#first time drawing Turtle its. hard surprisingly

[art-strix]

guh.. turtle

[helenarlett-rex]

Helen rambles on in a long post about her her relationship with Ninja Turtles.

Something my readers may or may not know about me is that I am a huge old school fan of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I was born at just the right time to be just the right age for the original Ninja Turtles cartoon back when it first came out in 1987. I lived through the big Ninja Turtle boom of the late 80s/early 90s when you couldn’t turn on a TV or step outside your house without having the Ninja Turtles shoved into your face one way or another. And I loved it. It was glorious. I fully blame Ninja Turtles for turning me into a furry. And I’m cool with that...

As a kid I watched TMNT every single day, read the comic books any chance I had to get my hands on them, and had a massive collection of Ninja Turtles toys. (Like... thinking back to the financial state we were in when I was a kid, I’m really not sure how my parents even afforded to buy all the stuff I had.) Until the day came that Ninja Turtles became “occultic,” and then I didn’t have any of that anymore... My mother bought into the satanic panic pretty hard back then so it was always just a matter of time before something I loved became “of the Devil” and it would be taken away from me. Once my Ninja Turtles collection (which would have been pretty fucking valuable today if I still had all of it) made its way to the dreaded bi-annual yard sale, I wound up slipping from the fandom.

I never fell out of it entirely. Yeah, I never got to watch the original cartoon all the way to the end of the series, but I would catch an episode here and there when my mother wasn’t around. And by the time The Next Mutation started airing in 1997 enough time had passed that Ninja Turtles wasn’t on my mother’s shit list anymore (she’d moved on to other things) so when I was a teenager I got back into watching Turtles with that series. I watched the 2003 series, and the 2012 series after that... But it never really went back to being something I was obsessed over like it had been when I was a kid. It was just something I watched on TV because it was nostalgic.

Ninja Turtles still held a special place in my heart... Always has... I’d even attribute much of career as a writer to the existence of TMNT. Eastman and Laird kind of came up with the idea as something of a joke, but then they published it anyways and despite how insane the idea was, it became a massive hit. So I’ve always looked back at Ninja Turtles and told myself no idea is too stupid or insane to find an audience or even become successful. But even with the esteem I hold for the franchise, I wouldn’t have considered myself in the fandom anymore.

So when IDW got the rights to start producing comic books for Ninja Turtles I didn’t really pay it any attention. I had read the old Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Adventures comic book published by Archie comics back in the day, but by this time I had fallen into just being a casual fan so I wasn’t really interested in getting back into comics. I was happy to see that someone was publishing comics for it again... Just didn’t feel any need to read them.

And then I heard that IDW had introduced a 5th turtle... A turtle woman... And I was like, that’s cool. We already had Venus de Milo back in The Next Mutation, so it’s not really a new concept. Despite the way many of the fans reacted, I actually liked Venus de Milo so it was nice to see someone giving a turtle lady another shot. I hoped this new one would have better luck than the last one did, but that was about the extent of my thoughts on the matter.

Then I saw her and I was like, okay... She’s actually kind of badass...

And I approve of giving her a body shape that isn’t any different from the guy turtles. Not that I hated Venus‘ more feminine body shape or anything... But portraying her as just another Ninja Turtle instead of feeling a need to draw attention to the fact that she’s a woman every single time you look at her is a nice change of pace.

This got me interested enough to look into the comic she’s appearing in and to my surprise I learned that the comic is being written by Kevin Eastman, one of the original two creators of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. (The better of the two if you ask me.) Now suddenly I’m really interested... A new Ninja Turtles comic book by Eastman himself? Without Laird there to interfere with all of his bullshit...? Okay, that settled it. I was going to have to give this a look.

So I did... And not only have I found the comic to be surprisingly good... but then I get to see our new turtle, Jennika (Jenny) and see what she’s like, and... oh god... Not only is she a tough, smart, capable Ninja Turtle, but she’s also an ex-con who’s done time in prison and completely hilarious? And oh god... she’s self conscious of the way she looks...? That’s something I can relate to heavily.

Okay... You are already making me love this character far too much... I mean, the only thing left that you could possibly do to make her any better would be to have her come out a queer.

Okay and then it fucking happens!

You made a tough, badass, turtle lady with a shady past who looks like a guy, is self conscious about how she looks, dresses punk, is humorous without being over the top about it, AND she’s bisexual? It’s like... Did someone tell Eastman I stopped being a hardcore fan? Did he sit down and deliberately write a character I could relate to on nearly every level just to get me back? Because that’s what it feels like right now... I mean, she’s even dating a hot pig girl, which is very much to my tastes...

Eastman may not realize this was written for me, but... this was fucking written for me...

So I guess I’m back in the Ninja Turtle fandom again... *Shrugs*

[sylvain-writes]

A Taste (TMNT Leonardo x Reader)

Rated: T (no underage drinking) Prompt/Inspired by @whygz comic (drunk!Leo x sona)

Mikey's 21st is loud. 

You haven’t been able to check your voicemail yet, but now you understand why Leo texted you a reminder to use the far entrance to the lair.  Music pours out from the common room, you’re surprised it can’t be heard from street level.  Raph and Donnie have really outdone themselves for their little brother.  The place has transformed into a nightclub, of sorts.  Dark, with shocks of strobing color, there’s just enough light in the room for you to make out the shapes of the turtles and their dates as they bop and gyrate to the music.  

You make your way through the ‘dancefloor’ with waves and a smile to the small crowd and a big hug to Mikey.  Then it’s off to find somewhere to rest your ear drums for a while.  You make the mistake of walking past the speakers again; they’re loud enough that you're squinting, as though that helps your ears filter out the noise.  In a way, you suppose, it does.  It helps you focus on Leo's lips as he welcomes you to the makeshift bar the guys have set up next to the kitchen.

Greeting Leo isn’t as easy as the quick waves to his brothers.  With him, it’s tempting to go in for a hug, to test a kiss on the cheek.  With him, you have to be more careful; it’s tempting to ask for more than what he’s willing to give. 

You drum your hands on the bar top and look over the selection of hard alcohol, mixers, and beers.  Maybe a drink or two will help you unwind.  It should take the edge off of the anxiety.  You had thought it would ease up once you were seated next to your best friend.  But surprisingly, your heart seems to be beating faster.  You feel like you’re going to vibrate out of your skin and all Leo’s done so far is lean into your side and say hello.  Of course, because of the music, he has to speak directly at your ear in order for you to hear him at all.  

His voice is smooth and his breath is hot as he comments on his brothers’ ideas of fun.  He’s complaining more than you think he really means.  In fact, he seems to talk just to deflect from his own nervous energy.

Even so, you’re grateful he’s started a conversation for you, though it’s stilted and rambly and mostly about how much things have changed in the past few years.  You nod along and offer your support.  It makes sense now, the way he bounces his knees under the table; you know change makes Leo nervous.  It’s one of the reasons you keep your feelings for him to yourself.  You don’t want to scare him off.  You don’t want things to change in your friendship, if it means they’ll change for the worse.

As you consider ‘worse’ and push away fantasies of ‘better’, the vodka and cranberry juice call your name, but you’re not sure you really want all that.  So, you turn your sights on the array of artisan beers to your left.

Leo’s still talking about how scary it can be to take a leap from one role to the next, and you wonder if he’s thinking about giving Mikey some new responsibilities on their team.  You ask as much and Leo looks a little surprised, but then waves off the idea.  His train of thought is all over the place, you think he may be confusing himself.

Over his shoulder, you see the others dancing provocatively with their dates, and it looks like fun, but you'll have to miss out. The only one you want holding you that close is the turtle nursing a beer and occasionally sparing you a glance so intense it makes you look away.

There had to have been a time, you think, before you had solidified your place in the friendzone.  You think, maybe, there had been some opportunity that you missed, where you and Leo could have tried to be something more to each other.

Finally, Leo slips out of his own musings long enough to follow your eye line to the drinks in front of him.  “You thirsty?” 

You shrug and your arm just barely brushes Leo’s as you move.  Shivers run over your skin from that small point of contact.  “I dunno what to try.”  It’s true.  You’d like to avoid hard alcohol and its ‘loose-tongue’ side effects, but the fancy selection of alternatives isn’t one you’d have picked for yourself.

Leo’s cheeks are dark under his mask.  Being tipsy brings an adorable flush to his smiling expression.  “This is really good,” he says, holding up the bottle like it’s some kind of prize.  “Wanna taste?”

You take a peek at the label, but it’s not like you have anything to lose.  With a smile, you welcome the offer, “Sure!”  It’s not the first time you’ve shared a drink, and you think that it’ll be nice to not waste an entire bottle of someone’s peanut butter ale or cherry lager.  But as you wait for Leo to hand you the drink, you end up watching him press the bottle to his lips and tilt his head back.  “So…” you cock your head to the side in question, “can I taste it or...?”

“Yeah-” Leo holds up his hand to ask for “-one sec-”

 And then he kisses you.  

He takes your head in his hands, pulls you halfway out of your chair, and brings your mouths together in an honest to goodness kiss.  Your eyes go wide, but his eyes flutter closed.  The kiss is closed-lipped and soft, and it doesn’t really give you a taste of the beer at all.  You could almost laugh.  You think you would, if your body could catch up with your racing thoughts.  If your heart could slow down enough for you to catch your breath.

Leo breaks the kiss and his eyes blink at you.  Noting your shocked expression and the fact that you didn’t kiss him back, his rambling starts up again.  "I'm sorry, was that not--  I shouldn't have just--"  

He starts to pull away, but you place your hand over his as it retreats to the table.  The caress of your thumb over his knuckles draws his attention to your hands, hypnotizing him as he stumbles through an apology neither of you really wants him to finish.  You don’t want his apologies; you want him to kiss you again.  

After a silence between you that seems to go on forever and somehow drowns out the techno hip hop all around you, Leo turns his palm up to take your hand. “Do you wanna dance?” he asks, although you thought he never would.  

You’re mostly hidden from his brothers by the large arcade machines, but still, you’re grateful the boys have the place dark enough to pass for a nightclub.  It's easier like this, with your back against Leo’s chest.  It’s easier not having to find the words for what you feel.  

It isn’t long before you’re giving into the music and the wills of your bodies.  You and Leo fit together so easily, your hips rolling against his.  The beat washes over you and when you close your eyes, all you care about is Leo's breath on your neck, his hands on your waist, his pelvis pressed against you from behind.  He brushes your hair away from your ear like he had at the bar so that you could hear him over the music.  Only this time, he doesn’t speak.  Instead, he peppers a trail of kisses down your neck to your shoulder and your whole body gives a shiver.  You turn in his arms to capture the next kiss with your lips.  

He pulls you closer and sways into you in rhythm to the song.  You move with him, luxuriating in the warmth that pools and swirls in your belly.  You can feel his arousal brush against you and you press in closer.  You moan and deepen the kiss, but his body responds too favorably to stay in the common room and he asks you to follow him to his bedroom instead.

You nod against his forehead, but he’s still got you by the waist.  He’s still holding you to him and dancing as slow as the music allows.  The smell of hops and ginger fills the air between you as he tries to catch his breath. You remind him of his suggestion to go somewhere more private and all of the sudden, he can't get to his room quick enough.  

It isn’t until he closes the bedroom door and leans back against it that you notice just how glassy Leo’s eyes are.  How lazy his smile.  How slowly he moves toward you.  He kisses you again, but he's so obviously drunk that you stop yourself from pressing your body against his again.

"I don't think we should take this further tonight."

At your words, the blood drains from Leo's cheeks and a new tension overtakes him.  "Oh, I-- I didn't mean to-- We don't have to go further. Of course.  We don't have to.  I understand."

But he's so flustered and apologetic, you wonder if he really does.  "Not tonight.  I don’t think we should go further tonight,” you clarify.  “You're drunk… and my best friend… and-"  You help him to sit at his bed as you struggle to explain why this is a bad idea.  

His eyes shine as they look up at you, glassy and sad.  When he says, “I love you,” for the first time, it sounds like his heart is breaking.

Your face goes tight with the effort it takes not to frown.  Your heart is breaking, too.  "Tell me again when you're sober."  You don’t think that, in the light of day, Leo will be feeling quite the same way.

But Leo rubs his hands over his thighs and swallows hard.  He’s not backing down.  "I'd like to tell you… everyday… if that'd be ok."

It doesn’t feel real.  You can’t let yourself believe him when he’s like this.  You don’t know if he’s ever been drunk before, but you’ve certainly never seen him so loose with his words or affections.  He isn’t in his right mind and you won’t take advantage of the sudden clarity alcohol has brought to him.  

Mindful to keep the boundaries you set, you kiss Leo’s forehead and say goodnight.  Nonetheless, after closing the door behind you, you linger in the tunnel outside his room.  You know you have a voicemail from him still unopened from earlier today.  You open it, just to hear his voice again.  To hear him sober.  To remind yourself that he’s a friend and not really looking for anything more.

But the Leo that you hear on the recording is wrought with just as much anxiety as the one that sat with you at the bar before your kiss.  "Hey, it's me,” he says, and your heart melts a little.  You love how he can say those three words and the world stops spinning. 

The voicemail continues, “The guys are heading out for supplies for tonight,” and Leo’s confidence begins to falter, “I was hoping you'd come by early.”  His voice lifts at the end, like a question.  “There's something I wanna ask you. Well, tell you.”  Then, Leo heaves a sigh and laughs at himself a little.  You turn toward his room and stare as you listen to the rest.  “Well, there's something I wanna talk to you about.  So, come on by when you get this, or whenever. I just…-” another sigh “-I'm really looking forward to seeing you."

As you stand in front of Leo’s door, every nerve in your body seems to be firing at once.  They send fuzzy tingles over your skin, distracting you from the feeling of the doorknob in your hand.  You knock and, at the sound of Leo’s voice, ease the door open.

Leo is still sitting where you left him, on the edge of the bed with his head in his hands.

“I just got your message,” you explain and he raises his eyes to yours.  “I’m sorry I couldn’t get here earlier so we could talk before the party.”

“Yeah, I-”  Leo shifts and hugs his arms over his chest.  “If you had come earlier, I would have said…”  His gaze drops to your feet until you helpfully supply the rest of his confession.

“That you love me.”

Leo nods as you take steps toward the bed.  “I would have asked you to be mine--my date--for tonight.”

A slow smile spreads across your face.  “I would have said, ‘yes’.”  When Leo looks up at your words, your smile grows.

Hope shines in his eyes, but there’s caution there, as well.  “And after tonight?  Would you-”

You reach out and touch his cheek, then lean down to his ear like he’s done so many times to you already this evening.  “Ask me in the morning.”  

The stroke of your hand along his jawline is full of affection.  The press of your lips between his eyes holds a promise.  You know, even in his intoxicated state, he won’t misread this goodbye as a rejection.  You pull away and he blinks up at you.  Then, before you can move too far from reach, he catches your hand.  You can’t help but hum in amusement as he pulls you closer.  

He asks, “Did you like it?” and your expression pinches in confusion.  The only thing you don’t like about the night is that it needs to end.  But the assurance of tomorrow thrills you.

“The ginger beer,” he clarifies. “Did you like it?”

“Oh,” you say, having forgotten all about the drink Leo had offered before stealing his kiss.  “I couldn’t really tell.”

“Hmm,” he considers your answer with more gravity than it warrants.  Then, with a light touch, Leo’s hands alight to your hips.  He smiles playfully as he guides you to sit in his lap.  “Maybe-” he says as his gaze lingers on your mouth “-maybe, you should have one last taste, before you go.”

The smile you reflect back at him says ‘just this one,’ but you lean in and your lips murmur, “Sure” against his.

[radramblog]

Midnight Hunt Commanders (and Midnight Hunt Commander)

Another month, another new set release. This time: Innistrad 3 Part 1, Midsommar edition. I’m sure you’ve read all the jokes at this point.

Still, though, I like running through cards like this. I’ve heard some podcasters and other content creators lament the accelerating release pace because it means you only get to do so much “normal” content between set review stuff. But I like set review stuff! One of the handful of upsides of the hypercapitalist nightmare that is WoTC under Hasbro.

Anyway here’s some spooky things you can put in charge of a scary deck.

Adeline, Resplendent Cathar

While being strictly inferior to Adeline from Kirby, this card is a surprisingly aggressive beater. She’s going to be attacking for 4 commander damage on turn 4, and that’s assuming no ramp or other creatures on the board. Sure, those tokens are probably going to bite it, but that’s something you can take advantage of! Also, curving her into Cathar’s Crusade is both flavourful and also terrifying. White Token Aggro is far from a new concept, but Adeline is quite the efficient example of the trope.

 Lier, Disciple of the Drowned

I cannot imagine that many people playing this as the commander. The number one thing you’re going to want to flashback in mono-blue is counterspells, which this card turns off. Sure, there’s some funky things you can do with slow blink effects, but that’s a lot of work for an extra Cancel. With that said, this is going to be in the 99 of so many decks, so I wouldn’t feel bad for Lier.

 Gisa, Glorious Ressurector

I guess we’re seeing Geralf in the next set? Gisa is super cool- I’m not huge on just having a hate piece in the command zone, but Gisa justifies it by giving you a bunch of value. I’m not sure how I feel about Decayed as a mechanic, but flavour-wise it works really well, and considering how much you can get out of an ETB or just one attack in this format, she’s probably not complaining. I think you really need a haste effect to get the most out of her, though. But she’s cool as heck, another sick card for everybody’s favourite small zombie goth GF.

 Gorex, the Tombshell

Gorex is interesting, as a pseudo-delve threat that slowly regains the value you put into it, and it is also a giant zombie turtle. On the other hand, it’s not especially interesting. I feel like a lot of these “lieutenant” creatures are really hit or miss, and I’m afraid to say I think this one’s the latter. You can’t even play it with Meandering Towershell!

 Jadar, Ghoulcaller of Nephalia

This just kinda feels like a waste of a legendary slot. It’s somewhere between Ophiomancer and Dreadhorde Invasion, but significantly worse than both, and you want to put this in the zone? It’s kind of disappointing, especially considering this dude has been on flavour text since the original Innistrad block. Which was 10 years ago.

 Jerren, Corrupted Bishop / Ormendahl, the Corrupter

As much as I love Westvale Abbey, the condition to flip Jerren is so utterly specific that I’m not going to bother considering it, so we kind of just have to ignore Ormendahl, powerful as he is. And Jerren isn’t much to write home about either. He wants to be in charge of a Humans deck, clearly, but there’s not really much to support that at all. Like, Xathrid Necromancer and Village Cannibals I guess? Probably taking the pass on this one.

Man there were 4 whole Mono-Black commanders in this one and like one of them is interesting. Gisa’s carrying the colour on her back this time around.

 Kurbis, Harvest Celebrant

Kurbis is…eh. The thing with your big +1/+1 counter threats is that damage isn’t usually the thing taking them out, so they’d work better in a deck that tries to distribute the counters more evenly. But then, in order to get much from Kurbis, you’re going to need to shrink them a lot…I honestly can’t see playing this in either maindeck or command zone. It just doesn’t do enough. I do like the “counters equal to mana spent” text on cards like this, at least.

 Saryth, the Viper’s Fang

Another 99er. Lot of those this time. Saryth is a great if somewhat awkward way to both abuse and protect things like Circle of Dreams Druid or Faeburrow Elder, or just as another Thousand-Year Elixir for commanders that like tap abilities. But I cannot imagine building this as a commander.

By the way, we’re done with all of the monocoloured commanders. And only 1/3rd of the way through all the cards. I know multicolour is more popular, but this set is kind of dire for those types of decks.

 Dennick, Pious Apprentice / Dennick, Pious Apparition

This feels a lot like a fixed Temmet (since the back half gets to deal commander damage) but with a different flavour. He is a card you can get a lot of value from for fairly cheap, seeing as you only pay the tax half the times you’re casting him, and the abilities on both sides are solid enough. I’m not inspired by this commander in basically any way, but he’s pretty much decent on either side and with how cheap he is you could kinda just build the deck however. Sure?

 Eloise, Nephalia Sleuth

Finally, a commander for the 6 Surveil Matters cards that were in GRN, which admittedly is more than I was expecting. Eloise is both a solid value engine for sacrifice-y decks that only really have had one Dimir commander in the past (that being Kels), and the trigger on the second ability is surprisingly flexible- it’s clearly meant to work with the Clue tokens she makes and the Decayed tokens from the precon, but it works great with Eldrazi Spawn, Treasures, and any other token creatures you’re deciding to churn through for value. The consistency and efficiency this adds to these kinds of decks is super sweet, and I’ve just checked EDHREC and literally nobody has built her. That is shocking to me, frankly, but I’m sure that’ll change.

 Ludevic, Necrogenius / Olag, Ludevic’s Hubris

I heard y’all wanted a new Ludevic since the old one’s terrible? Fuck you he’s dead now. Ludevic’s front face is extremely uninspired, but the real commander is on the back side- he does at least enable the strategy. Olag is, unfortunately, kind of just a worse Mimeoplasm, something I have a lot of experience with seeing as I have a Mimeoplasm deck. It’s actually not cheaper, seeing as Ludevic is minimum 2+5 versus Mimeo’s 5, and you don’t get to play Green so that’s also worse for you. It does start as a 4/4 base, but you’re not getting smaller than that very often with Mimeoplasm, and unlike that card Olag can’t be used as graveyard hate. Exiling cards from your own graveyard in a graveyard deck feels terrible. The long and short of this is just…play Mimeoplasm. They’re underrated these days.

 Wilhelt, the Rotcleaver

The first line of text on this dude is super flavourful, I really like the idea of this legion that just keeps getting back up. The second line of text is also really good, seeing as it works with either part of the first half and it generates value in what will be a board-based deck. And while it’s not exactly wrath protection, it does at least give you a pile of bodies for when you do get wrathed, ready to dogpile the guy that dared wipe your board. I’m always hesitant about precon face commanders, because they’re always a little too pushed for my liking, but I really don’t think Wilhelt is fuckbusted- just a very solid commander to helm a solid archetype.

 Florian, Voldaren Scion

Excuse me, what the fuck is this Vampire doing in my Werewolf set? Get this shit out of here. Florian is an aberration, and also a frustratingly boring one. He takes significant deckbuilding effort to be good, and even then best case scenario it’s an exile-draw impulse once per turn cycle. Rakdos was doing real well for a while, and probably will keep doing well in future considering the next set coming up, so this is a bit of a disappointment.

 Tovolar, Dire Overlord / Tovolar, the Midnight Scourge

I’ve already spent a bunch of time discussing Werewolves in EDH, so I’ll try to keep this brief. Tovolar is the epitome of “fine, here you go”. He’s a powerful Werewolf commander that compensates for the tribe’s weaknesses, gives you card advantage, and echoes an iconic card from the past. He is unquestionably the best Werewolf to helm your deck of the three total real options. I still kinda think you want Naya for this tribe, but if you don’t want to compromise on synergy or lose this effect (and to be fair it’s a lot) then here he is. It’s hard not to be cynical, seeing as I was one of the people fucking pissed at how nothing Ulrich was, but at least he exists now.

Maybe give us another one in Crimson Vow, WoTC?

 Katilda, Dawnhart Prime

This is kind of interesting, a proper Human tribal commander for GW. Now, unlike previous, where your options were Sigarda 2 in GW (which isn’t very good) and some other stuff like the Kudros for other colour combinations, Midnight Hunt has a couple new options for this exact deck, but at the very least they all do it a little differently. Katilda is effectively a second Cryptolith Rite, but one that gives you something to do with all that excess mana, which is pretty cool and good- decks that need to commit to the board often run out of cards (on account of having things get broken) and this makes sure you always have something to do with that mana. So sure! If you have a haste outlet it makes Increasing Devotion insanely free and that’s super spicy.

 Kyler, Sigardian Emissary

I find this substantially less interesting. Kyler is Thalia’s Lieutenant, but it works a bit better, but also its way more expensive. Anthem commanders are always underwhelming, because the effect is usually mediocre and also you can just…play anthems. But also, it doesn’t take much for this guy to make your team quite big. My biggest issue here is that I just think 5 mana is a lot for an aggressive commander like this, and in order to make him work you need to still be playing things afterwards- so the curve is going to be have to be super wonky.

 Leinore, Autumn Sovereign

Our other face commander for this set, Leinore is here to support the Coven mechanic, both making it easier to get three creatures with different powers (especially since she has 0 power herself, which is fairly uncommon) and rewarding you for doing so. She’s another card on this list that basically says “meet condition, draw a card every turn”, but at the very least she’s pumping the squad a little at the same time and she’s not super expensive. I think she’s a lot less interesting than the other face commander, Wilhelt, but she’s inoffensive.

 Sigarda, Champion of Light

Aside from immediately slamming into my cube, Sigarda part 3 looks a lot like Leinore in just drawing a card if you have Coven once per turn. The upside, Sigarda does a bunch of damage while doing it, and could feasibly finish someone off if necessary. The downside, she needs to get Humans, and she sure as -hell isn’t a Human herself. This off-tribe-ness is supremely awkward for what is effectively a tribal commander, and as a result I would be surprised if she saw much play in the zone. But seriously she’s so much better than the last one holy crap that card was mid.

 Liesa, Forgotten Archangel

I still don’t know why Liesa is…alive… but here she is again. I wasn’t a huge fan of the first card, and unfortunately the second one doesn’t change that. She takes a classic Orzhov commander in Athreos, removes the fun politics and play angle from it, gets more expensive, gets graveyard hate, and loses indestructible. I imagine some Athreos players will switch over since she guarantees a return, but she’s surprisingly boring for such a potentially interesting character. Liesa was one of the defenders of Innistrad along with her sisters, but one that was willing to actually interact with the darker creatures of her world and try to understand them rather than murdering them on sight. When Avacyn got created, she killed the fuck out of Liesa since that shit’s heresy, apparently, and had her name effectively wiped from the records- that she’s apparently been alive secretly the whole time begs a lot of questions and has a lot of potential flavour that this card does not represent. The card certainly can’t bring itself back from the dead.

 Vadrik, Astral Archmage

I wasn’t sure about this one, but LoadingReadyRun’s recent deck tech video on it did sell me on it a bit. Vadrik obviously invites comparisons to Mizzix, which is a well-known, kill-on-sight Commander at this point- while I don’t think he’s nearly as powerful as she is, he’s a different flavour of interesting and he is a whole mana cheaper. As well, I do like a lot that he grows himself in the process, giving the deck a board presence that Mizzix’s 2/2 stats don’t really contribute to. I’m still not sure how well day/night will play in the format, but with a deck full of instants you can probably get 2 counters per turn cycle without sacrificing your own tempo, which is decent enough.

 Old Stickfingers

I’m not sure where to be on Stickfingers. I love the flavour of this card, just being a scary forest monster that’s just a new but established in-universe part of the world, much like The Gitrog Monster. The card is kind of medium, though, and its text does really confuse me.

Okay, no, turns out I just misread it completely. You know when your brain just fills in the gaps with what it thinks is right? That’s what I did. I thought Stickfingers looked at the top X and just milled the creatures, but it reveals cards until it hits X creatures, which is muuuuuch better. The X cost effectively does act like it does on many a Hydra, but with added value for the graveyard decks it’s sure to lead. That and it can serve as an effective combo commander- just grab Necrotic Ooze and its combo pieces and some Regrowths and you’re good to go. I don’t think the card is going to be particularly interesting for more casual play, but I can at least admit that it’s much better than I’d assumed.

 Rem Karolus, Stalwart Slayer

He doesn’t explicitly say as much, but Rem is secretly a spellslinger commander, and one that gives other red decks a lot of trouble with you. Dealing one point of extra damage is rarely going to be game-changing, but it makes many a spell that little bit more efficient, and that prevention ability is the real deal. It’s never that hard to protect a single creature from damage, and if you find a way to do that with Rem, you’re basically immune to damage-based boardwipes, and in a great position to abuse the fuck out of them yourself. The card doesn’t really solve any of Boros’s shortcomings, but it is at least Doing A Thing, which is more than I can say for a lot of the combination’s commanders.

 Slogurk, the Overslime

Because Simic didn’t have enough of a lion’s share of the colour pie, here’s Simic doing what is really more of a Golgari or Gruul thing. I don’t hate getting to play with land stuff in blue (beyond Tatyova/Aesi style landfall), but this does feel like an overstepping. Besides the meta angle, the card…I dunno. It’s got a lot going on, but maybe I’m just burned out on playing around lands decks at this point. Slogurk bores me. I do kind of like the idea of hitting yourself with a Traumatize and just killing someone with this, though.

 Lynde, Cheerful Tormentor

Our closing act is one that is undeniably extremely cool. Not only is Lynde mechanically interesting, she’s also a new character that is tied to the surprisingly popular “unluckiest planeswalker” guy- I guess it might not have been luck this whole time. Curses are a really interesting build-around idea, and considering there are 29 (30 if you include Accursed Witch) of them in Grixis for Lynde to play with at this point, you do actually get to pick and choose a bit. She does somewhat suffer from being in the colours that basically don’t get to really play around with Enchantment synergy, but between her 3 colours I reckon there’s enough to keep her going- you can run some of Theros’s Constellation things. And she’s just….really cool. Putting the curse on you before you get to move it off to someone else feel so playful, the two cards a cackling compensation from this cruel master of cursecraft.

 And that’s the lot of them. Unfortunately, much of the Legendary offerings from Innistrad: Midnight Hunt are seriously mediocre. Many of the cards feel more fit for the deck itself than the commanding seat, and a fair few of them don’t even have much going on for that. There are a few real highlights- perhaps me being so into Lynde, Eloise and Gisa says something but I’m refusing to analyse that- but there’s just so many misses that I can’t help but feel underwhelmed. I think it’s somewhat telling of modern Magic design that there are more commanders in this release than were in the previous two Innistrad blocks combined, and yet despite predating the era when legendary creatures were designed for Commander, most of those cards will be better remembered for the format than this new batch.

[colour-outside-the-liness]

Hey, I'm doing good too. Just normal amounts of stressful stuff right now. Just moved to a country I've never been to before but can't complain, things are not as hard as the last time I did this so. Thanks for asking! Yeah, I saw you posting about some pretty scary health issues before, I'm glad you came out of that alive and hope you're healthier now!

The nerve some people have! Haha I know I would be pissed if people were questioning my intelligence like that especially after a couple of drinks in haha. Though I do like taunting people when I play group games, I'll be like "don't need to try that hard guys, you're gonna lose anyway" just to mess with them or just call people sore losers if they accuse me of cheating haha (they're probably right on the accusations tho). People get real mad sometimes it's kinda funny. 😂

Omg literally laughed out loud reading this! Hahaha, how did you manage to fall over a road sign then end up in a ditch? lol omg hope you didn't get hurt too bad 😂 I was trying to downplay my drunken escapades but since you shared yours I should tell you my worst one:

I was at this summer street party at night and got drunk on something made out of tropical herbs and cachaça (which is about 48% alcohol), drank 3 and a half bottles of that like it was apple juice, made friends with a bunch of strangers in a bathroom queue (who tried to talk to me weeks later but I had no idea who they were), had to be held by my best friend while I peed (mostly missing the toilet), fell in the middle of the street and scraped my knee, threatened this boy who was helping me walk and told him not to try anything funny or I would beat him up, then dragged my friends to the beach and left them shortly after to go make out with my ex, came back with lipstick all over my mouth and chin and when my friends asked what I was doing I said I was just talking to my ex and they were like NO YOU WERE NOT, hahaha then I kissed all my girl friends on a dare and we danced under the full moon, then I told my best friend I had to puke so she took me to the ocean but I changed my mind and happened to step on a dead turtle on the way back and started crying bc of it, but last month my best friend told me it was a rock I had stepped on (I believed it was a dead turtle for 7 years!). Had the worst hangover of my life the next day. ✌️✨

Ah I'm happy you liked it! I've never listened to Six musical before but it sounds fun! I can see why you like it haha made me want to dance around my apartment 💃. And hey if liking musicals is your thing then it's great, I'm sure Hozier will understand if he's not your top artist of the year. 😋 Here's my "damie" Pinterest board if you or anyone else wants to check it out, totally recommend making one if you're a visual person like me!

https://pin.it/UcHVlkq

Oh I could talk about Dani and Jamie forever I think. I love the beast in the jungle speech too and it's so painful to watch, VP delivered that beautifully, but I have to admit I'm always a crying mess from episode 1 when older Jamie starts reciting that song about being sad while waiting for her lover to return, this show is fucking cruel I hate it and love it at the same time hahaha. Omg your mom 😂 but I mean it's truly an honor to be compared to someone like Dani, no? She's really great even if she needs a little help haha (don't we all).

Aaah you're amazing! Thank you so much, I'll read this pirate AU soon!

I used to draw a lot, really loved doing it when I was a kid as I said before, and all throughout adulthood too but I haven't done that in almost a year now bc I've got a bit of a case of burnout I guess, it just takes a lot of effort to do it when it shouldn't be like that at all. I used to do fanart too, for other fandoms. Even made one for Dani x Jamie but ended up not liking how it turned out haha. I've got a lot of respect for writers and fanfic writers also! Yall can make words make sense in really interesting and beautiful ways, build worlds so enthralling I can see them vividly in my head. Writing is such an incredibly fascinating skill to have! And I guess the most important thing is that we enjoy doing these things right? Even if we think we're not particularly good at it.

Anyway, have a lovely weekend! 👋✨

Good I'm glad you're doing great but sorry you're dealing with stressful stuff!! Hope living in a new country goes well for you I'm so jealous that you've lived in different countries I'd love to live somewhere else even if just for s few years!! Awwh thank you so much I definitely came out of it alive and am feeling so much better now thank you I mean I do some pretty ditzy things so when people say it to me it's pretty deserved sometimes, I'm secretly smart and people just don't expect it so I never mind too much haha I might have to start saying the things that you do and just taunting them over it I mean, I usually do win even when they make me answer different questions so I will definitely have to start saying things like that to them Haha I love that you're just like "yeah they're probably right in their accusations" I agree seeing how mad some people get over games and stuff is funny (it's me I'm people I hate loosing games depending on what it is and I am very competitive) So it was very dark and all we had for light was my roommates flashlight on her phone but while we were walking home a friend of ours that lived else where kept texting her to make sure we were still safe (my phone as dead at this point) so while she was texting him her flashlight was facing down and someone had moved this road sign to the footpath and it was on that sits on the floor so while I couldn't see it I walked into it and fell over it but while I feel I grabbed hold of it and flipped with it and fell in a ditch with it on top of me... I was fine and was just laid laughing while my friend looked down at me and in the most northern accent ever just said "get up you dickhead." and helped me off of the floor and then asked if I was okay... and I was so it was all good!! Haha 😂 I love this drunken story that sounds like one hell of a night and is a roller coaster from start to finish!! I'm sorry you thought you had stood on a dead turtle for 7 years though, someone really should've told you that it was just a rock!! But that sounds like my kind of night!! I love nights like that... stories that will last a life time... the only down side is the hangover... luckily I have only ever had one hang over in my life and it wasn't the morning after the road sign fiasco... I felt surprisingly good the morning after that haha 😂 It's such a good musical it's about Henry VIII wives and I just love everything to do with his wives and that musical is so much fun and actually gives a little insight to the lives the six Tudor queens had away from Henry and with him because at school we're mainly just taught about him which sucks!! I loved the Hozier song and am definitely gonna have to listen to more of his stuff!! I love musicals so much I mainly listen to musical soundtracks at the minute- usually, Legally Blonde and Six on repeat haha 😂 Ooo thank you I will definitely check out this Pinterest board thanks for sending it to me!! I could talk about them forever too... since watching Bly Manor my niece has been asking me so many questions about it and I am more than happy to talk to her about it haha!! The beast in the jungle speech just breaks my heart every time I relate to it so much and VP just delivers it so beautifully!! Oh yeah now I know at the beginning that it's older Jamie I am just a wreck the whole show is just so beautiful and heart breaking at the same time I LOVE IT!! Even though it makes me sob- I keep putting myself through it!! I mean, yeah I was happy that she said it Dani is great but it was the way she said it... my mum can be something else sometimes... she said she thought Dani was like me the first time she does the accent when she says "I've fallen quite in love with London" because I just randomly do accents a lot too but it was the way she was like "She needs help... but I like her she reminds me of you" I was just like... "Should I go get help?" I still don't know the answer to my question about if I need help or not but I mean I probably do need it You're welcome I really hope you like it!! It's a

great fic I love it!! Yeah I get that if stuff starts taking too much effort and burns you out you're not gonna wanna keep doing it so it's understandable that you stopped!! I think fan art is great and I really would love to be able to do it myself but I just don't have the skill it takes!! Awwh it's a shame you didn't like the Dani x Jamie one you did I would've loved to have seen it!! Honestly there are so many talented writers out there and when I read their fics I am just in awe of the worlds they have built and the stories they have created we are so blessed in this fandom to have so many amazing writers and so many amazing fics out there Oh yeah definitely its important to enjoy what you do!! I know I love writing and love writing fics for Dani and Jamie so I think I'll be doing it for a while even if I'm not great at it haha Awwh thank you very much I hope you have a great weekend too!! ☺️

[cuppalevi]

Blue Guitar | Chapter 2: Dinner’s On You

Series Summary: Leone Abbacchio's trying his best to get his shit together for Narancia. But when Narancia ends up inviting him to a concert he's playing for, Leone ends up under the sheets of the popstar, Bruno Buccellati. It turns out dating a popstar has complications. Especially when a certain someone named Diavolo has tricks up his sleeves.

Chapter 2 Summary: Leone Abbacchio arrives at Bruno’s concert, only to be completed fascinated by the singer. He promptly meets the band, and gets flirted by Bruno. 

Fandom: Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure

Pairing: Leone Abbacchio x Bruno Buccellati

AO3 Link | Previously | Masterlist

“How are we doing so far tonight? Are we good?” Bruno took the microphone off from the stand it was placed and grasped it within his hand. He walks around the stage, waving a hand towards the crowd before him, a bright smile on his lips. The singer was clad in glittered, iridescent, light blue pants. A sheer white suit with ruffles upfront adorned his torso, showing off the black lace of his undergarment. All the while a shiny, heeled, black Christian Louboutin completed the outfit he wore.

Bruno’s under the spotlights, illuminating his whole figure and showcasing the singer to the audience in front of him. He’s charismatic, in words and in movement. When his band had started playing the first tunes to his opening song had started playing and he was waiting for his moment to come out to the stage, he clutched the handle of his microphone- a sleek white with black teardrops design which he had custom made- soft breaths leaving his lips as the rush of adrenaline had slowly come over him. And when it was his cue, all anxiety just drifted away and sheer euphoria flooded his veins as he started singing in sync with the tune.

The crowd before him cheers, waving their hands wildly. Bruno’s chest feels warm at the overwhelming attention he’s getting. Life on stage was the best part of being a musician. The adrenaline he gets from being upstage, hearing the screams of people, singing his songs as he moved to the beat. It was exhilarating.

Although, the handsome man upfront surely caught his attention.

Narancia seemed more anxious about the concert than Leone had expected. A few hours ago, Narancia was frantic. Running from the kitchen, his bedroom, the living room- pretty much the whole apartment basically- to make sure he did not forget anything. Moody Blues grumpily hissed at Narancia when the cat awoke from her nap due to the teenager’s feet shaking the floors of their apartment as if an earthquake was happening. Leone had to reassure Narancia a thousand times, all the while Moody Blues tried to resume her nap.

Leone did not have high expectations for the concert. He just wanted to watch Narancia rock his guitar. Before Buccellati climbed up the stage, the band first settled in. When Narancia had entered the stage with two other guys, his eyes immediately started to scan the crowd- eagerly wanting to see Leone. The teenager had frantically waved with a massive grin on his face when he had spotted Leone’s silver hair among the crowd.

The adult chuckled at Narancia and waved back at him, a warm feeling filling his chest.

But what he didn’t expect was to see the charming man, Bruno- whom he had met in the grocery shop after his squabble with Giorno, upstage singing in front of him. From the moment Bruno had revealed himself onstage with dancing lights above him, least to say he was stunned to see the view before him. Who knew that Bruno from the grocery store was the Buccellati Narancia was working for? Certainly not Leone.

Leone hadn’t been to many concerts. He’d rather put up his headphones and get lost in the music of Monteverdi. But today, this- wholly, beautiful man that’s got Leone into some sort of trance that’s gotten him lost in nothing but Bruno’s voice- it’s exhilarating. He’s irrevocably captivated. The tone of the singer’s voice sends deep chills down his spine and he’s pulled in to listen for more.

“Before we near the end of today’s show, I wanna give a massive thank you to my incredible, incredible band!” Bruno splayed out a hand and presented the band behind him, multiple spotlights falling on the boys who were bringing life to the instruments they were playing.

A grin is plastered on Bruno’s face as he presented Narancia to the crowd first, “A recent recruit of mine and my wonderful guitarist, Narancia Ghirga!”

The spotlights fell onto Narancia. The teenager waved to the crowd, full of enthusiasm. In return, the audience before him cheered. Leone’s lips twitched into a smile as he looked at Narancia fondly, warmth seeping through his chest. Damn, he’d never felt any prouder than he was before.

Narancia is wearing a black t-shirt which was tucked in grey wide-legged pants and black loafers that had a big, gold ring in front as design. But what really was eye-catching was the glittered light blue bandana he wore on his head. The bandana matched Bruno’s trendy trousers.

Leone looked over to the drummer as Bruno introduced him, “My great and amazing drummer, Guido Mista!”

Guido Mista was sitting behind the array of drums but he stood to his feet and stepped out from his set of drums and bowed with his hand outstretched when Bruno called his name. Mista is dressed in a solid black, cropped turtleneck sweater. A beanie of the same color sat on his head, an arrow pointed downwards on his forehead. However, the turtle-necked collar, the hem of the sleeves, and the color of the arrow of his beanie also happened to be glittered and light blue that also twinned Bruno’s trousers.

“Of course, last but not least. My skilled and marvelous keyboardist, Pannacotta Fugo!”

Pannacotta Fugo had dirty blonde hair that fell behind his back ever so gracefully. His face only showed a twitch of a smile and a gentle wave to the crowd. Leone had to keep a snicker when he saw that Fugo’s black suit was riddled with holes and strawberry earrings dangle freely. He thought that the boy looked ridiculous. And surprisingly, the necktie he adorned matched Bruno’s pants as well.

“Wow, fashionably coordinated, huh.” Leone murmured under his breath.

Bruno walked back in front of the microphone stand and attached the microphone back to its stand before speaking once more. “This is: Adore You.”

The lights dim a little bit, Mista starts thrumming his drums at a pace. Fugo’s fingers start pressing down on the keys and Narancia’s strumming his guitar with the chords of the song. Bruno’s foot starts tapping to the beat, bobbing his head to the sound, eyes shut as he starts singing, “Walk in your rainbow paradise,”

Narancia, Fugo, and Mista sing a back-up of, “Paradise,” and it amazes Leone how their voices mesh together in a perfect melody that accompanied Bruno’s voice so well.

“Blueberry lipstick state of mind,” Bruno’s eyebrows furrow as he sings into the mic.

Then the lyric is followed by the trio harmonizing, “State of mind.”

“I get so lost inside your eyes,” Bruno’s eyes subtly scan the array of people in the area in front of him. It wasn’t that hard to spot the pair of eyes he wanted to see as the owner of those eyes belonged to a man with hair white as snow. “Would you believe it?”

Bruno Buccellati, a kind, and compassionate soul. He was adored by many due to his songs. His overall aura just draws you to him. Bruno lived in the coastal suburbs of Naples with his mother and father. His father worked as a humble fisherman. When his mother had sung him a lullaby instead of the usual bedtime stories, he was instantly enthralled by the way his mother sang. It was then he developed an interest in singing.

“You don’t have to say you love me. You don’t have to say nothing, you don’t have to say you’re mine.”  

Even when his parents divorced, his passion for singing never wavered. His father was determined to give Bruno a good education so he started taking tourists on his boats to earn more. Bruno would entertain the tourists by giving them a song number he practiced the day before. Consequently, it earned him a good amount of lire which he put into his savings.

“ Honey, ” Bruno sang, taking the mic off its stand and walking around the stage.

Collectively, the three band members sang, “ Ah, ah, ah, ah, ”

“ I’d walk through fire for you, just let me adore you, ”

Leone used to think that nobody could match the likes of Monteverdi. Just like how no movie could surpass Sling Blade, in his opinion. But watching Bruno sing his heart out in front of him. And the charming smile the singer puts on his face while he gazes to the crowd. Leone thought, maybe Monteverdi won’t be the only artist he’ll be listening to after this.

“ Like it’s the only thing I’ll ever do, ” Bruno finishes the first chorus. He proceeds to walk around the stage, waving to people.

Bruno was found by Polpo who worked for the management, Passione. After being able to save up for his education, Bruno started working a part-time job in a local pub where he would stand in front of tipsy people and sing songs. Coincidentally, Polpo had been looking for a client. He offered Bruno a chance at becoming an artist. It took Bruno a couple of days to consider the man’s offer. He didn’t want to leave his father all alone when he was off chasing his dreams. But his father encouraged him to take it.

“You’d make a proud man,” His father had told him.

So here he was now. Pouring his heart out with every ounce of his being to the songs he had written.

Bruno stops in a particular spot at the stage, which just happened to be right in front of Leone. “ Your wonder under summer skies, ”

“ Summer skies, ” The three band members sing.

“ Fair skin and lemon over ice, ” A twitch overcomes Leone’s lips as he meets Bruno’s eyes.

He feels entranced when Bruno shoots him a subtle wink. Like he can’t seem to take his eyes off of him.

“ Would you believe it? ” Bruno tilts his head in question as if he was asking Leone.

Leone bites back a chuckle, pressing his lips together. He looks around him to see if anyone saw their interaction, but everyone else was lost in Bruno’s singing. Bruno starts his pre-chorus again, but he stays in that particular area of the stage. His body moves to the rhythm of the song, his head is swaying with the melody. The ends of his hair are dancing along with him, whipping against his head back and forth. And his right foot, simultaneously in sync.

“ It’s the only thing I’ll ever do,” Narancia, Fugo, and Mista sing the lyric repeatedly as the song’s bridge. They sing it a number of times as they play their instruments. Bruno’s feet bring him to different parts of the stage as he awaits the finishing lines. But before the bridge finishes, he quickly pulls the microphone stand and drags it toward that spot.

Just as the last chorus began, he swiftly places his microphone back on the stand and opens his mouth. “I'd walk through fire for you, just let me adore you.”

He knows Leone’s eyes are on him, but he doesn’t return the gaze this time. Instead, he shuts his eyes, grasping the thin body of the microphone stand. His other hand stays on the mic. “Oh, honey. I’d walk through fire for you. Just let me adore you.” He continues singing the chorus until it eventually comes to the finishing lyrics.

But for the last lyric of the song, he opens his eyes and it makes contact with Leone’s, “Just let me adore you.” Bruno places a hand on his heart as he sings, then he points. The crowd goes wild at the action- thinking it was meant for them and their proceeding screams are deafening. But Leone knows it was meant for him.

--

Leone’s pulled by Narancia’s hand through the hallway that led to the lounge where the rest of the band and Bruno retired too when the concert was finished. He was nervous to see Bruno again, especially after the striking stares a pair of blue eyes had given him when the singer was pouring his heart out on the song. Leone felt as though Bruno was indirectly talking to him through the song. Even with a crowd full of people that came to watch and adore Bruno Buccellati, it was like Bruno was playing the song for him.

When Narancia opened the door, Leone first laid eyes on a certain blonde that brought irritation to his veins. He immediately rolled his eyes when the familiarity struck him and the events at the grocery shop came flashing back in his mind.  

Giorno snickered when he saw Leone come through the door being pulled by Narancia while he leaned against Mista who was munching on a slice of strawberry cake.

“Guys! Guys! Meet Leone Abbacchio!” Narancia announced, two of his hands splayed to present the tall goth, “My foster dad!”

The tall goth received a wave from Mista and a nod of acknowledgment from Fugo. Giorno greeted Leone with a small smile, “ Buona serata. ”

“Buona serata my ass,” Leone murmured, but he slowly realized what Narancia had called him earlier on. His eyebrows raised in surprise as he turned to look at Narancia, “Foster dad? What have you been telling these people Narancia-” But he wasn’t able to finish what he was saying because before he could process what Narancia called him, his arm was tugged once more.

But this time, it was pulled in the direction of none other than Bruno Buccellati himself.

Oh shit, Leone thought, stammering in unsensible words as he tried to stop Narancia but alas, it was already too late since they neared Bruno who was stood by the food table.

“Buccellati! Buccellati!” Enthusiastically, Narancia beamed at the adult in front of him.

Bruno turned his head when he heard Narancia’s voice, first glancing at the teenager himself before settling to the tall male next to him. Gently, he smirked at Leone. “And to whom do I have the pleasure of meeting, Narancia?”

Narancia giggled with a cute grin, pulling Leone close to him like glue. “Buccellati, meet Leone Abbacchio! He’s the one who’s been taking care of me. Abba, meet Buccellati!”

Leone inhaled sharply, swimming in the pools of blue he’s staring at. Without the sunglasses (And standing directly in front of him), Bruno looked so handsome at this proximity. Leone’s able to see his pretty face and the full of his sweetly curved lips. He feels his cheeks flush red when he sees Bruno’s eyes check over his body almost sensually. Fuck, Leone feels weak at the knees under his intense stare.

“Is that so? It’s a pleasure to meet you, Leone, ” Bruno smiles endearingly, eyes looking back at Leone’s while he holds out his hand. The way his name falls out of Bruno’s lips is smooth. The tone of his voice is soft yet it’s deep and penetrating.

“Pleasure to meet you too, Buccellati,” Leone replied, taking Bruno’s hand in his for a shake.

Bruno’s hand feels soft against his compared to his calloused ones. The warmth of Bruno’s hand engulfs his own, and he is almost reluctant to let go. “Bruno’s just fine, bello,” Bruno’s thumb softly rubs at Leone’s knuckles- Leone’s hand still grasped in his- as he gave another one of his award-winning smiles. Narancia’s oblivious to the overwhelming tension between the two adults.

“Oi Narancia! If you don’t hurry I’ll finish the cake myself!” Mista’s exclaim echoes in the room.

Gasping offendedly, Narancia shrills, “You wouldn’t dare!” He turned his head to look at the cake which earlier was whole but was now reduced to two slices.

“Oh, I would!” Mista threateningly taunts Narancia.

“You guys get acquainted! I’m gonna get the cake before Mista eats all of it,” The teen says to the two adults who finally let go of each other’s hands when they heard Mista shout. Before the two could say another word, Narancia is shuffling over the food table to grab a plate and a fork before quickly heading to grab a slice of the cake.

“Did you enjoy the show?” Bruno asks Leone, turning to face the food table. He resumes filling up his plate with a slice of prosciutto.

Leone nods his head, picking at his lacquered nails. “It was good, yeah. You were uh- great up there.”

For a moment, Bruno’s head spins to look at Leone and gives him a smirk, “I’m glad you liked it, bello. You should take a seat.” He nudges the legs of the stool beside him with the toe of his foot.

Politely, Leone takes a seat at the stool. He brushes back a strand of hair behind his ear when it falls to the front of his face as he sits down.

"So you’re Narancia’s guardian?”

Leone hums, “Not legally. The kid ran away from home and all. I just gave him a place to stay.”

“Not foster dad then?” An amused smile overcomes Bruno’s lips.

Chuckling Leone answered, “Nope. Not foster dad.”

Bruno leans against the food table with his back away from the array of food and moves beside Leone. He holds a plate of prosciutto in front of him. “Tell me about yourself, Leone.” Bruno takes a forkful of the food in his mouth as he awaits Leone’s reply.

Leone scratches the back of his neck, “There’s not much to tell and besides, I just met you.” He raised a brow pointedly to which Bruno replies with a chuckle.

“Buon punto, Leone. Surely you remember our encounter in the grocery store? You know, orange thief?”

Leone inwardly groans, rolling his eyes as he remembers an annoying blonde brat. “Hardly makes me a thief. You gave them to me at the end, though. Remember?”

When he came home from the grocery shop, he refused to tell Narancia what had gone down to save himself from the teen’s endless bickering. Ugh, the things I do for you, Leone thought as he handed Narancia the pack of oranges hours before. He was rewarded by repetitious thank yous from the teenager.

Bruno nodded, “Sì, you were quite adamant about getting them for your kid and all.” He flicks his eyes to Narancia.

“Okay, okay. Let’s just- forget about the oranges.” The long-haired man sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose.

Another hearty chuckle escapes through Bruno’s mouth. “Don’t fret, Leone. I was only teasing. Anyway, have you formally met the others?”

“Not really. All I know is the brat who claimed that I stole the oranges.” Leone huffs, crossing his arms stubbornly.

“That brat is my publicist,” Bruno answers, finishing his plate of prosciutto. “Giorno’s pretty strict and he can be dogmatic at times. But it’s what makes him a good publicist. I apologize on his behalf.”

Leone shakes his head, “It’s fine. It’s over now anyway.”

Humming, Bruno asked, “Say, Leone, are you busy tonight?”

Shaking his head, Leone answered, “Have lots of free time, why do you ask?”

“Hmm… I have a reservation for Ristorante Don Alfonso 1890 to try out their food. Giorno insists I go and have dinner with a friend for the experience because apparently he and Mista had a date there. He said the food was great.” Bruno poured two glasses with iced tea, offering one to Leone.

Graciously, Leone accepts the glass. “You’re… you want me to go with you?”

“I was going to bring mio padre but he told me he was exhausted from working and he rather I’d bring a friend instead,” Bruno explained.

Leone purses his lips in thought. Staring at the iced tea before him. Bruno Buccellati was inviting him to dinner. “Are- are you asking me out?”

Bruno looks at Leone and hums. He shrugs his shoulders, “Maybe. Maybe not.”

It baffles him that someone like Bruno Buccellati would want to invite him to dinner. Bruno could have anyone he wants but instead, he’s asking Leone out for dinner. Leone wasn’t really a romantic person. He’s reserved and closed off, built up walls. Unlike Bruno’s charming and outgoing personality- which people admire- He’s the complete opposite of Bruno.

Bruno’s had his fair share of lovers. Ranging from men and women. But they were all flings. The only long-term relationship he had didn’t last because the press was being invasive with their relationship. Consequently, that led to a break-up. He coped with the aftermath through songwriting and thus, his new album was born.

“As long as there’s good wine, I’m in.” Said Leone. He agrees because he does want to go. He wants to get to know Bruno. Not Bruno Buccellati the pop star, but just simply Bruno. Even without admitting it to himself, he already likes where this is going.

Bruno smiles, “Di molto bene! Wear something nice, bello. I’d very much like to adore you.”

Leone blushes, he opens his mouth to reply however a sudden thud, crack of an object and a shout interrupts them.

“You shit for brains!”

A distorted, out of tune note erupts from the keyboard due to the clenched fist that belonged to Fugo pounded on the instrument. Bruno and Leone’s eyes widen and survey the scene.

Narancia and Mista lay on the floor groaning, the coffee table that used to be in front of the couch was now in broken pieces scattered around and under the two bodies. Giorno’s face is full of shock as he tries to process what the fuck just happened.

Bruno’s sudden snap makes the room go silent, “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU GUYS DOING?!”

< To Be Continued I \ I |

[dungeonecologist]

WILD ARMS 2 - Golgotha Prison

The name is not subtle, but the reference itself is actually oddly superficial.  At the end of the dungeon, Ashley is separated briefly from the party and Lilka and Brad are captured and tied to crosses, evoking the characters Dismus and Gestas, the thieves crucified during the same execution as the biblical christ.  There is little reference to that actual narrative however, instead seeming to draw from the fact that the name Golgotha is taken to be an epithet to mean literally “A Place of Skulls,” which seems rather appropriate and obvious for an execution field.

Bookending the start and end of this dungeon, we fight the boss monster, Trask.  First in a scripted “loss” and then in a solo match with Ashley’s new dark henshin hero form, the “Grotesque Black Knight,” Knightblazer.

“Trask” is yet another transliteration* issue that comes from the juggling between languages.  It actually comes from the Tarrasque, another monster most readily identified from its appearance in the original Dungeons & Dragons Monster Manual, itself originally taken from semi-obscure French myth of Saint Martha of Bethany and the Tarasque of Tarascon.

*(I realize I use this word a lot and it might not be as common use to others.  A “translation” lifts meaning between languages; a “transliteration” is to lift written characters between them.  Example: “Left” in English translates to 左[the direction] or 残[what remains] but transliterates to レフト.  Inversely 左 and 残 both translate back to English as “Left” but transliterate as “hidari” and “zan” respectively; and レフト transliterates back into English as “refuto.”)

Surprisingly, the Wild Arms 2 design (which would also go on to persist as the core design throughout the rest of the Wild Arms series) is based more on the original myth than the D&D representations tend to be: While the end product looks nothing like the depictions of the Tarasque of myth, it retains the spiked turtle shell, the prominent dual horns, poisonous quality, and fins on its head here account for being “half fish.”

Also of note is that the title card identifies it as a “Dragonoid” and it has various metallic and machine-like features.  These details are neat because it positions it as being not-quite a dragon, to work around a fact that will pop up much later: That dragons in Filgaia are extinct.  And also to play into the fact that Dragons in Wild Arms are semi-mechanical lifeforms.

In any case, our scripted loss to Trask the first time around ends with the team knocked out and imprisoned in what appears to be a disused execution ground and associated holding cells.  In our escape we run into monsters fitting the theme, who appear to be natural inhabitants, rather than guards put in place by the Odessa terrorist soldiers who are actually holding us here.

First up is the Wight, a classic undead warrior monster generally taken from D&D, but with a little more behind it than you might expect.  The term Wight in English lore actually traces back quite far as an archaic term with little to no real association with monsters.  The real intersection with name and subject comes from an early English translation of the Nordic Grettis Saga; In it the zombie-like creatures now better known as Draugr were referred to as apturgangr (lit.”againwalker”) but were translated as Barrow-wight. (lit.”[burial-]mound person”)

This may seem an odd choice, but the translation came at the hands of the eminent bookman William Morris.  I say “bookman” because he was not just a prolific author of prose and poetry, but a pioneer of the revival of the British textile and printing industry.  He and his wife, Jane Burden, did extensive arts, craft and design work in book and print design, book binding, and wall paper all stemming from the intricate design of modular and tiled printing blocks and stamps.  Oh and he translated various works of epic poetry and myth into English, including old Roman epics, French knightly romances, and of course Norse sagas. (all of which he wrote and published what was basically fanfiction of, btw)

His seemingly erroneous “translation” of the Barrow-wight came as an attempt to reflect a comparable agedness to the name: Rather than translating from old Norse into modern English, he chose what he thought a suitable old English equivalent; “Barrow” referring to pre-christian Anglo-Saxon burial mounds, and “Wight” meaning “thing” or “creature” but often used disparagingly to refer to a person.  The nuance there is actually quite clever, as the old Wight referred pretty exclusively to those living, even if it didn’t specify by definition, and that uncertainty or contradictory kind of implication uniquely fits a description of the undead.

This term would be picked up by J.R.R. Tolkein for use in Middle-Earth, retaining their lore and function from Norse legend to describe undead warriors.  And from there you can follow the usual chain of influence to D&D, where the shortened term Wight really solidified itself as synonymous with the undead, and eventually down to Game of Thrones, where George R.R. Martin cleverly brings the whole thing back around to old risen bodies of northern warriors, not unlike the Draugr of Norse myth.

Anyway in Wild Arms 2 we get some sorta death yeti ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Next up is the Ghoul, which I think we all know is a pretty generic term in modern parlance, but it’s specific origins date back to pre-Islamic Arabia.  It entered into English via translations of the original French translation of 1001 Arabian Nights, where it appears in one story as a monster lurking about the cemetery devouring corpses.

The Ghoul identity as a corpse eater quickly broadened into flesh eaters, and the association with lurking about graves in turn marked them as undead themselves until eventually the term became loosely applied to any variety of undead, including the thrall of vampires, supplanting the flesh of the dead with blood of the living and achieving a truly far removed meaning.  Even in modern Arabic the term now broadly applies to any number of fantasy monsters. 

And so long as we’re dabbling in pop culture transplants; the Arabaian word Ghul is in fact the same used in the name of the Batman villain, R’as al-Ghul, whose name/title has always been erroneously translated as “Head of The Demon.“

I have no idea why it’s a chicken with a mohawk but i love it

And finally the Bone Drake.  I don’t know that this one actually has any real specific lineage...

“Drake” is generally a synonym for dragon, although there is some case of fantasy semantics where different settings will try to define distinct body types of dragons each with their own name, in which case Drakes are often either dragons which simply don’t exceed a certain size (generally no bigger than a non-magical animal such as a dog or a horse) or a wingless variation of whatever the setting’s prototypical dragon might be.  I don’t know for certain, but I think this distinction in modern fantasy started with Tolkien’s wingless fire breathing dragon, Glaurung, and its offspring who were referred to as fire-drakes.

In any case, the specific term “Bone Drake” Doesn’t seem to appear with any visibility prior to Wild Arms 2, which leads me to believe it was just their name for a generic bone dragon-like creature.  It does make for an interesting companion, aesthetically, to Trask being here, although there don’t seem to be any implications that Trask lives in this dungeon at all.  Other than just being an obvious combination of cool fantasy things, it may also be pulled from Dungeon & Dragons’ Dracolich/Night Dragon; an undead (often skeletal) dragon raised from the dead, often by their own necromantic spells, hence the term “Lich.”  For whatever reason they are oddly reminiscent of shield crested dinosaurs like the Triceratops or Styracosaurus.

The attack Rhodon Breath doesn’t tell me anything either.  I think it’s just meant as “Rose Breath,” translating the “Rhodon” bit pretty literally, and references the smell of roses being present as a funeral, or else the palor of the faded pink color also called “Rose Breath.”  There is some apocryphal reference to a Rhodon but of no significance that I can tell.

Clearly the theme here is death and the undead, and with some small stretch on part of the Wight, we could even say skulls all befitting Golgotha’s “Place of Skulls” epithet.  It’s a really neat way to build this dungeon, albeit a little on the nose.  But I really like the idea that the dungeon appears to be abandoned and now haunted by all these reanimated corpses and bones before the villains arrive to use it for their plans.  Oddly there isn’t much of a martyrdom theme here, although we’ll get plenty of that a little later once we recruit our second magic user, summoner, christ figure, and perfect beautiful boy, Tim Rhymless to the team...

Anyway we get out, we fight Trask for real.  Ashley turns into a saturday morning superhero.  Trask gets solo’d.  And we all just kinda move along without asking too many questions...  Although the game dialogue describes this new form as a “grotesque black knight” the sprite work, 3D model, and even original character art don’t really convey much in the way of “grotesque” but in the context of the tokusatsu, henshin hero elements it’s not too hard to imagine that the design was meant to evoke a similar aesthetic to gruesome suit heroes like Guyver, Kamen Rider Shin, and Devilman.  I do love the gill/tendon-like organic vent structure in the pauldrons that stay.  And although it’s not visible in any of these images, but the D-Arts model has an exposed segment of vertebrae between the shoulders; that along with the teeth(?)/ribs on the open chest panels really helps bring out more of the “grotesque” quality of the design.

[werelywrites]

How the turtles behave/deal with jealousy with you being in a relationship with all four of them

Plus a little extra

Warnings: it’s kinda SFW (there’s no smut but there is mentionings of it) there is swearing and typos/bad grammar

Leo:

*His nature has always been the possessive type. He really tries to control it around you though. Admittedly, he’s not as bad as he thought he would be when you first started this arrangement     It is bad, however, when you’re around any other guys that aren’t his brothers

*If he had to admit which brother he gets the most jealous about, it’d be Raph and, surprisingly, Mikey.

           *He has jealously problems with Raph mainly because both he and Raph are alphas

                       *plus, whenever him and Raph get in a fight, you always go to cool Raph off. It frustrates him because even though he knows deep down you don’t really take sides when any of the guys argue, it feels like you’re choosing Raph over him.

                       *Sometimes his alpha instincts do get the better of him though. Cold showers are about the only thing he can do to control it until you come to him.

           *Mikey was a surprise to him though. You spend time with all of them, but for some reason Mikey makes him feel insecure. He knows he can be uptight and, as his brothers put it, “a fun killer” and it’s because of this he gets jealous of the youngest being the fun one. He worries that maybe you’ll realize that he’s boring and leave him completely.

*You would have guessed he’d be more reserved when it came to pda but the reality is that he’s constantly touching you in someway

           *expect lots of kisses (many small pecks anywhere he can reach)

           *even when you’re not sitting next to him he’ll make damn sure something is touching you even if he has to completely move to do it. Aka stretch his leg out completely from the recliner to you (who is on the couch) so his foot is touching your ankle. (subtle Leo, real subtle.)

           *hand holding during mediation is a must, if you join him

           *if he’s just walking by he will still touch you, even if it’s a slight brush of his hand or ruffling your hair

           *will absolutely grab your butt when you’re distracted (especially if your attention is on Raph)

*his favorite way to cuddle with you is having you snuggle into his chest. You will 100% get him to churr if you do this

Raph:

*he knew right from the get-go he and Leo would have an issue sharing you. They fought so much about everything and anything so why would the topic of you not be any different

           *honestly though, what surprised him was how he didn’t have any problem with sharing you with Mikey and Donnie.

           *He figured he’d be the most possessive out of the group. Turns out, it’s just Leo that bothers him, because, well, it’s an alpha thing. (Please don’t ask cuz there aint no real way to explain it. He tells you with a grumble)

           *well,\ maybe not just Leo, he’s got a problem with other males. If so much as your neighbor winks at you, he goes through the roof

                       *this stems from the fact that he just feels like he aint good enough for you but he’s just too selfish to let you go now that he’s had a taste of you

                                   *and just like all the brothers, before you got into a relationship with all of them, he felt possessive even then but there was no way he’d act on it in front of you, thinking you wouldn’t have gone for him in the first place. What right did he have to hog all your time when you would obviously want a human boyfriend? (the punching bag suffered a lot more beatings before you started dating because of this)

*pda is not an issue with him, (although if he’s honest, if he sees you and Leo making out together jealousy will rear its ugly head out sometimes….ok more than sometimes….poor punching bag), what he does hesitate to do in front of his brothers is being what he deems as “soft”

           *Making out? Groping you? Whispering dirty things to you when you’re not expecting it? Naw, that’s not “soft”

           *you coming to him bawling cuz you had a bad day and what you need is a hug? You looking all cute in your gym clothes nearly making him go awwwww? Telling you sweet things to either cheer you up or just cuz you made his heart swell? That’s “soft”

           *Because he hesitates to do “soft” stuff in front of the others, when he does do it, it makes it that much sweeter.

           *Unlike Leo though, he doesn’t need to touch you consistently. Oh, he does want to touch you. You have no idea how badly he does, but he also understands that people have bubbles.

           *he absolutely loves it when you go out of your way to touch him though

                       *you’re cuddling with Donnie and you reach to touch Raph’s thigh, boi will be high in the clouds a good while

*his favorite way to cuddle with you is having you in his lap. Watching a movie, lap. Eating dinner, lap. He’s doing sit ups, although technically it’s his stomach you’re sitting on, it counts as lap.

 Donnie:

*He wasn’t exactly the jealous type per se….but he isn’t as laid back as Mikey is when it comes to who you spend time with.

           *He wouldn’t exactly call it possessiveness either cuz he honestly has no problem sharing you with his brothers (but not human guys though. Those can back off)

           *he does pout a little bit when you’re not with him, but it’s only a little bit

           *he knows you spend time with all of them equally (at least try to) and he’s no exception. You’ll come around eventually to spend time with him or he’ll just go and spend time with you now. (Mario kart is always more fun with more players right?)

           *he thinks what it comes down to is that he likes having your attention when it comes to small stuff (don’t get him wrong he loves having your full attention but not having that isn’t what brings up these envious feelings)

                       *so when you’re drawing with Mikey or reading a book, sitting on raphs shell while he does push-ups or watching a show with Leo, Donnie will get a little envious. But it instantly become fine when you see him and you smile full of love at him (he’ll churr when you do this).

                       *any small gestures his way will make any jealous feelings go away (i.e. bringing him coffee, smiling at him, patting the seat next to you in offering to join in, or, hell, even just seeing that you’re reading one of his books is enough). It just reminds him that you are still thinking about him even when you’re spending time with someone else and that’s all that matters

*shy, nervous turtle means you’ll have to instigate pda. You could be with them for years and Donnie will still be nervous to kiss you in front of the others.

           *once you do instigate pda, he’ll stutter, get flushed, and get flustered but ultimately he won’t stop you. He won’t break contact until you do.

*he’s definitely a more~let’s do stuff where no one else can see~ kind of guy

*this kinda contradicts the fact that, like Leo, he loves to touch you constantly

*very much a submissive role in the relationship

           *on the rare occasions when he is dominant though…wooooooo boy do you love it

* his favorite way that you cuddle is when you hug him from behind (when he’s sitting of course) to watch him as he works (however, he’s not going to get anything done if you kiss him on the neck. File this under a very good way to distract)

Mikey:

*Mikey is just so excited that you’re with them that he does not care who you’re giving attention too. Jealousy and possessiveness just aint his thing

           *when it does occur, it is only when it comes to human dudes (although still doesn’t happen often) and it only takes the form of sadness.

           *you’ll have an idea when he’s had jealous issues when he’s surrounded by ice cream and pizza boxes (but maybe it was just another binge day, who knows, it’s hard to tell sometimes with him)

*jealousy may not be a thing for him probably because he has no qualms with just butting in at whatever you’re doing and either suggesting something else to do or joining you. (do you know how many times he’s slipped into the small almost none existent space between you and Raph when you’re watching a movie? little sneak)

*sure he loves having your attention and will butt in to get it but he actually is probably the most understanding of personal time and space

           *he really only butts in whenever it truly is ok (bugs the hell out of the other three but if they truly wanted alone time with you than they shouldn’t be in the living area. Should have taken her to your room, man.)

*Mikey has absolutely no fucks to give when it comes to pda, he will make out with you right there at the dinner table, he don’t care.

           *expect lots of cuddles, snuggles, hugs, anything to hold you

           *also your cheeks with probably hurt a lot after all the laughing you do when you’re with him

           *his absolute favorite thing to do to make you smile is taking your hand and kiss all the way up your arm til he gets to your cheek

*speaking of favourites, his favourite way to cuddle is actually holding you around your waist with his head at your stomach. It always makes you laugh and it has the added bonus of occasionally you’ll scratch the back of his head (this gets him churring nonstop too)

 Ultimately, the guys adore you. Yeah, jealousy will get the better of them sometimes, but you all will work it out one way or another.

The best way to cuddle is when you and all four of the boys are snuggled on the couch just peacefully watching something on the tv. It’s even better when you all fall asleep together. They wouldn’t have it any other way.

[thebibliomancer]

Essential Avengers: Avengers #203: Night of the Crawlers

January, 1981

Okay so this is a weird one.

And I’m not just talking about Wonder Man and Beast tussling with Puanepsion from Biscuit Hammer.

So Wonder Man and Beast were absent last issue, probably to better sync up the paperback novel and the comic adaptation.

Jocasta wasn’t able to locate them due to Ultron’s jamming and they never came back to the mansion after Wonder Man got fired from his shitty TV job. So where did they go?

It was kind of inevitable that we fill in that narrative gap but it didn’t necessarily have to be in Avengers. It might have been in another book and the only explanation readers of only Avengers would have gotten is ‘Check out this month’s Tales To Delight And Wow, true believers! ‘Nuff said!’

But obviously, that filling in happens here in Avengers. And its weird that it has all of the feeling of being a fill-in or filler issue when its written by the current Avengers writer David Michelinie.

I’ll get into why it feels like filler but damn this is a weird one.

I’ve covered most of the LAST TIME stuff so we start with the Avengers returning via giant windowed Quinjet to the mansion after their Ultron adventure.

After all that nonsense all they want are hot baths, cool drinks, and then to pass the hell out.

I guess the design for the Quinjet has stabilized because this is what its been looking like for a while.

After landing, the Avengers discuss some of the recent-

DEAR LORD VISION WHATS WRONG WITH YOUR FACE?

It looks like one of the yaranaika faces!

And Wanda, your tiara points are pointier than Batman’s ears OR shoulders!

Jocasta, you’ve sprouted some rivets!

Okay so the writer may be the same but we’ve gone from George Perez to Carmine Infantino and Carmine evidently has different ideas on how to draw the characters. I.e. they all kind of look off model.

Which contributes to the weird feeling that this book has so well done?

Anyway, where was I?

Iron Man and Captain America discuss how they just fucking left Ultron in the heavy metal plant. I mean sure he’s stuck under a blobby Ultron shaped shell of solid adamantium and can’t go anywhere but still.

Dig a hole and plant him in the hole!

He has a molecular rearranger that he uses to manipulate his own adamantium so maybe he can do something and escape! I don’t actually know how he gets out of this one but better safe than sorry! You’ll be sorry either way but you’ll be sorrier if it was something easily preventable rather than comic book nonsense like him having hypnotized Tony Stark off-panel!

Cap, pointy Wanda, and yaranaika Vision all head off to sleep until 7 in the afternoon.

No rest for the unintentionally wicked as Iron Man decides to use his downtime repairing the damage he did to Jocasta under Ultron’s influence.

But he discovers that Jocasta is already up and about, having been repaired by Jarvis.

Which sounds implausible but Jocasta wasn’t totally incapacitated by Iron Man’s hypnotized treachery so she was able to walk Jarvis through repairing her.

You go, Jocasta! Get by with a little help with your friends!

She and Jarvis do regret that she wasn’t fixed in time to either helped in battle or tracked down Wonder Man and Beast to bring them in as reinforcements.

Which makes Wasp wonder where those two are?

Now lets imagine the scene gets all wiggly as we go for a SCENE TRANSITION AND FLASHBACK COMBO.

Surprisingly, Beast and Wonder Man were not off getting crazy drunk like last time, right before the Red Ronin stuff.

They just... got lost somehow. On the way back from the studio.

Beast, a lifelong inhabitant of New York apparently and also the streets are numbered, has managed to get so turned around that he doesn’t even recognize a single landmark.

But he spots some street toughs loitering while carrying baseball bats and chains and thinks ‘hey those types always know their way around’ and asks them for directions.

The armed youths are also apparently jumpy, call Beast a ‘Crawler’ and start hitting him with a chain.

Now apparently Crawler is not a new slur for mutants. They’ve just completely mistaken Beast for something that looks nothing like him and does not in fact talk or ask for directions to an uptown bus.

That’s how jumpy they are.

The fight wouldn’t have been much of a fight had either of the heroes fought for real or if Wonder Man had done anything other than just lift up two of the toughs by their collars. But the ‘fight’ ends when Wonder Man calls Beast Beast and the toughs realize that these aren’t Crawlers, obviously. OBVIOUSLY. They’re Avengers!

They apologize for the violence, saying that things have been tense around the neighborhood since the Crawlers showed up.

And since the word has been thrown around a few times, Beast asks what a Crawler even is.

Lenny, the street tough: “A Crawler is scum, mister, that’s what it is. Scum that don’t even walk like a man. Scum that steals things, like food, an’ blankets... an’ children!”

Street tough Deuce asks Lenny whether they should get these Avengers to help them but Lenny dismisses the idea. They already asked for the police’s help and the cops laughed right in their faces.

So clearly they have to take care of their own neighborhood clearly.

And they head off into the night to loiter on other street corners and accidentally assault other people, I presume.

Before Beast and Wonder Man can absorb any of what just happened, a small child approaches them.

She introduces herself as Juanita Lopez, sister of Hugo, the kid taken by the Crawlers.

She explains that she and her brother are very close because their parents didn’t approve of them having friends. But about a week or two ago, Hugo began going off to play by himself. And around that same time there were a lot of break-ins at stores and markets. This was when rumors started of monsters that moved heavily and close to the ground - the Crawlers.

Juanita was worried about Hugo so she followed him, as ya do, and found him hanging out with a Crawler in a derelict building.

She screamed, as ya do, and the Crawler ran down a manhole.

Juanita took Hugo home but that night... he disappeared!

And then Juanita’s mom shows up and slaps her one for talking to strangers.

Juanita’s mom: “Hugo has run away. He will return when he gets hungry. Now come, you’ve work to do!”

And then the mom drags Juanita off into the fog. Which has been an ever present thing and maybe why the street toughs mistook Beast for a Crawler.

Anyway, with how odd everything is, Beast suggests that he and Wonder Man go wading through the sewers looking for trouble.

But first Beast undresses down to only his underwear. Because why ruin a perfectly good outfit? And also because aesthetic.

They soon discover a hole in the sewer wall where someone or something broke through.

Possibly turtles but that's unsubstantiated.

And heading through the hole they discover someone has placed torches along the walls lighting the way.

Curious and also more curious.

AND THEN THEY ARE SUDDENLY JUMPED BY CRAWLERS

but only for a panel so its all cool.

Hugo tells the Crawlers to “leave the anglos alone!” and then recognizes them as Avengers. Which is super cool to a kid who lives in a sewer. Real superheroes! Wow!

Hugo takes the two Avengers back to his sweet sewer pad and offers them sodas but Wonder Man just wants a tall refreshing drink of ‘will someone explain whats going on here?’

Prompted no doubt by a Crawler manspreading right in his peripheral vision.

So Hugo explains it all.

So some scientists were working on creating anaerobic life that could colonize space without needing air. But science is hard (and Hugo speculates that maybe they weren’t too bright) so they just dumped all of their chemicals down the drain because this was a super illegal operation. And then the anaerobic chemicals mixed with other illegally dumped chemicals and somehow this chemical mix created the Crawlers.

SCIENCE!

Or something that resembles it if you squint and are maybe also high.

Is mixing together random chemicals really the best way to create a brand new life form to colonize space for you?

It is with SCIENCE!

Anyway. Per Hugo at least, the Crawlers were smart and realized that they couldn’t live where the people are so made a home down in the sewers.

Not specified is whether they hung out with the Morlocks, Ninja Turtles, or any of the MANY inhabitants of New York’s sewers.

At night they would sneak up topside to steal things they needed like food and candles. Because they may not need to breath but apparently they needed food. Despite the lack of mouths.

One night while stealing they ran into Hugo and they instantly felt some kind of connection. Loneliness, probably.

So then Hugo and the Crawlers became best friends! Oh how they frolicked in the sewer water!

Hugo: “Anyway, the Crawlers, hey treated me real good, an’ we had a lot o’ fun together. We was simpatico, y’know? So I decided to come live with ‘em, an’ what’s wrong wit’ that?”

Live your own truth, man.

Wonder Man asks the very pertinent question of how Hugo knows all this about the Crawlers when they don’t even have mouths. But apparently “Crawlers don’t need mouths -- they talk wit’ their minds!”

Yeah.

Suddenly the street toughs burst in to ‘save’ Hugo and ‘violence’ the Crawlers.

Or the ‘street dudes’ as Beast dubs them.

The street dudes aren’t actually that effective a vigilante gang because the Crawlers just start kicking their collective asses.

They were bred to cope with all kinds of gravity, Beast speculates based on no evidence.

They weren’t bred for anything. They were random chemicals dumped into a sewer that mixed with other random chemicals. Its a wonder that any part of their original design manifested.

But kicking the asses of the street dudes has the Crawlers in such a frenzy that Beast grabs Hugo and runs off. Wonder Man skedaddles too. As do the street dudes.

Hugo protests that the Crawlers would never hurt him but when a blue gorilla man tells you to git you git.

The two Avengers bring Hugo back home and we instantly see why Hugo thought living in the sewer was preferable.

Hugo’s mom: “I will tell you what is happening, jovencito! You are going to do the chores you have not done for the three days you have been hiding! And then you will go to bed without your supper!”

Hugo: “But, mamacita! I wasn’t -- !”

Hugo’s mom: “Mocoso! Don’t you dispute my word!”

And then she slaps him.

And then she calls Beast and Wonder Man freaks and tells them to gtfo.

Beast: “Sheesh. It’s a wonder Hugo didn’t take off before he did!”

Wonder Man: “I know, Beast. This isn’t exactly what you’d call a happy ending.”

Meanwhile and confusingly, we see the street dudes marching down the streets carrying dynamite and fire bombs that they stole from the construction company Lenny works at. And now that they know where the Crawlers live, they can “skrag those slimy grubs for good!”

Meanwhile, Wonder Man complains about how unreal this whole evening has been as the fog renders things in weird colors.

Beast: “I know what you mean. I almost expect Rod Serling to step out of the fog any minute and say --”

Juanita:  “Help! P-please!”

Apparently right after the two Avengers left, Hugo climbed out a window and ran away again because why wouldn’t he?

Juanita is worried that the Crawlers will think Hugo an enemy and hurt him.

So time to go sloshing around in the sewer again, I guess.

Geez. If Beast had dried-in sewer stink in his fur no wonder Hugo and Juanita’s mom told him to gtfo. Smelling like that.

Meanwhile, the street dudes go swimming in the gross scum-crusted river.

As you know, street dudes have an impeccable sense of direction so they locate the drainage tunnel that’s adjacent to the Crawler’s lair and plan a bundle of TNT on it with a long enough fuse that they can go into the sewers and herd the Crawlers near the explosion.

Meanwhile, inside the sewers Juanita tries to convince Hugo to return home instead of, y’know, living in a sewer with monsters.

But Hugo flips the script.

Hugo: “Ah, my sister, still you do not understand. This place is a sewer, si -- but is it any filthier, or any less kind, than the world above? Why don’t you stay here with me? The Crawlers do not yell, they do not hurt. This could be our new home, Juanita. Please, say you’ll stay?”

And she looks like she’s seriously considering it when the street dudes burst in and start throwing explosives and yelling about how they’ll rescue the kids.

Holy shit I think they killed that Crawler. I can see Crawler chunks flying...

Beast tries to punch some sense into the dudes but they are beyond logic punches and continue throwing molotov cocktails which ignites the chemical in the water.

Hugo has to watch as his Crawler friends burn alive.

Traumatizing.

But not for long. Because the explosives set outside blow a hole in the sewer drawing all of the sewer water into the equally gross river.

The Crawlers get swept out but so does Hugo.

Juanita begs him to hold onto her but he lets go and is swept out.

Hugo: “Juanita, I... I cannot! These are my friends... and I belong with them. I’m going home, Juanita. Good-byyyyye...”

Okay. So that child is super dead.

The dudes and the Avengers and Juanita climb out of the sewer where they are confronted by Mrs Lopez who yells at Juanita for sneaking off without telling her.

Juanita tries to tell her that Hugo is not coming back but Mrs Lopez just says “Good riddance.”

Well.

Beast threatens to punch her in the face but Juanita asks him not to.

Juanita: “No, senor, please! There are some things that you cannot change! So do not mourn for me -- rejoice for Hugo. For he, senors... is the fortunate one.”

Bleak.

With the thick mists casting everything in weird psychedelic shades, Beast contemplates what just happened.

Beast: “What kind of world is it when a little kid is better off floating out to sea with those monsters instead of going home with his own family!”

Wonder Man: “I don’t know what kind of world it is, Beast. I don’t even know what place this is. Maybe we can find out after we get these punks to the local precinct house and --”

But the street dudes have vanished and Beast suggests that they two likewise.

As the sun rises, the fog and/or mist finally dissipates and Beast and Wonder Man find their way out of labyrinthine backstreets to a familiar intersection.

They even spot a cop and run towards him, which you can do when you are 1) in a comic book, 2) a superhero, and 3) not overly bothered by bullets.

They tell him that they can explain the explosion and fire by the river a little while ago but the cop hasn’t heard of any explosion or fire. And Beast... isn’t explaining it very lucidly.

Beast: “Y’see, there were these anaerobic mutations called “Crawlers” who lived in the sewer, and they were attacked by this mob of street punks who disappeared into thin air and--”

Out of respect for Beast being an Avenger and a large furry blue man, the cop does call to check with dispatch but they say that there have been no disturbances called in from that area.

You’d think that just on the strength of the Avengers’ words, the cop would go check out the story.

If an Avenger tells you an explosion happened they probably know what they’re talking about. Avenger life is like 70% explosions.

Beast wonders loudly right in front of a cop that a kid died tonight and they’re the only ones that know about it. Wonder Man just muses that maybe that’s just the way it’s supposed to be and bids the cop adieu.

The cop doesn’t at all react to Beast talking about dead kids. I figure he’s coming off the graveyard shift and in that state of exhaustion where if something doesn’t happen right in front of him it doesn’t exist.

A half hour later, Wasp and Hawkeye enjoy coffee and donuts when Jarvis comes into the kitchen to let them know that Beast and Wonder Man have returned and are currently resting in the ground-level lounge. Y’know, to differentiate from the other lounges this literal mansion has.

Wasp and Hawkeye go to rub in the fact that they got to fight Ultron but they find that Beast and Wonder Man are sound asleep on the couch. They’re even sort of sleeping on each other. Kind of cute.

Wasp: “Well, how do you like that? We save the world, and they act like it was them who’d had the great adventure!”

Hawkeye: “Yeah, I guess some people just don’t know when they’ve got it easy...!”

Hahahahahahahahahaha, well then!

Beast, why are your solo-ish filler-ish stories such bonkers ridiculousness? Between this and the Martyr Perplex, I’m thinking maybe we need to forbid you from ever having adventures away from a team.

What even happened here? All the events of this issue were just kind of debunked on the penultimate page so we don’t even know if any of it happened.

And with the weird mist painting everything in psychedelic colors and things just happening, there's this feeling of unreality over all of it.

It doesn’t feel like a dream because it lacks a dream logic. And we see stuff from the perspective of not Beast and Wonder Man.

It does feel like maybe something that happened once. Events seem to proceed as they would with little input from Beast and Wonder Man who are pulled along for the ride, like a young boy dragged out of a sewer.

There’s this feeling I get that events would have gone as they did even if the Avengers never got involved.

My best guess is that they experienced something like a ghost story, a tragedy that did occur once upon a time.

But there’s not really support for that. There’s not really support for anything except that a weird sequence of events happened and nobody but Beast and Wonder Man experienced it.

Or hey maybe there were just psychotropic drugs in that weird omnipresent fog mist. That’s equally likely!

I don’t know why this story was told. Michelinie evidently wanted to fill in where Beast and Wonder Man were during the Ultron story and I guess credit where its due for writing something truly unique instead of just... some other stock superhero adventure like foiling a bank robbery or something.

Its just so goddamn weird and its such an inconsequential issue that I couldn’t find anyone else really talking about it.

Next time, things are uncomfortable in a different way as we get a two-parter of the Avengers fighting a yellow peril villain from the ‘50s, the Yellow Claw.

Why?

Follow @essential-avengers. Because you think I’m a nice, interesting person or maybe because you like reading about someone reading about Avengers.

[4percent]

1- Probably the time bubble adult version of Elely from Wakfu. Shes just,,,,hhhh,,,

2- GRILLED CHEESE. PEANUT BUTTER AND JELLY IS STRAIGHT UP DISGUSTING

3- Its not a specific show, but usually one of my fav podcasts.

4- I'm 15. I dont drink.

5- The oldest pair of offbrand converse shoes ever. The sole is ripping apart from the shoes but Im not throwing away my babies.

6- uhh idk

7- Do I look like i remember that

8- I haven't ever worked, I'm not old enough to need to care for myself

9- A basket of laundry I need to put in my closet.

10- Uhh not books but I have an autograph from a band because their manager was in physiotherapy where my dad works at and he treated her. He often gets thank you gifts and that time it was an autograph.

11- Inside, drawing

12- Ive never eaten a bagel

13- Instant noodles or heat up pizza

14- FAVOURITE MUG. OKAY THIS ONE IS GREAT. There exists a pic of me with the caption "I am 30" and i found a super big mug in a store that had a warning sign on it that said "30" and there was a bell on it with the exact same warning sign. So now i have a 30 mug. I love that one so much.

15- Caramel Macchiato. I may not be everyones taste and I'm a bit mainstream, but for those who dont hate mainstream stuff its hard to dislike me. (Not meaning to sound entitled, it's just that I'm not a person you usually dislike. Maybe I'm a bit too loud for u but thats okay)

16- "This vibe, this night, this life" (originally german), Song is Hardcore High by Juju.

17- Herbal all the way, but im not gonna hate on fruit teas. Theyre all right but I just love herbal teas.

18- idrc about what others think of the shows i watch

19- None.

20- I have white and black socks and thats it. My white socks are short and the black ones are long so it rlly depends on the weather.

21- Yeah I was a horse girl until a horse bit me in the back and ripped a muscle

22- Anime. Like REALLY anime.

23- Nah, I'm 15 what would I do

24- Idk what the fuck that is

25- Depends if im in the mood.

26- Grape juice.

27- idk i usually know what im looking for

28- enjoying music

29- Juju. Shes great.

30- Nowhere really

31- The cutie stuff with crop tops.

32- Sunset colored clouds.

33- I dont really have the nerves to care for a pet. Like, daily. If I'm at my friends and have to help walk her dogs or brush the cats, feed the turtles and guinea pigs thats fine but i can't do it daily.

34- Surprisingly photographs! Of my friends :))

35- uhhh what would you do if we kissed meme on my ribcage

36- Im not into the superhero stuff hehe

37- Oceans

38- I was born back then and im not rlly into that music so-

39- Shorts and a T-shirt

40- The left end of the couch.

41- Knives

42- Gib Ihm by Shirin David because her voice was so annoying to me at first

43- oof idk

44- I talk a lot in my captions

45- WHAT ARE THOSE?? They are my crocs!

46-Pizza.

47- Nothing?? American culture confuses me

48-Tf is jello

49- The night me and my friend slept on a trampoline.

50- Im bad at any sport what do you expect

Quarantine Asks: Questions You Usually Wouldn’t Think of Asking But You’re Bored AF

Animated character that was your gay awakening?

Grilled cheese or PB&J?

What show/YouTube video(s) do you put on in the background when you when you don’t have anything to watch but you want something on?

Your go-to bar order, if you drink?

What’s your favorite pair of shoes that you own?

Top three cuisines?

What was your first word as a child (that wasn’t a variation of “Mom” or “Dad”)?

What’s a job that you’ve had that people might be surprised to find out you’ve had?

Look up. What’s directly across from you?

Do you own any signed books/memorabilia in general?

Preferred way to spend a rainy day?

What do you get on your bagels? What WOULD you get if you had access to anything you wanted?

Brunch or midnight snacks?

Favorite mug you own

What coffee drink would you describe yourself as?

Pick a song lyric to describe your current mood (and drop the name and artist!)

Fruity or herbal teas?

What’s that one TV show that you’re a little bit embarrassed to watch but you still like nonetheless?

That book you were forced to read for class but actually ended up enjoying?

Do you match your socks?

Have you ever been horseback riding?

What was your “phase” when you were younger? (i.e., Mythology Nerd, Horse Girl, Space Geek, etc)

Have you ever been to jail?

What’s your opinion on Lazy Susan’s (the spinning tray in the middle of tables)?

Puzzles?

You can only have one juice for the rest of your life, what is it?

What section do you immediately head for when you walk into a bookstore?

What’s one thing you’re trying to learn/relearn in your downtime right now?

Who’s your go-to musical artist when you’re feeling upbeat?

Where could someone find you in a museum?

What’s that one outfit in your closet you never get the chance to wear but want to?

Rainbows, stars, or sunset colored clouds?

If you could own any non-traditional pet (dogs, cats, fish, rodents, etc), what would it be?

Do you have more art on your walls or more photographs?

You have to get one meme tattooed on your body, what meme is it and where does it go?

Pick a superhero sidekick to hang out with

Lakes, rivers, or oceans?

Favorite mid-2000s song

How do you dress when you’re home alone?

Where do you sit in the living room (we all have a preferred spot, and you know it)?

Knives or swords?

A song you didn’t think you’d enjoy but ended up loving

Pick an old-school Disney Channel Original Movie

Are you a “Quote that relates to the photos” caption-er, an “explanation of where I took the photos” caption-er, or a no caption kinda person when you post pictures online?

Name a classic Vine

What’s the freezer food that you stock up on when you go to the grocery store?

How do you top your ice cream?

Do you like Jello?

What’s something that you don’t have a picture of that you wish you did?

How are you at climbing trees?

[misssophiachase]

25 Days of Klaroline + Mikaelson Siblings (photo not mine obviously, credit to Julie Plec). This is a totally crazy and crack like take on the 12 Days of Christmas theme with some family goodness (and lots of bickering).

We Are Family

"I did not sign up for this, Nik," Rebekah managed to bite out through gritted teeth. "You know how much I hate cows."

"And here I thought you'd feel a special kinship with your kind, Rebekah." Kol appeared from the balcony of the compound, surprisingly relaxed given their enormous task.

"Shut it Kol before I come up there and do it for you! What the hell happened to all your bloody minions? They should be doing the dirty work, big brother."

"Caroline and I set down some ground rules and agreed that our presents this year needed to be assistance free, and uncompelled."

"You mean Caroline set down the ground rules? Because that sure as hell doesn't sound like you, Niklaus," Elijah confirmed. "Last time I checked this plan isn't asistance free." 

"Ah, semantics. I'm sure she meant my minions, there's no way in hell she'd ever expect you to help me in the first place with..."

"Hard labour?" Elijah muttered. "Geese are vicious. I have feathers down my shirt and rips in my best suit trousers from those pests."

"You realise you don't have to wear a suit all the time, right? Especially when wrangling wayward animals."

"I know fashion is a foreign concept for you Kol but putting that fact aside, I don't recall asking your opinion."

"I don't know it's not so bad, Elijah."

"That's because you were auditioning all those maids-a-milking," Rebekah drawled. "You realise they only liked you because they needed the job, right?"

"Niklaus, why do I have to put up with this immaturity?"

"Says the biggest 1000 year-old child in the room. If anyone is putting up with anything it's me."

"I think we all are," Elijah offered, his normally even tone strained. Klaus figured his resolve must have been weakened by the run-in with his feathered friends. "I just hope Caroline truly appreciates this circus you’re planning for Christmas, Niklaus." 

"It's not a circus," he bristled, defensively. When Klaus had awoken from such a vivid dream, he knew exactly what to get Caroline. She loved unique gestures and Christmas and he knew this would be one of his best plans yet.

Trying to garner his family's assistance was another challenge but after much bickering, physical altercations and blackmail they'd come to an agreement, albeit reluctantly. 

"I need a status report," he instructed, changing the subject. "Elijah. Drummers and Lords?"

"Booked."

"Did you ever think we could have possibly modernised this little show of Christmas affection?" Klaus chose not to entertain his inane suggestions.  

"If Kol had his way we'd have strippers stripping," Rebekah teased, poking her tongue out at her brother.  

"Rings, Rebekah?"

"I picked them up from the jeweller yesterday, got myself a few other pieces on your tab for my trouble." Of course she did. It was always about Rebekah after all.

"What else, am I forgetting?" He said, more to himself than the others.

"I had a little trouble with the partridge," Kol admitted. "Do you know how difficult it is to find one of those already in a pear tree?"

"And I thought I was the blonde one," Rebekah scoffed.

"But day one is tomorrow," Klaus hissed, feeling like his best laid plans were unravelling thanks to his inept siblings who couldn't remember the lyrics to a well known English Christmas carol.

"No, that's day two," he insisted. "A partridge and a pear tree."

"No day two is calling birds," Rebekah answered knowingly even though it was in fact four.

"Are you sure it's not swans? I found these splashing around in my bath," Katherine growled, as they majestically waddled in behind her. "And I have no intention of cleaning it up." 

"What are they doing here already?" Klaus was pacing now, unsure of how to proceed he was that mad. "It's not day seven yet."

"But I got seven geese," Elijah murmured.

"You did what?"  

"It was a traumatic experience Niklaus but I'm fairly certain there were seven snapping at my nether regions."

"Sounds like Katherine, the house guest that will never leave," Kol joked.

"Sleep with one eye open is all I'm going to say Mikaelson," she meowed. "I might have a little, white oak surprise watiing."

"Enough!" Klaus shouted, his patience well and truly worn out. "All I asked was for you to do one thing and you can't even stop bickering long enough to do it."

"Any reason there are some guys in tights leaping around the yard?" Klaus stilled, why did she have to come home at that exact moment?

"Who cares?" Kol rebuffed. "Look, we have swans, darling." If this was his attempt at deflection, Klaus was worried.

"Any connection to the hens in the kitchen sink?" She asked curiously, her blue eyes regarding Klaus curiously.

"I was prepping them for Christmas dinner," Rebekah offered weakly.

"What is going on here?" Klaus knew by the hands on hips stance, the game was up. "There's only so much poultry I can handle in the same space."

"Hear, hear," Katherine agreed, giving the swans a dirty look.       

"I was planning on surprising you for Christmas," he murmured. "Surprise."

"What exactly did you do besides robbing Noah's ark of all its animal life?"

"It wasn't me," he blurted out. "It was them. I mean I don't know how difficult it is to take on a very simple task."

"Simple task?" Elijah shot back.  

"Last time I checked the rules state that we can't have any assistance, Klaus. What part of that don't you understand?"

"I did a bit."

"Oh, which part?" Rebekah insisted, now her hands were firmly on hip. "Did you organise the cows, the rings, the turtle doves?"

"The maids, the dancers, the pipers..."

"Fine, alright," he growled. "But silly me for thinking any of you could pull this off," he scoffed. "I promise I was doing all this for you, love."

"Don't you love me, you rule breaker," she huffed.

Knowing Caroline intimately he couldn't miss the slight tugging at the corners of her mouth. One look around the room told Klaus she wasn't the only one. Before too long they errupted in fits of laughter, even Katherine who didn't have a sense of humour most of the time.

"You set me up!"

"I can't believe you don't think we know the lyrics," Elijah scoffed, his offence obvious. 

"That's what you get for flauting the rules, Klaus," she smirked. She looked pretty hot right now but Klaus was supposed to be mad not attempting to jump his girlfriend.

"So, I know what your motives were," Klaus said pointedly to his girlfriend. She was a stickler for the rules, that's for sure. "But what about the rest of you?" He accused, wagging his finger in their direction.

"Are you kidding? Messing with you is my favourite past time," Kol chuckled. "Actually it's something we all have in common." Even his girlfriend by the looks of it. Sudden'y he realised she fit in perfectly fine.

"Yeah, who says we don't agree on anything?"

"We had a talk," Caroline began. "I was suspicious about your unlawful activity and your siblings wanted to play with you, as usual."

"Me too," Katherine offered. Klaus cocked his left eyebrow in his brother's girlfriend's direction. "What can I say? I'm still pissed about that whole 500 year vendetta."

"So, we made a deal."

"I don't think I like the sounds of this." Klaus hated being left out just as much as he hated secrets.

"In exchange for the prank, we get the compound all to ourselves after the holidays."

"We can only take so much noise within these paper thin walls and you are worse than rabbits," Kol groaned.

"Now, that's a visual I didn't need, Kol," Rebekah cursed. Then it struck him, his girlfriend was brilliant. He knew it before but now it was truly confirmed. Maybe she would fit in with their manipualtive family after all. This had been her plan all along to get them out of the house. It was genuis.  

The way Klaus saw it, being far away from his siblings was a definite bonus after the drama they'd no doubt inflict over the holidays. 

"I can't believe it," he muttered, pretending to be angry. "And if you want to keep your livers I suggest you disperse so I can have a word with my girlfriend here. Oh and while you're at it you might want to check there's no other wildlife present in the compound."

"I'll swap you," Elijah offered to Katherine. "Geese for the swans."

"If anyone finds a maid around the place, feel free to send her to my bedroom," Kol chuckled.

"Charming, Kol," she drawled. "Well, I don't know about anyone else but I'm definitely keeping the rings."

"You sneaky thing," he grinned, pulling her into his arms once they were out of vampire earshot. "You planned this

"No, that was you with all that rule breaking," she deflected. "I was just working with what I had."

"I just wanted it to be special," he implored, running his hands through her golden locks.

"The thought was there, no matter how huge. The reason I came up with those rules wasn't to be annoying. I don't need grand gestures, Klaus. You could have drawn me a picture and that would have been more than enough."

"I draw you pictures all the time though."

"And I love everyone of them," she smiled. "But just for future gift-giving reference, I have a huge bird phobia."

"Noted," he murmured, grazing his nose against hers. "Then I'm not sure you should be out in the open with all these birds on the loose, probably best we take this to the bedroom until all wildlife has been captured. Don't you think, love?"

"Knowing your siblings that might take a while so I fully support that plan," she grinned wickedly, leaning in to capture his mouth with hers before pulling him upstairs. Maybe if they were lucky the siblings would make themselves scarce sooner.  

[juminsswife]

Some simple RFA headcanons

Jumin: -loves when his s/o wears red lipstick-not nearly as kinky as people think he is -has no idea what curly fries are -fave animal after cats are fish, which is why he has them in his house -when he’s super stressed you may catch him standing there staring at the fish with a dead look in his eyes -knows the sesame street theme song by heart (this one is kinda canon lol) -was deathly afraid of the character big bird as a toddler and would cry when he saw him, but grew out of it quickly -got teary eyed at mc and V’s wedding -once asked jaehee to bring him a popular flavor of donut so he could try it. when she put the glazed donut in his hand, he stared at it for about 20 seconds as it started to melt on his fingers before looking up at her and saying blankly, “It’s gross.” -but he secretly ate it later anyway out of pure curiosity  -doesn’t care much for TV but has somehow seen the fullmetal alchemist series and he actually really enjoyed it, but nobody knows this -Was once offered a laffy taffy at work, to which he replied, “No thank you. I must not laugh at work.” -he said this with an impassive face in attempt to make a joke. -it did not make his employee laugh. -likes pizza but has only tried the fancy, healthy gourmet version his chef makes for him -gets along surprisingly well with young children

Zen: -Loves playing with his s/o’s hair idly. like he’ll be turning a random lock of her hair in his fingers when they’re next to each other even though his own hair is long enough to do that  -is used to getting compliments so they don’t surprise him EXCEPT when his s/o compliments him, it still makes him blush because he knows she’s not saying it to suck up to him, it’s an honest compliment -has never been to the beach or seen the ocean in real life, but he thinks it would be a really romantic setting for a date -cried when his first child was born -is okay at cooking but TERRIBLE at baking even in a toaster oven he somehow always burns it -last one in the RFA to get married -he describes his eye color as “bright ruby” -loves watching plays as much as he loves acting in them, and has written drafts of plays of various genres and themes -loves Mexican food -has been cutting his own hair for 4 years now to save money -a big fan of Beyonce  -has seen Phantom of the Opera 7 times already and owns it on VHS

Jihyun: -can’t sleep in complete darkness, so he actually uses a night light -he used to visit the aquarium with jumin when they were kids -not too keen on PDA but he does have a habit of kissing mc’s hand in public and often holds her hand -doesn’t care for horror movies, but they don’t scare him either -loves rock music, and piano paired with electric guitar -is terrible at playing instruments -doesn’t like bell peppers -eats cheerios bc he thinks they really do help with cholesterol  -its really difficult to make him angry, and when he does get angry it can be hard to tell because his face will be really calm and he still might even be smiling -jumps a lil when he hears someone curse in public (LOL) -loves the desert and uses it as inspiration for his paintings a lot -can speak the most english out of everyone in the RFA except for Saeyoung, who knows 18 languages -was never called by his name (Jihyun) by anyone except MC, including Rika. -doesn’t know much about memes but he likes Kermit the frog -grows a lot of flowers, herb, and vegetables in a backyard garden, where he spends a lot of time in with a giant sun hat like a really cute old man -has that super beautiful, charming Chris Traeger-esque smile that can convince anyone to say agree with him, but this doesn’t work on the RFA since all the talking is done in chatrooms or the phone and they know him too well

Saeyoung: -scared of butterflies -Elizabeth 3rd actually REALLY likes him and Jumin lowkey hates it so much -tried to hold a seance for the internet famous cat Tama, a calico cat who worked as a station master at the Kishi station railroad in Japan before passing away -really good at diy, he and mc do a lot of random and possibly crazy science experiments in their house  -once pranked mc by acting upset and then telling her he was pregnant and she was the father, mc actually believed him for a solid 9 seconds -current password for his front door has to be spoken in an accent like Shrek -can dance perfectly the entire song “Catallena” by orange caramel -he and mc rarely fight but when they do disagree on something he’ll talk to her in another language just to get on her nerves. it makes her laugh but also stuns her bc it reminds her of how freaking smart he is bc he knows 18 diff languages -on the other hand when she’s mad at him she won’t call him Saeyoung, she’ll call him Luciel, and on the rare occasion where she’s really pissed at him, “Seven Zero Seven.” -Loves the song Rocketman by Elton John -forgets to take down holiday/seasonal decorations for months after the holiday has passed

Yoosung: -is actually really good at coming up with lyrics on the spot and rapping them to a beat -has a really tiny sneeze -has the prettiest eyes in the RFA -quit LOLOL for the most part, only plays it here and there when he has free time now -likes kpop, specifically 2ne1, and was disappointed when they were disbanded -he forgets that he’s not naturally blonde a lot -loves couple items and having matching clothes/items with his s/o. he really wants to do a whole matching coord one day -Took full responsibility for Rika after she was finally placed in a center to take care of her mental health, is really supportive and visits her whenever he can so she knows she’s not alone -somehow always manages to win at carnival games no matter how rigged they appear to be -Favorite superhero is Nightwing -wants to buy his s/o an engagement ring from Tiffany and Co. and is saving money for it -wanted to be a pilot as a child but gave up that dream when he was older because he was afraid of heights -has written a 42 chapter long fanfiction based on the world of LOLOL. His penname is not his real name, so no one knows he wrote it except for Seven, who never mentioned it out of kindness. The fanfic has over 2000 reviews and is known famously in the LOLOL fanbase for how well it was written -can’t handle the taste of coffee no matter how sweetened it is, it always still tastes bitter to him

Jaehee: -loves sushi -sometimes forgets that she doesn’t actually need glasses to see -the walls of her house are covered in post-it notes with reminders of stuff she needs to do, whether its for work or for personal -likes growing her hair out but it gets tangled really easily and has to be combed through at least once every day so she’s always cutting it a bit here and there -designed the uniform for her cafe herself -has low blood pressure -owns a lot of watches bc people constantly gift them to her -wears really low heel shoes bc she’s terrible at walking in them -Has a habit of sticking her pens behind her ear and then forgetting they’re there -doesn’t like pet names -Was never really good at art or very creative as a child and it effected her self-esteem -can’t draw anything more complicated than stick figures, but somehow is pretty good at latte art -the number one thing on her wish list is an ebook reader, and to have enough free time to read a book on it -played the flute well in high school but never really liked it -has seven alarms set up in her phone that go off everyday for different reasons -is the most fearless at catching bugs or spiders than anyone else in the RFA -doesn’t have a pet bc she’s afraid she wouldn’t have the time to care properly for it, but if she could have one she would like a snake, turtle or small reptile

[themurphyzone]

Secret Santa Ch 2

Fun fact about this story: I actually determined who would be the giver and recipient through a random draw. Well, it’s not completely random. I set aside Milo so he would be the last one. And let me say this, chance has a fun sense of humor.

Ch 2: Chad

“Milo! We’re out of control!” Zack screamed.

Chad tightened his grip on Melissa’s shoulders as they plowed into yet another snow bank, which unfortunately did nothing to slow the huskies down. “We’re gonna die, aren’t we?” he asked.

“Have a little more faith in Milo,” Melissa said confidently. She scared Chad. How could anyone remain so eerily calm while constantly hanging around Milo?

It was a trait that made Melissa feared around the school. The fact that she never, ever lost bets was only secondary.

Except for the time she lost five bucks to Lydia, but all witnesses remained tight-lipped about that incident.  

A small, high-pitched bark sounded from the back of the sled. Everyone glanced over to see Diogee waiting obediently for an order.

“Diogee, go-wait, that’s it! I need a small object that Diogee can easily carry!” Milo yelled, wincing when a sharp branch cut a thin line off his jacket sleeve.

The road was bumpier now, and everyone was hanging on for dear life. “All I have is a pair of earbuds!” Zack shouted. Milo reached back for the earbuds, then sprayed it with something that smelled suspiciously like chicken.

“Diogee!” Milo called.

He perked up, taking the chicken-scented earbuds in his mouth and jumping off the sled. He kept pace with the lead husky for several seconds, then darted towards the left path, which would loop them back to town and let them avoid the wolf-infested Coyote Woods.

The lead husky barked once, then followed Diogee. The sled shifted abruptly, making everyone lose their balance.

Once they hit a main road, Diogee dropped the earbuds. The huskies suddenly ground to a halt, all crowding around the object as they sniffed it curiously.

Chad and Zack fell over from relief. At least they would still be alive to see another Christmas. However, the jury was still out for New Year’s.

“Good boy, Diogee,” Milo said, petting his head. “You’d better go home now if you want to lick the bowl of Mom’s dog-friendly Christmas cookies.”

Diogee licked him and ran off.

“That was my only pair of earbuds,” Zack complained, poking at the mess of wires in the snow.

“I don’t use them,” Milo admitted. “Long cords that fray easily and me don’t mix that well. Melissa can tell you all about the time I got myself tangled in a cord extension behind the teacher’s desk in fifth grade and no one noticed until recess was over. Isn’t that right, Melissa?”

Melissa seemed too preoccupied with the huskies to notice. “Aw, aren’t you a good boy?” she cooed to a pure white one that almost blended with the snow. “Yes, you are! You didn’t mean to lead us on a death trap!”

“Melissa?” Chad coughed.

Her head shot up in alarm. “Huh? Someone say my name? Oh, yeah. When Milo was in fifth grade, he got tangled in a cord extension behind the teacher’s desk and no one noticed until recess was over. I think I’m gonna call this one Jack.” She immediately went back to talking with the huskies.

“Ooh, as in Jack London? He wrote Diogee’s favorite book!” Milo asked. “Can we call this one London? Or maybe Balto?”

Chad raised an eyebrow. “Your dog can read?”

“Well, yeah!” Milo said. “Why wouldn’t he be able to? He also likes that series about the feral cats.”

That sounded hard to believe. Then again, it was Milo after all.

“Well, I’ve had enough near-death experiences for a week,” Chad yawned. “I’d better get home now. Got some research to do.”

“Okay, see you at the Secret Santa party!” Milo exclaimed. Zack gave a thumbs-up, nudging Melissa. She waved dismissively, uninterested in anything that wasn’t a husky.

“Bye!” Chad exclaimed, an idea already forming in his mind over his gift.

“-and then Diogee got the huskies to follow him with the chicken-scented earbuds, saving us from certain death!” Chad finished. “Who knew moving death traps could be so inspiring for gift ideas?”

Leonardo retreated inside his shell.

Chad sighed. “You always do that when I tell you about my day.”

It was okay though. Donatello had always been the better listener between the two turtles anyway.

“Well, Zack is a newcomer,” Chad continued. “I guess if I moved somewhere and befriended the local kid with a bad luck streak longer than the Nile, I wouldn’t know that I should always have a few spare ear buds lest the pair I use get destroyed by unforeseen circumstances.”

Donatello blinked, stretching his neck in a slow nod.

“You’re the bomb,” Chad grinned. Donatello was definitely getting extra mealworms for his dinner. “Now, before I buy the earbuds, I don’t think it would hurt to find out Zack’s favorite color first.”

He retracted what he said earlier. Apparently trying to find out Zack’s favorite color while playing twenty questions in the cafeteria hurt a lot.

The cafeteria monitors were rushing around the cafeteria and attempting to restore order while the students panicked. Chad ducked under the table for cover as the Flying Spaghetti Monster slathered bright red puddles of marinara all over the ceiling and walls.

“I can’t believe this,” Melissa huffed, crouching uncomfortably next to Chad. “You’d think people would learn by now to be careful with Mr. Drako’s special family recipe.”

“I’m on my seventh question, right?” Chad asked over the sound of Milo revving up a portable vacuum cleaner.

“Eighth now,” Zack said.

Milo put on a pair of eye goggles and rubber gloves for protection. “This monster has terrorized the innocent denizens of Jefferson County Middle School for far too long,” he growled in an odd lower pitch that Chad hadn’t heard since the day with the sentient blob.

Zack checked his phone. “It’s been five minutes.”

“For FAR too long,” Milo continued. “Luckily, flying spaghetti monsters are a superstitious, cowardly lot. Remain where you are, and I’ll signal when it’s safe.” He charged out of their hiding place, shouting at the Flying Spaghetti Monster to face him man-to-food.

Noodles and meatballs scattered in every direction, though the table they were underneath held up surprisingly well.

“Now I’ve got two questions,” Chad said. “First, does Mr. Drako’s special family recipe involve blood in any of its components?”

Melissa shrugged. “I stayed after class to ask about it once. He says he substitutes paprika for garlic. That’s all I got out of him for ingredients though.”

Chad typed out a quick note on his phone so he could post that piece of information on his blog later. “Now, my second question is-“

Suddenly the table they were underneath was lifted into the air by several thick strands of noodles. Chad swore he could see himself in a dozen of the Flying Spaghetti Monster’s meatball eyes.

Meatballs were not meant to be reflective.

Milo jumped on the Flying Spaghetti Monster’s back-or what Chad assumed was its back, it was hard to tell-and switched on the portable vacuum cleaner. The cafeteria was filled with the sound of air being sucked in and terrified screeching as it tried shaking Milo off.

“Zack, look out!” Melissa yelped. She covered her eyes when Zack couldn’t evade the torrent of shredded parmesan and alfredo sauce.

“Ugh, I hate alfredo,” Zack coughed weakly, his hair dripping with sauce.

“I didn’t realize portable vacuums could hold that much stuff,” Chad said. The last bits of the Flying Spaghetti Monster disappeared, though the cafeteria still had its residue.

Milo patted the vacuum, grinning. At least his voice was normal again. Chad thought the deeper pitch was too creepy to belong to Milo. “Better get this to the dumpster before-“

The vacuum exploded, covering everyone with broken strands of noodles and marinara.

“Never mind.”

“-Zack, I just wanted to know your favorite color,” Chad sighed.

“It used to be red, but after this I’m not so sure,” Zack said, gingerly pulling a glob of marinara from his shirt. “Probably green now.”

“Mommy! Mommy! That boy’s covered in blood!” the little girl behind him screamed.

Chad set three packs of green earbuds on the counter. The cashier quirked an eyebrow at his disheveled appearance.

“If I said Milo, will that satisfy any questions you have?”

[hellosaltysaladcollectionstuff]

THE ESSAYIST IS MANY THINGS: egotistic is definitely one of them. This cuts both ways, however. Essays can be focused on the writerly self, but they can also offer an escape. As Montaigne said well over 400 years ago, one gets rather wrapped up in oneself. “I have no more made my book than my book has made me — a book consubstantial with its author, concerned with my own self, an integral part of my life.” Yet the essayist also retreats. Emerson saw his reflections as solitude, where “all mean egotism vanishes” and he becomes “a transparent eyeball,” a “nothing.” The essay is much more than that too, of course. A riff or a sally, a fight or a laugh. A journey, a ramble, a wandering about. Beyond such meanderings — the digressions on which the essay thrives — the nature of the form is itself formless. It might be “short or long,” as Woolf wrote in 1922, “serious or trifling, about God and Spinoza,” or — recalling Samuel Butler — “about turtles and Cheapside.” But so often, as she wrote on Montaigne, the essay turns back to oneself, “the greatest monster and miracle in the world.”

Fast-forward almost a century and we have Brilliant, Brilliant, Brilliant Brilliant Brilliant by Joel Golby, which takes up (and takes down) his own monstrous ego with delicious panache. You probably know of his work. He’s a crusading hero for twenty- and thirtysomething UK renters who frequently lambastes the hellish property market in his regular “London Rental Opportunity of the Week” column for Vice. From an exposé of a toilet jammed inside a shower at the foot of the bed, to a Beckettian litany going over and over the nature of a bedsit with multiple sinks but no adequate space for a mattress, Golby wages a single-handed war against that peculiar subspecies of human: the landlord. He’s massively popular, not least with those of us destined to forever move from one overpriced grief hole to the next. Golby does absurdist humor on other themes, too. A piece asking questions about why Pete Doherty was seen “aggressively eating” a massive breakfast outside a greasy spoon in Margate; 101 ways to ruin a party; “deep dives” into property TV shows; the likelihood of certain celebrities eating worms if they go on I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! One recent column on “The New Rules of Being a Millennial” is both caustic and community-building. If Lena Dunham (as a “voice of her generation” — that now somewhat hackneyed joke in Girls) was a member of the precariat and grew up in Chesterfield, she might turn phrases like this:

The problem with the “us” thing is that we (Us) do not have a collective term for ourselves which isn’t wildly inaccurate or painfully cringey. “Hipster” suggests a level of effort that I think we’re all big enough to admit we don’t subscribe to. Does “millennials” work? Sort of, but not. It’s too broad. Plus, “millennial” is more-or-less a slur these days, isn’t it. Nobody self-identifies as one. It’s just something your dad calls people with university debt. It’s nothing. The people I’m talking about are the ones who know what De School is and don’t really know what a “James Arthur” is.

Brilliant, Brilliant, Brilliant Brilliant Brilliant is a gathering of 21 new essays and three updated pieces, and arrives at a time when emerging writers are voicing their histories and outlooks in hilarious and poignant ways that befit modern anxieties. The Chicago-based blogger-turned-writer Samantha Irby’s debut collection, Meaty, and her second, We Are Never Meeting in Real Life, both offer takes on bad sex, Crohn’s disease, life as a woman in her mid-30s, loss, and more, and recent collections from Hanif Abdurraqib, Chelsea Hodson, Scaachi Koul, and others reflect an exciting boom in the genre in the last few years alone. The essay has made a comeback, but it was always powerful. Again, Woolf said it best. “You can say in this shape what you cannot with equal fitness say in any other,” she wrote in “The Decay of Essay-Writing” in 1905: “its proper use is to express one’s personal peculiarities.”

There’s definitely something about essays, in their long-held comic tradition — “the joke” of literature, as G. K. Chesterton framed them — that resonates strongly today. After all, they are easily digestible, and in turn digest ideas. They are often simply “brain soufflés,” as David Lazar puts it in After Montaigne: a “walk-in closet of self or selves” ever more popular in our era of selfies and accumulations of followers on social media. Indeed, contemporary essays are often thoughts that gestate online, developed from blogs or one-off pieces: the sort of text with “14-minute read” under a byline for the crushing commute to work. They can also be surprisingly long and detailed, putting pay to the redundant idea that millennials cannot focus on anything beyond a shakshuka brunch, or — as the Daily Mail might interminably trot out — avocado toast. Caity Weaver’s epic quest to eat limitless mozzarella sticks as part of a TGI Friday’s promotion requires a good chunk of your time. John Saward’s classic reflections on Mike Tyson are as astute and amusing as Hazlitt. But with Golby we’re treated to two things at once: the pleasure of his wit and style as he ranges his themes, and a sustained, near-Swiftian satire on the very real and material challenges driven by the United Kingdom’s housing crisis. It’s not as simple as just laughing at £1,894 for a fold-out bed in Marylebone, or hedonism gone wrong; in Brilliant, we find a writer gunning for a fight.

In “PCM” (“Per Calendar Month”), Golby lays out the vagaries of dealing with the feudal overlords that might kick you out or take your deposit at the drop of a hat:

The landlords were very keen to stress when I was viewing the house that they were Reasonable People, which I have learned to now take from landlords as an immediate red flag that actually means “I am insanely deranged,” but I didn’t know this then; I was but a young bear cub, tiny and clear-eyed and full of trust, and plus desperate.

Golby intersperses his stories of the worst offenders with brutal, bloody fantasies of decimating each and every one: “The sound a landlord makes when you nail their toes down into the wood floor beneath them is, ‘This isn’t the definition of normal wear and tear.’” This is followed by an adroit move to his notion of “capsule coziness”: the kind of Scandinavian homely warmth called hygge that people were raving about a few years ago that in actuality equates to a herbal tea, a candle, and a “heather-colored blanket” you have to pack and move with every time the tenancy is up. Yet for all his inherently socialist leanings — this piece includes a well-researched outline of the real estate sector going back to 1986 — Golby is the first to admit that he is a slave to late capitalism’s charms. “Monopoly is the best game because the Actual Devil lives inside it,” he writes in another piece, before confessing to his rapacious greed and inhuman dealings on the board. “When I play Monopoly,” he writes,

I am David Cameron rimming Maggie off, I am Edwina Currie fucking John Major harder than he can fuck her back, I am a roaring-drunk Boris Johnson, I am Tory to the core-y, I am shaking hands with property developers in shady backroom multimillion-pound deals, I am blocking social housing to build luxury apartments in an effort to squeeze an extra £200K into my own private account, I am wearing a panama hat in the Cayman Islands and laughingly lighting a cigar with a £50 note.

In the United Kingdom there is a generational moniker: “Thatcher’s children.” If you were born in the ’80s, so the tag implies, you’ve been raised on rampant conservatism — the assumedly money-grabbing offspring spawned by her regime. But in truth we’re more conflicted. Society has raised us to believe getting on the property ladder is of paramount importance, but the reality of life-long renting and being pushed out of the city draws a big line between those who gained and those who lost under and after Thatcher. That Golby spins comedy gold from such a sorry state of affairs is testimony to how much we need a voice like his. Given his toothsome fight against oppressive property-owning profiteers, it is tempting to ascribe a cohesive political drive to Brilliant’s author. I asked him over email if he was interested in the horrors of capitalism, given how much of a theme it is in his work. “Mm, yes and no,” he responds. “My politics are, like baby-level deep. I was on a podcast the other week and everyone kept saying ‘neoliberal’ in a natural, casual air that made me sweat. I know the right and the left and vaguely where I fall on that spectrum … but beyond that I don’t feel qualified to talk. I don’t have the vocabulary.”

A similar modesty emerges with the very title of the book, even in its absurd egotism. “The title was initially there to make me laugh,” Golby explains, “then over time it became supremely annoying. It’s hard to pronounce without counting the Brilliants on your fingers: naming the book in this way has become the ultimate self-own.” One also finds this “ultimate self-own” in Golby’s approach to the book’s other major theme: masculinity. He riffs on the ineffable quality of “Machismo” (Golby’s brand is “soft knits and high necks” and a complex skin-care regime that includes the joys of an eye mask), offers an exhaustive, obsessive overview of all the Rocky films ranked in order of greatness, and marvels at Lenny Kravitz’s ability to pull off a leather jacket. (Golby decidedly cannot.) This deconstruction of masculinity accounts for some of the book’s funniest moments:

I realized a way of upgrading myself from a 5-out-of-10 to a solid 6 is to get a special trimmer to do the edging on my beard. And suddenly I went from a bar-of-soap-in-the-shower man to a guy with flannels, with precise and expensive tweezers. A guy who says this: “£55 for a moisturizer? Hell fucking yes!”

I asked Golby why masculinity can be so funny. “Well, because it’s absurd,” he replies, “but also it’s been one of the overriding influences on culture for the past million years, and we’re only just — just! — cracking out from that shadow … A lot of the things every man who has ever lived or ever died, a lot of what he has ever done, has been due to some deep roiling well of masculinity.”

I wonder if Golby is quite apart from the hegemonic masculinities (as initially theorized by R. W. Connell) that he decries. Brilliant arrives on the shoulders of gender theory: generations of feminist work with which emergent men’s studies became conversant in the 1980s, in works by Peter Schwenger, Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Lynne Segal, and many others. A major subject of such studies was the “New Man” figure that appeared in popular culture in that decade — an emotionally more intelligent, respectful of women, post-yuppie incarnation — which in turn led to the “New Lad” of the 1990s. Integral to the British “lad culture” associated with the Britpop musical genre, the “New Lad” has been characterized by Rosalind Gill as an ironic, “beer and shagging,” Nuts- or Loaded-reading, cheeky manchild. We found him in David Baddiel and Frank Skinner’s comedy and the “Three Lions” football anthem, for instance, in the TV series Men Behaving Badly and in the fiction of Nick Hornby and Martin Amis. “Ladlit,” as Elaine Showalter named it, is a direct forerunner of Brilliant, which — over 20 years after the classic “lad” film Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, and in the light shined on shameful male behavior by the #MeToo movement — inherits and plays with its own genre heritage.

On the one hand, Golby retrenches old notions of manhood. “The Full Spectrum of Masculinity as Represented by Rocky in the Rocky Movies” tangent is a somewhat limited list that veers between brute force and fragility, relying on tired myths as the joke. There’s a familiarity in this move, a well-worn trope. After all, as Steve Connor wrote in 2001 (in “The Shame of Being a Man”), talk about being a man usually has “tucked into it a snicker at its bumptious presumption”: “[W]e find it hard to take masculinity as seriously as we suppose.” That Golby turns his comedy on this theme so frequently suggests a reiteration not wholly free of its antecedents. On the other hand, however, he’s doing something utterly new with the late 2010s permutation of “lads.”

Golby’s Instagram is often one long stream of captioned images sending up exhausted “haway the lads” lager-swilling clichés with a belligerent repetition of “love and appreciation to the lads” — men and women — until it goes from funny to irritating to funny again. He’s also aware of the ways in which, as Connor puts it, “to write is to be unmanned, meritoriously to unman oneself.” Golby embraces such “unmanning.” He explores his own sensitivity and offers a catalog of “All the Fights I’ve Lost.” He’s part of a new generation that knows (yet still laughs) at how, as Connor again writes, “[m]en are spent up: masculinity is a category of ruin, a crashed category. It’s a bust.” Golby is also aware of its persistent homosocial nature: the values and relations exchanged between men, as Sedgwick’s ground-breaking work revealed. “I have to have a very small-voice conversation with myself every time I put a selfie on Instagram,” he tells me. “‘Is this … lame? Will the other boys … mock me?’ It’s an insane and stupid thing to be under a thrall to.”

The homosocial dimension of Golby’s thoughts on masculinity might explain the book’s main oddity. Brilliant has no women in Golby’s love life to speak of. No formative crushes, sex, dating stories — nothing except an encounter with a man in Barcelona selling state-of-the-art sex dolls. The cringeworthy, non-erotic nature of these scenes made me wince with the uncanny feeling Ernst Jentsch and later Freud associated with E. T. A. Hoffmann’s automaton doll Olympia in The Sandman. They are, as Golby puts it, “eerie”: “balloon-like breasts w/ bullet nipples, sagging unlocked jaw w/ a raw pink tongue, splayed neat rubberized vagina, a one-size-fits-all butthole put out with a drill.” Again, we’re less in the realm of sexuality and more in gendered constructs. Golby offers a feminist take on AI and consent, yet feels disquietingly shorn of “the pulsing core of straight masculinity” when surrounded by these uncanny valley robots. He has it both ways: exceeding the “busted” category of manhood, yet circling back to it for a laugh. Is this a new new laddism? The book provokes such a question.

There’s an adolescent immaturity to Golby’s writing, to be sure, but a joyful one, with a comedic suaveness that demands attention. He consistently delivers the jokes through distinctive stylistic moves. Words and phrases pile up in heaps until bam! — the thing tips over and you’re laughing, rereading. He even manages to pull off some comedy in the opening essay, the moving yet funny “Things You Only Know If Both Your Parents Are Dead” that appeared in an earlier form on Vice and more recently the Guardian, about being orphaned at 25. He repeats “My parents are dead” no fewer than 22 times, yet still finds humor in grief, in um-ming and ahh-ing over which kind of beer basket to plump for for a neighbor, or buying vol-au-vents at Tesco. (There was more about the ubiquitous supermarket Tesco, but it was subbed by the US editor for being a bit too British. Other Britishisms include: the cheap pub chain Wetherspoons; the cigarette papers Rizla; tights.) This is perhaps one of the most powerful things about the book: people have reached out to Golby after that essay’s first publication, “as if I am some sort of griefsaver,” but, as he says to friends, “no two griefs are the same. They are always different spikey, awkward shapes. There’s no clean, easy way to vomit grief up out of your system. It just works its way through you in whatever way it chooses to.”

In some ways, as with his romantic life, Golby keeps a lot back, but aspects of Brilliant, like his loss, are totally up front — a juxtaposition that gets us back to the question of ego. I wonder if he considers himself private. “I don’t know if I’m wildly private,” he tells me. “I tend to tweet every thought I have, Instagram my dinner with a forced hashtag and wrote an essay [“Ribs”] about attempting auto fellatio — so let’s not worry too much about that.” Golby still harbors a strong, endearing desire to go to America and “hole up in a motel room with every snack I’ve ever seen on TV and watch 24-hour news.” (He’s wanted to do this since he was about eight.) He admits that his book is all about him, as he has had to convey what it’s about to many an editor’s bemusement with “a blank stare and say something along the lines of: ‘things that I like. I am the theme.’” Ultimately, he confesses, “more than anything else it is, still, fundamentally, just an ego trip thing. I have an enormous ego. An insufferable one.”

In the end, it is Golby’s satire that carries most weight. I ask him one final question, which was always on my lips as I read his columns and choice bits of the book. Is it possible for a human being to become a landlord without turning into a monster? “No,” he replies, firmly. “It’s not possible to become a landlord without turning into a monster. It’s not even possible to conceive of the idea of becoming a landlord without some hollow part of you already being monstrous. No landlord can escape the curse of their own landlordism. Their soul is condemned before they even pull up outside the auction house.”

¤

Cathryn Setz is an Associate Visiting Research Fellow at the Rothermere American Institute at the University of Oxford. She is the author of Primordial Modernism: Animals, Ideas, transition (1927–1938) (Edinburgh University Press, 2019).

The post The Ultimate Self-Own: On Joel Golby’s “Brilliant, Brilliant, Brilliant Brilliant Brilliant” appeared first on Los Angeles Review of Books.

from Los Angeles Review of Books https://ift.tt/2FA9HRD

[naivelocus]

On choosing the 25 species for the 25 Genomes Project

By: Dan Mead, the 25th Anniversary Sequencing Project Coordinator Date: 08/01/2018

For those that don’t know (and until recently I could include myself in this group) there are A LOT of species on and in the earth. Currently it’s estimated that there are 2 billion! (2,000,000,000; see http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/693564 for details). Most of these are bacteria, and we’re not looking at those for the 25 Genomes project, but this still leaves about 450 million to choose from.

To make it easier for ourselves, we also decided to limit ourselves only to the 1.5 MILLION species that have currently been described and catalogued. And, to help us along a bit more, we decided that only species found in the UK would count. According to the National Biodiversity Network, that brings the number down to ‘only’ 56,674. Now if you choose to only look at the local area surrounding the Sanger Institute then it’s a much more manageable 318.

However, it wasn’t going to be that easy. In the spirit of the Sanger’s inclusive approach to science, the Steering Group for the 25 Genomes project were concerned that such a narrow list was ‘too parochial’ and directed that the species sequenced should be a representative group of organisms from the whole of the UK.

So, how do you filter more than 56,000 species down to just 25?

The first thing to do was to break down the problem and the idea of a 5×5 matrix was mooted, discussed and agreed upon surprisingly quickly. Rather unsurprisingly coming up with five different categories was not as straightforward as it might first appear. While some were no-brainers (iconic species for instance), getting all five nailed down was tricky.

The wisdom of crowds

So we put out a call for suggestions to the whole Wellcome Genome Campus, to draw on the collective wisdom of the more than 2000 people who work here.

The results were, by turns, pleasing, odd, not-at-all-answering-the-question and esoteric. Here are some examples:

Species for which Britain has major global richness and conservation responsibility

Female emancipation in the wild

Unusual in terms of genetic load accumulation rate and mechanism

The three-toed sloth (which is neither a theme nor from the UK)

25 local authors (and then we would really have 25 ‘novel’ genomes)

Species imported to the UK, which are making our lives healthier and happier (possibly a politically motivated suggestion)

What is ‘down there’ (in the detritus level down on the Ocean floor).

Finding five themes

Armed with these suggestions, the 25 Genomes Steering Group got back together to hammer out the final five categories. Here’s what we decided upon, reasoning that these themes should give a broad breadth of types of organism and habitats to sample:

5 Themes for the 25 Genomes Projects: Flourishing, Floundering, Cryptic, Iconic and Dangerous

Critical criteria

We also came up with a list of criteria that the species must meet:

Scientific justification must be solid– are there good questions that can be answered by the genome sequence being made available?

No decent draft sequence currently available

Sample availability– some organisms are too small, others are too protected, while others are too seasonal for collection

Tractable genome – some organisms have genomes that are incredibly complex and would take up too much time and resource. For example, many plants have cells that contain multiple copies of the same[ish] chromosomes, a phenomenon known as increased ploidy. (A hexaploid genome has SIX copies of each chromosome, and some plants have even more.)

Now there comes the hard part, actually getting the list of species. As mentioned in a previous post, our public engagement team suggested that we let the public decide five of the species, leaving us just 20.

Great you might think, as it means we don’t need to do as much work, but you’d be sadly mistaken. The reality was that I now needed a list of 20 to start collecting right away AND another 40+ that the public could vote on to decide the final five!

It’s who you know…

Rather splendidly we have a senior member of the Natural History Museum London on our steering group which meant we could exploit their contact list of some 400+ partner groups of wildlife experts. With this in mind I made a surveymonkey survey (it’s still about so you can check it out here, feel free to fill it in- you never know we might want to do more!) that, in my mind at least, cunningly hid the criteria in the questions. It also deliberately did not mention the themes so as not to steer people in any particular direction.

From this I got 99 responses (again discussed earlier) that made up most of the public vote and the 20* for getting on with, these latter ones are in the table below:

Cryptic Dangerous Floundering Flourishing Iconic Brown Trout Indian Balsam Red Squirrel Grey Squirrel Golden Eagle Common Pipistrelle King Scallop Water Vole Ringlet butterfly Blackberry Carrington’s Featherwort New Zealand Flatworm Turtle Dove Roesel’s Bush-Cricket European Robin Summer Truffle British Mosquito Northern February Red Stonefly Oxford Ragwort Orange-tailed Mining-bee

All in all, this took about 5 months to get to this stage as the species also needed to be individually reviewed to see if they met the criteria and then approved by the steering group.

Now the only problem is actually getting the species DNA; so collecting specimens and some lab work to follow, the supposed easy part….

More on this to come!

*Why we chose the above 20 species

Name

Why sequence it?

Summer Truffle There is disagreement in the literature as to whether this truffle is one or two separate species, plus it grows underground and is therefore largely unseen and difficult to locate. Prices for those collected in the UK remaining relatively stable at around 400GBP per kilo. Known as mycorrhizal, these fungi form a symbiotic association with a host plant on which they are dependent throughout their lifecycle. The sequencing of UK T. aestivum syn. uncinatum populations would be pivotal in helping to answer questions of modes of reproduction, life cycle questions as well as aiding in some core speciation questions. Brown Trout The Brown Trout has three isoforms that differ in their migratory patterns, one form remains in the locality of its birth where it will live out its life, spawn and die. The second type migrates from lakes to streams and rivers to spawn but remains in fresh water. The third form migrates to the sea/ocean and remains there for much of its life, only returning to spawn. There appears to be no genetic difference between these forms, also known as anadromous (migratory) and sympatric (resident). Additionally the Wellcome Genome Campus is built around an 18th century red brick hall, Hinton Hall, also known as Trout Hall, where a carved stone trout is prominently displayed over the main door to the croquet lawns. Carrington’s Featherwort This is selected as a representative of the liverworts, an ancient plant group predating flowering plants. It is one of the characteristic liverworts of very high rainfall areas in Scotland, and thus a representative of one of the very special groups of the British biota confined to such high-rainfall areas. Outside Scotland, it is only found in Ireland (extremely rare), the Faeroes and the Himalayas. The Scottish plants are apparently all male – like the Ents, the sexes have become separated in this species and the nearest females are in the Himalayas. Common Pipistrelle Until recently this bat was believed to be a single species however it is now know to be a dual species (common/soprano), with one other (Nathusius’) also being resident in the UK. Studying the genome will allow us to investigate the origins of the split between the two species, when and why it occurred. Indian Balsam Highly invasive weed species that substantial effort to control is undertaken, control methods based on finding would have important implications for wetland and river management. King Scallop Pecten maximus has been found to contain the Amnesic Shellfish Poisoning toxin, domoic acid, which accumulates after they consume algae/diatoms- especially in the event of algal blooms. This risk is regarded as a significant threat to both public health and the shellfish industry. Some studies have suggested that global warming is resulting in greater reproductive success for P. maximus in the UK, however concerns have been raised over increasing mortality, declining recruitment and spawning stock biomass in several Scottish populations. Pecten maximus is also of interest scientifically because of its unusual vision and because its two shell valves are coloured differently. Identifying molecular pathways for shell pigment production in Mollusca has lagged behind studies of vertebrates and terrestrial invertebrates, and is a major gap in our understanding of how colour has evolved in the natural world. Vision in Mollusca is also of great interest because of the many different eye morphologies and the fact that very few species are thought to see in colour. New Zealand Flatworm New Zealand flatworms prey on earthworms, posing a potential threat to native earthworm populations. Further spread could have an impact on wildlife species dependent on earthworms (e.g. Badgers, Moles) and could have a localised deleterious effect on soil structure. British Mosquito Mosquitos are an important disease vector and there has been speculation that an increase in the distribution of other species due to climate change could allow the re-introduction of diseases such as malaria to the UK. Red Squirrel Sequencing the whole genome of the native red squirrel will hopefully provide new tools and resources into reversing their decline and aiding their long-term conservation in the UK. For example, this research could reveal key insights into how red squirrels have adapted to living in an urban environment. This study could also provide further information for managing the spread of diseases and helping to protect the red squirrel from the fatal squirrelpox virus, as well as to gain a deeper understanding into the impact of newly-discovered diseases Northern February Red Stonefly These stonefly only inhabit the purest of waters and as such are very limited in their habitats and may struggle to adapt to climate change. Brachyptera putata is an endemic UK stonefly. There has been suggestions that other European Brachyptera species may be synonyms of B. putata. Sequencing would determine whether it is a true UK endemic. Turtle Dove Turtle Dove numbers have fallen by a staggering 93% since 1970 and now resides on the Global Red List for Endangered Species. Smaller than its collared cousin, the Turtle Dove is now only found in eastern England, where farmers are working with the RSPB to create feeding habitats, the destruction of which are blamed for the bird’s decline. Water Vole The Water vole is the UK’s fastest declining mammal and efforts to help the population maintain genetic fitness would benefit from having the genome sequenced. Arvicola is a fantastic example of a small mammal genus that survived through the last glaciation, and has adapted to a range of habitats across Europe and much of northern Asia. Oxford Ragwort The Oxford Ragwort is representative of a species being introduced and excelling in another habitat. It was collected from the slopes of Mount Vesuvius sometime in the 17th Century, and planted in Oxford where it rapidly colonised the area due to its natural hardiness, and could grow on urban landscapes too (sides of buildings, on stairs, etc.). When railways were introduced to the UK landscape, this facilitated the spread of Oxford Ragwort across the UK (it can be found growing along railway tracks today). Sequencing the genome would better increase our understanding of a non – native species excelling in a new habitat and may expand on our understanding of the ecology of flowering plants. Roesel’s Bush-cricket Once restricted to the south coast and estuaries (saltmarshes) it is now widespread, possibly due to climate change and the spreading of salt on UK roads. Ringlet butterfly Despite an overall decline in butterflies over the last 50 years the ringlet has increased its population by nearly 400%. It’s one of the few to fly on overcast days and has an interesting dwarf form that appears at 600ft, increasing until 100% of the population is this form at 1000ft. Grey Squirrel As the anti-hero for the red squirrel, investigating how/why the squirrelpox virus is tolerated Blackberry Good opportunity for citizen science, population genomics specifically for schools engagement. Also commercial soft-fruit genetics as it is an important and expanding food crop. Golden Eagle This is an iconic UK species that has suffered from hunting and pesticide poisoning in the past, leading to extinction in all parts of the UK except Scotland where there are still less than 500 breeding pairs. Orange-tailed Mining-bee This species is conspicuous and attractive, one of the mining bees that is more likely to have come to the attention of the general public. It is widespread and common throughout the United Kingdom, flying in spring. It is a component of natural pollination services which can ensure crop pollination in the absence of honeybees, and also the pollination of many wild and garden flowering plants ensuring their genetic diversity and conservation.  In the UK, of 276 species of bee, there is only one honey bee, and a score of bumblebees, the great majority of native bees are mining bees, including 68 species of Andrena.  The genome sequence itself will be useful for comparative study of the genomes of this solitary bee with the available genomes of social bees, in terms of gene composition relevant to sociality. European robin Robins use vision-based magneto-reception and the mechanism is not fully understood, it has been shown that it may involve quantum entanglement. Robins are also extremely territorial, unlike most other song birds, with up to 10% of all deaths occurring due to fights.

About the author:

Dan Mead is the 25th Anniversary Sequencing Project Coordinator, for the 25 Genomes Project for the Wellcome Sanger Institute, Cambridge.

More on the 25 Genomes Project:

25 Genomes Project web page 

— Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute Blo...

[darylelockhart]

2017 in film: a return to form for the Hollywood blockbuster

by Ari Mattes

If 2016 was the “year of the mediocre film,” as I churlishly wrote this time last year, then 2017 marked a return to form for the Hollywood blockbuster.

There were some extraordinary stand-alone films released this year. Barry Jenkins’s Moonlight (released in Australia in 2017, thus included on this list) is one of the best American films in years. It effortlessly develops its rather low-key coming of age story through an absolutely stunning visual schema, with the relationships between the surface action, the interior worlds of the characters, and the imagery creating some of the most satisfying on-screen tension this year. Moonlight deserved the Best Picture award at the 2017 Oscars: for once, the “best picture” won.

Ingrid Goes West, directed by Matt Spicer, is a painfully incisive dissection of the pathological effects of social media. Its narrative follows stalker Ingrid (Aubrey Plaza) as she moves to Venice Beach and insinuates herself into the life of Instagram celebrity Taylor (Elizabeth Olsen). It offers an, at times, deliriously uncomfortable blend of pathos and black comedy, and says more about contemporary consumer society than virtually any other American film of recent years.

Writer-director Jordan Peele’s Get Out similarly effectively critiques contemporary American culture, with its visceral blend of horror and comedy sustaining its reflection on race in the United States. It is as brutal and unforgiving as the best horror films, whilst relieving the tension at times with moments of side-splitting hilarity. Like the best genre films, it uses formula as a launch pad to say something genuinely interesting about the world (and the medium).

Daniel Kaluuya and Allison Williams in Get Out (2017). Universal Pictures, Blumhouse Productions, QC Entertainment

There were other surprisingly well-made and engaging films released in 2017 across multiple genres. Baywatch and The House are funny, sometimes stupid but always watchable big budget comedies, King Arthur: Legend of the Sword is Guy Ritchie’s best film in years, and Wind River and Sofia Coppola’s The Beguiled are engrossing mystery-thrillers.

Wind River is a soulful, Western-style cop film, set in the snowy reaches of Wyoming, and The Beguiled is a savagely funny bodice ripper, a little more pared-back than Coppola’s other work, anchored around amusing turns by Colin Farrell as an injured Union soldier and Nicole Kidman as the matriarch of the confederate-friendly household in which he convalesces. It was the adaptation Stephen King fans had been waiting for for years, offering a far less hokey take on King’s epic novel than the previous TV miniseries version.

Perhaps most surprisingly, 2017 also saw the release of the best Marvel and DC comic book films to date, as well as very good instalments in other series. Wonder Woman, whilst hardly ground-breaking, is a coherent and effectively made film, with clearly staged and executed action sequences, and an engaging performance by Gal Godot in the lead role. Thor: Ragnarok is an amazing rush of a film – one of the best of the year – blending wry comedy with psychedelic imagery and full-blooded action sequences, the whole thing punctuated by a first rate electronic score from Mark Mothersbaugh of Devo fame.

Mark Ruffalo, right, Tessa Thompson and Chris Hemsworth in Thor: Ragnarok (2017). Marvel Entertainment, Marvel Studios, Walt Disney Pictures

The Fate of the Furious, the latest in the Fast and the Furious franchise, is similarly one of the strongest in the series, with Vin Diesel at his epic best in James Bond mode. Fifty Shades Darker, directed by Hollywood great James Foley, is more convincing (though less funny) than Fifty Shades of Grey, and both Kong: Skull Island and Alien: Covenant are perfectly conceived and executed big budget fantasies, delivering a great deal more than they promise. The more minor Annabelle: Creation is similarly a pleasant surprise, a good example of high tension schlock horror. Other imperfect but nonetheless engrossing thrillers included Game of Death, Mayhem and Gore Verbinski’s A Cure for Wellness.

Non-Hollywood cinema, in contrast with 2016, seemed weaker this year, with only a handful of standout films. These included Michael Haneke’s wry take on bourgeois family dynamics in the Internet age, Happy End, Fatih Akin’s In the Fade, an intense thriller starring Diane Kruger centered around contemporary race relations in Germany, and Sami Blood, a poetic slow-burn of a film about 1930s racism in Sweden. François Ozon’s beautiful, elegiac Frantz and Olivier Assayas’ ode to the present, Personal Shopper, were other highlights.

Jean-Louis Trintignant in Michael Haneke’s Happy End (2017). Les Films du Losange, X-Filme Creative Pool, Wega Film

Of course, 2017 also saw the requisite amount of moralistic and sentimental dross emerging from the big-budget Hollywood landscape. Dunkirk is a conventional WWII propaganda film (worth-noting its context: Brexit, and the rise of nationalisms throughout Europe), Murder on the Orient Express features director-star Kenneth Branagh’s usual heavy-handed approach, and Beatriz at Dinner is a pretentious, one-dimensional, profoundly irritating experience that seems to equate opposition to global warming and environmental destruction with new-age mysticism. Other additions to series that fell equally flat include the incoherent, wildly uneven Justice League, and Spider-Man: Homecoming, which ineffectively tries to lighten its repellent class war narrative with liberal doses of tweenish humour.

The disappointments

There were only a few standout disappointments.

Blade Runner 2049 promised a lot and delivered very little. Any film that strains this hard to create meaning is going to be tough to watch – and everything about Blade Runner 2049 indicates that the people making the film consider it more profound, and more interesting, than it actually is. The sheer lack of dynamics in terms of both plot and visual elements – everything looked and felt the same – would be enough to sink this pretentious mess.

Mother!, likewise, was a potentially interesting film that, after a strong first half, quickly degenerated into trite absurdity. The allegorical implications of the narrative turn out to be completely uninspiring, and the film falls back into tedious romantic stereotypes. The first half is sufficiently intense to keep it from being a complete dud, but there’s nothing here that hasn’t been done more effectively elsewhere.

Jennifer Lawrence in Mother! (2017): a film that quickly degenerated into trite absurdity. Protozoa Pictures

Terence Malick’s Song to Song is perhaps the worst film of 2017 (and this includes The Mummy), with its combination of faux-poetic imagery and incredibly banal voice overs of characters as they think about love and life whilst attending music festivals and hanging out with cool bands and musicians. If Malick weren’t behind this, drawing on his stellar career, this film would never have been made.

There were, of course, films I didn’t manage to see, with varying degrees of promise. Some of these include: Alone in Berlin; The Red Turtle; Power Rangers; Free Fire; My Cousin Rachel; War for the Planet of the Apes; Atomic Blonde; Flatliners; and The Snowman. Each of these looks like it may offer something, be it sublime or ridiculous.

Most exciting is the list of films currently playing at cinemas. The Florida Project looks amazing, as do the Australian documentary Chauka, Please Tell Us the Time and Yorgos Lanthimos’ The Killing of a Sacred Deer. The Disaster Artist may even be worth catching before Christmas, though I’m sure it won’t be as good as The Room.

Overall, 2017 was a pretty good year for film.

Ari Mattes is a Lecturer in Media Studies at the University of Notre Dame Australia

This article was originally published on The Conversation.