#go watch the whole thing if you can they talk about producers and stuff for a good long while its rly interesting!!

[asnowperson]

Takemiya Keiko interview about Kazeki OVA (1987)

Here's another short interview from platypus's stack of old magazines with cool interviews: Takemiya Keiko talks about Kaze to Ki no Uta Sanctus: Sei Naru Kana in the 1987 December issue of Puff.

Translation is under the cut, and please let me know if you spot my mistakes.

Kaze to Ki no Uta – OVA is finally on sale!

Takemiya Keiko Interview

“It will not ruin your image of the work, so please watch it!”

Let us first hear your thoughts on finishing this project.

Mr. Yoshikazu was sitting at the director’s chair. That alone assured me that everything would go smoothly, and I left everything to him. He read the manga thoroughly and gave the work his own interpretation. I had nothing to worry about. I didn’t have to ask him not to do a certain part in a certain way, or to avoid including too many “risqué” scenes. I can feel that he gave the work the treatment it deserves. Even the animation style was not too flashy and anime-like. The movements were more orthodox. Everything worked out perfectly, so I have nothing to say.

The background art was amazing. Did you ask them to draw them that way?

Both Mr. Yoshikazu and I thought that she’d be a  good fit, and suggested having the same person who was the art director for “Natsu e no Tobira”, but we couldn’t get a hold of her. We found out the reason later: The producer thought she was too slow, and we should give up on working with her (laughs). But when we said that she was the only person who could draw the backgrounds, she was hired to work in the project. However, she was too late to turn in the drafts. We really were in a tight spot. She might have been slow, but she really is an artist. When she can’t draw something, she just can’t. She gave it her all… Even though it was something that’d only be on screen for two seconds… If we couldn’t ask them to do something, I said I should go ahead and do it myself.

So, I gather that you drew some key animation yourself. Are manga and anime too different to draw for?

Both mediums are used basically to capture “movement,” so I think they are the same. You go with the flow, trying to capture “movement”… You think about how original you can express it. That’s a really fun undertaking. For example, even if it’s just a scene of a character turning to look back, if you strive to give it a little touch, you can really bring out an erotic feeling. That’s the stuff I’m talking about. If I had a lot of money, I would dabble more in in-between animation. I now understand why Otomo Katsuhiro-san was so obsessed with it (laughs).

I’ve seen the OVA. It felt like reading one of your works.

Do you think so? I didn’t ask him to do it, but to keep close to the atmosphere of the original work, Mr. Yoshikazu outlined the key points. He put the same things as my drawings in those scenes. But if you looked closely, you could tell that they were different. When I saw the whole thing, I thought “wow, it’s the same!” However, upon closer inspection, I found out that such scenes did not exist in the original. I even thought maybe something was wrong with me. The same also goes for the lines. “Did he ever say that? He might have said that…” But when I re-read, I see that no such line was uttered. I had so many moments like that.

What was the fans’ reaction to this OVA adaptation?

When I said it was happening, I received an equal amount of positive and negative reactions. Well, that’s only to be expected. So, like I thought, only when I said that Mr. Yoshikazu was the one directing it, I saw the real opposition. The animation director was decided on, but the VAs weren’t cast yet. When news of the production got out, I received letters saying “it’s too late, I give up!” (laughs) They said stuff like, “Here we are, so against this idea, but you still say that you’ll do it! I don’t care anymore!” I can say that there are people who definitely won’t watch it. It makes me happy to see the work being loved that much, but when people are that obsessed with it… It’s kind of scary. I sometimes go as far not seeing it as something I myself created. But well, there are still a lot of people who say “I might cry and whine, but I’ll still watch it.”

Can we have Ms.Takemiya, the creator herself, do some advertisement for the OVA?

The OVA didn’t embarrass me, so I’ll keep promoting it. I don’t think it’ll ruin your image of the work. But I know that there are people who are too nitpicky and say stuff like the lines of a character’s profile is kind of off and they hate it, or that their legs are too thin  or that their feet look weird (laughs). In that sense, we paid extra attention to the movement itself and tried to animate the characters in a natural manner. “The Poem of the Wind and the Trees” makes you think of subtle movements, right? We can’t have them move too briskly, and even the fight scene is nothing too serious. Because Mr. Yoshikazu didn’t want to create too vivid of a scene. Rather, he didn’t want it to stink of “masculinity” that much. And people who’ve only seen the character designs might think that they look nothing like the manga, but when they are in motion, they do look like their manga counterparts. As for the voice of the characters, I don’t know the actress of Gilbert, but we have Nobita-kun for Serge (laughs)! People who are into anime will recognize her voice, so they might be a little bit of put off by that, but she doesn’t sound like Nobita-kun here. Not at all! The more you listen to her acting, the more you enjoy it! There are parts that reflect Serge’s character, so I’m really content with the result.

Can we consider this as “episode 1” of a series? Do you have plans for a continuation?

If this OVA sells, it might happen. If this one gets a positive reaction, I think we can make another one. The producer said that’s what he thought would happen. If you ask Mr. Yoshikazu, he says it’ll be at least 6 episodes long, but I doubt that. I can’t bring myself to believe that we can make that many episodes. Anyway, to think that we won’t be working with the staff who brought it to life with such resemblance feels so sad. But I also think that if we ask them to do it again, they’ll simply run away (laughs). We’ve already done Yoshikazu-san’s favorite part right off the bat, so what remains is the hard part. He says he can’t decipher a character like Augu (laughs). Maybe another director might do better.

And what about the future of the story in manga?

There’s the stuff about marriage and children problems, how to reach enlightenment, and everything in-between until Serge’s death. But even if I drew that, that would have no meaning for people who are only here for what Gilbert and Serge had (laughs). I don’t have any plans to draw any continuation for the moment, but one day, if I ever get the chance… If the are conditions right, I think I’d like to draw it.

Can we have your final message for Puff readers?

Watch the OVA. Please do it. I believe that if you watch it once, all of your worries will be washed away.

[synnamon-hearts]

Hii I’m back again to ask if you could please write headcannons of how UD characters would react waking up & you telling them you had a dream of them having sex & feeling needy bc of it ?? (Assuming they’re together) 🙂‍↔️

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Ooooo, okay! 👀

NSFW down below!

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Josh ~ Ohhhhh God, Josh would be the biggest tease. It would also boost his ego by like 1000%. He has that much of an effect on you that you had an actual sex dream about him? Man, what a flex! And it was so good that you want him right now? He would chuckle at this, already sitting up and preparing to recreate the scene. He's really dedicated to recreating settings since he dreams of being a film producer.

"Awww, needy because you dreamed of me fucking you silly? Look at you, already soaked through your little panties. Lay back and let me do all the work, beautiful. I got you."

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Chris ~ The way this mf would blush omfg it would make his whole year! He actually made a girl have a sex dream so intense she's ready to go as soon as she wakes up? No fucking way. Making a girl dream about you is wild enough, let alone this! He would be jumping at the opportunity to fulfill your desires as soon as you tell him what the dream was about.

"Wait, wait, wait... You had a dream... About me? Wow... Wow... This is unbelievable. Lay back. Let me do this for you. I need to."

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Mike ~ Ahhh Mike, Mike, Mike, Mike... Mike... Lmao he would be SO cocky. Even more than Josh, actually. Before you can even finish telling him about your dream, he's on top of you, already kissing your neck. He thinks he doesn't have to hear anymore, since he already knows every single thing that makes you tick.

"Shh, shh, shh. Let me take care of you, baby. You like that, yeah? Yeah? Let your big strong man make you feel good. You want that, huh? Just let me do the work, baby."

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Matt ~ Matt would be the biggest sweetheart over it, chuckling fondly and planting a soft kiss to your forehead. He would listen intently, a dopey and tired smile on his face as he watches you rant away about every detail that happened in the dream. And then he would ask what specifically you would like him to do for you to make you feel as good as you felt when you were sleeping.

"Awe that's so sweet, babe. I'm even on your mind while you're dreaming, hm? Want me to do anything for you? Don't worry about it being late and me having football practice tomorrow. You come first. What do you need me to do for you?"

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Sam ~ Sam would honestly be flattered that you had a dream about her. She would hold you, rub your back, and caress your hair as you tell her about your dream. Aw, you're so sweet and worked up right now for her. How did she get so lucky. Of course, she would want to help you in any way she can.

"Aww, sweetie. You don't have to ask me twice, okay? I'm here for you. Just lay back and relax, okay? I'll make you feel better."

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Ashley ~ Y-You had a sex dream??? About her??? Wow, this is something Ashley has written about in her fanfics, but never even dreamed of it happening to her. She would be blushing wildly as you talked her through what danced in your mind as you slumbered, before bashfully asking if you want to recreate the moment in real life.

"Oh... Oh wow... I've only read about this stuff before but I didn't think it could be possible. Not for me. Would you... Would you want to do this... In real life... Like... Right now? No pressure, of course!"

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

Jess ~ Jess would be shocked. Like she plays it off cocky but she didn't think this would happen. She isn't all that confident in the effect she has on you, despite what she says. So to hear this boosts her ego a little bit. She wouldn't admit it to you, but it almost made her want to cry.

Emily ~ I'm gonna be blunt, Emily would be pissed that you woke her up. How fucking dare you disturb her beauty sleep?! But to hear that it was because you were needy for her eases her frustration just by a small amount. Still, that's not gonna stop her from taking her anger out on you just a little bit in a way you crave for.

"You... You what? I-I mean, hell yeah! I bet I'm on that mind every night, huh? How about you just lay back and let me rock your world. I'll give you something to put you right back to sleep, baby."

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

"What the fuc— Are you fucking serious? I need my fucking sle— Oh... Oh... Okay, fine. Just this once. Now lay still while I get the cuffs..."

𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭~𖹭

[dontevenpmodarlin]

Montresor analysis post.

I am going to talk a lot about episode 87 and then a bit about other episodes.

I watched a guy talk funny on YouTube and here is it roughly translated;

“Ego produces most of our thoughts. We think that when we interact with the world, talk to people, that those things generate thoughts inside us. But no. What enters us are raw materials, materials from which the ego composes thoughts. But what thoughts it creates depends on what you have experienced, what traumas you have, how you were raised. What you have understood to what extent and how certain things, what conclusions you have drawn based on a certain understanding you had. What decisions based on these conclusions you have started to make and what patterns have been created based on making certain decisions. What you have seen, smelled, experienced.”

So the stuff that are being said here are very impressive to me and I adore it.

And it reminded me of Montresor.

Montresor is raised in a very religious community. In it, for reasons unknown to us yet, he is seen from birth as a sinner.

“You’ve had the devil inside you since the day you were born” - Monty’s mom.

If it’s by his mother, or by the whole community, we don’t know. We know that at the end he seems to be the scapegoat of them all, (if the robed figures do indeed symbolize his old community, idk they may symbolize just other people over all.) but let’s assume that ig? Going by that thinking Montresor is raised in a place where everyone blames him for stuff.

Let’s quickly go over the facts we get from the flashback:

We’re in a church.

There’s dirties cloaked figures, faceless, that are wearing white robes. The robes themselves are dirtied, suggesting that those people are themselves not ‘clean’ ‘pure’ or free of ‘sin’

Montresor asks them who they are and what do they want.

A figure reaches out from under the cloak- let’s also point out that everyone in this flashback is cloaked. As if the robe itself is a protection from the dirt? Perchance? (You can’t just say perchance☝️🤓)

The robes can suggest that they’re hiding themselves under the pretense of something pure/righteous and do not let the dirt stain them.

They may hide who they really are or their intentions.

The person who touches him on the chest -Duke and Annabel railing scene style- stays quiet for a moment “…” before saying that “You’re wicked.”

And THAT burns. That handprint burns.

The cloaked figures hand itself turns black, and the DIRT from the cloaked figures robe, atoms dissolves itself and burns Montresor leaving a mark.

Here’s the visual for the first time it happens and later on we get a whole panel of how the line infront of him is dirtied and the whole line after passing by him is cleansed.

Okay so we pretty clearly get the meaning of this, but let’s go over this panel by panel.

Montresor bends over holding onto his chest and making the ouch-sounds, and bro doesn’t get a break because the next hand is already reaching out for him, as the now cleaned ‘Mr.Yee Wicked’ goes away.

Montresors notices and says ‘WH- hold on’

But the next figure already is saying “You are selfish.”

And it’s dirt leaves its robe, creating a burn on Montresor’s back.

The figures keep coming with comments like “Gluttonous.” “Stupid.” “Depraved.” to which all Montresor objects, getting more and more agitated.

As I said, the whole line infront of him is dirtied, waiting for their turn to get rid of their dirt-sins-wrong doings, by blaming it on him, or projecting or whatever.

I’ve wanted to write down list over where which blame is placed but it doesn’t show past these three’s, and I don’t want to assume too that it was meant symbolically, but it would’ve been cool if it was.

Heart? - Wicked.

Upper back - Selfish.

Left Shoulder - Depraved? Or Wretched?

Either way the Wretched comment is where he breaks with a “Please.”

Now for everyone that is as English as me, id like to just quickly summarize that the word Wretched means being in a miserable, unfortunate, or deserving of pity state.

(If I’m wrong, do so correct me.)

Either way it suggest in religious context being removed from the God. Which well, is the source of life and everything overall.

Also let’s quickly say that the handprints leaving burns means them having a lasting effect on Montresor. They burn him. The accusations and judgments, handprints symbolizing different vices, condemning him, have long lasting effects on him.

Montresor is in the next panel curled up nearly, he hugs himself with his long hair covering his face, (in shame?) and his right eye being visible in emotion of like I’d say conflict? He is hurt by so many people here, he asks them to “Just leave me be.” I think that panel describes a lot of his childhood. He doesn’t understand what’s happening or why they’re doing this to him.

Him hugging himself with his hands holding his shoulders tightly amidst the burning handprints dooo create a visual. Are his hands atp holding him together or are they part of the blame, but now self inflicted? Does he believe all of that? Maybe he knows it’s not real but still it does force the thoughts and bad beliefs.

He must feel it to be wrong, OR he believes it, but he must’ve noticed as he grew up that others weren’t holier than him.

When a hand reaches to his forehead to say “You are worthless.” He SNAPS.

He does NOT let that touch him. He fights against it all then, with

“So what if I am.” He replies looking up. (Idk if the way the sentence is multiplied and lowered on opacity suggests it being said before, or a ringing effect.)

It continues with:

“Does it make you feel holy?!” “Like yer better than me!?” “Like y’all ain’t sinners yerselves?!”

Which hi? Okay so he may accept all those things, and believe them deep inside? Negative stuff being repeated to us as we grow up DO fuck up our brain, and worm inside it. They create beliefs because even IF we are so lucky to understand on an intellectual level that something may not be completely true, the wound itself was created on a deep emotional level.

If you’re told as a child that you’re an pathetic little crusty Cheeto thief-goblin then that may trigger an insane emotional reaction. You trust adults, if the ones that are your guardians say shit, you believe them ofc. They are keeping you alive, you need their love and approval to survive and grow.

So words like pathetic, Cheeto, and thief fx can leave marks on us, make us feel ashamed so insane degrees. And fear and shame are two main sources of a lot of feelings, that may be masking them.

So even understanding that you’re not a Cheeto might’ve left such an emotional scar on you that until you feel those feelings that were stopped back then and turned into a trauma, you won’t be left free of it and will be haunted. And for the emotions to flow, you also need a new logical understanding of what happened and why you’re not a Cheeto or why being a Cheeto is not wrong. You need to see on both levels that it’s a misunderstanding or not a wrong doing.

Anyway that Worthless comment ENRAGES Montresor. All the other comments lead him to feel anger, shame? Sadness? But that one triggers him more that the T-word (🚂)

“Worthless, y’say?” “Worthless!?” Monty screams looking around, he is circled by the purified freaks, “YOU.” “NEED.” “ME.”

Which fuck yeah, okay so he understands that everyone around him is a ‘sinner’ as well, and that they’re using him as a scapegoat to feel better about themselves. This is and understandable source of insane anger.

Now the fuck ass bitch of the mf year comes in, aka his Mother who I’ll call Samantha because I don’t want to type Monty’s mom 24/7.

Samantha- I’m kidding, his mother shushes him, calms him down as she reaches for him, and holds him- or rather has him in her clutches! As she doesn’t HUG him ladies and gentlemen, she holds her hands clasped around him.

Let’s add to this that his mother’s robe is colored RED. And her right hand has a golden cross ring.

Which HI OKAY. Okay. Funny thing, this might be a reach BUT, overall wearing a cross necklace is supposed to mean bearing your own cross, as in bearing your own hardships and suffering and pain etc, not rejecting it.

In literature such as Dostoyevsky the cross necklace is used often in ways as to show one taking the consequences of their actions and bearing them. Or as in exchanging them to show brotherhood.

Either way, I may be looking too much into stuff yk? But she’s wearing it on her middle finger which lol, but she’s wearing it on her hand, not around her neck, and she puts her hands around in a pseudo hug which is actually a cage next to the other burns on his body.

Is it meant to symbolize her trapping him by using religion? Or Samantha putting her own wrongs and blames on him as well? Her burdens? We’ll get back to that later.

Monty is huffing and puffing bcus he just had a rage attack, and his mother asks him “Are you picking fights again, my treasure?”

I’m shitting myself full live ultra HD because this implies that him trying to fight for himself and rejecting himself being worthless is declined.

He is not allowed to do so.

Why doesn’t his mother allow it? Because feelings as shame and guilt can be used to trap people. That’s what narcissists does usually taking facts mixing up words and phrases to make the other person seem guilty and in blame.

Holy Samantha is calling this ‘picking a fight.’ And the ‘again’ suggest that she’s been bending perceptions to her like and presenting the reality in her fancy.

And her fancy is keeping control over Montresor.

“My treasure.”

So this is a whole thing, which I suspect most of us already know of but let’s go over it for the sake of clarity.

His mother calling him ‘Montresor’ which can be directly translates to ‘My treasure’, and now it’s cute when it’s in the style of ‘My pumpkin’ pie’ but it’s rather giving ‘MY PRECIOUS.’ As in Gollum.

He belongs to HER. His autonomy is hers. He is not to misbehave- but actually he IS to misbehave, because that’s what keeps him trapped! If he sins, he needs HER to atone. How else is he to be forgiven? (Samantha is flashing us her Colgate smile my loves, she is NOT against this situation.)

His mother traps him in a cycle where he will always misbehave, and everything he does will be shown in that light, he’s either hopeless or selfish, and she DOES want him in that cycle, for him to endlessly try to not misbehave and always fail, and always have to depend on her for atoning for failing.

The next scenes will explain this better,

Montresor looks down at the arms wrapped around him and says “Mother.” In shock on his face. But not ‘Mother?’ But as in a statement.

Also back up, she is wearing a red robe. It’s not stained. She does not feel at fault or blame. And maybe it’s because her son is her main outlet. The white can symbolize righteousness, or devotion. Red may symbolize power or sin? Probably power, since she’s in power of him.

Anyhoo, she says

“Holler all you want. They’ll never hear you.”

Aka you’re helpless, no matter what to do they will never hear you = understand you = accept what you say. This can be a shaping belief to have, it’s no use to defend yourself because the crowd is deaf.

This is critically damaging because it’s partly truth in this situation. The cloaked figures won’t listen to what he has to say, he’s the worst of them all, all he says is bound to be bad.

This also dismisses the idea of trying for change or reaching for justice by peaceful means. They won’t listen anyways. You have to act in other ways.

“How don’t you understand yet?”

She’s insinuating he’s behind on something and it’s he who doesn’t understand, it’s all an illusion in his head. She’s planting doubt atp in his head too. Like darling? Why tf are you so behind, throwing a fit in a public server. Be ashamed- if you want ig.

“You are not one of us.”

Isollllation. Isolation is DEATHLY. Detaching him from all of them again would force him to think that she is like nearly a god for being there for him or loving him.

Making him dependent on her. He is to feel worse by overall, and it all comes at the end of the day of if she’ll be pitiful enough- or god forbid ah if she is forced to love him because he’s her child and it’s not even her choice to pity him! It’s forced! - and will grant him ‘acceptance’ or a form of it.

She won’t leave him. And her abandoning him should scare him. (Maybe this is a reach, I’d like to say that I’m theorizing real hard rn) but Samantha not wanting Montresor to leave her could indeed be swapped around into a way in which he feels her fear instead, so she gains more control. Typical narcissist behavior ig.

I feel ashamed? Nahhh, it’s all you G. I am angry? No it’s YOU who is raising your voice at ME. I’m the poor victim. LMAO IG?

I don’t want to be left alone? (Again?) (or to bear all the shame alone?)

Well, let’s switch it around and make YOU scared of me leaving so that I’ll be ensured you won’t leave me.

Ok next is just Monty looking at the big ass cross on the wall hit up by light and shit, as his mother holds him and keeps talking.

Btw id like to point out the effect of the windows. They have those diamond bars patterns. They’re ALL over Samantha’s smexy red H&M robe. They’re like prison bars, and it can ofc suggest her trapping him, or them both being trapped. I mean she herself is trapped in her own emotions and who she is, and she’s doing it to him too bcus that’s what she is doing to herself, unconsciously or not. The patters seem to do that to us.

“We walk with the lord, always.”

“Never question his plans.”

The statement of him not being one of them and then these being said suggest that he doesn’t walk with the lord and that he questions his plans- by questioning stuff? By questioning how he is treated? Very extreme show of how religion can be corrupted and bent for one’s own use. You could take overall a lot of wisdoms or Facebook quotes and do tf u want with them, and Montresor’s mother is quite a person.

“And He smiles upon us for our devotion.”

“But when He tests you, you get angry. You think you know better.”

Well what a way to spin and tamper with his emotions. His anger is not rightful. What he feels is wrong. People around him judging or abusing him is right or a test or whatever, and if Monty was devoted he wouldn’t feel like this.

Which is insane for as many reasons as you can think of. Anger to unjust is the right emotion, lmao it’s even mentioned in Bible, so she’s bending the words to her will.

Then, she reaches out for his hair in this very motherly manner of tucking it behind his ear, saying “You are faithless, my son.” “You have earned your misery.”

Okay so also to say, her tucking his hair behind his ear like this is crazy brainwashing. The physical touch and motion shows love and affection. While the words she speaks are of the opposite. We can see her mouth through most panels and she is show smiling, she is calm, she is content saying all of this.

Also the fact that she uh like takes the hair away for his ear to be out in the clear like dawgs on the beach, maybe in a way so he listens.

Montresor objects again.

“I’m not. I didn’t.”

Woah gender reveal ahh colors. He objects to being faithless, which may mean that he believes in god but thinks himself too wicked, and that’s why God does nothing for him? I’m unsure, as in episode 81 we get this golden stuff:

“Say, love Will? D’you wanna know a secret?”

“God’s never saved anybody. ‘Specially not the faithful.”

We could assume he means himself. I at first thought he meant himself when he was a believer but then if he went being non believer he wouldn’t say that God doesn’t save ppl because God wouldn’t exist I guess. So God chills but he’s mean in Monty’s opinion?

“Even in the good book, they always end up worse off. At the end of the day, all you can rely on is yourself. So maybe try growin’ a backbone, yeah?”

Okay so crazy good, because we can see where his belief of only relying on yourself comes from. It’s from the fact that he probably had to save himself from the situation he was in when he was younger. No magic hocus pocus apparated him out of the church, no Voldemort giving him a gun in the forest. He was all on his own, and he probably strongly believes he always will be.

Also in Wills gray ass shattered like pieces of glass flashbacks (William you’re so incredibly talented in being mentally unwell I feel better abt myself) we can see Monty’s comments to Will.

“Stop them you useless piece a shit!”

“Well? What’ll it be pal? Hightail it like a wimp, or die standing up?”

“Yer a damned fool, Will.”

“What a bootlicker” - “s’pose you’d know.”

“Hell, Will! S’the matter with you!?”

“I love you so much we should move out and live on a farm and see who kills who first.”

And by all those comments we get yet another glimpse into Montresor’s world.

William in Monty’s eyes is someone weak and helpless. Who has read FP ifykyk, I would love to write abt that, it’s another important part to Montresor’s character but idk if I should do so here, as idk how tf to spoiler anything.

Okay, and what is his reaction to weakness or helplessness? It’s a reaction of protection!

As in, rejecting portraying weakness or feeling helplessness or any act of it, and defying it, is a form of saving himself from the pain that those things brought him, as he associated being that with being trapped, used, manipulated. He can’t afford himself to have such weak spots, he has to be the opposite.

There’s a delicious other side to this but ig if I’ll get bored in a month or so I’ll write abt the current fp.

Next panel after Montresor objecting is his Mother smiling and telling him “The prove it.”

“Pray.”

And she pushes him down to kneel, looming over him. Also to mention, her brighter blonde hair is insane because he has dirty blonde hair. Hi?

His hands shake as she forms them into the praying hands, and he tells her “B-But I can’t.”

“And why not?”

“I’ve forgotten the words. Could you remind me how it starts? I need your help, Mother.”

(Also is she leading the church or what? Why is she ‘Mother’ and not ‘mother.’ So she has a superior lore in the church as a nun or smth idk?)

Montresor here is ready to pray and ask for forgiveness, but he doesn’t know the words any longer, and he is vulnerable in asking for help, he literally says out loud the ‘I need your help, Mother.” Which is crazy work for a guy like him. Sadly it’s the wrong person to ask for such, but it’s the only person perhaps he believes he can ask for that. She didn’t seem to leave him even if he’s born as this massive sinner from the beginning.

Then she lifts his chin up and tells him that

“I know.” “But there’s no helping you, my treasure.”

And her face seems ‘solemn’ now. As if she’s telling him the sad truth. This is her just further trapping him up in the cycle of being in control of him. There’s no helping him really, but he should be always asking for it. It’s using the stuff from Bible about people being born in sin and never being able to really get rid of it, but yet still are encouraged to ask for it.

As well, without the overall corruption it just means to accept one’s flaws and how stuff like generational trauma already passes upon us, and that such complicated stuff are impossible to fully fix. Since under one illusion lies another and so on, and you’d really need to be a God to fully just heal and be pure of all the ‘sin’ but asking for forgiveness even if you do stuff wrong bcus u don’t have control over every mean thing you do, I’d just admitting that you aren’t strong enough but want to change, and you keep that intention.

You don’t really have to believe in God or be religious to see that intentions are like really powerful stuff too, and they make our brain orient us on the goals we set for ourselves, and if the intention is indeed, Im sorry for doing this thing that I know is not good, and id like to ask for help and change, - Is literally gonna lead u good places either way.

Samantha is taking that away from Montresor. The belief that he can change, can ask for help, and then adds at the end that he is her treasure.

He is stuck with her. Who else will love him than her in this pov she’s forcing onto him? She takes away the possibility of being free by that, locking him in the delusional beliefs she keeps feeding him.

He has worth only when he’s with her. He snaps at being judged to be worthless, and his mother is the only one around to see him in any worth.

He’s literally her treasure.

Like no wonder bro compensates so bad, look at the cellar arc again in how he had a broken leg but stand up. Lenore comments:

“Their loyalty might be more fragile than it looks. Maybe he’s worried if he shows weakness, he’d lose control over them.”

Be weak = lose control over ppl or himself or over anything over all.

Back to Montresor and Samsung.

Samantha says “You’ve had the devil inside you since the day you were born.” Right after the there no helping you my treasure.

And yeah you can’t be helped fr bro, you was born with the devil inside you, no much to do with you other than keep under control for the rest of your life.

He gets angry then again and his eyes change to demon like.

Then he pukes the demon out- or well it leaves him?

The fuck ass hellish goat is birthed and stands on the symbol of Belial - Belial in Hebrew Bible originally meant “Worthlessness” or “Lawlessness” or “Wickedness.” The word itself means Without Worth, or usefulness.

So this demon in Montresor is created because of all of this. Before he even pukes it out and is forced to look up at his mother we can see the symbol itself being on the floor, not lightened up. As it can either mean it already being prepared by her or just the view that when you stand before God (since it’s where the cross was up on the wall) you put yourself in the state of being worthless.

Which woah again is insane, as the message in the Bible over all is the opposite in every way overall. But that’s then again the corruption.

The circle symbol thing lightens up in red, and Montresor is shaking on the floor. This a beautiful visual of what stuff like these can do to us, as we in fact do have something that can be described as a ‘demon’ in us. Aka the wounds and the ways we try to save ourselves and protect ourselves.

Also that doesn’t excuse our actions and doesn’t make Montresor not a villain in any way, it just explain him. This is NOT and apologist thing, I’ll jump before I’ll become that. But then when someone doesn’t hate on something bad every three seconds they must dislike waffles since they are taking about pancakes or smth.

“God have mercy.” Above the goat thing, is said by the figures we can guess from the font of the text.

The candles form around the circle and idk if that means shit since they’ve been floating around before or if it’s just decorative.

Then we get the visual of the figures praying out loud and saying the words Montresor has forgotten, as the demon attacks them.

Montresor gets blood on his face and looks up shocked and laughs at it. Because they’ve gotten what they deserved in his mind now.

Now idk what to say abt this panel, im totally missing out on the probably double meaning of it but it’s 3 am.

Then we switch pov to what’s actually happening and it’s Montresor choking his best friend on the floor. Parallel to the demon choking a cloaked figure shadow.

Lenore then says all kind of stuff to him, mocking him as “you, the devil you are.” “Ain’t scared of nutthin’ and no-body.” And he just agrees. And then she clocks him in with the “You’re always scared. Aren’t you?”

And he totally is.

Annabel then saying that if he wants help he’ll have to ask them for it is insane too, because we just saw what his beliefs/experiences are on asking for help.

Not to mention his overall power status going down if he does so.

“All he needs to do is ask for our help. But if his pride is more important to him than his life, who am I to argue?”

And that’s funny because for Montresor it’s not just pride, it ends up being it of course, but him thinking that he is worse than everyone around him is making him compensate in acting as if he’s better than everyone ig or trying/believing that he actually is and trying to reject how he was treated, and both thinking you’re better than everyone around you as well as thinking you’re the worst of the worst is being prideful, since in both you let yourself believe that you know better.

Which is tricky. Bro is defo stuck. His mother may not be around but he carries the cross on his neck. Idk what that symbolizes for him, if it’s a sign of his fate, of his mother still holding power over him, or something entirely else, or all at once.

Montresor’s first words after fairing and being awakened to be “I’m not,” and “I didn’t!” Are creepy as heck and sad.

And the fact that after saying those same words he has to ask for help again. A stranger. And Annabel replying the same way his mother did? “I’m quite certain you’re beyond help, Montresor.”

Montresor 💀 My treasure. Bye.

Also now I’m conflicted if him asking her why she hates him sm is like him getting a chance to ask his mother why she hated him sm?

Idk maybe it’s a reach. But we see that Montresor respects Annabel and that makes sense.

Then in episode 115 we see that when Eulalie ignores Montresor, which can make him feel un important or unworthy of attention, instantly maddens him.

Then he pretty much just shifts the words around like a professional and manipulates Will’s understanding of the situation into what he wants him to see/what he sees.

Then in the latest free chapter we see that Montresor did NOT in fact leave Will alone. Which says a LOT. It gives him a whole new side making him even more humane in his actions. Not to mention the fact that he SHIELDS Will with his own Body. And compliments him in the minimum way.

He treats Will the way his mother treated him in many ways, but there’s the MAIN big difference.

Okay but now we can finally get a conclusion to this thing.

Those two pages from a book I was reading are giving Monty I think. (hi Willspero nation)

We don’t know why Montresor is deemed to be born with the devil inside of him. Is it because of who his father might be? Or because he was meowed under no wedding circumstance? Did his father leave?

The shame of that would be left on his mother I guess? His mother is referred to as Mother rather than just mother, so she might be a nun or smth of high status and those usually make vows of not holding hands with guys.

Samantha could’ve lied or done something who knows, either way the father seems not to be around I think, and him leaving her would be a ‘good cause’ for her manipulating Montresor to never leave her.

We don’t know her story but if she got some abandonment issues or some shit she is definitely taking it out on him in the most malicious way possible. She might’ve been shamed for having a child and put that shame on Montresor too.

She mocks him for his anger, the way in earlier post I’ve talked about how Annabel mocks Ada for throwing a tantrum. Annabel does it to get out of a situation where she is held captive, Monty’s mother does it to keep someone captive. Ig?

“You’re either born a gambler or yer not.” You’re born this way or that way. Therems no change in life, you’re either this or that. He can’t change, he is born worthless is what is his core belief, and its in war against the new extreme of being better than anyone else. I think?

He has earned his misery, he deserves it, that’s his core belief that his mother gave him, and now he built a sub personality to contradict that, because he hates how it makes him feel, be seen, and treated.

He can’t accept healthy shame and tries to be more than a human. He strongly identifies with being strong, he disowns the trait of being weak, and “every disowned part has an opposite energy with which your protector/controller is identified with.”

So you don’t have to be religious to have healthy fundamentals, but she ruins the idea of any healthy principles for him by using the one that are shown in Christian religion and using them to control, so now no matter where he’d find good basic morals, he’d connect them to this, and reject them.

The devil that crawls out of him is part of his biggest fear of what she saying being the truth, that he’s at fault and not strong and powerful, but then he finds reassurance in it, he -I think- finds some peace in accepting that lie of being wrong, because it stops the war inside of him, but also contradicts itself by letting him feel strong as the cursed one. That they all fear him.

At last panel in the flashback chapter he just holds himself and laughs because I think we all can imagine how weird of a relief it must be to accept the lies but find strength in them and making them your own, even if they still are the ones that control you, you find some place of power and less helplessness in them. If u cant escape, at least u can do that.

Annabel manipulating Ada’s self worth - ‘lose him = loosing her self worth’ - Monty beliefs that people only will care for him when he is strong are being affirmed and reinforced

So going back to the orange text I started with, I’d like to show how everything that happens around Monty is just happening, but how he understands the world and which traumas he has had and what conclusion he has drawn, based on the certain understandings he has had at whatever age it happened all to him or kept happening, and then the decision he made on those flawed conclusions, and what patterns were created upon making those decisions.

Every character does that, so far I think? Ada has understood something to a specific extent about and concluded that true love is the priority in life. She started making decisions on this understanding and it created those patterns of swiping right on the wrong guys.

We don’t know what created that understanding, but we know that her self worth is connected to external forces.

Either way, Montresor accepting the fact that he’s the devil in a way, is a way of him taking control back in a deluded way. He turns around the judgements placed upon him and they grant him the illusion of power and strength.

And just for insurance I guess, he is the villain, this is not excusing him, he goes around acting all bleh and ew and he will deserve the consequences for that and he deserves the ones he gets now. He is not a good guy, and he doesn’t need to be.

He is not changing/wanting to change, because that would go against his whole thing. Does that mean I wouldn’t like to see him change? No. I would love to. But people like that hardly does ig since they’re so trapped. Montresor was trapped for how long we don’t know by his mother and even when he’s left and lives his life we see how deeply that wounded him.

He is still trapped, but maybe for him, being like this was what let him escape his community and his mother. Idk life is complex and his character story is too.

His spectre does have golden chains around him and his power is making deals and such. Would make sense.

[haikyuubby]

a burning hill ; k. bakugo

“i’m tired of wanting more, i think i’m finally worn.”

❆ - angst, gender neutral reader, italics = flashback.

✩ 𝐌𝐇𝐀 𝐒𝐏𝐎𝐈𝐋𝐄𝐑𝐒 𝐀𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐃! ✩

↳ note: this will take place during s7, ep11.

It was warm.

I felt a warm gush of blood puddle on the side of my body.

The crunching sound I heard from my ribs filled my ears, causing my face to contort with both pain and cringe.

Shigaraki landed a pretty good hit on me, throwing my body onto the ground.

We had to have been fighting for almost an hour now, everyone was relentlessly tired.

Mirko, Best Jeanist, Mr. Aizawa, Monoma, and Bakugo.

We were all doing our best to try and stall Shigaraki until Midoriya could come and help us.

The scenery around us was gorey, blood covering the natural colors of the Coffin in the Sky’s makeshift ground, small pieces of skin and ripped hero costumes also decorating the scene.

The place just reeked of pure blood and sweat; the situation was awful.

Shigaraki’s body wouldn’t stop producing these arm like things, causing the room that we once had to fight and move around to shrink.

Bakugo was laying down beside Best Jeanist, looking damn near like a corpse.

I was immobilized, any movement I chose to make hurt my body and made blood come out of the various open wounds i had.

I see Bakugo slowly get up and make his way towards Shigaraki.

At this point, I am mentally begging him to just stop, to just back down for once in his life.

I attempt to yell at Bakugo to stop, but my pleads comes out as mere whispers.

“Gotta…defeat him…” I hear Bakugo mumble.

He stops for a second and looks at me, lips turning upward ever so slightly— but not turning into a full smile.

Bakugo continues to walk towards Shigaraki, preparing to fight.

No…

In a flash, multiple explosions appear before me, watching Bakugo work himself to death.

I knew that his death was inevitable at this point, but there was no stopping him at this point.

I try to move my body closer towards the scene, inching closer to Bakugo and Shigaraki.

Everything hurts badly.

I might die if I push my body even a little bit more, but I don’t care.

As I’m inching closer to them, I watch Shigaraki punch a hole right through Bakugo’s body.

My entire body runs cold.

I look up, seeing Mr. Aizawa and Monoma’s eyes tear up.

Bakugo’s limp body was launched onto the ground, no sign of a rising chest or moving limbs.

Bakugo was dead.

I can’t yell, I can barely move, Mirko and Best Jeanist are worn down, and there has been no sign of Izuku Midoriya nearby.

This was awful.

My body falls back onto the ground, suddenly weighing me down.

The shock that ran through my body caused me to panic.

The gravity of the situation fully weighed in on me, which caused me to remember what Bakugo said to me just a few days ago.

ੈ♡‧₊˚

As I’m walking, I feel someone’s presence come up from behind me.

“Hey, Y/n. Can I come in?” Bakugo asks.

Currently, we were moving into our temporary dorm unit, preparing for the incoming war.

I nod my head yes, getting up to face him.

“Hey Bakugo, what’s up?” I ask while setting my box of things down.

Bakugo then grabs both of my shoulders, turning my body to directly face his.

“Bakugo? What’s going on?” I ask, surprised by his sudden display of physical touch.

“Look, I know that this isn’t the time right now to be talking about this kind of stuff, but I promise that after all this is over, I’ll take you out on a proper date.” Bakugo says.

My mouth parts slightly, eyebrows raising with his statement.

“W-Wait, where is this coming from?” I ask.

“We’ve liked each other for a while, it’s only right that I take you out after this whole “war thing” is over, right?” He responds.

Bakugo’s grip on my shoulders tightens slightly, worry coating his face.

He knows that I wouldn’t reject him, right?

“I’d really like that, Bakugo.”

ੈ♡‧₊˚

That moment flashed in my mind as I watched Bakugo’s body fully die out.

I see Edgeshot travel as fast as he can towards Bakugo and Best Jeanist.

Remembering Edgeshot’s quirk, I silently pray that he can do something to help Bakugo.

For a second, I forgot that I was at risk of dying, too.

Shigaraki uses one of his arms to break up the ground, causing me to tumble away from the scene.

I have no control over my body right now, and I feel my vision growing foggy.

I felt blood seeping from my wounds, I knew that I have neared the end.

If there’s a god out there, please keep Bakugo safe.

[undreaming-fanfiction]

Thinking of a modern AU when the kids get to be kids after it's all over and they go to the movies, they play games, hang out, all that. And of course, Steve drives them everywhere. He vouches for them in front of their parents, watches them like a hawk, tries to tell them about the adult stuff he's learned so far and chases Robin and Nancy to give them info on uni application and the things he feels he's too dumb for. Still, when Robin and Nancy are away and one of his kids needs something, he'll grab that legal document and either stare at it long enough to get a migraine or begins hounding the smart people who stayed in Hawkins (Mr. Clarke is Steve's go-to person and Mr. Clarke won't say it, but he's so proud of Harrington's progress).

So, Steve's life is basically nonstop work and babysitting (with lots of complaints and grumbling from the teens), they ask him to drive them somewhere and he'll bitch about it, sure, but he will get up after 4 hours of sleep and do it anyways. Dustin often reprimands Steve for not taking care of his health, but he doesn't see why.

When Encanto comes out, El really, really wants to see it, and how can Steve say no to her? He drives the whole gang to the movie theatre (some of them stacked on top of each other, some in the trunk on a pile of blankets) and decides to join them. He doesn't really like animated stuff, but Robin loves these movies and he wants yet another reason to call her and talk through the night.

He didn't expect to enjoy the movie so much, but it's colorful and catchy. The songs are nice and the characters are relatable. He makes a lot of mental notes to discuss with Robin. He thinks she will love Mirabel.

And then "Surface Pressure" starts playing and Steve wonders why he suddenly feels like crying. "I'm pretty sure I'm worthless if I can't be of service" hits especially hard. He's just sitting there and feeling incredibly stupid for tearing up at flying glitter-covered donkeys.

When they leave the movie theater, everyone is pretty excited and discussing which characters and songs they liked the most (even if some feel like rolling their eyes at a kids' movie, El's excitement stops them from doing that). They all start discussing to who they relate the most, El feels with Mirabel for being left out and different, even if she actually is the only one who has a gift, Will dares to utter that he really sympathizes with Dolores, Dustin loves Bruno for trying to fix the cracks in Casita.

And then they turn to Steve and someone makes a jab at him, saying he resembles Mariano the most. Steve is ready to shrug it off, there's some truth in that with what happened to his relationship with Nancy, but El just shakes her head and says: "No. Steve is our Luisa."

Everyone goes silent. There's a lot of hmmming and "well, he did get up to drive us when he had a night shift..." and "we could have just biked...". Steve tries to make them feel better about it, joking that he really has nothing better to do, but the drive home is full of whispering, and the party actually diligently thank him when they leave his car.

The next day is Sunday and Steve is ready for his usual routine, making himself busy until someone needs something. But there's a knock on the door to his small apartment and when he opens it, he sees his group of kids, proudly presenting a tray of muffins and two cartons of orange juice.

Out of all of them, it's Mike who speaks up. "Nancy said you often forget to eat breakfast," he states in his usual annoyed tone. "She also said that you like chocolate muffins, so we are here to ensure you don't die from hunger. Now move, I'll get the glasses and plates."

Steve just watches in awe as they swarm his flat, Will smiling at him and producing a DVD of the latest Spider-man movie. "This one was a tip from Robin, she says you haven't seen it yet."

Max is standing in the kitchenette with her cane, watching the pile of meds Steve has to take after his injuries with disdain. "This has to take forever for you to find what you need. Don't argue, I remember how shitty it was for me. Let me help you build a chart and thank me later."

El and Lucas are rearranging Steve's couch and placing pillows in front of the TV so everyone can sit comfortably. El also ensures the blinds are closed so Steve's eyes don't have to fight against the light.

And if that all wasn't more care than Steve has known in years, Dustin grabs his elbow and sits him down, threatening him with violence if he even thinks about working on Sunday.

As the opening titles start, Steve is surrounded by six teenagers in his tiny and cheap flat, chewing on a subpar muffin with an orange juice that probably never saw the actual fruit, and he thinks that there's no greater happiness than this.

[galaxythreads]

Foegive me of this is a question you've answered in the past but, what are your thoughts on the scene at the beginning of Avengers 1 where Loki sort of doubles over/trips on his way out of the SHIELD base and it's never addressed?

Also thoughts on the canonicity of various myths to the MCU Loki backstory?

no worries, I don't mind answering questions twice. My blog is long and tales tales, so I understand if people don't want to hunt for answers and just reask stuff.

as far as your question goes,

SCREAMING SCREAMING SCREAMING. Do you KNOW how much I LOVE that SCENE (the answer is no because I haven't talked about it) but I LOVE THAT SCENE! That is THE scene to me. I love everything about how carefully it's handled because what you have to look for is SUBTEXT here, because the Avengers was written in a way that forces you to think. It doesn't lay everything out for you, it's intended you come to your own conclusions.

The Avengers trusts you and that is a very strange thing for media now. It's pretty rare to find one that doesn't treat you like an idiot.

Breaking this down:

The first frame with Loki is of him kneeling. That is the first thing we learn about him. I want you guys to remember that the introduction of a character is HUGE. It tells us the most important things for us to know about that character right now

So what do we need to know about Loki RIGHT THEn. Right at the start of the movie?

he's smart. He opened the portal with the Tesseract, from across space, and teleported himself to another planet. This is something no one has replicated (using an infinity stone from across space). Loki is said to "know it's workings like they never will" which says a lot about him.

Loki was GIVEN the scepter by the Chitauri, but if you watch that opening opening scene, it looks more like it's being forced on him than him GLADLY taking it. (There's this half second where the Other waits to make sure Loki is actually going to hold it. Loki doesn't reach for it until he has to. One of the most powerful objects in existence and it practically has to be shoved into his hands) Look how close their bodies are. Like bro???

-okay, then Loki comes through the portal and he is KNEELING. so the first, and I mean the VERY FIRST thing we need to know about Loki is that he is in the subservience of someone/thing else. This gif below is artwork of that moment, but still. Like. who do you think he's kneeling TO? Well, the opening scene of the Avengers showcases that the Other is kneeling to Thanos, Ergo, using the subtext trust that the director/writers have given us, that means Loki was kneeling to Thanos before he came through the portal.

And then, Loki comes out like a hunted animal, but he legitimately does not remember he's holding the scepter until Fury points it out to him. You can see him look down at it in confusion. And okay, WHY is he confused? I remember watching this for the first time at 14 and going huh, that's kinda weird he forgot he had the weapon. What this is trying to tell us is that this is not a familiar weapon to Loki AND -- it is doing something to him. It's emitting that same misty thing that it does when Loki possesses someone later. That wispy smoke is always so interesting to me because of the implications. The scepter doesn't do that unless it is FRESHLY possessing someone. And what do we know about Loki TWO SECONDS AGO?

he was kneeling to thanos.

Anyway, so Loki gives his name, is not a well man, and the scene you're actually referring to is this one:

which GETS ME EVERY TIME. I could talk aout this scene for hours. The implications of it. (Also if you've read my work YSFSLWFTCA, that man who grabs Loki's back is Nathan Swenson ;)

So I've been getting professional acting training for about 6-7 months now and one thing I have learned is that nothing makes it in the movie by accident. The director has to approve it, the editor, the producer, up the whole food chain. This was not Tom Hiddleston sneezing and then them keeping it in the movie because it's funny. So this was put in on purpose. They WANTED you to know that Loki isn't okay. And a scene like this would get like what? idk 3-6 takes at a minimum, which means that they flimed this ON PURPOSE 3-6 times. Tom Hiddleston was instructed to do this ON PURPOSE. That guy who approaches Loki's back was told to do that ON PURPOSE. Loki was supposed to be shown to be a mess physically. Like. Then they go and KEEP doing this later, when Loki can't get into the car and can barely keep himself upright. Loki doesn't start to look "okay" until Germany and even then he's not doing amazing.

What's interesting to me, beyond the obvious implications toward bodily harm - torture! :) - is the timing. Loki immediately topples when Clint hands the Tesseract to Selvig. There's something about Clint doing that that seems to cause him physical pain. That could be a coincidence, and I bet it is because it's not brought up again in the movie that the Tesseract exchanging hands gives Loki physical pain, but it is interesting.

Another interesting point is that Clint looks away, Selvig doesn't care, but that sheild agent Immediately moves up to put his hand on Loki's back to support him. And Loki doesn't flinch. That always struck me as weird, right, because even people who don't have trauma flinch when someone touches their back and they weren't expecting it. And Loki clearly wasn't? So why didn't he twitch at least a little? Tom Hiddleston is too good of an actor for that to be a mistake.

So to me that means that Loki just... doesn't have feeling in his spine at that moment. Or he was in too much pain to even register it. Loki was clearly tortured with some type of heat. If you watch him in this scene he's displaying all the signs of heat exhaustion. So I kinda think that maybe Loki got burned so badly on his back before this happened that he just... doesn't feel anything anymore. It had to have been recent for walking to nearly send him toppling, but Loki's back is a source of issues for the entire movie.

That is why this scene is here from a directing perspective. to SET UP Loki's back problems. The extent of them are left vague, but I think when Tom Hiddleston and Joss Whedon sat down to talk about Loki for the Avengers, one of the things they must have agreed on was that Loki was not in good physical condition and they planned to show that THE ENTIRE MOVIE. I don't know if they talked about torture or Thanos, but they talked about SOMETHING.

But I just...idk. That guy grabs Loki's back to support him in an effort to help and it's just so interesting to me. Because how does the mind control WORK then? Selvig is obsessed with the Tesseract. He almost seems possessed by that rather than Loki. Clint goes completely silent and doesn't do anything except the mission. THIS GUY immediately comes to take care of Loki, and Loki himself is ruthlessly efficient with one goal in his mind. So it's interesting. Subtext! :D

So what do I think about this scene. I think that Loki was tortured and his back is giving out and I LOVE THIS SCENE BECAUSE IT IS SO DARK BUT TRYING NOT TO BE.

Thanos' immediate response to something not going his way is torture and he knows Loki. Knows him well enough to pick his brother out of a crowd in Infinity War and leave him alive until the end. Knows him well enough to make his death personal. Strangulation is a crime of passion. Thanos hurt Loki and he knew Loki, and the idea that Thanos made sure that Loki wouldn't see the torture coming - by doing it to his back/spine - is just an extra layer of awful. Thanos left Thor alive. On purpose. He could have killed him. He didn't.

That was Loki's punishment. Leaving Thor alone. Because Thanos knew that would hurt him the most.

But Thanos also chose to kill Loki, and in infintiny war, while hunting the stones, Thanos doesn't make any unnecessary bodies. Which to me, means that Thanos had to kill Loki because he saw Loki as a threat.

So anyway, somehow I'm talking about Loki and Thanos again, who are my favorite horrible duo and I love talking about them because their relationship is so so messed up. I wish that the Loki series had DONE something with Thanos and Loki, but they didn't. :/

But why Loki's back? Like Thanos started with Loki's head in the post-credits scene of Thor 1:

why did he move to Loki's back? Also the fact that Thanos was having Loki hunt down the Infinity Stones through astral projection and/or enchantment is just so messed up and I love it. Wish it had been explored because THIS ^^^ was the giant beast I wanted poked at in Loki season 1.

[renthony]

I haven't enjoyed a Marvel movie since I stopped bothering to keep up with the MCU in 2014. I don't care for most Marvel movies. I think Marvel Studios is a case study in things that are shitty in the entertainment industry. But holy shit, pretentious posts along the lines of "haha, I don't watch Marvel films, I have real taste, go watch another movie!" are so fucking annoying.

Like, go put up your middle finger at some preps or something. People are allowed to watch whatever they want and enjoy whatever movies they want and make whatever fandom stuff they want, and that doesn't say anything about their intelligence or morals or character. It doesn't mean they are somehow bad at watching movies, or are too stupid to realize whatever nugget of wisdom ye high-and-mighty Marvel Haters think you're the only ones to understand.

Again, not personally a Marvel fan, but this whole "haha, I'm better than Marvel fans" relates to something I've been musing on about media analysis as a whole. There is a persistent idea that mass entertainment is inherently lower quality or less artistic because it's made for a wide audience, and that bad art isn't worth analyzing or engaging with just because it's low quality. In this mindset, the only art that has the possibility to be any good at all is 100% independent projects made by amateurs, and anything produced by a studio or with wide appeal is inherently poser art with absolutely nothing meaningful to say. In this mindset, you can't possibly learn anything or take anything from bad art, and if you find meaning in bad art, you're clearly just stupid and uneducated and have bad taste.

The thing is? Liking bad art is not a sin. Having a different opinion about what constitutes "bad art" is not a sin. Finding something entertaining despite its flaws is not a sin. Studying bad art is not a sin. You can learn a lot from bad art, you can learn a lot from interpreting propaganda, you can learn a lot from engaging with things even if you don't think they're very "good."

My vaudeville research keeps turning up author after author who talks about vaudeville as some sort of "point of no return," like the performing arts all turned to shit the second things were intended to be seen by more than a single audience for a single show. Popularity gets equated with lack of skill or quality, because all the performers were "just pandering to the audience" instead of relying on "real skill."

For one, what the fuck does that even mean, but for two, the theatrical quality of vaudeville isn't what makes it interesting and worth engaging with. Every single thing that ever came out of vaudeville could be 100% total utter garbage, but vaudeville would still be worth studying because of how influential it still is on arts and entertainment today. It has significant historical and educational merit. And some of it is still genuinely fun and entertaining, once you pick out all the things that didn't age well or were just plain bigoted. There's artistic merit in those old sketches and songs, and there's meaning to be drawn from plenty of it even here in 2023.

You want to learn about the Hays Code? Well, let's talk about how early films were shown on projectors on vaudeville stages, so vaudeville censorship went on to influence American film censorship. Let's talk about how we still use slang to this day that originated on vaudeville, such as "skit" or "one night stand" or "ad lib" or "the big time." Vaudeville is still in the bones of the modern American entertainment industry and pop culture, and you can't really escape that influence.

People in modern day use Marvel movies as proof that big studio films are singlehandedly responsible for the decline of art, and there is nothing to learn from them or see in them at all, ever. But to me, "Marvel movies are bad" is such a flat, uninteresting observation, because when it comes to media analysis, it doesn't really matter if Marvel films are good or entertaining. If you want to actually dig into the problems with big-budget summer Hollywood blockbusters, and the way they're impacting the industry as a whole, you have to go deeper than "pop culture is all stupid stuff for stupid people, unlike me, who isn't like other girls actually has good taste in media!"

There are so many more factors at play than "mass entertainment = bad art." Let's look at the ways capitalism screws over small creators and forces them to seek funding from the very same studios that fuck them over. Let's talk about how the actual workers in the industry are fighting tooth and fucking nail against the exact same things all the Marvel haters harp on about. Let's talk about studios that accept funding from the United States Government to turn superhero comics into propaganda films, and then threaten the actual workers with never having a career again if they complain or quit. Let's talk about how the actors are regularly abused and treated to hostile work environments.

Let's talk about the people who made the films, because the films were not made by a CEO pressing the "make movie" button. The workers made those films. The workers were exploited by those studios. Let's try giving a shit about them, instead of taking the "haha, Marvel fans are stupid and cringe" route.

There is so much more fucking nuance and detail and conversation about mass media as a topic, and boiling it down to, "art made for a wide audience is inherently shitty and has nothing to say."

You're not a better, more intelligent, more educated person just because you don't like Marvel movies. Making posts about how much better you are than Marvel fans does nothing to either explain or tackle the issues in the entertainment industry.

It just makes you look like a dickhead.

[mashiraostail]

Me sitting sooooooo nicely

Could you possibly do “you can sit on my lap” from the prompt list with Fatgum? As NSFW as your heart desires, but I loooooove how you write him! (Ngl your depressive episode reader fics got me through some tough times here and I treasure them with all my heart)

omg thank you for sitting nicely!!!!

A quiet day in seemed to be exactly what you needed, it was all the more delightful that Taishiro was there. You were glad he'd found the time to spend with you, even moreso to spend it lolling around your. place together. You'd ran a few small errands during the day but ultimately came back together in the afternoon, content to enjoy each other's company. You're sitting on the couch, watching some silly television program when you decide to start washing up. You announce it as you stand.

"I'm gonna wash my face and stuff, maybe put on some PJs."

"PJs?" Taishiro sounds excited, "maybe I'll follow your lead."

You grin and stand in front of his seat, "we can't go to bed too early."

"I know, I know, I wanna spend as much time together as possible too, but we might as well be comfy while you tell me all your work gossip. I swear I'll stay awake, and if I don't I owe you big time....but I will stay up."

You laugh at that, a quiet lilting sound that Taishiro feels like he's always chasing. His hands rest on the back of your thighs and he leans his head into your stomach, "go on, I'm excited to talk to you some more. You're leaving me with a crazy cliffhanger with that HR lady."

"She works in finances." You chuckle as you kiss his brow, "but sure."

You make fast work of washing up it wasn't anything major, just washing the oils from the day off your skin and changing into a comfy set of shorts and a teeshirt. You didn't look when you reached into your pajama pile, and the shirt you produced was a bit smaller than your average bed time tee shirt but it wasn't too tight or restrictive and you figured it would be nice to have some more exposed skin for Taishiro to brush his fingers against anyway.

When you emerge again Taishiro looks surprised.

"Woah-"

"What?" You prickle, "you know I don't have any matching sets or-"

"No it's good, a good 'woah.'" And he's being honest, all of your newly exposed skin looks equally tantalizing from your thighs to the sliver of your belly showing over your shorts. He realizes how close you'd been all day and how little he's actually be able to touch.

"Come here," he eggs you on, "don't torture me now, I'm just a man."

You go to him, no real reason to deny him popping up in your immediate thoughts. In fact all you can thing of are reasons to indulge him.

"You look pretty as a petal." He's smiling, grinning impishly at you, "'re you gonna let me touch you?"

You flush, surprised at his change of mood but not at all displeased, "of course I am."

"Lucky me." He huffs out a quiet laugh, "come on, you can sit on my lap." The motion is so practiced and easy, you'd dare call it muscle memory.

"That's perfect." He's already sliding his hands into your shirt, the devil.

"Is this what you've been waiting for this whole time?" You laugh a bit, unable to even feign anger with him.

"Oh no," He assures you, "I was just...listening to you talk with that pretty voice of yours all day, watching you play with you hair, and smile at me like you do." His hands are gliding up your back pulling you closer to him easily.

You don't mind the direction this is going in, you indulge him, maybe a bit selfishly. You kiss him, hands holding on his shoulders and sliding down his chest. You enjoy the feeling of his lips wandering down your jaw and neck, and his hands sneaking lower to your belly then your thighs. You don't mind taking off the pajamas you just put on, and he certainly doesn't mind undressing and shifting his own clothes to get as much skin to skin contact as possible.

For all intents and purposes you liked being in his lap, you felt surrounded by him, and something about the idea of him watching you, egging you on along the way lit a fire inside you. And watch you he did, he liked having you on his lap just as much. He could touch and guide you but also leave you to your own devices and he could watch. He liked to let you set the pace, especially at a time like there where he would just like to ravish you with attention from all fronts. For now he'll huddle you close, and follow the roll of your hips while he continue to kiss around your lips and jaw. When you work yourself up to a climax he'll welcome you, slumped over into his chest, and he'll stand, taking you with him. He'll clean you off and bring you to bed and you won't have to say a word if you don't want to. He'll huddle you even closer under the covers and rub circles in the nape of your neck until you doze off for the night.

[d-criss-news]

Darren Criss and Helen J. Shen Talk Finding Their ‘Maybe Happy Ending’ on Broadway: ‘It’s a Really Charming, Kind Little World’

It’s best to let Darren Criss describe the simply complex story of Maybe Happy Ending, the new musical he co-stars in with Broadway newcomer Helen J. Shen. “There’s what the story is and then there’s what the show is about,” the Emmy and Golden Globe-winning singer/actor/songwriter tells Billboard in an interview you can watch above.

“Those aren’t necessarily the same things,” he notes about the musical love story from Will Aronson and Hue Park, in which the former Glee star and Shen appear as obsolete Helperbot robots who meet cute and fall in love. “Thematically, it’s about two elderly people in hospice who decide to break out of the situation to go connect with their family,” says Criss about what sounds like a potentially dark theme.

And while that “grim, depressing construct for a show” doesn’t sound like the stuff of uplifting Broadway magic, Criss promises that the musical’s creators have somehow morphed that idea about the chilly march of time and hard lessons about love and life into a “really charming, kind little world” filled with Helper robots who are living embodiments of our iPhones and other digital assistants.

Because many of us imbue our inanimate digital devices with human-like qualities, sometimes holding on to them well past their best-by use date, Criss says the musical asks what happens when those objects become more like us?

Shen makes her Broadway debut in the play alongside theater/TV/movie veteran Criss, 37, after turning heads last year in the ensemble of the Off Broadway musical Teeth. She says one of the most exciting parts of performing in the show is the chance to take the lead in a completely new piece of theater not based on any existing intellectual property or a reboot/revival, but something that theatergoers have never seen before.

“It’s super overwhelming. The idea of it has been something that I’ve dreamed about my whole life,” says Shen, 24 of originating a character on Broadway. “And to have it come to fruition with this particular story, with this particular group of people I just feel… abundance. I feel so lucky and grateful.”

Both say they feel really blessed to be part of the show, with Criss noting that he has typically starred in “iconic” roles in his previous Broadway runs, including as Harry Potter in A Very Potter Musical, J. Pierrpont Finch in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Seymour in Little Shop of Horrors and Hedwig in Hedwig and the Angry Inch, among others. “These are things people know and love,” he says of those classics.

“[Which] were great, with or without me. I now go in there trying to do my own thing and make it my own and there’s the excitement of the challenge, but also the pressure of living up to a certain thing and wanting to do your own thing,” he adds about trying to find something of yourself in a well-known role people may have seen many other times with other performers. “Whereas this, it’s an open canvas, not only for us, but for the audience. They don’t have any preconceived notions. That’s the best thing about this.”

Because it is a new experience, audiences don’t know what to expect, which both actors say makes attendees really listen and sit up in their seats to take in all the nuance of the show that also heralds the Broadway debuts for creators Aronson and Park; it began its life on stage in Seoul, South Korea in 2016 and was later produced in Japan and China as well.

Maybe Happy Ending, directed by Michael Arden (Parade), is open now at the Belasco Theatre on Broadway.

[roo-bastmoon]

IMPORTANT INFO: issues around Jimin’s album

I have an ARMY friend (who shall remain safely anonymous) who works in film production for the music and entertainment industry here in the US. They offered me some valuable insights today into production limitations and possible issues related to Jimin’s solo album.

Below the cut is a transcript of their messages to me. I share this in the hopes it better informs our discussions around fair treatment of BTS members’ releases. It is by no means a definitive account of Jimin’s situation—simply an insider’s ideas on what likely happened around a few things.

I understand there are very big feelings about this topic, especially with the apparent differences around JK’s single, and I appreciate everyone’s viewpoints. However, if you choose to interact with this post, you will be respectful to others (including members) or you will be blocked. You are always welcome to DM me privately if you need to vent—we are all human and we all need a bit of grace, so you’ll always have that with me.

Sending you guys so much love, Roo

Anonymous Insider

Some “light reading” while you’re resting up and recovering, lol. This is all just based on what I’ve been watching and seen. Of course, I don’t have access to their production budget sheet and Korea works very differently than the US when it comes to production, but this what I’ve been seeing when it comes to their videos and particularly the promotions for FACE.

(I’m sending in sections, lol)

Alrighty - I’m still like deep in edit-land (still am two days later 😭) but I started typing this on the train between meetings, ha ha. (And am still on the train doing this, lol.) Also this rambles a bit I’m sorry! So the first thing I did was go back to the interview where Jimin talked about the music videos — it was a Japanese TV show and he’s talking with a host in Korean.

He’s talking about “wanting to do it all,” laughs and says, “I wanted all the music videos” and that “they” (the company assuming) said “무리다” which has its roots in the word 무리 which means a herd, a party, a group — basically “it’s too much,” “it’s unreasonable,” and “it’s impossible” are decent translations as it refers to something or an idea being “too much” — then the host and Jimin burst out laughing and the host goes “서리와 무리다” which I read as “sorry (in konglish) but we can’t” and they continue to laugh. So based on that —it sounds very understandable.

We can imagine Jimin sitting down with his team and planning out SMFP2 and LC videos, with the 30 dancers and all the party scene extras, and then Jimin saying he wants to do the music shows with 6 different sets in rented locations so they could have total control. And if Jimin in that process went “what if we made official music videos for all of them?” the team would understandably go “that’s just not reasonable!” 1) because it would give Jimin a budget no other member had gotten and 2) there aren’t that many production houses in Korea. It’s a very small scene — it may just logistically not been possible. There aren’t enough DPs and crew and editors. Sometimes, as a producer, you have to tell your creative talent “I’m sorry, but no.” — I say it every week!

So what about the music videos? Well, here’s what I know from meticulously watching all the behind the scenes for BTS videos over the years. They work with a small team. They likely own a good deal of the gear — they shoot mainly on RED cameras and heavy expensive Cooke lenses (which you can’t get this stuff easily in Korea. I lost a lens cap for a Canon CINÉ Lens in Seoul and it was like this whole big deal because getting gear there is an import challenge but anyways) they use MOVI and Ronin gimbal stabilizers and Jimmy Rigs a lot.

Recently they’ve been using technocranes but I wonder how many technocranes there are in Seoul. As I said, they likely own a lot of this gear which can help with costs. But we’ve also been told — and I’ve heard through my industry friends — that Hybe PAYS. And in Korea there’s no unions in the entertainment world, and often the rates are shit (hence Netflix investing so much there - blerg) their standard work week is also already 12 hours longer than the US. It’s a whole thing. and they spend so much money on sets. It’s incredible.

They rent these huge spaces outside Seoul and BUILD — I mean the build out for SMFP2 was astounding. They easily dropped 1million on that video. The rigging, the build-out, the custom set and the custom camera rigs to achieve the 360 shots - the drone shots. They’re astounding videos. No US label is spending that money on videos these day. Absolutely none of them are — my friend recently produced a video for John Legend. They were trying to pull the whole thing off for $100K which is ridiculous. It’s really almost impossible.  

But on the Big videos they spend a lot of money, but they also produce a lot of other stuff too (and these are often looked at as Performance Videos vs all-caps MUSIC VIDEOS) -— like RM’s video shoot at DIA Beacon… that was a much smaller, fairly single camera shoot — all shot on drones or a MOVI handheld rig. No set, they also didn’t like pay for the set because DIA: Beacon is an art museum — and similar a little bit to Letter for Jimin, which was much smaller set and easy in-house gear.

(And it was also released on Bangtan TV channel vs Hybe Labels Channel, which is a good indicator of how they categorize these shoots.) But the big videos, they go for broke. I mean they spend so much money and again they may own a lot of the equipment but there’s still so much people-power and labor involved. Take the dancers’ rehearsals. You have to pay people for all that — you have to pay them for the weeks of rehearsal, you have to pay them to be in a video. It is so expensive — like, I would not be able to budget that video for under 1 million, that’s how much it costs.  

So then Jimin wanted to do music shows —- and so because he’s Jimin and it’s BTS, Hybe rented larger venues and locations for all of the shoots. None of them use the actual Broadcast spaces or were provided by the broadcast studios. The smaller companies do though — remember when BTS first started out they went to SBS to film on the day? — but they don’t do that anymore. They rent huge facilities so that they could be a mini concerts for ARMYs to visit with Jimin and see him.

They also have to do this kind of outside of the city and they built huge sets because they’re going to want to show off if they’re gonna be on TV but that is so expensive. (I don’t think you were an ARMY then, but when ON was released, at the time it was the “biggest broadcast performance ever” and they keep upping that ante for sure!) It’s possible the broadcast companies spend some money but what BTS is doing is so outside the usual budget and given the tension with the broadcasters and HYBE — they (Hybe) wants control of their products, and so I think they pay for that control.

I can’t imagine they got out of any of those days for under $500K; I mean, there were two different sets, all the crew; they’re paying for all of it. We add it up and they probably spent close to $3-5 million between Jimin’s music videos and his music show performances, and I would be understandably like: “That’s it!” Like, that’s the budget for an EP, you know.

I don’t think Jimin could have it all because that wasn’t the case for the other members. RM got to lead videos and J Hope had pyrotechnics, which definitely costs money and safety and insurance. You know he had visual effects his first video (a lotta visual effects) and again a lot of challenging technocrane work, but I haven’t really seen them build something on the scale of what they built for SMFP2 in a very long time (or ever?).

We heard from the Art Dept that Jimin did not want to shoot on blue screen, so they built the set for him. This cannot be the same label that is shafting him — that allows him to spend that amount of money just because the artist said “I want to shoot in a real space!” because I’m gonna be completely honest— he could’ve done that on a blue screen — I’m glad they built a real world because BTS almost always shoots on Blue/Green Screen. They build him a huge set like that. It’s absolutely incredible.

I was also reminded this morning that people are talking about radio for Like Crazy and not supporting the song — and I just keep thinking that they did exact rollout for Butter, Dynamite, and Permission to Dance. They released Like Crazy. It had both a Korean version and English version. (Obviously that wasn’t the case for the English BTS songs.) They released two additional remixes. Then they kept releasing, like, alternate cover versions — alternate covers of the main remix, alternate cover the other remix. They were trying to maximize the direct-to-consumer store and exact same way they had tried to maximize it with Dynamite and Butter and Permission to Dance.

The way you were buying Like Crazy was the same process I took on Dynamite. They did the exact same playbook. So the fact that they were unable to get the kind of radio play they wanted or maybe they weren’t prioritizing radio because they knew that they were gonna have a better chance at direct to consumer sales... Maybe they didn’t want to fight radio. Maybe Geffen was like “We don’t have the right ‘Ins’ yet!” — I’m not sure, but the fact that they got completely screwed over by Billboard doesn’t mean that they weren’t actually rolling it out in that way, because as soon as they started doing the whole alternate cover thing, I was like: “Well, they clearly want us to try to go for number one!” You know, “They clearly think that they are going to be able to get number one on the hot 100 and we’re gonna use these sales to do that!” And clearly that’s all changed now.

They keep changing the rules on us, so — with JK, they’re obviously trying to, you know, use whatever tools they have available to them at this point.

Finally, when it comes to restocking the digital single CD. There are still albums available in the store. So why would they manufacture and ship more (likely thrown away) plastic that’s just for one song, when those CD singles only serve to raise sales for the charts? All of the other member’s CD singles are out of stock except The Astronaut, which they treated more like a proper album a bit (kinda like the Butter CD releases). Because they still have both versions of his full albums in stock, so if I were Hybe, I’d be like “No,you need to buy the album, we still have albums, we’re not going to sell you a single song when you can buy the album!” That makes more sense to me. The albums cost more.

TL:DR, haha — so I feel like this narrative around Jimin’s release has been ramped up because, from my professional opinion, he’s had the most expensive release so far (by far) and if we want to compare him to, say, Beyoncé — well she owns her own production company (Parkwood Entertainment), so she can funnel her own money into a Visual Album, I don’t know if Jimin has considered that at this point in his career, but in the future, he might!

((Not including costs for Suga’s tour because that’s a whole other thing, and the tour probably made money I would expect to balance out the cost of the tour itself))

Anonymous Insider

This isn’t to say that the other things, the part where he didn’t get the cake celebration, or the posts, the issues with the linking and this general feeling that Jimin was short-changed in these things isn’t valid and understandable. I think Hybe relied too much on D2C sales and I don’t think they leveraged their might as much as could have for JM. They could have risked more for him.

{This is an end of Anonymous Insider’s messages to me. They noted that they are an intermediate non-native Korean speaker so please excuse any translation errors. They translated things themselves using Naver tools that aligned with the video subtitles.}

So, listen, I still don’t think Like Crazy was sent/promoted to radio (which was a mistake and still is a mistake) and I am furious at the shady articles and lack of celebration for Jimin…

But after reading the way the members approach their work in the Beyond the Story book and now hearing from someone who produces these works for a living, I have to wonder if the company was doing everything they knew how to do for Jimin, but the second it didn’t work out because of the western music industry culling streams and sales, they pulled back all their resources and pivoted for Yoongi and JK. (I also wonder if leadership shut up about it all due to liability issues, or not to cause bad blood with the music industry for future releases.)

Again, I’ll never forgive the lack of celebration and the split streams (not without a great explanation), but at least now I think there’s a good chance no one was actively trying to sabotage Jimin on purpose. They seemed to have wanted that #1 and then it all went to shit because Billboard and radio want to get paid. Maybe leadership decided not to put any more resources into Face but instead pivot for all the future music coming out (including PJM2.)

Perhaps I'm a cockeyed optimist. I’m just hoping like hell they never engage in payola. I want all our boys to win, but I want us to win fairly. And even if everyone cannot have the same investment every time on every project, I hope when they come back together in 2025 that everyone feels good about their solo works and each other. This is my prayer. Love, Roo

[mikecardensolofolkalbum]

Interview with Mike Carden for Bullz-Eye.com with Mike Farley May 11, 2007

The Academy Is are currently the textbook definition of a “buzz band.” Rolling Stone named them one of their top 10 artists to watch, Blender listed their new album, Santi, as one of their top 25 reasons to love 2007, and on top of it all, they're one of the bands participating in the Honda Civic Tour that's been headlined by Fall Out Boy. As such, Bullz-Eye was pretty psyched to get a chance to talk with the band's guitarist, Mike Carden, for a few minutes. We had the opportunity to quiz him about working with producer Butch Walker on the new album, the accuracy of his Wikipedia entry, the departure of Tom Conrad from the group's ranks, whether he ever had a “rumble” with bandmate William Beckett in their younger days and if their fans can spell. 

Mike Carden: Hello, hello! 

Bullz-Eye: Hey, how's it going? 

MC: Good, good, good. 

BE: So given how quickly Christina (the label rep) got you on the phone, I take it you're actually in Atlantic Records' New York offices right now. 

MC: I am, I am. You know, I guess it's Hub Central. Where it all happens, I guess. 

BE: Is it buzzing with excitement? 

MC: Everything. Everything's exciting. I'm learning more and more about how this business is changing, which I'm clearly aware of, but…

BE: You're learning it first hand. 

MC: Of course, of course. 

BE: You guys just did Jimmy Kimmel's show a couple of days ago, right? 

MC: Yes. Absolutely. (hesitates) I think last week. (hesitates again) A week exactly, I think. 

BE: (laughs) It's all kind of a blur? 

MC: Yeah. No, it's good, it's good. 

BE: How was it? Are you actually on the talk-show circuit – as it were – right now? 

MC: Yeah, we're doing a bit of it. I don't know if you're aware, but the Honda Civic Tour got moved back a few weeks, so we're doing a little more press stuff, and flying around…which is all good, because I like coming to New York. Good friends, good people. You do a little stuff, and then you get to go out. So it's all good. 

BE: There you go. So the new album premiered pretty well for you guys. 

MC: Thank you, yeah, I agree. I was completely…it's very hard in this time right now, just because, y'know, record sales are just so different from where they've been, and they just keep changing, as far as the positioning of bands; it's hard with all the country and pop bands. A lot of that stuff, I don't really pay attention to that much. But everyone seemed really happy about it. I mean, for us, it was more from all the MySpace and emails about the record. That's really what did us over. But the number on the charts was great, too. 

BE: And it was produced by Butch Walker …  

MC: Uh-huh. 

BE: …who clearly has the magic touch as far as producing hook-filled pop/rock. 

MC: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, I would think so. 

BE: Now, were you guys fans of his work already? 

MC: Yeah, I mean, I grew up listening to Marvelous 3. 

BE: OK, yeah, I love that band! 

MC: Yeah, exactly. So I love Marvelous 3, and I liked the solo records, but I always felt like…well, Butch Walker was doing the skinny tie and the tight jeans thing when rap-rock was going on, so it was weird. He was just way before his time in the sense that his songs… you're either, “Who?” Or you're, like, “Yeah, yeah, that dude's fucking great!” Y'know what I mean? So the fact that we got to work with him was great. And he's made an amazing career for himself; he's been very smart about playing a certain game, and I respect him for that, but also I think that his latest album, with the Let's-Go-Out-Tonites, was a great record. I loved the songs on it, and everything else. So when I heard that…wow. And we just get along. I mean, everyone says this, but he's our bro. Like, for real. He's our friend. We get along very well. 

BE: What was he like in the studio? 

MC: Fast, man! He works like a…well, he's a nasty man! He just works very fast. We did the record in about 22 days. And he's done the whole shuffle of doing records long, and he's made a ton of his own records, and everything else, and I think, but…well, with Almost Here, we made the record just as fast, but it was more because of the budget. But with Butch, he was, like, “Well, listen, I like Almost Here, I like what you do live, so let's talk about the demos, and then let's just start recording.” And I think that, for a lot of it, he was right. He didn't want to change the band too much. With Almost Here, we had the success that, really, no one expected. I mean, we were barely signed to a label when we made that record, we had no management. It was basically just me and William, and the next thing you know (pauses). We did that whole thing for, like, 12 grand or something, and I bagged his guy James (Paul Wisner) to do the record, which he did, which is great. But now, here we are in the studio, we've got a great engineer, Butch Walker's sitting there, and I'm thinking, “Here we go, it's gonna take us four months to make this record,” or whatever. But, no, it was good. And I think that, as players, we kind of surprised ourselves, because we were a lot more prepared than we thought. It's one of those things where you don't know how tall you've grown if you see yourself in the mirror every day? And when you get in the studio, it's, like, “Wow, after two and a half years of touring non-stop, I'm much more comfortable as a guitar player!” And Butch would do really cool things where…well, I mean, a lot of producers have done this, but he'd say, “OK, well, we're just gonna run through it, so just stand up and play it like you'd play it onstage or in the rehearsal room. I just wanna see some sounds.” And we'd run the song, and a lot of times, he'd use that. We'd do a regular take of it, and he'd say, “Y'know, the first take was better.” I'm, like, “What do you mean?” And he'd say, “No, I was rolling on the practice take.” And that was cool, y'know what I mean? That not-overthinking-things really helped me out, because I'm much more methodical, and I'm at this age where I like to think about every decision we make, and I like to twist the arrangements of the songs and make sure, but I think Butch has been to the movies so many times that he helped me a lot. It was a good blend of just trusting your instincts. 

BE: Now, were there any songs with arrangements that did end up getting switched up in the studio? 

MC: Yeah, well, not so much with lyrics, but with some of the phrasing and stuff like that, because William has such respect for Butch, and Butch has the same for William. I think they worked really well together. Butch is not just a great vocalist, but he's got a knack for interesting melodies and also just good pop hooks. And for William, I think it was important to keep that blend. So I definitely think he was instrumental for William. Singing in the studio is a weird kind of thing, because it's not a very natural thing, compared to being on the stage in front of a crowd. We'd just gotten so used to that. There needs to be a vibe in the room. And that's what Butch… (pauses) I'm not sure if you've ever met Butch. 

BE: I've talked to him, but I've never met him. 

MC: OK, well, you know how there are some dudes who, when they walk into a room, they've just got a good vibe? Where you're, like, “This guy's cool. For some reason, I trust this dude with a lot.” And he's got that thing. And in the sense of the pop world where he does his thing, once I really started working with him, I could see why certain people would want to keep working with this guy. In music, a lot of times, it's the relationships that you have with each other. Like, myself and William, we trust each other so much. I trust his judgment, he trusts my judgment, and that's why we write so well together. And it's the same with Butch. But, I mean, it's the same with any partnership, really, be it business or art or whatever. 

BE: The one time I talked to Butch was when “Freak of the Week” was just getting big for the Marvelous 3, and he just struck me as the kind of guy who, if you met him, he'd immediately have his hand outstretched and be saying, “How ya doin'?” 

MC: Yeah, exactly! No, he is, he absolutely is. And he still goes out on the road, he still puts on a hell of a show. He's a hell of a guitar player, too. Nasty. 

BE: You guys just released “We've Got A Big Mess On Our Hands” as a single… 

MC: Yes. 

BE: …but as a 7-inch single! 

MC: Yes! 

BE: You do realize that you're a member of the generation that's supposed to ask, “What's vinyl?” 

MC: I know, I know. But, you know, it's a piece. I agree with you, and, trust me, we're playing both fronts, but I think it's more for people who want to collect things. I mean, it's weird, and I go back and forth on it, because you're absolutely right. On one hand, we're growing into this minimalistic society where kids just want an iPod, they want their songs, and they don't even want the artwork. Or if they do, they'll just download it off of iTunes. But, then, there's a piece of you…I mean, for me, the Smashing Pumpkins were the band for me where, even now, if I go into a record store and I find some weird single – like, we were in Germany and I found something or other – and I'll just get it. You know what I mean? I'm not like that with everyone, but there's that one particular band. And I'm not trying to put us on that level at all, but I would figure that if someone wanted to purchase something like that of ours, it's always good to have. 

BE: I actually got to talk to Gabe, Ryland, and Alex from Cobra Starship several weeks back… 

MC: Yes! 

BE: …and they were very psyched to hear Santi at that time, but they hadn't heard it yet. Have you heard from them about it since then? 

MC: Yeah, absolutely! I saw them just on Tuesday. We had a good time; we went out. With Gabe, we toured with (his former band) Midtown quite a bit, so I know Gabe, and I was also a fan of Midtown for awhile. Also, Butch Walker worked on their record! It's all twisted and very much incestual. But, yeah, Alex and Ryland are also great dudes, and they have heard it. I've always gotten along with all those guys…and we're gonna spend eight weeks together soon, so everyone's really excited. And Gabe…I don't know how your vibe was with him, but he's always just a riot, so I always have a good time with him. 

BE: Oh, yeah. And Ryland just couldn't believe that I wrote for Bullz-Eye.com. It's apparently been one of his favorite sites for awhile. 

MC: Oh, that's great, that's great! And we're all about it as well! Those dudes…I'm actually going to try and see them, but we've got to catch a flight at 8, so I don't know. It's funny: those dudes – Gabe, Ryland and Alex – they're the sweetest dudes, and we get along with them so well. We don't see each other too often, but when we do, it just snaps on. They're good dudes. 

BE: Like you said, the Honda Civic tour got pushed back a few weeks, but the new date is now good to go? 

MC: Yeah! Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Which is good, in a sense, with the weather being what it is. Where are you? 

BE: Norfolk, Virginia. You'll be here in, like, late May. 

MC: I hear you, man, I hear you. But a lot of the dates are in outside venues, and it's just been so cold everywhere. Well, at least, here in New York, anyway. 

BE: Hey, it's in the 40s here in Norfolk today. 

MC: Dude, it's so bad, my friend. I don't even know. So I'm glad it got pushed back, in a sense, because a lot of the pavilions are outdoors. And for the kids, I think it's great. It's kind of an after-school thing now. I think a lot of graduations for colleges are in the first week of May. But, y'know, to be honest with you, I've always said that the tour should be moved back, and that April was a weird month to be starting a summer tour. You know what I mean? It's that month where you're, like, what is this? What's April? You can't really do stuff outdoors. 

BE: It's too unpredictable. 

MC: Exactly. 

BE: So I went and checked out your Wikipedia entry, and it says that you once turned down an offer to join Fall Out Boy. True? 

MC: Well, I mean, “turned down”? (scoffs) I grew up with those dudes! I had another year of high school left, and they were talking about it, and Patrick used to just sing, and I knew Joe and Pete, and we joked about it, but I don't know that I really “turned it down.” I guess the cards just didn't fall in the right place at the time. Which is totally cool. (laughs) 

BE: By the way, your entry also says that you smoke Marlboros, like sushi, are fond of water slides, and that you used to be a lifeguard. (laughs) 

MC: (Seemingly not as amused.) Well, I mean, that's all correct. 

BE: Any other former jobs in the closet that you want to come clean about? 

MC: Uh, you know, I lifeguarded, like, every summer. I swam in high school, so that was kind of my jam; I could swim, and I had no problem being by water. I mean, I still don't, but these days, I don't so much have the time anymore. But, yeah, that's basically what I did. You know, I worked at The Gap for a quick second, but that didn't last too long. 

BE: In the pre-Academy days, most articles tend to describe you and William as being “musical rivals.” 

MC: Uh-huh. 

BE: Did you ever come close to a rumble? 

MC: Day to day, my friend. (laughs) No, when we were younger, we played shows…VFW shows, church basements. When we were growing up, Limp Bizkit was big, and all this other rap-rock kind of stuff, so we went down and saw all these punk rock bands. I don't know how punk rock they really were, but they were punk rock in the sense that they weren't on the radio with everything else. So we had our own little clique, which I guess has bubbled up to be emo now. This little scene that had been around in some form or other, now, you walk into a mall and the fashion has completely taken it over…which is as it should be. That's how trends bubble up and whatnot. But, yeah, I knew him from there, so we'd just go to shows together, and we were little salty kids that wanted to have bands. And, finally, I was just, like, “Hey, William, you wanna start a band with me?” And we did. And so far, so good. 

BE: I know it hasn't really been that long ago, but when you look back at your earliest recordings and compare them to what you've just done, how much growth do you see? 

MC: Oh, tons! Tons! I mean, some of the bands I was listening to then. The Pumpkins were always important to me, Weezer's Pinkerton was a big record for me and still is, and Clarity, by Jimmy Eat World. But the thing is, on this record, it was the Replacements and the Clash. It's weird, because I grew up in the '90s, so, obviously, a lot of grunge bands like STP, Pearl Jam, and obviously Nirvana, those were my jams, so in a weird way, I kind of miss the '80s. They were just too close. It's like kids today are, like, “The Smashing who?” You know what I mean? They're just not classic yet. It takes a second to get to a place where you'll say, “OK, you should definitely listen to this.” So I think now, with the Replacements and the Clash and the Jam, even early U2 stuff, I think that influenced my playing on Santi. Just the attitude, and, well, I was really getting behind it, for some reason. When I was a kid, I saw the Get-Up Kids and the Promise Ring and Alkaline Trio and Cursive or whatever, it was the same vein when I started latching onto these punk bands from the late '70s and early '80s. And that changed my tastes. That's growth, I guess. And as a songwriter, I listen to more and more music now; with the iPod, everybody's got a soundtrack to their life, so when we're on the bus, I listen to a lot of music. 

BE: Talking about bands who've influenced you, do you have a favorite obscure band that you like to champion? 

MC: Obscure band…you know, I like this band called…I don't know how obscure they are now, but they're called Mew? 

BE: Yeah! 

MC: Yeah, I like them a lot…but I don't know how obscure they are. I mean, I'm in New York, so there's gotta be something way fucking cooler than that that I don't know about yet. But, yeah, I like them. And I'm trying to think: what else have I been listening to? Again, I don't know how big they are here now, but I like Phoenix. I like Phoenix a lot. I think a lot more people should listen to them. They're good. I also like a lot of the British stuff now. Like, I like the new Bloc Party record. It reminded me of (Jimmy Eat World's) Clarity a lot. If I was 15 or 16, this would be my jam. I would be listening to this all the time…which I am, anyway. 

BE: So, um, are you talking about Tom Conrad's departure at all yet? 

MC: Oh, sure, yeah. 

BE: What was the story with that? 

MC: Well, I mean, we went through a bit of a…it's funny, it's a bit of a cliché, but we went through a bit of a dark place for the band for a quick second. Now, it sounds so trivial, but at the time, we weren't getting along too well. The Warped Tour was a hard tour, kind of a messed up tour. You basically play for half an hour, you don't know when you're going to play, and we were kind of a band who was on the fence on that tour, in the sense of what we do. Which is fine, because the Warped Tour has changed over the years. We did the tour, and it's a great vehicle, but The Academy Is… isn't exactly…we aren't exactly a Warped Tour kind of band. So that was a little part of it. We were ready to make another record, though. Obviously, we signed onto the tour, and everyone's going, “This is a great opportunity,” but we're out there and everyone's going, “We really should just go make another record.” But you're signed up, and you get into that mode of touring, and I think William went down a little bit. It was just too much. And I think Tom…well, see, Tom never recorded anything with us. He joined the band after Almost Here was done, so he was always sort of a touring guy in the sense of my relationship with him. And, then, afterwards, we got off that tour and there were some problems, the vibes weren't right, we had a talk, and he left. And, y'know, I don't know what kind of terms it's on. I think he's salty. I mean, I'm not really sure what's the deal. But, see, I knew Michael (Guy Chislett, Conrad's replacement), and Michael played with Butch, and I met Michael at the “Slow Down” video that we did for Almost Here. I sat down with the dude, we just talked about music, we played guitar. It's funny. I was with a friend that night, and I go back, we're shooting this video, and I go, “Dude, that dude Michael is awesome. I know I'm gonna play guitar with him someday. I just don't know when it's going to be.” And I've just kept in touch with him about records, so when Butch was kind of slowing down with his thing…see, Michael's not just a good guitar player, but he's also got good taste, good intuitions, everything else. And when we started to make Santi, I called him and I was, like, “You should come out to Chicago, because I want you to hear this stuff that William and I are writing.” And he liked the band – he was a fan of Almost Here, I sent him a few demos – and he said, “Yeah, yeah, yeah!” And, then, it was about 10 days, and he came out here, and we just kinda started playing and stuff, and he said, “I really like this!” And it was weird, because it was like he was the guitar player I never got to play with, but, now, finally he's here! It was so cool. And we had that whole honeymoon period, where you play with someone and the chemistry's in the room, with no heavy bullshit stuff going on, and it's, like, “Man, this is so great! These songs are coming out so easy!” And, then, finally, he was, like, “Dude, let's just do this! I want to go on tour, and I want to do this!” So I said, “Great!” So that's kind of that. 

BE: And my last question. 

MC: Go ahead. 

BE: Based on the comments left on your MySpace page, I have some real concerns about the spelling abilities of some of your fans. 

MC: (laughs) 

BE: Do you ever see some of those and just go, “Can I buy you a copy of SpellCheck?” 

MC: Absolutely. Without a doubt. It's funny, but with this texting generation, and these slangs, and these shortcuts, and everything else. Well, because I'm not exactly on IM, like, ever, some of the abbreviations and crazy stuff, I'm, like, “I don't know what that means! What does that stand for?” But I think you're right. I think you're absolutely right. 

BE: OK, well, it's been a pleasure talking to you. 

MC: Cool! You, too, man! 

BE: Hopefully, I'll be able to meet up with Cobra Starship again when this tour comes through Virginia Beach, so maybe I can meet up with ya'll, too. 

MC: Absolutely! Please stop by, say “hello,” and whatever. I'm sure we'll be up to no good with the Cobra guys. Take it easy! 

[kfkr1ze]

[002-A06] Anemic Killer Horseshoe Crab～Night before the Counterattack～

Summary — ✈︎ Kaede visits the Lion Theater to watch the movie that Akuta produced by himself. When he enters the theater, though, he finds Akuta sitting there with a gloomy expression on his face.

Characters— ✈︎ Akuta

Location: Lion Theater

Kaede: Excuse me…

(This place is the Lion Theater, isn’t it?

I guess it hasn’t started yet. No one seems to be hereーー)

Akuta: ……

Kaede: Hee!

Akuta: …… Ah, it’s… Sensei?

Kaede: That scared me… Just what on earth is on your head…?

Akuta: I’m, the demonic, horseshoe crab. This whole world, I’ll curse it.

Kaede: I-I see… That’s a pretty unique way of talking…

Akuta: …… 

Kaede: Umm… I came to watch the thing on this tissue…

Akuta: Human, if you, want tissues…

There’s, still some, in that, mountain over there.

Kaede: (That box is filled to the brim with tissues…!

He definitely ordered the wrong amount…!)

Akuta: Go ahead, and take, as many, as you like.

Kaede: Don’t be so hasty! You can still use them for the next screening! You should save them for later!

Akuta: …… 

Kaede: (He has such a gloomy expression… It’s hard to see him like this, especially based on how he was before… I feel so bad for him.)

Is it fine if I sit next to you?

Akuta: Do what… you please…

Kaede: Thanks.

… They’re still doing screenings here, huh?

I thought this place was abandoned a long time ago.

Akuta: They’re not, it’s my, playground, that I sneak into…

Kaede: But isn’t the screening…?

Akuta: I rented, the projector… Got a bunch, of part time jobs… like, demolition, shopping for women, walking dogs, and stuff.

Kaede: I see… You worked really hard for this day huh.

But I don’t think it’s good to sneak in here though.

Akuta: …… 

Kaede: (He’s shaking his sword tail sadly…

I wonder if I could do anything to cheer him up)

Let’s wait a bit longer.

Someone else might show up after all.

Akuta: … Mm, nah it’s fine.

My ass is starting to hurt… Ahaha.

Kaede: ……

Akuta: Y’know.

In the past, this place used to be where entertainment began in HAMA.

Kaede: … Yeah. I heard something like that. 

Akuta: I wish I could’ve filled it with a lotta people again.

If only I were a more famous, a galactic filmmakerーー

If only I was the type of human… that could have an influence on people more.

Kaede: … Akuta-kun…

Don’t stay stuff like that, cheer upーー

Akuta: Then… I’d be so popular I could die… And I’d be swarmed by a loootta women…!

I wanna play tag shirtless on the moon～～～！

And I’d eat lots of mochi with Bunny-chan and Bunny-kun～～！

And then, we’d build a huge 365LDK [1] house up there, and we’d have a drinking party where we’d drink a lotta shots～～！

Kaede: Akuta-kun.

Akuta: Yup!

Kaede: Since I’m here, I wanted to watch the movie that was going to be shown. Is everything ready?

Akuta: ーーOf… Course!

Everything’s all set!

I’ll get everything started real quickly…!

Akuta: Hey hey, look look, this is a real projector! Isn’t it SUPER cool～～～!?

It’s so incredible. It has the weight from all these years… and the brightness is completely next level!

Didya know? When you’re talking about projectors, they project the film directly onto the screen. Directly! Isn’t that cool? It’s not data at all!

The colors from the film are projected exactly as they were from recording! 

It’s the real colors, not ones from an electric signal , y’know?

That’s why! I put a lotta effort into making the visuals look good!

Now then, now then… Take a look!

“Mysterious! The Anemic Horseshoe’s Counterattack!”

Jessica [2]: “NOOOOOOOOOO!”

Philip: “What’s wrong!? I heard a scream just nowーー Nee-san!?

What’s wrong Nee-san!?”

“NEE-SAAAAAAAAAAAAN!”

Dr. Henry: “Yet again, there’s another dead body just like this…”

“The only common thread between them was that they were struck in the head with a terrifyingly sharp blade.”

“It’s almost like… they were stabbed with the tail sword of a horseshoe crab.”

Demonic Horseshoe Crab: “Guh… GUYAAAAAAAH!”

Dr. Henry: The demon is scared!? Just what on earth could scareーー”

“It can’t be… The syringe!?”

“I see… After having your blood taken for medical reasons for tens of thousands of years… You must’ve grown to resent humans.”

“I pity you, demon.”

“Butーー … This is goodbye.”

Akuta: Whatdya think!?

Kaede: … Um… It was very innovative… Like it’s Avant Garde… Or like a roller coaster.

It was unprecedented… It was…

… It was a bit incoherent.

(Ah. I said it…)

Akuta: OH, incoherent! Yayyy〜 I’m happy〜! WOOO〜!

Kaede: (Wah, I’m relieved… Even though I accidentally said what was on my mind, I’m glad you don’t seem to be hurt…)

( … But really, everyone…)

( Really, could they not have come to watch even just a little bit?)

……

( I need to calm down… I’m sure that Akuta-kun is a hundred times more frustrated than I am)

(Today, this kid was both the star of the film and the director. I didn’t really get the message, but it was a great film in my opinion.)

(I’ll just return home today without showing him the proposal. I wouldn’t wanna spoil the mood.)

Then, it’s about time I go.

Akuta: Stoーp.

Kaede: Eh?

Akuta: Didn’t you come here to finish talking about that thing?

Kaede: No, but…

Akuta: Let’s hear it. …As a thank you gift for watching.

Location: Cafe 369

Akuta: D-Delicious… Meat buns are SERIOUSLY delicious～～～～！

Heyhey! Is it okay if I get 20 more!?

Kaede: Yeah, get as many as you want.

Akuta: YAYYY! Thanks! You’re like a god, Sensei!

Munch munch, it’s too gooood!!

Kaede: (He told me he’d hear me out, but ended up asking me to get him something to eat instead…)

( I can’t believe he spent all the earnings he got from those part time jobs on equipment, costumes, and those tissues… He hasn't had a proper meal in days.)

Are you gonna be able to fill up on those meat buns?

Akuta: I will I will! They’re super tasty and big, and they’re fluffy and dense! It’s like eating a proper meal!

Kaede: I’m glad then… But what about your family? You didn’t say anything?

Akuta: Nah. I’m pretty much the only one there.

Kaede: … I see.

(Maybe he has a complicated family situation…)

Okay then, feel free to eat as much as you want.

Akuta: Thanks!

Kaede: Then you can just listen to me while you’re eating.

So the plan isーー

We have decided that the members of the Community Revitalization Club will participate in a study tour as candidates for Ward Mayors.

During this training, they will experience work that a Ward Mayor typically does, and thus gain a deeper understanding of the job.

By the end, they will be graded based on their performance and contribution to the missions assigned on site.

If you pass this test, you will be officially appointed as a Ward Mayor…

That’s how the plan goes.

Kaede: This is the plan and the parental consent form…

Akuta: I didn’t get it at all. It’s stupidly difficult.

Kaede: To make it a bit more understandable… Oh I got it.

Akuta–kun, you want to be a more popular person right?

Akuta: Eh, that’s what you’re saying…?

Kaede: Yes it is. Listen closely, Akuta-kun.

First up, I think that using videos as an expression is a great way to boost tourism.

Also, by having a lot of people watch the video, many more people will start to get interested in Akuta-kun’s work. You’d gain people who look forward to what you want to put out!

Akuta: ……

Kaede: What’s more, being a high school student as the Ward Mayor is sure to give you more attention at school too.

Andーー

The tissues that Akuta-kun worked so hard to make ended up getting treated so poorly.

Even though they were at a party, it was so carelessーー

Akuta: ……

Kaede: The people who let the equipment Akuta-kun spent all his money on go to wasteーー

I think we should make them look back on this day and regret not coming!

Akuta: ーーHaha!

Sensei, somehow you ended more fired up than I was～～!

Suddenly, you looked all fired up like a punk, it was crazyy! 

You’re more interesting than I thought～～～!

Kaede: S-Sorry. I got heated without realizing.

Akuta: Nah. Thank you for that.

Kaede: ……

Akuta: Alright… Let’s do thisss!!

For the sake of movies! And to be more popular～～～！

The others are being kinda reluctant too aren’t they?

I’ll find a way to get them to agree, so it’s all good!

I’ll get them to go on that study tour thingy!

Leave it to me!

Kaede: T-That’s reassuring, thanks.

But tomorrow is summer break, isn’t it? Do you have their contact information?

Akuta: ‘Course I do!

Kaede: ( I see, so they stay in touch with each other.)

(At school they didn’t seem to be all that close at school when I saw them though. 

They had a strange distance between them.)

Previous — ✈︎ Masterlist — ✈︎ Next

Notes — ✈︎

And LDK stands for "Living Dining Kitchen" Typically you'd say like 1LDK or 2LDK for a one or two bedroom house respectively. 365LDK is . a 365 bedroom house.

For the film, every character is voiced by Akuta.

[bisexualnerd]

Writer tag game

I wasn’t tagged, but I saw the game randomly posted by another user so I want to play anyway! (red for fic links and blue for series links)

1. how many works do you have on AO3?

35 (and only one draft because I don't really like working on multiple projects at the same time)

2. what's your total AO3 word count?

395,306

3. what fandoms do you write for?

I write the most for Batfam, mostly Tim and Jason but usually, the whole fam (more or less) is also there.

I write a bit more for some other fandoms but there are only one or two fics for each (2021 Produce 101 - Chuang Zao Ying, Hollywood Undead (but these fics are not finished), Julie and The Phantoms (1 fic - finished), Arsenal Military Academy + The Legends (they are kinda connected in 1 fic) and I have like, one translation project too.

I'm hoping to write Star Wars fics one day too. Really like the whole time travel thing and Obi-Wan is my beloved.

4. what are your top 5 fics by kudos?

The Monster Under My Bed (The Monster Down The Hall)

"Back Away From Him."

if i lose everything in the fire, i'm sending all my love to you

Cold

A Pile of Sleeping Birds

5. do you respond to comments?

All of the comments, definitely. I really enjoy reading and replying to them and sometimes, I even come back to re-read the comments to feel validated 🤣

6. what is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I write angst a lot but I have a thing for happy endings. But if I look at the fics individually and not like, as a part of a bigger series, it might be i have so much to say but you're so far away. But if not just the ending but the whole plot in general, it can be any fic really (I would recommend Restless Heart Syndrome, And Now You're Home, The Monster Under My Bed (The Monster Down The Hall), and What The Heart Remembers).

7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

They all have some sort of happy endings (though some fics that are a part of a series might not but the series will have happy endings). But since all I have talked about is Batfam, I would recommend this from Julie and the Phantoms. I don't write romance often, but this is just a short soft, cute love story of two ghosts (Reggie and an OC based on his real-life wife) plus some humour in the band - ‘Cause I’m Not Too Far And You’re My Favorite Place. I was very satisfied with how it turned out and I still come back to re-read for my own enjoyment a few times so I hope you guys will give it a chance.

8. do you get hate on fics?

My most controversial fic would be Hold Me Close, Don't Let Go (Watch Me Burn) but it's not like people showed hate to me. They just didn't like the story and how I wrote it so there were some unpleasant comments. The newest one, I think I did well with my response. It's a rather heavy fic because I went through a really rough time when I was writing it (along with many others) so if you want to read it, be careful.

9. do you write smut? If so, what kind?

I don't. My fics are all rated G or T (mostly because of swearing and violence, and also some with suicidal theme or idealisation because I did have a really bad time).

10. do you write crossovers?

Just for two fandoms, Arsenal Military Academy & The Legends, because they share the same lead actor and actress so I thought it would be fun to write something about reincarnation. It's Then and Now, Forever and Always.

11. have you ever had a fic stolen?

I don't think I'm famous enough for that.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes, into Chinese, actually. It's The Monster Under My Bed (The Monster Down The Hall). The link to the translated fic is in the fic.

13. Have you ever cowritten a fic before?

Not really. I planned my current series How To Steal A Brother with my friend Den and she is also my beta-reader for this series but I still write all of the stuff, which she reads and corrects the mistakes for me later.

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

That's hard to choose. I really like Robin (Dick Grayson) and Starfire. It was like my first ship ever because I watched Teen Titans as a child. I also like Marinette/Adrien, very cute but the secondhand embarrassment is not very healthy for me (at least she has gotten better at interacting with him). The Doctor (10th) and Rose was one heartbreak that got me crying like a baby in 8th grade.

So honestly, I don't think I can pick because those were the three that came to my mind first, but I still have like a few dozen left.

15. What's a WIP you want to finish but doubt you will?

The Hollywood Undead fic - When Gravity Pulls You In. It was a really fun idea but then I ran into a big writer's block and I haven't recovered for this fic. I have been writing for Batfam again but I doubt I can go back and finish this one (at least anytime soon).

16. What are your writing strengths?

I don't think I'm too good with dialogue but I do have a strength in describing and like some sort of metaphor (English is not my first language so this is a difficult question to answer). I don't know if this is also considered a strength but like I said, I don't really write many fics at the same time so I can manage them pretty well. Most of my fics are completed before I move on to another one.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Dialogue. And I forget a lot of stuff so I have to go back to the earlier part so the plot won't be inconsistent. And of course, I write in English, which is not my mother tongue, so sometimes, I lack vocabulary or my grammar can feel weird.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I mean, I would add translation or explanation very subtly in there. But I saw a Star Wars fic where the writer had like, floating texts or something for the conversations in Mando'a so like, I will research on that if I need to write in another language.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Batfam. Tim-centric.

20. Favourite fic you've written?

Damn, that's like asking a parent for their fav child on national television.

In terms of like, wording and metaphors and descriptions and all the technical stuff - And Now You're Home - because some of my fav paragraphs are in here. In terms of logic, time can never change for the flying bird under the summer sun because I went crazy with all the planning for the whole time-travel-but-nothing-changes-the-future thing. In terms of plot, i'm so out of touch with everyone, and everything's a blur to me. This was one of my earlier ones but when I came back to this earlier this year, I found it so enjoyable and fascinated. I couldn't even believe I wrote this one. But it is a part of a series so you might want to check out I've Got You Brother.

This has been fun and I have been shamelessly PR-ing my fics. I don't really know who to tag so anyone else who wants to play, go ahead and have fun!

[noonaishere]

Music of the Heart [J.YH] - ninety-six | it’s a metaphor

“Should we just follow the chords here?” You asked. 

Hongjoong bit his nail, listening to the track again. “Hmmmmm…”

You and Hongjoong were in the studio together, working on more demo songs for Ans:wer. Maddox was not there that day.

“Should we go discordant?”

“Cor-dant or dis-cor-dant… that is the question.”

You smiled.

“I don’t know if I would here, I think it’d fuck up the flow of the song right before the pre-chorus. I think it could really help the song though…”

“Hmm…” You listened to the song a little more. “Maybe we go discordant before the last chorus instead?”

He nodded. “I think that’d be better.”

He stopped the track and moved a few parts of the file around, adding parts the two of you had hidden earlier, not knowing what to do with them. He started the track again and you both leaned back as well as you could, both of you with your feet pulled up to your chest as you sat in the fancy studio chairs.

He stopped it, clicked back a few times and played the part that you had altered a second time. He pointed at the screen and you watched as the progress bar scanned over several layers of the song.

“Should we do a Tension Harmony here?”

“A tension harmony? In a song called Tension?” You laughed.

His eyebrows furrowed. “Too corny?”

“More like you’re a genius and someone will make a whole-ass thirty minute youtube video just to talk about it.”

“You think so?”

“I know so. Let’s go for it.”

He chuckled as he wrote notes for when Ans:wer would come in and record the song.

“Okay, we’re done with this demo. Let’s work on the next one…” He saved and closed that project and opened another one and played it. 

You listened to it a few times before you paused it. “It’s missing something traditional.”

He nodded. “Yeah, that is kind of the point…”

You sat in silence as you thought.

“Should we go with big horns?”

You put your fingers on your head like a bull.

“Cute.”

You laughed at your own joke. “Hmm… can we get a bunch of nabal players?”

“Oh, you want to go full Daechwita?”

“That’s a good idea though, we could invite a whole group and have the drums too!”

He laughed loudly. “Ohh… that’d be a good idea for a performance video!”

“Yeah! Write that down.” You hit him in the arm excitedly and he laughed as he made notes in his notebook. 

“The group can be in full hanbok and we can get traditional dancers and stuff.”

Hongjoong laughed as he wrote. “You keep saying ‘we’ like you’re going to be doing all the calling musicians and dancers and shit.”

You laughed. “I’m changing from a music producer to a movie producer. I’ll finally find out what it is they do.”

He stopped and looked up at nothing, then turned to you. “I never realized I don’t know what a movie producer does.”

“I’m pretty sure they’re like… in charge of knowing people. Like they ‘know a guy’.”

“‘Know a guy’?” He laughed.

“Yeah. Like in a mob movie or something, someone will be like, ‘I know a guy’ and then the guy is like a lockpicker or… I don’t know. Some other useful thing the movie needs at that moment.” “Huh… I guess that makes sense.”

You shrugged. “You need a guy that knows a guy. And producers? They know guys.”

He nodded.

“Dolls, too.”

He slowly looked over at you. “‘Guys and Dolls’?” He asked blankly.

You held back a laugh.

He nodded with a sigh. “How do you even know that musical? I thought your parents only let you watch classical music things. Wouldn’t musical theater be too modern?”

“Some teenagers watched porn, I spent the wee hours of the morning looking up as many other kinds of music as I could find because all of it was verboten.”

He laughed. “Makes sense.”

You nodded.

“Okay, back to the song.”

He played it again and stopped it at another point.

He pointed at the screen. “It’s missing something.”

“Hmm…”

The two of you sat together, arms crossed, listening to that 10-second loop for about five minutes.

“Snare hit right… here?” You pointed as the moment came up.

He snapped his fingers. “I agree.”

Hongjoong added it and started the song again. When the moment came up and the snare hit happened, you both nodded like two doctors proud at having saved the life of a dying patient.

“So… I had a long talk with Ans:wer’s leader and came up with something for the intro for their new album. He wants to have some lore for their songs, so this is what I came up with…” Hongjoong said as he flipped to the page in his notes. 

“Mhm?”

He handed it to you. “Tell me what you think.”

You read the page. “Hmm… who’s going to be reading it? One of the members?”

“I was going to ask Maddox to read it.”

“Does he normally read stuff like this?”

“Well, he’s the most fluent in English, so it makes sense.”

You shrugged and nodded. It did. 

“He normally does the reads for the groups. If it has a man’s voice, it’s probably him..”

“He’s never mentioned that.”

Hongjoong shrugged, nodding towards the notebook. “What do you think?”

“I’m excited to hear it. Especially with the music behind it.”

He smiled and nodded as you handed the book back to him. 

“When is Maddox coming in? He hasn’t been here all day.”

“Hmm,” Hongjoong looked at his phone for the time, “we were so wrapped up in work that I didn’t even notice.”

“He’s not here to make crying puppy noises, how could we not have noticed?”

Hongjoong laughed quietly to himself as he dialed Maddox and put the phone on speaker. You both sat there and listened to the ring and wondered if he was going to pick up. Surprisingly, he did.

“Hello?”

“Hey, buddy, what’s up? You didn’t come in today.””

“...You’re only calling to ask about it now?”

“We were busy working on the demos for Ans:wer’s new album and got way too into it.”

“We’re going to hire a Daechwita band for it.” You added.

“Wowwwww,” Maddox said, somewhat sarcastically. 

You scrunched up your face at his reaction. 

“Maddox, you’re making her pout. Are you trying to hurt her feelings?”

“Oh--! No! I’m sorry! I woke up like five minutes ago and I’m an angry waker. I apologize.”

“I didn’t even know that was a thing,” you said quietly to Hongjoong.

He smiled and shook his head. “You should apologize again, hyung, she looks like she’s gonna cry.”

You frowned at Hongjoong and he held up his hand for you to wait.

“I’m so so so so so sorry. You even took me hiking and helped me record ideas, I’m SO sorry.”

You chuckled. “Thanks, but Hongjoong lied, I wasn’t on the verge of tears.” You pinched Hongjoong’s leg, making him yelp.

Maddox sighed. “He would lie to me, wouldn’t he?”

“He’s a horrible man.”

Hongjoong laughed. “Maddox, did you just sleep all day?”

“Ohhhhhh,” Maddox groaned in jest. “Now he’s in with the criticism. Do you hear this, t/n?”

You laughed. “Such a dad, always nagging.”

Hongjoong looked at you in faux displeasure, and you raised your brows as if to say you were right and smiled.

“Ugh, he is. “And for the record, I slept all morning, because I finished three demos last night.”

“Woah! Really?” You asked.

“Mhm.”

“Do you like them?” Hongjoong asked.

“I like… all of them.”

“Wowwww,” Hongjoong said, genuinely impressed. “That doesn’t happen often.”

“Mhm! I was super inspired yesterday I guess. Everything just clicked.”

“I’m really happy for you,” you said.

“Thanks.”

You could tell from the sound of his voice that he was smiling. 

“Maddox, I also wanted to ask if you wanted to do a read for Ans:wer’s opening track. I want to go with a very epic sounding opening of spoken word over an instrumental.”

“Ooh. Should I come over now?”

“Yeah, we have time.” “Okay. I’ll get ready and hurry over.”

“See you in a bit.” 

Maddox hung up.

“It’ll take him about thirty minutes to get here so I can show you the instrumental for the spoken word.”

You nodded as Hongjoong opened the track.

The music faded in, the gentle plucking of gayageum strings accompanied by flutes and then fleshed out by a western string section to make the sound more lush. The woodwinds gave the feeling of floating for a moment, as the drums and brass instruments joined in, seeming to swirl around each other like the clashing of swords on shields or - more metaphorically - emotions, before all of it came crashing down and the flutes came back by themselves, gentle, somber.

It was then that Maddox started his line read.

“The heart of a ruler. As a single man’s will looms over his people, they wonder; does he care? Does he care about all of us? Any of us? Or is he like so many others? So many men of history who walked through pools of red so they could be the most important man. Did he do it for gold? For glory? For something more? Did he do it because he thought only he could rule? And, if he is the one who should rule over us… do we have to accept him? If he is unjust, is that what we deserve? …no.”

As he spoke, the music swirled a second time; seemingly rotating on a singular point before the sound of shattering, as whatever the feeling was broke like glass into a thousand pieces, signaling that the members of Ans:wer were going to have to fight this unjust ruler.

He paused for a moment until Hongjoong gave him the signal that the recording had been stopped. He stepped out of the booth, hair still damp from a rushed shower and dry as he hurried himself there only five minutes before getting into the booth.

“How was that?”

You and Hongjoong were stock still as you looked at him, something between shock and admiration on both your faces. Hongjoong started clapping and you joined him, both of you giving Maddox a standing ovation for his performance.

He smiled and ran his hand through his hair bashfully. “Guys, come on.”

“As expected of my oppa and your hoobae!” You clapped louder.

“As expected!” Hongjoong echoed.

  previous | main cast | masterlist | next

a/n: I tried my best to write a Long Journey-esque opener for a concept about revolution against a king lol. How did i do? 😅

Send an ask or leave a comment if you want to be added to the tag list! 🎵 Any comments, reblogs, or asks are appreciated! I love talking with you guys and seeing what you’re saying about the chapters, it keeps me going 🥰

@luvvvx • @iamthehotdemon • @hrts4hanniehae • @rachs-words • @stayatinykatsy • @anythingrelatingtojinyoung​ • @jaytheatiny​ •

[shesalittlelost]

I’m afraid it’s not just shippers’ problems in this case. Judging by all said by cast and crew they were not trying to portray CSA. Depp outright said Ellen was not a victim and that she desired Orlok. Plus whole there’s love triangle thing. It for sure gives a whiplash. CSA is too sensitive of a topic, you can’t treat it in the vocabulary of love triangles and oh, it’s just a twisted romance. But they do. Since I hope creators didn’t want to romanticise CSA in such a cunning way, the takeaway is that they were not trying to portray it in the first place and like with whole Wuthering Heights stuff screwed up. I also would like to point out that this whole Thing of Ellen being this wild fairy human girl with magic powers who runs around the woods and summoned Orlok and bound himself to her is exclusively original to 2024 remake and didn’t appear before. But it did shift the focus to Ellen more actively attracting vampire to herself, even if by accident and I don’t think it was a smart plot change. Not to mention it doesn’t make much sense in the long run, Ellen has these mighty powers that she could reanimate vampire and connect with him long distance when she’s teenager but otherwise her powers don’t affect the rest of the plot much or don’t play any significant role and her outcome doesn’t change from what was in 1922 movie. Sloppy writing. I’m afraid a lot of that sloppy writing and creators clearly fumbling intent vs execution is responsible for shippers being the way they are.

Aside from that one interview of Eggers where he talks about taking inspiration from Wuthering Heights, I've not seen any others and I'm not planning on it either. Because I just don't care lol. Like I know people will not agree with this but like I really don't care what this actor or that actor said. I personally don't think what they say in their intws changes anything at all about the movie once it's out. I mean, yeah it does give us a better idea of what the original intent was and how they approached it but I've said this before and I'm saying this again, I'm going to form my opinions on the movie by watching said movie and not the off screen comments from the cast.

And frankly I've grown very tired of this recent trend where the effort of carefully building up a narrative to tell a story has been replaced by the creators just telling the audience what they want them to think in their BTS interviews and it rarely aligning with the actual piece of work they produced. Seen this happen with SaB and then HotD. It's exhausting.

Having said that, I don't think Lily saying Ellen desires Orlok & Robert Eggers calling it a love triangle negates the presence of grooming and abuse in their dynamic. There's room for more nuance than you give them credit for. And it's the lack of exactly that on both sides with one using her attraction to/desire for him as an evidence that it wasn't abuse and the other erasing it completely, that's resulting in such horrendous takes all around. Survivors absolutely can be in love or desire their abuser and an abusive relationship such as Ellen and Orlok's can still make for a twisted sort of romance. This idea that love is a Pure emotion that is felt only by Good people is flawed and untrue. Horrible people, can love too. Yes, even monsters. In their own horrible and monstrous way and I think that was what Eggers was trying to do with Ellen and Orlok. I can see how WH might've influenced this as an amoral sort of romance between two very shitty and selfish people who happen to share this emotional/psychic bond that exists beyond their physical bodies and tends to consume them, defying even death (Cathy's ghost haunting Heathcliff just as he had asked her). But like I said, for that to happen Orlok needed to be an actual character that's more than just a physical manifestation of evil, greed and hunger and the movie should've done more to establish his and Ellen's relationship outside of just sex that, on-screen, she's mostly coerced into having with him.

Ellen's character was actually the most compelling part of the movie for me and Lily's portrayal of her was beautiful. I've to disagree that her being the one to summon Orlok was a bad idea. It gives her character more depth and agency in the story since she is the one who basically moves the story forward due to these unique psychic powers and also makes her emotional struggles and plight all the more impactful. Her powers do serve a significant purpose in her story. They're used to show how strictly moralistic the society she existed in was. Had she existed in another time, she wouldn't have been judged and removed from the society because of it but the time and place she's born in only punishes her for it. Like it is her being different and “strange” that scared her father so much that he would cringe away from even her touch. And it is that loneliness and hurt that makes her seek for any other presence that would love and comfort her. Orlok is the only one who hears her and fills that void in her life, “At first it was sweet. I'd never known such a place.” she recalls, which is what makes his eventual psychic/spiritual subjugation of her feel all the more violating and gross. A very clear portrayal of abuse and grooming--an abusive/neglectful family that ostracizes the child instead of offering compassion and understanding, making them more vulnerable to predators who use their desire to be loved and understood to completely hijack their life.

Lastly, as someone who initially liked how Orlok wasn't humanised at all giving him little screen time and how the movie primarily focused on Ellen and the pain his actions caused her, simply because I'm tired of seeing male characters take up too much space in anything to do with vampires in popular media and the girl just becoming his side piece, I'll say this that I don't think that a piece of work should have to dial back on the portrayal of its character complexities just because the audience are incapable of understanding that a story can be many things at once.

[smoshsfavoritepizzaplace]

I'm sorry if this comes across as crass, but I am seated and here for what happened in today's Smosh After Dark🫡

Hearing the quartet shoot down these ludicrous rumors/assumptions that get brought up, was amazing!

Don't even get me started on the Mater bit! I knew when the question was asked, that was where Shayne was headed. How do people actually believe that they were fighting? I mean this with all sincerity, some people need to get a grip and not take everything so seriously like it's a Shakespearean drama🤦‍♂️

I remember seeing a Tiktok edit that I believe is now deleted, where someone did a breakdown of the moment in question, like it was a crime scene, with the most irritating music! Then when you went to the comments, they were adamant that Angela was going to HR and that The "Golden Boy" went a little to far/saying he has Main Character Energy!?

This was obviously and irrationally delusional, because they answered every critique with...

SORRY I DON'T LIKE YOUR FAV!

Which speaks volumes, clearly they just didn't like Shayne and tried to find anyway to paint him in a bad light, even though everybody in the video was hysterically laughing. Not to mention, Angela continued joking bout it in the same video!

Then there is the whole talking point about the end of year compilations. I mean come on, they've been doing this since what, like 2019? Every year has been the same since, it's the holidays, what do you expect them to do? The assumption of having a backlog of emergency videos waiting to go, clearly indicates that those commenter's know jack all about production, or are just entitled, ya know?

I'm sorry for going on such a tedious rant, but once I heard this, I just had to get it out! I sincerely adore this fandom/community, but I believe there are times when some go astray and let themselves get carried away, with such frivolous things.

As much as people want to clamor that Smosh aren't zoo animals and shouldn't be treated as such, (Shourtney). Then that needs to be more evident.

Obviously, there are outliers, people who just don't care or are trolling, but they've clearly seen the scuttlebutt, so it's annoying that there are those that still whine about anonymity or being one of hundreds/herd mentality.

Again, sorry for popping off, it just really ends up greasing my gears.

Let Smosh breathe and just enjoy the ride🚘

🙏✌️

I think one of the biggest problems with fan culture is that they forget these are real people. Sometimes people will get caught up in celebrities being an “entertainment system” rather than human beings. Even outside of smosh I see this so much, a celeb will change up their appearance and people will go, “I miss when she had this hairstyle, her new one is terrible.” And I’m like, it’s her hair?!? She doesn’t have her hair certain ways to please you. Or in the case of smosh, they will %100 release content that some fans don’t enjoy, e.g. the marathons. They sit here and work themselves so hard to produce content for us EVERY SINGLE DAY and some people have the nerve to complain about a break that’s like barely a month long. Even if it’s for a few days I’ll see some complaints which is crazy. Like I understand a channel you like not posting can be a little sad, especially if they’re all you watch, but to be so entitled to content from them is bizarre. And I feel like for someone who is watching comedy channels, a lot of the fans don’t know when they’re joking which is hilarious in hindsight lol. But yeah, whenever they put their foot down on things like that, it’s always great to see. As a fan it gets tiring seeing that stuff, so I can’t even imagine how they really feel