#for all of the let’s voice episodes for all the trolls and kids

[r0semultiverse]

I need to start jotting down my Homestuck Beyond Canon predictions and try to turn more of them into theory posts.

I like making these big elaborate theory posts, it’s fun (though it does take a lot out of me and takes a lot of time). If I had decent editing software I would probably save some of these ideas for YouTube videos. Hell, I still might turn some of these into Youtube videos! 👀

Depending on how fast for tech stuff, IRL stuff, and the pacing of Beyond Canon... if nothing else I can make a hits and misses video of what I got right and what I got wrong. Might be fun! Let me know if you’d like to see that or if you have other ideas y’all would like to see! 💜

[a34trgv2]

The Problem With Exposition Dumps

In any form of entertainment, it's important to establish some context for the events of the story. There is a right way to do it and a wrong way. Dumping exposition onto the audience is most certainly the wrong way. For this post, I'm going to explain my problem with exposition dumps and how to better convey exposition. And in case you're wondering, no, I'm not going to put down writers who use exposition dumps as "lazy" or "pathetic."" My intent is always to educate, not belittle.

You should be familiar with what an exposition dump is as they pop up everywhere. In movies, TV shows, video games, radio podcasts and etc.. Characters will stop the story dead in it's tracks to spend more than a paragraph talking about lore, character backstorys, or the setting they're in. This makes for boring entertainment because at that point, the characters are just spouting random trivia from the story bible and not actually telling a compelling story. I'm all about fun facts and interesting lore, but not at the expense of good storytelling and creative world building.

Let's dissect this clip from Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur. Moon Girl says that she's tired, yet the way she's animated in the clip leads me to believe otherwise as she's not panting or sweating. She also mentions that the bad guy is getting stronger, then asks "but how?" I can suspend my disbelief enough to get behind a child prodigy befriending a dinosaur and fighting bad guys in New York, but I don't buy for a second she doesn't know what a troll is. But okay, let's actually assume she doesn't know what a troll is (as unlikely as that sounds); she should still put 2 and 2 together when she sees that everytime she takes his petty comments personally, he gets stronger. She should've known before this particular clip that he was feeding off her negative emotions like a parasite, or in this case, a symbiote. She then zooms in on the troll and realizes that it's a symbiote before spelling out for the audience what a symbiote's weakness is. First of all, even if people didn't know what a symbiote was, you could've still showed us what it's weakness is by having Devil roar immediately. Or better yet, leave it a mystery to be solved in a latter episode because it honestly doesn't matter too much in the context of the episode. Second, you mean to tell me this kid knows what an alien symbiote is but not a troll? This makes her less of a relatable kid who just so happens to be smart and more like a socially inept outcast who's so caught up in science and math that she's basically stupid when it comes to being a human. Not only was this exposition dump useless, but it was also poorly constructed based on what we already know about Moon Girl and what kind of girl she's supposed to be.

Is there a way to give exposition without it feeling pointless and boring, though? Actually, yes. One of the best examples I can think of is the opening to Samurai Jack. It perfectly sums up the main driving force behind Jack's quest with the late-great Mako's chilling and sinster voice, and eerie flute plaing, and the still images that look like ancient Japanese artwork. The lines used are also vague enough for the audience to fill in the gaps and we're told just enough to be invested in the story. Exposition can also be told in a way that's funny, such as in the Wander Over Yonder episode The Ball, where Beeza nonchalantly explains to Wander and Sylvia that the world is ending (again) at the paws of a giant space puppy. The comedic timing is on point as Tara Strong gives a very relaxed and soft spoken delivery as Beeza mentions cannibalism and starvation as possible fates for her people. Exposition can even be sung in a banging musical number, such as Part Of Your World from Little Mermaid, One Day More from Les Miserable, or the iconic Oompa Loompa songs from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. In the hands of the right storyteller, the exposition scene could be an audience member's favorite moment from the story.

As the saying goes, less is more. This is especially true when you're writing exposition. Dumping exposition on the audience will either frustrate them or bore them to sleep. If you're gonna give exposition during the story, try having it delivered in a way that's interesting; i.e. during an action scene like in Kung Fu Panda, a funny scene like in The Bad Guys, or in a musical number like in The Hunchback of Notre Dame. Just because exposition is necessary doesn't mean it has to be boring. Exposition is the avocado of storytelling. Alone, it's as bland and boring as paint drying on a rainy day. With the right ingredients, though, it can make for some pretty good guacamole. See you next time ✌️

[hostilemuppet]

Congrats on finishing Trollstopia! What are your final impressions?

okay, closing thoughts, none of which are particularly "clean" or "organised" or whatever but theyre what i think

so many of the morals were either nonsensical (keep it up) had good intentions but fumbled the execution (race to the crest) or outright harmful (potluck poppy). the show is at its best when you treat it like a sitcom, and not a cartoon that was teaching kids that other cultures foods are icky and undeserving of respect if they arent exactly like their own

it was so. so sorely felt that they were forced to have a song in EVERY episode instead of every other episode. dont get me wrong, some of them were good! (off the top of my head, i like "make some noise" and "a song so sweet" (synth has a really nice singing voice and they shouldve let him use it more!) and all of dantes ones were really funny bc they were usually silly lyrics on top of real life classical pieces) but most of them were........ well. forced. i hope in the tbt cartoon they go back to one song per 2 episodes, so they can make the songs actually DECENT (most of the time)

val started off as a HORRIBLE character, utterly unlikable in every way and it made every episode about her intolerable. she slowly got better though, after s1 it was like the writers realised they made her a terrible person (did they see the reaction to her? WAS there a reaction? did people love her back then?) and they toned her down and slowly made her actually develop as a character in ways none of the others did, and she actually ended up being pretty good! i like how she started mean, then grew to regret how she used to be and wants to be better. its just... yknow. its trollstopia. they fumble the execution sometimes. val did nothing wrong in murray duty, thats a dumb rule

as much as i love holly darlin........ i wish they went in the exact opposite direction for her character. in world tour, country trolls are established as being pretty gloomy (but not complete sad sacks!) so having holly be optimistic and upbeat to the point she rivals (and surpasses!) poppy? it does NOT make her a good representative of her tribe, and for the most part it seems like they forgot country trolls are supposed to be gloomy anyway... but they remembered in "the farmer and the hound"! overall i wish holly was a more subdued, melancholic character. she can still show southern hospitality (actual southern hospitality. not just her SAYING she has southern hospitality. also lonesome flats isnt even in the south of troll kingdom) but she can be a lot more quiet about it. maybe holly can ALSO develop as a character the way val did, and slowly start to show more outward joy as the series progresses, similar to branch getting happier. she and branch could even have been besties, since branch said he liked country music in the movie!

i wish they spread the focus a little more. obviously val and holly were the "main" ambassadors and i fully expected them to get the most focus, but it felt like dante got way more focus than like, the entire funk tribe combined. and to an extent i get it i mean dante is an incredible character and was clearly the crews favourite so it makes sense they used him a lot even if he wasnt the star, but... couldnt it have been spread out more evenly? maybe when you look at like, statistics itd look better but it felt like dante was always at the scene of the crime (it was a lot better in s7 though! perhaps they learned...) and i wish characters like laguna and lownote got a bit more love

and finally: i cant wait for the tbt cartoon. i know none of the main trollstopia characters will be in it and ill miss them dearly but im so excited for whats in store

[thevaudevilledemon]

Cartoon Rap Battles: Magica De Spell vs Count Duckula

Been a while... and this may be the last one of these for a good while until I can get some better creativity going. That's neurodivergencies for ya.

Magica De Spell:

Abra Cadabra, and a Bette Midler movie too I’ve summoned a vampire before that was much greater than you

You really wish to go beak to beak with one of Cartoons greatest foes? I can outwit Scrooge McDuck, so I can keep you on your toes

I’ve got control over meteors, I can alter the shape of reality While all you strive to be is a half-wit no talent celebrity

Your first Foray against a real opponent, not that incompetent Goosewing You don’t have any teeth kid, this battle was your greatest misdoing

I’ve watched your show, every episode is a slog It can’t be easy being green, let me turn you into a frog

You’re just a cowardly egotist, a juice drinking kale lover So fly back to home and cower under your bed cover

Count Duckula:

In the Vampire Hall of Fame In the heart of Transylvania There’s not a vampire Zanier than me, Duckula

Tell me to fly home, I’ve got a genuine castle you know And it’s nicer than your shack you built at the base of a volcano

You’re rival is Scrooge McDuck and you’re his ally from time to time But I find it all the more curious that you’re fighting over a stupid dime

You’re an Italian, questo è un fatto, so answer me this De Spell Why did they decide to give you the voice of Natasha Fatale?

You’re after the midas touch to make everything turn to gold But it couldn’t save your rhymes, your bars are worthless all told

Go throw a tantrum like this is yet another one of your failed plans You’re being beaten by another old duck Magica, this victory is out of your hands

Magica:

Alakazam, Klaatu and Hey Presto too! I haven’t laughed at vegan beasts like this since I watched Troll 2

I’m a sultry and seductive enchantress from comic pages You’re an improperly resurrected corpse from the middle ages

I’m dropping nothing but Foof Bombs you’re all quack and no bite Best friend of Madam Mim I’m the real terror of the night

The original Duck Witch stepping up to take over the house While you’re predated by Quacula on Mighty Mouse

This evil witch shall haunt you from the shadows for as long as I please I’m so evil and naughty I can make the Beagle Boys freeze

You’re about as threatening as an understuffed Care Bear Between us both, you’re Green Day while I’m Aurelio Voltaire

Count Duckula:

Keep shouting Pokémon names I’m sure something will happen soon I think I’d be more intimidated By the lamest of Maleficent’s Goons

Evil witch? I think the proper word is terrible You were defeated by a family you turned into animals

You turned your brother into a raven drove away your own niece Or should all this annoying cartoon multiverse garbage simply cease?

There’s too many of you Magica, there is only one of me Resurrected from DangerMouse it was Nickelodeon who summoned me

Capcom stole me for a boss, I was out a few months prior, you know? And Matt and Frank made an emo version of me for your brother Poe

You’re always outwitted by some kids you can’t even handle your own And everybody knows you want the magic wand of Lucky Gladstone

Seriously, you’re the worst witch I’ve ever had to fight You can call me Michael Stipe because this is me in the Spotlight

[ecargmura]

Wind Breaker Episode 3 Review - Patrolling The Town

This episode was a good mix of fighting and world building. It also seems that Furin High School has no teachers as the students mainly obey the top dog of the school, Umemiya, and abide by the rules of the school. It’s an interesting concept as the school doesn’t feel like a school, but rather a base of operations.

The Sakura and Sugishita fight could’ve been better, but I know they were mainly saving the animation for the latter half of the episode. Though, it was nice to see Sakura not losing to Sugishita and even getting a hit on him that caused the taller guy to get a bad nosebleed. Their fight gets interrupted when Umemiya starts his broadcast on the intercom. It was also nice to see the other Bofurin kids praising Sakura, helping him open up and soak in human warmth.

I also like that this portion of the episode shows off all of the important characters’ personality so well. Sakura is hot-headed but can be rationalized; he only picked a fight with Sugishita because the latter did it first. It’s justified. Sugishita is a rather rampaging mad dog, but he stops the moment Umemiya speaks in the broadcast. He’s super loyal to him to the point that he glares and barks at Nirei when the latter commented on how weird it was that Umemiya brought up shaved ice. Nirei is just the stressed kid with anxiety. Suo is a troll, but he also functions as the mediator. I think that’s pretty neat. The mediator role usually is calm and a bit motherly, but this guy is just trolling like he breathes in it.  There’s also Hiragi who gets introduced formally and while he seems like a grouchy guy, he’s just a dude with stomach issues. I love the little gag of him taking out stomach pain medicine and plopping them into his mouth like candy. He’s going to die of overdose one day…

Their first order of business on the first day is…to patrol the town. Yes. Instead of studying, they patrol their side of the town. Accompanied by Hiragi, who happens to be one of the Four Kings of the school and works under Umemiya, Sakura, Sugishita, Nirei and Suo walk around and help out people. The part where they get taiyaki after painting walls was so cute, especially the part where Suo gives his taiyaki to Nirei! A lot of information about the town and the gangs’ policies are dumped into this episode.

Apparently, there is another territory just under a train track bridge and it belongs to a rival gang called Shishitoren. One of their bigwigs is introduced from the get-go. His name is Togame and his design and demeanor stand out a lot! I really like him! I love the green eyes, round sunglasses and his rather slow way of talking. I really like how he seems flighty and slow but he’s crazy dangerous. He’s also funny as he called Sakura “Othello-kun” and just casually says “Yahoo” to Hiragi when he sees him. His voice actor is Yuichiro Umehara! Togame is a bit different from the usual characters Umehara plays, but I really like his voice acting here! I’d love to hear more of the slow and relaxed type of voice from him more often!

Umemiya is introduced in the last portion of the episode. He’s a lot different than I expected. He likes gardening and is very laid-back. He even showed off his eggplant and green peppers. Given that he’s the top of the school, he is definitely powerful. Heck, he’s voiced by Yuichi Nakamura. You know he’s a big deal.

I honestly can’t wait to learn who Umemiya is and if Shishitoren will attack given that Sakura and Sugishita did sort of violate the rules. I’ll see you next week for the next episode review. Let me know your thoughts on this episode!

[lolotheparagon]

Sofia the First Season 1 in a Nutshell

Gonna rapidfire review each Sofia the First episode in one paragraph cos I wanna gush about this show. Might do this with some other shows

Once Upon a Princess - 4/10

Local village girl Sofia becomes a princess cos her mum married the king and now has to deal with being part of the monarchy. Her half sister Amber goes into jealous bitch mode and makes Sofia's day a living hell then Cinderella literally appears out of the aether to gaslight Sofia into giving Amber a second chance. Not a great start, show.

Just One of the Princes - 7/10

Sofia learns about the inherent misogyny in Royal Prep regarding the flying horse derby and immediately goes lol fuck you im gonna fly a horse and win the race cos I can. Bluebell princess is best princess

The Big Sleepover - 9/10

Sofia invites her old besties from the village for a sleepover while Amber invites her own princess friends and Sofia legit thought that 3 snobby princesses and some village girls could get along.

Let the Good Times Troll - 8/10

Sofia befriends a bunch of trolls who quite literally cause panic on the dancefloor. They also perform a jazz musical number that fucking slaps

Cedric's Apprentice - 10/10

Hapless sorceror Cedric tries to take over the kingdom by getting Sofia's amulet but cant bring himself to do it cos Sofia is too baby must protect. One surefire way to make a villain sympathetic is make them completely incapable of hurting a child's feelings

A Royal Mess - 5/10

James destroys a stained glass window cos he played ball in the castle when THERES A COURTYARD JUST OUTSIDE

The Shy Princess - 10/10

Sofia befriends the class introvert and end up having the most adorable musical number together. In this house, we approve of the baby gays

Blue Ribbon Bunny - 4/10

Okay fuck off, Sofia would never replace her fave bunny Clover for a show rabbit just cos Amber suggested it.

The Princess Test - 8/10

Sofia having major insecurities over being a worthy princess while she's unknowingly flexing on every other princess in school by being her kindhearted self.

Baileywick's Day Off - 2/10

Baileywick finally gets a well deserved break. The royal family immediately proceed to bother him for help every 2 minutes cos they cant even tie their shoelaces without him. Oh but its okay cos they gave him a party at the end of the day.

The Tri-Kingdom Picnic - 5/10

Ooo, a tri-kingdom episode? Surely this'll be a great way to teach kids about different cultures and how it relates to the charac- oh wait its a James episode...great.

The Little Witch - 9/10

Sofia befriends the wicked witch who's pulling pranks on everyone. Turns out she's actually a little witch whos lonely cos everyone fears her so they work together to change her reputation. Awww

Takes Two to Tangu - 6/10

Amber and Sofia get lost in Arabia and the former is slowly losing her mind. Oh and Princess Jasmine's there.

Finding Clover - 7/10

Finally, a good Clover episode. This time, Sofia is travelling across the entire kingdom to search for him cos this kid is willing to trek through the Nine Circles of Hell to get her bunny back

The Amulet of Avalor - 10/10

This is just an extended Scooby Doo chase scene but with an amulet and I fucking love it

The Buttercups - 4/10

I find it really insulting that Baileywick is coddling poor Sofia from doing her outdoor Girl Scouts activities cos the king was being needlessly overprotective over her and Sofia just has to deal with it the majority of the episode

Make Way for Miss Nettle - 8/10

So the show's recurring villain is also a spiteful ex-member of the Sleeping Beauty fairies? And she's voiced by Megan Mullally? OH THIS IS GONNA BE FUN

The Amulet and the Anthem - -3/10

Remember, kids. Its good to have confidence in your achievements BUT DONT YOU DARE BOAST ABOUT THEM. And by boasting, we mean talking about your achievements for more than a minute. So we're gonna curse you until you apologise and we'll have PRINCESS BELLE OF ALL PEOPLE tell Sofia to make an effort to be a better person when she wasn't even that boastful to begin with (especially compared to Amber's boasting) like why is Belle here why couldnt Sofia's mother tell her that WHAT IS THIS EPISODE

Tea for Too Many - 5/10

Amber takes over Sofia's tea party because of her obsession with decadence and the inability to shut up. Sofia, you really need to stop being a pushover

Princess Butterfly - 10/10

A wonderful lesson about cheaters never prosper and that its wrong for to get someone else to give up something to fix your own mistakes. The first time Amber gets some proper development

Great Aunt-Venture - 7/10

Well, Roland's sister is an absolute delight. I sure do hope she wont become a boring quest-giver to Sofia later on!

The Baker King - 6/10

King Roland commanding a cow to make milk is the highlight of the whole episode. No, you will not get context for that.

The Floating Palace - -3/10

Sofia befriends a mermaid named Oona but the merpeople have this racial prejudice against humans so they hate Sofia because she's human but dont worry its all fixed by the end, Cedric wants Oona's comb cos apparently thats more powerful than Sofia's amulet??? so he turns into a sea monster and captures Oona so Sofia doesnt have any allies to help her but her family Oh and Sofia doesnt recognise Cedric in sea monster form EVEN THOUGH HE AINT EVEN HIDING HIS VOICE OH MY GOD THIS EP'S A MESS

Holiday in Enchancia - 7/10

Its a typical Christmas episode but its a very low-key, cosy one. The fact the royals are spending the holiday with a peasant family and giving them all their presents is so sweet. Like this is just pure serotonin

Four's a Crowd - 9/10

We see Sofia's jealous side conflicting with her happiness to see Amber getting along with her own friends, which is really interesting. Also its nice to see Amber being friends with characters who aren't royalty.

[phantom-of-the-ruckus]

The lost episode of Mortimer's Handeemen

Disclaimer: This is a creepypasta meant to be a just-for-fun Halloween thingy. I did not go all the clichés. I now just find most of them silly, but I know there are some good ones. This creepypasta is not connected to any AU and is more of an internet story that would appear in the games in the 1990s to 2010s with some speculation about whether it's real or if the one who posted it was a troll or did it for entertainment.

Either way, happy halloween! Enjoy ^^

TW: for blood, scary imagery, horror, creepypasta, body horror, and gore

[An audio log is found. A mysterious person presses it. The message start.]

H-Hello?

[It appears to be a young teenager. Her voice is groggy and whispery, you can hear her heavy breathing]

I...I hope you can hear me or...well rather listening to this audio log.

I'm trapped, and I can't get out...I can't remember well how I got in, but I can tell you what I know of my current location and well my personal state.

[There was a long pause and heavy breathing. In the background there were some steps and scratches at the distance.]

T-they're looking for me....

[It appears that she is muttering to herself. After another long period of silence, she begins to speak once again.]

Sorry...I'm not exactly in a situation where I can easily tell my story. I'm c-currently hiding in some domain of the studio.... T-the Handeemen Studio to be exact. The one that got burned down and close.

[She let out another long pause as footsteps in the distance could be heard.]

I am not supposed to be here. I am supposed to be in the testing rooms, or I think it was the testing rooms. Perhaps I did die and I am a ghost... No. They are looking for me. I must be alive...

[A door shuts and the mysterious girl lets out some heavy breathing.]

I think they left. Hopefully.

[She breathes once again. Her voice is hearing a bit close to the voice recorder.]

I...I don't remember much. I can't remember my family, if I had one, nor my age. I can't recall my own face, or my own name. I think It was Jessica Parker....or was it Jessica Drew? No...maybe it was Siobhan Drew or Siobhan Parker.... It must be one of those names. They are familiar to me, but I can't remember who belong to who. I do remember they were part of a story. The story of how I got here. That is the story that I can't seem to forget, and probably the reason why I am recording this. I may never remember it or probably would get killed for running away. So...I guess I am recording this now in hopes anyone finds it.

[There was another long pause and a sigh followed after.]

I suppose I can't remain nameless for the rest of this recording. I don't want to remain nameless as I don't remember my name of who am I. But....but I think I used to be called "Jay." It's written on my wrist, or well is smeared with my own blood and I can see is either "Jay" or "J 4 Y." I used to have some writing on my arms and legs, they are smeared and I can't decipher what it was or why it was written. The only thing readable was the "Jay" or "J 4 Y." You can call me Jay. After all it does sound like a name, and I do love the idea of having a name...even if it's not my own name....since I can't remember. But....but I do remember one name. It's Jordan. No last name since I can't recall. Jordan was a kid I used to babysit...or I think I did. I used to watch him. I do recall a lady who was his guardian or mom I don't remember her name. I think it was either one of the possible names I mentioned before.

She'll be just Jordan's mom. It makes it easier for me to remember, and she no longer becomes a nameless face in what remains of my memory. So...Jordan's mom usually called me to watch over Jordan. I think I was his babysitter. I can't remember. She often had to go to work, and we spent hours upon hours doing homework, playing, and...watching TV He...he had a favorite show. A puppet show, some sort of Muppet's knockoff....or was it Sesame Street? It was a cancelled show from a closed down and burnt down studio. The same studio I am trapped here today Mortimer's Handeemen. The thing that got me where I am today. My own nightmare, and the parasite that is taking away my life and memories.

[There was a small pause. Jay was oddly silent. It was almost as if she was taking a time to recompose herself.]

I can remember how did they use to look like. They looked friendlier, happy, and almost as if they never thought about harming anyone. What a crude lie. I see them every day. They are mean, and they like to sew puppets into my arms. I can feel the pain, and then I feel asleep and wake up with no memory.

It's an endless cycle. Every day, I remember less and less about myself. My memories are snapping moments in time. I can't remember how long or when they happened. But I do remember the handeemen from the episodes. I remember them so vividly, and their hyperrealistic faces that were captured into my memories. I saw them permanent smiles. They made Jordan happy ...or I think they did.

He loved the show. It was no longer on aired, but he managed to get some merchandise, VHS tapes of the episode, specials, and shorts. He owned the figures of the main group and the dog. I...I think his favorite was the dog or the artistic guy, Nick Nack. I remember seeing them in a lot of the episodes Jordan and I used to watch. Or maybe it's because I have vivid snapping memories of a hyperrealistic dog made out of humans parts. Large teeth filled with blood, a red eyes staring at me, and his killer bloody paws that could maul anyone within reach.

[Jay pauses momentary.]

Sorry, I lost track of myself.

My mind keeps flooding with memories and...I keep forgetting why am I here sometimes. Not...not how I got here, but rather why am I hiding again...

I know I don't have much time...so it's better if I finish my story. That if I actually have time as they might get me soon...

[There is another period of silence. Jay gets close one again. Her voice is trembly.]

J-Jordan adored the show, and we watch it like a lot. Eventually, we ran out of episodes, and Jordan was getting tired of watching them.

This is where it gets a bit blurry for me. I can recall caring for Jordan, and I am sure I bought him a VHS tape.

But...but the thing is I can't remember why I bought it.

I think he asked me if there were unseen episodes to watch, or I wanted to surprise him.

I was talking to who I believe was my boyfriend. I don't remember his name, so he'll remain as "boyfriend." There is also this other guy involved, so he'll be called "Guy."

So...Boyfriend told me about Guy. He was in his 20s I think. He loved to break into abandoned places for loot, which...also included the abandoned studio.

According to Guy, he didn't break into the studio as often. He got inside like three times I believe or from what I can actually remember.

One of these times, he found a mysterious VHS in the late creator's office. I can't tell if that was a stretch to be cool, or if he actually went in there. Either way, the VHS was a very real thing.

The episode was a never seen or aired episode. The episode was called "Mortimer's Handeemen and the mysterious Meteorite." In the back there was a note saying "PROTOTYPE. DO NOT PLAY" but Guy did play it for some testing before putting it on sale.

I knew that Jordan would love it, so I bought the VHS tape for about 20 or 10 bucks. I remember doing some bargaining. I can't remember the exact price, but I got a sweet deal and immediately brought it to Jordan.

We turned on the TV and placed the tape. The episode started with Mortimer staring with his permanent smile. There was so music. Only a dreadful silence. I didn't have too much importance, and took the VHS out and in thinking the episode froze.

Then, the episode started with Mortimer greeting the audience. He sounded less cheerful than usual. He was introducing the fictional place where the Handeemen lived....but he was rather staring almost as if he could see us. I ignored thinking it was just a prototype error.

Eventually the main theme started. It was very slowed down, and the music sounded off-key. We figured it was due to the age of the VHS tape and continued watching the episode. It started normal with one of the kids finding a strange rock and calling the Handeemen about it.

Then, things started to get odd. The tape suddenly stopped and looped over when the Handeemen were picking up the meteorite. Suddenly the TV went black, almost as if someone turned off....but it was still on and the VHS tape was running.

The screen turned on and showed an empty room. It was silent, but I could feel something was lurking over. I turned off and on the TV. The normal episode was on. I rewind the tape, but everything was as if the image was not there. We continued watching the episode thinking it was a glitch.

Or so we thought...

As the episode progressed. The handeemen sounded less friendly. They sounded annoyed and furious. Their eyes were slowly becoming red. Then they went back to normal as if nothing happened.

I was getting nervous as this was starting to look less of a malfunction and more of a prank. I left the room to call Guy and ask him what was this all about. He was confused and told me that never happened before.

Suddenly I heard a scream. It was Jordan. I hung up and rushed to the living room. He was curled up and crying as he begged me to turned it off. I was confused, so I watched at the TV to see what was going on.

[Jay gives out a long pause. Growling can be heard from the outside. Her breath can be heard again, until the growling fades.]

Sorry... there were puppets nearby...

Where was I?

Oh yes...

When I looked back at the TV, I saw hyperrealistic man. He had a horrified expression and seemingly was rotting. He was sitting on a chair...but he was cut in half and was bleeding. He had mitten sewn into his hands, as I could see the bloody stiches.

It was almost as it was a real thing going on, as if the camara was live. It was horryfing.

Jordan began to scream and begged me to put it away. The channel began to fave, as numerous symbols and strange words began to appeared. I tried to turn off the TV but the off and on button nor the controller were working.

Suddenly a raspy voice began to muttered "I C U" just as the image of the man cut in half was getting closer. Before anything else could happened, I unplugged the TV and everything shut down.

Jordan was upset and terrifed as ever. It was within very good reaons. I did my best to calm him down and told him that I will get to the bottom of this. He decided to go outside and play with his friends. I called Boyfriend, and then called Guy.

When they arrived, Jordan was drawing on the floor. Boyfriend and I confronted Guy about the tape. He swore he never tampered with it. I took him to the living room and plugged the TV back. The episode runned down normally to my surprised.

Jordan eventually sat down and watch it as Guy told me I was crazy and to never contact him again. He left leaving Jordan and I confused. Boyfriend tried to be suportive, and telling me it was propbably some prank in bad taste.

[Jay pauses. It appears she needed a momment to think.]

I do like to think that was the case, but reality turned to be another. Now I am stuck here. Loosing my memory and myself eventually... Alone. A lab rat And-

[Jay pauses before sighing]

Sorry. I lost track again.

I....we....

Jordan. I talked to Jordan about the situation. I told him that this was either a malfunction or a prank from Guy. He felt unsure, but decided to trust my word. That's what I can remember most about the event.

I know that I ended up staying watching for the night. I cannot assure you wether it was on that same night or if a few days pased. All I know was that Jorda's Mom had aked me to stay overnight to watch her son.

And then, that was when things started to get spooky and unsettling...

Jordan was in his room asleep. I just tucked him in, and I was helping Jordan's mom to clean the kitchen. The phone began to rang and I picked up thinking it was probably Jordan's mom asking me if Jordan was okay.

When I picked up the phone....there was silence and a breathing.

"Hello?" I said, thinking this was some bad connection.

"Have you checked on the kid yet?" My blood went cold as shivers sent right down my spine. I dropped the phone and ran towards Jordan's room.

He was still in his bed asleep. I checked around to see if there was anything off. When I was sure he was safe, I left the room and picked up the phone.

"He's alright." That was the lat thing I said when I hung up.

15 minutes, I recieved the same call.

"Have you checked on the kid yet?" I once again dropped the phone and checked on Jordan.

He was alright, and I hung up the phone refusing to answer the question this time. The mysterious guy called again but I hung up as soon as I heard his voice, and went directly to check on Jordan.

After a while, I decided to leave the door open and keep an eye if anything happened. The same mysterious person kept calling for about 20 minutes. I hung up each of his calls, and he eventually stopped.

I started to slowly doze off. It was getting pretty late, but part of me remained unsettled about the mysterious calls. I doze off momentarily before the phone rang. I hesitated to pick it up, fearing it was the mysterious caller.

To my surprise and relief, it was Jordan's mom. She was calling to check if Jordan was alright.

"He's just in bed. Everything is fine, ma'am." I said just as I heard the TV turning on, and the Handeemen's playing. I ended the conversation and hung up.

I was upset. I figured that Jordan woke up and tried to sneak into watching another episode. When I entered the living room, my skin went pale. The episode I brought from guy was playing, but there was no one watching it.

I took the TV remote and tried to turn off the TV or stop the player. Neither of them worked, but their batteries were still on. I tried to manually turned them off, but it was useless. Then...I tried to unplug the TV.

"This should do it." I thought to myself.

The episode continued to play as if nothing had happened.

Terrified, I tried to remove the tape but what happened next, left me paralyzed in fear.

The screen went back, and then showed Guy being strapped into a bed. His eyes were swollen and he was screaming. Suddenly, the scientist puppet, Riley, entered the room. She had a twisted smile and her eyes were glowing red. In her left hand, she had a saw.

I could not feel my body as I was too horrified to move. I saw Riley slowly approaching guy as she maniatically laughed.

"You'll become one of us!" She said just as she slowly began to press the saw into Guy's torso and slowly cuting him off as blood dropped.

The screen went back, and the next picture was a twisted and bloody Mortimer staring at the screen with a teacup filled with blood and the letters I, C, and U underneath.

The picture then changed to a video of Nick. He was in his art room. His face was melting so hyperrealistic, that it almost looked as if he was bleading. He was sobbing uncontrollably as he strocked some abstract painting of black and red.

The screen went black, and then Daisy appeared on what is seemed to be a kitchen. She was humming to herself as she baked a pie made out of human organs. My stomatch twirled up as I could see Guy's eyes into the mix.

The screen shut down as I stood there trembling as the phone began to ring. I walk towards it and pick up with trembling hands.

"Have you checked on the kid yet?" It was the same mysterious caller as before. I dropped the phone and ran towards Jordan's room.

The bed was empty and he was nowhere to be found.

I picked up the phone and I cried "WHO ARE YOU? WHERE IS HE?"

There was no answer, and no sign of the caller. Then the call disconected and the phone disconnected completely. I dropped the phone, and rushed towards the living room when I heard sobbing.

The place was empty, but the TV had a distrubing picture. It was the same mysterious human puppet man, but now where was Guy accompaning him. His eyes were gone and he was bleeding. He had sewn mittens into his hands, and just as the mysterious man, his upper body was sitting on a bleeding chair.

There was some silent sobbing as the background, but my eyes focused on the message underneath the figures...

"HELP ME" Underneath was the direction to the abandoned studio.

Fearing that Jordan was taken by those puppets, I left the house and rode on my bike into the studio. After I came in, I broke inside and desperately began to look for Jordan.

[Jay's voice trails off as she starts to become uneased.]

I-I couldn't find him, but I heard noices from the outside. I feared that they were outside...a-and went down deeper. Then someone struck me in the head and everything became a blurr.

I heard the voices of Jordan's mom, Boyfriend, the police, and Jordan looking for me outside. I doze off as they shut down.

I woke up on a lab with a puppet sewn into my hand, and then I lost my memory slowly and began to forget who am I or where am I, just remembering the evil faces of the puppets and how I got here.

Now, this the only chance I got to store what becomes of my memory. If you find this, that means that I am dead...or if miracously you found me with no memory.

Either way, please find the VHS and destroy it. No one should have ever seen the lost episode, and become a victim like I or Guy became.

[The tape ends as Riley Ruckus tosses it aside , scoffing, before returning to work. Not realizing that a mysterious man is staring at the tape from afar. His plaque, reading JORDAN]

---

HAPPY HALLOWEEN AND I WISH YOU A VERY SPOOKY DAY!

~ With care, Phantom <3

[the-rewatch-rewind]

New episode! Script below the break.

Hello and welcome back to the Rewatch Rewind! My name is Jane and this is the podcast where I count down my top 40 most rewatched movies. Today I will be discussing #36 on my list: Disney’s 2013 animated musical Frozen, directed by Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee, written by Jennifer Lee, from a story by Chris Buck, Jennifer Lee, and Shane Morris inspired by Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Snow Queen”, and featuring the voice talents of Kristen Bell, Idina Menzel, Jonathan Groff, Josh Gad, and Santino Fontana.

Frozen is the story of two royal sisters. The older, Elsa (voiced by Idina Menzel), has ice powers that she doesn’t know how to control. As a child, she accidentally injured her younger sister, Anna (voiced by Kristen Bell), who was healed by trolls but has no memory of Elsa’s powers. On Elsa’s coronation day, the palace gates are opened for the first time in years, and Anna meets Prince Hans of the Southern Isles (Santino Fontana) and is immediately smitten. But asking for Elsa’s blessing of their marriage leads to a fight that causes Elsa to unintentionally unleash her powers. Terrified, Elsa runs away, leaving the whole kingdom frozen. Anna goes after her and teams up with mountain man Kristoff (Jonathan Groff), his reindeer Sven, and a magical snowman created by Elsa named Olaf (Josh Gad) to bring back summer, and her sister.

I remember seeing teasers for this movie that made it look like it was about a snowman and a reindeer chasing each other around an ice rink, which seemed very boring. But my sister and I decided to give it a chance and see it in theaters. It had only been out for a couple of days, so we had vaguely heard that people seemed to be liking it, but we still didn’t really know what it was about, let alone how popular it would become. And I know I’m about 10 years too late with this advice, but I highly recommend experiencing Frozen for the first time in a crowded theater, before the hype, with no expectations, next to your sister with whom you have a close relationship. Truly one of my top 5 best cinematic experiences ever. I think I probably would still love this movie even if I’d been introduced to it in a less powerful way, but that first viewing has certainly impacted the way I feel about the movie to this day.

I still remember exactly how I felt when I heard and saw Let It Go for the first time. The song started and it was like, yes, good, an Idina Menzel number, I love Wicked, I’m here for this. And then that first “The cold never bothered me anyway” when she throws off her cloak gave me chills. My brain went, “Oh wow. This isn’t just a song, it’s a FEELING.” And it just. kept. escalating. as Elsa’s confidence grew and she could finally be herself for the very first time. By the end of the number, I was either in tears or too overwhelmed with emotion to even cry, I can’t remember which. Some kid a few rows behind us murmured, “Wow, she’s…way prettier than I thought.” And maybe I was just projecting the way I felt, but to me it sounded like the kid was really saying, “Something needs to be said here, but I can’t find the words.” It’s not that I’d never been moved by a musical number before, but this took it to the next level. And all of this is almost embarrassing for me to admit now, because Let It Go then became one of the most overplayed songs of all time and everyone got sick of it, but listen. It was overplayed for a reason. It’s an epic song, and Idina Menzel frickin kills it. I still stand by this.

Looking back on my other thoughts as I watched Frozen unfold for the first time shows me just how much amatonormativity – the idea that everyone wants and needs a long-term monogamous romantic partner – had affected me. I still thought I was straight, although my standard justification of “I’m not into dating yet but I’m sure I will be when I’m older” was feeling less and less valid, as I was then 23 years old. Anyway, I distinctly remember, during Love Is an Open Door, which is the song that Hans and Anna sing to each other soon after they meet, that my sister and I turned to each other and whispered, “I ship it.” And then Kristoff got thrown into the story, and I was conflicted, because I really liked Anna with him, too. I started thinking maybe Elsa would end up with Hans. And then Elsa wounded Anna’s heart with her ice, which only an act of true love could heal, and it did not even occur to me that that could be anything other than a romantic kiss. I thought Kristoff would bring her back to Hans, she would kiss him but it wouldn’t do anything, and that’s when she’d realize her true love was actually Kristoff. But while I was expecting things to not work out between Anna and Hans, I was NOT expecting Hans to be cruel, so his “Oh Anna, if only there was someone out there who loved you” was shocking and devastating. I thought the scene when Olaf rescues her and explains that “some people are worth melting for” was beautiful – the snowman was far less obnoxious than I’d been anticipating – but even then it never occurred to me that Anna would be cured by anything other than kissing Kristoff. And then. Fighting the blizzard and the ice spreading through her body, almost reunited with her romantic true love, Anna sees Hans draw a sword against Elsa. I’m sure if I’d been able to think clearly in that moment, I would have finally figured out what was coming, but all I could do was gape at the screen as Anna changed course and saved her sister instead. And with hindsight, duh, that was the act of true love, but for a second or two I legitimately thought she was now permanently frozen. And, like, here’s the thing. I’ve loved Disney movies as long as I can remember, so I’m not trying to insult them. But the studio that made Snow White and Sleeping Beauty and The Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast and Enchanted had so thoroughly convinced me that when you need love to break a spell, it must be romantic and almost always involves a kiss, that I couldn’t even imagine that a Disney film would ever treat saving a family member’s life as powerful enough for that. But Frozen did. Frozen went there. While I was sitting next to my wonderful sister, one of the most important people to me, this movie showed me that it’s okay for sisterly love to be the most powerful thing in your life. So at that point I definitely cried.

As far back as I can remember, the overemphasis on romance in movies has bothered me, but until then I thought I just had to accept it. Falling in romantic love was a universal human experience, so everyone said; naturally people wanted to tell stories about it. Obviously I’d seen movies, even Disney movies like Mary Poppins and Emperor’s New Groove, that didn’t have love stories before. But a Disney PRINCESS movie, that HAD romantic love, but showed a character actively CHOOSING a non-romantic loved one over a romantic one, and saving herself in the process??? That was mind-blowing. Even though I didn’t know I was aroace at the time, I knew I loved that message. So as my sister and I left the theater, we could not praise this movie enough, and for weeks and months afterward, I couldn’t get this story out of my head, and I didn’t want to. I saw it two more times in theaters, for a total of 3 views in 2013, and then bought the DVD as soon as it was released. The following Halloween I dressed as Elsa, along with thousands of girls 15 to 20 years younger than me. I ended up watching Frozen eight times in 2014. But then…I stopped watching it for a while.

Part of that was just because watching a movie 11 times in a little over a year is a lot, even for me, so I needed a break. But another part of it was people started really hating on this movie, and it got to me. Some of the criticism was legitimate – like, no, we really didn’t need another animated musical about white royalty, and yes, there are several plot holes – but a lot of it boiled down to: this thing is overwhelmingly popular and therefore it’s cool and edgy to say it’s bad. But I bought it. I felt embarrassed by my initial enthusiasm. I was way too old to be obsessing over a movie like this the way I had done in my early teens. Normally I don’t have much trouble loving the movies I love unapologetically, but normally the movies I love are old or obscure enough that the internet isn’t filled with hot takes about why it’s bad to love them. I still enjoyed listening to the songs, and I still defended it when I heard it disparaged in person, but after my 8 viewings in 2014 I didn’t watch Frozen again until 2019. And I only watched it then because Frozen II was coming out and I wanted to refresh myself on the first one before I saw the sequel. I was kind of expecting that viewing to convince me once and for all that I had gotten over it, but I had the complete opposite experience. I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of that rewatch. I was reminded that I really do genuinely love and enjoy this movie, and I wished I hadn’t let the haters convince me otherwise. So I watched it once each in 2020, 2021, and 2022, which was partly because of the Disney watching project I did with my brother – we watched through all the animated Disney movies in order in 2020, and then we re-watched the ones we’d ranked in the top 10 in 2022 – yes, we decided Frozen is a top 10 Disney animated film, and no I will not apologize for that.

I think a big reason why I let myself get temporarily talked out of loving Frozen is because I couldn’t articulate what I really loved about it at the time, so I thought that meant I didn’t actually love it. But now that I know I’m aroace, it makes perfect sense. As I mentioned before, even at the time, I knew that seeing a character choose familial love over romantic love in a matter of life and death meant a lot to me, though I didn’t know the extent of it. And I related to Elsa and Let It Go spoke to me, but it took me a long time to recognize the extent of that too. As someone who has struggled with depression, I initially saw Elsa’s self-imposed isolation to try to protect people that ended up hurting them as an allegory for that disease, which I still think it is to a certain extent. Depression dulls all emotions and tricks one’s brain into thinking others would be better off without them, and that describes some of what Elsa is going through. But there’s also the aspect of hiding a part of herself that she knew she wouldn’t be accepted for, and finally breaking away from that to live as her true self, that a lot of LGBTQIA+ people relate to, which I didn’t recognize in myself at the time – and now I wonder if another reason I stepped away from the movie for a while was a subconscious fear of facing my own queerness. I know a lot of people see Elsa as a lesbian, which seemed to be confirmed by a couple of brief moments in Frozen II. While I would argue that it’s not quite canon yet, I wouldn’t mind if Frozen III makes it so – provided the story of Frozen III actually makes sense, unlike whatever the heck Frozen II is supposed to be about. What I’m trying to say is I don’t want to dismiss the Elsa is a lesbian theory, but to me she feels very aroace. She doesn’t seem at all interested in finding a partner, she just wants to hang out in her mountain ice palace by herself, which sounds pretty awesome even though I still don’t understand how she was going to be able to feed herself up there. Also, at the end of the first movie, she seems very surprised to learn that she has the capacity to thaw what she’s frozen by allowing herself to feel love. Elsa has been suppressing all of her emotions because she knows that her ice powers are harder to control when she feels things, which is again similar to depression. But seeing this through an aroace lens of constantly feeling like you’re incapable of the “correct” kind of love, I could see an aroace Elsa being aware of love as a thawing force, but thinking it had to be romantic love and that she was therefore doomed. So seeing Anna using their sisterly love to heal her frozen heart showed Elsa that the type of love she could feel was powerful enough, and that was all she needed to bring back summer. Like most of my aroace headcanons, I’m pretty sure this wasn’t quite what the filmmakers actually intended, but it works and it’s beautiful.

 Whether Elsa is intentional queer representation or not, even the straight romantic relationship in Frozen is unusual for a Disney movie. Anna and Kristoff’s rocky start leading to eventual feelings is nothing new, of course, but the way they leave it (at least at the end of the first movie, which I like to pretend is the end of the story because, again, the sequel makes no sense) is very sweet. They’re not officially dating, let alone engaged or married, but Anna presents Kristoff with a new sled, and he’s so excited that he exclaims, “I could kiss you!” And then he backs off and asks her permission and they only kiss after they both agree that they want to. This may not seem like much, but in a culture that tends to romanticize spontaneity and persistent pursuit at the expense of consent, especially in fairytales, it’s so wonderful to see asking for consent encouraged in such an adorable way here.

I think a big part of what makes Frozen work is that it’s all about subverting expectations. Before the movie came out, they set expectations that the snowman and the reindeer would be annoying, and then Olaf and Sven both turned out to be sweet and genuinely funny. Then at the beginning it makes you think it’s going to be a typical fairytale romance, but it turns out the prince is the actual villain. Plot twist villains are pretty common in this Disney era, and I’m not sure even I would consider Hans the best instance of that trope, but I do love the way the Duke of Weselton is established as a decoy villain, and that he’s voiced by Alan Tudyk, who had just voiced the plot twist villain in Wreck-It Ralph. At first I felt like the Hans reveal was a little too out of nowhere, but there are a few delightfully subtle clues that I completely missed initially, like how he sings about “finding his own place” when he’s pretending to be singing about Anna, or how he’s clearly calculating a way to incapacitate Elsa while making it look like he’s saving her. I would have liked a few more clues, but I also think it’s good to portray that red flags can be hard to spot. And then on top of that there’s the unexpected challenge to the amatonormative idea that romance is the most important and powerful form of love. It was all so completely different from what I was expecting, in the best possible way.

Clearly this movie appeals to people who are not aroace, but I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the most popular children’s movie of the decade is so focused on platonic love. A lot more kids can relate to familial love than to romantic love. And Frozen proves that you don’t have to eliminate romance from a story entirely to emphasize other types of love. When Anna falls in love with Kristoff, that doesn’t make her relationship with him the only one that matters, or even the one that matters the most, and that’s a message that we don’t get from nearly enough stories. A big fear that many aromantic people share is that all of our friends will eventually abandon us for romantic partners, due to the prevalence of the message that one’s romantic partner should be one’s number one focus at all times. Personally I’ve been fortunate enough to find people who value friendship as much as I do, and therefore want to maintain close platonic relationships whether they’re in romantic relationships or not, and I’m very grateful for all of them. But I know not all aros are as fortunate in that respect. So that’s why I keep emphasizing how awesome it is that in Frozen not only is one of the main characters potentially aroace, but the other main character who is not still chooses to save herself with platonic love instead of romantic love. Encouraging people to cultivate non-romantic relationships benefits everyone, not just aros, because putting too much pressure on one relationship to fulfill all or even most of one’s social needs is unsustainable, and often dangerous. When Hans meets Anna, he correctly observes that she’s lonely and desperate for love, and he hopes to manipulate her by filling that entire void himself. But he ultimately fails because, while Anna does desire romance, she wants to reconnect with her sister even more. Even though Elsa has shut her out for years, as soon as she reveals her powers Anna understands that her sister has been in just as much pain as she has. Instead of festering resentment, Anna is filled with empathy and compassion, which allows her to save herself, her sister, and the kingdom. We need more heroes like Anna. And while it may be overrated, overhyped, and a little underdeveloped, in terms of emphasizing the power of non-romantic love, we need more stories like Frozen.

Thank you for listening to me attempt to express my love for this movie. I still don’t feel like I’ve done it justice, which I suspect will become more and more of a problem as I continue to work my way up this list. If you want to hear about more movies that I love enthusiastically, remember to follow or subscribe on your podcast platform of choice, and leave a rating or review if you feel like it. This episode is coming out during Aromantic Spectrum Awareness Week, so I hope any of you out there who are or think you might be on the aromantic spectrum are feeling particularly appreciated and accepted. And if you’re not aro-spec yourself, maybe reach out to any aromantic friends you have and tell them you value them. And if you don’t know of any aros in your life, just reach out to any friend and tell them you care about them. Let’s spread lots of good non-romantic feelings this week! And the next time you get the urge to tell a single friend they need a romantic partner: don’t.

Next week I’ll be talking about another movie musical that I’ve watched 15 times, although that one is not animated and is decidedly not geared toward children. As always, I will leave you with a quote from that next movie: “And then he ran into my knife. He ran into my knife ten times.”

[princess-of-morkva]

1. How did you find out about merlin?

Oh, i was reading a harry potter fic. Which was, by the way, not tagged as a crossover. Just somewhere in the middle we got introduced to a mysterious teacher who goes by the name Emrys and teaches kids wandless magic and is also kinda pretty (understatement). And then there is a whole subplot about Arthur's return and others also get reincarnated. And i liked it and went to read other fics by that author in merlin fandom. And then by other authors. And then i went and watched the show. By the way, it all happened on a russian fanfiction website and merlin fandom there is very small so i quickly ran out of fics..

2. Do you have a ship? If so, when did you start shipping them?

When i first got into merlin, i was still deeply in the closet. I refused to read any slash or femslash tagged fanfics. So i was limited to gen and straight ships. Which is how i became a part of small, three and a half people community of mergana fans on the aforementioned website. I even got new year congratulations from them, for two years, which was sweet, especially as only wrote one single mergana oneshot on there.

And then i returned to the fandom about two years later, out of the closet and ready to consume anything and everything and found a way to the endless ao3 well of ships. So now i happily ship merthur, of course, and also morgwen, but at the same time i'll die on the gwencelot hill, but in all honesty i'll read any ship as long as it's good writing. Ironically, i now only avoid mergana, the same ship that got me into the fandom in the first place. It just feels to weird, like shipping a lesbian and a gay man. I like their dynamic too much to go and ruin it with romance.

3. What’s your favorite episode/two-parter?

It's either "The Tears of Uther Pendragon" or "Beauty and the Beast". First one because of plot, and tension, and Morgana and everything that makes a good episode — and second one because Uther married a troll. And all that. I really like that troll.

4. What’s your favorite scene?

There are too many to count.

But i think the one in "The Sword in the Stone" part 2, with Arthur and Morgana in the throne room.

"I thought we were friends." "So did I."

and "Not so powerful now, my lady?"

The lighting. The angle. The acting is on top. The way Morgana's voice breaks a little on "so did i". The way they look at each other. Oh god.

5. What’s your favorite quote/interaction?

Again, too many to name or count, but i can name a few:

"Not so powerful now, my lady?" (i already named ot in previous answer, but it's just too good, i can hear it in my head with all exact intonations)

"I'll- leave you to your poetry then, my lord." (leon my beloved. he sounds so confused)

"The more brutal you are, the more enemies you create." (and isn't that ironic, morgana?)

"I grew up" and "He grew up"( by morgana and by merlin, in season 5. it's heartbreaking.)

more morgana quotes:

"-and you, Uther. You're going to hell."

"Sometimes you've got to do what you think is right, and damn the consequences."

"What're you going to do? Kill me?" "You don't think i can?" (merlin and morgana sword fighting scene in s3e2)

and than right after: "It doesn't have to be like this, Morgana. We can find another way." "There is no other way."

"Do you really hate me so much?" "You can not begin to know how much I hate you" (morgana in uther's prison cell)

"And killing things mends a broken heart?" (after sofia debacle)

"I just don't think that chopping someone's head of is a cause for a celebration."

aaaand "Don't worry, dear brother, I won't let you die alone. I'll stay and watch over you, till the wolves gorge on your carcass and bathe in your blood."

and now my sweetheart mordred: "Until then we go unmarked in death as in life."

and "Such hatred as yours can never triumph. I hope one day you will find the love and compassion that used to fill your heart."

also Queen Annis my beloved "You came to me in the name of Gorlois, but I fear you're more like Uther than you realise."

"No man, no matter how great, can know his destiny."

Aaaaaaaaand "IN A LAND, OF MYTH, AND A TIME OF MAGIC, THE DESTINY OF THE GREAT KINGDOM RESTS ON THE SHOULDERS OF A YOUNG BOY-" (i always chant it out loud every time i begin an episode. i replay it many times. people ask me to stop. sometimes, i just randomly say in the middle of a family dinner)

6. How do you feel about the ending?

I love it. It's perfect in the most unsatisfying and heartbreaking way. It's a tragedy, it's supposed to be like this. If not for the ending, we wouldn't have this wonderful fandom thriving after ten years. I wouldn't change a thing.

7. What’s your favorite headcanon in merlin?

That Arthur will not return for some great catastrophe. He will only return when Merlin finally lets him go and learns to live without him so that they can have a healthy relationship that is not overly codependent.

Also Merlin definitely becomes a surgeon at some point.

And also i have a headcanon that marriage between Arthur and Gwen was not a romantic partnership. They def loved each other, just not romantically. We need more qpr marriages in fandom.

Also i have a headcanon that Merlin never celebrates Christmas until Arthur's return because it's his death anniversary. Isn't that sad? But it's also sweet because he celebrates his first Christmas together with Arthur.

8. Do you have a favorite merlin fic?

Oooh i have some.

For Want of a Nail by 0hHeyThereBigBadWolf on ao3

People Think the Knights are Straight? by rcracer123 on ao3

Schwellenangst by BurntOreo on ao3

to the point of fear by Imagined on ao3

Spilled Ink, Spilled Blood by kyrakaryanne on ao3

Seeing White by The AsexualofSpades on ao3

When I Didn't Know The Answer, I Found It In Your Eyes by ironfamjam on ao3

and every single merlin fic written by SnufflesThePig ever

9. What is your personal head-canon after s5?

Ohh, well i already answered it in general headcanons question, but i'll elaborate on it here

I think Merlin returns to Camelot and probably stays there until Gwen dies. I also believe that Gwen maybe remarried, maybe not, but she definitely had children and had a happy life and was loved by the people and lifted the magic ban. Then, Merlin begun to travel around the world and became really good wtoth his magic and learnt many professions and languages and had many friends over the years all over the world. But he never forgets Arthur and his life in Camelot. He can change his age and appearances but mostly stays around 26.

Ohh and also Morgana must reincarnate at sone point. Multiple times.

And also Arthur reincarnates instead if walking out of the lake and grows up with his mother because she divorced Uther this time around.

10. What’s your favorite character?

Morgana is my favourite character to write. She's interesting and complicated and has a lot to unpack.

Arthur is my favourite character to read. Because i can't for the love of gods properly write him. I'm always dissatisfied with his characterisation. And it's hard to find good written Arthur, but when i do, it's my instant favourite. I love reading him suffer the most, and i love his character development and i love everything about him. Everything.

I love Mordred the way i would love my baby. I want to cuddle him and give him a happy ending and also the world. And i want others to acknowledge his cuteness.

But Aithusa is my favourite baby.

Merlin questions to do when you’re bored

1. How did you find out about merlin?

2. Do you have a ship? If so, when did you start shipping them?

3. What’s your favorite episode/two-parter?

4. What’s your favorite scene?

5. What’s your favorite quote/interaction? (ex | merlin: “how long have you been training to be a prat, my lord?” | arthur: “i love poetry” merlin: 😀)

6. How do you feel about the ending? 😉

7. What’s your favorite headcanon in merlin?

8. Do you have a favorite merlin fic? Please share 😍

9. What is your personal head-canon after s5? (Ex: arthur dies and merlin waits for 1500 years | the roundtable lives | merlin becomes court-sorcerer)

10. What’s your favorite character?

That’s all!! Tell me if you want more!! Answer in the reblogs!! Or comment!! Or anywhere!!

[sodapopsolstice]

This post is for @autisticsupervillain and them only!!! (Im joking obviously but I'm making it for them)

Welcome to the Sol~Ath au! It's my brainchild and I'm word spewing. So let's goooo....

It starts with the death of Sollux in the Vast Glub, he knew that this was gonna happen so he made a back up plan, an ai equivalent to him. (Think AR (not hal hes his own deal) to Dirk.)

This equivalent to Sollux is kind of a bonzi buddy/that one episode of TTG where cyborg takes control of the tower figure. His file name is Sol.ath so that's where his name comes from. (It's also a really grim joke cause he's Sollux till death, which is never.)

He contacts Karkat AS he is grieving proto-sollux and the conversation goes something like this

Obviously it's a lot more existential and Solath actively denying he is a different to Sollux (it's your own choice if he is or not.) than this, and he convinces Karkat to let him live in his computer and then inadvertently his entire hive.

Oh yea Solath uses 1=I and 0=O cause you know puters n shit

All the other trolls think Karkat is insane, as they all know Sollux is dead but yet still find Karkat hunched over whatever alchemized laptop saying he's talking to Sol. Some like Tavros and Kanaya are sympathetic thinking Karkat is just taking the death quite bad whilst others like Vriska and Eridan chastise him for still talking to Sol's (what they think is) inactive pesterchum. With exclusion to Feferi.

Also since Solath is not plagued by the voices of the imminently deceased he's more of a dick and more chipper than regular Sollux, causing Karkat to feel like there is more dissonance between the Sols

Also murderstuck never happens cause no Sollux means no Eridan murder.

Feferi couldn't revive Sollux cause Feferi was told by Solath he was fine. The pair are quite close but no matespritship happens since Feferi feels weird at the concept of dating someone who'll be 6 sweeps forever.

Also Solath can choose to go between his and Karkat's Trollian accounts, which causes shenanigans between him, Karkat and the beta kids.

This is mostly all I have so far this au (that I can think of) I'll have a tag for it so when I do make art or think of new stuff, it'll go there!

I'll leave off with Solath's sprite

[be-the-creature-fan]

Wild Kratts Season 2.

Review

One sentence review (1 being the worse - 10 being a masters piece) Hope you enjoy :)

Bad Hair Day: It was an alright start to Season 2 but why did the WK crew leave the paint on the lion cubs for that long? 7/10

Race for the Hippo Disc: I'M SORRY BUT CHRIS SHOULD HAVE JUST LET ZACH DIE, it would have solved so many problems in future episodes (sorry zach fans) 8/10

Creature Power Challenge: Zachs drawings were hilarious but not as funny as Jimmy and Zach's conversation also acorn powers return (this whole episode wouldn't have happened if Zach was offed in the previous episode) 7/10

Neck and Neck: All I can think about is what would Martin's life have been like if they weren't able to fix the problem and how technically chronologically you can take off the suit at any time sooo.... ._. (6/10)

Happy Turkey Day: Chris and the WK kids trolling Gormond is pretty funny also R.I.P Martin's tail feathers. (8/10)

Termites v.s Tongues: This episode was overplayed on my local pbs station but the moment when Chris thought he was too late in saving was very heartwarming (but why did Koki and Aviva scream "help me" like that?) (4/10)

Bugs or Monkeys: I just love how when Chris looses Martin he's just like "Oh no Martin is gone ._. But when Chris is lost, Martin be like

Also Martin with Grabsy are some of the best moments in the show (9/10)

Secrets of the Spiders Web: Donita creates a spider sweatshop, you know for kids ( and why did the WK crew send the fabric to Donita? She doesn't deserve it.) (7/10)

Shadow the Black Jaguar: (One of my personal favorite episodes because Jaguars are my favorite animals) The Jaguar CPS suit should be used more often if it's capable of turning into a Shadow like that. (10/10)

To Touch a Hummingbird: insert gif from THAT one scene (10/10) (Martin's trumpet 4th wall break was also great)

Rainforest Stew: Martin's Gormond voice is spot on, Chris sounds ummm... bizarre with sloth powers, but is it concerning that Gormond knows what the Kratt Brothers smell like? (7/10)

Seahorse Rodeo: Martin having an awkward conversation with Donita while Chris dies from 2nd hand embarrassment never fails to make me laugh. Also poor Dabio (9/10)

Speaking Dophinese: The dolphins were pretty cute but beef stems from them having a full episode of them saying Sharks are not the bad guys, but then in this episode they make a Shark the bad guy. (6/10)

Aqua Frog: Those Frog CPS are lowkey cursed and WHY didn't the WK Crew review Zach's invention journal? (F-f-f-frog/10)

Tortuga Tune Up: Robbed of a freshwater turtle episode just because Jimmy wanted to SEE TURTLES, though the shark chewing sound effect was very satisfying for me and I don't know why. (8/10)

Blowfish Blowout: I loved the water balloon fight intro and how it connects to the final battle, also poor Martin and Dabio. (9/10)

Snow Runners: Spends the majority of the episode thinking that we were getting our first Hare CPS then Aviva going JK and making a Lynx CPS for Martin and makes Chris suffer in a basilisk CPS while wearing Santa hat and bunny costume then almost getting his bucket kicked by a Lynx, I love it. (8/10)

Road Runners: An amazing homage to the Roadrunner and Coyote cartoons and HOLY CRAP! how did they not die from that fall? (10/10)

Rocket Jaw Rescuer of the Reef: How is Donita on the same intelligence level as Zach? (7/10)

Attack of the Tree Eating Aliens: Chris has a voice crack and gets his brain rattled while Martin chases himself. (10/10)

Rattlesnake Crystal: Jimmy almost kills the Tortuga and not gonna lie I was on the edge of my seat during the climax, and Chris almost dies. (7/10)

Skunked: HOW IN THE CREATURE WORLD CAN JIMMY MISTAKE A SKUNK FOR A CAT?! But to be fair how he was interacting with the skunk was very cute, also Zach loves tomato soup the more you know. (8/10)

Gilla Monster Under My House: WHY is Zach spying in on Children?! Also why did the WK Crew help Zach out again? (7/10)

Desert Elves: Chris' being a drama queen?!? I'm all for it (10/10)

Groundhog Wake Up Call: Finally someone mentions the dangers of deactivaing a CPS at the wrong time, also Groundhog Creature Powers lowkey sucks. (7/10)

Journey into the Subnivian Zone: Aviva and Koki destroys a habitat, R.I.P Freezy (8/10)

[j4gm]

TOGETHER AGAIN SPOILERS

A thread of lore, Easter eggs, episode connections, and background details from Adventure Time: Distant Lands: Together Again! Let me know if I missed anything! This is adapted from my original Twitter thread.

Keep reading ⬇️⬇️⬇️

1. I was expecting them to perhaps do a classic style title sequence for this episode, but I wasn't expecting them to straight up use the original title sequence. The only difference is this final screen saying "Distant Lands".

2. The background of the title cards is also the hill from the title sequence.

3. The ice cream having "50 flavours" and having an image of an enlightened soul is an obvious reference to the 50th Dead World as we see it later in the episode.

4. Continuing with the metaphor, the dirt in the ice cream could be a parallel to the fact that Jake's Nirvana actually wasn't perfect, because his inaction was allowing for injustice to perpetuate.

5. This whole scene feels immediately slightly off. Finn has his Scarlet sword and is out on a classic Ice King adventure, but he speaks in his grown voice and all the slang feels much more forced than it did in the real season one. Turns out this was deliberate.

6. The snow golem speaks with a baby voice like it did in the pilot episode, even though in canon it has a deeper voice. This further hints that something is not quite right.

7. The first major break in continuity is these snow golems resembling Uncle Gumbald and Peace Master, who Finn didn't meet until later in his life.

8. LSP sitting on Finn's head like this is reminiscent of Pen Ward's piece for the 2018 Ble crew zine.

9. Finn being given the choice of helping somebody but ending up helping everybody reminds me of "Memories of Boom Boom Mountain". It's the kind of resolution that wouldn't happen so much in the late seasons of the show, which helps make this scene feel even further out of place.

10. Jake is half frozen by Ice King in pretty much the exact same way as he was in "Prisoners of Love", and even has a very similar line.

11. The Snail is seen here. The crew have said that the Snail has been deliberately left out of previous Distant Lands specials, so its placement here is another very deliberate hint that this whole sequence is "trying too hard" to be like the early seasons.

12. The book "Mind Games" appears a couple of times, as seen in several previous episodes of Adventure Time. The first is as Finn is approaching the library in his dream. It also appears as one of the items in Finn's backpack later.

13. Jake is hurt when Finn fist bumps him with his metal arm, revealing that this scene is not real. This is also a callback to the title sequences of "Islands" and "Elements".

14. A whole bunch of familiar skeletons are seen in the bird's nest: Dirt Beer Guy, Abracadaniel, Me-Mow, Lemongrab, Mr. Pig, and the Snail again. This doesn't necessarily mean that all these characters are dead, since this scene is just a hallucination.

15. Old Man Finn! He's still got the chest tattoo of Jake, and this time we know that Jake is dead, so the theory that Jake died before "Obsidian" seems pretty likely. He looks similar to his old man design from "Puhoy", with the same facial hair.

16. There are several cameos of familiar characters who apparently died at the same time as Finn. The first is this duck, who previously appeared in "Ocarina".

17. The second is Donny, from the episode... uh, "Donny".

18. This goblin guy is an unnamed background character from “The Silent King”.

19. This old lady first appeared in "The Enchiridion", way back in season one. Old ladies are a species in the Land of Ooo, so I guess she wasn't actually very old back then, given she just about outlived Finn.

20. This is the cobbler who first appears in "His Hero". Amazing that he lived so long given all the trouble he got into in that episode.

21. Land of the Dead! This place was first seen in season two's "Death in Bloom", and now we are finally learning its actual purpose. It's a sort of gateway and hub to all of the other dead worlds.

22. There are some more minor cameos at the gates: a house person from "Donny", a soft person from "Gut Grinder", and a wood person from "When Wedding Bells Thaw". And, of course, the gate guardian himself from “Death in Bloom”.

23. Finn completely ignores the gate guardian in the same way he did in Death in Bloom. This also has the convenient effect of not having to reveal how Finn died, leaving it up to the audience's imagination.

24. Mr. Fox! We already knew he would die at some point because BMO had his skull in the finale.

25. Finn has his design from the first Distant Lands poster in this scene. Turns out it's young Finn in old Finn's clothes. But they gave him a shirt in the poster so you wouldn't be able to see the tattoo.

26. The clapping that Finn does while he's looking for Jake is a callback to "James Baxter the Horse", when Jake tells Finn to listen for that same rhythm if they are killed and need to find each other in the afterlife.

27. Mr. Fox talks about a "past life quotient", suggesting that there might be some kind of limit to how many times somebody can reincarnate. Finn's reincarnations are also seen in this scene; a callback to "The Vault", and confirmation that reincarnations share the same soul.

28. Boobafina, the goose who Mr. Fox was in love with in his debut episode “Storytelling”, apparently reincarnated into a tugboat. We've already seen that objects can have souls in the episode "Ghost Fly".

29. Finn is initially assigned to the 37th Dead World, which is the same one that Jake went to when he died in "Sons of Mars". We can only guess at what the other numbers on the ticket mean ;)

30. Tiffany! Despite several lucky escapes throughout his life, Tiffany has finally died. I like the use of this imagery to express Finn's conflicted feelings about him.

31. The 50th Dead World has long been established as the "highest" dead world, and the one synonymous with Heaven within Adventure Time's universe. It was first mentioned in "Ghost Princess" back in season three.

32. It's unclear what happens to souls which are destroyed within the dead worlds. It is a similar question to asking what happened to the ghosts that were killed in "Ghost Fly".

33. Death doesn't speak at all in Together Again because his voice actor, Miguel Ferrer, passed away in 2017 long before production began.

34. Finn phases through New Death when he tries to attack him, just like what happened way back in "Death in Bloom".

35. The 30th Dead World contains Tree Trunks as well as many of her love interests; Mr. Pig, her alien husband from "High Strangeness", Danny and Randy who first appeared in "Apple Wedding", and several more who we don't recognise, including at least one who presents as a woman.

36. Literally yelled when these two showed up. Joshua calls Finn a crybaby, which is a callback to "Dad's Dungeon".

37. The wall of weapons in Joshua and Margaret's house includes the iconic Demon Blood Sword, which was broken in "Play Date", as well as Margaret's auto-loading crossbow from "Joshua & Margaret Investigations".

38. Jermaine is sidelined a few times through the episode, in reference to his attitude in "Jermaine" where he feels that Finn and Jake were always their parents' favourites. I would have hoped things would be a bit better by now.

39. Fern gets name dropped while Finn and Jake are reuniting. A shame he doesn't actually show up in the episode.

40. In this scene, Finn says "What time is it?" This is a very subtle reference to the 2010 cartoon "Adventure Time".

41. In a couple of shots during this fight scene it looks like Jake might have a tattoo. It seems like it only becomes visible when he stretches out his arm.

42. New Death's amulet in this scene resembles parts of the Lich's cape, foreshadowing his influence on New Death.

43. There are several more cameos in the 50th Dead World: Booshy from "High Strangeness", one of the Marshmallow Kids from "Scamps", and Ghost Princess and Clarence, who were seen ascending to the 50th Dead World in "Ghost Princess".

44. Finn didn't interact with Booshy in "High Strangeness", but it seems they must have met at some point before they both died because Finn knows his name.

45. It seems like people in the 1st Dead World are slowly melted away until they become part of the landscape. Nasty.

46. Lots more cameos in this scene: a gnome from "Power Animal", a gnome from "The Enchiridion", a Bath Boy from "The Vault", Blagertha from "Love Games", Maja the Sky Witch, a troll from "Dungeon", Chocoberry, Choose Goose, Wyatt, a spiky person from "Gut Grinder", and possibly more.

47. Tiffany's insults are consistently nonsensical and amazing, as they were in the original series.

48. The Candy Kingdom looks extremely different. Peppermint Butler is wearing the crown so he might be in charge now, which is supported by the kingdom's very magical-looking augmentations. It’s not clear whether Finn and Jake were expecting to find Princess Bubblegum or Peppermint Butler, since both have the initials “PB” and both could be going by the title of “Princess”. Perhaps Peps and Bubblegum share the princess duties now that PB is living with Marceline more of the time.

49. Peppermint Butler has a "Boss" mug, although it's not the same colour as the one from "Obsidian".

50. Jake's ghost has the same design as he did when BMO killed him in "Ghost Fly". I also absolutely love Finn's ghost. This scene establishes that ghosts are just visitors to the mortal plane from the dead worlds.

51. Life has only appeared in animated shorts before now. Namely, "The Gift That Reaps Giving" which establishes her relationship with Death, and "Frog Seasons: Winter". This episode gives her a concrete place within Adventure Time's pantheon: she is in charge of reincarnation.

52. A translation of Life’s angry French dialogue by Shado: “After all I did for that boy. After all I did for him. No, it's not possible. It's not possible no, that... that makes me so mad but it's not possible.”

53. We finally have in-universe confirmation that Shoko's tiger is a previous life of Jake. This was previously confirmed by one of the writers, but wasn't canon until now.

54. I feel like Finn pulled off Shoko's look even better than Shoko did. I wonder whether Finn has gained the memories of his past lives now that he’s dead.

55. No Easter egg here, just want to appreciate this image.

56. There is an elemental symbol on the wall here, as seen in "Jelly Beans Have Power".

57. Tiffany's dramatic internal monologue is a recurring gag, as is his habit of nearly dying from falling into holes.

58. The Jake suit makes a cameo in the fight against New Death. It was last seen in the episode "Reboot”.

59. Finn's backpack contains a few familiar items: the t-shirt with the pocket from "It Came from the Nightosphere", Finn's underwear from "Little Dude" and other episodes, and a copy of Mind Games as I've already mentioned.

60. The Lich's Hand is present in the background of Death's... death scene. This is probably the unseen "friend" who New Death keeps talking about.

61. The Lich's menacing monologues often begin with a single command. Previously they have included "Fall" and "Stop". This time, the command is "Burn".

62. Jake uses the word "boingloings", which is a callback all the way to "Hitman" in the third season.

63. Jake's blue shape-shifter form from "Abstract" appears very briefly during his fight with Finn.

64. Finn's lumpy space person form also makes an appearance. This design was last seen all the way back in the second episode of the entire show, "Trouble in Lumpy Space".

65. Jake steps on the Lich's hand in a very similar way to how he stepped on Ash in "Memory of a Memory", which is itself a Monty Python reference.

66. The credits include a dedication to a few AT cast and crew who have passed away. Polly Lou Livingston was the voice of Tree Trunks. Miguel Ferrer was the voice of Death. Michel Lyman and Maureen Mlynarczyk were both sheet timers on the original series. Rest in peace.

67. The message that Finn and Jake write out on the ouija board is "BUTT", which Peppermint Butler takes as a distress signal. This message is also used as a distress signal by the Hot Dog Knights in "The Limit".

68. Peppermint Butler's reversed dialogue from the scene where he makes contact with Finn and Jake is "Kee-Oth Rama Pancake", the spell from “Dad's Dungeon” for banishing demons.

69. That appears to be President Porpoise with all of Tree Trunks’ other lovers.

70. In this scene, Life is humming part of "Lonely Bones", the song which Death tried to record for her in her debut short "The Gift That Reaps Giving". It's hard to notice because it's so brief.

71. Finn and Jake's cover is blown while in the Land of the Dead because Jake loudly farts, which also happened in "Death in Bloom".

72. The place where Mr. Fox explains the perception mechanics of the afterlife is the exact same location as the River of Forgetfulness from "Death in Bloom", which, as it turns out, was imaginary.

These are sort of out of order at the end because I was adding stuff to the Twitter thread as it got discovered. That’s all for now!

[tlbodine]

The Horror Genius of Five Nights At Freddy’s

I’ve been playing FNAF: Help Wanted VR on my Oculus Quest lately (a birthday present to myself -- I know I’m late to that party!) and it’s reignited in me my old love of this series. I know Scott Cawthon’s politics aren’t great, but I don’t think there’s any malice in his heart beyond usual Christian conservative nonsense -- and I think he stepped down as graciously and magnanimously as possible when confronted about it. Time will judge Scott Cawthon’s politics, and that’s not what I’m here to talk about. I want to talk about what makes these games so damn special, from a horror, design, and marketing perspective. I think there’s really SO MUCH to be learned from studying these games and the wider influence they’ve had as intellectual property. 

What Is FNAF? 

In case you’ve somehow been living under a rock for the last seven years, Five Nights At Freddy’s (hereafter, FNAF) is a horror franchise spanning 17 games (10 main games + some spinoffs and troll games, we’ll get to that), 27 books, a movie deal, and a couple live-action attractions. 

But before it exploded into that kind of tremendous IP, it started out as a single indie pont-and-click game created entirely by one dude, Scott Cawthon. Cawthon had developed other games in the past without much fame or success, including some Christian children’s entertainment. He was working as a cashier at Dollar General and making games in his spare time -- and most of those games got panned. 

So he tried making something different. 

After being criticized that the characters in one of his children’s games looked like soulless, creepy animatronics, Cawthon had his lightbulb moment and created a horror game centered on....creepy animatronics! 

The rest, as they say, is history. 

The Genius of FNAF’s Horror Elements

In the first FNAF game, you play as a night security guard at Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza, a sort of ersatz Chuck-E-Cheese establishment. The animatronics are on free-roaming mode at night, but you don’t want to let them find you in your security room so you have to watch them move through the building on security camera monitors. If they get too close, you can slam your security room doors closed. But be careful, because this restaurant operates on a shoestring budget, and the power will go off if you keep the doors closed too long or flicker the lights too often. And once the lights go out, you’re helpless against the animatronics in the dark. 

Guiding you through your gameplay is a fellow employee, Phone Guy, who calls you each night with some helpful advice. Phone Guy is voiced by Cawthon himself, and listening to his tapes gives you some hints of the game’s underlying story as well as telling you how to play. A few newspaper clippings and other bits of scrap material help to fill in more details of the story. 

Over the next set of games, the story would be further developed, with each new game introducing new mechanics and variations on the theme -- in one, you don a mask to slip past the notice of animatronics; in another, you have to play sound cues to lure an animatronic away from you. By the fourth game, the setup was changed completely, now featuring a child with a flashlight hiding from the monsters outside his door -- nightmarish versions of the beloved child-friendly mascots. The mechanics change just enough between variations to keep things fresh while maintaining a consistent brand. 

There are so many things these games do well from a storytelling and horror perspective: 

Jump Scares: It’s easy to shrug these games off for relying heavily on jump scares, and they absolutely do have a lot of them. But they’re used strategically. In most games, the jump scares are a punishment (a controlled shock, if you will) -- if you play the game perfectly, you’ll never be jump-scared. This is an important design choice that a lot of other horror games don’t follow. 

Atmospheric Dread: These games absolutely deliver horror and tension through every element of design -- some more than others, admittedly. But a combination of sound cues, the overall texture and aesthetic of the world, the “things move when you’re not looking at them” mechanic, all of it works together to create a feeling of unease and paranoia. 

Paranoia: As in most survival horror games, you’re at a disadvantage. You can’t move or defend yourself, really -- all you can do is watch. And so watch you do. Except it’s a false sense of security, because flicking lights and checking cameras uses up precious resources, putting you at greater risk. So you have to balance your compulsive need to check, double-check, and make sure...with methodical resource conservation. The best way to survive these games is to remain calm and focused. It’s a brilliant design choice. 

Visceral Horror: The monster design of the animatronics is absolutely delightful, and there’s a whole range of them to choose from. The sheer size and weight of the creatures, the way they move and position themselves, their grunginess, the deadness of their eyes, the quantity and prominence of their teeth. They are simultaneously adorable and horrifying. 

Implicit Horror: One of the greatest strengths to FNAF as a franchise is that it never wears its story on its sleeve. Instead of outright telling you what’s going on, the story is delivered in bits and pieces that you have to put together yourself -- creating a puzzle for an engaged player to think about and theorize over and consider long after the game is done. But more than that, the nature of the horror itself is such that it becomes increasingly upsetting the more you think on it. The implications of what’s going on in the game world -- that there are decaying bodies tucked away inside mascots that continue to perform for children, that a man dressed in a costume is luring kids away into a private room to kill them, and so forth -- are the epitome of fridge horror. 

The FNAF lore does admittedly start to become fairly ridiculous and convoluted as the franchise wears on. But even ret-conned material manages to be pretty interesting in its own right (and there is nothing in the world keeping you from playing the first four games, or even the first six, and pretending none of the rest exist). 

Another thing I really appreciate about the FNAF franchise is that it’s quite funny, in a way that complements and underscores the horror rather than detracting from it. It’s something a lot of other properties utterly fail to do. 

The Genius of Scott Cawthon’s Marketing 

OK, so FNAF utilizes a multi-prong attack for creating horror and implements it well -- big deal. Why did it explode into a massive IP sensation when other indie horror games that are just as well-made barely made a blip on the radar? 

Well! That’s where the real genius comes in. This game was built and marketed in a way to maximize its franchisability. 

First, the story utilizes instantly identifiable, simple but effective character designs, and then generates more and more instantly identifiable unique characters with each iteration. Having a wealth of characters and clever, unique designs basically paves the way for merchandise and fan-works. (That they’re anthropomorphic animal designs also probably helped -- because that taps into the furry fandom as well without completely alienating non-furries). 

Speaking of fan-work, Scott Cawthon has always been very supportive of fandom, only taking action when people would try to profit off knock-off games and that sort of thing -- basically bad-faith copies. But as far as I know he’s always been super chill with fan-created content, even going so far as to engage directly with the fandom. Which brings me to....

These games were practically designed for streaming, and he took care to deliver them into the hands of influential streamers. Because the games are heavy on jump-scares and scale in difficulty (even including extra-challenging modes after the core game is beaten) they are extremely fun to watch people play. They’re short enough to be easily finished over the duration of a long stream, and they’re episodic -- lending themselves perfectly to a YouTube Lets Play format. One Night = One Video, and now the streamer has weeks of content from your game (but viewers can jump in at any time without really missing much). 

The games are kid-friendly but also genuinely frightening. Because the most disturbing parts of the game’s lore are hinted at rather than made explicit, younger players can easily engage with the game on a more basic surface level, and others can go as deep into the lore as they feel comfortable. There is no blood and gore and violence or even any explicitly stated death in the main game; all of the murder and death is portrayed obliquely by way of 8-bit mini games and tangential references. Making this game terrifying but accessible to youngsters, and then marketing it directly to younger viewers through popular streamers (and later, merchandising deals) is genius -- because it creates a very broad potential audience, and kids tend to spend 100% of their money (birthdays, allowances, etc.) and are most likely to tell their friends about this super scary game, etc. etc.

By creating a puzzle box of lore, and then interacting directly with the fandom -- dropping hints, trolling, essentially creating an ARG of his own lore through his website, in-game easter eggs, and tie-in materials -- Cawthon created a mystery for fandom to solve. And fans LOVE endlessly speculating over convoluted theories. 

Cawthon released these games FAST. He dropped FNAF 2 within months of the first game’s release, and kept up a pace of 1-2 games a year ever since. This steady output ensured the games never dropped out of public consciousness -- and introducing new puzzle pieces for the lore-hungry fans to pore over helped keep the discussion going. 

I think MatPat and The Game Theorists owe a tremendous amount of their own huge success to this game. I think Markiplier does, too, and other big streamers and YouTubers. It’s been fascinating watching the symbiotic relationship between these games and the people who make content about these games. Obviously that’s true for a lot of fandom -- but FNAF feels so special because it really did start so small. It’s a true rags-to-riches sleeper hit and luck absolutely played a role in its growth, but skill is a big part too. 

Take-Aways For Creatives 

I want to be very clear here: I do not think that every piece of media needs to be “IP,” franchisable, an extended universe, or a multimedia sensation. I think there is plenty to be said for creating art of all types, and sometimes that means a standalone story with a small audience. 

But if you do want a chance at real break-out, run-away success and forging a media empire of your own, I think there are some take-aways to be learned from the success of FNAF: 

Persistence. Scott Cawthon studied animation and game-design in the 1990s and released his first game in 2002. He released a bunch of stuff afterward. None of it stuck. It took 12 years to hit on the winning formula, and then another several years of incredibly hard work to push out more titles and stoke the fires before it really became a sensation. Wherever you’re at on your creative journey, don’t give up. You never know when your next thing will be The Thing that breaks you out. 

If you want to sell a lot of something, you have to make it widely appealing to a bunch of people. This means keeping your concept simple to understand (”security guard wards off creepy killer animatronics at a pizza parlor”) and appealing to as wide a segment of the market as you can (ie, a horror story that appeals to both kids and adults). The more hyper-specific your audience, the harder it’s gonna be to find them and the fewer copies of your thing you’ll be selling. 

Know your shit and put your best work out there. I think there’s an impulse to feel like “well, nobody reads this anyway, so why does it matter if it’s no good” (I certainly have fallen into that on multiple occasions) but that’s the wrong way to think about it. You never know when and where your break will come. Put your best work out there and keep on polishing your craft with better and better stuff because eventually one of those things you chuck out there is going to be The Thing. 

Figure out where your target audience hangs out, and who influences them, and then get your thing in the hands of those influencers. Streaming and YouTube were the secret to FNAF’s success. Maybe yours will be BookTube, or Instagram, or a secret cabal of free librarians. I don’t know. But you should try your best to figure out who would like the thing that you’re making, and then figure out how to reach those people, and put all of your energy into that instead of shotgun-blasting your marketing all willy nilly. 

You don’t have to put the whole story on the page. Audiences love puzzles. Fans love mysteries. You can actually leave a lot more unanswered than you think. There’s some value in keeping secrets and leaving things for others to fill in. Remember -- your art is only partly yours. The sandbox belongs to others to play in, too, and you have to let them do that. 

If in doubt, appealing to furries never hurts. 

Do I take all of this advice myself? Not by a long shot. But it’s definitely a lot to think about. 

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go beat The Curse of Dreadbear. 

[nochiquinn]

campaign 3 episode 5: rated m

I am Uncomfortable

these companies have to know what they're getting into when they sign these contracts right

"pretend this is it bc liam and I both forgot to bring it"

[shakes the show til the new intro falls out]

dooger

matt: give me your backstory npcs

ashton that's CHEATING

this is "promote gilmore's glorious goods"

that's fucking ominous

"I'm being a NOTE-TAKER :D"

laura "friendship via pastry" bailey

oh my god

"we were so much more organized when bertrand was here" you absolutely were not

"you don't wanna do murder on an empty stomach"

rip matt's voice

whisperssss

tumblr hates me posting images anymore but please google rooster hannigan, that's advik

marisha

blue boi

fearne remembering the residuum from exu

oh bless marisha for also thinking of Mario Mario and Luigi Mario

liam incapable of not trolling laura

"I don't know if I want to be without orym" ;-;

"something was always going wrong!" that's it that's campaign 2

13 storeys

fearne: for a moment I lived in a world where cops didn't exist

"you know what you did werthers"

quietly discussing orym's distrust of authority

oh no they have dummy-seeking dogs

oh! drip effects!!

oh it's a movie theater

"I'm relying on laura's balls" aren't we all

oh I hate it

oh that's a sweet little map

feel like I should maybe not eat soup while watching this

I'm sorry HOW many attacks??

my periodic fun fact that filming of the first (?) alien movie was delayed bc customs had to investigate the multiple 30-gallon barrels of KY they were trying to import

gabbadagoo

n i n e t e e n

sam

fcg does not have 4wd

"this..." "bitch"

why does everything come back to shit with sam

"I've got KIDS, I would NEVER"

poPS

"he's got back babies!"

"gizmo NO"

persona 5 showtime attack

my robit!!

NO

D:

oh thank god

"fuck that guy! he killed my friend bertrand!"

HEY LET'S FUCKING NOT

oryyyyym

ngl I was playing animal crossing until THAT and now I'm stressed

"I realized when I said it it was a problem!!"

"we both went unconscious in this fight! buddies!!"

"what is a stONKY'S RING"

"HOW DO YOU HEAL A ROBIT"

"disassemble!" I'm gonna fight liam

"don't put fcg in the bathtub!!"

nvm I'm gonna fight sam

my beloved upcycle witch

byebyeeee

"you told him your real name twice" did he though? are we sure?

every time eshteross is on screen I just think "your job is to be old and die so we can learn and be sad" but that was already bertrand so he needs a different gimmick

fearne

ashton just sloooowly reaching for the money

[caleb voice] one...two...three...

level four, LEVEL FOUR

[ninja-knox-ur-sox-off]

Hello! First of all I love you and I hope you're having the best day ever! Second, I've got a fic in the works about this concept but I was curious to see what rabbit holes your mind goes down SO consider what would happen if Lloyd had met Kai and Nya before the pilot episodes :3

Well, I suppose it depends on where they are but...

INSTANT ADOPTION

BUT PLOT TWIST

IT WOULD BE BY NYA DOING THE ADOPTING

Kai’s busy in the forge most of the day, and spends most of his time trying to keep them afloat, dealing with customers and bills, grocery shopping, convincing the people in the village he can care for his sister so they don’t try and separate them-- He doesn’t have a lot of time for scoping out new little siblings, and he certainly doesn’t have time to spare on random candy-stealing, loud, bratty children. He’s got a sister to look after. 

Nya is the one that brings Lloyd back to the forge. She’d probably bait him with candy, seeing the scared loneliness behind his loud voice and theatrics and not wanting to leave him alone on the streets.

After a very long day, dealing with cheap customers, an especially stubborn piece of metal, and worrying over money so much that he accidentally burned half of what was supposed to be supper, Kai turns around expecting to see his sister, and only his sister, coming through the door, but instead there’s his sister with that small kid that tried to bite open his grocery bags on the way back from the market earlier that day.

“Hey, Kai!” Nya says brightly. “How do you feel about adopting a little brother?”

“I will destroy your village!” declares Lloyd.

Kai’s ready to lay down and stare at the ceiling until they go away lskdmfaowef

Nya convinces him to let the kid stay the night, (it’s not actually that hard since Kai’s a big ol’ softie, even if the kid is an actual gremlin, who may or may not smash something on purpose in the first five minutes he’s there,) and after said kid jumps on their couch for ten minutes before tiring himself out and promptly passing out, they have a bit more of a serious discussion about it.

“You know we can’t support another person, we’re barely getting by as it is.”

“But look at his little face! He’s so lonely! Besides, it’s only for a little while.”

“Do you know how much tiny kids like that eat?”

“I’m pretty sure his parents left him too.”

Gosh dang conscious. Stupid guilt tripping, jerk of a sister--

Yeah, Lloyd stays.

Shenanigans, bonding, Lloyd learning he’s valued and doesn’t have to do anything to gain attention and that he’s important just because he exists and Kai getting annoyed at his blatantly rude behavior until he finds Lloyd crying one night and makes him hot chocolate and sits nearby until he calms down before telling him stories until he falls asleep--gosh dang it, I’m trying to limit myself here so I don’t ramble for the next three hours about this--

The interesting part would be deciding whether Lloyd is accidentally nabbed by the Skulkin along with Nya, or he goes with Kai while he’s training to be a ninja to go rescue their sister. Then there’s the question of would Garmadon lose his mind over the fact he accidentally kidnapped his own son? Or would Wu recognize his nephew right away? WHO KNOWS! Either way it’d be absolutely hilarious.

Imagine him feeling left out and jumping in to train with Kai cause he wants to help his big sister too, and he ends up getting launched halfway across the training course in the first two seconds, and Kai drops everything to dive and catch him before he hits the ground. And then Lloyd climbing into Kai’s bed at night, even though Wu gave him his own room because they both miss Nya and ;-;

Or like, Garmadon letting Lloyd roam free in the underworld and he just trolls the skulkin the entire time and they’re not allowed to do anything to him in retaliation because he’s immune due to his dad being the boss man slkdfma;ewof He’d probably demand Nya’s release too, which would put a damper on Garmadon’s plans, but he’s absolutely terrible at saying no to his son, so he compromises and just… doesn’t let them leave, but also doesn’t like...throw them in cages or anything. Nya would be absolutely livid and a little terrified, but Lloyd would feel right at home, climbing on his dad’s shoulders and soldiers during “time to take over ninjago” meetings.

I dunno sdklfmawef it’d be fun.

And the serpentine being released… perhase--OH WHAT IF I MADE IT ANGSTY.

Just hear me out: the ninja defeated Garmadon… Lloyd’s dad, whom he loves very much. OH MAN OUCH. Lloyd hates choosing, and he doesn’t want to choose between his dad or his siblings, and when he has to he can’t help but hate his siblings a little for making him choose. So he runs away. Goes back to doing what he was doing, or maybe not cause he probably thinks his dad’s dead.

Kai and Nya would immediately be looking for him, of course, so he would have to go in hiding.

When they drop into Jamakawhats-it village he runs for it and ends up accidentally falling into the serpentine tomb--YOU KNOW I DUNNO ASLKDMFAOWEF

POINT IS THIS IS A GREAT IDEA I COULD TOTALLY GET INVESTED IN (am already invested in) ASLKDMFA;OIWEFMSADF I’ma stop myself before I try going further and spend the next two days thinking about this! slkdmf too late 

[evanbuckley-heartofgold]

Sorry to bug you again, but I thought of this immediately after my first ask: what about the FireFam seeing just how much Chris relies on Buck? Maybe there is a call at his school, or Chris has a meltdown for some reason, but as soon they are in scene/when Chris gets brought to the station mid-meltdown, Buck is down the stairs before even Eddie can react - is one his knees and holding Chris within seconds, shushing him and telling him he’s safe, Buck’s got him, hey Dad’s here too, Buddy, you’re safe now?

(I’m in a very Buck-Is-Christopher’s-Co-Parent mood and there is never enough Christopher Diaz Love in the world)

Pt 1: So I have been trolling the tags, as one does, and after reading a few Post-Tsunami fics - can we get one with Buck and Chris dealing with it years later? Like maybe something at school brings it up & It’s Buck that immediately knows and gets what’s bothering him? Maybe Chris wanting to go to a pool party but being afraid and Buck canceling plans/switching shifts so that he can be there?

Read on ao3 (1.5k)

Shifts without Eddie are always the worst. They seem to drag on not to mention Hen and Chimney’s constant teasing about him missing his boyfriend. But Eddie called out for the day to help his abuela fix her porch so Buck is left alone with Hen and Chimney who seem to have nothing better to do than good naturedly bully him.

Now, Buck sits at the dining table, scooping lunch into his mouth, knowing any second the bell could ring and he’d be forced to abandon yet another meal. But what interrupts his meal isn’t the bell it’s a shout of, “Buck!”, from downstairs. He’d know that voice anywhere. 

Buck quickly walks over to the railing and sees Eddie walking into the station, his momentary confusion at Eddie’s presence washes away when he sees Chris beside him, looking very absent and leaning heavily into his dad’s side. Buck flies down the stairs, eyes only on Christopher. 

He slowly crouches down in front of Christopher, and this close Buck can see that his breathing is shallow and his eyes are unfocused. “Hey, buddy,” Buck says softly.  When Chris doesn’t react, Buck looks at Eddie who looks just as lost as Buck feels. 

“School called me and said that Chris was having some kind of episode.” Eddie squeezes Chris a little more into his side. “I took him home and tried to get him to tell me what was wrong but he only said your name so I figured if I brought him here you might be able to help.” 

Buck nods and looks back and Christopher. He takes Chris’s hand and gives it a reassuring squeeze. “Okay, peanut. I’m not really an expert, but I’m going to try my best here.” Buck tugs Christopher forward until the boy leans against his chest, Eddie taking Chris’s crutches. Buck hugs him tightly, hoping the pressure will do something to bring Christopher back to them. “I’ve got you.” He gently rubs Chris’s back. He whispers quiet affirmations into the boy’s ear until Christopher lifts his head and blinks up at Buck. 

“Bucky?”

“Hey, superman.” Buck smiles and squeezes Christopher’s arms. “Lost you there for a second. How are you feeling?” 

“I-I…” Christopher looks around at the station, taking it in for the first time. Then he glances over at Eddie before leaning closer to Buck and quietly telling him. “I heard the ocean and-and then I felt like I was drowning and I couldn’t find you.” Then, even quieter, “Bucky, I don’t remember coming here.”  

Oh. 

Buck gives him a reassuring smile despite his racing mind. “That’s okay, buddy. You’re okay. Let’s get you upstairs and then you can take a nap and have something to eat.” Chris nods and lets Buck scoop him up into his arms, head automatically resting on Buck’s shoulder. 

While Chris can’t see his face, Buck looks at Eddie, silently asking if Eddie had heard what Chris had said. Eddie nods, his expression neutral, something Buck has come to learn means that what’s going on inside his head is anything but. 

Once Christopher has gotten settled and tucked under a blanket, Eddie and Buck walk into the kitchen, Eddie taking a seat at the breakfast bar while Buck leans on the counter. Eddie rakes his fingers through his hair. 

Eddie sighs, “He told me they were learning about marine biology this month. Maybe his teacher played something or showed him something that triggered him. I-I don’t know I thought it was getting better.” 

“Eddie, has this been happening a lot?” 

Eddie looks up at Buck, “Kind of? It was happening a lot more a few months back. He would have nightmares a lot and he couldn’t stand the sound of running water. He’s been seeing a therapist, but he doesn’t really talk to me about any of this stuff. And for a while you and I…” Eddie trails off but Buck knows what he means. 

They couldn’t stand to be in the same room together for more than ten minutes without biting each other’s heads off. It had taken dozens of failed apologies and miscommunications before they had finally both gotten their heads out of their asses, apologized and then admitted their feelings for each other. 

Buck takes Eddie’s hand in his, “Eds. This isn’t your fault, you’re a great dad. I’m still struggling after the tsunami too, maybe the three of us can do this together. None of us have to be alone.” 

Eddie squeezes his hand, “Okay.” 

Buck wakes up to someone calling his name. His eyes flash open and he sits up groggily, clicking on the lamp. Beside him, he can see Eddie is doing the same, scrubbing a hand down his face. Buck squints in the darkness unsure if he just imagined it. 

“Buck!” The cry is almost desperate and Buck knows immediately that it’s Chris. Just like that he is out of bed, quickly followed by Eddie as he rushes down the hallway to Chris’s bedroom. The door is slightly open and when Buck pulls the door open, he sees Chris thrashing on his bed, still asleep. 

Buck sits on the edge of the bed and reaches over to touch Chris’s shoulder, shaking him gently, “Hey, buddy. It’s just a dream. You gotta wake up.” After a second, Chris’s eyes fly open and he gasps in air. 

Upon seeing Buck, Chris throws himself into the older man’s arms, burying his head against Buck’s chest, crying. Buck hugs him back immediately, his heart aching for the pain Chris is in. “I’m right here, Chris. I’ve got you.” 

“You didn’t though,” Chris whispers through his tears. Buck feels his heart split in two, now fighting back tears of his own. “I-I was lost and there was so much water and I-”

“Shh…” Buck rocks him side to side as he begins to sob. “I’m sorry, peanut. I’m sorry that I lost you. But I swear to you that will never happen again, I’ve got you now and there’s no way in hell I’m letting you go again.” Buck presses a kiss to the boy’s curls. “Just breathe.” Chris nods and Buck can feel Christopher’s stuttering breath against his chest. “Just like that, peanut.” He takes the next breath with Chris. 

“Buck…” 

“I’m right here.” Buck looks over his shoulder to see Eddie in the doorway watching the two of them with an unreadable expression in the darkness. “Your dad’s here too, bud.” 

Chris lifts his head and peers over Buck’s shoulder at Eddie. “Dad?” He asks, voice cracking. Eddie sinks down onto the other side of the bed and embraces Buck and Chris so Chris is sandwiched between them, safe on all sides. 

“We’ve got you, mijo. It’s alright now.” 

It takes a year and a half before Buck and Chris agree to go to the beach. 

It’s a warm Monday afternoon since Chris has off of school for the day, Eddie and Buck decided it would be the perfect day to go to the beach when it is likely not to have much traffic. Luckily they’re right and they manage to find a secluded spot to lay out their towels. 

For the first half-hour or so, Buck just sits with his arm around Chris, looking out at the water. Even being this close is making his heart beat faster and his palms get all sweaty. Chris is just as nervous, telling Buck and Eddie as much. 

“Do you still want to do this?” Eddie asks, crouching down next to where they’re sitting. “Because we can always go home and try again later.” 

Chris shakes his head, “I want to try. Just promise you won’t let me go under?” 

“I promise,” Eddie holds his hand over his heart.

A few minutes later the three of them walk down to the shore. Chris has a hand on both Eddie and Buck both for reassurance and balance. They stop where the sand is wet and let the cold ocean water lap up to their ankles. 

Buck takes a shaky breath and takes another step. Chris looks up at him, “It’s scary, isn’t it.” 

“It sure is, kid. But your dad’s going to keep us safe, he’s not going to let us go underwater.” 

Eddie reaches out his free hand and gives Buck’s shoulder a reassuring squeeze. “I’ve got you both.” 

They take another step and Buck has to fight the rising panic as the water reaches his knees. He feels Chris squeeze his hand and he looks down at the boy, giving him a grateful smile. “Keep going?” Eddie asks.

Buck and Chris both nod. They take a couple more steps. 

When the water touches Chris’s chest, he takes a panicked breath in and quickly shakes his head from side to side. “Okay, mijo, I’ve got you.” Eddie and Buck gently guide Christopher back a few steps until the water is lower on his body. 

“Okay?” Buck asks. Chris nods and pulls away from Eddie to lean his full body weight on Buck. Buck wraps his arms around Chris’s back and runs his fingers through the boy’s curls. “We’re going to be okay, superman.”