Caretaker, with the claim that the vampire was the “Real” Cain and that the one in The Dreaming was a Nightmare creation, but I believe that has since been dropped and it is best to pretend it had not happened, after, the comic book where “Cain, sire of all vampires” appeared only lasted twelve-issues whereas Cain of The Sandman Universe has existed for fifty-years as of today. 

The House of Mystery / Sandman Universe version of Cain also appeared in the 2016 Halloween episode of the animated series, Justice League Action to narrate the story Trick or Threat.

In The Bible Cain murdered his brother, Abel.   They were the children of Adam and Eve.   Eventually Eve had another son, Seth, but that came later.   Cain murdered Abel out of jealousy because it was implied that God liked his animal sacrifice better than Cain’s sacrifice of a good autumn harvest (I guess the Bible writers don’t appreciate the hard work of agriculture).

When God asks Cain where Abel is he answers “Am I my brother’s keeper?”  When it’s revealed that Abel was murdered by Cain (the very first murder) Cain is cursed with immortality and left to wander. A mark is put upon him by God to protect him so that no one will harm him for his crime lest they suffer seven (or in some versions three) times the harm done to Cain.  

In most versions Cain ends up in The Land of Nod, which Neil Gaiman took to mean the realm of Dreams (playing on the pun since Land of Nod is used to mean dream land in British childrens’ literature).  

It’s unclear if DC’s Cain is THE Cain of The Bible or a version of the character created by the Dream Lord (Morpheus AKA Dream of The Endless).

  But in any event Cain’s compelled to kill his brother every so often.  And both men are now guardians of two houses in The Dreaming.  The House of Secrets (Abel) and The House of Mystery (Cain).   Both houses can and do appear in the human world as if on their own accord and are bigger on the inside.   They are usually together though sometimes The House of Mystery is seen alone.

Now here’s where I will give Cain a little defense.

Lucifer is not listed as evil in the comics. He is listed as neutral.  The same can be said of Cain.  He’s not actually evil either.  Cain does murder his brother fairly regularly but if he is ever lead to think that Abel will not revive he is devastated by the idea.  

In The Sandman comics storyline called The Kindly Ones, the Greek Furies arrived, and one of their acts to get Morpheus’ attention, was to murder Abel.  Cain was heartbroken and could not bear to carry on with his usual ghoulish theatrics.  As soon as the dust settled in the storyline called The Wake, Cain barged into the castle demanding that his king, Dream of The Endless, raise Abel from the dead. 

 When it is not Cain who kills Abel, it requires the ruler of Dreams to bring him back. This adds to the theory that he may not literally be Cain and Abel may not literally be Abel, but that they are both dream entities inspired by the cultural collective idea of the two characters.

  They are even referred to as “Nightmares” in the comic book series called The Dreaming.

(Issue 59 of The Dreaming.  Warning, This particular version of The Dreaming comics is no longer canon as the series is set to be rebooted this summer.)

Cain’s compulsion to kill Abel has been used as everything from an uncomfortable metaphor of an abusive domestic relationship to a dark version of Obsessive Compulsive disorder.  But a few things are clear.  He cannot bear the idea of Abel’s death truly being permanent.  And Cain has (as far as I know) never killed anyone other than Abel.        

In general Cain is actually a relatively harmless and good natured guy.  He’ll invite you in for tea as long as you’re willing to listen to one of his scary stories.  Just think of it as being invited in by Gomez Addams.   He believes in justice and has taunted the villains of his own stories when he feels they deserve it.  He is also surprisingly good with children.

 Cain might be a liternal Nightmare representation of the Biblical character, which accounts for the bulk of his behavior.  LIke a citizen of Halloween Town from Tim Burton’s Nightmare before Christmas his very nature is to scare but not necessarily do harm.  He is most satisfied when he has given an adequately scary story. 

Even if Cain was created by Morpheus he would still have his own personality and autonomy.  Morpheus’ creations are usually self-aware individual entities.  

Unlike the Lucifer TV show version of Cain, the Cain of The Sandman Universe (the lore where Lucifer’s solo comics come from) likes who and what he is.  He’s actually quite content with his existence despite the compulsion to kill his brother (which he sometimes does not seem to like while other times he does).

 And if Cain ever thinks Abel is in danger he can become surprisingly and fiercely protective.  (Only he gets to kill his brother!) 

  Cain will avoid crossing Lucifer if he can help it after his brief visit to Hell (During Sandman Season of Mists) where Lucifer taunted him by holding him by his hair over Hell as he flew before finally setting him down.

Cain, naturally, kept his distance when Lucifer paid a visit to The Dreaming (realm of Dreams)  in 2016.

 Also how can you hate a guy who sounds like Vincent Price?

Honestly, I love this asshole.

He can also be bribed with cookies.

[omgjojomcjojouniverse]

Cultural Dance: Polka, Germany

Welcome back to my series of blog post that explore different cultural dances around the World. After exploring different cultural dances in Cameroon and China, I thought it would be fun to explore the dances in a country I am not so Familiar with. Germany! when looking at Europe and its diverse culture you can notice that the different countries share a different form of Ballroom dancing such as the Waltz, Tarantella, Flamenco and Can Can . For this post because of its fun name I will be Covering The Polka.

The History of Polka:

The polka was first originated as a Czech peasant dance. According to historic Folklore the steps of the dance were created by a peasant girl named Anna Slezak for her own amusement. The word Polka derived from the Czech phrase “half-step”, which describe step dance as stepping from one foot to the other.

The polka dance was first introduced to Prague ballrooms in 1835, and to Paris ballrooms in 1840. French dancers took to polka immediately, and it soon grew wildly popular. Polka eventually reached England and the United States by the late 1840s. In the twentieth century, Polish American immigrants adopted the polka as their national dance. Today, polka is one of the few dances that originated during the nineteenth century that is still popular worldwide.

The Dance and Music:

The dance is usually performed face to face or side to side in pairs or couples, with the mans hands around the woman's waist and  her hand on his shoulder. One characteristic of dancing the polka is the half-step, or hop, that precedes the first step. The basic polka step is done in four counts. Begin with standing with your weight on your right foot. Give the preliminary hop on the right foot, then step forward on your left foot. Close the right foot to the left, taking weight on the right foot, and step again on the left foot. Then hold for a beat, keeping weight on the left foot.

The dance is usually performed with a 2/4 beat and it is structured around choruses and verses usually about loss, love or food.  A standard polka band might include bass, trumpet, clarinet, saxophone and drums, but because of its wide spred you migh find some band with diifent instrumrmts or just different verison deppending on were you are (Germany, Polans or even Texas)

https://youtu.be/ZrWJL8JZLT0

For my previous blog post I explored dances in Cameroon and the dragon dance form china and noticed they are both composed of intricate dnace steps perfomed by numerous people and props to the beat of a drum at special occasion. The German polka dance like many european dances are usually perdoemd also at special occasions but in couples, unlike the dragon dance and agrcan dnaces. The polka dance is a direct representation of what they value as a society. The first priority of a human is survival – living until the next day, the next season, a natural death in old age. The second priority is the survival of your genes – your family.

sources 

http://www.centralhome.com/ballroomcountry/polka.htm

http://www.centralhome.com/ballroomcountry/polka.htm

https://www.pbs.org/independentlens/polkatime/polka.html#:~:text=Polka%20originated%20as%20a%20Czech,day%20for%20her%20own%20amusement.&text=The%20polka%20dance%20was%20first,to%20Paris%20ballrooms%20in%201840.

https://folkdancefootnotes.org/begin/why-do-north-west-european-folk-cultures-have-mostly-partner-dances-while-south-east-europe-has-hardly-any/

[spnreactionblogging]

back to the future again

SPOILERS BELOW

tumblr wasn’t happy with the last verison of this post

I like this intro, I like that they grabbed presumably iron? maybe? from that graveyard fence. I want to think it’s iron to fend off ghosts but it sure is pointy and metal at least

I’m very soft for cas picking up jack’s body to get him somewhere safe, or at least what’s left of him

I’m also soft for cas calling to sam first

I like this new title card

in addition to the kevin & crowley vs jack & nick parallel scene in the bunker we also have jack lying on the floor with his eyes burnt out so that’s just... a lot of visual similarity here

I’m into this picking up in medias res or I guess not so much that as just exactly where we left off last time, mid-swing

the work they do with lighting is excellent

“he didn’t deserve this” says dean who then implores castiel to fix it, even though dean wanted to execute jack like “just another monster” until god told him to do it and then he didn’t feel like it anymore

sam notes the doors are indeed made of iron so there you go, sam and I are thinking along the same lines here

CAS: Well, I wouldn’t starve to death.

IN FUCKING DEED maybe stop taking castiel for granted for how much he could just ditch you guys at any point here ever that he ever chose to but DIDN’T

dean calling chuck “squirrelly” is entertaining on a “dean is the squirrel to sam’s moose” level and also a “chuck had an all-squirrel AU” level

it surprises no one that sam is immediately resourceful and trying to figure a way out, that castiel is steadfastly watching over jack’s body, and dean is literally “old man yells at cloud god”

I like seeing sam and dean digging again, it’s so reminiscent of season 1. arguably being in a mausoleum and fucking up its lowest layer counts as digging up a grave

oh jack’s up

oh it’s not jack

I like alexander doing the “belphegor” character though

In demonology, Belphegor is a demon, and one of the seven princes of Hell, who helps people make discoveries. He seduces people by suggesting to them ingenious inventions that will make them rich. Bishop and witch-hunter Peter Binsfeld believed that Belphegor tempts by means of laziness. Wikipedia

interesting

I do love the weekend at bernie’s thing going on here

definitely easier to have him put on sunglasses right away rather than keep up the prosthetics, lmao

okay so given the wikipedia definition there of this guy I don’t believe he’s some level one rando punching a clock, given that he’s a prince of hell, and I’m not even entirely convinced it’s not just chuck fucking with them?

oh we need some graveyard dirt and some angel blood, where’s the GIF when I need it, we literally have a GIF for this one

I’m still tabbed into wikipedia so THAT’S interesting too

The palindromic prime number 1000000000000066600000000000001 is known as Belphegor's Prime, due to the significance of containing the number 666, on both sides enclosed by thirteen zeroes and a one.

I’m glad castiel is skeptical of “bel”

I’m also thinking a salt mine would be a good defensive position against ghosts, now that we’re talking about giant salt circles

I feel bad for the two girls :(

vancouver is so good at being foggy

season 15 is just reenacting The Sorrow fight

also it’s like in S8 when Crowley starts killing off people they previously saved

the clown scene is genuinely tense and I like that the mom and kid don’t do anything stupid and are fairly competent at trying to get out

DOUGIE’S DOUGHNUTS

“crowley jr” ha

but also fuck dean for taking this so fucking lightly, i guess if you’re viewing everything from a lens of something approximating NPD it’s easy to expect cas to ignore the harm done to his loved ones when it’s inconvenient

evacuate the town because of the water supply brings to mind The Crazies but I don’t know that it’s a direct reference because it’s so broad but I liked the remake a lot

I like that Sam and Cas are off together

I do not like that Dean was left alone with “Bel”/Jack’s body

re: penis rock, there’s references to phallic imagery on the wiki page for belphegor as well

dean IS gorgeous he’s not wrong, everybody on this show is gorgeous

I can’t remember if there’s any previously established canon about this but shouldn’t “bel” be able to read some info about jack by way of possessing him, or is that only if he’s possessing a living body?

big bag of salt and a human heart. sounds like it’s time to check transplant wings

oh sam good luck with the clown, dude :(

I’m not used to seeing cas holding a shotgun

:(((( about the girls

I’m glad sam made it to help the mom and her daughter in time

2019 is also the year I stop pretending that I am casual about sastiel lmao I fucking love them I’m so glad cas saved him and I want him to heal his injury I’m so here for it!!!!!!

“move your exquisite ass, please” is more like it honestly, stop being so fucking rude, dean

and there it is, “bel” liked dean’s torture work in hell all those years ago, amazing. incredible. “it was art”

“flaying people for eternity, like you do, right?” lmaoooo

ohhhh and michael’s out of the cage, huh? are we sure “bel” isn’t michael

CAS: [heals sam] LADY: ...how!? CAS: I’m an angel. LADY: And the clown was...? SAM: A ghost. LADY: And you are? SAM: Just a guy.

oh cute tumblr ate my fucking post after all the work I spent on this second half so I’m gonna retype it I GUESS

sam’s plot-related wound makes me think of john egbert with his lord english tooth injury in the epilogues

I’m here for head-tilt samifer? or whatever’s going on there

I’m ultra here for castiel gently hovering his hand over sam’s bare shoulder

sad about the sheriff, I guess that’s convenient

I realize it would break the dramatic tension but can’t castiel just teleport everybody to safety? they already know he’s an angel. then again why don’t the ghosts just teleport to catch up with them?

this season’s gonna be “spot the easter egg” the whole time, I’m remembering that I liked the episode with the hotel pool ghost or whatever it was with the people drowning

CAS: [leaves the impala to get some space] DEAN: [gets out to approach him anyway] You okay? CAS: Yes, but-- DEAN: Good. [walks off] FUCK YOURSELF DEAN

I do appreciate sam’s take on the situation like that they’re finally able to live in their own world, and that the things they did and the people they saved, that all still did matter

I’M NOT CRYING YOU’RE CRYING

i really liked the music in this episode

this was good, the bourbon I got was good, I’m genuinely stoked to see where this goes

can’t wait for:

Pose as a team, the world is real.

[ichikarps]

Tagged by: @rightnao Tagging: @askxatsushixkun @jyxshi @cherrypop-matsu @jyushiipop @belovedcerulean @bigsisteroso (and anyone else that wants to)

NAME: Just call me Ruby ;P GENDER:  Female EYE COLOR: Hazel HAIR COLOR: Dark brown RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Single ZODIAC: Sagittarius  FAVORITE COLOR: I can never pick one, so here's my fave colors: Orange, red, and black (I think). FAVORITE SEASON: Fall FAVORITE PLACE: Home, Books-a-Million, or a store with anime stuff in it. FAVORITE HOLIDAY: Halloween. It's the only time of year we're people celebrate creepy stuff! FAVORITE VIDEO GAME: Do I have to pick one? D: Well, one game I can always replay would be.... Hamtaro Ham-Ham heartbreak. . .Don't judge me! It's cute! LAST SHOW YOU WATCHED: Osomatsu-kun 1988. WHAT’S YOUR HONEST OPINION ABOUT YOUR MUSE? She's so complex that sometimes it's hard to rp her, especially since I have to keep some of Ichi's personality and I'm afraid of people thinking I'm doing it wrong. Like most of my muses I put pieces of myself in them, so they become more like a real person. Has anyone else noticed she's becoming a bit of a Tsundere? And that she seems to have a brother complex since she's in love with Totoko's brother who looks like her brothers when they were younger, and in one universe she's dating Atsushi, who looks like a richer verison of her brothers, but she doesn't realize this. But she can be cute at times, and while it's hard to rp her, it's also fun.

WOULD YOU DATE YOUR MUSE?: No. Not just because I'm straight, but she's like a wounded cat: She's been berated by humans, so it's hard for someone to get close to her, even if you do manage to get close to her, she'll always be wary of you. I'm a very affectionate person and I would always want to kiss, hug, and other fluff stuff with my partner, but she can only handle so much, so she'd probably get mad at me. Not to mention we'd always be doubting ourselves and each other, thinking that the other one likes someone else, so we'd be miserable dating each other.

ARE YOU A SELECTIVE ROLEPLAYER? My blog says I'm semi-selective, but so far I haven't met anyone I don't want to rp with. The only thing I'm selective about is following non-rp blogs. DO YOU HAVE A FAVORITE MUSE? Out of all of mine, I'd have to say my Alfred muse from Hetalia. I've worked with him for years and he's had character development. He honestly feels like a real person, like me, than a fan-made muse. WHAT MADE YOU DECIDE TO JOIN THE FANDOM? ((Mostly gonna answer why I decided to rp in it)) The same reason I started to watch Osomatsu-san: Ichimatsu. Before I watched the anime, I saw a video with him in it. It was dark and I loved it, then I found out about the "Only Child" theory for Oso. After I finished the anime, I decided to make an Ichi rp blog, and I thought about making it my first indie blog.  DO YOU SEE YOURSELF STAYING WITH THE FANDOM FOR A LONG TIME? I just started the fandom, but yes. I'm having fun rping as Ichika and I have ideas for new rp blogs. Heck I even started a script fanfic for the fandom. Plus I want to make friends with my new rp buddies.

[popculturebuffet]

Amphibia Reviews: The Shut-In

More Halloween Havoc, whoop woop! The Plantars return just in time for Halloween! It’s Shut-In in Wartwood, their version of halloween, but less of a focus on getting candy and more on getting suplies to protect yourselve and barricade yourself in so the moon dosen’t turn you into a monster. I remain not suprised. To pass the time our heroes tell some true spooky stories and Polly tries to find one they weren’t around for.  Phone-Mo: Anne and humanized versions of Polly, Maddie, and Toady watch a cursed video and soon disappear by one. Nothing ominous about that! Dead End: A young Hop Pop serves as Chauffer for a mysterious man played by george takei and death seems to follow them at every stop. Oh myyyyyyyy.  Skin Deep: Sprig and Ivy go to fetch a lost ball and end up running into the skin stealing seamstress. Arson naturally insues..  It’s Terror Time again, with full recap and spoilers, under the cut. 

Whelp, no dancing around it this airing order is weird. And look airing shit in a weird way has been disney’s past time since the 90′s, Darkwing Duck’s airing order is a waking nightmare, and this very show had all of season 1 air within the span of a month and a week in order to get it on disney plus by launch, star vs had it’s last season burned off in three months, and Ducktales pre-covid flip flopped from airing week to week to just one for some reason and then no others for months. Consitency is not their strong suit is what i’m saying and it’s not new.  And yes I get these holiday special episodes are mecurial: their built specifically to slot in wherever without really upsetting continuity: The Casagrandes recently aired their first season 2 episode before even finishing season 1, so this isn’t just a disney thing, while speaking of disney things ducktales had it’s first proper halloweeen episode air the week before a spring break set episode, with a christmas episode set to air next month. What i’m saying is I get these things sometimes don’t air in production order, but it’s less excuable on Disney’s part here when it’d take airing exactly one episode for this not to be a tad jarring. Not enough that it spoils the episode nor does the episode effect the ongoing story or continuity in any way, so it’s not TERRIBLE but it smacks of lazy incompetence on Disney’s part and I wish they’d do better already. 

Okay that rant out of the way we can dive right in! It’s the annual Shut-In in Wartwood! Basically their verison of halloween but instead of a fun spooky holiday, it’s the annual tradition of getting various things from the neighbors to help stay indoors during the blue moon, which in wartwood turns whoever views into a monster. Because of course their halloween is a fight for suvival. Also theirs pumpkins everywhere with their versions of jack o lanterns being fear gourds which.. okay. Point is instead of candy the kids trick or treating has turned up rusty nails, a hatchet, a first aid kit and anne, winning the night, a flamethrower! On one hand it’s neat these exist in wartwood via fire breathing slugs. On the other I do worry about Anne accidently burning everyone and everything down so please take that from her. 

The Plantars then lock themselves in. To stave off bordeom, Shut-In tradition is to go around the fire and tell each other creepy true stories that happened to them. Polly tries going first but just has the Inn story from last season which they were all there for.. thought hat dosen’t make complete sense as they werent’ awake for all of it and shoudl’ve just let her tell her side of things. But eh it sets up polly’s plot so fair enough. Luckily anne has one. So we get our first tale of terror Terror Tales of the Park/Treehouse of Horror III Styles...

Phone-Mo 

Anne’s story is very clearly made up, though no one really calls her on it and it DOES add elemnts from the domino II story from last season so fair enough.  Rather than use her real friends, which is fair enough since she just sadly had to say goodbye to Marcy and probably isn’t handeling the guilt well and Sasha you know.. tried to stab her a few months back then tried sacrifcing herself for Anne’s own well being. Point is thnking about them is a loaaded issue right now so instead she dreams up human versions of Sprig, Polly, with a bucket on her foot for a shot which is a nice visual gag, as is how we meet them, along with Maddie and for some weird reason Toady. I mean I do get Ivy is in our third story, so fair enough, but they could’ve used.. anyone else. Wally would’ve made more sense honestly and he’s also an adult but he’s also you know Anne’s friend and not some town asshole she vaugley knows. It’s just weird. That said I do love the human designs for everyone and they clearly put a lot of work in knowing the fans would like them, with little touches like Polly having pink hair, sprig having his normal haircut he does under the hat but not covered up and toady’s phone having a little keychain of his amphibia version. Also while they all have diffrent names including Anne I won’t be using them on the grounds that I don’t wanna. 

Anne and the plantars are watching a funny internet video when Toady and Maddie offer to show them one that’s apparently cursed and makes whoever watched it disappear. Sprig talks Anne out of it and keeps her from watching anyway but Polly’s naturally all in. ON the way to class, once sprig is gone, anne ends up watching it and liking it anyway because she has no self control and freely admits it.  Naturally given this is a halloween episode, the others start disapearing, with Maddie coming to anne with support after Toady vanishes which again is just.. weird. It’s just weird to hear anyone car about wether toady lives or dies. It keeps throwing me off. Anne reasssures her but sure enough the second anne’s gone Maddie’s phone eats her alive. Still nice to see her again. Regular Maddie should get a hoodie. Also anne apparently eats the corners of her sandwitch so she dosen’t have to share. Clever girl.  Back at home where Anne continues to mock whoever it is told her she can’t write stories as she makes a gila monster and a flamingo make out, where are they I must hurt them, when Sprig calls panicked that polly is missing and admits i’ts a good thing they ddin’t watch the video.. yeah about that. Sprig is of course freaked, and soon the video pops on anne’s phone and soon the weird cat thing inside comes to life and then turns deadly.. also it turns out it eats the host then forces them to be int he background of the video, which was hinted at earlier with one guy having been in there for 35 years.. despite having a smartphone. Well this is anne’s story I don’t think she knows those didn’t exist once. 

Luckily Anne figures out how to beat it.. in the most hilarious way possible. by disliking it, since liking and commeting linked it to her, she weakens it before finishing it with a rude comment. It’s.. i’ts purespun comedy gold. This frees everyone else and they leave along with sprig.. but eggs are left behind. Dun dun dun.  Final Thoughts on Phone Mo:

First off .. I have no idea what FOMO means so the title left me as lost at first at the plantars... oh okay it’s fear of missing out.. should’ve remebered that from brooklyn nine nine and amy’s legendadrily bad case of it. Aw well a decent story, if the weakest of the three. It does have an incredibly funny conclusion, neat human designs, and an intresting setting given while school stories are common, usually we don’t get that here so it’s a nice break from the norm. But compared to the genuinely chilling with a funny and odd climax next two, it’s just okay. Not bad, but not quite as good.  Back in the present, Polly once again tries this time with children of the spore, once again being shot down though that being said hop pop’s line of “I was responsible for that one” was given a great delvery by charlie addler. Also Anne missed Wally’s birthday and he’s sad. oh Wally. Though i’m sure she’ll make it up to him.. at least he’s back home. So anyways speaking of HOp Pop, it’s his turn for a story...

Dead End:  And it’s a story from Hop Pop’s Youth! Given we’ve never SEEN hop pop beyond his present day and only heard the ocasional scrap, it’s REALLY nice to hear. It dosen’t tell us a ton more granted, but we at least see what he looked like, get to hear charlie adler use a slightly less aged voice for him and get to see him with a luxrious golden mane of johnny bravo hair, which is as hilaroius and glorious as it sounds. 

Back in those days Hop Pop was a coachman. He still had the farm, but given how tight things are now it’s not a stretch to assume he could always use some extra coppers to keep his family we never get to know about besides the grandkids fed. He also prides himself on honest work, not taking payment till the rides finished and the customer is satisfied which is INCREIDBLY risky, but I do kinda get it both for Hopidah’s sense of honor and because it seems clear he mostly does it in town by the fact all his stops this ep are within wartwood or close enough, so clearly it’s mostly people he knows personally.  This time though the rider is the well dressed, crimson red Mr. Littlepot, played by George Takei. Best known for Star Trek, being out and proud and since coming out after years and years in the closet, using his celebrity to help promote gay rights and other good stuff. He’s also known for saying ohhhh myyy and this clip from futurama. 

I got a lot of respect for the guy, He was even in archie comics once after Kevin Keller was introduced. So it’s nice to see him doing some voice work and he kills it here.. pun intended but more on that in a sec. Littlepot has some simple rule: keep driving no matter what hapepned where he was.. and given both places he ends up have someone dying, once by a horrifying looking snake, it’s clear somethings up. IT also nicely builds the tension as hop pop tries to steady himself, but is clearly cracking as he realizes his client might be murdering people he knows.. and he could be next. As Hopidiah KNOWS each person Littlepot visits and it nicely ratches up the tension. But turns out he’s not a killer.. he’s simplyd eath himself come to collect those already about to die. 

It’s a nice twist: The genuine trappings of the guy make you think h’es some form of the devil, the crimson skin, yellow eyes and cultured demanor.. it’s only as he goes you start to realize what the man actually is and even then he easily could still be frog satan. But no he’s just the frog reaper and defends himself to Hop Pop when confronted: He’s just doing his job, just like Hopidiah, getting people where they need to be. Unforutnately for Hop Pop his final stop is the farm.. though thankfully for him he hasnt come for Hopidiah.. just his hair. Yeah it’s a nice comedic twist on an otherwise chiling and well done story that what the devil came to take is his hair.. which he starts wearing hilariously. So Hop Pop lives but sobs, and Anne points out it was pretty fucked up. 

Final Thoughts for Dead End:  Not much to say. This one was dripping with atmosphere, Takei was utterly awesome and need to do more voice work, and the comedic ending twist was really damn funny. Top notch. 

Polly tries again, gets shut down again and is now really understandably frustrated at not having a story. Naturally given the other plantars have gone though, Sprig does. And he dosen’t have at itle at first until one cuts him off ....

Skin Deep:

Ivy’s Back! 

Yeah I was genuinely worried the return ep would break up either her and sprig or hop pop and silvia.. and while the second one remains a horrifying sword of damocles over my head, Sprig and Ivy are fine and Ivy gets a nice spotlight episode here. It was a pleasant surprise to get some fresh info since i’tll be months till we find out anything else.  So the young couple are playing bugball down at the old courts, when a couple of guys they were up to no good, started making trouble in the neghborhood. Sprig got in one little fight and Hop Pop got scared he said “your moving with your auntie and uncle to bell air”. He begged and pleaded day after day but Hop Pop packed his suit case and sent him on his way. He gave him a kiss and then he gave him a ticket Sprig put his walkman on and thought he might as well kick it. First class yo this ain’t bad, drinking orange juice out of a champagne glass. Is this what the people of bel air live like, yo, this might be alirght!   He whistled for a cab and when it came near the liscene plate said fresh and it had dice in the mirror, if anything he could say that this cab was rare but he thought man forget it yo holmes to bell air. He pulled up to the cab about 7 or 8 and yelled to the cabbie yo holmes smell ya later. He looked at his kingdom and he was finally there to sit on his throne as the fresh prince of bell air. 

So then Will walked into the mansion and wait.. wrong show.. so the young couple are playing bugball when they loose their ball, and it goes off into the creepy part of the woods. Ivy also looses her hat and is self concious about her hair. Looks fine to sprig but she’d rather not. Aww she’s insecure. But the two head off with Sprig getting more and more nervous, as Ivy details a legend about the area of the seamstress, a mysterious recluse who steals your skin! Naturally Sprig is nettled while Ivy says it’s fine and does what anyone would do upon finding out the ball went into a creepy abandoned shack in a world where it’s clear murderers are pretty common: kick down the door! It’s the perfect crime. 

Naturally Sprig gets more unernved, finding a set of needles and thread, which gets a great gag as Ivy points out that’s nto that uncommon.. but the giant pile of skin they find sure is!

Oh.. it gets worse me. Sprig finds the ball. and the Seamstress who has a horrifying patchwork of skins on her and wants to add theirs.. the kids are naturally spooked and prepare to flee but she wants their skin and grabs ivy! Thankfully she breaks free and Sprig busts some off.. OH GOD.. and it turns out she’s a glass frog! .. turns out theres a kind of frog that has translucent skin.

But yeah obvoiusly the show takes it a step further, and her skin is entirely see through. Poor girl. Ivy sympathizes shows off her hair.. then puts her hat over the Seamstress’ eyes and tells sprig now, and sprig starts a fire, and the two start to escape when he grabs Ivy’s leg!

Thankfully Ivy breaks free and the two leave her to die. Sprig compliments ivy’s hair, ivy gets him a smooch it’s all adorable and they defintely murdered someone who defintely murdered a lot of people. Horay!

Naturally the rest of the family is freaked out by this with Anne wanting to know if ivy being bitten means sh’es infected and Hop Pop wanting to know if one of her skins was his friend fred he hasn’t seen in a while. Sprig then spooks them by having ivy show up, complete with a burlap frog skin.. maybe. She could’ve been lying. We dunno. Ivy heads home to risk her life for a good gag, depsite the fact her boyfriend’s house is right there and her mom and grandmom clearly had to sign off on this shenanigan given the night. But this life risking prank naturally risks some life as Polly has ran off to look at the moon to get her own story. The rest of hte family runs after her only tfind it did.. ntohing. She’s apparently fine just fine and they assure her the fear they felt thinking she might become some kind of monster was scarier than any story and the rest of them head home with polly following.. after transofrming. Turns out the moon DOES make you into monsters but she’s fine with it. She’s got her legs now! Everyone screams understandably, Anne finally realizes this isn’t quite a holiday the end. 

Final Thoughts on Skin Game and the special as a whole: Easily my faviorite, partly for shipping reasons as I do like Ivy and Sprig together, and partly because it really let Ivy have a roll OTHER than sprig’s love intrest. Sure she still smooched his cheek and their clearly still together, but she got to be proactive, badass and hilariously impulsive and trollish. It was a nice change of pace and the story itslef was the best of the bunch to me becuase of that, though Dead End was really close.  Overall this was a nice treat, a good anthology with lots of fright and humor and a nice wraparound story arc with polly, as well as some nice call backs to previous episodes. An utterly excellent halloween special i’ll probably be revisiting every year and another slam dunk from disney this year. The airing snaufu really dosen’t hurt it any and in the future this one will likely be after Return to Wartwood on D+ anyway so no harm done. Great all around. If you liked this review follow me for more amphibia whenever it comes back, ducktales reviews every monday, and loud house reviews every saturday or sunday depending. And until next time stay safe, stay spooky and happy halloween!