#everyone has a different idea of what modern warfare will look like

[compacflt]

wip wednesday: made a HUGE amount of progress this week (for context—purple is unfinished & yellow is finished; last week all of them were purple) … i am in the home stretch here

[stoutguts]

Been re-playing 09 recently, and like what if what if—

(the idea is low-key out there but just hear me out, also MAJOR ANGST, MCD, trigger warning/content warning for implied/briefly mentioned s*ic*de)

Price knows that he's in a vídeo game. Like, he figured it out after the first couple of resets,—after the first few playthroughs of the campaign. He has sentience across MW’s 1-3, while everyone else doesn’t.

No matter what he does, the outcome always remains the same.

Like a broken tape recorder, history repeats itself.

Forced to sit by and watch as his men die, again and again.

With their being absolutely fucking nothing he can do to stop it.

The plot is predetermined, and the programming just won’t allow it.

No matter how many times he tries to fight it, no matter how many times he tries to scream or say something off script, or move his body in a different way, it’s all futile.

First, it’s always Gaz.

Killed by Zakhaev, with that damned Desert Eagle.

Failing to protect him from the shot, time and time again. Even when he tries his best to shield him, it just phases right through him.

Then eventually it’s time for Ghost and Roach to go, and it’s never not devastating.

His transmission over comms is always just a smidge too late, no matter how many times he tries to warn them.

The worst part of it is that they’re not even able to recover the bodies,—Shepherd took care of that and then some.

But the most soul crushing of all—

Soap.

The bloody game has the audacity to give Price and the player some sliver of hope,—that maybe Johnny’ll make it out alive somehow.

Shepherd didn’t manage to kill him,—he survived that near death experience at the very least.—But that all comes crashing down after Modern Warfare 3–“Blood Brothers”.

The most brutal of them all, (in Price’s opinion), and it’s of course for the person he cares about most.

His (essentially) adopted son slowly bleeding to death, as they’re under heavy gunfire and surrounded by enemies on all sides. Before finally kicking the bucket from explosives planted by that bastard Makarov.

Of all people, why did it have to be him?

Yuri is gone before he even really got to know the guy.

So blah blah blah, the cycle continues over and over again, and the loop remains unbroken for a long time.

Price tries everything he can possibly think of, and eventually he runs out of options.

By some miracle however,—perhaps some fault in the game’s coding.—There comes an opportunity to end the cycle.—Price meanwhile, has slowly and progressively lost his mind,—until he finally snaps.

After he’d killed Makarov for around the 1,000th time, he can finally end his suffering.

As he watches Makarov’s lifeless body hanging from the rappel, instead of the usual lighter he pulls out to light his cigar, he gains just enough control over his body to pull out his pistol and pull the trigger.

A mass recall of copies of MW3 ensued after the discovery of this “glitch”, due to a outrage within the fan base and community. No matter what the developers and devs tried too, it couldn’t be patched. The game was then rewritten to where Price is the one to die, while Soap lives and is the one to kill Makarov instead. Re-released in 2013.

The idea came to me while listening to/was heavily inspired by the song “S.I.U” by Maretu btw.

If any of you know that song or are familiar, you’re a real one.

Also, completey unrelated, but is it just me or like does 09’s Makarov not sound and look like fucking Ben Shapiro lmfao??? He more so sounds like him though, or at least he reminds me of Ben Shapiro—

[panther-os]

Nickels' Penny - Final Answers

Summary and avatars towards the bottom.

Okay, so the survey was still overwhelmingly Price-oriented to the point Penny was going to be a Price clone when she's supposed to be a PriceNik child, but rather than discard it completely and come up with everything on my own, I decided to choose one person's responses for each question.

To be fair to everyone, I randomized it by rolling a d10 (10 applicable questions, 10 responses, it worked out well). Any time I rolled a number I'd previously rolled, I rerolled until I got a new one. So there are some things on this that multiple people voted for, but nobody got their answer chosen more than once.

I did have to adjust the first question. Everybody got really excited about trans Price, which is super awesome and cool but then I was reading the British Army's regulations on pregnancy. Price would not be able to remain in command of the 141 and be pregnant, he would most likely have to retire or take leave of a year or longer - because you know he would be all-in being a dad just as he is being a captain. That's retirement or extended leave is not something I feel is in character for him, and it doesn't work with the other answers I got, so I'm making an executive decision as the author.

I am never doing a public survey for an OC again.

Question 1, Response 7: "How did they get Penny?" This person voted for trans Price being the one to carry Penny and for it to be an unplanned pregnancy. For the reason listed above, I'm changing it to Nikolai, but keeping it as a trans parent carrying an unplanned pregnancy. So trans Nikolai carried (unplanned).

Question 2, Response 8: "When did they get Penny?" This person voted for them to get Penny - so for her to be born - between Modern Warfare (2019) and Modern Warfare II (2022).

Question 3, Response 10: "How old was Penny during MWIII?" This person voted for between 4-6 years old, which works out really well for the answer above, HOWEVER I'm going to have Penny born just a year before MWII. The Kill or Capture mission where Ghost and Soap first met is supposed to have taken place on October 28, 2022, but also the Flashpoint mission where they're both already on the taskforce and working together on the same squad takes place "four years" before MWIII. So, essentially, the timeline is inconsistent and I do what I want. This makes Penny 1 during MWII and 5 during MWIII.

Question 4, Response 3: "What color are Penny's eyes?" This person voted for Penny to have hazel eyes. True hazel eyes are something called heterochromia centralis, which means there's rings of different color around the eye, usually brown on the outer edge, green in the middle, and blue nearer the pupil, or vice-versa. It's caused by melanin production in the iris starting and then stopping before the eyes turn fully brown. Don't quote me on that, it's been a while. But this means Penny has both her parent's eye colors.

Question 5, Response 2: "What color is Penny's hair?" This person voted for Penny to have copper hair, like a penny.

Question 6, Response 6: "What color is Penny's skin?" This person voted for Penny to have pale tan skin like Price's. Someone else also wrote in the comment box a suggestion for her to have vitiligo, and I am seriously considering it, on top of her having the pale tan skin (yes, white people can have vitiligo, it's just not as noticeable as on Black or Brown people, and doesn't carry the same complicated relationship with cultural identity) but I haven't made a decision yet.

Question 7, Response 5: "Is Penny short for something?" This person voted yes, author's choice. Someone else voted Spencer which made me go "ooooh" but ultimately didn't feel like it fit, I would have felt really bad if I had rolled their response. It did give me the good idea to look at names that are not traditionally shortened to Penny, though. I was thinking oh, Russian, Stepan, maybe, and I looked up Russian feminine form Stepan, which took from Stepan to Stepanov to Stepanovna to Anna Stepanovna Politkovskaya. She was a Russian investigative journalist who was assassinated for her work exposing human rights abuses in the Chechen War and corruption in the Russian government. She sounds like someone Nikolai would very much look up to. The actual feminine form of the Russian name Stepan is Stefaniya. So Penny is short for Anna Stefaniya.

Question 8, Response 4: "Is Penny's middle name an otchestvo, a Russian patronymic middle name?" This person voted yes, so Penny's middle name is Nikolayevna. As far as I understand, when being addressed formally, if people were doing it correctly, they would use her otchestvo instead of her surname. So like, if she was getting an award or something, it would be awarded to Anna Stefaniya Nikolayevna or Penny Nikolayevna. Her surname would be reserved pretty much just for legal documents and for being full-named by her family. (Which now gives me the awesome idea for Price full-naming Nikolai including his surname, but I already did that with AleRudy, and I hesitate to do it again so soon.)

Question 9, Response 9: "What is Penny's surname?" First off, rolling two answers that have the same number as their question has me tripping. Second, this person voted that Penny's surname is hyphenated, with Nikolai's surname coming before Price's.

Question 10, Response 1: "What is Nikolai's surname?" This person voted for author's choice of Russian surname. Another option on this survey was Belinski, like another Call of Duty character named Nikolai. I do like the -sky/-ski ending for Nikolai, I feel like that fits him, and then I decided to go with the initial p, because I always think it's funny and cute when couples have different last names but the same initial. I wound up choosing Pokrovsky, which because Russian surnames are gendered just like otchestvos, makes it so Penny's surname is Pokrovskaya-Price.

So, in summary: Penny's full name is Anna Stefaniya Nikolayevna Pokrovskaya-Price, but literally nobody calls her that unless she's in trouble. She was born a year before MWII but is 5 years old during MWIII because of timeline fuckery. She looks mostly like her Dad, as opposed to her Papa, with pale tan skin and red hair - although hers is copper while his is more auburn. She also has true hazel eyes that contain both her dads' eye colors. And even though she looks like her Dad, her Papa was the one to carry her. She wasn't planned, but her dads say she was the best surprise.

I have two avatars, here, they do both need image descriptions, if anyone is up for writing them, I'll add them to this post and reblog it from myself so followers see the new version. The first one is Penny around the same age she would be in MWIII without vitiligo, and the second one is Penny closer to a preteen with vitiligo. In both of them, the eyes are a light brown which is usually the closest you're going to get to true hazel.

Sometime in the next week, I'll type up and post a transcript of an rp I did with Nik and Price ai sort of to figure out more of Penny's personality. I've tentatively titled it The Penny Murder Saga and she is certainly a redhead, that's all I'll say for now. XD I'll include links to the AI as well, they're both really fun if that's your thing.

Thank you everyone for participating and make sure to follow me and/or the "nickels' penny" tag for more Penny content. I can't guarantee it will be often or with any regularity, but it will happen.

[foxgloveinspace]

this is hella random but-

if you ever want to info dump about the call of duty guys (ghost and soap i think? are those call names? soap is weird lol) please do! that ship has started popping up more and more in my feeds and now i am thoroughly intrigued. mostly because yes give me more ships with everyone suffering ptsd, but also i had no idea call of duty had any sort of plot line or recognizable characters?

i’ve played it only a handful of times and it always just seemed to me like a “create a character then join a server and shoot people” kind of game i didn’t think it had any story lol

but yeah. pls fill me in if you so desire :) i am so curious

I’m the wrong person to ask, cause I haven’t played the games yet😔🤣.

I own a couple of them, but I haven’t played yet just cause… last year I was in a weird place with video games really, is the only explanation I have. The campaigns (the plot parts) are not too long if you wanna watch them on YouTube (I also haven’t done that,,,,,, I should do that if I’m not gonna play the 2020s games, just cause I know that people where Not Happy with the last game, but I should freaking play the ogs cause they are RIGHT up my alley oof).

There’s a couple things you gotta know, if you wanna get into to it: There’s two different series of Modern Warfare, the og, which came out 07, 09, and 11. And then the remakes (which is what got the fandom So Big), which is from 2019, 22, and 23. They are, the same story told differently, and they are Very Different. The characters have very different personalities depending on the series.

(This is why I tag things as ghostsoap, or 09 soapghost so I can keep track of the different characters lol).

Ghost and Soap are their callsigns, yeah. It makes the ship names fun though! (Ghosts first name is Simon, Soap’s is John (Ghost calls him Johnny, so the fandom runs with calling him that lmao)).

Ghost wears a mask, and doesn’t have a canonical face clam! Which is really cool to me, cause we get so many different versions of Simon from the fandom🖤 and also, masked characters make brain go brrrrrr.

I am mostly in it for the fic, and there’s tones of good fanart. Not to say I don’t know anything at all, cause I have read the fandom wikis/synopsis of the games (though I’m a little rusty on my knowledge,,,, again I do want to play the games, I just.. wasn’t in a video game mood all last year). I’m just… sometimes info dumping is hard.

But yeah. The fic is freaking good. Like, I was looking for military themed romance novels the other day and I legit couldn’t bring myself to start any cause I’m worried it won’t live up to ghostsoap🤣🤣🤣.

I was gonna give some recommendations, but I uhhh…. I have realized I mostly bookmark the good smut, and only have a couple fics that aren’t smut, but they are SO ANGSTY🤣🤣🤣. And then one long fic, but it’s ghostroachsoap (roach is a player character from the first mw2).

Gosh. What can I say about ghostsoap…… they are black and red coded characters??? (Not Actually, but in the fandom way. Ghost is black, Soap is red. I don’t know if that’s even still a fandom thing lmao).

I…. I don’t know what else to say, haha.

[forestgoblinvibes]

141 x Male!reader (shifter Au)

So! I wanted to give y’all more information about the shifters in this AU before posting the first chapter (should be out soon)

These questions are some i have worked on for a while. Since while I’m making this a Modern Warfare AU. The character you read as, and the questions/rule’s below all come from a separate project I’m doing that was worked into this!

From this point on, questions from me made after I post this will be in green. Questions in blue will be from my lovely readers!!

To start:

What is a shifter in this AU?

Good question! A shifter is a person, who’s born with the ability to shapeshift into an and animal whether it be an avian, reptile, aquatic animal and so in.

This also means some people can be shifters of domesticated animals like basic cats and dogs. Not everyone has a more wild creature.

Can a shifter turn a human?

Another great question and no. That would make them a were-creature and that’s not what I’m going for. While it would be cool it can also create many issues.

What are the physical differences between a shifter and human?

It depends. In my story 90% of shifters look just like any other human being. From head to toe you really can’t tell.

Now! That doesn’t mean it’s always like that. Shifters have ability to let more animal features take over their features.

Some examples include: an avian allowing feathers to grow through their hair or they pupils became slit shapes. Or a reptile having faint patches of scales. An aquatic having gills while swimming in a pool. Or some having claws out on a regular basis. Or faint markings like spots or stripes.

It all depends on the person, and partially on how accepting the community around them is.

Are there shifters who prefer living an animalistic life?

Yes! In the shifter community these people are known as “ferals” or “nomads”

And their not looked down upon. Some people admire them and their protected under hunting laws.

In fact that brings us to our next question!

What kind of laws are in place that go against or protect shifters and humans from each other?

Let’s start with the protection laws! And I’ll just list these off for the most part.

Shifters cannot hunt a human obviously. If a shifter harms a human there must be a probable cause for self defense or protection of property or family. This goes the same for humans to shifters

Any shifter who wishes to live a nomadic/feral lifestyle is REQUIRED to let areas of power such as (police offices, hunting and game wardens and mayors ect) know who they are and what their form looks like. They are always required to wear a item of identification such as collars, scarves, chains or specific plants to make hunters aware that they are not game.

Following this rule, if a normadic shifter is killed with malicious intent (meaning the hunter saw and choose to ignore the shifter’s identification) said hunter while be charged with murder and punished accordingly. But if a shifter is killed and lacked any identification an investigation will take place and as long as the hunter is proven not guilty nothing can be down and any family members who may more the death will be given compensation for the tragic accident

There are serval laws that protect shifters and humans from discrimination against each other. A shifter can’t be fired/not hired for being a shifter or specific animal and vice versa

Shifters do need hunting license, this was agreed upon to help protect local while from dwindling or overgrowing of the area lacks many predators. They do not need licenses for flying or swimming though

And while I think of more laws or are given ideas I will add to this

So are there only predator shifters? What about bugs?

Fabulous question! To start no! Shifters can be predator or prey and they both live happily with each other. There are deer, horses, even mice and such. Prey shifters have laws protecting them from predators shifters as well to insure peaceful living. But there are no bug shifters, for me it’s not the best? I feel like they’d be to small and I’m to much danger that even if there was they’d live happily in hiding to avoid being squished

At what age does a shifter first change?

Well normally this’ll vary person to person from how they take care of themselves to stimulants around them. But on average most shift by 16 and this earliest shift recorded was at 3 years of age

Why are shifters a dying species?

That’s because of humans sadly. Before laws and regulations were in place, when shifters were first discovered humans were scared. And what does one do when scared? Protect what you know and kill what you think is dangerous. It took serval years long ago to reach peace

Are there clothing differences for shifters in the military?

So this idea comes from a TikTok artist and I do have their permission to use this idea. The artist is (@the_dumbestbitch)

But yes, Chirps (the reader) is not the only shifter in the military and obviously not the first so there was some trial and error to find a military uniform that worked if a shifter needed to quickly shift. Obviously no shifter wants to be naked when they shift back so after some testing. A special skin tight clothing was made.

These clothing items were normally one a piece sleeveless suit that went on under all their gear. So In emergency’s or when needed a shifter could quickly shed their gear and turn. All while being able to shift back and not be as naked as the day they were born.

Do shifters have more then two forms?

Yes and no? So to start the two forms are their human and animal. That’s a given, but some people can have more than one and this depends on family lineage. Now a wolf shifter and a feline shifter can have kids together. But the child in question will only take after one parent (so no hybrids/ligers and so on) but here is where bloodline comes into play. Say a human and a shifter get together, they can have kids, those kids have a 50/50 chance of coming out fully human or fully shifter no in between. And a child from a human and shifter could only have those to forms.

Now! If two shifters have a child no matter of the animals the bloodline is stronger and depending on the strength of said like going further back the child had a chance to have more then two forms. This all depends on how common it is in your families history. Take Chirps for example

Chirps comes from a strong feline family, mother was a tiger, father was a panther. Grandma was a lion and grandfather was a panther. It goes back a long way with a few wolves at one point but never a human so the shifter gene is incredibly strong in chirps.

So chirps could have more then the two. He’s never tried. So who knows?

But for the most part extra forms come down to two basic things. Bloodline and emotions. Fear is a powerful thing. Anger can be a dangerous fuel. Sorrow can be a blanket that suffocates. All of this can be portrayed in the form someone takes. All these emotions can unlock new and dangerous things.

Are any 141 members going to be shifters?

Honestly I don’t know. What do you think? I truly want options from others. I want the reader to feel unique and special. (In my experience AND THIS IS MY OPINION. I AM NOT SHAMING OTHER WRITERS) but when it comes to reading shifter story’s a lot of it is the omegaverse or smut driven and there’s nothing wrong with that. I just want something for readers that’s not smut driven. And yes I know there are plenty of incredible writers who have story’s that aren’t driven by smut. But at the same time I don’t find a lot of shapeshifter story’s

How tall is a shifters animal form?

This is intierly based in their human highs. For example a normal adult lion can be anywhere from 6/8 feet tall nose to tail (I think)

Now this is how it works to me? Say someone whines a shifter lion is 5,5. Their animal from while average out at 6 or so feet tall. Their second form will never be smaller then a normal animal.

But they can be bigger!! Agin, take Chirps for example. As a human he’s about 6,3 (almost as tall as ghost. Dennis is 5,10)

An average adult panther is about 5/7 feet from nose to tail and height is normally 2.33 inches (I think) so for Chirps there is a big different in normal animal height.

Wanna know how I fix that? With the magic of being a writer of creative liberty hahahaha.

Anyone, Chirps Panther from stand at about 7 feet tall at the shoulder. He’s a big bish (taller then ghost like that) but this leaders to another question asked but a friend.

Can shifters pick and chose their size when that large or in general?

And the answer is yes, with practice. So for Chirps his ‘true height’ while in animal form is 7ft at the shoulder. Which in most scenarios is extremely impractical, especially in situations where stealth is required. Chirps rarely using his true height, only in cases like chapter one where he needs to carry someone on his back to safety while also fighting. It’s a bulkier form even if he’s still slender. Normally he chooses a height of about 5.10 at the shoulder. Still large but more comfortable for him. The smallest he’ll normally shift to is that of an average panther.

What inspired me to make the shifter Au Chirps story in general?

A lot actually inspired me for this AU and the story in general. The episode Shapeshifters from “love death and robots” played into my inspiration for the AU. And “Teen wolf” inspired some of the ability’s or lore for my actual story. As well as “wolf blood” (does anyone temper that show?). And even “supernatural”. And some things like eye colors, abilities and weaknesses are inspired from these shows as you’ll see in further chapters.

But for now this is it. This will be pinned on my blog for easy access. If you have any questions please, please ask them! I’ll be happy to answer them on here!!! Same for suggestions that I can go off of for the story to come!! And with that, have an amazing time!! Don’t be scared to reach out!!

[sp00keh0urs]

Hello everyone!

I'm looking for a unicorn of an RP partner to play both Simon "Ghost" Riley and John "Soap" MacTavish from the Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2 remake! I recently finished the game and developed a COD OC with a group of my friends, and I'm looking for someone to RP with! I am a semi-literate to literate roleplayer with 12+ years of experience looking for 18+ partners only! I write exclusively in third person, and would prefer you do the same. The goal is for a long term RP!

I have a vague idea of what I would like to do / where to start within the game for the RP. I'm looking for relationship development combined with action, angst, and sexual themes (when the time is right). I'm looking for a healthy poly dynamic, even if it has a rough start. No toxic masculinity or toxic relationships for this dynamic, please. We can also do AU settings, as I have ideas for those as well (specifically zombie apocalypse AU, though I don't know anything about COD zombies).

My OC is a sergeant and sort of a combination role in his task force as a sniper and canine handler! How he ends up in COD MW2 can be discussed during plotting, but I do have ideas for how and why he gets involved. If this interests you, please HMU!

If you recognize this, you are correct that it was a different blog. I’m an idiot and deleted that blog on accident.

[nanowrimo]

How to Make Interesting Worldbuilding Choices

We can’t assume that everyone knows the world we’re talking about, right? Luckily, author and previous Camp NaNoWriMo counselor Cass Morris has a few suggestions to help us more deeply explore our worldbuilding:

One of the most powerful things we can do as writers is create a world. What we write holds a mirror up to reality, where we can examine and criticize our own world or try to build a better one. We get to play god with our characters, and in doing so, we exercise a great deal of power in what we choose to reflect, to magnify, to laud, and to condemn.

So how can we make interesting choices, rather than relying on stale tropes, biased perspectives, or common assumptions about “the way things are” or “the way things were”?

Here are five basic concepts I suggest you explore to develop a richly detailed and unique world:

1. Family

What is a family structure? Is marriage tied to finances, or is it a purely emotional bond? Do you live with your spouse? Do you raise kids together? Is sexual fidelity expected? How many people can be in a marriage? Does “legitimacy” mean anything to family bonds? To inheritance? Is adoption common? 

2.Gender & Sexuality

What sexualities are socially permissible? How does your world conceive of gender? Does it accept third genders, nonbinary people, gender fluidity? If your world has rigid gender roles, or if one gender has more power and privilege than the other, make sure that’s a choice you examine, not just something you presume.

3. Race

What do race relations and ideas of ethnicity look like in your world? A historical or invented world may conceive identity very differently than we do today. If you have aliens or fantasy races, like elves, dwarves, or goblins, examine them carefully to avoid perpetuating racist stereotypes or erasing real-world issues with a handwave. I recommend Writing the Other as an excellent resource to help you think through these ideas respectfully).

4. The Afterlife and Religion

What do your characters believe happens to them when they die? This can affect so much else in a society: how eager or reluctant they are for war, how they preserve assets for future generations, how they conceive of sin and virtue. So what’s your basis? Gods or no gods? Ancestor worship? Natural spirits? And how exclusionary is it? Can your various cults play nice together, or are they trying to wipe each other out?

5. Government 

Who has power, how do they get it, and how do they hold onto it? There are so many options beyond “ye olde feudalism” and our modern conception of representative republics. Figure out what your structure is, how it came to be that way, and what other beliefs and structures, like religion or the military, it might be tied to.

These basic concepts will touch many other elements of your characters’ lives, from architecture to economy to warfare. They can also help generate wonderful, inventive plot hooks; in making deliberate choices about your world, you may find new challenges and opportunities for your characters.

While worldbuilding is typically associated with fantasy and science fiction, it’s important to real-world genres as well. The world in your book, whether invented or a version of our own, should be as diverse and complex as the world your readers live in. In historical fiction, the challenge is often in distinguishing what “everyone knows” about a period from the lived reality of people during that time. In a modern romance or thriller or anything else, details as small as what someone thinks of as a “normal” lunch can communicate elements of that character’s personal history and the world they operate in.

Make interesting choices. Your readers will be grateful.

Cass Morris works as a writer and educator in central Virginia. Her debut series, The Aven Cycle, is Roman-flavored historical fantasy released by DAW Books. She is also one-third of the team behind the Hugo Award Finalist podcast Worldbuilding for Masochists. She holds a Master of Letters from Mary Baldwin University and a BA in English and History from the College of William and Mary. She reads voraciously, wears corsets voluntarily, and will beat you at MarioKart. You can find her on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Patreon. Make sure to check out The Aven Cycle and Worldbuilding for Masochists. 

[zazzander]

Reyna and Octavian as Foils

Looking for more? Here's my master list of Octavian analysis.

Reyna and Octavian are foils to each other in many ways.

Octavian wears his heart on his sleeve, expressing his thoughts and opinions through emotion, raising his voice, and generally dramatic gestures. Yet, at the same time, his actions are actually quite analytical and logical. To the point of almost being cynical.

On the other hand Reyna is very stoic. She rarely raises her voice and talks with restraint and composure. It’s not often that a character can tell what she’s really thinking through her expressions and tone of voice alone. Yet, she often makes decisions based on a gut feeling. She has a strong amount of scepticism when it comes in prophecies and legends, but in the here-and-now she will trust her instincts.

Interestingly, both characters will often make quick decisions in the heat of the moment, but with very different thought processes.

Both of them also attempt to achieve the ideal of being “Roman” but what they do so differently. We have a quote from Son of Neptune about Lupa’s tenants. And the goddess is a good guide:

Demigods like Percy were still responsible for carrying on Roman traditions in modern times – fighting monsters, serving the gods, protecting mortals and upholding the memory of the empire. [Son of Neptune, 36]

We can see that’s a long list, and the last point is especially broad. Which monsters should they fight, and which ones do they make a truce or even ally with? Does serving the gods prevail over protecting mortals, which is more important? And, lastly, the empire lasted a long time and even within a single time period there was a diversity of things that was deemed “important”.

So while the general ideas hold the same, each character is going to have a different interpretation and understanding of that. And I think we can see that with Reyna and Octavian, even down to the emperor they look up to. For Octavian it’s Augustus, the first emperor, a son of Apollo*, someone who fought and schemed his way to the top but managed to end an age of warfare in the process. For Reyna it’s Diocletian, the last pagan emperor*, a son of Jupiter*, someone whose parents were once slaves, who fought his way to the top, and eventually retired peacefully.

*Riordanverse history

How Reyna and Octavian Lead

Reyna herself seems to be the kind of leader who believes in great heroic deeds on behalf of her people, often going out solo to face the greatest challenge.

Meanwhile, we have Octavian. His leadership style seems far more unit-based. Everyone acts as one, as per his orders. He’s rarely seen away from the central unit when it comes to combat. Notably different from Reyna.

Examples:

- Battle in Son of Neptune: Reyna is seen in the air, riding Scipio, facing off against Polybotes. While Octavian is on the ground with the First and Second legionaries.

- Mark of Athena: Reyna hunts down Annabeth while Octavian leads the majority of the legionaries against the docked Argo II.

- House of Hades: Reyna chooses to go on a quest, alone; something that strikes Octavian as unthinkable (and potentially unforgivable).

All of these indicate a general trend for how Reyna and Octavian choose to lead. Neither option is worse or better.

Leaders They Admire - Diocletian:

We also know that Reyna is a fan of Diocletian (along with Jason).

“Reyna and I used to talk about Diocletian,” [Jason] said. “We both kind of idolized the guy as a leader.”

We can see that, in the Riordanverse, that Diocletian is a son of Jupiter. And upheld the old Roman pagan society – notably by executing thousands of Christians.

“He wasn’t a total villain,” Jason said. “Yeah, he persecuted Christians, but otherwise he was a good ruler. He worked his way up from nothing by joining the legion. His parents were former slaves . . . or at least his mom was. Demigods know he was a son of Jupiter - the last demigod to rule Rome. He was the first emperor ever to retire, like, peacefully, and give up his power. He was from Dalmatia, so he moved back there and built a retirement palace. The town of Split grew up around…” [House of Hades]

And in Blood of Olympus,

Reyna used to dream about going there with Jason to admire their favourite emperor’s home. She pictured romantic walked with him through the old city, sunset picnic on the parapets. […] Don’t be bitter, she chided herself. Aeneas suffered, too. So did Romulus, Diocletian and all the rest. Romans don’t complain about hardship.

We can see Reyna’s own story reflected here. Reyna wasn’t someone from a great family in New Rome. When her sister decided to join the Amazons instead, Reyna was left without a support system at all. Yet she rose quickly through the ranks. And eventually “retired” peacefully (by joining the Hunt).

And while Reyna’s thoughts on Diocletian are pretty limited, we can assume Reyna and Jason had a similar thought process. I would even argue that Reyna might have been the one to idolise him more since it’s Reyna who first assumed Jason would go to Split to meet her. Not to mention her romanisation of the the palace.

Even her understanding of bitterness and how to process disapointment is filtered through this idealisation of Roman figures. Aeneas and Romulus are obvious, they are mythical heroes, but Diocletian was a real historical figure. Yet to her, they all represent who she is striving to be. Who she ought to be.

On that point, let’s talk about Jason and Reyna for a moment. The emperor Jason and Reyna bonded over was a son of Jupiter. They both idolised this emperor. And for that reason, a part of me wonders if Reyna might have been one of the people who placed their expectations upon Jason as the son of Jupiter.

She expected him to live up to the legacy of their favourite emperor: Diocletian.

They were close friends, of course. But it’s possible that Jason, in his heart, knew they couldn’t be anything more. Even before coming to Camp Half-Blood, Jason tried to resist the pressure of those expectations. And he might have feared that Reyna wouldn't accept him if he failed to meet those high standards.

And in Mark of Athena, it's Reyna who comments on how Jason has "changed". But I would argue Jason has simply come to understand himself more.

“And Jason… well, he has changed. He seems distant, no longer quite Roman.”

Part of Reyna’s romantic feelings may very well have been simple admiration, which was born from the façade Jason presented to the world. Jason did everything he could to be a great "son of Jupiter". And when he came back changed? I think Reyna lost some of the admiration – and therefore the romantic feelings. Not that that stopped her feelings of friendship. But it certainly made her confused and bitter (I'll get into that later).

Not only that, but they both have very different recollections of their time in Camp Jupiter:

Her four years at Camp Jupiter hasn’t been easy, but they’d been the best time of Reyna’s life. [Blood of Olympus 59]

Compared with, only a couple chapters earlier, Jason’s thoughts:

This has been the story of his life, he thought bitterly. Everyone had always watched him, expecting him to lead the way. From the moment he’d arrived at Camp Jupiter, the Roman demigods had treated him like a prince in waiting. Despite his attempts to alter his destiny […] he had been made praetor anyway. [Blood of Olympus 28]

Overall, I think at minimun the fact that they shared a favourite emperor - one so intrinsically tied to their hopes and desires, their understanding of leadership - placed those expectations on Jason. For Reyna, it was a choice to take up the mantle of praetor, but Jason it was a duty thrust upon him.

Diocletian was a die-hard pagan, one who persecuted Christians. But what Reyna and Jason seem to have admired was how he reorganised the empire, stabilising it. His reforms helped fend of the Western half’s fall – and enabled the Eastern half to flourish.

This is the emperor that Reyna admires most. Not a conqueror, but a strong leader who brought stability and who retired once their job was done. And the way Diocletian chose to retire peacefully reflects a fundamental Roman ideal. One seen in the story of Cincinnatus returning to his farm after holding the Dictatorship for only fifteen days. An ideal Reyna fuflils by joining the Hunt.

Leaders They Admire - Augustus

“Besides, the first day of August is most auspicious – the month named after my ancestor Augustus. And you know how he united the Romans?”

“He seized power and became emperor,” Mike rumbled.

Octavian waved aside the comment. “Nonsense. He saved Rome by becoming First Citizen. He wanted peace and prosperity, not power! Believe me, Mike, I intend to follow his example. I will save New Rome and, when I do, I will remember my friends.” [BOO 66]

So let’s get into Octavian. It’s important to note that Octavian is speaking in front of an audience here (Jacob), so the words he says are measured. But I think they give us a good enough insight.

We know that Octavian admires his namesake (and ancestor), Augustus. And we can see here what Octavian admired. The fact that Augustus stopped the 50-year-long streak of civil wars that had ravaged the Republic.

Obviously, he’s dismissive of Augustus’ less than moral means of getting into power here – but we know that Octavian follows Augustus’s example there are as well. Augustus when he was “Octavian” was ruthless. But after he was in charge, after he changed his name? He changed his tune, switching from an image of power to one of benevolence.

And much like how Reyna and Jason can look passed Diocletian’s cruelty against the Christians, Octavian also sees the best of his ideal leader. “Peace and prosperity” might not be some hollow promise. But an end goal of Octavian's.

Not that this is the last war they wil have to fight. Octavian, more than any other character, is aware of the impeding threat that is the Triumvirate.

As I’ve also discussed, Octavian didn’t hate the Greeks. Not really. Not until they attack his city, at the point they (from his perspective) declared war.

Summary

I think it's fascinating that, by Riordan lore, Octavian admired the first emperor while Reyna admired the last (pagan) emperor. Both rulers came to power during a time of instability. And both were able to lay out a foundation of prosperity. Augustus was able to pass away peacefully, dying of old age; Diocletian was able to retire peacefully, living out his days in his palace.

Interestingly, neither of these emperors count among the martial emperor, the ones famous for their military prowess. Augustus had Agrippa. Diocletian had Maximian.

There's is one notable difference - one that I think is important. Augustus was a son of Apollo, Diocletian a son of Jupiter.

Augustus brought Egypt into the empire (it was still technically independent until that point). He patroned a golden age of art - integrating the Hellenistic influence that had been such a controversial idea a couple generations before. He ruled to the end of his days, never letting go of power.

Meanwhile, Diocletian's retirement, as I've mentioned, mirrors an older ideal. One of the Republic. Where power was something a person only help for a short time. And even that power ought to be shared.

Neither interpretation is wrong. But I think we can see where Reyna and Octavian's enmity might have begun. Reyna would never allow Apollo to become the patron god of the legion.

The Legion That Failed

I’m going to on a little side-track for a moment, just to discuss why Reyna might be resistant to changing their patron god (Octavian’s idea). We get a few hints throughout the series that there was other groups of Roman demigods out in the world, at one point in the past. We also know that Reyna is aware of them.

“I think – well, this is the part I don’t know, but Reyna always said there were many lost legions. The Twelfth founded Camp Jupiter.” [Son of Neptune]

Some carried tattered lightning-bolt banners of the Twelfth Legion, Fifth Cohort – Michael Varus’s doomed expedition from the 1980s. Others carried standards and insignia Hazel didn’t recognise, as if they’d died at different times, on different quests – maybe not even from Camp Jupiter. [Son of Neptune]

The name “Camp Jupiter” shows this particular legion’s strong association to Jupiter. He is their patron god. The eagle’s power comes from Jupiter himself. It’s not so strange of a concept that the other groups (potentially in the form of a legion, potentially as something else) had other patron gods.

However, they have all failed to last. They were defeated or simply withered to nothing.

So perhaps Reyna sees the changes Octavian was proposing not as starting a “new era” but instead an abandonment of the divine patron who had seen them through the ages It would harm the legion, not help it.

Warfare, Peace, and Stability

Reyna

Reyna seems to have the general attitude that she will only fight a defensive war, though she is aware that is not the “Roman way”. As I’ve discussed, her ideal emperor wasn’t a conqueror – he was more of an administrator (Diocletian did wage wars, but mostly he worked on fixed the mess of an empire he had come to rule, such as reconquering Egypt when it declared independence).

Reyna acknowledges the Roman way here:

“You see, Romans have always believed that offence is the best defence.”

[…] “It doesn’t have to be that way,” Annabeth said. “We’ve got to work together, or Gaia will destroy us both.”

“I agree,” Reyna said. “But is cooperation possible?” [Mark of Athena 39]

Even after the attack on New Rome, Reyna is hesitant to go into full war-mode.

The blond scarecrow-looking kid, Octavian, was speaking to the mob shaking his fist. Piper couldn’t her him, but the gist was obvious: We need to kill those Greeks!

Reyna, the praetor, stood to one side, her face tight with suppressed emotion. Bitterness? Anger? Piper wasn’t sure. [Mark of Athena]

Reyna is not ready to call it ‘war’ yet.

“Reyna,” she said, “what happened at Camp Jupiter was Gaia’s fault. Eidolons, possessing spirits–”

“Save your explanations,” Reyna said. “You’ll need them for the trial.”

The dogs snarled and inched forward. This time, it didn’t seem to matter to them that Annabeth was telling the truth. [Mark of Athena 249]

Reyna isn’t there to listen to Annabeth’s ‘reasons’. She might not be keen for this war, but it isn’t due to her trusting the Seven (outside of Jason).

“It wasn’t me!”

“It doesn’t matter!” Reyna snapped. [Mark of Athena 249]

And again, Reyna rejects Annabeth’s attempts to tell the Romans about the eidolons. For all the Seven’s assumptions about her listening to them – Reyna at this moment isn’t ready to hear it. She retains her scepticism because of that she’s between a rock and a hard place. Does she accept this war or does she accept the excuses the Greeks? She wants to do neither.

“You see?” Reyna said bitterly. “The spear is thrown. Our people are at war.”

“Not if I succeed,” Annabeth said.

Reyna’s expression looked the same as it had at Camp Jupiter when she realised Jason had found another girl. The praetor was too alone, too bitter and betrayed to believe anything could go right for her again. Annbeth waited for her to attack. Instead, Reyna flicked her hand. The metal dogs backed away. “Annabeth Chase,” she said, “When we meet again, we will be enemies on the field of battle.”

The praetor turned and walked across the rampart, her greyhounds behind her.

[Mark of Athena 251-2]

In this scene, Reyna allows Annabeth to go off and return to the Argo II. And it’s Annabeth’s words here, ‘not if I succeed’ that convince Reyna to let her go.

And this happens again in House of Hades,

“A Roman leader returning the most important Greek statue to Camp Half-Blood – she knows that could prevent a war.”

“This isn’t a trick,” Rachel added. “We’re not lying. Ask your dogs.”

The metallic greyhounds didn’t react. Reyna stroked Aurum’s head thoughtfully. “The Athena Parthenos… so the legend is true.” [House of Hades 252]

Once again, Reyna is swayed by the idea of preventing a war that has already begun. Logically, this doesn’t make a sense, but I think it’s a key element of her character. And to see it happen multiple times – I don’t think it’s a momentary thing. A potential war is a completely different beast that a war that is already raging.

Because Reyna knows that to be an ideal Roman leader, she might fight. She must lead the legion in this war. After all she says this to Percy:

“The praetorship will be yours for the taking. Together, you and I could expand the power of Rome. We could raise an army and find the Doors of Death, crush Gaia’s forces once and for all.”

But in action, Reyna doesn’t seem to think like this. Her goal isn’t to expand Roman power. It’s to solidify it.

But Reyna is ultimately burdened by this question of what it means to uphold the memory of the empire. The need to expand, to build, and – most of all – to conquer is a fundamental part of Rome. Reyna doesn’t go against tradition very often. Except on this note. And I think that bothers her.

I wonder if that is the conflict her character is undergoing throughout Mark of Athena. Why she seems so tired, bitter, and on edge. So knows that as a Roman she should be readying for war.

Octavian is ready to fight this battle. He’s out for blood. Like a proper Roman. So what about her? What’s stopping her? I think this might be why she seems to flip back and forth between being against the Seven and helping them in MoA, and even in HoH.

Because if they are at war – then she must fight. If the war has yet to begin then she can stop it. And if you are wondering what I mean by her flipping back and forth.

Reyna:

1. Agreed to bring the Seven to trial, potentially to execute them

2. Gave the legion to the location of Camp Half-Blood [probably]

Annabeth wanted to sob. Camp Half-Blood was the only real home she’d ever known, and in a bid for friendship she had told Reyna exactly where to find it. She couldn’t leave it at the mercy of the Romans and travel halfway around the world. [Mark of Athena 250]

Why is this the case?

Well, Jason is the one to explain to the legion his version of events. And he doesn’t necessarily say where Camp Half-Blood is.

Jason explained how he’d arrived at Camp Half-Blood without his memory, and how he’d gone on a quest with Piper and Leo to rescue the goddess Hera (or Juno, take your pick – she was equally annoying in Greek or Roman).

There this isn’t the conversation Annabeth is referring to – no, it’s where she tells Reyna, in private, her life story.

She talked about how she had run away when she was only seven, finding her friends Luke and Thalia and making her way to Camp Half-Blood on Long Island. She described the camp and her years growing up there.

As Annabeth predicts, the Romans seem to know exactly where they are going after this. They beeline it to New York (coming to settle and start scouting Long Island within a few days of leaving Charleston).

While, sure, Octavian could have seen it in an augury or possibly from Nero (if he was already working with the emperor at that point).

But Annabeth at least seems to think Reyna will inform the legion. And, at least, on face value she seems to do it.

Octavian

Obviously, Octavian doesn’t have the same qualms about this war that Reyna does. The war has begun – that’s not up for debate. And while Reyna stands back, Octavian takes over, rallying the legion.

When it comes to war, Octavian is one who veers towards the tradition.

“The Romans have honour to think about. They’ve been attacked. They’ll shoot first and ask questions posthac.” [Mark of Athena 107]

Yet despite Octavian’s aggression, he see that the war takes a physical toll on him. In the twelve days between Charleston and the meeting on the rooftop, Octavian’s condition has worsened.

Octavian stood to one side, thin and pale, his eyes red-rimmed from sleeplessness or anger. [House of Hades 247]

In Blood of Olympus, we see this again,

He stopped so close that Nico could see the bloodshot veins in his pale watery eyes. His face was gaunt. [Blood of Olympus]

But also the mental toll, Octavian was certainly losing his grip on reality in the final battle.

Octavian's laughter was brittle and quite insane.

With that in mind, let’s talk about Octavian’s intentions when it comes to this war. Because I don’t believe it was wholesale destructions into very late.

In Mark of Athena, he says,

“Surrender to Rome!”

In House of Hades, he says,

“I hope you’ve come to discuss surrender terms.”

So we can see that Octavian has a strong focus on ‘surrender’ in both books. These are his opening statements when dealing with the Greeks.

And it’s even possible, there was a third attempt at getting a surrender in Blood of Olympus. This would have occurred just before the councillor meeting at Camp Half-Blood. It would explain why Will Solace seems to be hate Octavian. And why Jake Mason seems to have heard Octavian’s last name, then forgotten it, in his comment “Octavian what’s-his-name”.

Now the question of ‘why’ comes. What terms does Octavian want to bring to the table. Well, as I’ve send before, Octavian does seem to have locked onto “unity” at some point.

And while, by the time we get to the quote below, Octavian has given up on getting the Greeks to surrender, he stills mentions the idea twice.

[Octavian] rose and stretched. “Don’t worry, old friend. Our siege teams have the Greek camp surrounded. Our eagles have complete air superiority. The Greeks aren’t going anywhere until we’re ready to strike. In eleven days, all my forces will be in place. My little surprises will be prepared. On August first, the Feast of Spes, the Greek camp will fall. […] We demigods will be strong and unified, as we were in the old days of the empire.” [Boo 65]

And we can see that this goal of unity under Rome is Octavian’s interpretation of upholding the memory of the empire.

“We eliminate the division.We wipe out the Greeks. We return the gods to their proper manifestation as Roman. Once the gods are restored to their full power, Gaia will not dare rise.”

Obviously, at this point Octavian has given up on the Greeks surrendering, so his plan has been modified. But the general gist is the same. He wishes to eliminate the division and make the gods fully Roman. It seems to me reasonably likely that Octavian desired the Greek to surrender to Rome and join it. This would have expanded the legion’s power and unified all the demigods under one banner.

I think, as well, Apollo would have been more willing to go along with that plan. I doubt Apollo would have been willing to overlook the death of his kids but having the join the legion would solve a lot of headaches (literally).

Summary

Much like any good foils, Octavian and Reyna seems to have almost-aligning goals. Stability and strength for the legion. But they differ on a few key points - and that has caused them to come into conflict.

[magnusmysteries]

Part 4: The Sixteenth Fear

The Magnus Archives was a horror podcast. It is now completed. Many of the show’s mysteries were never explained on the show. I intend to explain them. Spoilers for the show, but also spoilers if you wanna solve these mysteries yourself.

In part 3 I said every fear has an opposite. But the Flesh didn’t exist before the industrial revolution. So there would have been 13 fears then, an uneven number, and not every fear could balance against an opposite. So how could that be?

The answer is, there were only 12 fears before the Flesh. The Corruption and the Desolation used to be the same fear. 

Diego Molina of the Lightless Flame cult worships Asag. A Sumerian god of disease that could make fish boil. So Asag seems to be of both the Corruption and the Desolation.

In Infectious Doubts Arthur Nolan complains about it: “Not like I can vent to the others about what a prat Diego is. Got a lot of funny ideas. Still calls the Lightless Flame Asag, like he was when he was first researching it. I just really wanna tell him to get over it; I mean Asag was traditionally a force of destruction, sure, but as a church we very much settled on burning in terms of the – face we worship, and some fish-boiling Sumerian demon doesn’t really match up, does it? Plus there’s a lot of disease imagery with Asag that I’ll reckon is way too close to Filth for my taste, but no, he read it in some ancient tome, so that’s that –“

Ancient is the key word. The tome predates the industrial revolution and the Flesh. Asag probably isn’t a thing anymore and Diego is indeed a prat for worshipping it.

In The Architecture of Fear Smirke writes “I know you say the Flesh was perhaps always there, shriveled and nascent until its recent growth, but to grant the existence of such a lesser power would throw everything into confusion. Would you have me separate the Corruption into insects, dirt, and disease? To divide the fungal bloom from the maggot?”

It is not random that Smirke uses the Corruption as an example here. The Corruption is the opposite of the Flesh, so the Corruption is the fear that Smirke believed had no opposite for hundreds or thousands of years.

In part 3 I said vampires where Corruption/Desolation/Hunt. This is a little far-fetched, but I wonder if the vampire’s we’ve seen have been old ones that predate the Flesh. And that’s why they are part Corruption, since Corruption and Hunt used to be next to each other. Maybe there are more modern vampires without the long sucking tongue. Maybe instead of sucking blood, when they bite you begin to burn or boil. Since the Hunt is now next to the Desolation instead of the Corruption-Desolation combo.

In Vampire Killer Trevor says “I have killed five people that I know for sure as vampires, and there are two more that may or may not have been.” There is a missing middle part of Trevor’s statement. Maybe there he talks about killing two vampires that are modern and therefore different so he’s not sure if they’re actually vampires.

Speaking of fears splitting up, why is the Darkness the opposite fear of the Slaughter? In Last Words we hear of the first fear “A fear of blood and pounding feet, a fear of that sudden burst of pain and then nothing.” 

And of the second fear “The fear of their own end, of the things that lived in the darkness, became a fear of the darkness itself.”

I think the first was a general fear of violence. It includes what became the Hunt “Blood and pounding Feet...” and the Slaughter “...Sudden burst of pain and then nothing”, and the End “The fear of their own end…” And the second fear was the Darkness. They were the opposite by default, simply for being the two first fears.

When the Buried became a fear, the Hunt split up from the Violence to oppose it. When the Vast became a fear, the End split up from the Violence to oppose it. All that was left of the Violence was Slaughter, still opposing the Dark. When humans began warfare, fear of war fit nicely with the Slaughter.

The Eye might have been part of the Dark at first. Still from Last Words: “...because they knew the dark held flashing talons and shining eyes…” 

When the Lonely became a fear, the Eye split up from the Dark to oppose it.

So what about the Extinction? Does it have an opposite? Yes! There is a sixteenth fear. And what can be the opposite of the fear of the end of the world? The fear that the world isn’t real. That we’re all just living in a computer simulation. If you think the world isn’t even real, you’re not gonna be so worried about it ending. I’ll call it the Simulation.

Here is how the fears are arranged on the wheel, with the two latest fears added:

Description of image: A circle with 16 spots similar to a clock. On each spot is a number and the name of a power: 1. Corruption. 2 Extinction. 3. Desolation. 4. Hunt. 5. Slaughter. 6. End. 7. Lonely. 8. Stranger. 9. Flesh. 10. Simulation 11. Spiral. 12. Buried. 13. Dark. 14. Vast. 15. Eye. 16. Web.

The Extinction is next to the Corruption. Disease and garbage are both gross. Possessive is an Extinction episode, even if not acknowledged as such by any of the characters. It’s about garbage. And Maggie is creating people out of garbage. She is making the inheritors mentioned in Time of Revelation. There are also creatures made of garbage in Concrete Jungle. And Maggie was full of moving insect legs, showing Corruption influence.

Quote from Adelard Dekker from Rotten Core: “I’ve spoken before about how keenly I’ve watched news of possible pandemics, which is where I suspect the Extinction may pull away from the Corruption during its emergence.” Adelard knows the Extinction is next to Corruption.

The Extinction is next to Desolation. That fits, nuclear weapons cause fire. Quote from Times of Revelation, describing corpses: “They were stiff, and desiccated, mummified by some process Bernadette could not begin to guess at, but that rendered their flesh like tightly packed ash” Ash as if they were burned.

The Simulation is next to the Flesh. The Flesh makes you think humans aren’t people, they are just meat. The Simulation makes you think humans aren’t people, they are just NPCs.

The Simulation is the next to the Spiral. Both make you question what is real. The Spiral makes you doubt your mind, the Simulation makes you doubt your world.

There are four episodes about the Simulation: Binary, Zombie, Cul-de-sac and Reflection.

In Binary Sergey Ushanka uploads his mind into a computer. He becomes a simulation and it hurts. There is influence by the Spiral, the statement giver isn’t sure if she’s going crazy. And there is influence by the Flesh. Ushanka uploads himself into a computer and then he eats the computer. So that’s cannibalism.

In Zombie the statement giver thinks other people aren’t real, they’re philosophical zombies, In other words they like simulations or NPCs. The man that follows her repeats the phrase “Just fine, thank you for asking” and says nothing else. Just like some NPCs in video games will say the same phrase over and over. The man is identical the three times they meet, except for his t-shirt changes color. Sometimes in video games some NPCs will be identical, except for some colors are changed. (Because it’s less work to recollar a character than to draw one from scratch.)

John thinks Cul-De-Sac is about the Lonely. And yes, the statement giver was lonely. But the people affected by the Lonely choose to be lonely, and the statement giver didn’t. His boyfriend broke up with him because of cheating and then he lost his friends because they sided with his boyfriend. 

I think the theme of the statement is unreality, not loneliness. In the Magnus Archives, when someone gets marked by a power it is because they made some wrong choice. The choice the statement giver makes is to return to the place he found dead and soulless. He drives back to his ex-boyfriend to deliver the moose, rather than send it by mail. He specifically wants to meet his ex. Not an act of loneliness, quite the opposite. Also he is returning a moose that is angular and creepy, in other words it is unreal.

When the statement escapes from the nightmare it’s because he got a phone call from his ex. And he says “I love you.” and that fits neatly with the Lonely. But it also fits with escape from the unreal. He escapes because he communicates with a real person.

The road signs says “Road” and “Street”. Generic and unreal. All the houses look the same. Like in a computer game. The statement giver wonders if they are the same house. Like in a computer game where one might reuse the code for a house many times.

The house he enters has stock photos. Unreal.

The people on TV have something wrong with their eyes, similar to the eyes of the zombies in Zombie. And it's a fake cooking show, and a fake infomercial.

The dead woman upstairs was someone who had social media profiles, and that nobody notices had died. Meaning she lived her life online. That sounds like she was lonely. But living online also makes her a good victim for the Simulation. Everyone she talked to was on a computer, she couldn’t know for sure if they were real.

The woman had killed herself with a mirror. I think what happened was she had looked into the mirror and seen that her eyes were wrong, like the eyes of the people on TV. And she had thought she was just a simulation, like everything around her. And therefore she killed herself. Or perhaps she wasn’t reflected in the mirror at all? Like in…

Reflection. Adelard speculated that this statement was about the Extinction, but I don’t think so. The protagonist was in a world that seemed unreal. A fun fair is artificial so that fits the theme. The people were playing games, which fits the theme via computer games maybe.

Adelard says “I can’t quite get past the detail that there was no reflection at all in the mirror he used to return.” It is almost at the end of Adelard’s letter, it’s clearly meant to be significant. The no reflection might be symbolic for the statement giver starting to think he isn’t real, which might be what happened to him after he gave the statement.

Reflection has influence by the Spiral, with the maze of mirrors. There is influence by the Flesh, with the cannibalism.

[qqueenofhades]

Hi, I hope this isnt annoying to ask but w the old guard ive seen a lot of people mixing up catholic and christian when it comes to nicky. when by todays standards theyre not interchangeable as catholic is a specific strain of christianity. i was kinda under the impression the crusades were a purely catholic thing since the pope. is that right or were other christians involved??

Hmm. Just to be clear what you’re asking, are you wondering whether it’s a mistake to use “Catholic” and “Christian” interchangeably when talking about this time period or describing Nicky’s faith? And/or asking for a basic religious primer on medieval Europe and the crusades more generally?

First, it’s not a mistake to use “Catholic” and “Christian” as synonyms during the crusades, especially since a) Catholics are Christians, no matter what the militant Protestant reformers would like you to think, and b) until said Protestant reformation, they were the dominant and almost (but not quite) singular Christian denomination in Western Europe. Our source material for the period doesn’t describe the crusaders as “Catholics,” even if they were; they call them Christians or Franks. (Likewise, the word “Frank,” i.e. “French” was often used to describe Western European crusaders no matter which country they were from, since so many crusaders came from France and that was where the crusades were originally launched, at the council of Clermont in 1095.) To call them “Christians” points us to the fact that the crusades were viewed as a great pan-Christian enterprise, even if the reality was more complicated, and nobody would need to specify “Catholic,” because that was implicit.

In short, medieval Europe had two major strands of Christianity, which developed out of the centuries of arguments over heresy, the contents of the biblical canon, the nature and/or divinity of Christ, their relationship to Judaism, paganism, and other religions of late antiquity, and so forth. Eventually these two competing branches took on geographical, cultural, and linguistic associations: Western (Latin) Catholic Christianity, and Eastern (Greek) Orthodox Christianity. The Great Schism in 1054 split these two rites formally apart, though both of them had at least some thought that the internal divisions in Christianity should be healed and dialogue has continued intermittently even up to the present day (though they’re still not actually reconciled and this seems highly unlikely to ever happen.)

The head of Western Catholic Christianity was (and is) the Pope of Rome, and the head of Eastern Orthodox Christianity was (and is) the Patriarch of Constantinople. Both of these branches of Christianity were involved in launching the crusades. To make a long story short, the Byzantine (Greek) Emperor, Alexios Komnenos, appealed to the Catholic (Latin) pope, Urban II, for help in defending the rights of eastern Christians, territorial incursions against Greek possessions by the Muslims of the Holy Land and North Africa, and the city of Constantinople (and Jerusalem) itself. So although the actual French and Western European participants in the crusades were Catholic, they (originally, at least) joined up with the intention of helping out their Orthodox brethren in the East and “liberating” Jerusalem from the so-called tyranny of Islam. To this end, the accounts of the council of Clermont focused heavily on the brotherhood of western and eastern Christians and the alleged terrible treatment of these Christians by the ruling Islamic caliphate in Jerusalem. At that time, that was the Isma’ili Shia Muslim Fatimids (who had replaced the Sunni Muslim Abbasids in the early 10th century -- there are many names and many dynasties, but yes.)

However, despite this ecumenical start, relations between Western and Eastern Christians started to go bad very quickly over the course of the crusades, indeed within a few short years of Clermont. Alexios Komnenos wanted the crusade leaders to swear loyalty to him and pledge to return formerly Byzantine lands that might be recaptured from the Muslims, and the crusade leaders did not want to do this. There were deep cultural, linguistic, religious, social, and political differences between Greek and Latin Christians, even if they were both technically Christians, and these caused the obvious problems. The Greeks were obviously located in a different part of the world and had a different relationship with their Islamic neighbors (they fought them often, but also traded with them and established diplomatic ties) and this caused constant friction during the crusades, since the Westerners always suspected (not entirely wrongly) that the Greeks were secretly in league with the Turks. Albert of Aachen, writing his Historia Ierosolimitana in the early 12th century, referred to “wicked Christians, that is to say Greeks,” and our primary source for the Second Crusade (1145--49) is Odo of Deuil and his De profectione Ludovici VII in Orientem (Journey of Louis VII to the East.) He spent the entire time grousing about “treacherous Greeks” and blaming them for the crusade’s struggles (though the Second Crusade pretty much sabotaged itself and didn’t need any outside force to blame for its failure). There was some truth to this accusation, since Byzantium was then engaged in a war against Sicily (Louis VII’s ally, though it had its own connections to Muslim culture and indeed had been Muslim before the Normans conquered it in 1061). The Greeks had thus been working with the Muslims to undercut the invasion of Western Europeans into this contested territory, and this was not forgotten or forgiven.

The best-known example of Western-Eastern relations during the crusades going catastrophically awry is in 1204, at the sack of Constantinople as the culmination of the Fourth Crusade. Basically: the crusaders were deeply in debt to the Venetians and had already attacked the Catholic city of Zara (Zadar in Croatia) in hopes of getting some money back, then got involved in the messy politics of the Byzantine succession, went to Constantinople, and eventually outright attacked it, sacked and destroyed the city, and raped and slaughtered its inhabitants. This obviously poisoned the well all but permanently between Latin and Greek Christians (frankly, in my opinion, it’s one of the worst tragedies of history) and Constantinople never regained its former wealth and pre-eminence. It declined until it was captured in 1453 by the Ottoman Turks and Sultan Mehmed II, and has been an Islamic city ever since. (It was renamed Istanbul in 1923, under Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the “founding father” of modern Turkey.) Obviously, Latin and Greek Christianity still had to work with each other somehow, but the crusades were actually the single biggest factor in driving the two branches further apart, rather than reconciling them.

The words “catholic” and “orthodox” both have connotations of universality, overall correctness, and all-encompassing truth claims. Therefore, in some sense, to a Catholic Christian or an Orthodox Christian, defining themselves as such, with both words, is repetitious; they are Catholic/Orthodox and therefore the correct sort of Christian (even if their theological opponents would disagree). However, historians obviously do use that convention to distinguish them, since the identity is important, and makes a big difference as to what religious landscape an individual is living in. As for heresy, it was an equally complicated subject. Numerous “heretical” (i.e. not mainstream Catholic Christianity) Christian sects existed in Europe for this entire period, most notably the Cathars. (They got their own crusade launched against them, the Albigensian Crusade of 1209--29 in southern France.) The lines between heresy and orthodoxy (small-o orthodoxy meaning in this case, confusingly, Catholic Christianity) could often be blurred, and religious practices were syncretic and constantly influenced each other. A big problem in the Albigensian Crusade was identifying who the heretics actually were; they looked like their Catholic neighbors, they lived in community with them, their friends and family members were Cathar and Catholic alike, both rites were practiced, and plenty of towns were just fine with this hybrid arrangement. Hence it was not as simple as just pointing and going “get those guys,” and indeed, one of the leaders of the Albigensian Crusade, when asked by a knight how to tell them apart, advocated to just kill them all and God would know who the good Catholics were. Welp.

Northern and eastern Europe also remained pagan relatively late into the medieval era (into the 10th and 11th centuries) and the Northern and Baltic Crusades were launched with the aim of converting them to Catholic Christianity. (You will notice that the crusades have a complicated history as both a vehicle of religious warfare and as an attempted theater of conversion.) Heresy was a constant preoccupation of the Catholic popes, especially Innocent III (the progenitor of the Fourth, Albigensian, and Fifth Crusades). Especially in the thirteenth century, splinter religious groups and localized sects of “heresy” were popping up like crazy, and it was a constant point of contention as to how to deal with them, i.e. by force, persuasion, reconciliation, dialogue, etc. No, the medieval Catholic church was not the stereotyped instrument of fear, oppression, and tyranny, and could never enforce its views universally on all of western Europe. Church attendance on the parish level could be so low that in 1215 at the Fourth Lateran Council, Innocent issued an order requiring Christians to take communion at least once a year. So yes. The standard was very far from “everyone believed Catholicism fervently at all times and if they didn’t, they were immediately punished/burned alive.” The idea of burning heretics at the stake wasn’t even introduced until the early fifteenth century, and even then, it required an often-months-long formal church trial and wasn’t just something that the local village priest could hand out on a whim.

There were also monastic orders, and these (at least in Western Europe) were therefore Catholic, but they had different ways of practicing it and what their orders emphasized. The most common order were Benedictines (founded in the 6th century by Saint Benedict), who adhered to the Rule of Saint Benedict, which is still the basis for the following monastic orders. There were also the Cluniacs (founded in 10th-century France at Cluny Abbey) and the Cistercians (founded as rivals to the Cluniacs at the end of the 11th century, also in France). In terms of the crusades, the Cistercians were by far the most involved with/zealously supportive of them (Bernard of Clairvaux was a Cistercian) and took part in directly financing, preaching, and launching the Second, Fourth, and Albigensian Crusades alike. The better-known monastic orders, the Franciscans and Dominicans, weren’t founded until the thirteenth century, on the tail end of the crusades, and didn’t take much direct part in them. The Dominican inquisition, however, took over the business of dealing with the Cathars after the Albigensian Crusade petered out, and their concern was often with heresy thereafter.

Anyway. This has gotten long, as per usual. But I hope this gives you some introductory sense of the religious landscape of medieval Europe, the divisions within Christianity, and the fact that it’s entirely accurate to use “Catholic” and “Christian” interchangeably when discussing Nicky’s crusades-era faith and counterparts. The crusaders themselves did not specify themselves as being Catholic, and the crusades were (at least initially) viewed as a pan-Christian movement, even if eventually fatal tensions with Orthodox Christians left a permanent scar. The idea of identifying the precise denomination of Christianity is also another Protestant Reformation-era innovation, and wasn’t, at least in this case, necessary to do.

[teabooksandsweets]

@athoughtfox asked me this:

I'd be interested to hear your opinion on one particular bit in HHB, which always strikes me - the bit where it describes the Narnian giants putting on spiked boots, which is a gory, nasty image, and yet it's the good guys who are doing it - I think it's an interesting look at the brutality war draws out, even from the good guys.

Oh, dear. Yes, I think it makes a gory, nasty image. And I think it’s also what I meant about the stylized violence—it is a nasty image to realistically think of what they are doing. But it is a rather exciting image to just think of the big spiked boots on the giant’s feet and the idea of the way they can quickly defeat the enemy, and the almost cartoonish extravagance of it!

But that is one part. Now for the harsh reality.

I mentioned “battles are ugly when women fight” earlier, and I talked about it quite often before. It is a good example of Lewis approach to war: as a bad thing, a thing that one shouldn’t be involved with when one didn’t actually need to, and a thing that shouldn’t be glorified, and sometimes was inevitable.

Father Christmas said very clearly “battles are ugly when women fight” and not “women are ugly in battle” or “women make battles ugly” or anything like that. It is absolutely wrong to assume that he meant women weren’t good enough for war. War wasn’t good enough for anyone—but when there had to be a war, and men had to be in it, then women shouldn’t go unnecessarily. And when it was necessary for women to fight, then the battles were indeed very ugly... and yet, they had to be fought.

The two world wars were very different from previous wars. WWI with the new speed of the modern machine guns and the long or everlasting effect they had on the soldiers, and WWII, the war of the Narnia books, with it’s scale, affecting everybody. Not just soldiers (tragic enough) or the politicians in charge.

The giants in their spiky boots were, I think, an example of the crude and ruthless bruality of modern wars. They were like bombs—they didn't kill the enemy, they just killed. Even when they came of the “good side”. Just think of Dresden—the allies fighting Nazis, and to do so killing countless civillians and refugees. A terrible and terribly complex matter, which really doesn’t belong here, but an example of the terrible scale of that new kind of war, that wasn’t fought in far away battle-fields and that meant danger and tragedy to everyone.

The giants, of course, only stumped on Calormene soldiers (or am I wrong about that? I don’t remember, but I think it was only in battle) but they has the scale of and technique of modern wars, not of the old-fashioned fight of man against man, so to speak. And yet, they were not only used by the villains, unlike their real counterpoints, by the good side, only used against the villains. Unless I am wrong about that last part, as said before. They were, as it is, a big scale weapon. Not specifically bombs, but on that new scale and extend of warfare.

And maybe, maybe they were not. That is again the thing of the style—maybe they are just that funny image. The idea of “what could giants do? stump them all! how would it be more dramatic? spiky boots!” is quite possible for a dramatic, maybe even comical fight in a children’s book.

And that brings me back to my other post: You never really know with Lewis. Because the harsh reality of war was so significant in his books, yet he also played around with the detached and superficial kind of battle in traditional romance and old tales, and his rather blunt way of writing it all down, make it sometimes difficult to distinguish. Does one read too much into it? Or too little?

In any case, and that is now the really important bit of all my rambling, there are two things quite clear about violence and battles and war in Narnia: they are bad, and the good side does them too. They should be avoided, but, when on the defence or for a really good cause, sometimes cannot be avoided. It is bad to do harm, and one shouldn’t fight because of one’s own pride or fun of it, but one has to stand up to one’s duty and do what one has to do. They are not enjoyable or in any way recommendable, but if the enemies choose to fight, then they have to face the consequences.

And one thing is very significant about Narnia, and about the Pevensies, and everyone on their side: They only hurt those who want to fight them, who want to harm them, and never harm anyone just for happening to be unintentionally on the same “side” or in the same place as the enemy. Not even the giants (unless I am wrong about that).

[a-green-onion]

The He*archate vs Umberto Eco’s “Ur-Fascism”

ok it looks like I haven’t already done this, so! A lot of fictional Evil Empires use the visuals of fascism (iirc the Star Wars original trilogy did this), but not all of them follow through on making the Empire substantially fascist in ideology and practice. Machineries of Empire certainly has fascist visual components, with its regiments of black-shirted soldiers. Umberto Eco, a writer who grew up in Italy under Mussolini, wrote an essay about growing up under that regime and his ideas about key features of fascist and fascist-like movements (I’ll link it in a reblog, I don’t want Tumblr eating this post. I really recommend it, it’s very accessible and well-written). I want to see how much the he*archate correlates with these. It’s easy to get caught up in all the flashy space battles and gory exotic tortures, but YHL is very into military history, and that’s one reason his despotic regimes work so well--they’re taken from real life.

This is horribly incomplete because in my reread I’m only about halfway through Ninefox Gambit, but...I wanna Post.

An important note to start: Eco uses “fascism”, the name for Italian political movement, to refer to a variety of different totalitarian regimes and philosophies, because “fascism had no quintessence. Fascism was a fuzzy totalitarianism, a collage of different philosophical and political ideas, a beehive of contradictions.” Further, “Fascism became an all-purpose term because one can eliminate from a fascist regime one or more features, and it will still be recognizable as fascist.” Thus, the common characteristics he lists are not features of every fascist movement, and are often features of non-fascist repressive movements. The he*archate does not have all these features, but I think it makes sense to analyze it as a fascist empire.

Without further ado:

1. The cult of tradition, including syncretic occultism. “As a consequence, there can be no advancement of learning. Truth has been already spelled out once and for all, and we can only keep interpreting its obscure message” (Eco).

The he*archate does not do this. As I pointed out in an earlier post, there are no foundational religious beliefs behind the High Calendar. No holy texts, no prophets, just a way of life, a set of practices, and endless heresies.

2. Rejection of modernism. “Even though Nazism was proud of its industrial achievements, its praise of modernism was only the surface of an ideology based upon Blood and Earth (Blut und Boden)” (Eco).

I don’t think the he*archate does this? I might be forgetting something though, feel free to chime in.

3. Action for action’s sake. (Eco)

Kel Kel Kel Kel Kel.

4. Inability to tolerate analysis. “Disagreement is treason.” (Eco)

Yeah that’s precisely how the High Calendar functions.

5. “Ur-Fascism grows up and seeks for consensus by exploiting and exacerbating the natural fear of difference. The first appeal of a fascist or prematurely fascist movement is an appeal against the intruders.”

So, we don’t get to see much of the heptarchate in its earliest forms, and what we do see is in the third book, which I don’t remember super well. I think the he*archate does this, but it’s more obvious how in the context of Eco’s points 5 and 9.

6. “Derives from individual or social frustration” and features an “appeal to a frustrated middle class.”

Again, this talks more about how fascism begins than how it continues. The he*archate is an established, stable totalitarian empire, not a burgeoning movement (which is interesting because by rights this house of cards should have collapsed centuries ago). It would be interesting to look at how the hexarchate uses propaganda but uhhh iirc that’s mostly in the second and third books and I don’t remember them that well.

7. Nationalism, and the obsession with a plot, both as an outside and an inside threat. 

Reflected in how the heretics (an inside plot) are iirc assumed to be aligned with the Hafn (an outside threat). See also point 9.

8. “The followers must feel humiliated by the ostentatious wealth and force of their enemies. [...] However, the followers must be convinced that they can overwhelm the enemies. Thus, by a continuous shifting of rhetorical focus, the enemies are at the same time too strong and too weak. Fascist governments are condemned to lose wars because they are constitutionally incapable of objectively evaluating the force of the enemy.”

...I think the he*archate might win too many wars for this to be applicable?

9. “Pacifism is trafficking with the enemy [...] life is permanent warfare. This, however, brings about an Armageddon complex. Since enemies have to be defeated, there must be a final battle, after which the movement will have control of the world. But such a “final solution” implies a further era of peace, a Golden Age, which contradicts the principle of permanent war. No fascist leader has ever succeeded in solving this predicament.”

The he*archate absolutely does live in a state of permanent war, against heresy which is everywhere. The he*archate seems to have solved this predicament by achieving a placid, high standard of living for the majority of its citizenry, contingent upon those citizens’ complicity in the ritual torture of prisoners of this “war.” Thus, every citizen is both invested and involved in the fighting and encouraged to identify with its sacrifices, but also able to live in a true golden age. I’ve always thought about this aspect of the he*archate as in conversation with Ursula K. LeGuin’s short story “The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas,” but that’s an essay for another day.

10. Contempt for the weak and popular elitism. “Every citizen belongs to the best people of the world, the members of the party are the best among the citizens, every citizen can (or ought to) become a member of the party. But there cannot be patricians without plebeians. In fact, the Leader, knowing that his power was not delegated to him democratically but was conquered by force, also knows that his force is based upon the weakness of the masses; they are so weak as to need and deserve a ruler. Since the group is hierarchically organized (according to a military model), every subordinate leader despises his own underlings, and each of them despises his inferiors. This reinforces the sense of mass elitism.”

This one isn’t an obvious component, but I think it’s present, especially looking at how the Kel talk about “crashhawks”. I’m going to keep a closer eye out for it as I reread.

Cheris is “un-Kel” because she cannot do this. One of the first things we see Cheris do is order her soldiers into a mildly heretical formation to keep them alive, and we see again and again how well she knows, respects, and cares for the people and servitors under her command. 

On the flip side, Kujen is able to become the system’s architect precisely because he despises his inferiors, and sees everyone as an inferior. As we learn in the third book, this does not come naturally to him, but inducing this state of mind in himself is necessary for his success.

11. “Everybody is educated to become a hero. [...] This cult of heroism is strictly linked with the cult of death. [...] In non-fascist societies, the lay public is told that death is unpleasant but must be faced with dignity; believers are told that it is the painful way to reach a supernatural happiness. By contrast, the Ur-Fascist hero craves heroic death, advertised as the best reward for a heroic life. The Ur-Fascist hero is impatient to die. In his impatience, he more frequently sends other people to death.”

Kel Kel Kel Kel.

12. ��Machismo (which implies both disdain for women and intolerance and condemnation of nonstandard sexual habits, from chastity to homosexuality).”

The he*archate absolutely, emphatically does not do this. Plenty of gender equality, plenty of nonstandard sexual behavior. 

But! There is another component to point 12. “Since even sex is a difficult game to play, the Ur-Fascist hero tends to play with weapons—doing so becomes an ersatz phallic exercise.” This might be relevant to the commonness of dueling as a form of entertainment, both as a participant and a spectator sport? I don’t think dueling is particularly eroticized but it’s certainly linked to exchanges of power.

13. Selective populism. “In a democracy, the citizens have individual rights, but the citizens in their entirety have a political impact only from a quantitative point of view—one follows the decisions of the majority. For Ur-Fascism, however, individuals as individuals have no rights, and the People is conceived as a quality, a monolithic entity expressing the Common Will. Since no large quantity of human beings can have a common will, the Leader pretends to be their interpreter. Having lost their power of delegation, citizens do not act; they are only called on to play the role of the People. Thus the People is only a theatrical fiction.”

Not a strong theme in MoE, but arguably, this is how the calendar operates: on the Will of the People, carefully channeled by the appropriate authorities.

Also, not strictly relevant, but everyone needs to see this line: “There is in our future a TV or Internet populism, in which the emotional response of a selected group of citizens can be presented and accepted as the Voice of the People.” Hm.

14. Newspeak. “All the Nazi or Fascist schoolbooks made use of an impoverished vocabulary, and an elementary syntax, in order to limit the instruments for complex and critical reasoning. But we must be ready to identify other kinds of Newspeak, even if they take the apparently innocent form of a popular talk show.”

Again, I’d like to take another look at the propaganda that gets sent out in later books to talk about this properly! The Kel make heavy internal use of euphemisms, but that’s not quite the same thing.

***

Anyway, that was fun, and I hope everyone learned something about how fascism emerges! I encourage you to read the entire essay, chew on its ideas a bit, think about if they apply to other fictional words and to real life.

[sebastianshaw]

Let's go wide and predictable... Tell me about the different WoD incarnations for Shaw. :>

OK SO First thing I am glad you are also a nerd for this so I don’t don’t to explain all these terms. Secondly wow I need to be better about tagging/organizing, I couldn’t find all the other posts on this I was SURE I wrote. SO HERE’S A BIG FAT POST, RIP YOUR EYES

VAMPIRE Lasombra: This is the clan I typically default to in answers for him AS YOU HAVE NOTICED. I mean, they’re dark aristocrats who are all about Social Darwinish, preying on the weak, and the strong reigning. They primarily enforce this subtly through political games, but they have NO PROBLEM throwing an elegant Potence-backed punch. While one would think that these proud predators demanding sniveling obedience---and one would, in a way, be right---they certainly don’t RESPECT it, and it can even induce violent rage in them. Fits Shaw to a T. Sure, the Catholicism/Church control and Spanish origins and attraction to the sea and Abyss mysticism aren’t for him, but hey, he fits the outlook of the Clan perfectly aside from the religious aspects, and no one fits EVERY stereotype of a clan anyway.  Most Lasombra are Sabbat, and he could be too, but he would be in it for personal power, not true belief in being the Sword of Caine. I can equally easily see him going antitribu for the political power and stability of the Camarilla.  My other choices for him are VENTURE which is pretty obvious, but also Gangrel, which sounds counterintuitive but I HAVE A REALLY GOOD ARGUEMENT FOR IT! WEREWOLF Shadow Lord. Total Shadow Lord for pretty much all the same reasons as Lasombra. Like just LOOK AT THIS QUOTE: “ The Shadow Lords are a fictional tribe of Garou (werewolves) in White Wolf Game Studio’s Werewolf: The Apocalypse role-playing game.   […]  The Shadow Lords’ lives are like a daily game of chess and a constant struggle for power […] Shadow Lords respect power and condemn weakness, any cub who’s not strong enough in their eyes is banished from the tribe [… ] None of the other tribes like them very much, or at all, but even the ones who hate them most don’t question their ability to get things done. […] perhaps the largest camp, the Lords of the Summit tend to be the stereotypical Shadow Lords - power-hungry, manipulative, ambitious, and arrogant. This by no means makes them less dangerous foes.” And like. . . .they focus on political and intellectual power FIRST, and that sort of character is typically physically weak. But as with the Lasombra, nope, the Shadow Lords had bodily power too; they’re described as looking more like over-muscled pit bulls in lupine form than wolves. So....yeah, that’s perfect. Because Shaw does fight “smart” first, he ideally never touches his opponent, but when he has to? BOY CAN HE PULVERIZE. So, Shadow Lord Shaw is a Homid, probably an Ahroun but maybe a Philodox, and he has a lot of Glass Walkers following him as well as fellow Shadow Lords; he finds great use in their technological talents and ability to adapt to an urban environment and OWN it (rather than just SURVIVE in its fringes like a Bone Gnawer, as he sees it) and they organize themselves in a corporate-like structure where he takes a natural lead.  While the Shadow Lords are stereotypically/traditionally Eastern European, they can be of any race today. Shaw’s dad is English, but since we never see his mom in canon, for this version I’m saying his mom was a great big Eastern European Shadow Lord, and that’s why he never knew her, because the Garou aren’t typically raising their own young. He’s just. . . .big brutal wolf boy. And has like a billion puppies/Kinfolk kids. I DREW HIM FERA Ok, so I picked a BUNCH of Fera for Shaw, and you know why? I could. Literally just because I could. I don’t have a DM to tell me no! I even picked extinct ones, BECAUSE I WANTED TO! Cat-wise, I like him as a Khan or a Khara. Are the Khara extinct? Yes. Do they really suit him, the way they’re described less as warriors and more just secret-gatherers? Not at all. I picked them because I just like the idea of him turning into a massive, massive black smilodon. Because I think it’s cool and I don’t have to respect canon here. He can be the last of the Khara and not fit them at all if I say so. And hey, he LOOKS like a prehistoric man already! As for the Khan. . . .of the extant Bastet, the Simba and Khan fit him best. And if I am being honest? The Simba probably are a better fit for him. And I’m fine with that. I’m fine with Shaw as a big ol werelion with a black mane. But I also just really, really like the Khan. And as I have made clear, I am running this show. So my first choice for him that isn’t a Shadow Lord, is a Khan. They’re most typically Indian, Chinese, or (due to breeding with colonizers in India) English, so he could be one of the English Khan, and hey, fighting the Wyrm gives him a good outlet for. . . himself. Their human forms are also typically tall and HUGE, upwards of 300 lbs, and they’ve sired some of the most beautiful kittens and powerful bloodlines. T “ The Simba may declare themselves nobility, but the weretigers fit the title. Regal hunters and warriors, these Bastet evoke the respect the lions demand. From the snowy mountains of Asia to the cities of India, the weretigers hunt the spawn of Asura and defend the last of their Kin. They’re solid, dependable, smart and strong. Their weaknesses, such as they are, come from being too trusting or too sure of themselves. Khan are straightforward and action-oriented, not clever schemers. Whatever a Khan does, he does full-tilt — fighting, romancing, hunting, studying, even contemplating. These Bastet throw themselves into all tasks with vigor and passion, and their bodies, in any form, bristle with vitality. Most Khan love company; though few of them can stand the presence of another of their kind for long, they often enjoy companions. And who would deny a tiger’s friendship? It’s said the Khan were brought forth to battle demons, and many of them take that charge literally. Vampires, Asura and fomori have few enemies more relentless than a tiger. Perhaps that’s why the Khan have been brought to the verge of extinction: They made too many of the wrong kind of enemies.” “ The tribe’s traditional cultures stress honor and obedience. The treachery of Nagda was worsened by the stain it put on the tigers’ pride. While solitary in nature, most Khan establish protectorates where they defend a given family or land against corruption. The fact that “defense” occasionally includes killing certain people doesn’t detract from the tribal purpose. The Kahn were created to war against demons. Those who court the darkness must die “ “ While many Khan tend to be bad-tempered and aggressive, others love company of all kinds (and are powerful enough to demand respect). “ So, is that ALL Shaw? No. He’d be a particularly nasty, scheming Khan, in fact, a little unusual for his breed. But that’s hardly unheard of. After all, the famous English Khan named Lord Clouster “had cobras for a heart; he tossed his own kuasha beneath the wheels of a train, fed his wife to a suttee fire by pretending to be dead, then killed his children when he found they did not carry the Changing Touch.” And another Khan, the Indian sultan Nagda, got into a feud with another Khan and “ taken over by his rage, the Sultan Nagda betrayed his race and used a tribal secret. During an eclipse, his assassins struck all over Asia, slaying nearly 100 Khan and many Kinfolk outright.” So, Khan can be bad too.  But not as bad as the Simba. “ “The Lords of Sunlight.” That’s what they call themselves. Like the blazing mane around the heads of their kings, werelions liken themselves to the sun. All things have a place and an order and rebels must be reminded of this fact. The real fact, of course, is that the other tribes dislike the lions; the Simba may call themselves “Lords of Sunlight,” but many other cats give them another name: “The Dark Kings,” an unflattering comparison to the Khan. The Simba aren’t villains; they’re magnificent lords, slayers of demons. Things are simply out of order. When the balance is  restored, when the humans know their place and the cities become graveyards, the lions will be proven right. The demons of the modern age can be traced to the end of the Impergium and the laxity of the Changing Breeds. The Simba mean to put things in order, and if that requires bloodshed, so be it. Warfare is the sport of kings” “ Werelions value strength and order. Despite their bloody reputation, Simba adore their loved ones, and watch their Kinolk closely. Children and kittens are raised within the pride and must constantly prove themselves to survive. “ “ Each pride has one Mtolo (“father”), or dominant male, and several Kirii (“wives”) and Anwana (“young hunters”). Small prides defer to larger ones, and may owe allegiance to a Chakuva (“High King”) like Black Tooth. “ So, Simba are very patriarchal, very hierarchal, and want to run everyone else and feel they’re entitled to do so by birthright,  and the more I talk the LESS it sounds like Shaw actually? Like don’t get me wrong, he’s proud and power-hungry AS YOU KNOW, but what sets him apart from Apocalypse or Magneto or Xavier is that Shaw has never sought to have mutantkind follow him. He has his own ideologies, but he has never sought to lead others or enforce it on them. So really, the Simba mentality of “we should be in charge because it’s us” DOESN’T work for him, nor does the idea of being entitled to do so, as Shaw’s “power first” mentality is all about EARNING your position, not deserving it automatically. It’s all very Fabian though! So I’ll leave that here as a bonus for you instead of going back and deleting it lol. yEAH HE’S A BAD KHAN, BASICALLY And his Pyrio, no matter what cat type he is, would be Night.  Each Bastet has a “Pyrio” meaning a classification of their general personality and what fields they’re likely to pursue and be talented in. “Like the Dark Father Cahlash, the favor of the Night indicates a sinister or hidden nature. Most Bastet with this Pryio tend to withdraw from others, concentrating on their own business unless interrupted. Although they might not be actively malignant, they have short tempers and quiet ways, and fiercely guard their privacy. Night Bastet prefer occupations such as assassin, scholar, scientist and dark mystic. In the wilderness, the Night cats are hidden hunters and man-eaters, with nasty dispositions and an eerie reputations. These are the cats whose deeds are told around campfires for years to come. If you’ve got a disposition toward the Night, activities that cause others discomfort, reinforce your private space or protect some valuable secret from outsiders can refresh your Willpower.” So yeah. Shaw is a night kitty.  Rats are not the type that fit him the MOST, but I drew him as a RATKIN WARRIOR anyway. Because rats. Also while I drew him as a Warrior, he could also be an Engineer or a Plague Lord (specifically sylphyllis; every Plague Lord contracts with a disease spirit and embodies its most horrific symptoms and I just love the idea of this hideous terrifying syph-ridden Shaw) And hey, he can get into the “culling humanity” and “survive so that you may breed” deal! Most wererats also have very little kindness towards the weak either, despite being the underdogs of the Fera themselves. Likewise, hyenas aren’t the breed that fit him the most but I kinda dig the idea of him as an Ajaba? Their role was choosers of the slain, tasked with culling the sick, dying, and unfit. They were called rainmakers because of the tears their task brought to others, and they did not spare even their own. Then, the Simba came to their lands, and enacted genocide against them. They left Africa and spread across the globe, now breeding indiscriminately to survive and can be any race. What holds them together now first isn’t any duty, but the desire to simply stay alive. And both those things---culling weakness, and being knocked off his pedestal and now forced to fight for scraps in the shadows to survive---seem fitting for Shaw. The philosophy is obviously what he’s always had, and the degraded position reflects where he currently is in canon. He’s not usually the underdog, but he is here---but doubtlessly a brutal one, the Fera equivalent of a gang leader, recruiting  Also they’re matriarchal and I kinda like the idea of him having to deal with that, as....that kind of fits too? Shaw was the only MAN of note in the Hellfire Club. All the other most iconic, powerful, threatening members were women, and Shaw’s never really had a chance (or tried to fuck with) any of them. He’s USED to being around a ton of badass ladies who are calling the shots, that’s just TUESDAY for him.   Finally---FINALLY-- I could see him as the odd human-born Rokea. A Great White, of course. Again, it was probably his mother who was the Fera, some monstrous creature who came on land and mated with his human father, only to spawn this boy while still out of the water. All Rokea are ugly in their human state, but Shaw looks better than most due to being born on land and as a human, and he is also able to move through---and thrive---in human society. Since he is seen as a Betweener---one of the Rokea who “betrays” the Sea by living on land instead---stepping into what should be his natural habitat is always risky for him, as other Rokea WILL kill Betweeners on sight. And the single-minded nature of sharks leaves little room for explaining oneself.  Oh did I say finally SURPRISE I HAVE ONE MORE. The peaceful, matchmaking, extinct Apis don’t really fit SHAW aT ALL, and they’re EXTINCT, but I love the idea of him turning into a HUGE BLACK BULL. So here’s my explanation. The deal with the Apis is that when their numbers reached the single digits, a last handful of young Apis called Last Hope went into the Deep Umbra and haven’t been seen since. The “hook” in the 20th anniversary Changing Breeds book for their return is that maybe they finally came out the Umbra and back to the physical world. My idea is that he and HAVEN are mebers of Last Hope who have re-emerged in modern times to bring back their kind---something that rests entirely on SHAW’S shoulders, since Haven’s womb was cursed by the Wyrm. So it’s up to him to just breed with as many women and cows as possible. So he’s got an excuse! And as for why he’s so un-Apis, my explanation is that the trauma of their species being wiped out and the time that was allowed to fester in them during their long sleep in the Deep Umbra, drove Haven and Shaw to two extremes of Apis behavior. Haven took on the gentle caretaker side to the extreme, becoming so pacifistic she can’t fight or defend herself. Shaw went the other end, becoming so enraged and resentful that he’s become more like a bloodthirsty predator himself.  Eventually, they both fall to madness after re-emerging, but in the opposite ways that everyone expect. It’s the sweet gentle Haven who ends up Frenzying other of control in a berserker rage, rampaging across the city in massive bovine form, causing untold death and destruction until she’s put down. . . .while the cruel violent Shaw falls to a “cow version of Harano” sinking into a depression so profound he goes catatonic up until Haven’s own loss of sanity, at which point he throws himself on her horn. The story ends with the last of the Apis truly dead, but with a new hope for the species living on in Shaw’s children, who are showing signs of being Kinfolk or Apis themselves.

[astro-break]

Quick first thoughts on the first ep of the Hypmic Anime. Spoilers beware (and im writing this as I watch so :p)

Otome’s speech is.... questionable from a persuasive point of view. Manga did a great job of introducing her (which you can read here) but they really cut out the more terrifying parts of her speech and how she uses force to show people that she's not to be messed with

Its cool seeing everyone in their respective environments though. thats cool. Though they could have added Sasara and Kuuko (shhh i know why they didn’t let me dream)

I love how poppy the typography is. Its amazing how the visuals just leap out at you. The OP does a great job of this. The first few seconds before the title really gives me Persona 4 OG OP vibes with the influx of information given. The rest is a clear concise and streamlined way that still gives character. Animation is sparse but still carries across a general idea of each character and shows off each character object. Rendering is really nice and pays a bit of homage to the posing artwork thats done for the MVs. They also do their division hand signals and thats cute

Love how the OP has blatant HifuDoppo and DRB matchup foreshadowing

so far I really like what theyre going for. BB is about brotherly familial bonds and they show the goods and the bads. Jiro and Saburo bickering right out the gate really cements the fact that they get along like cats and dogs but you can still see that they love each other, working together when the situation calls for it

Now the 3d models. Theyre... not great but usable if you don’t look too hard. They serve their purpose and don’t actively detract from the viewing experience.

Visual typography in the rap itself are fun and poppy but they dont.... speak to me? like theyre there yes and I appreciate them but the only ones that got me excited were from Ichiro’s rap

I take my words back the group portion was kickass and I apologize

I love how they interpret the Hypnosis Speakers though. Esp. Saburo’s organs. That was super creative and I love it! If there was one thing that I felt was missing from the franchise was a deeper exploration of the speakers but the anime puts a new and fresh spin on it! Love it, especially with their attack patterns!

If the production team ever feels inclined to, Id love to see those info sheets on Otome’s desk released. There seems to be very interesting info and stats written out about each member (like capabilities, personal status etc.) They all seem unique too so I really really really hope they release images of those sheets

OOOOOOOOKAY MTC. I have such a big biased for them so Im very torn to see what unfolds

Rio striking out on his own is interesting. Out of everyone in MTC hes the biggest team player yet here he trusts his teammates to go ahead. This either displays Rio’s willingness to trust his teammates or it becomes very OOC if the anime wants to set him up as a lone wolf like character

I love how they specify its a drug deal. It means that Jyuto surely will show up and it also shows that Samatoki knows Jyuto’s motives and willingly gives black market info that he knows aligns with Jyuto’s goal. Thats A+ detail writing there and a great establishing characteristic for both of them

OOohhhhhhhhhhhhh man Asunama-san’s voice acting is god tier his work as Samatoki is phenomenal. He pulls of Samatoki’s threatening voice so well with those almost calm words before his voice becomes loud and confrontational. Those rolling syllables in contrast to Komada-san’s almost lyrical and airy speech and Kamio-san’s strict and enunciated words is such a delight to hear. It just speaks to how amazing and great these Seiyuu’s are in order to pull of such amazing work

Im so biased but MTC has such a better rap than BB im so sorry. Just by watching Samatoki’s part, the imagery is amazing. Even the arrival of his Hypnosis Speaker was awesome and sent a shiver down my spine. using the lyrics to form blades and blood was such a great thing to do. Theres so much more variety that just him standing there and shots of his hypnosis speaker. The old fashioned vignette shots, the four panel spread, the nods to old Kurosawa era films are great and I love these small details. Even the typography looks better.

Again, the interpretations with the speakers is fresh and new. Its great and I love the different imagery and attack patterns. Each one is so unique but carries across each different style of rap.

The 3d modles aren’t any better tho lol

(Hi this is Astro who is reading over their assessment again and making a note. Yeah I’m a bit harsh on BB’s rap. I’m not going to change it since I still stand by it and this post is supposed to be a documentation of my first impressions. I think one of the reasons why I’m so harsh on BB is because of their dynamic as a trio of brothers. They Have to have a more uniform approach than the other divisions. Which in of itself isn’t a terrible thing, it just doesn’t catch my eye as much as MTC did. Thats all! I definitely don’t hate BB, they’re maybe my 3rd favorite division out of the current lineup [not including TDD era teams like Kujaku Posse, MCD, and Naughty Busters] its just that their rap was pretty meh)

Samatoki crouching like a real gangstar and the cigarette kiss killed me

sadjkhfjkasdghsadjkcsdjhsdfsjhf im dying i love these trio of dumbasses so uch oh y fod someone save me aaaaaaaa (Astro note here! yeah i died when the jyuto and samatoki’s stomach growled im weak please. Samatoki’s face is just so precious and funny I might set it as a profile pic somewhere)

But also my initial assessment of Rio possibly being characterized as a lone wolf is very much jossed and im very thankful for that. It seems that Rio was simply trusting his teammates to carry out their part of the plan while he carried out his own. I like that, it really shows how much of a team these three are and that they genuinely trust each other. He’s also comfortable enough around them to invite them to dinners after work casually and not just for special occasions.

I really love MTC guys

Oooh! we get Ramuda on his design process which is really cute. the inside of his studio is super cute and retro and i love it. the poppy old music you would hear in a cafe or 90′s resturaunt is also really cute (astro note: yeah i know that in ARB you see the interior of Ramuda’s office but its kinda different seeing it animated)

the translation i have has gentaro speaking in early modern english (Shakespearian english for those who aren’t english nerds like me) but from what I can hear, he doesn’t speak in a particularly old fashioned way? Its more formal than old? and hes speaking without any of his character persona lying thing that he likes to do (as he refers to himself as “Shousei” throughout the segment where hes in Ramuda’s office which is kind of his default pronoun of choice). so its kinda odd for the translation to go in that direction but im not complaining

Gendice banter is gold but it feels... flat? a little? it doesn’t have the same impact as in the drama cds or in the manga? i feel? Also Ramuda using gratuitous english is??? idk how to feel about that

kjshf thats against the rules Ramuda omgggg,,,,,,,, (astro note again: while watching i was under the assumption that using your hypmic for monetary gain such a as buskering [which is what FP is doing] is against the rules. May not be the case but whatever)

FP’s rap might be my favorite in terms of tune and lyrics though. It’s a nice laid back bop and really gives of chill vibes. the integration of 3d and 2d is really nice and i love how they play off each other in the rap. The wordplay is so fun with little nods here and there and the beat is poppy too so it really energizes me.

Ramuda’s rap concerns me slightly since he makes very subtle and small nods towards his past (being created in a laboratory, warfare, and his overall very unpleasant life experiences) but spins it into something cutesy. It could be a coping mechanism, it could be me overthinking it. But it does make me worry a bit. Gentaro and Dice’s rap really play off each other with Gentaro sticking to stories and Dice taking up the baton by carrying on that same imagery but putting his own spin on it.

the self awareness of how scattered they are as a team is interesting though. It doesn’t seem like something you’d speak about in a rap? but i guess since its not really a do or die situation they can afford to be looser on things like this.

Right off the bat, i don’t like how they handled Hifumi and Doppo in relation to Hifumi’s fear of women. Slug made a post once talking about this and I echo many of his sentiments. Hypmic has never been very tactful about tackling this particular issue and while I didn’t have high hopes that the anime would be any better it hurts to see Doppo take away the one thing that allows Hifumi to function within society.

Doppo’s breakdown mirrors a lot of my own mental state when I spiral though its shown a lot quicker than what happens to me oof. that hits close to home. though Jakurai’s advice is. Questionable. Its not the best advice to give to someone but we have no idea what kind of doctor Jakurai is so ill let it slide

Jakurai’s pose looks like hes going to do a mahou shoujou transformation lmao

I don’t have many thoughts about the rap though again. How they visualize the rap is interesting. the different imagery is quite interesting for each of them and the typography is nice a distinct but im still on the fence about the visuals here

The sound is in the same boat. The sound effects either drown out the rap or are too quet but some parts are nice at least. When they talk about Tokyo’s beating heart, the heartbeat sound is a but distracting especially since its only played once. But the imagery is at least nice

I wonder if for the eds they’re going to take a similar approach to what Enstars did and have a four different endings, one for each division. I love the blend of styles here and it really accentuates that although they’re different they mesh well together.

Ramuda’s silhouette though is hilarious. Love it.

:p and thats it. Uh not bad for a first episode. Established all 12 characters really nicely and their dynamics. I had some problems with it but then again nothing is perfect. I look forward to what they show us next week

[calliecat93]

ST: TNG Watchthrough Episodes 17-20.

Home Soil: So from what I’ve read, this would be Gene Roddenberry’s final episode as showrunner before getting replaced by writer Maurice Hurly. I won’t comment on the behind the scenes drama and such that caused it because it was decades ago and not relevant for a First Watchthrough post, but since this is the last I wanted to make note of it. My thoughts? It was okay. This is very much borrowing from the TOS episode Devil in the Dark (the one with the Horta) with the plot being of an alien presence killing humans... but only because the humans were unknowingly causing it harm. It’s done fine enough, not being any better or worst than when TOS did it, but that’s about it. It does executed it a little differently with the events and the alien is FAR less willing to comply than the Horta was at first and ends with the alien backing down, but refusing contact with humans for three centuries, which DOES make it a nice contrast to how Devil in the Dark ended. It’s not great. It’s not horrible. It’s just okay with the biggest criticism being pulling too much from TOS again. Look, I love TOS and so far TNG hasn’t passed it. I outright have a 30 disc Blu-Ray set coming in the next few days of all the TOS material, including TAS and the films. If I want to revisit TOS, I’ll go watch it or read fanfiction or heck, go watch AOS. TNG has remained painfully average or not good at this point because it’s trying to retain what TOS had, despite it being over 20 years later and even the TOS films had changed how it did things compared to the show. Whatever one feels about Roddenberry, his removal I hope helped push TNG away from TOS and let it carve it’s own identity while still honoring what TOS had stood for, and according to history it did. Not sure if we’ll see the quality go up in these final few S1 episodes, but still. Sorry, felt appropriate to finally get this out here. Going back to the episode, it’s perfectly fine and it delivers it’s message well, and hey it’s not always a bad idea to showcase the same themes as the previous incarnation in a spinoff especially fi a relevant one/gets shown to viewers who hadn’t seen that TOS episode. Not the best, not the worst, and that’s not such a bad way to end up. 3/5.

Coming of Age: Alright Wesley, it took a bit but you’re starting to grow on me. So we have Wesley going through a test to get into the Academy while Picard and the crew are dealing with some rough interrogations and Picard being painted as an incompetent captain by the interrogator. They don’t seem that connected, but infact the latter is a test for Picard to determine if e’s ready for a promotion. I like how they bring up Picard’s actions in past continuity that WOULD present him as at least fallible to major error, ignoring certain conditions that caused it to begin with and how he got them out of the situation. Like I said, this was one of Wesley’s better episodes. While doing well with testing, his worry about the psyche test and not knowing his own fear and therefore worried about what the test will unleash upon him is very relatable. Heck his talk with Worf was a really nice scene, especially with Worf outright stating that only fools fear nothing which in turns add more depth and dimensions to the Klingons. The reveal fo his greatest fear, while I wish he had hesitated a little bit more, made perfect sense and he acted as a true Starfleet Officer. Which since this was before Undiscovered Country, is a VERY positive development. Picard guiding a kid who made a stupid decision was also good and shows why he’s a good captain, and his talk to him as well as encouraging a disappointed Wesley at the end was a nice moment to cap the episode off with. As far as Wesley goes, he may still be presented as too competent and intelligent, but he is more likeable and the testing setting allows him to shine like this without, again, affecting the adult characters. Plus text anxiety is super relatable haha. Now of course due to Status Quo is God, Wesley fails, but he takes it well and proved that he will be ready for it in the future. It was a pretty nice episode all in all. Nothing spectacular, but I enjoyed it, neither plot overpowered the other, had a good theme of one’s integrity as a person/doing your best, good use of past continuity, and it really shows the best in characters like Picard, Wesley, and the crew’s loyalty to the former. 4/5.

Heart of Glory: Back in TOS, the Klingons were depicted as war-loving jerks. They weren’t without some depth and episodes like Day of the Dove did attempt to give them a bit more positive limelight, but it wasn’t enough to overpower the one-dimensional characterization. The films were a bit better, Undiscovered Country especialy, but that one hadn’t been made yet and they still stuck with the ruthless characterization, just changed up the makeup to make them look more alien like. It was weird sicne whenever I ddi watch TNG back when that’s all I knew of Star Trek, Worf never came across like a ruthless warmonger but like an honorable warrior which made him stand-out amongst the cast for me (that and because I freakin’ love Michael Dorn due to his animation voice over work, anyone else remember I.M. Weasel? XD). So now we get an episode where Worf gets to interact with other Klingons. I lift a brow at Worf not knowing about most Klingon customs when he seemed perfectly knowledgeable about i in past episodes. Maybe that wad due tot he shift after getting rid of Roddenberry/ IDK, but these kinds of retcons happens sometimes. This was an interesting one for sure. The Klingons are much better presented here than the entirety of TOS, showing more of their culture/customs and compared to Worf, who was raised by humans and therefore not fully in touch with his people and their ways. This is probably one of, if not the first time he’s interacted with his full culture and naturally he’d want to interact with them and learn more now that he has the chance. There’s the themes of one growing in another culture, how they adapt while still trying to be part of that culture, and finding one’s own path. There is the question on why Worf wans’t just returned tot he Klingons as a child and IDK if they address it down the line, but that type of life and struggle with identity/culture clash due to upbringing IS real and VERY relatable. I’m really glad to see the Klingons fleshed out past their TOS depiction and it’s overall respected by the cast, showing how far things have come since Kirk’s time. It fleshes out Worf’s character a great deal and makes him more likable/relatable and giving him a very realistic struggle, and in the end he stands by his beliefs and even gets the respect and offer to serve with Klingons in the future by Klingon Captain K’Nera. Very much glad that I watched this one~ 4/5.

The Arsenal of Freedom: Oh boy, war machines that killed everything! That theme never gets old! I’m not joking, with how modern warfare and technology are growing and being sold for profit, it feels like it just keeps getting more and more relevant. There’s a lot of tension in this one with Yar, Data, and Riker dealing with the arsenal that is intelligent and they’re unable to be beamed up, the ship getting attacked with Geordi in command and the Chief Engineer (they seem to go through a LOT of those this season, guess they couldn’t handle the strain of acting as miracle workers like Scotty) being an asshole to him, and Crusher injured with Picard trying to keep her alive and not get killed. Seriously, I loved Geordi here for being an effective acting commanding officer during a VERY intense situation AND telling off the Chief Engineer without even so much as raising is voice while encouraging the other officers. Badass and admirable. The away team scenes were also good with everyone being plain awesome~ Crusher having to explain to Picard how to treat her injuries while she’s in obvious pain was really good character stuff and Thank God that they avoided indulging in the obvious shipping fodder. I know they’ve hinted a little at Picard/Crusher... but I’m not really interested in it int he romantic sense at least currently. It comes off as a Captain and CMO trusting the other (not quite the same as say... Kirk and McCoy, but the trust is very much strong here plus Picard and Crusher should be allowed to form their own dynamic) and that’s the kind of interaction I live for~! It feels like everyone got a moment to shine, even Troi checking on Geordi’s mental well-being and letting him express some of his nervousness was really nice. And of course the arsenal having destroyed their own creators... like I said, a theme that just seems to grow more and more in relevance. Like I said above, some themes are necessary to repeat, and this one very much qualifies. But yeah this was great for it’s tensions, the characters being all great especially Geordi, and it’s themes (even fi IDK how intentional it was) being a huge reminder of the dangers of modernized warfare/using warfare for profit. It doesn’t go well. 4.5/5.

Okay, it’s late in the season, but we are FINALLY getting somewhere! The characters have truly grown on me and their characterizations are getting better (i.e. Picard is still a serious captain, but is very much warming up and not as cold as he was early on), the stories are steadily improving, and even with what I said about the first one, I really enjoyed this batch of episodes! Only five remain in the season, and the plan is to knock ‘em all out tomorrow. Might take a day or two off before tarting Season 2, but golly I’m finally feeling excited~!

[dillydedalus]

april reading

oh yeah this is a thing. anyway in april i read about uhhh.... first contact (twice), murderers on skis & victorian church politics

the yield, tara june winch a novel about indigenous australian identity and history (now and throughout the 20th century) in three narrative strands. imo the narrative strand that consists of a grandfather writing a dictionary of his language (wiradjuri) in order to prove a claim to some land is by far the strongest, but overall i liked this quite a lot. 3/5

land of big numbers, te-ping chen a solid short story collection focused on modern china and young(ish) chinese people, both in china and the diaspora. i particularly liked the stories that had some slighty surreal or speculative elements, such as one about fruit that strongly evoke emotions when eaten and a group of people stuck in a train station for months as the train is delayed, which imo use their speculative aspects in effective (if not super subtle) ways to talk about society. 3/5

the pear field, nana ekvtimishvili (tr. from georgian by elizabeth heighway) international booker prize longlist! a short, fairly depressing read about a 18-year-old girl at a post-soviet school for developmentally disabled childred (but also orphans, abandoned children & other random kids) who is trying to get a younger boy adopted by an american couple. there seem to be a lot of novels set at post-soviet orphanages etc & imo this is a well-executed example of the microgenre, with the pear field full of pears that are never picked bc they don’t taste right as a strong central image. 3/5

the warden, anthony trollope (chronicles of barsetshire #1) ah yes, a 6-part victorian series about church politics in an english town, exactly the kind of thing i’m interested in. not sure why i committed to at least the first two entries of the series but here we are. despite this lack of interest (and disagreement with most of the politics on display here) i found this quite charming; trollope has a gift for an amusing turn of phrase & making fun of his characters in benevolent ways. 3/5

the lesson, cadwell turnbull first contact scifi novel set on the virgin islands, where an alien ship arrives one day. the aliens seem benevolent & share helpful technology, but also react with extreme violence to any aggression. they claim to be on earth to study.... something, but it’s never entirely clear what. the book makes some interesting choices (like immediately skipping over the actual first contact to a few years in the future, when the aliens are already established on the islands) but i thought much of it was kinda disjointed and confusing. 2/5

the heart is a lonely hunter, carson mccullers look, i get it, it’s all about the isolation & alienation (& dare i say loneliness) of 4 miserable characters projecting their issues on the central character singer, who is kind and patient and also deaf and mute, thus making him the perfect receptacle for their issues without really having to connect with him as a person and how that isolation hinders them socially, artistically, emotionally, politically, but like... i didn’t really like it. i didn’t hate it but i just felt very meh about it all. 2.5/5

acht tage im mai: die letzte woche des dritten reiches, volker ulrich fascinating history book about the last week(ish) of the third reich, starting with the day of hitler’s suicide and ending with the total surrender (but with plenty of flashbacks and forwards), and looking at military&political leadership (german and allied) as well as prisoners of war, forced laborers, concentration camp prisoners, and everyone else. very interesting look at what kästner described as the “gap between the not-anymore and the not-yet.” 3.5/5

firekeeper’s daughter, angeline boulley) i’ve been mostly off the YA train for the last few years, but this was a really good example of contemporary YA with a focus on ~social issues. ANYWAY. this is YA crime novel about daunis, a mixed-race unenrolled ojibwe girl close to finishing high school who is struggling with family problems, university plans, and feeling caught between her white and her native familiy when her best friend is shot in front of her and she decides to become a CI for an fbi investigation into meth production in the community. i really appreciated how hard this went both with the broader social issues (racism, addiction) and daunis’ personal struggles. there are a few bits that felt a bit didactic & on the nose (and the romance... oh well), but overall the themes of community, family, and the value of living indigenous culture are really well done & i teared up several times. 4/5

the magic toyshop, angela carter i love carter’s short stories but struggle with (while still liking) her novels so far. this one, a tale of melanie, suddenly orphaned after trying on her mother’s wedding dress in the garden, coming of age and awakening to womanhood or whatever. carter’s really into that. it’s well-written, sensual as carter always is, and the family melanie and her siblings are sent to, her tyrannical puppet-maker uncle, his mute wife and the wife’s two brothers, both fascinating and offputting (& dirty) make for an interesting cast of characters, but overall i just wish i was reading the bloody chamber again. 3/5

barchester towers, anthony trollope (chronicles of barsetshire #2) (audio) lol tbh i still don’t know why i am committing to this series about, again, church politics in 19th century rural england, but it’s just so chill & warm & funny (we love gently or not so gently - but always politely - mocking our characters) that i’m enjoying it as a nice little trip where people do some #crazyschemes to gain church positions or fight over whether there should be songs in church or whatever it is people in the 19th century fought about. it’s very relaxing. there also is a lot of love quadrangleyness going on and that’s also fun. trollope has weird ideas about women but like whatever, i for one wish mrs proudie much joy of her position as defacto bishop of barchester, she really girlbossed her way to the top. 3.5/5

semiosis, sue burke (semiosis #1) i love spinning the wheel on the “first contact with X weird alien species” & i guess this time we landed on plants! plant intelligence is interesting and the idea of plant warfare is really cool. i do like the structure, with different generations of human settlers on the planet pax providing a long-term view but this allows the author to skip over a lot of the development of the relationship between the settlers and the plant and locating the plot elsewhere, which i think is ultimately a mistake. i might continue w/ the series tho, depending on library availability. 2.5/5

one by one, ruth ware a bunch of start-up people go on a corporate retreat to a ski chalet in the alps, avalanche warning goes up, one of them disappears, presumably on a black piste, the rest get snowed in & completely cut off when the avalanche hits and then they get picked off *title drop* (altho really not that many of them). nice fluff when i had a miserable cold (not covid) but fails when it tries to go for deeper themes... like an attempt to address classism and entitlement sure... was made. also like what kind of luxury skiing chalet does not have emergency communication devices in case internet/phone lines are down...  i’d have sued just for that. 2/5

fake accounts, lauren oyler the microgenre of ‘alienated intellectual(ish) probably anglophone person has some sort of crisis, goes to berlin about it’ is my ultimate literary weakness - i almost never really like them, they mostly irritate me & yet i can never resist their siren call. this one is p strong on the irritation, altho at least the narrator does not ascribe much meaning to her decision to go to berlin after she a) discovers her boyf is an online conspiracy theorist (probably not sincerely) and b) gets a call that said boyf has died, it’s really just something to do to avoid doing anything else. but other than that it’s so BerlinExpat by the numbers, like she lives in kreuzkölln! put her somewhere else at least! there is one scene that elevates the BerlinExpat-ness of it all (narrator asks expatfriend for advice on visa applications, expatfriend assures her that it’s really easy for americans to get visa, adds “especially now” while literally, as the narrator remarks, gesturing at the falafel she’s eating) other than that, the novel is.... fine. it’s smart, but not really as smart as it thinks it is, which is a problem bc it thinks it’s just sooo incisive. whatever. 2/5

the tenant of wildfell hall, anne bronte this is reductive but: jane eyre: i could fix him // wuthering heights: i could make him worse // wildfell hall: lmao i’m gonna leave his ass anyway i enjoyed the part that is actually narrated by the titular tenant of wildfell hall, helen (which thankfully, i think, is most of it) because the perspective of a woman who runs away from her abusive alcoholic of a husband is genuinely interesting and engaging, while gilbert, the frame story narrator who falls in love with helen, is.... the worst. i mean he’s not the worst bc the abusive husband arthur is there and hard to beat in terms of worseness, but he’s pretty fucking bad. imagine if helen had found out that gilbert attacked her secret brother over a misunderstanding, severely injured him & LEFT HIM TO DIE & then (when dude survived & the misunderstanding got cleared up) apologised like well i guess i didn’t treat you quite right! she’d have to run away from her second husband as well! poor girl. 3/5